case of Athene chiaradiae. 15 



A. noctua and one nestling of A. chiaradiae. Seen by re- 

 liable witnesses, bnt neither by Mr. Vallon nor by myself — 

 the black-eyed Civetta having been devoured by a eat shortly 

 after being found. 



e. \\th-\2th July, 1902.— A small Owl's nest found by 

 Mr. Vallon at Pizzocco, quite close to where the first was 

 got, and also placed in a loose stone wall ; it contained five 

 nestlings — two black-eyed A. chiaradiae and three yellow-eyed 

 common A. noctua. The two parent birds, captured on the 

 nest, had yellow eyes, and although belonging to A. noctua 7 

 are each of them singular and different in various ways 

 from the ordinary A. noctua. 



f. July 1902. — News got of a specimen of A. chiaradiae 

 used for enticing small birds by a shepherd in the hills 

 between Pizzocco and Caneva di Sacile, four years ago, viz. 

 in 1899. This may easily have been a co-nestling of the 

 first specimen of A. chiaradiae obtained, if the account of 

 the shepherd-girl who took it at Pizzocco be true. 



And now for an attempt to explain the very strange and 

 novel case. Of course, after what is now known, my first 

 supposition that A. chiaradiae might have been one of the 

 last survivors of a species on the verge of extinction falls to 

 the ground. But the opposite hypothesis, that \\e have in 

 this singular small Owl a case of neogenesis — i. e. the ex- 

 ahruptu formation of a new type with sufficient differential 

 characters to constitute, if maintained, a neiv species, — can, 

 I believe, be upheld. 



The term neogenesis was first used to explain this sudden 

 origin of new forms from old-established species, if I am 

 not mistaken, by my friend and colleague Prof. Paolo Man- 

 tegazza, many years ago; it has been since used, more or 

 less in the same sense, by the late Prof. Cope and by others. 

 1 have no intention here of making any attempt to explain 

 the causes which may bring forth such a result : they arc 

 necessarily various and usually occult. Suffice it to say 

 that without a strong perturbation of the force of heredity 

 such primary causes would give no result. 



Now, if in the ease of A. chiaradiae we have indeed an 



