ZOOLOGY. 559 
new idea into him unconnected with money. But he sticks stoutly 
to his dusty cradle, and never attempts to escape, saying plainly 
enough, ‘My mother told me to stop here till she brought me my 
supper; and here I am going to stay.” — EARL or PEMBROKE in 
South-Sea Bubbles, p. 143.— Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist. 
GEOGRAPHICAL VARIATION. — At the meeting of the Boston 
Society of Natural History on June 19, Mr. J. A. Allen made 
some further remarks on ‘‘ Geographical Variation in North Amer- 
ican Birds,” a subject to which he had called the attention of the 
Society at a previous meeting, at which he exhibited specimens 
illustrating the general facts of geographical variation. He briefly, 
referred to the smaller size, generally darker colors, larger beaks, 
longer claws and longer tails characterizing, as a general rule, 
individuals of the same species living at the southern borders of 
their respective habitats as compared with those living further 
northward, and the paler tints òf those inhabiting the arid portions 
of the interior of the continent, as compared with those of the 
moister adjoining districts. He alluded to the changes of nomen- 
clature that must naturally result from the now known intergra- 
dation of forms formerly regarded as specifically differentiated, 
such intergradation showing them to be geographical races and not 
Species; and called attention to the coincidence of the occurrence 
of the brighter colored birds, not only as respects the avian class 
as a whole, but in respect to families and genera, within the 
tropical and subtropical regions, and also the occurrence within 
the same regions of all forms in which the bill or tail was 
remarkably developed ; and finally passed to a consideration of 
the bearing of the general facts of geographical variation upon 
the question of the genesis of species. While admitting the laws 
so-called natural and sexual selection to be potent influences in 
the differentiation of animals, he thought that they were secoridary 
rather than primary agencies, and that the conditions of environ- 
ment, and especially those of a geographical or climatic character, 
exercised a greater influence than evolutionists were generally 
wating to admit, and also that the “ laws of acceleration and retar- 
dation,” as shown by Professors Hyatt and Cope, were necessary 
to explain a certain class of phenomena presented by “ modifica- 
tion by descent.” 
_ Although some of the modifications of color were undoubtedly 
