470 Scientific Intelligence. 



The explosion of the original meteor yielded three pieces ; of 

 these, the main mass recovered weighed about 7 pounds ; a second 

 small piece was found but lost and a third has not been found. 

 The material of the meteorite is soft and friable, resembling 

 somewhat the stones of Warrenton, Missouri, and Lance, France, 

 though darker than the former and more chondritic than the lat- 

 ter. It consists essentially of the minerals olivine, augite, and 

 enstatite, with troilite and native iron, the silicates occurring in 

 the form of chondrules, or associated more or less fragmental 

 particles, embedded in a dark, opaque, or faintly translucent base^ 

 which is irresolvable so far as the microscope is concerned. The 

 non-metallic portion (including troilite and chromite) made up 

 97 per cent of the whole and nickeliferous iron only 3 per cent. 

 The dark color of the stone is attributed to carbon distributed as 

 minute flakes of graphite. — Proc. IT. S. Nat. Museum, xxiv, 192. 



III. Zoology. 



1. Note on the Nomenclature of Bermuda Birds. — Mr. A. 

 Hyatt Vereill published a short paper on the Bermuda avi- 

 fauna in this Journal for July, 1901 (issued the last of June). 

 He also printed a more detailed article in "The Osprey," v, 

 pp. 83-85, for June, 1901, with figures of the three following 

 species and of the Tropic Bird, photographed from life. In 

 these articles he described the Bermuda Cardinal Bird and the 

 Blue Bird as new sub-species, peculiar to Bermuda. The Cardi- 

 nal Bird he named Cardinalis cardinalis Somersii ; the Blue 

 Bird, Sialia sialis Bermudensis ; the Ground Dove, Columbi- 

 gallina passerina Bahamensis. 



Outram Bangs and Thos. S. Bradlee also published a paper on 

 the Birds of Bermuda in "The Auk" for July, 1901, pp. 249- 

 257, in which new names are given to two of these birds and 

 two others, which they call new species. 



They name the Ground Dove, Columbigallina bermudiana / 

 the White-eyed Vireo, Vireo bermudianus ; the Catbird, Galeo- 

 scoptes bermudianus ; the Cardinal, Cardinalis bermudianus. 

 Mr. Verrill's article in this Journal appears to have been pub- 

 lished a few days earlier than the latter. 



To me it seems quite useless to regard these very slightly dif- 

 ferentiated forms as distinct "species." The differences noted 

 in the Ground Dove, Catbird, and Vireo, are trivial and scarcely 

 sufficient to constitute varieties. To consider them as "sub- 

 species" is certainly a sufficient strain on the much-stretched 

 meaning of the term " sub-species." I should at most call these 

 mere local varieties, scarcely differentiated. 



In respect to the Ground Dove, there are reasons for believing 

 that it was introduced to Bermuda from the Bahamas, since the 

 settlement of the islands, like many other things. None of the 

 earlier writers mentioned it in the lists of birds that they gave. 



