GENERAL NOTES. BOTANY. INFLUENCE OF MOISTURE ON VEGETATION.-Carefully conducted experiments (published by Paul Sorauer in the Botanische Zeitung, Jan., 1878) with spring barley yielded the following results: In dry air branching was greater than in moist, the mean figures standing at 2.77 and 2.37 respectively; length of leaves was greater in moist air in the ratio of 21.37 to 21.07, but the breadth was less (6.74 to 7.33); a moist atmosphere is more favorable to length of leaf-sheath in the proportion of 9.26 to 8.18, to growth of the principal stem (13.5 to 11.5) and to root development (26.8 to 23.9). It was found that the epidermal cells of the leaves were more numerous and broader, the cells between the stomates shorter, and the stomates themselves shorter in dry air. Also, that leaves developing in a moist atmosphere have comparatively fewer stomates per millemetre of length. The question is worth further working out apropos of the relation between the minute structure of organs and their environment.-Journal of Botany. BESSY'S INJURIOUS FUNGI.-This is an essay on the different species of blight or Erysiphei, which live chiefly on the leaves and sometimes on the stems of plants, and attack no less than fifty species of plants of much value in agriculture. The article contains descriptions of all but three species, the descriptions in a few cases being original. Figures of ten species in sufficient detail for their identification accompany the text, which is extracted from the Seventh biennial report of the Iowa Agricultural College. VARIATIONS IN THE LEAF-SCARS OF SIGILLARIA AND LEPIDODenDRON. In two papers reprinted from the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Mr. H. L. Fairchild gives some interesting results of studies showing that species of these fossils have been multiplied to too great an extent, from the imperfect nature of the fossils, owing to the great variability of the only characters that can be used by fossil botanists. REINSCH'S SAPROLEGNIEÆ AND PARASITES IN DESMID CELLS.— While this article from Pringsheim's Yahrbuch contains observations on certain new and very curious low plants, its chief interest to us are the figures and descriptions of sundry cytodes which have the power of penetrating the interior of desmids, and remind us of certain monera described some years ago by Cienkowski under the name of Vampirella. The author, who has just gone to Key West to study the large one-celled algæ, has lately, during a visit to this country, been engaged in a study of the organisms in the Cochituate water of Boston. He found over a hundred species of minute plants and animals in this excellent drinking water. BOTANICAL NEWS.-In the London Journal of Botany M. A. Hartog describes the floral structure and affinities of Sapotacea. W. P. Hiem discusses a question of botanical nomenclature. C. C. Babington contributes Notes on Rubi, and there are several descriptive papers. At a late meeting of the Linnæan Society, F. Darwin read a paper on the Nutrition of Drosera rotundifolia, in which he showed the advantage gained by the plant being fed with meat, and that the capture by the plant of flies is of similar benefit. Mr. T. Dyer made a brief communication on the so-called "rain-tree" of Moyobamba, North Peru. This tree promises to excite as much interest amongst residents in hot, dry countries as the supposed anti-malarious properties of the fever tree (Eucalyptus globulus) had done amongst the inhabitants of hot dry ones. From information received through Mr. Spence, it seemed probable that the rain tree was Pithecolobium saman, and the so-called "rain" the fluid excretions of homopterous insects which fed on the juices of the foliage; other trees, however might become rain trees, and the phenomena were comparable to the production of honey dew from the lime, etc., by the agency of Aphides. ZOOLOGY." THE HOMOLOGY OF THE CHEVRON BONES.