554 NATURAL HISTORY MISCELLANY. 
plates commence calcification within the skin of the young Radiate as 
circular grains, and increase at their periphery until they impinge against 
being determined by the number of other plates they impinge against. 
The plate he figures happens to have six, but many others upon the same 
individual had a different number and their angles were often unequal in 
the same plate. The hexagonal outline of the microscopic bodies in the 
retina is uniform in all because they are uniform in size and consistence. 
The plates of Radiates are not uniform because their r of calcifica- 
tion are usually located at unequal distances. By this it will be seen that 
the number of angles any plate receives is essentially accidental and bears 
to make it harmonize with the crystalline structure of snow-flakes, etc. 
noni 

SaGaciry OF THE PunPLE ManrrN. In the spring of 1868, a young 
friend of mine in this city desiring to obtain eggs of the Purple Martin, 
constructed a nesting-box and hung it out of the window. This box had 
a hole on the outside for the entrance of the birds, and a hole on the 
inside through which to reach the hand and remove the eggs. The birds 
at once ed the box, and he succeeded in procuring specimens 
of the eggs 
This socie (1869) the birds again built in the box, and having secured 
his eggs, my friend concluded to preserve a specimen of the birds. He 
reached through the back hole in the box and seized one of the birds, and 
killed and mounted it. The mate was absent for a day or two, when i 
returned with a companion, and both birds built a mud wall, shutting 
up the back hole into the box from which a bird had been taken, and then 
went on and raised a brood of young. — D. D. HUGHES 
THE CAPTURE OF THE CENTRONYX BAIRDII AT IPS On Dec. 
4th, 1868, I shot a sparrow that was new to me, on the anita at Ips- 
ch. Through the kindness of Prof. S. F. Baird, of the Smithsonian In- ` 
stitation, to whom I sent it for comparison ed the only extant specimen. 
of the Centronyx Bairdii (which is owned by him), it has been proved 
identical with that collected by Audubon in ak on the banks of the 
Kanon esos in the far We 
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ted “A Guide to Naturalists in collecting and preserving objects of Nat- 
Bas L | hich will aio 
some of the rarer species occur. A €: zed engrav- 
captured at Ipswich will also be d 
much interested in a discovery that I made wun to the length 




