5 0-5,13 2OE TOWNSHEND STITH BRANDEGEE EDITOR VOLUME I. , o r, ^ 18 OO COLLECTS San Francisco, California. CONTENTS. PAGE Nomenclature of Organic Life: H. W. Harkness........................ i An Arborescent Polygala: T. S. Brandegee............................ 4 Nests and Eggs of Townsend's Junco and San Pedro Partridge: A. W. Anthony 5 Notes on the Naturalized Plants of Southern California: S. B. Parish 7, 56, 122, 182, 205, 261, 300 Evolution of the Catfishes: Carl H. Eigenmann........................ 10 Description of a Fossil Species of Sebastodes: Carl H. Eigenmann....... 16 Dodecatheon Meadia (Shooting Star): Katharine Brandegee.......... 17 Ornithological Observations during the Total Solar Eclipse of January, 1889: Walter E. Bryant 21 Habits in the Life History of Pleocoma Behrensii: J. J. Rivers........... 24 A Cardon Forest: T. S. Brandegee.................................... 26 Crossosoma: Frank H. Vaslit........................................ 27 Economy of Nature as Exemplified by Vegetable and Animal Parasites: H. H. BEHR..33, 74 Fishes of the Yellowstone Park: David S. Jordan....................... 38 Effect of Rain on Fouquieria: T. S. Brandegee......................... 40 A Monoecious Willow: C. L. Anderson................................. 41 * Nesting Habits of the Golden Eagle: H. R. Taylor......... ........... 42 Birds New or Rare in California: W. Otto Emerson.................... 44 Deformed Flowers of Dendromecon: T. S. Brandegee................... 46 The European Daisy: Frank H. Vaslit................................ 48 Nomenclature of Fungi: H. W. Harkness.............................. 49 Mexican Notes: W. G. Wright.............................51, 102, 212, 231 A New Perityle: T. S. Brandegee..................................... 54 The Barracuda: Carl H. Eigenmann............................... 55 » Notes on Lepidoptera: James Behrens..................-............... 60 The Point Loma Blind Fish and its Relatives: Carl H. Eigenmann...... 65 Songs of some Californian Zonotrichke: Charles A. Keeler............ 72 Migratory Instinct in Caged Wild Birds: W. Otto Emerson............. 80 Notes on West American Plants: Katharine Brandegee................ 82 Botanical Generic Names: H. W. Harkness........................... 84 Convolvulus Occidentalis: T. S. Brandegee............................. 85 Escapes in the Coast Range: Frank H. Vaslit......................... 86 • The Curled Leaf: H. W. Harkness.................................... 87 Heterosporous Fern Allies of the Pacific Coast and Mexico: Lucien M. Underwood 97 Brodirea Multiflora: Carl Purdy...................................... 101 j Classification of Dryocampa Riversii: H. H. Behr..................'.___ 106 The Plants of Santa Catalina Island: T. S. Brandegee.................. 107 Song Birds about San Francisco Bay: Charles A. Keeler............... 116 Annual Migrations of the Deer of the Sierra Nevada: L. Belding.......... 121 iv Contents. [zoe PAGE The Pappus of Microseris: T. S. Brandegee........................... 126 Flora of the Californian Islands: T. S. Brandegee....................... 129 Notices of Supposed New Birds: W. E. Bryant......................... 148 Dangerous Fungi: H. W. Harkness................................... 150 Nest of the California Bush Tit: Charles A. Keeler.................... 151 Customs of the Coyotero Apaches: Edward Palmer.................... 161 Observations on the Life History of the House Finch: Chas. A. Keeler.. . 172 Yosemite Lepidoptera: H. H. Behr.................................... 177 The Hedgerows of Todos Santos: T. S. Brandegee..................... 179 Note on Typhlogobius Californiensis: Rosa Smith Eigenmann........... 181 Lavatera—Is it an Introduced Plant? T. S. Brandegee................. 188 Proposed Amendment to the Constitution of the California Academy of Sciences.......................................................... 193 Fresh-Water Mollusca of San Francisco County: J. G. Cooper............ 196 A New Fern from Lower California: D. C. Eaton....................... 197 Sequoia Forests of the Sierra Nevada—Their Location and Area: Frank J. Walker 198 A New Epilobium: William Trelease............................... 210 Double Broods of Argynnis Calippe: H. H. Behr........................ 211 Loeflingia squarrosa: T. S. Brandegee................................. 219 Rattlesnake Antidotes: Frank H. Vaslit.............................. 221 Geographical Distribution of Land Birds in California: Charles A. Keeler 225, 257, 295, 337, 369 A New Achyronychia (A. Rixfordii): T. S. Brandegee.................. 230 Notes on the Yellow-Haired Porcupine: L. E. Ricksecker............... 235 A New Junco from California (Junco hyemalis thurberi): A. W. Anthony . 238 Rhamnus Californica and Its Allies: Katharine Brandegee............. 240 Notes on Liliacese: Carl Purdy....................................... 244 Lepidoptera from San Jose* del Cabo: H. H. Behr....................... 246 A Doomed Bird: J. G. Cooper...................................... 248 Csenurus of the Hare: Katharine Brandegee.......................... 265 Notes Concerning the Collection of Plants made by Xantus at Cape St. Lucas and Vicinity: T. S. Brandegee............................. 269 El Zorillo: Walter E. Bryant..................................... 272 A New Cottonwood: T. S. Brandegee................................ 274 Nomenclature and Its Amenities: H. W. Harkness..................... 275 Abnormal Nest of Vigors's Wren: Harry R. Taylor.................... 276 Land Birds of the Pacific District: W. E. B............................. 277 Variations of Platystemon and Eschscholtzia: Katharine Brandegee___ 278 Found Dead on the Beach: Walter E. Bryant........................ 282 An Ornithological Retrospect: Walter E. Bryant..................... 289 Asplenium Filix-fcemina as a Tree-Fern: Katharine Brandegee......... 293 The Wolverine {Gulo lusais) in California: L. Belding.................. 303 Note on Cybister: L. E. Ricksecker.................................... 304 A New Nolina: T. S. Brandegee...................................... 305 Notice of a Supposed New Vireo from Oregon: A. W. Anthony.......... 307 VOL. I.] Contents. PAGE Studies in Coreopsidese and Tagetinese: T. S. Brandegee................ 308 A Collector's Notes on Variation in Shells, with some New Varieties: Henry Hemphill 321 Oh Mrs. Brandegee's Review of My List of State and Local Floras: N. L. Britton 344 Euphorbiacese Collected by T. S. Brandegee, Principally in the Vicinity of Todos Santos, Baja California, January and February, 1890: C. F. Millspaugh 346 List of Land Mammals of California: Walter E. Bryant................ 353 Preliminary List of Pacific Coast Hepaticse: Lucien M. Underwood...... 361 A New Cucurbit: Alfred Cogniaux................................... 368 Californian Lobeliacese: Katharine Brandegee........................ 373 The Wolverine in California: Walter E. Bryant....................... 377 A New Species of Esenbeckia: T. S. Brandegee........................ 378 Secondary Migration of Birds: A. W. Anthony......... ................ 379 REVIEWS. Allen: To what extent is it profitable to recognize Geographical forms among North American Birds, 27. The Sixth Edition of Gray's Manual of Botany; 30. Niedenzu: Uber den Anatomischen Bau der Laublatter der Arbutoideae und Vac- cinioidese, 30. Saccardo: Sylloge Fungorum, vol. viii, 31. Bolles: Barred Owls in Captivity, 60. Dwight: The Horned Larks of North America, 61. Amateur Ornithological Journals, 88. McCook: American Spiders and their Spinning Work, 89. Cryptogamic Laboratory of Harvard University, Contribution xii, 91. Insect Life, ii, Nos. 7, 8, 91. Psyche, No. 166-169, 92. Ninth Report of the State Min- eralogist, 93. Sayre: Active principle of the Loco Weed, 95. E. L. Greene: West American Oaks, 156. Contributions from the U. S. National Herbarium, No. I, 159. Baker: Synopsis of the Genera and Species of Malvae, 191. Hemphill: Cat- alogue of Shells, 191. Merriam: North American Fauna, No. 3, 221. J. M. Coul- ter: Contributions from the U. S. National Herbarium, No. II, 222. F. L. Clarke: Catalogue of Flowering Plants and Ferns of Santa Cruz County, 223. L. Belding: Land Birds of the Pacific District, 249. Frank M. Chapman: On a Collection of Birds made by Mr. Clark P. Streator in British Columbia, with Field Notes by the Collector, 251. William Brewster: A New Subspecies of the Solitary Sandpiper, 251. Charles H. Townsend: Birds from the Coasts of Western North America and Adjacent Islands, 252. George Vasey: Grasses of the Southwest, Part I, 252. F. L. Scribner: New or Little Known Grasses, II, 252. George Vasey and J. N. Rose: Contributions from U. S. National Herbarium, No. Ill, 253. Sereno Wat- son: Contributions to American Botany, XVII, 253. R. Brown: The Fate of the Quadrate in Mammals, 283. John Macoun: Catalogue of Canadian Plants, Part V, Acrogens, 285. W. H. Pearson: List of Canadian Hepaticse, 285. Theodore Holm: Notes on the Leaves of Liriodendron, 285. N. L- Britton: A List of State and Local Floras of the United States and British America, 286. S. Garman: The Gila Monster, 315. Kew Bulletin, No. 47, 315. W. G. Farlow and A. B. Sey- mour: Provisional Host-Index of the Fungi of the United States, Part II, Apetalse, 316. Biological Survey of the Death Valley Region, 348. Grevillea, December, VI Contents. 1890, 351. Stewart Culin: I Hing or Patriotic Rising, and Customs of the Chinese in America, 381. J. A. Allen: A Seven Years'. Retrospect, 383. PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES. California Academy of Sciences: 3i» 63, 95, 128, 160, 192, 224, 256, 288, 316, 352, 384. San Francisco Microscopical Society: 32, 64. California Ornithological Club: 384. LIST OF PLATES. I. Deformities of Dendromecon. II, III. Point Loma Blind Fish and Its Relatives. IV. Leaf Variations of Rhus integrifolia. V. Leaf Variations of Lyonothamnus floribundus. VI. Stages in the development of the House Finch. VII. Asplenium blepharodes. VIII. Sequoia Forests of the Sierra Nevada. IX. Faunal Areas in California. X. Anodonta angulata and Nuttalliana. XI. Vaseyanthus Rosei. XII. Esenbeckia flava. INDEX. [Simple lists not indexed.] Page Abronia pogonantha........ 62 AchyronychiaRixfordii...... 230 Adenostegia rigida......... 2 Adiantum pedatum......... 14S ^EJgithalus flaviceps......... 150 -^sculus Californica......... 87 Aglaope Infausta........... 247 Alchemilla arvensis......... 9 Alfileria................ 8 Allium Palmeri........... 245 serratum........... 145 Amarantus alba........... 125 chlorostachys...... 125 retroflexa........ 125 Amblyopappus pusillus....... 208 Ammodramus sandwichensis sa- vanna ................ 45 Anagallis aryensis.......... 123 Anchovy.............. 56 Andropogon Sorghum......... 186 Anethum graveolens......... 10 Anodonta angulata......... 325 Californiensis....... 328 Nuttallianavar.Idahoensis 328 Oregonensis........ 325 Wahlamatensis...... 329 Anthemis cotula.......... 59 Antirrhinum junceum....... 112 speciosum....... 112 Aphanisma blitoides......... 144 Aphelocoma Californica....... '230 insularis........ 342 Apium graveolens.......... 9 Aquila chryssetos.......... 43 Arabis filifolia........... 132 Arctostaphylos alpina........ 30 bicolor........ 112 insnlaris....... 141 Arctous alpina............ 30 Argynnis Calippe........... 211 Zerene........... 177 Artemisia biennis.......... 303 Ascomyces deformans....... 87 Aspidium aculeatum......... 148 Asplenium blepharodes..... 197 Filix-foemina...... 293 Aster foliaceus............ 138 Astragalus Hornii......... 303 Miguelensis....... 135 Page Auriparus flaviceps o'rnatus..... 150 A vena fatua.............. 185 Azolla Caroliuiana......... 100 filicoides........... 101 Baccharis consanguinea........ 138 Barracuda............. 55 Bebbia atriplicifolia........ 271 Bellis perennis............ 48 Berberis gracillima......... 62 Bermuda grass........... 185 Bidens heterosperma........ 309 heterophylla......... 309 nudata........... 309 refracta .......... 310 Xantiana.......... 309 Brassica adpressa.......... 57 campestris......... 57 nigra............ 57 sinapistrum......... 57 Brodisea congesta......... 244 laxa............. 244 multiflora......... 101 Bromus Madritensis......... 183 maximus.......... 183 mollis........... 183 pilosa............ 59 rubens............ 183 secalinus.......... 183 Rabbit, Brush............ 266 Cotton Tail.......... 266 Jack.............. 265 Bush Tit, California......... 151 Csesalpinia pannosa......... 271 Calais Clevelandi........... 126 Kelloggii............ 126 fhtriseta............ 127 Calochortus Catalinse....... 146 Kennedyi........ 146 luteus var. oculatus.. . 245 Maweanus X pulchellus 245 pulchellus var. macu- losus....... 245 Calyculina........„..... 197 Campanula exigua.......... 83 Cardon................ 26 Carpodacus mexicanus frontalis . . 172 Cascara sagrada........... 242 Castilleia hololeuca........ 143 Caucalis microcarpa......... 221 386 Index. [zoe Page Ceanothus arboreus.........no sorediatus........no Celosia floribunda..........272 Cenchrus echinatus.........187 tribuloides.........187 Centauria Melitensis......... 58 solstitialis......... 58 Cereus pecten-aborigiuum...... 26 Pringlei........... 26 Schottii........... 26 Cheat.................184 Cheilanthes Californica .......147 Chenopodium ainbrosioides.....125 murale........125 Cnicus edulis............. 58 lilacinus...........140 Convolvulus occidentalis....... 85 macrostegius....... 85 Cordylanthus filifolius........ 3 Coriandrum sativum......... 10 Cornus sessilis............ 88 Cotula australis..........58 corouopifolia......... 58 Crab grass..............185 Crossosoma Bigelovii........ 27 Californicum.....27, 109 Curled Leaf........... . . 87 Cyanocitta stelleri frontalis ...... 230 Cybister ellipticus..........304 explanatus.........304 Cynodon dactyluni..........185 Dactylis glomerata..........188 Daisy.................48 Danais Berenice...........246 ¦ Plexippus...........177 Datura Tatula............. 123 Daucus pusillus...........221 Dendroica cserulescens.......371 Dendromecon/fortfe........47 Harfordii....... 46 rigidum........ 46 Devil grass.............185 Didelphys Californica........353 Digitalis purpurea.........239 Diplostephium canum........138 Dipsacus fullonum........57, 86 Dodecatheon Cleuelandi........ 17 cruciatum......18, 50 dentatum........ 19 ellipticum........ 18 frigidum........ 18 Hendersoni ....... 17 Jejfreyi......... 18 Meadia......... 17 patulum........ 18 Page Downingia pusilla..........374 elegans..........374 pulchella.........374 cottcolor..........374 insignis..........374 montana.........374 ornatissima........374 tricolor..........374 corymbosa.........374 bicornuta.........374 Dryocampa Riversii.........106 Dryobates pubescens.........370 Dysodiaspeciosa...........272 Eagle, Bald.............. 43 Golden............ 43 Echinocystis fabacea.........137 Encelia farinosa . ......... 83 radians............ 83 Epilobium Parishii........210 Eragrostis pilosa...........184 Erethizon epixanthus.......235 Erodium cicutarium........ 8 moschatum........ 8 Eschscholtzia Californica......281 maritima .......281 minutiflora......281 peninsularis......281 rhotnbifetala......282 Esenbeckia f lava..........378 Euphorbia biserrata.......347 Hindsiana........347 leucophylla........272 Watsonli......347 Exoascus pruni............150 Festuca myurus..........187 Fiber zibethicus pallidus......356 Finch, House.............172 Flycatcher, Say's..........379 Foeniculum vulgare ......... 10 Fouquieria spinosa......... 40 Foxtail................184 Fuller's Teasel...........57, 186 Galeoscoptes Carolinensis......371 Galiuxn buxifoliunt........112, 138 Californicum.........138 Catalinense .......112, 138 fiaccidum...........138 Miguelense.........138 Nuttallii...........138 Gilia Nevinii . ."...........141 Goldfinch, Arizona.......... 44 Gossypium Davidsonii........271 Gulo luscus.............303, 377 Haliseetus leucocephalus...... 43 Harporhynchus cinereus.......381 VOL. I.] Index. 387 Page Helix arrosa.............335 Ayresiana...........33° Californiensis ....... 335 Dupetithouarsi........334 fidelis.............336 intercisa............331 Kellettii............333 ruficincta . .........332 Townsendiana.........335 Traskii.............33° Tryoni............331 var. subcarinata.....332 tudiculata...........336 Hemizonia Fitchii.......... 59 Hesperomys aztecus.........356 Heterotneles arbiitifolia.......111 Heterospernium Xanti........ 309 Hibiscus ribifolius.........271 Hieracium Scouleri.........221 Hordeum murinum.........184 Hosackia glabra...........135 occitlta...........134 Horsfordia Purisimae.........253 Hymenocallis adnata........235 Ictalurus albidus.......... 12 Ipomaea purpurea.......... 56 Isoetes Bolanderi........... 98 echinospora......... 97 Howellii........... 98 maritima........... 99 Mexicana........... g8 nuda............. 98 Nuttallii........... 99 Pringlei.......... 98 pygmsea........... 97 Suksdorfii....... . 98 Jatropha canescens......... 41 Junco hyemalis..........45, 369 thurberi.....238 slate-colored ........ 45 Towusendi.......... 5 Krynitzkia microstachys.....114 Lady's Mantle............ 9 Laniarckia aurea...........182 Lark, Mexican Horned........148 Lastarrioea Chileusis.........209 Lavatera assurgentiflora, 109,133,189, 301 insularis..........no occidentals........no venosa.........no, 189 Ledum glandulosum......... 83 I.eersia oryzoides........187 Lemmonia Californica........ 83 I,eptosyne dissecta..........308 gigantea......... 