Maech 27, 1903.] 



SCIENCE. 



509 



bodies tlian that given by Professor A. Hall in 

 this journal, p. 349, are referred to my article 

 in Science, N. S., Vol, XIV., pp. 853-855. 

 The experiments by Professor E. H. Hall, 

 recently outlined in this journal, p. 181, are 

 extremely interesting. They seem to indicate 

 a minute southerly deviation. Thus nearly all 

 experimentalists on this subject, from the time 

 of Eobert Hooke to the present, have found 

 a small southerly deviation. I believe the 

 only exception is Benzenberg, who in 1804 had, 

 for theoretical reasons, come to disbelieve in 

 the actual existence of this deviation, and 

 who, accordingly, found it absent in his ex- 

 periments of that year after selecting from 

 the total number of trials those only which, 

 in his judgment, were made under the most 

 favorable conditions. I read Benzenberg's apd 

 other papers in Gilbert's Annalen two years 

 ago and I can not recall that Benzenberg, or 

 any one else, ever announced a northerly de- 

 viation. In 1802 Benzenberg reported, as a 

 final result of his experiments in Hamburg, a 

 marked southerly deviation. In the following 

 summary, H = height in m., S.D. = southerly 

 deviation in mm., A = average southerly 

 deviation in mm., per meter of fall. 



Hooke, 1680, 8.3 



Guglielmini, 1791, 78.3 



Benzenberg, 1802, 76.3 



Benzenberg, 1804, 84.4 



Reich, 1831, 158.5 



Eundell, 1848, 400. 



E. H. Hall, 1902, 23. 



Colorado College, 

 March 3, 1903. 



S. D. A. 



+ 



11.89 .15 



3.4 .044 



0.00 .00 



4.374 .028 



250 to 510 .95 



.05 .002 

 Floeian Cajori. 



SHORTER ARTICLES. 

 pyceapt's classification of the falconi- 



FORMES.* 



Probably no recent paper on the classifica- 

 tion of any group of birds is equal in interest 



*Pyoraft, W. P., F.Z.S., A.L.S., 'Contributions 

 to the Osteology of Birds,' Part V., Falconiformes. 

 Proc. Zool. Soc. Loncl., 1902, Vol. I., Part ii., 

 August 1, 1902,. pp. 277-320, pis. xxxiii.-xxxvii. 



Published here by permission of the Secretary 

 of the Smithsonian Institution. 



or importance to that by Mr. W. P. Pycraft 

 on the osteology and classification of the Fal- 

 coniformes, a group in which the crudities of 

 earlier systems have been held on to with a 

 persistence most remarkable in these days of 

 advanced knowledge of avian anatomy. Until 

 the appearance of Huxley's celebrated paper, 

 in 1867* all naked-headed carrion-feeding 

 birds of prey were ' Vulturidae ' (vultures), 

 the superficial resemblance between those of 

 the Old World and those of the New being, in 

 those days of anatomical ignorance, far more 

 obvious than the external differences, marked 

 though they be. Although in separating the 

 American vultures as a distinct family, Cath- 

 artida?, Huxley drove the first nail in the 

 burial case of the old systems, he unfortu- 

 nately went no farther concerning the typical 

 Falconiformes, t and, therefore, ornithologists 

 have continued to recognize the purely artifi- 

 cial and unnatural minor groups of the older 

 authors. All those of largest size, except 

 vultures, are still 'Aquilinse' (eagles), in the 

 latest arrangements; all those with exception- 

 ally long wings and more or less forked tails J 

 are ' Milvins ' (kites) ; all short-winged, long- 

 legged and long-tailed forms ' Accipitrinae, ' 

 (hawks) ; those of heavy build, moderate size 

 and alleged ' sluggish ' habits ' Buteoninse ' 

 (buzzards) ; while those with notched bills 

 are 'Faleoninffi' (falcons). 



Although, as before remarked, Huxley's 

 paper went scarcely beyond the definition of 

 the three primary divisions of the order, he 

 fortunately gave a valuable clue to further 



* ' On the Classification of Birds ; and on the 

 Taxonomie Value of the Modification of certain 

 of the Cranial Bones observable in that Class,' 

 by TJiomas H. Huxley, F.E.S., V.P.Z.S. Proc. 

 Zool. Soc. Land., 1867, pp. 415-472. (The 

 .^iltomorphse, = Falconifonnes -|- Striges, treated 

 on pp. 462-465.) 



t He divided the so-called diurnal raptores into 

 three groups, Cathartidfe, Gypaetidse, and Gypo- 

 geranidje, each equivalent to the suborders Cath- 

 artse, Aecipitres, and Serpentarii of Pycraft. 



J All these artificial groups, however, contain 

 forms which do not conform to the diagnoses of 

 said groups, some so-called ' kites,' for example, 

 having a truncated or even rounded tail, and some 

 ' eagles ' being no larger than the average hawk. 



