IxXXviii PEOCKEDINGS OF THE 



teresting papers ; amongst others, he has sent a curious one describing 

 a new species of Balanus (5. armatus), as well as a singular form 

 which he regards as a hybrid between this and Darwin's B. impro- 

 visus, var. assimilis. I cannot, also, pass over in silence the active 

 exertions of M, Correa da Mello, of Campinus in Brazil, whose ad- 

 mirably selected botanical specimens and observations, under the 

 guidance of his friend and correspondent Mr. Hanbury, cannot fail 

 to supply us with much knowledge of the vegetation of South Brazil 

 which can only be given by a resident botanist. 



United States of Noeth America. 



The progress of biological investigation in the United States, at 

 least as far as Scientific Bodies have contributed to it, having been 

 the subject of my last year's Address, I need say but very few words 

 on the present occasion. I have, however, to express my regret at 

 one accidental omission, that of the Essex Institute at Salem, whose 

 Proceedings, now forming live 8vo vohimcs, are replete with zoolo- 

 gical and botanical papers of general as well as of local interest. 

 Amongst those contained in the most recent numbers, I observe the 

 commencement of a Flora of the Hawaiian Islands by Mr. Horace 

 Mann, which appears to be drawn up verj'- nearly upon the plan sanc- 

 tioned by the late Sir William Hooker for the series of our Colonial 

 Floras. Such a Flora is now much wanted to enable us to form a fair 

 judgment of the peculiar vegetation of that group, comprising so 

 much that is absolutely endemic, but partaking also of that South- 

 Pacific flora which extends to the shores of Australia. I should also 

 now mention, as not having come within the scope of my last year's 

 review, the completion of Mr. Eyton's great work on the Compara- 

 tive Osteology of Birds ; the commencement of Mr. Elliott's ' Birds 

 of North America,' a magnificent series of large folio plates, intended 

 as a sort of supplement and companion to the great work of Audu- 

 bon, and Professor Louis Agassiz's ichthyological and geological ex- 

 pedition to Brazil. In this journey, which appears to have been 

 well planned and eminently successful, ho was accompanied by a 

 staff of six assistants (including a skilled draughtsman) whose ex- 

 penses were defrayed by Mr. Nathaniel Thayer, by six volunteer 

 assistants, by a doctor and his wife, and, last but not least, by his 

 own wife, Mrs. Agassiz, to whose pen we are indebted for a most 

 interesting as well as instructive narrative of the expedition. The 

 scientific results have not yet been published, but I shall presently 