139 parthenioides......308 Page Lepus Californicus.......... 265 cuniculus........... 266 sylvaticus auduboni..... 266 trowbridgei.......... 266 Lilasa subulata........... 206 Lilium Washingtonianum...... 245 . Limnophysa adelinse......... 196 Loeflingia Hispanica......... 220 pentandra......... 220 Jnisilla............ 220 squarrosa......... 210 Texana........... 220 Lolium perenne........... 186 temuleutum......... 186 Lutra canadensis.......... 360 Lycaena regia............. 60 Lycium Hassei..........115, 143 Richii............ 115 Lyonothamnus asplenifolius..... in floribundus..... in Lyrocarpa Coulteri.......... 271 Mairania alpina........... 30 Malacotbrix indecora......... 140 squalida......... 140 Malva borealis............ 125 rosa............109, 303 Marrubim vulgare.......... 123 Marsilia macropoda ....... Mexicana......... minuta.......... polycarpa......... vestita........... 99 Mayweed............... 59 Melampodium perfoliatum..... 59 Melospiza fasciata clementse . . . 342 graminea .... 342 rufina...... 45 Merula confinis............ 46 Mesenibrianthemuni aequilaterale . 261 chilense..... 261 coccineum... 261 crystallinum . 113, 262 nodiflorum, 113, 263 Microseris anomala.......... 126 Lindleyi......... 126 linearifolia........ 126 macrochata........ 126 Parryi........... 126 Millet, evergreen........... 186 Mimosa Xanti............ 271 Mimulus androsaceus........ 83 glutinosus......... 112 Mirabilis Watsoni.......... 62 Mniotilta varia............ 371 Molothrus ater obscurus....... 278 388 Index. [zoe. Page Monardella macrantha var. nana . ¦ » . 83 . Morning Glory ... -......... 56 Mouse, Aztec. ,........-.356 Muskrat, Pale............356 Nasturtium officinale........... 125 Nemacladus capillaris........377 . longiflorus.......... 377 vumtanus....... . 377 pinnatifidus.......377 ramosissimus......377 rigidus..........377 rubescetis.........377 tenuisimns..,......377 Neophasia Menapia.........178 Nepeta Catania............ 124 Nicotiana glauca...........124 Nolina Beldingi..........305 Bigelovii..............306 Palmeri ........... 306 Parryi............306 Notholsena Candida ......... 147 CEnanthe sarmentosa........ 9 CEnothera cheiranthifolia......137 nitida............137 Oligocottus analis . .........181 Oligomeris subulata.........302 Orchard Grass . . ..........188 Oreortyx pictus confinis......." 5 Otter, North American........360 Osmerus thaleichthys........ 64 Otocoris alpestris adusta....... 61 chrysolsema. ... 148 Merrillii...... 61 pallida.....61, 149 Palmerella debilis.........373 var. serrata .... 83 Palo de Adam............ 41 Panicum Crus-galli..........185 Parrishella..............377 Partridge, San Pedro......... 5 Paspalum distichum.........185 Passerella iliaca...........370 Pastinaca sativa.......... 10 Pectocarya linearis.........209 pusilla.........209 Perityle cuneata.......... 54 Entoryi...........114 Peronospora viticola........150 Petunia parviflora..........302 Phacelia floribunda......... 142 phyllomanica.......142 scabrella.......... 142 Phalaris Canariensis.........186 Phleum pratense..........1S6 Phryganidia Californica....... 35 Page Physalis sequata...........123 crassifolia.........272 glabra...........272 Pilularia Americana.........100 Piranga rubriceps........\ . 372 Plagiobothrys rufescens.......209 Plantago Coronopus.........144 lanceolata.........125 minor...........125 Platystemon Californicus......27S crinitus.........280 Platystomatichthys sturio...... 13 Pleocoma Behrensii......... 24 conjungens........ 24 Rickseckeri........ 24 Plowrightia morbosa........150 Poaannua..............1S6 pratensis . . ......... . 186 Polioptila plumbea........ . 277 Polygala apopetala......... 4 puberula..........271 Xanti...........271 Polygonum aviculare........126 nodosum........126 Polypogon Monspeliensis......184 Polyporus tuberosus........ 31 Populus monticola........ 274 Porcupine, Yellow-Haired.....'. 235 Porophyllum filifolium.......312 gracile....... . 313 Seemanui.......313 Possum, Texas............353 Primella...............197 Prunus ilicifolia.......... 135, 151 emarginata.........151 occidentalis..........151 Psaltriparus minimus Californicus . 151 Quercus Engdmanni.......145, 157 Macdonaldi........145, 157 var. clegantula. . . 145 parvula............145 Ransomi...........156 vaccinifolia..........157 Ranunculus Californicus......131 a Deppei..........131 Redstart, American......... 45 Rhamnus Californica........ 240 Caroliniana........241 crocea........... 241 lattrifolius.........243 lettcodermis.........241 Purshiana.........240 occidentalis.........241 oieifoliits..........240 rubra.............240 VOL. I.] Index. 389 Page Rhamnus tomentdla.........240 Rhododendron Californicum . . . 83, 215 Rhus diversiloba..........no integrifolia..........111 laurina.............in Rhytisma arbuti............ 31 Ricinus communis..........124 Robin, St. Lucas........... 46 Rose Bay..............315 Rubus spectabilis.......... 83 Rutnex conglomeratus.......126 crispus...........126 Sagittaria Chinensis ....... 122, 176 Salix Babylonica........... 41 lasiandra............ 41 Salpinctes obsoletus.........343 Sambucus racemosa......... 83 Saxifraga vutlvcefolia..........136 Scabiosa atropurpurea....... 86 Scrophularia Californica......112 Sebastodes goodei.......... 59 rosae........... 16 Senecio Lyoni............114 Setaria viridis............188 Setophaga ruticilla......... 45 Shooting star............ 17 Sida Elliottii.............271 Xanti..............271 Silene antirrhina.......... 9 Gallica............. 9 multinervia..........133 siinulans............133 Silybum Marianum......... 58 Smelt................. 64 Solanum rostratum.........124 Soliva sessilis............207 Sonchus asper............ 58 oleracea......... 58 tenerrimus......... 57 Sparrow, Savanna.......... 45 sooty song......... 45 white-crowned......379 white-throated...... 45 Specularia biflora..........208 Sphasralcea Californica.......253 Sphaeriuin lenticula........196 Sphyrana argentea......... 55 Spinus psaltria arizonse......44, 277 Page Spizella pallida..........277 Spilogale lucasana..........272 Squirrel Grass............184 Stachys acuminata..........148 Stellaria media........... 125 Stephanomeria tomentosa.......140 Stolephorus ringens......... 56 Syrmatium dendroidenm.......135 patens...........135 niveum..........135 ornitJiopus.........135 Tagetes Iacera...........314 scabra..........314 Tamias quadrimaculatus......354 Thrush, Big Tree..........149 Dwarf hermit........149 Thryothorus bewickii spilurus . . . 277 Thysanocarpus conchuliferus .... 132 Tigrodera.............. 78 Timothy...............189 Trifolium exile............134 Turdus aonalaschkse........149 sequoiensis . . ......149 Turtle dove.............380 Typha bracteata............146 Typhlogobius Californiensis .... 181 Urtica urens.............125 Utricularia vulgaris......... 83 Vaseyanthus Rosei......368 Verbascum virgatum........123 Verbesina encelioides........ 59 Verdin................149 Viguiera deltoidea..........272 tomentosa........ . 272 Vinca major............. 86 Vireo flavoviridis . ........372 huttoni............307 obscurus......307 vicinior californicus..... 67 "Vulture, California.........248 Wren, Rock.............343 Vigors's............276 Wolverine............303, 377 Xanthium Canadense.......58 spinosum........ 58 Zonotrichia albicollis.......45, 371 Zorillo................272 ERRATA. Page 93,17th line from bottom, for "genuine" read "generic." " '35> i.5th " " " " "S. argophylla" read "H. argophylla." " 293,21st " '• top " "without" read "with." " 3°3i title " " Gulo lucens " read " Gulo luscus." sgg INTRODUCTION. The want of a medium for recording in accessible form the numerous, often unconnected observations, pertaining more par- ticularly to the western part of North America, made by amateurs as well as by working naturalists, has been felt as a serious draw- back. Such a means is now offered in this journal, which, while supplying an existing need, will, it is hoped, greatly extend and stimulate the taste for these observations among those who are little attracted by the graver and more technical works published by 'scientific societies. Contributions of such studies in the life-history and structure of animals and plants are preferred to all other communications, though a moderate amount of systematic work will be welcomed. The bulky compilations which delight the soul of the encyclopedian scientist will not appear in the pages of Zoe, and pains will be taken, as much as possible, to disembarrass the grain of truth from its attendant mass of chaff. It is hoped that the support accorded to this journal will be sufficiently liberal to admit of copious illustration, and every effort will be made to render it worthy of such encouragement. ZOB A.BIOLOGICAL JOURNAL MARCH, 1890. No. 1. THE NOMENCLATURE OF ORGANIC LIFE. BY H. W. HARKNESS. •To facilitate the study of the natural sciences and avoid confusion,, it is important that no two species shall have an identical name. No department of science, so far as I am aware, has laid down the rule that such names are not admissible, though all discourage them. They exist at present in large numbers, and in departments which have an unusually intimate connection with the vegetable world, as in the case of entomology, are productive of considerable inconvenience, requiring at the least the suffix Bot. or Ent. to the name. They exist, also, though only in inconsiderable number in bot- any, as between phanerogamic and cryptogamic—especially fungi— but with the impending reductions of genera will probably nearly or entirely cease. Their consideration, which should be preceded by conscientious revisions, may seriously affect the nomenclature of all branches of biological science, as the tendency undoubtedly is to make the law of priority absolute throughout the organic world. In a more restricted sense, the question, though necessarily of equal interest to all, is now raging with especial virulence in the de- partment of phanerogamic botany, and has developed in some quarters a regrettable amount of bitterness. The rigid enforcement of the law of priority seems to give the best promise of a stable nomenclature—a boon so precious that even a very considerable preliminary confusion may well be endured in the prospect of attaining it. To be in any degree effectual, it should be enforced without any of those exceptions upon which systematists . soonest and most completely split. 2 Nomenclature of Organic Life. [zoe The beginning of classification is, undoubtedly, that assemblage of forms having a common and not too distant origin, and ulti- mately reproducing itself, subject to variation by environment, which we are accustomed to consider an entity and call "species," and if priority is to have any force or meaning it must commence here with the name proper of the organism. The practice which has had, and still has, some notable followers, of changing specific names at will, whenever it was thought necessary to alter their grouping, tends to obscure their identity and render it doubly dif- ficult to trace them through the changes of genera, without offering any compensating benefit. The only valid reason which can be given for changing a specific name is the existence in the same genus of an identical older one, and even then the change should not be made without a most critical examination of the affected spe- cies, for it may easily happen that after a whole series of duplicate specific names have been changed in consequence of the merging of vtwo or more genera, many of the so-called species may be proved to be mere forms, and not entitled to names, and unnecessary con- fusion will have resulted from the hasty action of some individual inspired with no higher motive than attaching his name to species. Genera form a secondary step—they presuppose the existence of species ; and it naturally follows from this view that in cases where at first, as with many Linnaean names, only one word was applied to a species, it should have remained the specific name, and not have been altered in rank, although the practice of Linnaeus seems usually to have been the reverse. It has happened, curiously enough, that priority in generic names has been much more respected than in specific ones, perhaps as a sort of compensation for their mutations in boundaries, yet they do not escape; and one of the most flagrant violations of the rule—en- tirely, however, without those elements of vanity and meanness which so frequently figure in these changes—has been often men- tioned in my hearing. It was the act of the eminent botanist Ben- tham, and was, in effect, a claim that both generic and specific names might be changed for very trivial reasons—for no principle has been better established than that which rules that an author shall have no more power over a name once published than any other person. He published a genus of Californian plants founded on a single species which he named Adenostegia rigida; but subse- vol. i.] Nomenclature of Organic Life. 3 quently finding- that there were other species without glands, and his generic name would be somewhat inaccurate, he retired not only the generic, but the specific name as well, in favor of a later manu- script one of Nuttall's—so that the name of the plant as it appears to-day in our books is Cordylanthus filifolius Nutt. \ Dr. Asa Gray is known to have held opinions similar, at least t measurably, to Mr. Bentham's, but his fine tact early led him to see that such license, if justified in opinion, had better be exceedingly restricted in practice. Indeed, his argument that a name is but a name, and no part of the description of an organism, has been much used by advocates of a rigid priority, for if the name, even if descriptive, is to be considered no part of the description, it matters nothing at all if it be meaningless or even false—perhaps even the incongruity may be an aid to memory, as in a case mentioned by an entomologist friend, Sesia Schmidttifcfrmis, where the ludicrous idea presented to the mind stamps the name of the species firmly upon it. In the life of humanity this kind of false naming gives no sort of trouble. We have all known "Blacks" who were remarkably white, and " Whites " who were at least dingy, yet none of them seem to suffer inconvenience, or apply to the courts for relief. The objections of purists against barbarous compounds, names from the vernacular, etc., etc., may be very easily waived. The '' classical'' terminology of any of the sciences would probably appear very barbarous to Cicero, and the most vigorous sticklers in this regard are usually those who, having acquired late " a little Latin and less Greek," wish to make of that little as great a display as possible. It has been gravely argued that priority being a question of time, does not apply, for instance, to names on the same page, which being printed at one stroke of the press, are therefore simultaneous. The absurdity of this argument may readily be seen from the fact that not only the page, but a certain number preceding or following it, varying from three in folio to 23 in 24mo., are so printed. The '' Citation of Authors'' brings up a whole field of vexed ques- tions, none of them of very great importance, except to the feelings of the said authors. In the case of well-known species these citations are dropped, in popular and semi-popular publications, and as names become settled they will probably at length lose their sometimes unwieldy appendices in the more scientific. They probably served An Arboi'escent Poly gala. [zoe a more useful purpose in the infancy of science, when the name of the author appended to a genus or species was often, at the same time, a reference to a solitary book or series, than in these days of numerous journals, proceedings of societies, etc., where frequently the name gives no sort of clue to the place of publication. As a method of escape from the conflicting claims of the first to the fiftieth author who has dealt with any given species, the citation in place of the author, of the place of publication or the page of an index, to which sooner or later all such matters are likely to be rel- egated seems to offer many advantages. One not inconsiderable benefit would be the removal of the temptation to found genera and species in whose creation nature had no part, so that the author might, by attaching his name thereto, acquire a brief glory and a fleeting aggrandizement. It has been often said that the attaching of these citations was merely a matter of sentiment; but if they serve no other purpose, the sentiment, in the case of a species at least, is certainly misplaced, and belongs rather to the one who in long and toilsome, often hazardous, sometimes fatal journeys, first finds it in its native haunt, rather than to the systematist who, sitting at ease by his fireside, leisurely dissects and labels it. The nomenclature of certain departments, notably fungi, on ac- count of the polymorphism of a large proportion of the species, is complicated by unusual questions, the consideration of which is de- ferred to a future notice. AN ARBORESCENT POLYGALA. BY T. S. BRANDEGEE. Polygalas are described as herbaceous and shrubby plants, but I know of no instance of one ever having been mentioned growing so large as to become a tree. Poly gala apopeiala was described from small specimens growing at its most northern habitat. This year I found it abundant in the Sierra de Laguna, a range of mountains near Todos Santos, in Lower California, that reach an altitude of nearly 5,000 feet. In the canons at the base of the range this hand- some species acquires its greatest development, and becomes a small tree, having a trunk and spreading top, and equaling in height the surrounding Acacias and Lysilomas. The finest example seen vol. l] Nests and Eggs of Towns end''s Junco. 