Northern News. 233 



may be discerned from the similar cavities in the stems of 

 horsetails, grasses, etc. The examples noted have not belonged 

 to, or been more plentiful in, one group of spiders than in 

 another; an example of total suppression of palpal organs in 

 Epeira sturmii Hahn (East Riding, T. Stainforth, 1916) and 

 another of mal-development of the same in a Clubiona terrestris 

 Westr. (near Huddersfield, June 1917) being far apart in a 

 classificatory sense. 



One or two cases of so-called hermaphroditism, that is of 

 the same spider possessing one palp of the male type and the 

 other of the female type as well as the female organ (both 

 kinds of genitalia more or less defective), have also occurred. 

 From examples noted by observers at different times in various 

 countries, the condition has been thought to be a peculiarity 

 of the sub-family Linyphiince, but in June, 1913, at Hebden 

 Bridge, I took a Neon reticulatus Bl., in which the state was 

 well exemplified, the right palp only being of the male type, 

 but as usual neither this nor the female vulva perfect. 



It is, I think, to be expected that the condition will occur 

 also in other sections, rarely, however, in most and only com- 

 paratively more commonly in the Linyphiince, which constitute, 

 both as regards genera and species, by far the greater bulk of 

 our spider population. 



With regard to other forms of abnormality mentioned 

 (loc. cit.) partial blindness by obliteration or imperfect develop- 

 ment of one or more eyes keeps recurring, but the most frequent 

 of all is that of deep wide longitudinal channels in the soft 

 substance of the abdomen, above or below. 



Finally, a kind of superficial deviation from rule new to me 

 is furnished by a spider taken in Cumberland, fully two-thirds 

 of its ocular area being, if I may use a botanical term, etiolated, 

 with an appreciable effect on the formation of the eyes affected. 



: o : 



We have received the Eighty-third A nnual Report of the Bootham 

 School, York, Natural History Society, which bears evidence that this 

 famous school still keeps up its reputation for encouraging the study of 

 nature among its scholars. 



A recent writer in the Yorkshire Weekly Post gave a description of the 

 colony of the Black-headed Gulls on Skipwbrth Common. In this he 

 referred to the ' falling off in numbers which is extraordinary and un- 

 accountable. Since the season began, in the first week of May, the keeper 

 has sent about 300 eggs to York, 360 to Bradford, and there were 140 in 

 hand. A Saturday's collection numbered 70 or 80, so that there is a total 

 of say 900 eggs ; and this, he estimates, is about half the usual yield. 

 Normally, under protection, there are fully 500 pairs of gulls on the Com- 

 mon ; to-day there are not more than 200. On Washdyke, for example, — 

 a deep, extensive pond, thick with reeds, and an ideal breeding place- 

 there used to be 100 nests ; there is not one to be found this season. The 

 adjacent dykes, where he used to see 50 or 60 nests, contain only one 

 to-day, from which three eggs have been taken.' 



1917 July 1. 



