614 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XIV. 



The requisites for this relaxing-chamber cau be procured for a few 

 shillings from Messrs, J. J. Griffin & Sons, 20, Sardinia Street, Lincoln's Inn 

 Fields, W.C. 



A casual remark by Sir Geo. Hampson on the loss of colour of specimens 

 in the relaxing-box led to an explanation as to the method I adopted, which he 

 has been good enough to test for several months in the Natural History 

 Museum, and with such satisfactory results that he encouraged me to make a 

 note of the method for the benefit of fellow- workers. 



These notes are the reply to his request, which it gives me great pleasure 

 to send to him, 



5, Stanley Crescent, W, : lUh January 1902. 



{The above appeared in the " Entomologist.'^) 



No, XXYI.-VIPERA iJfJSS^JLLZ BREEDING IN CAPTIVITY. 



It may be of interest to record that a Vipera russelli, which has been in 

 a cage in the Society's Museum for several years with two or three others of 

 the same species, gave birth yesterday to 33 young ones. Three were born 

 dead, but the other 30 are active and healthy young vipers. Within 48 hours 

 of their birth, 28 out of the 30 young vipers had cast their ploughs. The three 

 dead ones measured about 10 J to 11 inches in length, 



W. S. MILLARD, 

 Hon, Sec, Bombay Natural History Society. 

 21sf June 1902. 



No. XXVII.— DROUGHT-RESISTING FODDER PLANTS, 

 One unhappy feature which distinguished the famine of 1900 from other 

 Indian famines, was the wholesale destruction of cattle ; a fatality specially 

 disastrous on account of the difficulty of replacement, and the blow thus 

 struck at the cultivator's power of recuperation. Can anything- be done to 

 prevent this evil in future ? Section XX of Sir A. MacDonnell's Famine 

 Report deals with this question : "The great mortality of cattle in the 

 recent famine has pushed to the front the question of their preservation in 



times of drought and dearth of fodder It is estimated that nearly 



two million cattle , . , . died in the Central Provinces and its Feudatory 

 States ; and that an equal number died in Bombay. The mortality was also 



great in Berar and Ajmere Nor was this mortality confined to 



useless cattle ; valuable bullocks and breeding cattle have perished in 

 thousands, involving a loss to agriculturists, from which, even with the liberal 

 assistance of Government, it will take them long to recover. This loss was 

 most severe, as its results were most disastrous, in Gujarat, where the fodder 

 famine was complete, and where the wealth of the people was largely sunk in 

 cattle. In their efl'orts to save their cattle, the Gujarat agriculturists expended 

 all their savings, themselves enduring great privations ; they sold their jewels 

 and even the doors and rafters of their houses, we were told, in order to 



