176 



NEWS FROM THE MAGAZINES, etc. 



Knowledge and The Quarry will appear quarterly, instead of monthly, 

 for the future. 



The Belfast Museum Publication No. 59, is devoted to ' Weeds, and 

 How to Combat Them,' by the Curator, Mr. A. Deane. 



Mr. A. Chapman writes on Brent Geese, and Mr. W. Denison Roebuck 

 on the Mollusca of Elgin, in The Scottish Naturalist for April. 



Prof. G. H. Carpenter's Presidential address to the Dublin Naturalists' 

 Field Club, on ' Useful Studies for Field Naturalists,' is printed in The 

 Irish Naturalist for April (pp. 66-70). 



The natural history collections at the University College, Nottingham, 

 are to be transferred to Burwell Hall, which is some distance away. We 

 trust that Prof. Carr, who has done so much for this Museum, will still 

 be able to keep a watchful eye upon it. 



Among the papers in The Entomologist for April are ' A New Geometrid 

 Moth,' by Rev. J. W. Metcalfe; ' New and Little Known British Aphides,' 

 (referred to as ' Britishaphides ' ), by F. V. Theobald ; ' British Plant 

 Galls,' by H. J. Burkill ; ' British Neuroptera in 1916,' by W. J. Lucas. 



In The Entomologist' s Monthly Magazine for April, Mr. W. E. Sharp 

 writes on Cryptocephalus bipunctatus L., and C. biguttatus Scop. ( = bipus- 

 tulatus F.) ; and Mr. G. T. Porritt describes a new variety of Abraxas 

 grossulariata, bred at Huddersfield by Mr. J. Lee, to which the name 

 albovarleyata is given. 



Punch draws the attention of Biologists to the fact that a recent 

 writer in the Daily Mail refers to a certain octopus having antenna?. 

 Presumably the point is there antenna. Personally, we don't think that 

 biologists would consult either Punch or the Daily Mail as to the precise 

 histological significance of the sessilc-suckered tentacles in the larger 

 cephalopoda. 



The Vasculum for February contains the following items : — ' Mice, 

 Voles and Shrews,' by George Bolam ; ' Some Beasts of Barn and Byre/ 

 by J. E. Hull; 'Concerning Grebes,' by A. Chapman; 'Talks about 

 Plant Galls,' by Richard S. Bagnall and J. W. Heslop Harrison ; ' A 

 New British Midge-Gall from County Durham,' by Harry Stewart; 

 ' Newham Bog,' by J. E. Hull; among others. 



We regret to see the announcement of the death of the Rev. O. 

 Pickard-Cambridge, M.A., F.R.S., who was born in 1828. He frequently 

 wrote on entomological subjects, and had a world-wide repulation as 

 an authority on Arachnida, his ' Spiders of Dorset ' being a classic. He 

 also contributed a fine article on Arachnida to the ' Encyclopaedia Brit- 

 annica ' (9th ed.). He frequently helped Yorkshire naturalists in their 

 work among the spiders, as the pages of The Naturalist testify. 



We notice that the caretaker at the offices of a large Railway Company 

 at Hull was recently summoned in respect of a light which was visible 

 all night. The defence was that the rats had evidently run over the 

 lever and turned the gas on. It is not stated whether the rats struck a 

 match and applied it to the gas jet. We know rats are very accommo- 

 dating at Hull. Even specimens of the old English black rat occasionally 

 walk into the traps which are set for them in the garden at one of the 

 museums there. 



The largest haul of coarse fish ever made in the River Eden has been 

 made by Inspector Whyte in the Kingarth Water. He had noticed a 

 large collection of fish below the ice covering a pool, and with the assist- 

 ance of two other water bailiffs he managed to get a net round them below 

 the ice, and when the net was hauled in about 8,000 fish, chiefly chub and 

 dace, which weighed over a ton, were caught. Most of the fish were in 

 spawn. The largest number taken previously in one draft from the Eden 

 was about 1,300. 



Naturalist, 