- -The chevron bones of Reptilia and Mammalia have been regarded as the homologues on the inferior side of the vertebral centrum, of the neural arch on the superior side. However this may be true of fishes, it appears not to be the case in the two classes named, in an exact sense. I have recently determined the fact that the basal portions of the chevron bones are continued throughout the greater part of the vertebral column in the Permian genera Clepsydrops, Metarmasaurus and Epicordylus, forming intervertebral elements to which I have given the name of intercentra. This intercentrum nearly replaces the centrum in Trimerorachis, and does so completely in Rhachitomus, both Permian genera. In Cricotus the intercentra are subequally developed with the centra, producing the curious appearance of two kinds of vertebral bodies alternating with each other, the true centra only bearing neural arches, and the intercentra bearing chevrons in the caudal region. It appears then that the chevron bones are the remnants in the caudal vertebræ of a structure once general throughout the column of airbreathing Vertebrata, but which has been replaced in them in the dorsal and lumbar regions, by the true centrum. The free elements of the cervical series of some reptiles are probably the same.-E. D. Cope. 1 The departments of Ornithology and Mammalogy are conducted by Dr. ELLIOTT COUES, U. S. A. NOTES ON THE RECENTLY DESCRIBED MONOTREMES.-With the appearance of Gervais' Osteographie des Monotremes Vivant et Fossiles, zoologists are again reminded that not all that is to be known in regard to beings now living has yet been chronicled. This memoir follows close upon Mr. E. P. Ramsay's papers read to the Linnæan Society of New South Wales. In the two we get materials which very greatly enlarge our knowledge of these curious porcupine-like animals with anteater-like tongues, of which the best and longest known example is Echidna hystrix. Mr. Ramsay describes a form apparently belonging to the old genus, which he calls, E. lawesi, from Port Moresby, New Guinea; the number of nails being the same as in the old species, viz: five, both in front and behind; but I find upon comparing a skin of E. hystrix with his drawings that the inner nail is apparently somewhat longer in his species. He observes that the species" is distinguished chiefly by the long cylindrical form of the quills, and the stiff, flat hair-like bristles on the face." It is unfortunate that the describer has not ascertained the number of palatal corneous processes on the tongue and also the cranial and osteological differences which would have done much to establish the legitimacy of the species. The new Acanthoglossus bruijni, monographed by Prof. Gervais, measures about 19 inches in length, or about one-half longer than the species hitherto described. The occiptal condyles are much more prominent backwards than in Echidna, and the beak is about three times as long as in the latter, and curved slightly downwards. On the palatal membrane there are a series of conical corneous processes depending into the oral cavity; these are in five transverse rows of from four to eleven, at the posterior nareal extremity; then in twos, then a single one, then a pair, then in symmetrical clusters with transverse toothed borders. There are seventeen of these rows, individual and clusters of corneous retroverted processes in Acanthoglossus. Gervais says that in Echidna there never was more than seven of these series; Owen corroborates this, saying (Anatomy of Vertebrates vol. iii, p. 385), "The palate is armed with six or seven transverse rows of strong, sharp, but short retroverted spines." The posteriorly convergent lines of spines on the basal portion of the tongue in Acanthoglossus furnished a further distinction from Echidna in which these are in a confused cluster. The four transverse fimbriated lamellæ in front of this cluster of spines, as in Echidna, are absent. The tongue itself is about two and a-half times longer than in the old species, the basal two-thirds cylindrical, tapering and vermiform, but not acuminate at the tip, being rounded at the end and grooved on the dorsal face for about a third of its length. In the groove there are three longitudinal rows of backwardly directed spines, a median and two lateral, 1 Bertrand. Paris, 1877-78, The cerebral portion of the brain of Acanthoglossus bruijnii is more pointed, while that of Echidna is more obtuse and somewhat square in outline anteriorly when viewed from above. The cerebral convolutions of the former are more numerous and complex than in the latter, where they are relatively few and simple. The interclavicular bone supports a strong median carina much more prominent than in Echidna. The xiphoid segments of the sternum in Acanthoglossus are ossified and not cartilaginous. The phalanges of the manus and pes of both genera may be repre sented as follows: Acanthoglossus, manus 1,3,3,3,2; pes 1.3,3,3,2; ungues The foregoing characters which are the principal ones, justify, it would