5 was fifteen feet high or more, with the ends of the branches ter- minated by racemes of showy flowers in full bloom. The plate of this plant in the Proceedings of the California Acad- emy, drawn from specimens collected at Comondu, does not repre- sent in the least its beauty as seen in the Sierra de Laguna, where a single raceme, crowded with purple flowers, equals the length of the drawing. It is found growing as a bush about the high altitudes of the mountains, and during my visit withstood slight frosts, prov- ing that it is somewhat hardy, and would grow in a more northern climate, and perhaps be capable of becoming an ornament to the gardens of San Francisco. THE NESTS AND EGGS OF TOWNSEND'S JUNCO {Jztnco townsendi) AND SAN PEDRO PARTRIDGE {Oreortyx pictus confinis). BY A. W. ANTHONY. In the latter part of April and first of May, 1889, this junco was found by Mr. Chas. H. Townsend and the writer to be very abun- dant throughout all of the San Pedro Martir region, above 7,000 feet elevation, and many nests could doubtless have been taken had the time at our disposal permitted of our making a more extensive search. But three sets were taken, and these vary to such an ex- tent that a description and comparison is of interest. Set No. 178, coll. A. W. Anthony, from San Pedro Martir, Lower California, taken May 6, 1889, at an elevation of 9,000 feet. Nest composed of soft, dry grasses and lined with finer grass stems and hair of the mule deer. In form it is rather bulky, the walls being unusually thick, but soft. It was very artfully concealed behind a thick bunch of grass and under the overhanging edge of a large granite boulder. The eggs were three in number and slightly incu- bated. The shell is pure white in two specimens, while the third shows a slight greenish wash. This specimen is also the most strongly marked of the set, being heavily blotched with pale lilac, chiefly on the larger end, but extending in small flecks over nearly the entire shell. The other two are marked with small spots of pale fawn color, with a few small spots and lines of burnt umber collected about the large end. They measure in millimetres 19 x 15; 6 Nests and Eggs of TownsencTs Junco. [zoe 19 x 15; 19 x 14. The nest measures externally 130 mm. in width, by 60 mm. in height; inside diameter, 57 mm. by 30 mm. in depth. Set No. 177 was taken in the same locality May 5. The nest was sunken to the level of the ground, apparently in a cow-track, and well hidden in the tall grass on the edge of a running stream. Owing to its location the walls, are very thin and the nest much smaller than the first mentioned; measuring inside 70 mm. in width by 40 mm. in depth. The material used in its construction | is the same as that in set No. 178, with the addition in the lining of ! a little cow hair. The eggs of this set are alike in color and mark- | ings, and appear at first glance more like eggs of Sialia mexicana f than those of any junco with which I am familiar. They are | uniformly bluish-white with a few of the faintest minute specks of | burnt umber, on the large end, which are not at first noticeable. I Incubation was well advanced. Measurements, 20 x 15; 19 x 15; | 20 x 15 mm. I Set No. 179, May 1, presents features different from either of the "\ others in their profuse markings, they being, I think, the heaviest **% I have seen in this genus. The ground color is faint bluish-white ; ;j one is heavily marked with large spots of raw umber and lilac, ! chiefly collected about the larger end, but covering the entire shell 1 to a great extent ; another has a heavy ring of raw umber encir- } cling the large end, mixing with finer spots of lilac, a few fine i markings straying over the entire Qgg. The third has similar | markings, but collected about the small end, though it is hardly proper to call either end small in this case, the specimen being unique in having ends almost equal in diameter. j Unfortunately the nest was not saved with the set. The eggs measure 20 x 15 ; 19 x 15 ; 18 x 15 mm. The single nest of the San Pedro partridge that I have seen was discovered near the base of the San Pedro Martir range, March 29, 1889. It contained but a single egg, while the female, which was secured as she left the nest, furnished a second, which she was about to deposit. These specimens are of the usual pyriform shape common to the genus, and not distinguishable from eggs of O. piclus in my collection from Oregon. In color, creamy white; measuring in millimetres, 37 x 27 ; 36 x 28. ' The nest was a mere hollow under a manzanita bush, filled with dry leaves from the manzanita and lilac. n NOTES ON THE NATURALIZED PLANTS OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA. I. BY S. B. PARISH. The evidence upon which plants are excluded from the native flora of regions in which they are found growing spontaneously, must in many cases be largely inferential. Some species there are of such world-wide notoriety that they may be branded as " cosmopolitan weeds," even when detected in the least suspicious places. As to others, direct testimony may sometimes be produced as to when, where and how they first obtained a foothold. But the records are too scanty, and the intrusion is usually too insidious for this to be often the case. The negative evidence of the absence of a species from every collection of plants is not conclusive, especially of com- mon weeds. In exploring a new field the well-known plants are the ones a collector is most likely to leave ungathered. Few are so thorough as to include in their sets purslane and pigweed, when most of the vegetation by which they are surrounded is still rare or new. It is the later gleaner who takes everything, and many of his additions are of plants his predecessors thought too common to gather. Often circumstantial evidence must be relied upon. The habitats of the suspected plant are to be examined, its history traced as far as possible, and the probabilities of its accidental origin and dis- persion considered. California is not a new country, if we date back to its Spanish settlement, but the agencies by which plants are dis- seminated were few and sluggish in the days of the Missions, while in recent years their activity and multiplicity have been wonderfully increased. Railroads facilitate the transportation of produce of every kind from all parts of the country, and are likely to bring us most of the weeds and some of the indigenes of the regions through which their ramifications extend. The coming and spread of them should be recorded, and in their investigation the local observer may occupy himself with profit. The following notes are mostly confined to the four southermost counties of the State—San Diego, Orange, Los Angeles and San Bernardino—and relate more especially to the last named, in which my opportnnity for observations has been most extended. Among the most widely dispersed of our naturalized plants the u S Naturalized Plants. [zoe two species of Erodium, indiscriminately known as " Alfileria," easily hold the first place. There is, however, a considerable dif- ference in respect to the extent to which they have established themselves. Every western collector, from the Mexican to the Do- minion line, finds E. cictdarium in abundance. Indeed, Brewer and Watson* incline to regard it as a native, and in his Bibliographical Index Dr. Watson prints it in ordinary type as an indigenous species. Dr. Trelease,f the latest monographer of the order, has no hesitation in pronouncing it an introduction. And it is easy to ac- cept this view when it is considered how admirably the seed is adapted for conveyance in the fleece of sheep. Indeed, it rather would have been strange had it not been brought over by the Spanish flocks, or carried wherever their successors have wandered. But E. moschatum, which has a seed essentially the same, has not established itself as widely as its companion. Few references to it are found in botanical reports. It does not appear to have been found by the botanists of the Mexican boundary, but first appears in the collection of the Pacific Railroad Survey.% The Botany of California returns it only from Los Angeles and Santa Inez Valley. Dr. Palmer got it below our boundary on Guadalupe Island§ and on the adjacent mainland, at San Quintin Bay:|| Prof. Greene has also collected it at the former station,^ and on San Miguel Islandff in the Santa Barbara channel. Professor Brewer does not even enumerate it in his exhaustive account of the Foreign Plants of the United'States for the tenth census. \\ These reports indicate that it is mostly confined to the southeen extremity of the State. Dr. Trelease indeed calls it a mere " roadside weed." On the red-clay foothills of the San Bernardino Valley it, however, grows in great abundance, and so luxuriant as sometimes to be cut for hay. On these hills it is much commoner than its congener. On black adobe soil it is much less abundant, and on sandy ones very scarce. E. cicutarium nearly reverses this distribution, but its preferences of soil are less pronounced, and this may have aided in its wider dif- *Bot. Cal. I, 94. tN. A. Geran., 81. jTorrey, Pac. R. R. Rep. VII., 8. $Wats. Proc. Am. Acad. XI, 114. ||Vasey & Rose, Proc. Nat. Mus., 1888, 534. TfBull. Cal. Acad. I., 222. ttPitt. I, 85. ttTo complete the account it may be added that it has been detected twice in Canadian gardens. Macoun, Cat. Canad. PI. 1, 91. V LI vol. i.] Nahiralised Plants. 9 fusion since it appears to be able to thrive under a greater variety of conditions. It is worth noting that it is to the plant-eradicating sheep, which has wrought such destruction to our native flora, that California probably owes the introduction of its most valuable and abundant forage plants, namely, alfileria, bur-clover and wild oats, .and that all are of Mediterranean origin. Silene Gallica is another foothill plant, although not restricted to a particular soil. It is a companion of 6". antirrhina and has as much appearance of being indigenous as that species. Both are far from rare, and are thoroughly at home on rough hillsides and the steep banks of canons quite removed from cultivation, and I have never observed it in fields or by waysides, where one expects to find intruders. The former species, however, is put down in the books as an exotic. But one who observed its habits here would certainly never suspect that it was not indigenous, and I am dis- posed to exclude it from the catalogue of our introduced plants. A third habitant of the foothills is the "Lady's Mantle" of Europe, Alchemilla arvensis. This delicate little herb is very abundant in early spring on clayey slopes, usually seeking the par- tial shelter of open growths of Adenostoma and other shrubs. Although an introduced species in the Atlantic States, it is here evidently indigenous. I am also disposed to claim a native origin for Apium graveolens, although it is always noted as the opposite. Brewer and Watson state of this " Wild Celery " that it is " rare in California, but has been collected in salt marshes from Santa Barbara to San Diego, and also at Fort Tejon."* Coulter and Rosef add another station, San Bernardino. It is, in fact, common enough throughout this region, abounding on wet meadows and by stream banks. It has no more appearance of a foreign origin than has CEnanthe sdrmen- tosa, with which it is frequently associated. So widely diffused and well established a plant, if introduced at all, must have gotten its start in Spanish times. Now the cultivation of celery as a vegetable indicates a far more advanced state of the gardener's art than ex- isted at the ranchos and missions of that period. The seed also is one that very soon loses its vitality, which diminishes the chances of the vegetating of an accidental sowing. Considering then the *Bot. Cal. I, 258. tRev. Umbell, 124. IO The Evolution of the CatfisJies. [zoe thoroughly established and stationary habit of the plant, for it is certainly not increasing, at least in later years, and the unlikelihood of any extraneous origin, it appears more satisfactory to regard it as a native of this region, as well as of the coasts of Southern Europe. Here may be mentioned a few other Umbelliferse which had not been observed when the Botany of California was completed. Pastinaca sativa, the wild form! of the cultivated parsnip, I first collected in 1882 in Edgar canon, near the San Gorgonio Pass, where it was well established at a stream bank for some distance below a farm house. About five years ago it began to appear by the roadside near San Bernardino, and is yearly becoming more abundant. Anethum graveolens occasionally appears in the same neighbor- hood, but so far as I have observed only as a transient escape by roadsides and yards. Dr. H. E. Hasse, however, reports it as " apparently established at Los Angeles." The same gentleman has observed Fceniculum vulgare as an escape at the same place, and Mr. W. E. Lyon has collected Corian- drum sativicm, the common coriander, in San Diego county.* *Coult. & Rose, Rev. Umbell., 35. *w * The writer would be greatly obliged by the communication of notes on the naturalized plants of the region embraced in this paper, in order that the account may be as complete as possible. i THE EVOLUTION OF THE CATFISHES. BY CARL H. EIGENMANN. The Nematognathi, the Eventognathi and the Gymnonoti have been united by some comparative anatomists, chiefly on account of the presence of a Weberian apparatus, under the supra-ordinal name Os- tariophysiae. The Weberian apparatus consists of a chain of ossicula auditus lying beneath the lateral processes of the anterior coossified vertebrae. The structure and functions of this apparatus being highly complicated and specialized it is not probable that it was independ- ently developed in the above named orders, and the common de- scent of the Nematognathi, Eventognathi and Gymnonoti from prim- itive Ostarioyhysiae may be granted. This view was first proposed vol. i.] The Evolution of the Catfislies. n by Sagemehl. Cope and Gill in their systems have derived the Nematognathi and Eventognathi from distinct sources. - The Nematognathi are distinguished from the remaining Ostario- physiae by the absence of a suboperculum and the coossified supra- occipital and parietals, and, with one exception, by the vestigiary maxillary. In general appearance some members of the order ap- proach the Eventognathi so closely that even Valenciennes was mis- led by the superficial resemblance. In this paper only American forms are considered, but the series of Nematognathi from the low- est (Diplomystes) to the highest (Farlowella) living species is so com- plete among American species that I am led to believe that all exotic forms are descendants of emigrants from the Americas. Not many fossils of this order have been found, and those which have been discovered do not help us materially in determining the inter-rela- tions of the higher groups. The date of the differentiation of the orders of Ostariophysiae is uncertain. Silurinae,* Bagariinae and Pimelodinaef were separated as early as the beginning of the Tertiary, and as both tjhese sub- families are quite remote from the most primitive living nematog- nathoid the Nematognathi must extend into the secondary period. The Nematognathi reach their highest development in the neo- tropics, where they constitute forty per cent, of the entire fresh-water fish fauna. All the families,% subfamilies and genera now inhabiting this region have undoubtedly originated here. In most of the families the maxillary bone is a mere vestige and serves only as a support for a highly specialized dermal appendage, the maxillary barbel. So greatly has this bone been modified even in its develop- ment that Ryder§ seriously questioned whether the basal bone of the maxillary barbel in the North American cat fishes is in reality the vestige of a maxillary. No doubt need, however, be entertained on that score, since in Diplomystes the basal bone of the short primitive maxillary barbel is a functional dentiferous maxillary. The comparative development of the maxillary is, then, an excel- *Pseudentropius and Bagarius, living Indian genera, have been found in tertiary deposits of the highlands of Padang in Sumatra. tLeidy, Contr. Ext. Vert. Fauna Western Ter., 192. The species recorded by him is in all probability a member of Cope's Rhineastes. Cope, Ter. Verteb. X The families of this order were defined by us in the Am. Nat., July, 188S. §On the Development of Osseous Fishes, Washington, 1886. t! 12 The Evolution of the Catfishes. [zoe lent guide to the determination of the rank any family-is to occupy in the system. Other structures valuable in this respect are the different barbels so highly developed in some forms. Of the development of the barbels of Ictalurus albidus, Ryder says: " The remarkably developed barbels of the embryos of the species make their appearance very early, especially the maxillary pair; these appear on the second day. * * The barbels on the lower jaw do not appear till the fourth day of development is completed. * * The last of all to be developed is the nasal pair * * [which] does not appear until the seventh day." In Diplomystes only short maxillary barbels are developed, and, as stated above, the maxillary is dentiferous and forms the mouth border above. It therefore has its barbels less specialized than the remaining families, while its maxillary is more generalized and re- sembles most that of other fishes. The Diplomystidae may there- fore be considered the most primitive of the Nematognathi. At present this family is resricted to the fresh waters of central Chile. The next important factor to be considered is the relative devel- opment and specialization of the air bladder and Weberian apparatus. In the Bunocephalidae and the Siluridae, with the exception of the Ageneiosinae, the air bladder is large and lies below the coossified vertebrae. In the remaining families the air bladder has been split into lateral halves, and, with the corresponding bones of the Web- erian apparatus, has been enclosed in a bony capsule. In the Bunocephalidse there are no indications of any approach to the enclosed air bladder, and indeed this family shows little re- semblance to the remaining families. It has lost the opercular bones entirely, and has in other ways attained a high state of specializa- tion. It was early differentiated from the descendants of the Diplo- mystidae, but not before*the maxillary had become quite vestigiary. Two subfamilies have become differentiated; they differ chiefly in the number of vertebrae in the tail and the number of anal rays. This family inhabits the Amazon and the South American rivers to the north of it. The cosmopolitan Siluridae is composed of a large number of sub- families, seven of which are American, or have representatives in America. They vary considerably from the most generalized Tachi- surinae which most resemble the Diplomystidae to the Dorandinae VOL. I.] The Evolution of the Catfishes. and Ageneiosinae, in which last we observe an-approach to the con- ditions obtaining in the families with closed air bladders. The meth- ods of transition from the Ageneiosinae to the Hypophthalmidae has been pointed out by us.