5834 Repfiles. — Fishes. 



the nutcracker, in consequence of its fondness for the cones, is called Arven Fogel. I 

 found these birds particularly numerous in the forest, which the path leading to the 

 RifFelberg traverses, which must be familiar to every visitor to Zermatt. They were 

 so tame that I have often approached within ten yards of them before they flew away, 

 and I have frequently watched them, perched on the topmost branch of a Pinus Cem- 

 bra, hammering vigorously with their powerful bills at the cones, which contain hard 

 nut-like seeds, the kernels of which they seemed to prefer to any other kind of food. 

 I have occasionally seen them alight on the stem of a tree like a woodpecker. With 

 the assistance of a native Chasseur I obtained specimens. I found the bill consider- 

 ably longer than it is represented in the Plate in Yarrell's ' British Birds,' and not so 

 stout. In flying the white under tail-coverts are conspicuous. I observed these birds 

 also in some other parts of Switzerland, in fact wherever I saw Pinus Cembra, but 

 nowhere in such abundance as at Zermatt. At Chamounix I saw several specimens 

 of that beautiful bird, the wall-creeper, running about the masses of rock on the mo- 

 raine of the Mer de Glace. — E. Cavendish Taylor; Doncaster, October 15, 1857. 

 [There are two supposed species of nutcracker on the Continent : Nucifraga caryoca- 

 tactes, with a long slender bill ; and N. brachyrhynchus, figured by Mr. Yarrell, with a 

 short conical bill. An admirably illustrated paper on this subject will be found at p. 

 1073 of the 'Zoologist.'— E. N.] 



Occurrence of rare Sea Birds near Cambridge. — On the 28th of September a mag- 

 nificent young male of the pomarine skua (Lestris pomarinus) was shot at Marston ; 

 it is just in that state of plumage so admirably figured by the late lamented Mr. Yar- 

 rell in his excellent work on British Birds: a few days subsequently an adult male 

 was procured. On the 9th of the present month (October) some boys caught a tired- 

 out bird on the turnpike road near Cottenham, which proved to be a female of the 

 great skua (Lestris catarractes) ; and since then no less than six have been killed, three 

 of each sex. One specimen of the arctic skua (L. parasiticus) has also occurred here, 

 but I do not know the date. On the afternoon of Thursday, October 8, a farmer shot 

 a specimen of the common tern (Sterna hirundo) ; it was sitting on his cow-shed at 

 Hardwick, in this county. — Samuel Parker Savi lie ; 13, Regent Street, Cambridge, 

 October 15, 1857. 



The Great Weever (Trachinus Draco) taken near Banff. — A very fine specimen of 

 the great weever, or king bull, was taken near this place about a fortnight since. 

 This fish appears to be rare in our firth ; at least I know of but one other captured 

 here, and that so long ago as 1810 ; neither did any of our fishermen who saw this 

 specimen thrown on shore know what it was, a fact that shows its great rarity. — 

 Thomas Edward ; Banff", October 19, 1857. 



Lithobius forcipatus Luminous. — The phosphorescent properties of Geophilus 

 electricus have long been known, and the reported phosphorescence of a second spe- 

 cies, Scolopendra phosphorea, has been taken for granted, although we have no very 

 precise data whence to derive conclusions either as to the species or properties of the 

 last-named animal. I have to announce a third Myriapod gifted with the phospho- 

 rescent properties. My relation, Mr. Samuel Hallam, a chemist residing at Weston- 



