308 Miscellaneous. 



surface of buildings, and having a very small circular opening, two 

 or three centimetres in diameter, for the entrance and exit of the 

 birds. The new nests, on the contrary, represent the quarter of a 

 hollow hemiovoid, having its poles much elongated, and its three 

 sections adhering to the walls of buildings, except above, where the 

 entrance is formed ; and this entrance, instead of being a mere 

 rounded hole, is a long transverse fissure bounded below by a de- 

 pression of the margin of the nest, and above by a projection of the 

 buUding to which the nest is attached. This aperture is nine or ten 

 centimetres in length, whilst its gape is only two centimetres. 



M. Pouchet regards this alteration in the form of the nest as not 

 only a change, but an improvement. The greater extent of the floor 

 gives more room for the movements of the little family, the members 

 of which will be less heaped upon one another. The long narrow 

 aperture enables the young birds to put out their heads so as to 

 breathe the fresh air and contemplate the world around them, whilst 

 the access of the parent birds to the nest without displacing the 

 young ones is rendered far more easy, and the interior of the nest is 

 better protected from the weather. 



His attention having been called to this change in the structure of 

 the Martins' nests, M. Pouchet set to work to examine with a glass 

 the nests in position in various parts of Rouen. He found that 

 upon the old churches of the centre of the town many of the nests 

 presented the old construction, being either old nests repaired and 

 made fit for use, or the work of conservative architects who stiU 

 stuck to the old plan : the former appeared to M. Pouchet to be the 

 most probable supposition. Mixed with these were other nests of 

 the new form. Along the new streets of Kouen, on the other hand, 

 all the nests were built after the new fashion. — Comptes liendus, 

 March 7, 1870, tome Ixx. pp. 492-496. 



Character of a neiv Species of Crossoi)tilou. 

 By the Abbe Armand David. 



M. Milne-Edwards has communicated to the Academy of Sciences 

 the following diagnosis of a Crossoptilon, extracted from a letter of 

 M. A. David, dated Sse-Tchuan, December 18, 1869. The species is 

 named C. ccerulescens : — 



" Same dimensions and form as C. auritum ; feet red ; bill light 

 red, marked with bro"svn towards the tip ; iris reddish nut-brown ; 

 head hke that of the species from Pekin, with the elongated feathers 

 of the ears a little more developed ; general colour of the plumage a 

 uniform and very fine darh-hluish slate-colour, except that the ends 

 of the large feathers of the tail are black and shining, with green 

 and violet reflections ; the three or four smaU lateral feathers are 

 white at their basal portion or entirely, according to age ; the large 

 quill-feathers of the wings also are oHve-coloured ; and the black 

 velvety feathers of the top of the head are separated from the slate- 

 coloured feathers of the neck by a small white streak." — Comptes 

 Rendus, March 7, 1870, tome Ixx. p. 538. 



