Mollusca.— Birds. 421 



surface was in life a tentaculum more or less branched, semitransparent, 

 agreeably coloured, varying from half to one inch in length, each arm of 

 which used to stretch itself out in all directions, the different stems on 

 the head, neck, and body alternately contracting or expanding, while the 

 dorsal sack was constantly opening and shutting its edges, and the sin- 

 gular apparatus within in perpetual and curiously varying activity. 

 These animals die shortly after being taken out of the sea; and although 

 some of them have been brought up to me without delay in sea water, 

 I have never had the time, even if I had possessed the ability, to draw 

 their figure. Nor is there any artist here, that I know of, who is at all 

 capable of doing justice to subjects of this description, of which there are 

 here many hundreds probably of the most interesting kind. I must not 

 omit to mention that this Aplysia, though apparently dead, afforded a 

 liquor which, applied to linen, soon changed it to a good purple hue. 



You are now informed of the contents of the breaker. Another pack- 

 age, a deal box, has also been sent to your address, which contains some 

 bottles well secured from breakage, and other things. Among these I 

 am glad to say there are some specimens in your favourite department of 

 Ornithology, though I regret that they are not in the state in which I 

 should have desired to send them. But I prefer much to receive them in 

 an imperfect condition to being wholly without them, knowing that even 

 in such a state they may still afford very useful information to an able 

 Naturalist. The first I shall notice of these is a splendid species, to the 

 characters of which I can find no parallel in any books I have. It was 

 killed some time ago in Manchester, and appears to be extremely rare in 

 the interior of the Island. The person who killed it has since died, and 

 my endeavours to find out any particulars about the bird, and especially 

 of the areoZa round the eye, and of the iris, have been fruitless. The 

 horizontally produced upper mandible, the variety and brilliancy of its 

 colours, and the contrast of the alar specula to its other hues will recom- 

 mend this individual to your attention. 2dly. There is a variety of 

 Phaeton eethereus, ft, with this peculiarity, that it has but a single long 

 feather in the tail, and that each of the tail feathers has its shaft black. 

 That these are not accidental variations will be clear from their equally 



