NATURAL HISTORY MISCELLANY. 439 
Tue PrckEoN Hawk. — Mr. Samuels, in his work on the “ Ornithology 
and Oology of New England," says that he never saw a nest of this bird, 
and never heard of but one instance of its being found in New England, but 
he adds that it doubtless breeds here. This may be true, but it seems to 
me almost as though he really could not have inquired into the matter, 
for in this very town (Amherst, Mass.), I know of three positive in- 
o 
so I do not hesitate to Sis this fact. The bird seems to be compara- 
tively common here. It seems to me as if this bird is so often here, and 
found to breed here, it must Ap that some other town or state in New 
England receives its due share of attention. —WINFRID STEARNS, Amherst, 
Mass 
THE FLIGHT or BIRDS AND INsECTS. — M. Marey has recently shown 
that birds and insects zd in a totally different manner. In birds the ex- 
rough a series of lemniscs (lemniscates, or figures e 
author has studied this intricate subject by ns of two very ingenious 
machines, one of h, by a very simple arrangement, indicates very 
o whi 
precisely the flight of an insect; while the other made to be placed on 
the back of a bird, transmits all the movements of the wing to a receiver 
which faithfully records them. — Cosmos. 
PÆDOGENESIS IN THE STYLOPIDÆ. — Professor von Siebold has dis- 
covered that the so-called female of Xenos is in re ality a larva, and that 
in s er undergoes the "jux transformations of these gall flie is 
child-reproduction, in individuals without true ov. varies, was aptly termed 
by Von Baer “ Pzedogenesis."— Siebold and Külliker's Journal of Scientific 
Zoology. : 
CURIOUS CONDUCT OF A SHARP-SHINNED Hawk. — On the 6th of April, 
while wandering along the Sepia Creek, near Trenton, N. J., I sat 
down on a convenient mat of dead grass to observe the movements of the 
“red-fins” ( Hypsilepis sche swimming in the clear waters before 
ovem 
S 
fuscus). It had evidently been visiting the grass, on which I was now 
sitting, gatheri ing from it materials for lining a nest which I soon discov- 
en the 
towards me near the ground and lit by a small tuft of grass. Walking 
around this he scratched the ground away from the roots, and then seiz- 
