3794 Royal Physical Society of Edinburgh. 



stated, seemed to be by no means a common bird in this district, or it had been 

 strangely overlooked ; as, with the exception of Mr. Small, George Street, who pre- 

 pared this specimen, none of our bird-stuffers ever saw an individual which had been 

 captured in our neighbouring seas. 



Mr. Logan remarked that he had brought with him a very interesting paper on 

 this bird, published by Mr. John Wolley, which was diametrically opposed to the 

 opinions of Mr. Procter, and stating that he believed the bird to be merely the young 

 of the U. troile, although in this case the changes in the white ring would be the very 

 reverse of what takes place in the Alca torda, in which the white line on the head be- 

 comes more distinct as the bird approaches maturity. Still it bred in the same locali- 

 ties as the U. troile, and seemed in all other respects exactly to correspond. Dr. 

 Fleming doubted the propriety of a white ring or streak being looked upon as a dis- 

 tinctive character, considering how much the black and white colours vary in the 

 winter and summer plumage of many of these birds. He stated he had always been 

 in the habit of looking upon it as a mere variety of the U. troile. 



II. The Rev. John Fleming, D.D., next exhibited a recent specimen of the little 

 auk, or common rotche {Alca alle, Linn.), in its winter plumage, which had been 

 kindly sent to him by the Rev. Mr. Cunningham of Prestonpans, near which place it 

 had been taken in an exhausted state by some fishermen. Dr. John Alexander Smith 

 mentioned that another specimen of this bird had been shot in the Firth off Dalmeny 

 Park during the severe frosty weather we had about a month ago. 



III. A number of interesting specimens of snakes, insects, &c, which had been 

 collected by the Rev. H. M. Waddell, at the Mission of Old Calabar, was next exhi- 

 bited. Mr. Waddell had for some time been stationed there as a missionary for the 

 United Presbyterian Church, and on his recent return to this country he had brought 

 with him the specimens in question. These he had liberally divided among some of 

 the naturalists in this city, in order that thev might be examined, identified, and ex- 

 hibited to the Society. 



Among the objects shown, Mr. James Cunningham, W. S. (on behalf of Dr. 

 Coldstream, who was unavoidably absent), exhibited a specimen of the very curious 

 Arachnidan Phrynus lunatus of Olivier, Latreille, &c. It belongs to the tribe of 

 Solifugae (Tarentulidce) and is supposed to be very poisonous. Mr. Waddell stated 

 that this was the only specimen of the kind he had ever met with, and that it had 

 been found in an outhouse amoug some lumber. 



Dr. Lowe next reported on one or two species of Myriapoda— one of which was a 

 very large species of lulus, in which, from its size, the peculiar characters of the 

 genus were very distinctly seen. In connexion with this he gave some very interesting 

 information as to the habits of one of the British species which he had himself 

 watched. 



Mr. Andrew Murray, W. S., to whom the beetles had mostly fallen, exhibited 

 them, and reported that the principal species were Augosoma Centaurus, Fab., male 

 and female, Oryctes Monoceros, Oliv., and Diplognatha Gagates, Fab. There was 

 also a species of Oryctes, which was probably undescribed, and which at least was not 

 in the collection of the British Museum, to which he had sent it for identification. 

 The beetles shown were all of large size and sombre colours. 



Mr. li. F. Logan described eight of the insects; two gigantic spiders, one of them 

 belonging to the family Mygalidae ; and, after alluding to the fabled bird-catching 

 propensities of the genus Mygale, completely disproved by their habits, read an extract 



