1883.] 



MICROSCOPICAL JOURNAL. 



11 



quite as useful to the general microscopist 

 as the tirst, which is now complete. The 

 plan of the current volume is somewhat 

 different from the other. It will be in 

 three sections: I. "'Physiological His- 

 tology/' including a description of instru- 

 ments of research and methods of prepar- 

 ing specimens in the first part, and in the 

 second part a series of histological demon- 

 strations with corresponding preparations. 

 II. "Pathological Histology." III. Botan- 

 ical Histology." IV. " Microscopical 

 Petrography." Sections II. and IV. will 

 not be published unless a sufiicient 

 number of subscribers to pay the cost 

 is obtained. 



— On the evening of the 6th of April, 

 the Editor addressed the New York 

 Microscopical Society on the subject of 

 deep-sea sounding and dredging. The 

 subject was illustrated by lantern-trans- 

 parencies prepared for the occasion. 

 This was the tirst of two proposed lec- 

 tures on the subject, and was confined 

 entirely to a description of the apparatus 

 and methods employed in deep-sea inves- 

 gation. 



— What seems to be an excellent ar- 

 rangement for a fish-trough when it is 

 desired to show the circulation of the 

 blood in the tail of a fish, has been devised 

 by a .Mr! Caton. It consists of a conical 

 ebony box large enough to hold the head 

 of a small fish. The box is attached to an 

 ebony plate having a circular plate of 

 glass so that when the fish's head is in 

 thebox its tail will be on the glass. Just 

 at the border of the glass the plate is 

 perforated to allow a cord to pass through 

 and over the tail of the fish to hold it 

 securely down. The box is partly filled 

 with water, and two tubes open into it, so 

 that a constant stream of water can be 

 made to pass through it and keep the 

 fish alive for hours or days. 



— It may interest some readers, especi- 

 ally those who are studying the diatoms, 

 and would like to find the rare forms that 

 occur occasionally in the stomachs of 

 certain animals, to know that the contents 

 of an oysters stomach can be withdrawn 

 ■by inserting a tube through the mouth. 



If this can be done with the oyster, there 

 is no apparent reason why it cannot also 

 be done with many other animals, and 

 the contents could be far more easily 

 cleaned than when they are obtained by 

 dissection in the usual way. 



— In the March nun^ber of Grevillea 



Mr. M. C. Cooke describes a species of 

 yauchen'a \\\\\c\\, At the time of fructifi- 

 cation, becomes divided by septa into 

 cells resembling CladopJiora. Vaucheria 

 filaments are universally regarded as 

 single cells until at the time of fructifica- 

 tion a single septum forms, separating 

 the terminal portion from the rest; but 

 these observations of Mr. Cooke— first 

 made by Mr. Frederic Bates — require 

 some modifications of views concerning 

 this plant. 



— Sponges used for toilet purposes 

 sometimes become quite black in color 

 by the growth of a fungus of the genus 

 Tornla which M. Dufour has named T. 

 spons^icola. 



^The New York Medical Journal \?> 

 publishing abtracts of the Cartwright lec- 

 tures on the Relations of Micro-Organ- 

 isms to Disease, delivered by Dr. W. T. 

 Belfield, of Chicago, before the Alumni 

 Association of the College of Physicians 

 and surgeons of New York. The ab- 

 stracts seem to be very carefully prepared 

 and are very interesting as well as in- 

 structive. 



— The first volume of the Transactions 

 of the Linnaean Society of New York has 

 recently been published. It contains a 

 portrait of Linnaeus, engraved on metal, 

 as a frontispiece, and three articles, the 

 first on " The Vertebrates of the Adiron- 

 dack Region;" the second, "Is not the 

 Fish Crow {Corvus ossifragiis, Wilson) a 

 Winter as well as well as a Summer Resi- 

 dent at the Northern Limit of its Range .'' " 

 and the third is "A Review of the Sum- 

 mer Birds of a Part of the Catskill Moun- 

 tains, with Prefatory Remarks on the 

 Faunal and Floral Features of the 

 Region." The first article fills io6 out 

 of the 1 68 pages in the volume. It is 

 not only an instructive, but also a very 

 readable article, being evidently written 

 by an experienced naturahst and a careful 

 observer — Dr. C. H. Merriam. 



The volume contains much valuable 

 information to both the zoologist and the 

 botanist. It is printed in large type, 

 leaded, on heavy book-paper, small quarto 

 size, and the mechanical work is excellent 

 throughout. Bound in cloth the price is 

 $3.00, in paper jS52.oo. 



— Somebody has sent us some card 

 photomicrographs, but we have received 

 no letter informing us from whom they 

 came. Among them is a section of bass- 

 wood and the foot of a rose-beetle. 



