NATURAL HISTORY MISCELLANY. 127 
tirai GILLs IN Ganorp Fises. — Steindachner has pied hus 
lyp- 
terus Senegalus external branchiw occur when they are youn In T new 
species, P. Lapradei, the branchie persist in individuals yb viua inches 
long. They consist of a long, flattened band, with fringed edges, very 
like the external branchis of the axolotls; there is a single one on each 
side behind the operculum, and it does not pass the posterior margin 
of the pectoral fin. In P. Senegalus this transitory organ SEEPI 
sooner, and is no longer to be found in specimens measuring thre 
half to four inches in length. That these are respiratory organs en been 
proved by the anatomical investigations of Professor Hyrtl. — Annals 
and Magazine of .Natural History. 
Tur LIMBS OF ICHTHYOSAURUS AND PLESIOSAURUS. — Dr. Gegenbaur of 
Jena, has recently published an essay on the nature of the limbs of Ich- 
thyosaurus and Plesiosaurus. He indicates that the homologies of the 
paddle of the former are best understood by reference to the fin of the 
Selachians, especially of the sharks, a most important point. He accepts 
the view of the great importance of the differences between i 
sauroid fishes, and therefore a basis for the estimation of the origin of 
the distal portions of limbs from the simplest form — the simple ray. — 
. D. COPE. 
THE ORGANS OF HEARING AND SMELL IX INSECTS. — Mr. Lowne, in a 
which are remarkably dilated, and are covered with minute — 
communicating with little sacs in the interior. The halteres he rega 
as t of hearing, their cavity being filled by a very large nerve 
terminating in nerve cells, which is connected with a number of small, 
highly — bodies, regularly arranged around the base of the organ. 
ALBINO BanN SwaLLow.-——In the month of July of last year, near 
Saco, Maine, I observed a flock of Barn Swallows (Hirundo horreorum 
Barton), one of the individuals of which was pure white or nearly so. — 
P. ATKINSON 
Tue Sars Funp.— At a parlor lecture delivered in Salem by Mr. E. S. 
Morse, the sum of twenty-nine dollars and fifty cents ($29.50) was raised 
for the family of the late Professor Michael Sars, of Christiania. Liberal 
sums have already been'subscribed in London and Paris. 
