540 



SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



[June 8, I J 



home, or if a hard and protracted winter has reduced the 

 supply of food, emigration becomes a matter of necessity. 



It is also suggested that the wandering species may 

 have been, in the remote past, regular annual migrants 

 which have gradually settled down and become station- 

 ary, yet now and then revert to their ancestral habit. 



Very general attention has been drawn this year to the 

 appearance in considerable numbers of Syrrhaptes para- 

 doxus, a bird inhabiting the steppes of Central Asia, It 

 is generally known as the " Tartary Sand Grouse," as 

 Pallas's Sand Grouse (from its discoverer), or as the 

 " Partridge of the Steppes." Of this stranger more than 

 a hundred specimens have been seen in Britain this 

 season, whilst in Central Europe it has been plentiful, 

 from Pomerania to Dalmatia. 



Strictly speaking this bird, of which we subjoin an 

 illustration, is not a grouse at all, but a partridge. It is 

 rather smaller than our common partridge. Its colour is 

 f^r the most part an impure ye"low,pas3ing into a light bay. 

 The head, throat, and the region of the eyes are orange-co- 

 loured, the breast grey, and the belly black. The wings are 

 of a dark-brown, and the back is striped transversely with 

 black. Ithas only three toes ; thefeathers on the feet, which 

 come down to the toes, resemble hair. The middle tail- 

 feathers and the tips of the wings are long and pointed. 

 It is swift on the wing, and is therefore not especially 

 debarred from a migratory life. In China its cry of 

 " truck-turuck, truck-turuck," is often heard in the valley 

 of the Hoang Ho. 



We must not suppose that the steppe-partridge is this 

 year making its first appearance in Europe. It was dis- 

 covered by Pallas, to the west of the Caspian in 1773. 

 The first specimen seen in Europe was in 1848. In 

 July 1S59, one was killed near Norwich, and a few 

 others were seen. In 1863 they entered Europe in 

 thousands, spreading from Archangel to Albania, and as 

 far westwards as the coast of Donegal. A single bird 

 was found at Plauen, in Saxon}', in June 1864, perhaps a 

 survivor of the flocks of the previous year. In 1872 a 

 few were seen in Northumberland and in Ayrshire. In 

 1876 a single specimen occurred at Modena in Italy. 



Since that time none have been recognised in Europe 

 until the present season. They appeared about the end 

 of April in various parts of Germany, Austria and Hun- 

 gary, and have since spread on to England. 



Here, the headquarters at once of humanitarianism 

 and of the wanton destruction of animal life, they will 

 fare badly. The " Wild Birds Protection Act " is simply a 

 dead letter which no one cares for or dares to put in force. 

 For the benefit of the exterminators we may say that 

 the sand-grouse, or steppe-partridge, is but indifferent 

 eating. We must remember that rare birds have to 

 dread, not merely the gamekeer and the " rough," but 

 the pseudo-naturalist, who is always eager to secure a 

 " British specimen " of any bird or insect. 



Milk and Butter Trees, — The rich and httle-known 

 vegetation of Upper Senegal and Upper Niger includes 

 curious forest specimens, whose fruit or sap furnish men 

 with food products analogous to milk and butter. In 

 the first place, we may mention a sort of oak called the 

 karit6. This tree bears iruit somewhat like that of the 

 horse chestnut tree, and having a white and compact 

 flesh. These nuts, dried in a furnace and then decorti- 

 cated, are crushed and powdered, and the resulting pasty 

 flour is put into cold water. This forms a white substance 

 of buttery aspect, which rises to the surface of the 



liquid, and which, beaten and pressed, constitutes a sort 

 of butter which the natives use as a food. Commander 

 Gallieni, who has studied this substance and its produc- 

 tion in situ, considers it very nourishing, and thinks that 

 it might also be used for making soaps and candles 

 analogous to those manufactured from paraffin. In 

 Venezuela, the karite has a vegetable competitor in a 

 tree of another species, the tubayba. In this case, it is 

 the abundant lacteous sap of the tree that is utilised. 

 This is collected by the natives by simply making an 

 incision in the bark. According to explorers, the milk 

 of this tree is fatty, has an agreeable odour, and is 

 nutritive. Perhaps the most remarkable of these milk 

 trees is found in the forests of British Guiana. The 

 pith and bark of this tree contain so large a quantity of 

 sap that the least incision made in the surface causes the 

 valuable liquid to flow. The natives hold it in high 

 esteem as a food. This product, called hya-hya, not 

 only resembles milk in appearance, but also in unctuous- 

 ness and taste. — Scientific American. 



The Food of Bee Larv^. — Dr. Adolf von Planta 

 {Zeitschrift fiir Physiolog. Cliemie) shows that the food 

 prepared by the bees for the larvse respectively of 

 queens, drones, and workers, is regularly distinct in its 

 character. 



Occurrence of Fluorine in Animal Matter. — 

 According to G. Tammann {Zciischrift fiir Physiolog. 

 Chemic) fluorine occurs not only, as previously ascer- 

 tained, in bones, in the brain, and in peas and barley, but 

 in hen's eggs. Here the shell contains a mere trace of 

 fluorine, the white a little more, and the yolk decidedly 

 more. From this gradual concentration we may suspect 

 that fluorine plays an important physiological part in 

 organisms. Fluorine is also found in the milk and blood 

 of cows. 



A New Weather Prophet. — At the Jubilee Flower 

 Show at Vienna there was exhibited a mimosa, which 

 is said to foretell, or to enable its owner to foretell, storms 

 and earthquakes forty-eight hours in advance. The 

 sensitiveness of certain plants to light is, of course, well 

 known, and they may, for anything we dare assert to the 

 contrary, react to atmospheric conditions of which we 

 know nothing. But we must beg to reserve judgment on 

 this wonderful plant until its indications have been syste- 

 matically studied. 



Zoometrical Appliances. — M. G. Demeny (Comptes 

 Rendus) has constructed instruments for the accurate 

 determination of the external form of the thorax, the 

 extent of the respiratory movements, the profiles and sec- 

 tions of the trunk, and the volume of air inhaled and 

 exhaled. 



The Buzzard, — Some discussion has occurred in a 

 contemporary as to the diet of this bird. We quite agree 

 that it is not to be regarded with hostility by game pre- 

 servers, and we wish to point out that it is useful as a 

 destroyer of vipers. These snakes are on the increase 

 in some parts of England, owing to the war waged by 

 gamekeepers against their chief enemy, the hedgehog. 



Cultivation of Sponges in the Adriatic. — Professor 

 Oscar Schmidt, of the University of Gratz, has, according 

 to Cosmos, instituted a series of experiments calculated 