* As is intimated above, the Tachisurinae are the lowest of the liv- ing Siluridae. The members of this subfamily are mostly marine, and from it have, in all probability, been derived the remaining sub- families. Some members of Tachisurinae have only the maxillary barbels developed, while in others the mental barbels have been added. From the Tachisurinae have unquestionably been derived the Callophysiriae and Pimelodinae, which differ from each other in dentition. Both these subfamilies are neotropical in their distribu- tion, the Callophysinae being found in the Amazon and northward, the Pimelodinae in the whole region from the La Plata to Mexico. One of the chief features modified in passing from the Tachisurinae to the Pimelodinae. is the space between the anterior and posterior nares. In the Pimelodinae the barbels obtain their greatest special- ization. The nasal barbels are, however, not developed before the Bagrinae are reached. AH the North American species belong to this subfamily. From the Pimelodinae have also been derived the Doradinae, in which dermal ossifications first make their appearance, f In the Doradinae and the succeeding subfamilies of Siluridae the Weberian apparatus varies greatly and the whole group seems to be in a state of unstable equilibrium. In the Ageneiosinae appears for the first time the great reduction and splitting into lateral halves of the air bladder. From the Ageneiosinae were undoubtedly directly derived the Hypoph- thalmidae. \ * American Naturalist, July, 1888. t Minute plates are noticed along the anterior portion of the lateral line of Platy- stomatichthys sturio (Pimelodinse). \ The members of this family were widely separated from the Ageneiosinse by Giin- ther, Cope and others on account of the supposed absence of an air bladder and the simple anterior vertebrse. R. Ramsay Wright proved the presence of an air bladder and that the anterior vertebrae are coossified, and we have in our MS. Review of the Nematognathi followed older authors in placing the genus Hypophthalmus near Ageneiosus. The Evolution of the CatfisJies. [zoe From the primitive Ageneiosinae and Auchenipterinas have evi- dently been derived, as a lateral offshoot, the Pygididae/of which the Cetopsinae retain the most ancestral traits. In this family nasal bar- bels again appear. Some members of Stegophelinae have lost the habit of free swimming, and live as commensals in the gill cavity of large species of Siluridae. The three remaining families were, by Dr. Giinther, united in one of his inferior groups, Hypostomatina. They have little external resemblance to the Siluridae. The Callichthyidae have two series of smooth plates covering the sides, while the Loricariidae have several series of rough plates. The teeth and dentiferous bones of the latter have also been consid- erably modified. The Argiidae are dwarfed forms inhabiting high mountain streams. As diagnoses of the families enumerated here were published by us*, and more detailed descriptions of both the families and sub- families will appear in a subsequent paper already referred to, no further descriptions will be necessary here. We wish to raise the genus Diplomystes to family rank on account of its dentiferous maxillary. The transitions from one family to another are, in most cases, very gradual. How far paleontology will bear out the system here proposed re- mains to be seen. ' The following diagram represents the inter-relation of the families of Nematognathi and subfamilies of Siluridae and Pygididae: *American Naturalist, July, 1888. vol. i.] The Evolution of the Catfislies. Loricariidie Argiiclae NematogenyinEE Pygidinre f StegopTiilinret Cetopsin£B'" Bagrimo BunocepLaliaoD CalliclithyiclDS Hypoplitlialmidfe Auclienipterina; * Diplomystidte Primitive NfematognatM Primitive Ostanophysiae -j- Pygididffi DESCRIPTION OF A FOSSIL SPECIES OF SEBASTODES. BY CARL H. EIGENMANN. During half an hour's search in a bed of Tertiary fossils at Port Harford, Cal., a comparatively large number of fish remains were discovered. They consisted mostly of isolated, and in many cases fragmentary, bones, mixed with the remains of mammals, birds, crustaceans, radiates and mollusks. Among the fish remains is the lower limb of the preopercle of a Sebastodes, or some related genus. It represents a fish about .30 m. long. The three lower preopercular spines are of about equal size, and the distance between them is about equal. They are all directed downward and backward. The ridge between the exposed portion of the limb and that portion serving for the attachment of the muscles of the cheek, is less marked than in living species, and the latter surface is shallower and broader. Compared with living species of Sebastodes this species most resembles rosaceus; the preopercle is, however, much heavier. The openings into the mucous canal differ from all living species very strikingly. There are three such openings, or pits, on the anterior half of the first spine, decreasing in size backward (the posterior is quite small and not in view in the accompanying figure). There is a large pit between the first and second, and another be- tween the second and third spines, and two smaller ones on the anterior half of the second spine. The species may stand as Sebas- todes (?) rosce. I have named this species for Rosa S. Eigenmann. Other fossils from the same locality are t, St?~o?igyloce?itrotus pur- purahis A. Ag.; 2 Scutella gibbsii Remond; 3, Cancer brewerii Gabb; 4, Cancer antennarius Stimpson; 5, Cancer magister Dana. As far as I am aware, Nos. 1, 4 and 5 of the above have not been found as fossils before. Length, .02 m. DODECATHEON MEADIA. (Shooting Star.) BY KATHARINE BRANDEGEE. Since the publication of the Botany of California and the Syn- optical Flora, three papers dealing- with Dodecatheon have ap- peared in American journals. The first by Mr. A. F. Foerste* is a most interesting contribution to our knowledge of its structure and growth ; the second a tentative revision by Dr. Grayf suggest- ing rather doubtfully five species, one of them, D. He?idersoni, new; and the third by E. L. Greene § in which three new species are proposed upon very trivial and inconstant characters. It has been known ever since the cultivation of Dodecatheon in gardens, that it was most easily propagated from root-buds. Mr. Foerste in the paper alluded to above has shown by figures the formation of these buds, and makes the interesting- observation that the leaf-arrangement is preserved in the roots. That these buds at the upper ends of the roots are developed in the axils of leaves is difficult of demonstration in the common variety with very short rootstock, but in the form known as var. alpinum, which belongs to high alti- tudes, and generally grows in bogs, the rootstock is often much elongated, and the transition from leaves with a bud above and a root below, to scales more and more reduced, but holding the same position, can be easily seen. These roots are thick and fleshy, abound in starch for some distance from their origin, and when sep- arated from the parent plant by its decay, by the scratching of birds or the rooting of hogs, are quite capable of giving their buds a fair start in life. In some forms the roots of a variable number of the numerous buds produced around the rootstock cease growing at a short distance from the stem, and have nearly the appearance of small wheat grains, and their connection with the parent not being- strengthened by the passing of nutriment is much slighter. This character, though so obviously inconstant and dependent like the number of the leaves, largely upon the character of the soil or the degree of moisture, has been relied upon as the principal one to distinguish two species, D. patulum and D. Clevelandi Greene. These rootbuds, whatever their form or the extent to which the attached root is produced, are equally capable of independent growth, and at least in Central California most of the new plants *Torr. Bull. XI, 31. tBot. Gaz. XI, 23. §Pitt. I, 209. i8 Dodecatiieon Meadia. [zoe originate from them, and can always be distinguished from seed- lings by the primary leaf which, although resembling the cotyledons, is solitary. The petals of Dodecatheon, and sometimes the sepals and sta- mens may be more or less than the normal number, five, and one of these variations is the basis of the recent species, D. cruciferum Greene. They are usually, but not "invariably," four in that, the common form about San Francisco otherwise absolutely identical in all its parts with the one found in the foothills of the Sierra Ne- vada, which has usually, but not invariably, a 5-parted calyx and corolla. D. Meadia var. alpinum and D. Jeffreyi are also in most cases 4-merous. D. Meadia var. brevifolium, of the Botany of Cali- fornia, has 4-9, very commonly 6 petals, though ihe sepals and stamens are very rarely more than five. There has been some dispute as to whether the filaments of Dode- catheon are truly connate in a ring, and Dr. Gray in his latest revision re-establishes D. frigidzitn principally on the ground that the very short filaments are unconnected, although Chamisso & Schlechten- dal* in the original description say they are connate, and it may be easily demonstrated in this case as in the forms known as D. Jef- freyi and var. alpinum which usually have sessile anthers, that the filaments are truly united into a tube which is adnate to, though easily separable from, the whole length of the corolla tube, and that in this regard the varieties, and even the individuals, differ simply in the length of the filaments. No constant character can be found in the more or less thickened dorsal folds of the filament and connective, which apparently serve to secure the introrse opening of the anthers and include till after fertilization, the afterward elongating stigma. The color of the an- thers, and even their relative length and slenderness, are not more to be relied upon, for any large suite of specimens will readily show that in these particulars the individuals of each of the forms, espec- ially of that known as D. ellipticum, differ widely amongst them- selves. The characters drawn from the capsule are in the light of recent observations almost equally unreliable. Dr. Gray having had his • i *Linnsea, I, 223. VOL. I.] Dodecatheon Meadia. attention called to the opercujate dehiscence of one of the western forms, founded upon the apparently good character a new species which he called D. Hendersoni in recognition of the observant bot- anist who made the fact known to him. Mr. E. L. Greene has since shown, however, that this peculiarity belongs to nearly all the forms found on this coast. He was mistaken in supposing that even D. Jeffreyi or its depauperate alpine form, var. alpinum, has a strictly valvular dehiscence, for the capsule does not split through the base of the style, that organ, as a preliminary step, falling off with a small portion of the attached apex. The dehiscence is, there- fore, intermediate between D. Meadia of the east, and its varieties ellipticum and Hendersoni of this coast. The length of the capsules is often extremely unequal, even in in- dividuals growing together, and this inequality is especially notice- able in var. Hendersoni, and renders comparison with the calyx o little diagnostic value. Dr. Gray remarks* that " the truncate ori- fice seems indisposed to split up at all into valves." In this in- stance he must have been misled by immature specimens, for in those fully ripe the margin, as in all western forms, splits for a short distance into a variable number, 5-12, teeth. The so- called operculum, and therefore also the truncate margin of the capsule is usually somewhat irregular in shape. The stipe of the columnar placenta is ^s variable as the other parts of the plant. In var. Jeffreyi, which appears to have stronger claims to specific rank than any other form, it is very short, while a fruiting scape from Alaska in which the dehiscence is apparently valvular, has a stipe as long as the placenta. The seeds differ but little at the same stage of growth in any of the western varieties, as far as color and reticulation go, but in both forms of var. Jeffreyi they are somewhat oblong in shape, their mar- gins produced into short wings, and the hilum instead of an umbilical depression, takes the form of a linear ridge. It is possible that D.frigidum and D. dentalum may agree with var. Jeffreyi in these particulars, and thus strengthen its claim to specific rank under the oldest name, but fruit of these northern forms seems to be very little collected, and even of typical D. Meadia of the east no mature specimens have reached the writer. Yet it is so easy to cultivate * Bot. Gaz. XI, 233. 2O Dodecatheon Meaciia. [zoe these plants and their rootbuds, if not their seeds, are so easily ob- tainable that the question should soon be settled. Until such time the following arrangement of the forms is offered as agreeing somewhat better than the older ones with more recent and more extended observations. D. Meadia L. Leaves tapering at base ; stamen-tube exserted ; dehiscence valvular.—Eastern United States extending to the Rocky Mountains and Northern Mexico. --------var. Jeffreyi. Leaves linear-oblanceolate tapering into the petiole; flowers usually 4-merous ; stamen-tube little or not at all exserted ; style and a small portion of the apex of the capsule falling off in dehiscence ; seeds with narrow wing-like margins and prominent linear hilum. D. JeffreyiMoore (according to Dr. Gray); D. Meadia vars. macrocarpum (f), lancifolium and alpinum Gray. —Sierra Nevada from 4,000-8,000 feet, usually in bogs. Some specimens collected on the floor of the Yosemite are two or more feet in height with leaves eighteen inches long, but at greater eleva- tions it is represented by the very much smaller var. alpinum. --------var. frigidum. Leaves broader, usually thin ; stamen- tube not exserted ; mature fruit unknown. D. frigidum Ch. & Schl.; D. dentatum Hook.; D. Meadia var. latilobum Gray.—Or- egon to Idaho, Alaska and Northeastern Asia. ---------var. ellipticum. Leaves thickish obovate, oblong or ob- lanceolate with cuneate base ; stamen-tube exserted ; scapes low and stout; petals 4-9, yellowish, pure white or rose-colored ; anthers usually rather short and blunt; capsule commonly short and blunt, with circumscissile dehiscence. D. ellipticum Nutt.; D. Meadia var. brevifolium Gray ; D.patidum Greene.—San Diego to the Columbia River, often in the Sacramento Valley growing in the margins of small depressions, "hog wallows," which are filled with water dur- ing the rainy season. ---------var. Hendersoni. Leaves as short but usually broader than the last; scapes taller, the corolla usually rose-colored and often 4-merous, the petals sometimes laciniate; stamen-tube ex- serted, the anthers usually longer and more pointed than in the last; capsule circumscissile and commonly longer and less blunt. D. Hen- dersoni- Gray ; D. cruciferum & D. Clevelandi Greene.