42 



to have reached a limit to their darkening. During this same 

 period, and owing to the fine weather, other examples had been in 

 a temperature that rose during the day to 90°, falling at night to 

 60° or even lower. This had apparently produced no change in 

 their coloration. The change in the examples exhibited was 

 therefore due probably rather to the humidity than to the tempe- 

 rature. Mr. Bonhote was therefore inclined to think that the 

 pale colour of desert animals was due to the extreme dryness of 

 the atmosphere rather than to any special assimilation of their 

 colour to the surroundings. 



Mr. R. I. PococK, F.R.S., F.Z.S., Superintendent of the 

 Gardens, exhibited photographs of a hybrid between the Somali- 

 land Wild Donkey (Equics asinus somaliensis) S and the Mountain 

 Zebra {Eqims zebra) $ , and remarked that although Mountain 

 Zebras and domestic Asses had been previously crossed, no hybrid 

 had hitherto been produced between this Zebra and the Somaliland 

 race of Equus asinus. The period of gestation was twelve months 

 and three weeks exactly. The foal showed much greater resem- 

 blance to Eqmis asinus than to E. zebra, the body being practically 

 unhanded, except for the spinal and shoulder stripes. The stripes 

 on the legs extended as high as the level of the belly and were 

 broader and more numerous than in the sire and narrower and 

 fewer than in the dam. In the presence of the shoulder stripe, 

 the spinal stripe, and the stripe on the base of the ear, the foal 

 resembled typical examples of Equus asinus and differed from its 

 actual sire, which was without those marks. 



Mr. D. Seth-Smith, F.Z.S., the Society's Curator of Birds, 

 exhibited two immature Black-backed Porphyries {Porj^hyrio 

 melanonotus) which had been bred in the Gardens, and remai-ked 

 vipon their possession of a well-developed claw on the pollex. 

 Although these wing-claws were said to be functional only in the 

 Hoatzin amongst living birds, the exhibitor believed that they 

 were so also in the present species as also probably in the Common 

 Moorhen, these birds using these appendages to assist them in 

 climbing amongst reeds and other herbage. 



The Secretary remarked that on a recent visit to the Ostiich 

 Farm of Mr. Carl Hagenbeck at Stellingen, near Hamburg, he 

 had seen in the incubator fertile eggs of StriUhio massaicus from 

 German East Afi-ica, 6'. australis from South Africa, and aS'. mo- 

 lybdophanes from Somaliland, the eggs all having been laid at 

 Stellingen. A. Reichenow (' Die Ybgel Africas,' vol. i. p. 7) had 

 already described and figured certain specific diflferences in the 

 number and arrangement of the pits on the eggs of these species. 

 He himself had been interested to notice that the eggs of the 

 Masai Ostrich were much larger than those of the others, more 

 spherical in shape, and very smooth and porcelanous in texture. 

 Those of the Cape Ostrich were somewhat similar in shape and 



