SCIENTIFIC SUMMARY. 
223 
lowing were cliosen officers for the first session : — President — Dr. J. H. 
Gladstone, F.R.S. Vice-Presidents — Prof. W. G. Adams, F.R.S., and Prof. 
G. C. Foster, F.R.S. Secretaries — Prof. E. Atkinson and Prof. A. W. 
Rein old. Treasurer — Prof. E. Atkinson. Demonstrator — Prof. F. Guthrie. 
Other Member's of the Council — W. Crookes, F.R.S., Prof. A. Dupre, Prof. 
T. M. Goodeve, M.A., Prof. O. Henrici, B. Lcewy, Dr. E. Mills, and H. 
Sprengel. 
ZOOLOGY AND COMPARATIVE ANATOMY. 
Large Cuttlefish. — Our first article (see p. 113) shows that it is no longer 
a mere idea that huge cuttle-fish are in existence. But besides this we may 
refer to a paper which Mr. Saville Kent, F.L.S., F.Z.S., read before the 
Zoological Society of London on March 3, on a huge Cephalopod or cuttle-fish, 
announced by the Rev. M. Harvey as lately encountered in Conception Bay, 
Newfoundland, and of which a tentacle sixteen feet long has been secured 
for the St. John’s Museum. Mr. Saville Kent contributed the additional 
evidence of an arm nine feet long preserved in the British Museum, in proof 
of the gigantic dimensions occasionally attained by certain members of this 
order of the Mollusca, and proposed to institute the new generic title of 
Megaloteuthis for their especial reception ; he further suggested distinguish- 
ing the Newfoundland example as Megaloteuthis Harveyi, in recognition of 
the service to science rendered by Mr. Harvey, in his record of, and steps 
taken to preserve, so valuable a trophy. 
The Museum of Comparative Anatomy , Cambridge , Massachusetts, ZJ.S.A . , 
has, we learn, been placed under the direction of Mr. Alexander Agassiz, 
son of Professor Agassiz, and Mr. Carey, both of whom are thoroughly 
conversant with Professor Agassiz’s plans with regard to the Museum, 
and familiar with the collections. Who will take the Agassiz lectureship 
we cannot tell, though we hear it has been offered to a most distinguished 
English candidate — one who would do it infinite credit. 
A neiv Classification of Birds. — Another of the contributors to the present 
number of the ‘‘Popular Science Review,” Mr. Garrod, B.A., F.L.S., lately 
(Feb. 3) read a paper before the Zoological Society of London, in which he 
proposed a new classification of birds, founded mainly on the disposition of 
their muscles and other soft parts. The five muscles which he had observed 
to vary most were the ambiens,the femoro-caudal,the accessory femoro-cau dal, 
the semi-tendinosus, and the accessory semi-tendinosus. After stating which 
of these are present or absent in the different families of birds, he showed that 
the presence or absence of the ambiens muscle is so intimately correlated with 
other characters that a division of the whole class into Homalogonati and 
Anomalogonati, depending on that peculiarity, would stand the test of much 
criticism. The Homalogonatous birds were divided into the Galliformes, the 
Anseriformes, the Ciconiiformes, and the Charadriiformes ; the Anomalo- 
gonatous into the Passeriformes, the Piciformes, and the Cypseliformes. 
Among the most important changes proposed or substantiated were the 
