Zoology and Geology. 377 



that will not have a large portion of them unfit for use. The most 

 smooth and polished frequently contains a large grub. These wood- 

 peckers never encroach on their packed stores until all the nuts on the 

 surface of the ground are covered with snow, when they resort to those in 

 the bark, and peck them of their contents without removing the shell from 

 the hole. The bark of the pine tree, from its great thickness, and the 

 ease of boring, is mostly sought for by these birds as their granary for 

 the winter season." — (Cassin — Birds of California and Texas.) 



Societe Zoologique d' Acclimatation. — A new Society has been esta- 

 blished in Paris under the above title. The objects of the Society are to 

 encourage the Introduction, the Acclimatation, and the Domestication 

 of useful and ornamental animals. The first meeting was held on 20th 

 January 1854, under the presidency of M. Isidore Geolfroy Saint Hilaire. 

 A report has been published, and the Society already numbers a long list 

 of members. 



Introduction of Foreign Species of Salmon. — At a meeting of " Aca- 

 demie des Sciences de Paris," 6th February 1854, Mon. Coste exhi- 

 bited to the Academy specimens of salmon that had been hatched by him 

 at the College of Frome. Similar results had been accomplished by Mons. 

 de Vibraye in the fine establishment he had constructed on the banks of 

 the Loire ; by Mon. Desrne, at his demesne in the vicinity of Saumur ; 

 by Mon. Blanchet in the department of the Isere. The acclimatation of 

 species at a distance from their native localities is not, therefore, so diffi- 

 cult as was supposed, and the following species have already been suc- 

 cessfully introduced into certain waters of France : — The Salmo hucho 

 of the Danube ; S. umbla ; coregonus fera ; and into the Lake Ballon 

 (Yosges) the great trout of the Swiss Lakes, Salmo lemanis, Cuvier.- — . 

 (Rev. and Mag. &c, Zool., 1854, p. 103.) 



Eschara cervicornis. — This zoophyte has been discovered by Mr 

 Embleton, in Embleton Bay, on the Northumberland coast. It was ex- 

 hibited at the June (1853) meeting of the Berwickshire Naturalists' Club, 

 by Dr Johnston, with the following remarks : — ■ 



" I have Mr Burke's authority for stating that our coral is the Eschara 

 cervicornis of his catalogue of marine polyzoa. He is of opinion that it 

 is identical with the Cellipora cervicornis of my British Zoophytes. The 

 two specimens differ in habit, one being attached by a solid expanded 

 base, the other by a cementation of the segments. The Cellipora cervi- 

 cornis is, moreover, more erect in its mode of growth, and more solid in 

 its texture ; but these differences may be the result of age, and of pecu- 

 liarities in the sites wherein the corals were developed. It would seem 

 that although Eschara cervicornis has been often mentioned in works on 

 the British Fauna, there are very few instances known of its occurrence 

 on our coast. Dr Fleming has not included it in his ' History of British 

 Animals,' so that the evidence for its being a native production must 

 have been weak when that very valuable work was published. The species 

 described in my ' British Zoophytes' was procured from the coast of 

 Devonshire. Mr Burke did not know the exact habitat of his British 

 species, for he seems to have seen only one. Thus Mr Embleton's is the 

 third known British specimen, and it is the more valuable, as the locality 

 is fully ascertained."' — (Proc. of BerwicJcsh. Nat. Club, 1854.) 



GEOLOGY. 



Cause of the Gray Colour in Dolomite and other Neptunian Rocks. 



Petzholdt has submitted to examination the opinion expressed by 

 Gobel, that the colouring matter of dolomite depends on the presence of 

 iron pyrites. He has examined seven different dolomites, and draws the 



