LINNEAN SOCIETY OF LONDON. Ixi 



Querctis, Gastanca, and their allies. Whether his genera prove to be 

 more satisfactory than those previously adopted or proposed remains 

 to be ascertained. Probably the whole are best considered one large 

 natural genus, divisible into sections more or less definitely circum- 

 scribed ; but CErsted'g primary division, derived from the styles, 

 appears to be at once more definite and more natural than any pre- 

 vious one. 



Sweden. 



Professor Malm's ' Monographie illustree du Baleinoptere' is a most 

 interesting account of the great Rorqual captured on the Swedish 

 coast, with an admirable description of its structure, illustrated by 

 woodcuts and photographs. M. Wallengren has inserted a memoir 

 on the Heterocerous Lepidoptera of Caffraria, in the Transactions of 

 the Royal Swedish Academy. Dr. Stfd has completed his work 

 entitled * Ilemiptera Africana.' The 8th and 0th volumes of C. G. 

 Thomson's ' Skandinaviens Coleoptera ' have recently appeared, and 

 Messrs. Malmgren aud Kinberg have communicated to the Royal 

 Swedish Academy papers containing descriptions of numerous species 

 and new genera of Annelides. 



The botanical contributions most worthy of notice are : — Ander- 

 son's sketch of the vegetation of Sweden, chiefly as to cultivated 

 plants, translated in the Aunales des Sciences Naturelles ; and 

 0. Norstedt's observations on the germination of Characeae, in 

 the Lund Transactions for 1865, but not, as far as I am aware, 

 actually published till 1867. Th. M. Pries has also published, in 

 the Transactions of the Royal Swedish Academy, an enumeration 

 of the lichens of Spitzbergen, remarkable for the great number of 

 species found in those high latitudes, even at an elevation of 2300 

 feet. 



Russia. 



Russian naturalists have been chiefly engaged in the investigation 

 of the natural history of the remote provinces of their vast empire. 

 Early in 1866 a report reached St. Petersburg that a native trader 

 had ascertained the existence of the remains of a Mammoth, with 

 the skin and soft parts still perfect, in a ravine on one of the bays of 

 the estuary of the Ob ; and this report seemed sufliciently authenti- 

 cated to justify the Academy in the immediate despatch of a scientific 

 expedition to examine the remains in situ, and bring them over 

 to the capital. Magister P. Schmidt, who was already personally 



