246 



NATURE 



\jfan, 16, 1879 



^htrhynchus has been discovered in the Amou Daria 

 or Oxus by Modest Bogdanoff, and named after the well- 

 known governor of Turkestan, S. kmifmanni. This new 

 fish was first described and figured in a Russian work on 

 the Natural History of Khiva, prepared under General 

 Kaufmann's directions some time since, but not yet 

 published — owing, we may well suppose, to General 

 Kauf mann' s time being too much taken up with other 

 more important matters. Figures and descriptions of 

 it are given in Prof. Kessler's great work upon the 

 results of the Aralo-Caspian Expedition. The fourth 

 part of this work, published in January, 1877, contains 

 not only full details as to this species, but also of a third 

 Asiatic species of this genus — 6". hermaimi, Severzoff, 

 likew-ise from the Oxus, without caudal filaments, which, 

 however, is only based upon young examples. As already 

 remarked by Dr. Giinther in the note above referred to, 

 the presence in the great Asiatic, as well as in the North 

 American rivers, of this and another peculiar form of the 

 limited group of sturgeons ^ is one of the highest import- 

 ance in zoological geography. There can be little doubt 

 that species of the genus Scaphirhynchus will also be 

 found to occur in the great Chinese rivers, the Yang-tz^- 

 kiang and Ho-ang-ho. 



Respiration of Ami a. — Amia calva is a fresh-water 

 fish of the United States, It is abundant in the Missis- 

 sippi and its tributaries and in the great lakes. It attains a 

 length of about two feet. Mr. Burt G. Wilder has pub- 

 lished {Proceedings of the American Association for the 

 Advancement of Science, 1877) an account of a series of 

 experiments, which seem very conclusively to show that 

 Amia not only exhales but also inhales air, and that this 

 respiration is carried on by means of its swim (air) 

 bladder. This is so much subdivided, that it will be re- 

 membered that Cuvier and others compared it to the lung 

 of some reptiles. Experiments seem to show that the 

 aerial respiration was more active when the water in 

 which the fish lay was imperfectly aerated. The average 

 of twenty-three measurements of the amount exhaled was 

 thirteen cubic centimetres. The exhaled air contained 

 about three per cent, of carbonic acid, and when the fish was 

 fasting it contained at least one per cent. Amia displays 

 great powers of endurance of privation of water. On one 

 occasion a specimen was kept out of water for an hour 

 and five minutes without any apparent discomfort or 

 injury. During most of the time the gill-covers were 

 tightly closed, but there were regular movements of the 

 jaw, hyoid apparatus, and sides of the mouth. 



Chilian Butterflies. — We have received a mono- 

 graph of the butterflies of Chih, by Edwyn C. Reed, 

 printed at the national press at Santiago de Chile. It 

 contains descriptions of some sixty-six species, several 

 of which are described as new, and the monograph is 

 accompanied by three plates. We hope that we may 

 from time to time be able to announce further new con- 

 tributions to the natural history of this district, so well 

 known by the elaborate " Historia fisica y politica" of 

 Gay. 



Insects in Tertiary Rocks. — Mr. S. H. Scudder 

 has recently published an account of some very remark- 

 able forms of insects from the tertiary rocks of Colorado 

 and Wyoming. These descriptions form Article xxiv. of 

 the forthcoming vol. iv. of the United States Geological 

 and Geographical Survey. Perhaps the most generally 

 interesting insect described is a fossil butterfly {Pro- 

 dryas persepJwne), which was found so perfect as to allow 

 of the description even of the scales of the body and 

 wings. It is the first butterfly fossil found in America, 

 and, as only some nine species are known from the well- 

 worked tertiary strata of Europe, it is undoubtedly of 



' Of the Sturime genus Polyodan, or Shovel-ncsed Sturgecns, one, P. 

 folium, occurs in the Mississippi, and a second, P. gladiiis, in the Yang-tze- 

 kiang. 



great value and interest. It shows a marked divergence 

 from living types. A beetle is described {Parolamm 

 rudis) which is rather of an Old World than of a New 

 World type. A fly {Palembolus florigerus) is interesting 

 not only as representing a highly-specialised type hitherto 

 unknown in America, but as showing how the semblance 

 of an original vein may be formed in a wing out of mere 

 fragments of distinct veins. Masses of eggs of a species 

 of Corydalites are also described as the first insect eggs 

 found in a fossil state. 



On the Relations of Rhabdopleura. — Prof- 

 Allman believes that the very anomalous characters 

 of this curious polyzoon genus {Rhabdopleura) admit of 

 being derived from the typical confirmation of a polyzoon 

 by certain easily understood modifications. One of the 

 most puzzling of those characters is the apparent absence 

 of a tentacular sheath. He maintains that the endocyst 

 is really represented by the contractile cord which seems 

 to take the place of the funiculus in the fresh-water 

 polyzoa, but with which it has nothing to do. In Rhabdo- 

 pleura the endocyst has receded from the ectocyst, and 

 in its posterior part of the approximation of its walls, and 

 the consequent nearly complete obliteration of its cavity 

 has become changed into the contractile cord. Anteriorly, 

 it spreads over the alimentary canal of the polypide, to 

 which it becomes closely adherent, and here represents 

 the tentacular sheath. Still more posteriorily the endocyst 

 undergoes even greater modification, for the contractile 

 cord becomes chitinised and converted into the firm rod 

 which is found running through the stem and branches 

 of the older parts of the colony, and which still presents 

 in its narrow lumen a trace of the original cavity of the 

 endocyst. The shield-like appendage which is attached 

 to the lophophore is one of the most remarkable features 

 in the genus. G. O. Sars regards it as representing the 

 epistome of the Phylactolasmatous polyzoa, but this view 

 is entirely opposed by the history of its development. 

 Prof. Allman, by tracing its development in connection 

 with that of the polypide has arrived at the conclusion 

 that it is formed as a primary bud from the modified 

 endocyst, and that in its turn it gives origin to a bud of 

 the second order, which becomes directly developed into 

 the definite polypide. The primary or scutiform bud 

 continues for some time to increase in size with the 

 developing polypide which it considerably exceeds, but is 

 at last surpassed by the latter. It never disappears, 

 however, but ultimately remains in the condition of a 

 subordinate appendage of the polypide to which it had 

 given origin. We have thus in the life-history of Rhabdo- 

 pleura an alteration of heteromorphic zooids. The first 

 term, however, in the genetic series, the direct product of 

 the sexual system is as yet wanting, no trace of this 

 system having hitherto been discovered in Rhabdopleura 

 (Linnean Society of December 19, 1878). 



GEOGRAPHICAL NOTES 

 M. Brazza and Dr. Ballay, the two Ogowd explorers, ^ 

 have arrived in Paris. M. Brazza is now preparing a map 1 

 showing his discoveries in West Africa. It shows that 

 the Ogovvd issues from a large chain of mountains, and is I 

 formed by a number of rivulets descending from the i 

 high regions. The explorers suppose that a large part i 

 of the water filling the bed of the Ogowe issues by sub- 1 

 terranean infiltrations from the Congo Basin. MM. 

 Brazza and Ballay are led to this conclusion by the , 

 belief that the Congo is to be found on the other side of j 

 the range of mountains mentioned. They were unable to 

 make a direct verification of this assumption, on account ! 

 of the hostility evinced by the native tribes, who are of j 

 the most warlike disposition. It Avas with the utmost 

 difficulty that the French explorers escaped from the 

 hands of these barbarians, whose war-cries, arms, and 

 canoes present striking resemblances to the ferocious 