—Through- out the length and breadth of California. ORNITHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS DURING THE TOTAL SOLAR ECLIPSE OF JANUARY, 1889. BY WALTER E. BRYANT. In the afternoon of January 1, 1889, occurred phenomena of such great importance to astronomers that they took every precau- tion to secure valuable observations and data from various' locali- ties. Most of these results have already been published, but as yet I have heard nothing from ornithologists who apparently failed to improve the opportunity for observing the effect upon birds of the sudden obscuring of the sun. Some years ago a partial eclipse of the sun occurred soon after rising, and although I went some miles on foot to a favorable locality near Oakland, Cal., and noted the activity, songs, etc., of the birds for two hours, I was unable to connect any of these events with the eclipse, which was so slight, that I doubt if the birds were at all conscious of anything unusual. Had I anticipated anything- so wonderful as the total eclipse proved to be, I should have endeavored to stimulate observers to take the field and have suggested a schedule upon which to record correlative phenomena during the afternoon. With such material a generalization might have been made developing new facts. As it is I can but give the notes which I made at Healdsburg, Sonoma county, at which place the eclipse was total for about fifty seconds, and I believe the line of totality extended for some eight miles be- yond. My observations were made while photographing phases of the eclipse in a vineyard about one hundred yards from large, leafless white oaks, and two hundred yards from a grove of madrono. The location was quite favorable, being upon high ground between Russian River and Dry Creek, and fairly swarming with birds, principally robins, whose medley of calls and songs rivaled the con- fusion in a bird-store. Not having any one to call time for me the seconds were not taken, nor are they important in this connection. Observations were recorded every five minutes after 1:2o, some time before any noticeable effects upon the birds were seen, and half an hour before totality ; also, for half an hour following totality, which occurred at Healdsburg about 1:5c 22 Ornithological Observations. [zoe The first contact was at 12 h. 25 m. 23 s., about one hour previous to my note-taking. Weather, sunny, calm and fairly clear. 1:20—Robins (Menda migratoria propinqua) were scattered about the vineyard feeding upon dry grapes left upon the vines, or collected in the leafless oak trees, singing loudly in confusion with a flock of blackbirds (Scolecophagus cyanocephahis and Agelaius gubernator). 1:25—No difference in the behavior of the above mentioned birds, whose abundance and noisy ness were closely watched through- out. A few Audubon's warblers (Dendroica auduboni) were seen feeding in the vineyard. 1:3O—There was a momentary lull in the medley of bird notes due, I believe, to a change in position of some of the robins and blackbirds, for the songs at once recommenced after they had alighted. 1:35—Most of the robins had ceased singing, but continued their startled calls ; the notes of the blackbirds became quieter. 140—The robins became very restless, frequently calling, but not one singing ; the blackbirds, too, were uneasy, and almost wholly silent. It was now getting very dark, and stars were visible. A few ground squirrels (Spermophilus grammurus donglassz) were out from their holes, and one that had his cheek-pouches crowded full of corn, stood bewildered near his hole until I came within ten feet of him. This species is usually very shy, so much so that it is often difficult to shoot them over open ground, yet here was an in- dividual that did not seem to realize that I was so close, for his entire demeanor was fearless. 1:45—The blackbirds took wing and circled in a close flock about the trees ; but few sounds were uttered by the robins. 1150—At this time I recorded the sudden disappearance of all sun rays. The actual time may have differed two minutes, more or less. The sudden totality was accompanied by an awful stillness. The trees were full of birds, but not a sound was heard except a faint chirp from a goldfinch (Spinus) flying overhead, and sug- gestive of a bird migrating at night. The sky had a peculiar greenish color, and well may have caused terror among the birds. During this period I was told by some neighbors that their chickens had gone to roost. Those which I observed appeared to be too suddenly overcome by the change, and did not go to roost, but huddled together close to the sides of buildings and fences. VOL. I.] Ornithological Observations. 23 A cow in a pasture near by came to the gate and lowed, as was her habit at milking-time, four hours later. 1:55—The first sunbeams were welcomed by the chirps of Audubon's warbler, then the notes, but not songs, of robins, and a sudden disturbance in the tree-tops as the apparently alarmed birds broke out in slight notes of their calls. 2:00—The metallic notes of the ruby-crowned wren ('Regidus calendula) were heard, and increased noise from the robins. 2:05—A flock of eight mourning doves (Zenaidura macroiira) flew past. The birds acted very much as on dark, cloudy days, but did not seem to be feeding. The cow returned to pasture. 2:10—Blackbirds were observed feeding. 2:15—The sun was about half obscured ; nothing unusual could be detected in the behavior of the birds unless that they did not recommence their songs. 2:20—Vigorous crowing of roosters and increased screaming of robins. 2:25—Alight breeze sprang up, and a normal condition of life among the birds was noticed, all again feeding and calling, but the songs had ended for the day with the exception of a few robins which sang in the oaks. Summing up the general behavior of the birds during the event, the peculiarities which cannot well be defined in writing, were all, it seemed, due to a sense of terror from circumstances which were appalling inasmuch as they were unknown and unexpected. In the Sacramento valley, I am told, the wild geese which were in flocks of hundreds were very noisy previous to the eclipse, but when darkness came on they became quieter, and many took wing, probably to the night resting grounds. Since this paper was written I have received a letter from Mr. Chas. A. Keeler of Berkeley who was at San Rafael, Marin county, on the day of the eclipse. At that place it was not total, but his observations seem to coincide with mine, that the actions of the birds were caused by fright. He writes: " Until the eclipse neared totality the birds acted in a perfectly normal manner. When nearly total all bird notes were hushed. The sharp metallic note of the California brown towhee (Pipilo fiiscus crissalis) was no longer heard, and the same, was the case with the Arkansas goldfinch (Spinus psaitria) which was also common. A number of Anna's 24 Pleocoma Behrensii. [zoe humming-birds ( Trochilus anna), however, acted quite differently. When the eclipse was fullest they flew about near some gum trees uttering a sharp, loud note of alarm somewhat different from any- thing I ever heard from them. When the sky grew brighter their manner again became normal." HABITS IN THE LIFE HISTORY OF PLEOCOMA BEHRENSII. BY J. J. RIVERS. This is one of the larger species of California Scarabaeidae, belong- ing to the sub-family Laparosiidi of the classification of N. A. Coleoptera. The natural history of the members of this genus of beetles was until recently entirely conjectural. Four species were identified by various authors up to 1870, but Dr. J. L. LeConte es- tablished the genus, and Dr. Horn in 1888 published in the Trans- actions of the American Entomological Society, a systematic review of the species, which then had increased to seven, Dr. Horn having added three new ones. Since this work appeared another has been discovered, and the female of P. conjungens has also become known. Of the eight species seven are Californian, one of which, however, extends its area into Oregon, as I learn from a label at- tached to an example of P. Rickseckeri in the collection of Mr. Charles Fuchs. The other species is Arizonian. The larva of P. Behrensii is found in its own burrows in the earth, which is usually of a rich, loamy or clayey nature, intermixed with humus, through which pass decaying rootlets of shrubs and trees. The decaying fibres, together with fungoids, appear to be the only possible vegetable food within the reach of this insect in its growing state. The perfect beetle is found during the first heavy rain storm of the season, which often comes in the month of October, and as soon as the ground has become sufficiently softened by the rain the beetle emerges from its subterranean home. The female has but very rudimentary wings, measuring only a fourth of an inch, a size which renders impotent any attempt to raise its own body, which measures one and three-quarters inches. She therefore being apter- ous, simply comes to the surface and re-enters the earth in a fresh place. The male, however, takes wing and goes in search of the VOL. I.] Pleocoma Behrensii. other sex. He is a good flyer, and possesses the secret of finding the retreat of the female, though she be hidden beneath the earth beyond the penetration of eyesight. Last season while in search of specimens of this species, I saw a male example coming towards me, and when about a yard off he altered the direction of his course by swerving and then circling around me, and finally dropping to the ground, where he immedi- ately commenced burrowing, and in a very short time, perhaps about a minute, was buried out of sight. I at once suspected that he had traced out the abode of a female. I began excavating the ground where the beetle entered, and in a short time exhumed both male and female, they having become companions at a depth of six inches; proving conclusively that the male is endowed with the power of finding the female, though she be hidden from view. The female most probably had not long entered the earth, or it may be the habit to remain near the surface in order to be more surely found by the male. However this may be, the depth at which pupation takes place is two feet or more, and it takes place in an earthern cell compactly constructed and cemented together, so as to retain its shape after removal. The observations upon the movements of the male make it evi- dent that he searches for the other sex by scent; and a correlative fact is, that at the time he circled around me, he had been drawn on the line of scent of a female which was in a box in my coat pocket; for when I first saw him he was hovering about the place from which I had just before removed the female, and when he left that place his course was straight towards where I stood, making a turn around me, but coming in contact with a stronger wave of scent from another female, it led him into the ground as related above. This is not a new principle of attraction between the sexes, for on the contrary it is the oldest known in the animal economy. The higher classes of animals possess it largely, and is a commonly ob- served power among the Articulata, but it is among the members of the group Bombycidse among the Lepidoptera that this method of attraction has been mostly observed, and particularly among those species in which the wings are fully developed in both sexes, as well as among the other groups wherein the wing power of the male is ample, and the female completely apterous. But this case 26 A Cardon Forest. [zoe of Pleocoma is one of the strongest examples among Coleoptera, and is new in this: That while all those others are examples of fol- lowing a scent carried upon waves of the atmosphere, there is here added the faculty of tracing it to a point well beneath the earth. A CARDON FOREST. BY T. S. BRANDEGEE. Cereus Pringlei was described from specimens collected by Mr. Pringle in northwestern Sonora. Later it was collected by Dr. Palmer on San Pedro Martir, an island of the Gulf of California, and since then has been found to be one of the most abundant of the many species of cactus growing in Lower California. There are few places between the southern end of the Peninsula and San Quintin, where this huge cactus can not be seen. It is called by the Mexi- cans "Cardon;" they, however, apply the same name to another giant cactus {Cereus pecien-aboriginuni), equally as tall and grow- ing with C. Pri?iglei in the southern part of the Peninsula. Along the road between La Paz and Triunfo grows one of the largest and most striking cardon forests I have seen in Lower California. The forest is composed mainly of plants of C. Pringlei that cover the ground almost entirely for miles, so that when looking down upon it not even a bush is visible. The plants are three or four feet or more in diameter, branch near the base, and send up a half-dozen of nearly erect stems to a height of twenty to forty feet. It is a strange and interesting sight, and in April when the numerous large cream- white flowers are in bloom must be very handsome. Cereus pecten-aboriginum is not abundant, excepting, perhaps, in the Sierra de Laguna; it is more graceful than C. Pringlei, has sharper ribs and a purple tinge to the whole plant, but is most readily distinguished by its fruit, which seems often to persist for a year. This giant cactus was named by Dr. Engelmann from speci- mens of the fruit bought by Dr. Palmer from the Papago Indians of Sonora, who used it as a hair comb, a use that suggested the spe- cific name. The fruit covered with stiff yellow spines forms balls six inches in diameter, and often many of them growing close to- gether, crowd the tops of the branches. Small plants of this cactus grow upon the islands about the harbor of Mazatlan. CROSSOSOMA. BY FRANK H. VASLIT. This genus, which has been referred to various orders with more or less uncertainty, consists of two described species. C. Califor- nicum was described from Catalina Island, and has since been found on Guadalupe Island. It was said to be four feet high, but has since been observed on the island where it was first discovered to be as much as twelve feet high and four inches in diameter. A collection made by Mr. Brandegee last year in Lower California makes it doubtful whether the second species, C. Bigelovii, is any- thing more than a depauperate variety of the first. In these speci- mens of Mr. Brandegee's the petals, though more slender than those of the island form, are 8-16 mm. long, the stamens 15-30, and the carpels nearly as long as in the original species. The leaves as in all the mainland forms are smaller, thicker, and with less distinct reticulations. Certain structural peculiarities seem to have been in some degree misunderstood. In the original description Nuttall states that the carpels are united at the base and stipitate. Although this charac- ter does not appear in his plate, and has been neglected by every subsequent author, it is true to an extent which Mr. Nuttall probably never observed, the stipe being in many cases 8-10 mm. long. The carpels are often six. Bentham says that the carpels separate into two valves, a statement which is certainly not borne out by the facts. They open only along the ventral side, and never by the dorsal ridge, which represents the midrib of the leaf. The seeds are min- utely reticulate, the base of the aril is apparently continue d as a lining to the inflexed hilum. RECENT LITERATURE. ZOOLOGY. In the initial article of the January number of the Auk, Mr. J. A. Allen makes many timely remarks and intimations on '' To What Extent is it Profitable to Recognize Geographical Forms among North American Birds." Not only will it bear careful read- ing and consideration by nearly all the ornithologists of this country, but mammalogists and others may well reflect upon the importance of allowing "incipient local forms " to "escape till further differen- 28 Recent Literature. [zoe tation, in future ages, shall render them desirable captures." The author has always been regarded, on the Pacific Coast at least, as one of the most conservative American zoologists, but whether be- ing " conscious of my own changed tendencies " may be interpreted as an endorsement of the present '' hair-splitting'' in American ornithology will remain to be seen. We think not, and shall await with keen anticipation his forthcoming revision of the susceptible genus Taniias. The benefit to ornithology resulting from the study and applica- tion of the ideas presented by Mr. Allen is not to be estimated now. A few years hence may show whether any consideration is given to the question in the light in which it is presented, or whether like the " Plea for the Metric System " published a few years ago by Dr Merriam, it is passed without regard. It has been a matter of some surprise that American zoologists have not been able to agree upon a standard unit of measurement as well as a uniform method of measuring, based upon the most important structural members and the most tangible points for as- certaining the dimensions. In the length of the tail of a bird some four or five different starting points are used by as many different individuals, rendering the figures of one almost valueless for com- parison with the others. w. E. b. Judging from the comments which occasionally appear in the Ornithologist and Oologist—and there must be many that do not appear—some of its patrons are slightly dissatisfied with the quality of some of the articles, and do not hesitate to let the publisher have the advantage of their views. His genial and independent nature once classified some suggestions alphabetically and continued in the usual style. The February issue contains a number of interesting papers, and also several installments of the catalogue of the " J. P. N." col- lection of eggs, wherein the collector seldom receives mention. w. e. b. 'Wissenschaftliche Resitltate der von N. M. Przewalski nach Ce?i- tral-Asien untemommenen Reisen. Zoologischer Theil—Bd. Ill, Abth. 2. By S. Herzenstein, St. Petersburg, 1888. Part 1. Being descriptions of the species of Nemachilus, including six new species. With plates I-VIII. 1889.