Recent Literature. IO/ 



two forms actually cross one another, and that the area where P. 

 bilineata comes into contact with the northern section of P. nigri- 

 ceps corresponds more or less to that occupied by P. afbi/oris, at 

 once suggesting the supposition that P. albiloris is not a true 

 species at all. hut due to the intermingling of P. bilineata and 

 P. nigriceps. and. further, that technically these last named birds 

 are not true species either." 



The authors next endeavor to explain this geographical muddle 

 by some curious conjectures which exactly reverse the accepted 

 workings of the theory of evolution as understood on this side of 

 the Atlantic. P. nigriceps and P. bilineata are supposed to 

 have been originally distinct species, which having extended their 

 respective ranges to a point of meeting, wdiere a hybrid race, 

 P. a/bi/ora, was produced, crossed each other's path, and in their 

 further extension apart, resumed their distinctive characters. 



A simpler solution than this must surely be found to exist, and 

 to the ornithologist who next takes up the investigation, I offer 

 the preceding analogy, in the hope that it may at least have some 

 bearing on what seems to me a parallel case. 



llerent literature. 



Vogt ox the Second Fossil Archveopteryx.* — This specimen 

 was found by M. Haeberlein in the same slates as the first. As described by 

 Professor Vogt, it shows several structural peculiarities which were not 

 visible in the first specimen. Of the head, which was not preserved in 

 the first example. Professor Vogt only says that the upper jaw had two 

 small teeth at its end (i. e. in premaxilla* ?), and that the entire skull 

 is strongly reptilian in its appearance. The position of the teeth in 

 the Archcuopteryx is thus exactly the opposite of their position in the 

 Odoiitornitlns. where teeth were absent only in the end of the upper jaw. 

 The cervical vertebra? were not very numerous and were provided with 

 ribs. The dorsal vertebra? were ten in number, and their ribs lacked unci- 

 nate processes. One of the points of great interest is the thoracic arch, 



* L'Archfeopteryx macroura. — Un intermediaire entre les oiseaux et les reptiles. 

 Par M. C. Vogt. La Revue Scientifique, 2? Ser., g e Ann6e, No. II, 13 Sept. 1879, pp. 

 241-248, figg. 18-21. There is a translation of this piece, supplemented by a photo- 

 graph of the slab, in the " Ibis " for October, 1880, pp. 434-456. 



