December 28, 1905] 



NA TURE 



20- 



gard to the alleged sheep-killing habit of the New Zealand 

 kea parrot. As is well known, this bird is commonly re- 

 ported to cause the death of sheep — or to leave them in 

 such a condition that death soon ensues — by pecking a hole 

 in the side, and the alleged habit is accepted as a 

 fact in ornithological and other natural history works. 

 According, however, to investigations undertaken indepen- 

 dently by a number of New Zealand gentlemen, the story 

 is without a shadow of foundation. The observers included 

 naturalists and estate agents, as well as others whose 

 judgment must be regarded as equally trustworthy. The 

 kea is a bird of unbounded curiosity, and it is suggested 

 that the myth is probably due to this habit, some observer 

 who had seen a kea inspecting the carcase of a defunct 

 sheep or lamb having very likely jumped to the conclusion 

 that the bird was the active cause of the animal's death. 

 It is concluded that although the legend cannot be said to 

 be completely disproved, yet there is not a scrap of evidence 

 in its favour. Owing to its bad repute, the kea is in 

 imminent danger of extermination. 



The ornithology of Oxfordshire, by Mr. Aplin, and notes 

 on fishes taken at Yarmouth, by Mr. A. H. Patterson, 

 are the subjects of the two articles in the December issue 

 of the Zoologist. Mention of several birds new to the 

 British list or of very rare occurrence in our islands is 

 made in the notes column, the two new forms being the 

 yellow-breasted bunting, from Norfolk, and the dusky 

 thrush, from Nottinghamshire. A correspondent publishes 

 a photograph of the skeleton of the fore-feet of a poly- 

 dactyle cat, displaying duplication of the thumb on one 

 -ide, and triplication on the other. Almost exactly similar 

 conditions obtain in the feet of two such abnormal cats 

 exhibited in the Natural History Museum. 



The December number of the Naturalist contains new 

 regulations for the local protection of birds promulgated 

 by the county councils of the North, East, and West 

 Ridings of Yorkshire in response to a petition presented 

 by the Naturalists' Union of the county. Among the more 

 noticeable items are the extension of the close time for a 

 previously scheduled list of species, the period now being 

 from the last day of February to September 1 ; the total 

 prohibition of the killing of a number of species mentioned 

 in a second list for a period of five years; and total protec- 

 tion for a similar period of the eggs of a third list of 

 species. Wild-bird shooting is entirely prohibited on 

 Sundays, while two proclaimed areas are to be protected 

 tor a further five years. It is added that, in response to 

 an appeal from the Union, the Bridlington Harbour Com- 

 missioners have prohibited the practice of firing at the 

 birds on Bempton and Speeton Cliffs from passing pleasure- 

 steamers. 



Museum News (Brooklyn, New York), No. 5, opens with 

 a dissertation on the proper mode of visiting museums, 

 that is, in order to derive some benefit therefrom. Type 

 descriptions of two exhibits are appended, one dealing 

 with the eggs of the brant-goose and the other with the 

 manati. The latter, we should say, is an excellent ex- 

 ample of what a museum descriptive label ought not to be, 

 for while manatis, dugongs, and rhytinas are all referred 

 to, there is not a word to indicate how they are to be 

 respectively distinguished. A novel practical exhibition — 

 desirable or otherwise — has been added to the Children's 

 Museum in Bedford. In a vessel of water are placed a few 

 coins with an invitation to take one ; but the coins remain, 

 for in the water are a couple of charged wires, from which 

 a severe electric shock is received. 



no. 1S87, VOL. 73~] 



Four papers on Cretaceous reptiles are included in the 

 December number of the American Journal of Science. 

 The two first of these are devoted to a couple of new- 

 representatives of horned dinosaurs (Ceratopsial from the 

 Laramie beds of Wyoming, discovered by the late Mr. 

 J. B. Hatcher, for one of which the finder proposed the 

 name Triceratops brevicornis, while to the second, which 

 lacks the single nasal horn, Mr. R. S. Lull gives the new- 

 generic and specific title Diceralops haicheri. A figure of 

 a restored model of the head of the latter shows a creature 

 strangely like a rhinoceros, save for the rudimentary con- 

 dition of the nasal horn and the presence of a pair of 

 horns above the eyes. We have now evidence of the exist- 

 ence of either one, two, or three functional horns in the 

 Ceratopsia — features correlated by Mr. Lull with differences 

 in the mode of attack of these giant reptiles. The one- 

 horned form is supposed to have attacked in what the 

 author describes as rhinoceros-fashion, i.e. with an upward 

 thrust. Mr. Lull, however, appears to be unaware 

 that neither of the Asiatic one-horned rhinoceroses uses its 

 horn for fighting, but relies solely on its tusks ! A 

 mounted skeleton of a third species, Triceratops prorsus, 

 in the U.S. National Museum, forms the subject of an 

 illustrated paper by Mr. C. Schuchert. The fourth of the 

 aforesaid series of reptilian papers is the first of a series 

 by Mr. G. R. Wieland on Upper Cretaceous turtles, the 

 forms dealt with in this instance being the small but thick- 

 shelled Adocidae (Adocus and Agomphus). The thickness 

 of the shell may have been correlated with sublittoral 

 habits as a protection against predatory dinosaurs. 



The four latest issues of the Proceedings of the U.S. 

 National Museum comprise the description by Mi>s 

 Richardson of a new species of the crustacean genus 

 Livoneca from Panama (No. 1430) ; an account of the 

 breeding habits and the segmentation of the eggs of the 

 Florida pipe-fish (Siphostoma floridae), by Mr. E. W. 

 Gudger (No. 143 1) ; notes on exotic earwigs, with de- 

 scriptions of new species, by Mr. J. A. G. Rehn (No. 1432) ; 

 and a list of fishes collected at Shanghai and Hong Kong 

 in 1882-3, °Y Messrs. Jordan and Scale (No. 1433), con- 

 taining descriptions of half a dozen species regarded as 

 new to science. In the above-mentioned paper on the 

 Florida pipe-fish, Mr. Gudger gives a detailed summary 

 of the history of our knowledge of the breeding habits of 

 pipe-fishes and their kindred, and then discusses those of 

 the species under consideration. In all these fishes the 

 ripe eggs are transferred from the oviducts of the female 

 to a special brooding-pouch on the under-side of the 

 abdomen of the male. In the case of the Florida species, 

 when the eggs are ready for transference the male and 

 female fishes swim round and round one another for a 

 time, and then intertwine their bodies in the form of a 

 double letter S, with the heads of each turned outwards. 

 In this position the eggs are transferred from the ovary 

 of the female to the pouch of the male, where the two 

 are in contact, about a dozen eggs being received in the 

 pouch, where they are presumably fertilised. The male 

 then performs a series of evolutions for the purpose of 

 " shaking down " the eggs into the end of the pouch, on 

 the completion of which the process of transference is 

 resumed. The eggs, which soon become fixed to the 

 pouch, are hatched in ten days. Full details, with illus- 

 trations, are given of the segmentation. 



The first appendix to the Kew Bulletin for 1906 has put 

 in an early appearance ; it contains a list of seeds of hardy 

 herbaceous plants, and of trees and shrubs available for 

 exchange with botanic gardens or regular correspondents 

 of Kew. 



