HISTORY OF THE SOCIETY. 487 



first joint, and the form and size of the scutellae, this bird, the 

 Professor remarked, seemed to hold a prominent place between 

 the geuus Pyrgita and Tanagra. 



Rubecola Tytleri. — The Professor applied the specific term 

 Tytleri, to a Rubecola which he described, in honour of the late- 

 Lieutenant Tytler, a very active ornithologist, whose labours in 

 India have added much to the interest of the Royal Museum of 

 the University of Edinburgh, and remarked, that although it 

 agreed in the grouping of its colours with the common robin, 

 yet, in the form of the bill, it presented as it were a link be- 

 tween the genus Rubecola and Phoenecura. The specimen was 

 sent to the Royal Museum by Lieutenant Tytler from the Hima- 

 layan Mountains. 



A series of specimens of the Muscipeta paradisi, Cuv., were 

 exhibited by the Professor, for the purpose of pointing out that 

 the Muscipeta indica is but a sexual variety ; and he stated this 

 from the examination of a large series of specimens lately re- 

 ceived from the Himmaleh Mountains, some of which shewed 

 the passage of the one into the other. In its distribution this 

 species is very wide, occurring spread over all India and China ; 

 and identically the same species is found in Africa. 



A fine live specimen of the Noctua nivea, hitherto confounded 

 with the Noctua nyctea, it was announced had been found in 

 Orkney. 



TWENTY-NINTH SESSION. 



Sir Patrick Walker, Vice-President, in the chair. — Mr James 1835. 



Nov. 21. 

 Wilson read Mr P. J. Selby's account of the animals inha- 

 biting the county of Sutherland, and particularly of the birds 

 observed during the excursion thither of a party of naturalists 

 in the summer of 1834. — Professor Jameson communicated a 

 brief notice of some observations, by M. Arago, on the Light of 

 Halley's Comet, finally determining that cometic light is derived 

 from the sun, and not dependent on any kind of phosphorescence 

 inherent in the comet itself. He also made some remarks on the 