—Part 2. Descriptive of the VOL. I.] Recent Literature. 29 new genus Lefna, including one new species and of the species of Schizothorax, including seven species new to science. With plates IX-XIII. Cave Animals from Southwestern Missouri. With two plates. By S. Garman. Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool. XVII. No. 6. Dec. 1889. Mr. Garman discusses a collection made by Miss Ruth Hoppin of Jasper county, Missouri, who made notes on the living forms. Only one species of fish, Typhlichthys subterraneus, is mentioned. It was represented by a large number of specimens, mostly from wells, a few from caves and one from a creek outside. Two new species of Crustacea are described by Prof. W. Faxon in- to whose hands the Crustacea were placed for identification. The invertebrates which were sent to Prof. H. Garmam to study con- tained no new forms. r. s. e. Descriptions of New Species of Fishes collected at the Galapagos Islands and along the Coast of the United States of Cohcmbia, 1877- '88. By David Starr Jordan and Charles Harvey Bollman. From Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus. XII, pp. 149-183. Washington, 1889. Thirty-one new species are described, being part of a collection made by the U. S. Fish Comm. steamer Albatross. A genus re- lated to Lepidogobius is named Bollmannia, by Dr. Jordan, in honor of the junior author of the paper, who died while engaged in ex- ploring the rivers of Georgia, while it was passing through the press. Three other new genera are described. r. s. e. List of Fishes collected by Alphonse Farrer about Mazatlan, with Descriptions of Two New Species—/Zeros beani and Pcecilia btttleri. By D. S. Jordan. Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., 1888, pp. 329-334. List of Fishes now in the U. S. National Museum, Collected in Nicaragua by Dr. Louis F. H. Birt. Ibid., 1. c, p. 411. On the Occurrence of the Great Lake Trout (Salvelinus namay- cush) in the Waters of British Columbia. Ibid., 1. c, p. 58. Notes on a Collection of Fishes Obtained in the Gila River, at Fort Thomas, Arizona, by Lieut. W. L. Carpenter, U. S. A. By Philip H. Kirsch. The generic name Xyrauchen is proposed for Catostomus cypho of Lockington, a species from the Gila river. One new species (Catosto??iusgild) is described. r s. e. Recent Literature. [zoe A Review of the American Species of Sturgeons (Acipenseridce.) By P. H. Kirsch and Morton W. Fordice, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci., Phila., 1889, pp. 245-257. Description of a New Species of B,athymaster (B. jordani) Front Pnget Sound and Alaska. By Charles H. Gilbert. Dated August 27, 1889. Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., 1888, p. 554. Notes from the San Diego Biological Laboratory. Part I, The Fishes of Cortes Banks, issued November 9, 1889. Part LI, Ad- ditions to the Fauna of Cortez Banks ; additions to the Fauna of San Diego; Fishes of sEtna Springs, Napa County, Cat.; Fishes of Allen Springs, Lake County. Cal.; The Young Stages of Some Selachians, issued December 19, 1889, by C. H. and R. S. Eigen- mann. Reprinted from West Am. Scientist. Notes from the San Diego Biological Laboratory, III. Additions to the Fauna of Sa?i Diego. Issued March 24, 1890. Ibid. Ex- tract Proc. Cal. Acad. Sci., Ser. 2, Vol III, pp. 1-24. In these papers are included fifty species which are new to the vicinity of San Diego, being about 33 per cent, of the entire fauna. Of'this number nineteen are here described as new. BOTANY. Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States. Sixth ed., revised and extended westward to the 100th meridian. By Sereno Watson and John M. Coulter. The present edition of Dr. Gray's familiar manual includes, besides the phanerogams, all the vascular cryptograms with the exception of the mosses, which would make the volume inconveniently large. Very few names are changed, a matter of congratulation in the present unsettled state of botani- cal nomenclature. It will be quite time enough to make these changes in text-books and manuals when some deree of permanency shall have been reached. t. s. b. In a paper by Dr. F. Niedenzu in Engler's Jarhrbuch, 1889, enti- tled " Uber den Anatomischen Bau der Laublatter der Arbutoideae und Vaccinioideae," Arctostaphylos alpi?ia is raised to generic rank under the name Arctous alpina (L. Gray)—Arctous being the sec- tional name applied to it by Dr. Gray. Drude, in the Ericaceas of Natural. Pflanzenf. adopts his view and writes the name A. alpina Niedz. Dr. Parry, in Bull. Cal. Acad. ii. 489 (1887), referred this plant "to an older genus Mairania, Neck., viz.: M. alpina Desv." t. s. B. VOL. I.] Proceedings of Societies. 31 Sylloge Fungorum, vol. viii., Dec. 1889, By P. A. Saccardo. This volume completes the great w,ork undertaken by the author seven years ago, though a second volume of " Additamenta" is promised. The amount of labor involved in bringing together, in connected form, diagnoses of all known species of fungi, amounting to 31,927, is sufficiently great to exclude any idea of critical work. The great benefit conferred on mycologists consists in bringing to their notice in accessible form all the species, and thereby greatly simplifying the revisions which are now in order, and which will greatly reduce their number. h. w. h. PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES. California Academy of Sciences. March j, i8go. President Harkness in the chair. A paper by W. J. Raymond, edited by Dr. J. G. Cooper, was read by title, and referred to the Publication Committee. Mr. Gutzkow exhibited a specimen of Cordyceps growing from the larva of a moth. Dr. Behr and Dr. Harkness commented upon its life history. Mr. T. H. Hittell read the following notice, which, on motion, was spread upon the minutes : Ernest Cosson, honorary member of this society, died at the age of 70 years, on the last day of 1889, at his residence in Paris. A man of generous disposition, and in easy circumstances, he early turned his attention to botany. Well known in France as the author of excellent-local botanical works, he is best known abroad by his connection with the exploration of Algiers, to the botany of which he devoted the last forty years of his life, and which, delayed by his conscientious care, remains unfortunately unfinished. He was elected a member of this society in 1887, and testified his interest in our welfare by sending us publications and a large collection of Algerian plants, and when overtaken by his last illness was preparing to send us a second installment. His death is a severe loss to science, as well as to all his friends. March 17, i8go. President Harkness in the Chair. Dr. Harkness read a short paper on the " Nomenclature of Organic Life." Some specimens of a tuberiform growth were presented by Mr. August Ehrlich, of Kaweah, Tulare County. They were found in the earth, in making a mountain road, and were at first soft, but hardened in drying. Dr. Behr and Dr. Harkness discussed their origin; the latter considered them sclerotia, belonging to some fun- gus, perhaps Polyporus tuberosus. Dr. Harkness exhibited specimens of Rhytisma Arbnti, a fungus found on the under side of the leaves of the Madrono (Arbutus Menziesi), on Mt. Tamalpais, and killing so many of the leaves that in many places the slopes have a rusty brown appearance. 32 Proceedings of Societies. San Francisco Microscopical Society. March ij, i8go. President Wickson in the chair. The usual periodicals and exchanges were reported and placed on file. The special discourse of the evening was then delivered by Professor Joseph Le Conte, of the University of California, his topic being "The Germ Theory of Disease." All decay he said was accompanied by and caused by micro-organisms, and its rapidity depended upon and corresponded with the rapidity of the develop- ment of those organisms. The importance of this fact to industries was noted, as also the necessity of these organisms to the process of decay without which life itself would soon be im- possible. The remarkable analogy existing between the phenomena of contagion and those of life was alluded to, but the speaker remarked that science is content only with absolute proof and that it had become necessary to modify in many important par- ticulars the original sweeping claims of the advocates of the germ theory, many grave disorders now being attributed to secondary effects known as ptomaines. In conclusion the distinguished speaker drew a vivid picture of the heights which science would undoubtedly yet attain in the extension and practical application of the great truths of the germ theory. He was unanimously accorded a vote of thanks for his very interesting lecture. After the reading of the paper by Professor Le Conte, the President invited dis- cussion and remarks, which was generally entered into by members, and resulted in eliciting further interesting facts and opinions. Dr. J. H. Stallard exhibited, as pertinent to the subject of the evening, a pure culture of Bacillus leprcz, started in 1886, and a nearly pure culture of Bacillus tuberculosis, March 26, iSgo. Vice-President Bates in the chair. The Secretary reported the usual additions to the library of periodicals and pro- ceedings. R. H. Freund and John D. Coulie were elected active members and the applica- tion of Dr. E. S. Clark was received. The paper of the evening was by Carl H. Eigenmann, Ph.D., on " The Genesis of Chromatophores in Fishes." Mr. Eigenmann has made a special study of the life of fishes and his paper bore the stamp of original investigation. By way of introduction he mentioned how the color of fishes varied under differ- ent conditions; the color of the food would modify it, or the color of the bottom of the sea where the individual made its habitat would change it. The same species, under these varying conditions, would show a marked difference of color in tide pools separated but a few feet. In order to fully explain the formation of the chromatophores or color cells, the speaker gave a brief outline of the development of the fish, its embryology. A number of carefully made drawings supplemented various preparations shown under the microscope, and the various stages of the embryo were drawn on the black- board. Pigment is nearly always found sometime before hatching, and as the embryonic life of pelagic eggs is usually short, lasting from eighteen to forty-eight hours, and the eggs are transparent, the whole process, from fertilization to hatching, can be observed without any very great inconvenience. The observations recorded were all made on the living egg, which was usually placed under a cover-glass, supported either by wax feet or paraffine rings. ZOB A BIOLOGICAL JOURNAL Vol. I. APRIL, 1890. No. 2. THE ECONOMY OF NATURE AS EXEMPLIFIED BY VEGETABLE AND ANIMAL PARASITES. BY H. H. BEHR. The ancients, by a kind of intuition or instinctive knowledge of the general fitness of things, expressed their admiration of the universe by the phrase "the harmony of the spheres," and some even went so far as to believe in strains of music produced by the rotation of celestial bodies. It has since been proved that mathe- matical laws govern the infinite space. We leave the study of those laws to the astronomer and restrict our attention to the beautiful harmony that rules the organic creations peopling our earth. We see here first the antagonism between animal and vegetable life, and observe at the same time that each is necessary to the ex- istence of the other. As there is no shadow without light and vice versa, so no animal life can exist without plant, no vegetable life without animal. We see animal and plant by their respiring process absorb oxygen and secrete dioxide of carbon. We observe that, with the sole exception of those plants entirely destitute of chlorophyll, an opposite process takes place in the nutrition of the plant, by which it absorbs the carbon of the dioxide and sets the oxygen free. As this process of nutrition is considerably more active than the exceedingly slow one of vegetable respiration, prac- tically the plant secretes oxygen and absorbs carbon. Any aquarium illustrates this natural dependence of animal and plant. Practically the experiment could be made in a very simple way with two glass globes containing gold fish. If there are intro- duced into one some rooting branches of watercress it will be seen that the water keeps fresh and respirable to the fish, the water- cress secreting the supply of oxygen necessary to sustain animal respiration and absorbing the carbon from the dioxide of carbon 34 The Economy of Nature. [zoe produced by the respiration of the fish and using it for its own growth. The globe that contains fish without watercress soon must have its water renewed or the fish will die by gradual suffocation. Something similar will take place if watercress is placed in a third globe without fish. The watercress will wither amid a slimy matter. This slimy matter is, it is true, also of vegetable origin. It belongs to the group of Thallophytes whose biological conditions do not require a considerable amount of carbon, and which adapt them- selves very well to the surplus of oxygen that, during the short time the watercress sustains -its biological processes, is secreted by its growth. If the first globe is exposed to the sunlight, the whole- some state of the water, and with it the equilibrium between animal and plant life, may be kept up for a considerable time without re- newing the water. We see that the existence of both primary forms of organic life is a biological law. But now a great many complications arise by a network of cause and effect that connects not only the two fundamen- tally different types of organic lile, that is, animal and plant, but also animal and animal, plant and plant. To give an idea of the long chain of causes that produce certain phenomena I will first re- mind you of the phenomenon quoted by that most talented ob- server, Darwin, when in a certain district the destruction of cats caused the disappearance of the wild pansies occupying before a prominent place among; the agricultural weeds of the locality. The field mice multiplied considerably; they ate the young brood of the hornet and bumble bee and destroyed their nests. Now the pansy belongs to those plants that rarely, or never, produce perfect seeds without the agency of these insects in carrying the pollen to the stigma of the flower. No new plants sprang up, the fecundating insects having disappeared, and the old plants gradually died out. Now you see the removal of the cat caused the dying out of the pansy. I can give here an instance of a similar concatenation of efforts that caused the defoliation of our live oak, Quercus agrifolia. There exists around our bay a moth, Phryganidia Cali/ornica, which moth lives exclusively on live oak, though I lately have found some stray larvae on 0. lobata. When, in 1853, I first found the caterpillar of this species, I considered it a great prize, so rare was VOL. I.] The Economy of Nature. 