38 



mainly dependent upon tlieir mother's milk. In another six 

 weeks — that is to say, three months after captiu'e — they were 

 three-fourths their mother's size, and apparently quite capable of 

 fending for themselves. 



Mr. PococK also exhibited two young examples of a Degu 

 {Octodon degus), born from a pair from Valparaiso, presented by 

 Mr. Walter Goodfellow, F.Z.S. The mother had a litter of four, 

 but died from inability to give birth to a fifth. The little ones 

 were fed by hand, and although two of them quickly died from 

 pneumonia, the remaining two throve and promised to do well. 

 Like the young of all Hystricomorphous rodents, the Degus ai'e 

 of large size at birth and open their eyes within twenty-four hours, 

 and are in every respect very precocious as compared with young 

 rats. Particular attention was directed to the lateral position of 

 the teats in the Degu, a condition which is repeated in the Yiscacha 

 and Chinchilla and the Coypu. This condition is probably an 

 adaptation to the large size of the young, which are enabled to 

 suck lying alongside the mother, so that they do not interfere 

 with each other. In the Coypu, as first described by Owen, the 

 teats are higher up the side than in the Chinchilla and the Degu, 

 an arrangement which permits the young of that species, it has 

 been alleged, to suck while swimming alongside their mother in 

 the water. 



Mr. D. Seth-Smith, F.Z.S., Curator of Birds, exhibited a 

 spirit-specimen of a young Toucanet [Selenidera 'maculirostris) 

 which had been hatched in the Society's Gardens in July, and 

 called special attention to the well-developed seri^ated pads on 

 the back of the ankle-joint or heel. This pad had been pre- 

 viously observed in the nestlings of Woodpeckers, Wrynecks, 

 and Barbets, and it was only to be expected that it would be 

 present also in the Toucans. 



The use of this serrated pad, which disappeai's soon after the 

 young bird leaves the nest, is doubtless to enable it to climb np 

 the side of the hollow cavity in a tree in which it is hatched — 

 these pads forming, as it were, a second set of claws. It is note- 

 woi-thy that no such pads are found in the Parrots, which nest 

 in similar situations to those chosen by Barbets and Toucans, but 

 which are provided with a hooked beak which aids them in 

 climbing. 



Mr. C. Tate Began, M.A., F.Z.S., exhibited a specimen of 

 Melanocetus johnsonii Giinther, a curious fish having an enormous 

 mouth armed with slender, pointed, depressible teeth and an 

 extraordinarily distensible stomach. It has the first ray of the 

 spinous dorsal fin situated on the snout and modified into a 

 line and bait, the latter being a luminous bulb. 



