Jan. 20, 1 881] 



NATURE 



77 



spread as if for flight. The head is small, pyramidal, 

 nearly fiat. The orbit is large, with the nostril in front of 

 it. By means of a lens two little conical and sharp teeth 

 are perceived at the end, planted in tlie upper jaw. On the 

 lower surface there is a forked bone to be seen, but Prof. Vogt 

 dare not say whether this is the lower jaw or a tongue bjiie ; 

 the bones of the head show clearly that it is a true reptile's 

 head. Its shoulder-girdle proves also to be that of a reptile. 

 In fact the head, the neck, the thorax, with the ribs, the tail, 

 the shoulder-girdle, and the whole fore-limb, are plainly con- 

 structed as in reptiles. The pelvis has probably more agreement 

 with that of reptiles than with that of birds. The hind-foot is 

 that of a bird, therefore reptilian afiinities prevail in the skeleton 

 over all others. The fevthers are those of a bird. The 

 remiges of the wings are fixed to the ulnar edge of the arm and 

 to the hand ; tliey are covered for nearly half their length with 

 a fine filiform down ; none of them project beyond the others. 

 It is possible that at the base of the neck there w.i.s a ruff like 

 that of the condor. The tibia was clothed with feathers for the 

 whole of its length. Archseopteryx thus wore breeches, as do 

 our falcons All the other parts of the body were evidently naked. 

 It would thus seem to take its rank neither among birds nor rep- 

 tiles. It forms an intermediate ty|)e of the most marked kind, 

 and confirms in a brilliant way the views of Prof. Huxley, who 

 has united birds and reptiles — to form of them under the name 

 of Suuropsids, a single great section of Vertebrates. 



European and North American Birds. — The occurrence 

 of North American birds in Europe has always been a subject of 

 interest to ornithologists. In the April number {1S80) of the 

 Proceedings of the Koyal Dublin Society there is a paper by 

 Percy Evans Freke giving a comparative catalogue of the birds 

 found in Europe and North America, in which the species of 

 North American birds are arranged in columns side by side with 

 the same species found at times in Europe. The geographical 

 distribution of these species is also given, and the residents, 

 which are probably breeders, are distinguished. This list seems 

 worked out \x ith a gre.at deal of care. A paper on the same 

 subject by Mr. J. J. Dalglei-h appears also in the April number 

 (1S80) of the £^«//f//« of the Nuttall Ornith ilogical Club, with 

 a table giving a "Li>t of Occurrences of North American Birds in 

 Europe." Great care has evidently been taken in this mem )ir aliO 

 to secure correctness. On comparison of the lists it would seem 

 as if Evans had overlooked Gcitke's paper on Heligoland Birds. 



A Gnat with two kinds of Wives. — Dr. Fritz MiiUer 

 describes in a late number of Kosmos (Octolier) a very remark- 

 able two-winged insect which he calls Paltosioma torrcntium^ 

 and which he found at It.ajah. The larvae were found by 

 him under stones and rocks in the little streams with which this 

 province abounds. These larva; were carefully watched and 

 reared, and the jierfect insects on their appearance were found to 

 be males and females, but the latter of tuo well-marked and 

 very different ty|ies. In the male gnat the eyes occupy nearly 

 the whole side of the head, and leave not even room for the three 

 ocelli, which are thus forced to the top of a peculiar stalk-like 

 body. In one of the two forms of the female the eyes occupy 

 the whole length of the head, but leave between them a broad 

 belt, which in the second form of fem.ile is not half so wide or 

 long. In the large-eyed females the parts of the mouth are 

 formed after the type of those to be met with in the blood- 

 sucking females of the mosquito or horse-fly. But in the small- 

 eyed females and in the males this formidable development of the 

 parts of the moath, v\hich enables the large eyed females to feed 

 on blood, is wanting, and the former are huncy-suckers, obtaining 

 this food from the nectaries of several flowers. Along with this 

 remarkable difference in the parts of the mouth there is a notable 

 difference in the foot-joints, the honey-sucking wives Imving 

 slender feet, with smaller claws than their honey-sucking hus- 

 bands ; while the blood-sucking wives have the last foot-joint 

 short and wide, furnished on its under surface with a thick pad, 

 from which arise strong curved hairs ; the claws are also much 

 longer. Thus the small-eyed honey-loving form has the more 

 simple structure of foot, wh reas the blood--eeker has not only 

 the more complicated form of foot, but great eager eyes looking 

 about for what they can get to devour. 



