THE NATURALIST AND COLLECTOR 
H 
is deeply pensile, suspended from the 
forks of a tree at a height of three or 
live feet from the ground. It is com¬ 
posed of lichens, fragments of insects, 
vegetable fibres, pieces of catapillar’s 
and spider’s webs, wrapped round and 
bound firmly with hempen fibres. It 
is lined with fire grasses. The eggs 
are white, spotted with reddish brown 
and measure .85 x.65. 
Bell’s Vireo ( Vireo belli) a miniature 
of the Warbling Vireo, confined to the 
prairie districts, is rather a rare bird, 
probably having* now disappeared en¬ 
tirely from the boundaries of the state. 
The nest is similar to that built by 
other Vireos. The eggs are white, 
spotted with red dots on the larger end 
and measure about .75 x .55. 
We have as migrants the Philadel¬ 
phia and Blue Headed Vireos. The 
former, being very plain in plumage, 
is often mistaken for some species of 
warbler, and so passes unnoticed. 
The Blue Headed Vireo passes through 
Illinois as a spring and fall migrant 
and may breed in the northern part. 
—0. L. Scott. 
Darwin Vindicated. 
O PUBLICATION of late date is 
likely to excite more interest 
than a quarto of forty pages 
which has just been issued from 
the local press of Batavia, with the 
title “Pithecanthropus Erectus, Eine 
Menschenanliches Uebehgangsform aus 
Java. Von Eng. Dubois, Militarartzt 
der Niedland Armee.” 
This noteworthy essay contains the 
detailed description of three fragments 
of three skeletons which have been 
found in the early pleistocene strata of 
Java, and which introduce to us a new 
species, which is also a new genus and 
a new family, of the order of primates, 
placed between the Simiidce and Hbm- 
inidce; in other words, apparently sup¬ 
plying the “missing link” between man 
and the apes which has so long and so 
anxiously been awaited. 
The material is sufficient for a close 
osteological comparison. The cubic 
capacity of the skull is about two-thirds 
that of the human average. It is dis¬ 
tinctly dolichocephalic, about 70 de¬ 
grees and its norma verticalis astonish¬ 
ingly lil^e that of the famous Neander¬ 
thal skull. The dental apparatus is 
still of the simian type, but less mark¬ 
edly so than in other apes. Th e femora 
are singularly human. They prove 
beyond doubt, that this creature 
walked constantly on two leg’s, and 
when erect was quite equal to the aver¬ 
age human male. Of the various diff¬ 
erences which seperate it from the 
highest apes and the lowest men, it 
may be said that they bring it closer to 
latter than to the former. 
One of the bearings of this discovery 
is upon the original birthplace of the 
human race. The author believes that 
the steps in the immediate genealogy 
of our species were these: Prothylohates, 
Anthropopithecus, Sweden sis, Pithecan¬ 
thropus erectus and Homo sapiens. This 
series takes us to the Indian faunal 
province and to the other aspects of the 
great Himalayan chain as the region 
somewhere in which our specific div- 
ison of the great organic chain first 
came into being. 
—Science. 
Since 1888 the Malay Peninsula, ac¬ 
cording to M. Murtelet, has supplied 
nearly 30,000 tons of tin, or more than 
half of the world’s total production. 
England has furnished 9,000 tons; 
Australia, 6,500 tons; America, Tas¬ 
mania, and the rest of Europe, 13,000 
tons. 
