THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. Ill 



I have felled a good many of these trees, and have frequently 

 found in their almost invariably hollow stems several quarts of 

 water. Whether this water has found its way in through some 

 unobserved hole or flaw in the wood, and been preserved from 

 evaporation by the hard wood-case that surrounds it, or has been 

 absorbed through the roots of the tree, I cannot say, but it is 

 very often there. To return to the Adansonias. The inveterate 

 habit of these trees is to shed their leaves after the rains have 

 gone over, but a curiosity of its kind — (possibly a Sterculia, F. v. 

 M.) — in Derby has worn a copious glossy foliage throughout the 

 seasons for upwards of eight years, and is the only example of its 

 sort noticed in the district. Another tree that I was fortunate 

 enough to discover, and of which I have made a sketch, is the 

 one mentioned on page 44, vol. ii., of Captain King's voyages, 

 upon which the Mermaid's name was cut. The characters 

 H.M.C. MERMAID, 1820, in foot letters, are yet perfectly clear, 

 and promise to all appearance to survive at least another 100 

 years. The tree is close to the beach in Careening Bay, and is 

 easily found." 



NOTES. 



An interesting article on " The Platypus and its Gippsland 

 Haunts" appeared in Scribner's Magazine for June, 1893, from 

 the pen of Mr. Sidney Dickenson. 



Chambers's Journal for April, 1893, contained an article giving 

 some interesting facts on the " Avi-Fauna of the Furneaux Group," 

 the islands in Bass' Straits which several members of the Field 

 Naturalists' Club purpose visiting during the current month. 



At the recent annual meeting of the Surrey Hills Field Club, 

 an interesting report of the year's doings was presented, and 

 Baron von Mueller, in an address to the young people, urged 

 them to create a liking for observing the works of Nature, and 

 showed the pleasures and development of mind and body arising 

 from such a pastime. 



It is rumoured that another suburban field club is about to 

 be started. We wish, it every success, and hope to see rivals in 

 other districts. 



A WORK recently issued by the Smithsonian Institution, 

 Washington, U.S.A., entitled " Life-Histories of North American 

 Birds, with Special Reference to their Breeding, Habits, and 

 Eggs," by Captain C. Bendire, in which attention is called to the 

 rapidly diminishing numbers of many well-known North American 

 birds, forms the basis for an interesting article in the Nineteenth 

 Century for April, 1893. 



