78 Miscellaneous Intelligence. 



carried by the winds and by birds ; and the winds were of sec- 

 ondary importance. The peopling was carried forward rapidly, 

 as the recent origin of the lakes proves. The extreme fecundity 

 of most of the aquatic types and their remarkable faculty of 

 adaptation to cold, heat, and impure waters, and at the same 

 time the freedom from struggle for existence explains why the 

 waters could become so quickly peopled while still decidedly 

 impure from volcanic agency. Further, the study of the aquatic 

 fauna leads to the conclusion that the terrestrial fauna is equally 

 due to the fortuitous introduction of species either from the con- 

 tinents or from the nearer archipelagos or islands of the Atlantic. 

 The fact of greater differentiations in the terrestrial fauna than 

 in the aquatic, and especially in the mollusks (of which the 

 species of JBulimus are examples), is a consequence of the much 

 less frequent transportation of the types constituting it and of its 

 more ancient origin. Among amphipod crustaceans the Orchestia 

 Chevreuxi, reported as new, is probably a modified marine form. 

 At a former epoch, when the oceanic currents or conditions were 

 different from now, various species have been brought to the 

 archipelago on floating bodies and even upon ice. The presence 

 of erratic blocks on the shores of Terceira and Santa Maria sus- 

 tains this conclusion. 



The alpine character often attributed to the fauna M. Guerne 

 does not regard as established. The species so considered are 

 those of very wide distribution. The present fauna will probably 

 be soon more or less displaced by new introductions. 



III. Miscellaneous Scientific Intelligence. 



1. Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of 

 Science, for 1888. — The date of August 22d, for the meeting of the 

 Association at Cleveland, has been changed by the Local Com- 

 mittee to the 15th, on account of another great fathering to take 

 place there that week. The special office and reception rooms of 

 the Association will be at No. 407 Superior street, next door to the 

 Hollenden, where will be the hotel headquarters. The meetings 

 will be held at the Central High School Building on Wilson Ave- 

 nue, where will be the offices of the Local Committee and of the 

 Permanent Secretary during the week of the meeting. 



2. Annual Report of the Board of Regents of the Smithso- 

 nian Institution, showing the operations, expenditures and con- 

 dition of the Institution to July, 1885. Part II. — This volume of 

 940 pages is occupied, after reports of progress in the several de- 

 partments, with an illustrated descriptive report by Thomas Don- 

 aldson, of the George Catlin Indian Gallery, in the U. S. Na- 

 tional Museum, with a memoir and statistics. It is illustrated by 

 nearly 150 plates and maps, which have wide ethnographic, his- 

 torical and geographic value. 



3. Lick Observatory, University of California. — The Lick 



