18 



vinons-red colour over a considerable part of the body, especially 

 the breast and wings, and another in which there was no vinous 

 colour, but a neutral drab. These facts seem to indicate that 

 segregation occurs between colour and white in Mendelian 

 fashion, but that the segregation is not complete, that the colour 

 is not a permanent unit, but undergoes subdivision. 



Mr. D. Seth- Smith, r.Z.S.., Curator of Birds, exhibited lantern- 

 slide photographs of " intensive " poultry-houses, and remarked 

 that the Council had decided to hold an exhibition of laying 

 hens, kept on the intensive system, with a view to educating the 

 public to the possibility and importance of keeping poultry for 

 egg-production, even though their accommodation was limited 

 to a. suburban garden or even a back yard. The system was 

 explained, and stress laid upon the importance of correct feeding 

 and sufficient exercise, the latter being provided by the birds 

 being compelled to scratch for their grain, which must be buried 

 under deep litter. 



The Exhibitor stated that the houses were of three sizes, to 

 accommodate from six to thirty birds, and had been lent to the 

 Society by Mr. Randolph Meech, who was the pioneer of the 

 system in this country. The exhibition would be open to 

 the public on April 8th, and some two hundred birds would be 

 on view. 



Prof. J. P. Hill, D.Sc, F.R.S., F.Z.S., exhibited living speci- 

 mens of the Cfecilian, Siphonops annulatus, collected by the Percy 

 Sladen Expedition at Theresopolis, Serra dos Orgaos, Brazil, in 

 October 1913. He also exhibited a series of photographs of 

 embryos of the same, obtained from eggs laid at University 

 College. 



Mr. G. A. BouLENGER, F.R.S., F.Z.S., read a paper " On the 

 Lizards allied to Lacerta 7nu7-alis, with an Account of Lacerta 

 agilis and L. p>aTva" 



This paper is the third and last instalment of a revision of the 

 "Wall- Lizards, of which the first two parts were published in the 

 ' Transactions' in 1905 and 1913. 



The author has endeavoured to depart from the empirical 

 method usually followed in the arrangement of species, by tracing 

 back the various forms of this difficult group to a hypothetical 

 ancestor of which Lacerta agilis appeai-s to be the nearest living 

 representative. The characters of lepidosis and coloration on 

 which his views are based are discussed, and detailed descriptions 

 are given of L^ agilis and its ally L. parva, the latter being 

 regarded as the connecting-link between the first and fourth of 

 the six sections into which it is proposed to divide the genus 

 Lacerta. All the species of the fourth section, of which the 

 type, L, micralis, has been dealt with in the previous contri- 



