SCIENTIFIC SOCIETIES. 197 



brought from Somali-land by Mr. W. H. D. Merewether, who had purchased 

 it from a caravan arriving from the southern Dolbahanta country to the S.E. 

 of Berbera. Although it corresponded in the character and disposition of the 

 stripes with the type specimen from Shoa, and with a skin in the British 

 Museum from Berbera (Proc. Zool. Soc. 1870, p. 413), it differed in the 

 stripes being brown upon a pale sandy or rufescent ground, instead of black 

 upon a white ground. It was suggested that this might be the desert form, 

 the type specimen representing the mountain form. 



Mr. Tristram Valentine also exhibited horns of Swayne's Hartebeest 

 and Clarke's Antelope (both recently described species), which, like the 

 Zebra-skin, had been lately brought from Somali-land by Mr. Merewether. 



Mr. W. S. D'Urban exhibited specimens of the Shell-slug, Testacella 

 maugei, from Devonshire. 



A paper was then read by Mr. D. Morris, " On the phenomena con- 

 cerned in the production of forked and branched Palms," the conclusions 

 arrived at being the following : — (1) Branching is habitual in certain species 

 of Hyphame ; occasional in others, and occasional also in the genera 

 Areca, Rhopalostylis, Dictyosperma, Oreodoxa, Leopoldinia, Phcenix, &c. 



(2) Branching in many cases results from injury to, or destruction of, the 

 terminal bud causing the development of axillary or adventitious buds 

 below the apex ; these buds when lengthened out produce branches. 



(3) In some cases, as in Nannorhops ritchieana and Phoenix sylvestris, 

 branching is caused by the replacement of floweriug buds by branch buds. 

 In such cases the branches are usually short and are arranged alternately 

 along the stem. The terminal bud is apparently neither injured nor 

 destroyed. 



A paper by Mr. A. W. Waters, " On the gland-like bodies in the Bryozoa," 

 was, in the absence of the author, read by Mr. W. Percy Sladen. 



Zoological Society of London. 



March 15, 1892.— Prof. W. H. Flower, C.B., LL.D., F.R.S., President, 

 in the chair. 



Mr. Sclater exhibited and made remarks on the skin of a Wild Ass 

 obtained by Mr. J. D. Inverarity in Somali-land. 



A report was read, drawn up by Mr. A. Thomson, the Society's Head- 

 Keeper, on the insects bred in the Insect House during the past season. 



Mr. Seebohm exhibited and made remarks on two pairs of Picus 

 richardsi from the island of Tsusima in the Japanese Sea. 



Mr. Oldfield Thomas exhibited and described a head (placed at his 

 disposal by Messrs. Rowland Ward & Co.) of the East-African Oryx. This 

 Antelope, commonly supposed to be the 0. beisa, was shown to differ from 



