450 General Notes. [June, 
general assent, especially as we see that the importance of the 
subject does not require exaggeration. Of course the individual 
farmer or gardener could, by intelligent and careful management, 
if he knew just what to do, increase the value of his own birds 
far beyond his individual share of the above-mentioned general 
aggregate. 
“ It is thus made probable that the birds intervene continuously 
between us and the complete destruction of our most important 
industries, the irretrievable financial ruin of nearly our whole 
population.” 
In conclusion, Mr. Forbes does not, with his present knowledge 
of economical entomology, attach any great economical value to 
the thrush family ; it appears from his paper that they often eat 
many insects beneficial to agriculture, particularly ground beetles, 
still he would treat this question with careful conservatism, and 
not turn the delicate balance of nature by the extermination or 
undue breeding of birds. 
ZooLocicaL Notes. — The study of the Siphonophores is 
advanced by two excellent papers by Mr. W. J. Fewkes, in the 
Proceedings of the Boston Society of Natural History, one on the 
structure of Rhizophysa filiformis, and the other on the tubes in 
the larger nectocalyx of Adyla pentagona, both Mediterranean 
forms. Mr. Tewkes has added three Siphonophores to our New 
England fauna. To the same number of the Proceedings, Dr. 
W. K. Brooks contributes a paper on the development of the 
digestive tract in Mollusks. Dr. Fritz Miiller has discovered 
a minute Ostracod Crustacean, like Cythere, living in the tree tops 
of the Bromeliaceze in Southern Brazil. It appears that these 
, tree tops harbor a host of animals, including the larva of insects, 
even the tadpoles of treefrogs here undergoing their transforma- 
mann, this is the exclusive mode of respirations. Mr. Hartog 
now shows (in the Quarterly Fournal of Microscopical Science for 
April) that it occurs in several Copepod Crustacea. He also 
describes how the Hydra swallows its prey. The part played by 
the tentacles ceases as soon as the mouth comes in contact with 
the food. The hydra then slowly stretches itself over the food 
and engulfs it, the tentacles usually turning away from the food. 
ANTHROPOLOGY.? 
A DICTIONARY AND GRAMMAR OF THE AIMARA Lanauace.— The 
literature of aboriginal languages has just been favored with an 
important addition in the shape of a “ Dictionary and Grammar 
of the Aimara language,” spoken in the southern portion of Peru, 
by the Collas (pron. Colyas) and other tribes. This language 1 
1Edited by Prof. Oris T. MAsoNn, Columbian College, Washington, D. C 