seem beyond all doubt, the propriety of erecting the large New Guinea species into a separate genus as Gervais has done. Knowing, as we do, the exceedingly trivial and insufficient morphological differences which have served for the establishment of new genera and species, we can readily appreciate such wide differences as are here presented principally in the number of phalanges and nails, as well as perhaps the more important lingual, palatal, cranial and cerebral characters. The specimens, a male and female, upon which Prof. Gervais has based his genus, were brought by M. Leglaize from the northern part of New Guinea to Paris. They were obtained on the Karon mountains, at a elevation of 3770 feet above sea level. Peters and Doria had previously described the skull of this species and called it Tachyglossus bruijnii.2 The natives call the animal Nokdiak. The known species of monotrematous spiny anteaters are accordingly three, provided Echidna lawesi is distinct, which it appears to be from the rather brief and hardly sufficient description of its author; and E. hystrix and E. setosa are identical. The species then stand as follows in the order of discovery, or rather of characterization : Echidna hystrix Cuv. E. lawesi Ramsay. -Fno. A. Ryder. PROF. P. E. SCHULZE has discovered the mode of development of the European cavernicolous Proteus anguinus. He found one at Adelsberg cave which had laid. fifty-six eggs, very similar to those of Siredon pisciformis. The Proteus anguinus is proved by researches on the ovary of a female from which the eggs were taken to be oviparous. 1 Nouv. Arch. du Mus. Tom. 5, Pl. 14, fig. 16, p. 248. * Ann. del Mus. Civ. di Sci. Nat. di Genova, tom. IX Dec. 3, 1876. ANTHROPOLOGY.' MODERN MOUND-BUILDERS.-The Tualati tribe of the Kalapúya stock, living near Forest Grove, the Yampill tribe formerly occupying the valley now called the Grande Ronde Reserve, Yampill and Polk counties, Oregon, and probably all the Kalapúya tribes of the Willamette valley are accustomed to invoke the celestial powers by working themselves violently into a state of utter exhaustion. They roam all night without eating, put themselves into a sweat and leap into a cold river, and scale high mountains to see the sun rise. At the appearance of the god of day they exclaim "O, I am poor! O, I am poor! Make me rich! Make a chief of me!" (The chiefs being the wealthiest men in the tribes.) During the night they throw up with their hands little mounds from three to seven feet long and from twelve to eighteen inches high. Their design is not to conceal property or to bury the dead, but simply to work themselves into a terrible sweat. Their exertions often occupied five nights, the wandering about without food being kept up during the day. These little hillocks are ever after kept in repair. They are erected principally by girls on their first menstruation, by parents who have lost children, by others after bereavements, and by young people generally who thus expected to obtain riches by dreaming of eagles and other good portents. These tamanowus dreams are regarded very highly among them.-Albert S. Gatschet. THE THIRD VOLUME OF CONTRIBUTIONS to North American Ethnology, published by the Department of the Interior, under the editorial charge of Major J. W. Powell, is a positive addition to our ethnological literature, and demonstrates the wisdom of the Smithsonian Institution in committing the publication of its linguistic material to its present hands. The first portion of the volume is by the veteran explorer, Mr. Stephen Powers, first introduced to the literary world by Mr. H. H. Bancroft in his Native Races, and contains an exhaustive account of his researches among the California tribes. The preface contains a rather severe blow at Major Powell's pet theory about the sparseness of Indian population on our continent, the publication of which is a tribute to the fairness of the Major as well as to the independence of Mr. Powers. The latter part of the work is occupied by vocabularies, in the collection of which Major Powell is especially engaged. ANTHROPOLOGICAL NEWS.-The Davenport, Iowa, Daily Gazette of February 16th, contains the description of another carved slate tablet, found in No. 11 of the Cook Farm group, from which the cremation tablet was taken last year. It is about seven and a-half by 12 inches, and has on one surface a human figure sur1 Edited by Prof. OTIS T. MASON, Columbian College, Washington, D. C. |