136 Scientific Intelligence. 
consequently, that State takes precedence over Louisiana. Agassiz, 
whose sounding (fishing) line has passed the living waters to the most 
ancient paleozoic rocks, says, in regard to the California viviparous 
fishes, that “‘a country which furnishes such novelties in our days, bids 
fair to enrich science with many other unexpected facts.” 
The remarks of Dr. Dowler upon a viviparous fish of Louisiana, 
contained in the above notice, add a few points to the unpublished facts 
connected with the history of that family. The fish itself is not new ; 
it has already been described and figured in 1821 by Lesueur in the 
2d volume of the Journal of the Academy of Natural Sciences in Phil- 
adelphia, under the name of Pecilia multilineata. It belongs to my 
family of Cyprinodonts.* 1 have had ample opportunity of observing 
large numbers of this fish during my stay in the South in the spring of 
1853, in Mobile and in New Orleans where it is found everywhere in the 
lagoons in the immediate vicinity of these two cities, and not only of as- 
certaining that they are viviparous as I have already mentioned in this 
Journal for July, 1853, (p. 135,) but also of tracing the whole develop- 
ment of the embryo from the first stages of the segmentation of the yolk 
to the hatching of the young, which were freed from the abdominal pouch 
of the mother in the month of April. The date of the observations of 
d 
sentatives of the great type of Vertebrates. My Heterandria formosa, 
for instance, when full grown, is not quite an inch long and does not 
weigh more than five grains. An adult male weighed 334 milligrams. 
Cambridge, Aug. 22, 1854, L. Agassiz. 
13. Perforating Animals.—M. Valenciennes observes that there are 
several Echini that perforate rocks like the Lithodomi. He also states 
that he has endeavored to obtain evidence of the presence of acid oF 
perforating in different perforating animals, but has never detected the 
slightest alteration of litmus paper while in contact with them ; and he 
admits that the action is wholly mechanical, proceeding from the ince* 
sant friction of the fleshy foot or some other part of the animal.—L’In- 
stitut, Oct. 11, 1854. . ) 
* See Agassiz’s Re he a Py. yee | , vol. y, part 2d, p. 47- 
