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[March, 
NOTES. 
Biology. 
An anonymous writer in a contemporary, raising some interesting 
questions concerning the sting of the hive bee, declares the 
queen “ stingless ” — a novel dodtrine. 
The question of parthenogenesis among bees is still not abso- 
lutely decided, though the observations of Ziernon, confirmed by 
Sanson, decidedly support the affirmative view. 
According to “ Les Mondes ” a young man died lately from 
having struck a match upon his finger-nail. A particle of phos- 
phorus got under the nail, occasioning so virulent a burn that 
death ensued after twenty-seven hours. 
It appears, from the “ Royal Gazette ” of British Guayana, 
that legislative measures have been taken to protect birds from 
the ravages of feather-hunters. 
Prof. Belucci, in a carefully conducted series of experiments 
recorded in the “ Gazzetta Chimica Italiana,” has refuted Cler- 
mont’s admission of the presence of peroxide of hydrogen in 
plants. 
It is found that the human digestive organs are by no means 
able to extradt all the nitrogenous compounds present in vege- 
table matters. Hence analytical results throw little light on their 
true nutritive value. 
M. L. Couty has studied the physiological adtion cf mate. 
He finds that its adtion is localised in the par;s subservient to 
organic life, and especially the organs relatively least dependent 
on the nervous centres and specially on the brain. Upon the 
latter it has no apparent adlion . — Comptes Rendus, lxxxvii., 
p. 1091. 
Dr. J. J. de Lanessan complains strongly of the negledted 
condition of French institutions for the study of the natural 
sciences. Thus at Dijon the Professor of Zoology is not even 
provided with a microscope. 
M. Lacerda has laid before the Academy of Sciences certain 
results concerning the poison of serpents, as obtained from ex- 
periments on a Crotalus (species not named). He considers that 
the poison is a ferment, but not of the solid class, containing 
bodies resembling badteria, and that it reproduces itself in the 
blood of animals which die from the bite of the serpent. As an 
antidote he recommends alcohol, both taken inwardly and injedfed 
