828 General Notes. 
The population of the Caucasus, which in 1858 was only 4,526,- 
000, had in 1880 risen to 5,870,000, the immigration of Cossacks 
and Russian peasants more than counterbalancing the emigration, 
while all districts have a regular excess of births over deaths. The 
Russian element is now in excess of any other, consisting of 1,410,- 
000, while the Georgians are but 1,150,000 in number, and the Les- 
ghiens and mountaineers have diminished since 1858 from 1,400,- 
000 to 1,050,000. 
Lukoma, the principal island in Lake Nyassa, though only four 
and a half miles long and two and a half wide, contains 2,500 
inhabitants. Ula, or witchcraft, of the kind described with much 
graphic force by Mr. Rider Haggard in one of his earlier works, 
prevails and is a great curse in the island. 
Herr Aug. Fitzau (Deutsche Geographische Blatter) gives an 
account of the West African seaboard between Morocco and the 
Senegal. Though Arabic is the prevalent language, he believes 
that the old Hamitic or Berber is still the chief ethnic element. 
The writer describes in detail the coast between Agadir and St. 
Louis. 
Count Teleki has ascended Mt. Kenia to a height of 15,000 feet, 
and believes its elevation to be greater than that of Kilima-njaro. 
Corrections made by Dr. H. Heyer himself in the barometrical 
observations taken during his ascent of Kilima-njaro prove that he 
did not reach within 820 feet of the summit of the mountain. 
Petermann’s Mitteilungen (Part 5) gives an account of a partial 
exploration of the small and little-known group of the era 
Islands, seven in number, and situated in 4.35 N. Lat., and 127. d 
E. Long. Only three of the islets—Karaton, re 000 
the east side of Karaton. Mengampit has a hill, 800 feet high, in 
its centre, and is well wooded, but Karaton is flat. 
GEOLOGY AND PALAZONTOLOGY. 
Tae Exrixcr Scueroperms.—By reason of the deviation from 
copy of the note on “Some Extinct Scleroderms” in the AME 
NATURALIsT for May, 1888, p. 448, it might be infe h 
were more extinct genera of Balistids than are really kama ea 
anes (1) Balistomorphus Gill (=Acanthoderma Ag. 18 errs 
traine 1835) and (2) Bucklandium Koenig (= @lyptocep 
Ag. 1843, fide Pictet, not Gottsche 1835). 
