372 
pompilius found by Mr. Whitelegge stranded on the beach at Curl Curl La- 
goon, near Sydney, and he remarked that instances of this species drifting 
ashore on our coast had been recorded by Mr. Brazier, in the Catalogue 
Marine Shells of Australia and Tasmania, p. 18. It has also been noticed | 
by Mr. Johnston as wrecked on the Tasmanian coast. On the Queensland | 
seaboard the speaker had frequently remarked it. There it is highly prized | 
by the aborigines, who trade the shells as ornaments from tribe to tribe; the | 
time for its occurrence is said by the natives to coincide with the blossoming | 
of the Bloodwood tree (Eucalyptus corymbosa). Associated with the Pearly 
Nautilus among the sea-drift on the northern coast are cocoanuts, so fresh 
as to be eagerly devoured by the blacks, and pumice stone. The nuts might 
have floated from any tropical island in the Pacific; the Nautilus shells are 
derivable from the narrower limits of the Solomons, the Fijis, and the New 
Hebrides, while the pumice would seem to be the product of the active volca- 
noes of the New Hebrides. The agent which strews these foreign products on 
Australian coasts is probably not an ocean current, but the north east trade- 
wind. — Mr. J. Mitchell, Narellan, contributed the following »Note on 
the discovery of the genus Hstheria in the Upper Coal Measures of N.S.W.c: 
— On July 3rd inst., from beneath the second coal seam at Bellambi, ina 
cherty rock I obtained a very good specimen of the above, associated with 
Glossopteris linearis and G. browniana (?). It is worthy of note that this 
Estheria occurs associated with the same typical species of G/ossopteris in the 
Illawarra district as the allied genus Zeaia is found associated with in the 
Newcastle district; that the character of the rocks in each case is identical or 
nearly so, and that the relative positions as compared with the coal seams 
in each locality are equally in concurrence. 
III. Personal-Notizen. 
Lincoln, Nebr., U.S.A. Dr. Henry B. Ward of Michigan Univer- 
sity has accepted a call to the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebr., as 
Associate Professor of Zoology. 
Melbourne. Dr. Arthur Dendy, of Melbourne, has been appointed 
to the position of Lecturer in Biology in the Canterbury College (University 
of New Zealand). His address, after January next, will be Canterbury 
College, Christchurch, New Zealand. 
Necrolog. 
Am 12. August starb plötzlich in der Nähe von Newcastle-on-Tyne 
Mr. George Brook. Er war am 17. März 1857 geboren, war bis 1887 
Scientific Assistant to the Scottish Fishery Board, und zuletzt Leeturer on 
Comparative Embryology an der Universität in Edinburg. Außer seinen 
embryologischen Arbeiten ist er besonders rühmlich bekannt durch seine 
Bearbeitung der Antipatharia des Challenger und des soeben vollendeten 
»Catalogue of the Genus Madrepora« (Brit. Museum). 
Am 14./26. August starb in Wiesbaden der Academiker und Director 
des zoologischen Museums der kais. Academie d. Wiss. in St. Petersburg, 
Dr. Alexander Strauch. Im Jahre 1832 geboren war Strauch durch eine 
Reihe wichtiger Arbeiten als einer der bedeutendsten Herpetologen bekannt. 
Druck von Breitkopt & Härtel in Leipzig. 