The Function of Asparagine. — Boussingault's researches 

 seemed to show that asparagine was a substance comparable to 

 urea, the re.-ult, like it, of a transformation of albuminous 

 matters, and that this substance made its appearance only in 

 seeds during their germination ; but from the discovery of this 



substance not only in bitter almonds when the embryo is not yet 

 visible ; in the same seeds w hen completely ripe ; in the young 

 seeds of the apricot, plum, and cherry, and even in the un- 

 opened i I florescences of the pear, M. L. Portes sees reasjn to 

 doubt the propriety of ascribing to it this function. If, he says, 

 Boussingault'se.xperiments show the existence in leguminous ]:ilants 

 of an asparagine concomitant with the act of germination — which 

 might be called blastemic asp.aragine — there also exists in the 

 almond tribe and pear-bud s, another form apparently not having any 

 physiological connection with the other, which may be referred to 

 as ablastemic. In both ca^es the asparagine is a secondary pro- 

 duct ; its formation is in intimate connection with the production 

 of new cells. Sweet and bitter almonds gathered in March in 

 the mi'idle of France were proved to contain neither sugar nor 

 starch, but dextrine was present. Previous analysis allows one 

 to affirm that neither sugar nor starch ever existed in them, nor 

 as yet were they in the flouering stalk. May it not be admitted 

 that the dextrine and glucose which .speedily appear have at 

 least in part an albuniiuoid origin ? since the seed does not 

 contain, nor will it for a long time contain, starch ; since the 

 young seed shows no sugar ; and lastly, since there is a product 

 of excretion representing the azote of the transformed proto- 

 plasmic matter. {Revue Internationale des Sciences hiologiqiies, 

 October 15 ) 



A Cause of the Motion of Diatoms. — According to one 

 view diatoms move by means of strong osmotic processes, which, 

 being more intense in one direction, cau^e impulsion in the 

 other. Some observations by Herr Mereschkowsky supporting 

 the latter view are described by him in the Botanische Zeitiing 

 {1880, p. 529). He examined two species of Navicula and 

 one of Stauridium in sea-water containing many very small 

 micrococci, which, near the diatoajs, vibrated greatly, bat at 

 a distance were quite still. It was first evident that the move- 

 ments of the diatoms consisted of a straightforward motion, 

 then a backward, with a pause between, or of a turning round 

 the axis. Then it was noticed that so long as the diatom re- 

 mained still, all the actively vibrating micrococci were uniformly 

 distributed, whereas, when the diatom moved, the micrococci 

 vibrated with excessive activity at the hinder end, as if a strong 

 water current entered behind the alga. At the fore end there 

 was only a very slight mo' ion of micrococci. When the still state 

 was reached the vibration became again equally distributed, and 

 on commencement of the backward motion a reverse distribution 

 of the vibration was observed. These phenomena (observed also 

 in rotation of diatoms) can only lie explained, the author con- 

 siders, by the hypothesis above ste.ted. 



Fungal Growths in the Auimal Body. — By experi- 

 ments on animals, Herr Grawitz (Virc/iow's Arc/iiv, B. Si, p. 

 355), has recently proved the following: — I. The well-known 

 mould-fungi Eurotiiim (Asp.rgillus] and Penicillium occur in 

 two varieties, which are quite alike in form, but quite diff'erent 

 physiologically ; the one proving wholly indifferent in the blood- 

 system of the higher animals, while the other has all the malig- 

 nity of the worst pathogenic fungi known. 2. From any origi- 

 nal form both varieties can be obtained by continued cultivation, 

 and similarly from either of the two varieties the other may be 

 got, iu twelve to twenty generations, by systematic cultivation. 



3. The principle of the cultivation is to habituate the fungi 

 which live on solid, weakly acid, nutritive substances at a tem- 

 perature of about S° to 20° C, through a series of generations, to 

 liquid alkaline albumen solutions, and a heat of 38° to 40° C. 



4. The malignity of the pathogenic mould-fungi consists, in 

 acute cases, in their spores, which on reaching the circulation of 

 the higher mammals, there germinate, and passing into different 

 parts of the body, multiply, and cause local neuroses, and death 

 in about three days. In the subacute and chronic cases a reactive 

 inffamniation occurs in each of the numerous fungus- centres, 

 which may cause the death of the hyphse and lead to cure. 5. 

 Most of the small mould-accumulations easily seen with the n.aked 

 eye in the kidneys, liver, muscles, and retina, are microscopi- 

 cally distinguishable neither by size nor by histological characters 

 from fungi of the same species, which have grown on their 

 favourite substrata, except that they have only rudimentary fruit- 

 stalks, and never attain to the separation of spores. 



Brain-Weight. — The weight of the human brain, according to 

 a recently-published work by the eminent Munich anatomist Prof. 

 BischolT, is on an average 1362 grammes for man and 1219 gr. for 

 woman. The difference between the average brain-weight of 

 man and woman thas amounts to 143 gr., ir lo'50 per cent. 



