410 General Notes. | April, 
1342 fathoms; three species of a new genus allied to Pasiphe 
and also to Hymenodora ; a Penæid of the genus Aristzas, a foot 
in length, and a large Sergestes, three inches long. The size of 
these new shrimps is remarkable, but is greatly exceeded by that 
of some of the deep-sea crabs. Thus the great spiny Lithodes 
agassizii has a carapace seven inches in lengthand six in width, 
and measures above three feet over the outstretched legs. 
Arachnidans—The development of Chelifer differs from that 
of other arachnids in the existence of a larval state as yet little 
known, and the structure of which has been found by M. J. Bar- 
rois to be more complicated than was stated by Metschnikoff. 
The number of pairs of feet is five. The nutritive vitellus is sur- 
rounded by a layer of exodermal cells preceded by an ample 
organ of suction opening on the ventral aspect between the two 
large claws (second pair). The whole forms a digestive apparatus 
destined to pass nutritive material into the interior of the larva. 
The larva is fixed upon the ventral face of its mother, and sub- 
sists parasitically upon her. The sucking apparatus is destined 
to fall, and its mode of elimination is singular. In the earlier 
Stage the ventral nervous band consists of two parts, one in front 
of, the other behind the sucking organ. Afterwards, when the 
two bands are united into a continuous cord, the sucking organ 
is thrust outwards, becomes attached only by a thin cord below 
the definitive mouth, and falls at the same time with the larval 
envelope. 
Fishes——Karl Mobries, in a letter to Nature, maintains that 
flying fish are incapable of flight “ for the simple reason that the 
_ muscles of their pectoral fins are not large enough to bear the 
weight of their body aloft in the air.” The pectoral muscles of 
birds weigh on an average } of the total weight of the body, 
those of bats 75, those of the flying fish only +. The impulse 
is given while still in the water by the powerful masses of muscle 
along the sides of the body, masses which are larger than in any 
other fishes of similar size. The flickering motion which has 
been noticed is only a vibration of the elastic membrane of the 
pectorals, which occurs whenever the fins are in a horizontal 
position parallel to the wind. 
the natives. The last moa hunt of which memory is preserved, 
according to Mr. White, took place near Whalatone, in the Bay 
of Plenty. The feathers of birds killed there were until recently 
_ inthe hands of a chief named Appanui. _ 