35 the little thing. Gradually the insect became less rare, and as soon as a sufficient number of shotguns were placed in the hands of little boys who shot little birds, I had ample opportunities to fill the empty spot in my collection that for several years had only the male of the species on a pin. I have counted four generations of the insect in one summer. Nevertheless they did not endanger the life of the trees inhabited by them. There existed still a sufficient number of insect-feeding birds to decimate the four broods of the insect, especially a species of titmouse, then rather common in our surroundings and very fre- quent in Marin county, took care of the eggs and the adult cater- pillar. This bird managed in some way to escape destruction by the shotgun, but then the English sparrow was introduced by some well-meaning but imperfectly instructed people. The sparrow soon drove away the titmouse. The titmouse no more decimated the Phryganidia egg and larva, at both of which the sparrow looked with a contemptuous smile. The Phryganidia multiplied in mathe- matical progression; the leaves of the live oaks, for instance at San Rafael, disappeared four times a summer; some trees survived, others succumbed; and so you see the introduction of the English sparrow destroyed our Californian live oaks. The best proof that the English sparrow was the cause of this destruction is the circum- stance that the destruction coincides with the spreading of the sparrow. The sparrow being an admirer of human civilization, never moves from the neighborhood of cities as long as he can help, but extends baneful influence on the rest of the birds, unfortu- nately, over a more considerable area than that which he really occupies himself. The phenomena referred to show very clearly that an interference in any province of biology does not remain a single interference, but like a stone thrown into a pond raises circles of disturbance ex- tending farther and farther, till at last nature restores a state of things more or less like the one that was suspended by the original interference. The same state of things never returns, because nature never copies herself; she is progressive. Changes are constantly going on in the form of slow development. If I say slow development of course I speak from my own standpoint, or better, from the stand- point of our race, because nature does not know the ideas of slow and rapid, because the universe knows neither space nor time. The Economy of Nature. [ZOE Taking human reasoning as a standpoint, the gradual organic development has different standards ; first, the daily growth of plant and animal; second, a yearly periodicity depending on the solar cycle, and third, secular changes which become perceptible to us only by changes in historical landscapes or the underground remains of plant and animal now superseded by a different vegeta- tion, inhabited by different animals. Rapid changes or disturbances in organic life are exceptions, and even in prehistoric times may not have been so frequent as we are now disposed to think, and probably have more usually taken the form of gradual develop- ments. It would lead too far to discuss all the different forms of such dis- turbances that have occurred or may occur. We will only discuss- the one to which considerable practical interest is attached in regard to cultivated land, that is, the multiplication of certain forms of organic life frequently injurious to our plantations, herds, or even ourselves, whether the form multiplied out of proportion be animal or plant. One of the most frequent causes of such disturbance is man himself, but even without his interference, a combination of circumstances produces occasionally such disturbances in districts little or not at all interfered with by man ; for instance in the Arctic the wanderings of the lemming, a kind of gopher or rat, or, what is of more practical interest, the migrations of different kinds of grasshoppers in our own temperate zone. Almost all disturbances of the equilibrium in nature are more or less undesirable, and to prevent their frequent occurrences, to restrict and repair the damages inflicted by them to human inter- ests, is one of the most noble problems of science. To accomplish such object it is necessary to study the phenomenon where it takes- its course without human interference, because the less complicated phenomenon is more likely to reveal to us its causes and show to- us the ways and means applied by nature itself to restore the en- dangered balance of power. Thus it is necessary to study the single case of disturbance first in its isolation, then by comparing it to analogous cases in which human agency is as little apparent as. possible. This study will make us acquainted: first, with the cause or the combination of causes that produced the inordinate multi- plication of plant or animal, so that it became a pest; second,. VOL. I.] The Economy of Nature. 37 the means applied by nature herself to restore the equilibrium, in other words to counteract the harm resulting from an inordinate prevalence of the injurious species. These means we have to imi- tate, as far as an imitation of them is in our power, and carefully abstain from producing new disturbances by the use of violent rem- edies, because the history of these experiments, where it dates farther back than in our own country, has demonstrated that the ben- efit derived from violent interference is of short duration, and even then frequently of a very questionable nature, and that a series of other disturbances is always the result. I quote here a historical example: At the beginning of this century the orchards of Normandy, Belgium and other districts of Northern Europe were afflicted by a kind of Psylla. As cider is one of the staple products of that region the matter excited considerable attention, and a wash, chiefly con- taining lye, was applied, and proved a perfect success. The next year the grain fields suffered considerably from the green aphis, which, as it was a warm and moist summer was imputed to that cir-. •cumstance, but as the aphis increased for two years independently of the weather, and the apple trees became infested also by different kinds of borers more than ever before, the scientists at the univer- sities of the different countries were consulted, and their investiga- tions proved that the application of the lye had killed, besides the Psylla, the Coccinella and other enemies of the injurious insect, had driven away the insect-feeding birds, and in this way facilitated the multiplication not only of the insect-feeding parasites of the apple tree, but of insects injurious to vegetation in general. I am glad to see that our biological authorities begin to follow the advice given by nature, and introduce insects of the Coccinella tribe from Australia. This of course would not have been necessary if they had protected our native species, formerly common and now very rare. I think it not out of place to warn our horticulturists not to combine the two systems and treat the Australian newcomers to a course of washes, or else a new expedition to Australia may become necessary. THE FISHES OF THE YELLOWSTONE PARK. BY DAVID S. JORDAN. Not long ago the writer was directed by the U. S. Fish Commis- sioner, Hon. Marshall McDonald, to make an examination of the streams of the Yellowstone Park, with a view to finding the dis- tribution of the species of fishes there, and also to give direction to- the work of stocking the streams with trout and grayling. In September last, the writer, assisted by Dr. Charles H. Gilbert, spent three weeks in such explorations. A few of the facts ascer- tained are given in this paper. The Park region is an elevated plateau of lava, traversed by many clear mountain streams, and with a number of large lakes of glacial origin. On all sides of the plateau, excepting the southeast, wherever the streams leave the lava-plateau they have cut deep canons, and at the head of each canon there is a waterfall. These falls vary in height and steepness, the highest being the vertical fall of the Yel- lowstone, but almost all of them constitute an impassable barrier to the ascent of fishes. The original lava flow, which dates from Tertiary times was, of course, fatal to all life in this region. If the fishes ever invaded the region after the suface of the lava became cold, the snows of the glacial period must have again driven them out. Since the glacial period the formation of falls and canons have effectually prevented their return, except in a few cases noted below. It has thus resulted that a territory of 1,500 square miles, nearly- half the area of the Park, is wholly destitute of fish. This com- prises the drainage of the Gardiner, Gibbon, Fire-hole, Nez Perce, Tower and Lewis rivers, with Shoshone and Lewis lakes. Among these are some of the clearest and coldest streams of the Rocky Mountains, streams in every way suitable for the maintenance of trout. If the popular idea that each species of animal has been placed in those regions most suitable for its development be cor- rect, the failure to fill these streams with fish must be regarded as a great oversight on the part of Mother Nature. Besides this fish- less area within the Park, there is another perhaps equally large, further east, on Clarke's Fork of the Yellowstone. In all these streams they are placing trout and grayling, and it is the intention Fishes of Yellozvstone Park. 39 of Commissioner McDonald to give to each drainage basin a differ- ent kind of trout. If these trout do well, and there can be little doubt that they will thrive, the Park will become the most attractive trout-preserve in the world. In the largest stream in the Park, the Yellowstone, trout exist in abundance, both above, below and between the falls. Above the falls in the river, and in Yellowstone Lake, no other species of fish are found. The reason for this anomaly of distribution is to be found in the character of the Continental Divide at the head of the Yellowstone. At a point called " Two-Ocean Pass," Atlantic Creek, a tribu- tary of the Yellowstone and Pacific Creek, a tributary of the Snake River, come within less than a quarter of a mile of each other. This interspace, the " Two-Ocean Pass," is occupied by marshy meadow, which is covered with water for a time in the spring. Across this pass the trout of the Upper Yellowstone must have come. As no fish except trout ascend Pacific Creek from Snake River, it is natural that no other species should be in the Upper Yellowstone River or in the Lake. There is good evidence that the interval between the two falls of the Yellowstone has been stocked by fish from above. Whether the Lower Yellowstone, with the Madison River and other tributaries of the Missouri were stocked through Two-Ocean Pass, is an unset- tled question. Few, if any, trout could go safely over the lower fall of the Yellowstone (about 300 feet). In a stream called Lava Creek, which flows into Gardiner River, a tributary of the Yellowstone, a few trout have been seen above its waterfall. We find that one of the branches of Lava Creek heads in the same depression with one of the forks of the stream next east of it, the Black-tail Deer Creek. The Black-tail Deer flows into the Yellowstone without a waterfall, and it is well stocked with trout. The watershed between the two streams is at one place reduced to about three rods of meadow, elevated less than two feet above the bed of the tributary of Lava Creek. In the spring this meadow must form a continuous pond through which fish can cross from one stream to another. In the Gibbon River, above the high fall which is wholly impassa- ble to fishes, the " Blob," or " Miller's Thumb," a little-bottom fish, is very abundant. This fish is especially fond of ascending springs, 4° Effect of Rain on Fouquieria. [zoe and in Elk Park, on Gibbon River, we found the remains of three individuals which had been boiled in attempting to ascend a spring of hot water. There is no certain explanation of the presence of the Blob above the Gibbon Falls. The most plausible supposition is this: The Osprey is abundant about the river. A trout caught by the Osprey would die in the air, and could not -be dropped alive into the other waters. The tougher Blob so transported might fall into the stream above the falls and survive the journey. In no stream other than the three mentioned (Yellowstone, Lava and Gibbon) is any fish-life to be found above the fails. In the large and beautiful lakes, Shoshone and Lewis, there are no fishes whatever. The following are the species of fishes found by us in the Park: 1. . In the north and northeast (Yellowstone Drainage). Salmo mykiss Walbaum. The Trout. Catostomus griseus (Girard). The Sucker. Rhinichthys dulcis (Girard). The Minnow. 2. In the northwest (Madison River Drainage). Sdlmo mykiss. The Trout. Coregonus williarnsofii Girard (var.) The Whitefish. Thymallus signifer ontariensis Cuv. & Val. The Grayling. Cottus bairdipunctulatus (Gill). The Blob. 3. In the south and southwest (Snake River Drainage). Salmo mykiss. The Trout. Catosiomus dcemonolephis Jordan. The Witch Creek Sucker. Leuciscus* ccerulezcs (Girard). The Chub. Leuciscus hodrophlox (Cope). The Shiner. Algosia nubila (Girard). The Minnow. *The genus Leuciscus Cuvier, based on several European Cyprinoids, was first re- stricted by Agassiz and Bonaparte to Cyprinus leuciscus L. It is therefore identical with the genus Squalius of Bonaparte. THE EFFECT OF RAIN ON FOUQUIERIA. BY T. S. BRANDEGEE. The growth of plants in Southern Lower California, and their production of leaves,'flowers and fruits depend upon the time of the rains and their amount. Sometimes in seasons of slight fall the whole country becomes parched, and only one tree, known to the VOL. I.] A Monoecious Willow. 41 natives as " Palo de San Juan," or St. John's tree, the systematic position of which in botany is yet unknown, holds its leaves and remains green. The large extent of country between Magdalena Bay and La Paz is mostly covered with cactus and bushes ten feet or less in height, the most common of these bushes being Fouquieria spinosa, known to the natives as " Palo de Adam," and yatropha canescens. These two species were leafless in the early part of January, and their preponderance gave to the region an unusually dry and barren ap- pearance, but the occurrence of a rainstorm almost immediately changed the face of the country. Fouquieria put out leaves at once, and a few days later was covered with foliage. The broader leaves of Jatropha appeared soon after, and grew rapidly. Fou- quieria seems to lose its leaves quickly, and I was told that every rainstorm produced a new set, so that it necessarily goes through this process several times during the year. A MONCECIOUS WILLOW. BY C. L. ANDERSON. The willows being, as has been said, the bUe noir of botanists, we may expect many strange freaks in that family. I find it necessary to live with them from year to year before they can be known. Living with a grove of them at my back door I have become somewhat familiar with some half a dozen species. Botanists say they are dioecious; and so they are, as a rule. I have however in my back lot an exception. It is monoecious bearing both staminate and pistillate flowers on the same catkin. This particular willow is not uncommon among these trees in this locality, and has each spring given me some anxiety because I had no name for it. For a time I considered it a form of Salix lasiandra very near the typical. But finding several trees with male and female flowers on the same ament I have come to a different con- clusion. In the early settlement of this locality by the missionaries Salix Babylonica (weeping willow) was introduced and there are many fine large trees in existence now. They are all pistillate as far as I have examined. I feel quite sure that my monoecious willow is a hybrid of 6". Babylonica and 6*. lasiandra. The trees have the Nesting Habits of the Golden Eagle. [zoe weeping habit, so that in some cases they are hardly distinguishable from the genuine weeping willow; but in other cases they come very near 6*. lasiandra. It does not seem strange that we should have a monoecious hybrid of dioecious trees. The strangeness is that we do not always have them. But among the willows I have never noticed such a result before. NESTING HABITS OF THE GOLDEN EAGLE-. BY H. R. TAYLOR. On February 20, 1889, I received the following telegram, to me perfectly intelligible: "Come to Sargents to-morrow; the eagles are early." This was somewhat of a surprise, as I had regarded a set of the golden eagle's eggs taken on February 29, 1888, as an early laying. Plainly the last three weeks of pleasant weather had made the nesting season early. It is almost needless to say I packed up hastily and was off for the eagle territory the following morning. On arrival I met my friend B. at the station, and started off to visit an eagle's nest which I found last year. On arriving in sight of the eagle's nest, which was in a rather small live-oak near a road, we saw the male perched on a fence not one hundred yards from the tree. When we came near he flew, passing close to the nest, from which the female followed a few moments later. It did not take us long to climb the tree, when we were delighted to find two eggs, handsomely marked. The nest was only thirty feet from the ground, and was not a large one, being three feet in diameter, by eighteen inches in thickness. It was constructed of oak sticks, poison-oak branches and sage brush; lined with green and dry oak leaves and grass, with a sprig of the bright-red Toyon berries. Before reaching my friend's house, several miles distant, we visited an old eagle's nest, which was in an oak about fifty feet above the ground. It was a very bulky affair, formed of big oak sticks, mustard stalks and pieces of grain sacks. The lining was of Spanish moss and oak leaves. When we rode under the tree we saw the great bird's tail projecting over the edge. She perceived us soon and flew off, when we made the ascent and found one egg, brightly marked with brown and lilac. vol. I.] Nesting Habits of tlie Golden Eagle. 