142 THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 



Perhaps the most valuable collection of birds' effgs in this 

 country is the property of Professor Thos. G. Gentry, of Phila- 

 delphia, who is the author of "The Nests and Eggs of Birds of 

 North America." He spent four years collecting the speci- 

 mens, some of which are worth to collectors £20 apiece. — New 

 York Mail and Express. 



Undoubtedly the largest oological collection in the world is 

 in possession of Herr Adolph Nehrkorn. of Germany. At 

 present that indomitable oologist has amassed no less than 

 3015 different species of eggs. 



Nesting of the Fairy Martin. — Gould, in his grand work 

 The Birds of Anstralia, has the following : — " The Fairy IMartin, 

 unlike the favourite swallow of the Australians, although enjoy- 

 ing a most extensive range, appears to have an antipathy to the 

 country near the sea ; for neither in New South Wales nor at 

 Swan River have I ever known of it approaching the coast-line 

 nearer than 20 miles." This is not strictly correct, if Tasmania 

 may be included in Australasia. At Bridport, on theN.E. coast 

 of Tasmania, there is a hotel where I have had occasion to put 

 up during several years in my peregrinations through that part 

 of the island. The hotel, which has a verandah facing the sea, 

 is barely fifty 3'ards from the wash of Bass' Straits. Under this 

 verandah the Fairy Martins built their nests. The nests were 

 frequently broken by boys throwing missiles at them. Still, the 

 swallows, upon their return from their migrations, invariably 

 repaired them, and reared their brood. I have also seen the 

 bottle-shaped clay nests of the Fairy Martin under bridges and 

 culverts in Sydney 35 years ago, within a few hundred yards 

 of Port Jackson.— 6". H. Winile, F.L.S., &c. 



An Old Bird. — A cockatoo which had been in the Went- 

 worth family, Sydney, during the last ninety years, died lately. 

 Mr. W. C. Wentworth, when a schoolboy, owned the bird, and 

 taught it to speak. It therefore was anything but a chick, and 

 died in all probability fully a century old. 



Geological. 



Australian Lion. — Several very complete jaw-bones, con- 

 taining teeth in an exceedingly good state of preservation, of 

 the extinct Thylacoleo have been found in the famous Welling- 

 ton Caves, and forwarded to Sir Richard Owen. Professor 

 Owen had described the animal previously from imperfect 

 specimens, and in his paper read in November last before the 

 Royal Society (England) repeated his view that Thylacoleo was 

 a carnivorous marsupial of about the size of the lion, which had 

 preyed upon the larger forms of the extinct kangaroos, &c. 

 Professor Flower criticised this opinion, inasmuch as the denti- 



