38 



celata) still present January 20 in the Moravian Cemetery at 

 New Dorp. 



Dr. Frank M. Chapman gave an account of ''An Orni- 

 thological Reconnaissance in South America," a six months' 

 American Museum expedition he had led during the past 

 year. The party had visited Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Chile, 

 Argentina and Brazil. Dr. Chapman spoke particularly of the 

 immense multitudes of water-fowl along the Peruvian coast. 

 The lecture was illustrated with lantern-slides and with speci- 

 mens of interesting birds. 



February 13, 1917. — Joint meeting with the Section of 

 Biology of the New York Academy of Sciences, at the invita- 

 tion of the Section. In the absence of the President of the 

 Linnaean Society and of the Chairman of the Section of 

 Biology, Dr. F. A. Lucas was asked to preside. Sixteen 

 members (Prof. H. F. Osborn and Messrs. Chapin, Chubb, 

 Cleaves, Gladden, Granger, Heller, Hix, J. M. Johnson, Lang, 

 Marks, Murphy, J. T. Nichols, L. N. Nichols, Rogers and 

 Weber) of the Society and thirty members of the Section and 

 visitors present. 



The regular business of the Society and of the Section was 

 waived to proceed at once to a paper* by Dr. W. D. Matthew 

 (who presented it) and Mr. Walter Granger on '' A Gigantic 

 Bird from the Eocene of Wyoming." Dr. Matthew exhibited 

 and described a skeleton of Diatryma, fairly complete except 

 for lacking the sternum, found by an American Museum 

 expedition in 1916. As this genus had been known only from 

 a few bones, this was the first chance for anything like an 

 adequate conception of it. The bird had the height of 

 Struthio, but a shorter neck, far larger head, enormous biU, 

 broader pelvis, and four well-developed toes on each foot. 

 Superficially it resembled Phororachus. but the bill seemed 

 rather for crushing than for tearing, and the claws were com- 

 paratively short, straight and blunt. A large chart, lantern- 

 slides and skeletons of struthious and other birds were used in 



* See "The Skeleton of Diatryma, a Gigantic Bird from the Lower 

 Eocene of Wyoming," Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., XXXVII, Art. XI, 

 307-326; also (less technical), "A Giant Eocene Bird," Amer. AIus. 

 Journal, XVII, 417-418. 



