1881.] Scientific News. ea ok 
work of a dog. The lamb was taken out, and was, strange to say, 
little the worse of its burial. A diligent watch was instituted, 
with the result that the depredator—a collie dog——was captured 
in the act of burying another lamb, which was also alive. 
— The new building at South Kensington for the British Mu- 
seum was finished last June, and the geological, botanical and 
mineralogical specimens have been removed from the old build- 
i The zoological collections, which are equal in bulk to the 
other three collectively, have yet to be removed, as the necessary 
funds for this purpose have not yet been appropriated. Professor 
wen, the veteran Superintendent of the Natural History Collec- 
tion, still actively directs the labors of his assistants. A  bio- 
graphical notice of Professor Owen and an excellent portrait by 
Jeens appeared in Nature. He has lately designed an index mu- 
seum in the new building, intended “to show the type characters 
of the principal groups of organized beings,” thus epitomizing 
nearly the entire museum. 
— The members of the expedition which, under the auspices 
of the Archeological Institute of America, is to investigate 
the ruins of the city of Assos, in Asia Minor, will sail this 
week in the steamship Germanic, of the White Star Line. The 
party comprises Joseph Thatcher Clarke, of Boston, who will act 
as the leader; Francis Henry Bacon, of this city; Maxwell Wrig- 
ley, of Brooklyn, and two or three other gentlemen who are inter- 
ested in archeological research. Through the Department of 
State, the Turkish Government has offered the members of the 
expedition every assistance in its power. Assos is on the south- 
ern coast of Mysia, opposite the island of Lesbos, and contains 
among other things the ruins of a Doric temple, a theatre, and 
massive fortification walls. 
— The following calculation as to the total number of existing 
botanical species, has been recently made by Dr. Miller, of Geneva. 
We have at present in our books about 130,000 species, and if we 
suppose that 30,000 (in round numbers), belong to countries like 
Europe and North America, where there are hardly any species, 
but some cryptogams to be discovered, the remainder, or 100,000, 
representing exotic plants, more or less tropical and southern, we 
may double the latter for new species, giving 200,000 for these 
less known regions, and altogether 230,000 for the whole globe, 
with the exception of countries still quite unknown botanically. 
Adding only 20,000 species for the latter, we reach a minimum 
sum of 250,000 species of plants. 
Dr. B. W. Richardson, in a paper read before the Sanitary 
Institute (Exeter, September 20, 1880), seems to approach the 
position of Professor Jager. He writes: ‘‘ Go into the wards of a 
