Vol. xxix.] 84 



Mr. Rothschild said : — " I can fully endorse Mr. Wallis's 

 remarks as to the taraeness of the House-Bunting, and con- 

 sider the most interesting point about this bird is its curious 

 distribution in Algeria. It is found all along the edges ot 

 tiie north-east and north central portion of the Sahara, and 

 is entirely absent from most of the actual desert, though an 

 isolated colony exists in the towns of the Mzab Valley .^^ 



Mr. Meaue-Waldo added that the Moorish House- 

 Bunting, although a resident in houses, villages, &c., occa- 

 sionally wandered far afield, and he had seen these birds 

 in the mountains far removed from any buildings at an 

 elevation of at least 4000 feet. He said that the birds had 

 a habit of occasionally making an unsuitable site for a nest 

 serve their purpose by preparing a foundation of clods of 

 earth and small stones, on the top of which the nest was 

 placed. 



Mr. Wallis also exhibited two clutches of eggs of the 

 Algerian Blackbird {Turdus merula mauretanica, Hartert) — 

 one from a whitethorn tree at Hammam Meskoutine, the 

 other from a palm tree at El Kantara. These eggs were 

 smaller than typical eggs of the British form. 



Mr. Rothschild added that the eggs and nesting-habits 

 of Blackbirds all over the world were very similar, but the 

 female of the Algerian Blackbird was very different from the 

 European bird, being almost as uniform black as the male. 



i\rr. J. H. Gurnet exhibited a chick of the Gannet [Sula 

 bassana) in its embryonic stage, and made the following 

 remarks : — 



" This embryo Gannet is almost in the exact position 

 which it occupied in the egg-shell, and would probably have 

 been hatched in less than two days. It will be seen that 

 the head, which has grown more rapidly than the body, and 

 is disproportionately large, lies curled up on one side, but 

 rather nearer to the large end of the egg, which doubtless 

 traverses the oviduct foremost in the process of being laid. 