43 My friend returned some days later for the eggs, and finding the female again on the nest, on climbing up grasped her by the tail, thinking to secure some feathers as well. The bird turned upon him angrily, doubtless mistaking him for a coon or wildcat, and not until beaten off with his hat did she discover the mistake and take flight. The only eagle breeding in Santa Clara and San Benito Counties, so far as observed by me, is the golden eagle (Aquila chrysaetos). The bald eagle (Haliczetus leucocephalus) nests, I am told, in Mon- terey County; also, in Alameda County. The golden eagle usually chooses an open tree for its nest. The setting bird is said to leave the eggs uncovered for several hours after 12 m. on sunny days, while it takes recreation in flying with its mate. I have never investigated this fact, although once on a warm day I saw an eagle fly to its nest about three o'clock. They become attached to their old homes, and if not disturbed, refit them for occupancy every year, increasing their bulk sometimes to immense proportions. When robbed they still cling to the locality, commonly building a new nest within three hundred yards of the old one, although frequently they return again trustingly to their old home. If robbed again at a new loca- tion they are pretty certain to go back to the old nest the following year, but when there are two nests in the same tree, as frequently happens, the persecuted eagles only remove to their first nest, fancying that on another limb they will be safe from disturbance. After several years' study of these eagles, the writer feels that he has formed the acquaintance of a number of individuals of this spe- cies, and this purely from the regularity of their habits. The first eagle I ever saw in Santa Clara County was moving about the grassy top of a big hill, and on nearly every day thereafter I observed him at his favorite play-ground. On my visit the year following he was still doing '' look-out duty " at his old post. The nest of this eagle had a curious ornament to the interior in the shape of a large "soap-root." The new nest, built the year after, also contained a soap-root, which fact is of interest, as showing the individuality of my feathered friend. Another eagle I know has a singular predilection, when nest-building, for grain sacks, which it uses chiefly in the lining. When I first discovered this eagle's nest, there was one of these large sacks inside. The heavy storms of the next winter dislodged its nest, and in the new one it built I was sur- 44 Birds New or Rare in California. [zoe prised and interested to observe a grain sack. The set of two eggs taken from this nest were unusually large, one of them measuring 79x62.2 millimeters. A curious circumstance about the eagles that make their home near Sargents is that several pairs that are always seen there appar- ently do not nest. The nature of the country in some of the hills is such that one accustomed to riding about might actually know every tree where the birds could build, so that an undiscovered nest would be an impossibility. My friend showed me a pair of eagles that have lived in the hills just back of his house for many years. He also pointed out to me their nest, which the eagles repaired last year, but did not use. He says they have not layed since 1884, when they had three eggs. This pair stay about the place all the year, living largely (like the other eagles thereabouts) on squirrels. They are accustomed to roost in one particular tree. I heard them uttering their peculiar, plaintive whistle in the mornings several times during my stay. Their nest was not much over three hun- dred yards from the house, and was a large structure built on a horizontal limb about forty feet from the ground. From what has been said it will be seen that.collecting eagle's eggs in California is not fraught with the difficulties and dangers which confront the ambitious egg-hunter in the Eastern States. One eagle's nest I found was so accessible that a lady could have climbed to it almost without difficultv. BIRDS NEW OR RARE IN CALIFORNIA. BY W. OTTO EMERSON. During the past ten years of my collecting' experiences in Califor- nia I have added some species which are new to the avifauna of the state or of rare occurrence; these are Spinus psaltria arizoncz. Arizona Goldfinch.—A male was taken in a garden at Hay wards, January 10, 1883. This variety of gold- finch is apt to be overlooked from the fact of its associating with others of the same genus during the winter months. A male is men- tioned by Dr. Cooper as being seen May 7,1872, at Encinitas Ranch, thirty miles north of San Diego, feeding on wild sunflowers; also another near San Buenaventura, January, 1873.. vol. i.] Birds New or Rare in California. 45 Ammodramus sandwichensis savanna. Savanna Sparrow.—This rare straggler was shot at an elevation of 5000 feet in the Volcan Mountains, San Diego County, March 9, 1884. It was'the only bird of this genus seen. It was sent to Mr. Robert Ridgeway for identification and returned as being this form. (No. 205, $, coll. W. O. E.) [This bird was recorded as A. s. alaudimis in Bull. Cal. Acad. Sci., II, No. 7, p. 422.—w. e. b.] Zonotrichia albicollis. White-throated Sparrow.—I am quite sure that I saw one of this species at different times between January 2 and 14, 1889, about the door yard, feeding upon crumbs swept out. On trying to shoot it I missed several times, when the bird left the flock of golden-crowned sparrows with which it was associated. The female which was taken was first observed in the yard, Novem- ber 18, 1889, with golden-crowned sparrows. I did not succeed in getting her this day, but on the 20th this straggler was secured. This species has not been observed by any of the early explorers on the west coast of North America. Junco hyemalis. Slate-colored Junco.— My specimen, a female, was caught with several Oregon juncos in a quail trap set in the garden for small birds, at Haywards, March 20, 1880. Others have been taken in different parts of California. Mr. W. A. Jeffries men- tions one taken at Santa Barbara, March 14, 1883. (A?ik, July, 1889, p. 221.) Mr. W. W. Price has two males taken at Riverside, February 10 and December 1, 1888. Melospiza fasciaia rufina. Sooty Song Sparrow. — This song sparrow was shot at Haywards, November 23, 1882, from a flock of Gambel's sparrows. (No. 309, d\ coll. W. O. E.) I supposed it was the rusty song sparrow until Dr. Cooper called my attention to the differences between it and specimens of the rusty in my collec- tion. This specimen may have been driven southward by the hard storms that occurred in November, 1882. It breeds north of lat. 490 and has not been positively known to have been taken even in win- ter south of the American boundary; possibly some may inhabit the high mountains of Oregon and Washington in summer. Setophaga ruticilla. American Redstart.—This species, which I took at Haywards, June 20, 1881, is known for the first time in this state. The bird was a male. Mr. Clark P. Streator informs me that 46 Deformed Flowers of Dendromecon. [zoe it breeds within a hundred miles of the boundary at Ashcroft and Duck's Station, B. C. Dr. Cooper mentions this species as one of the seventy-five doubtful west coast birds as likely to occur on the Pacific Coast. Merula confinis. St. Lucas Robin.— I noticed this light colored form of robin among a large flock of western robins on a hillside feeding on earth worms, Haywards, January 2, 1882. (No. 159, 9, coll. W. O. E.) My first impression was that I had obtained an al- bino robin until I compared it with a specimen collected- by Mr. Frazar in the Sierra de la Laguna, Lower California. Mr. Geo. B. Badger informs me that he took what he supposed to be this robin at Haywards, March 10, 1880. [A specimen of the black-throated blue warbler (D. ccerulescens) and one of the black and white warbler (M. varia) which Mr. Em- erson collected on the Farallon Islands have been recorded. (Proc. Cal. Acad., 2d Ser. 1, 48.) Mr. T. E. Slevin collected a white-throated sparrow near San Francisco, December 23, 1888.—w. e. b.] DEFORMED FLOWERS OF DENDROMECON. (With Plate 1.) BY T. S. BRANDEGEE. Dendromecon rigidum is found nearly throughout California, but most abundantly in the southern part, where it is common and of more luxuriant growth. It was brought by the writer last year from Lake County, from Mt. St. Helena, Alta, Encinitas, Santa Catalina Island, and from Mt. Tamalpais, near San Francisco; and the year before from Santa Cruz and Santa Rosa Islands and the Santa Inez mountains near Santa Barbara. The form found on the islands is the same on all, and differs from that of the mainland only in its smoother leaves, which usually have the membranous margin entire and are commonly broader. It has received two specific names, the first of which, D. Harfordii, is given in the Botany of California as a synonym of D. rigidum. All the mainland forms known to us have rougher leaves with the membranous margin more or less lacerated. The specimens found near Alta, however, approach in this way as well as in breadth of leaves the island forms. vol. I.] Deformed Flowers of Dendromecon. 47 Dendromecon is especially abundant on hillsides sloping up from the sea at Encinitas in San Diego County. It is found there three inches or more in diameter sending up numerous slender stems 6-10 feet high, often drooping in the manner of the taller of the island specimens, to which the name D. flexile was applied. On these southern slopes it bears flowers of a size and abundance never seen in northern forms. The early leaves of Dendromecon, succeeding the linear-acumi- nate cotyledons, have been seldom noticed. In young plants 1-6 inches high growing in abundance in the loose earth of the steep mountain side at " Cape Horn " above Alta, they were found to be obovate-cuneate in outline with 3-8 rather deep notches. In some localities, especially at Mt. St. Helena and at Encinitas, the flowers of this plant are subject to a very interesting retrograde metamorphosis. Dense masses of small shoots crowded with depau- perate leaves grow from the ends of the branches, bending them down and appearing from a distance like bunches of mistletoe. The flowers in these clusters are all in some degree deformed and often proliferous. In those found at Mt. St. Helena the sepals, petals and pistil are all more or less leaf-like, but the stamens are petaloid. In those from Encinitas however, all the floral parts re- vert in a greater or less degree to leaves, the axis of the flower is elongated, the sepals becoming two alternate leaves, often separated by a considerable interval; the petals are more nearly approximated; the thickened portion of the axis above bears on its sides the sta- mens in every gradation from nearly perfect polliniferous ones to leaves; above them arise the two often nearly or quite distinct car- pellary leaves which represent the pistil. The axis is often continued between these last, continuing the growth of the shoot and some- times bearing a second similar flower above. These deformities of flowers have long been considered of much value as explaining the mode of formation of the more complex organs, and the present one appears to illustrate with a considerable degree of clearness the morphology of simple extrorse quadrilocular stamens. In this case the leaf is first folded backward with the margins to the midrib, the upper surface outward. The first trace of the anther is shown by a trough-like groove on the fold nearer the margin than the midrib but some distance from either. Although this groove is 48 The European Daisy. [zoe apparently a depression of the leaf, it can easily be shown that the folded-in lower surface of the leaf remains flat and the trough is really formed by the elevation of two thick ridges on the outer (upper) surface. The anther cells appear to be formed in the tissue of these ridges, which swell and approximate in pairs, corresponding to the two lobes, the contiguous sides of each pair coalescing at base to form the partition between the cells, which in dehiscence separate from it on either side. The connective is of course the modified midrib and in all these retrograde anthers is prolonged beyond the lobes, making them apiculate instead of as in the normal form, emar- ginate. The accompanying figures will make this description more intel- ligible. Only few forms are shown, but it must be remembered that all gradations from the leaf to the nearly perfect stamen were found. EXPLANATION OF PLATE. 1. Stamen completely changed into a leaf. 2. Leaf unfolded, showing ridges of anther. 3. Stamen approaching normal form. 4. Perfect stamen. 5. ' Carpellary leaves representing the style with the continuing shoot drawn through at the side. 6. Cross section of No. 2. 7. Cross section of No. 4. 8. Carpellary leaves of deformed pistil. 9. Perfect pistil. 10. Cross section of No. 3. THE EUROPEAN DAISY (Bellis perennis). BY FRANK H. VASLIT. This familiar little plant of our gardens often escapes from culti- vation, but seldom succeeds in establishing itself, probably on ac- count of the dryness of our climate. It seems however to have met suitable conditions in one of the glens of Tamalpais, where it has spread from the vicinity of the old mill on the Throckmorton Ranch for more than a mile up and down the creek, and seems thoroughly established. In the uncultivated state it of course reverts to its normal form, and is not "double" as in the gardens. Although its white and purple-tipped flowers add considerably to the beauty of the meadows, it is not desirable as an inhabitant of pasture lands. THE NOMENCLATURE OF FUNGI. BY H. W. HARKNESS. The species of fungi brought together in the nine volumes of Saccardo's Sylloge Fungorum number more than 31,000, and being classified very largely by spore-characters, necessitated great changes in arrangement, with the inevitable result of very numer- ous synonyms. On account of the immense labor and time neces- sary to a critical revison of the species, very little of such work was attempted, so that the chief value of the publication lies in its bringing together in accessible form descriptions and references to nearly all the species, and the works in which they were published. The species are probably much less numerous than is generally supposed. The reproductive bodies of most of them.are so minute as to be invisible to the naked eye, and therefore widely dissem- inated by the winds, are apt to be more climatic than geographical in their distribution. Mycologists are often but slightly acquainted with phanerogamic botany, and are therefore not able to readily judge the degree of relationship of the host plants, which fact is responsible for many synonyms among the parasitic fungi, too many of the forms having received names under the supposition that even if exactly alike, they must be different species if found growing on different hosts. It is, however, well known in the vegetable-feeding insects that while a few are confined to a single species, the majority feed upon all the plants of a genus, or even of a natural family, while a considerable number are almost omnivorous. There is no reason to doubt that a similar state of affairs prevails in parasitic fungi, and that many of these slight differences in size and form which are held to consti- tute very distinct species are really produced by differences of ven- ation, succulence, etc., of the plants on which they grow. An attempt has been made by Dr. Farlow, of Cambridge, the highest authority on this subject in America, to furnish a readier means of comparison of presumably related or identical forms, by means of a host index * which, however, has not met with the appreciation it deserves, the average maker of species evidently not relishing any work which tends to cast a doubt upon their validity. *A Provisional Host-Index of the Fungi of the United States, Part I, Polypetalse, by W. G. Farlow and A. B. Seymour, Cambridge, 1888. Nomenclature of Fungi. [zoe The chief cause, however, of the synonomy of fungi and the one least understood in other departments of science is the polymor- phism of the species. It is probably quite well known to the world at large that such a fungus as the "red rust" of the grain fields often appears under four different forms, three of which are capable of reproducing the species, but it will hardly be believed, and is certainly little to the credit of mycology that these forms, though confessedly belonging to the same species, having all received gen- eric names before their relationship was understood, the form- genera are still kept up, and worse, continually added to. In the Sphaeriaceous fungi the relations of the forms not having been so much studied, the matter is still worse, witness the long lists of "new species" of Septoria, Phyllosticta, Glceosporium, etc., which burden the pages of mycological publications. No one, I think, in the present state of our knowledge, not even the authors themselves, will seriously attempt to justify such a practice which is only excusable, if at all, in the case of some wide- spread pest which forces itself into such prominence, that a name even if certain to be a synonym has a, certain convenience. The mere publishing of a mass of this kind of names, which already probably amount in the aggregate to nearly one-third of the enumerated genera and species, would do no particular harm, except in the lamentable waste of time involved, if all these names of imperfect forms, specific as well as generic, were certain of retire- ment as fast as fully identified with their ultimates, but it has been proposed with more or less following, to reckon . these imperfect forms in the question of priority, and the possible general adoption of this practice which would unsettle the nomenclature of fungi for something like a century to come, makes it highly undesirable to add to their number. In the meantime the biological study of fungi offers a field wide enough for all who are likely to be attracted, and in point of inter- est, and of economic importance the life history of a single fungus, carefully worked out and identified throughout its forms, by obser- vation and cultures is worth far more to mankind than any number of "new species." [Correction.—In article on Dodecatheon in March number, for "Z?. cruciferum" on pages 18 and 20, read D. cruciatum^\ MEXICAN NOTES. I. BY W. G. WRIGHT. The city of Mazatlan is built upon a rather low and narrow pen- insula running out from the mainland, with the ocean on the north and the "estero" or lagoon on the south. The end of the peninsula consists of two sharp, rocky hills about 300 feet high, while a higher conical island stands just outside, upon the peak of which is a light- house. These high hills cut off the view of the city in great meas- ure from the sight of persons coming from the northward, so that the city is fairly seen only after having rounded the out-lying islands, and reaching the anchorage under the lee of the larger island, and about a mile from the city. Mazatlan has 16,000 population, and is the second port in Mexico as to value of her commerce—Vera Cruz being first — yet it has no pier or wharf, except a little one at which row-boats land the passen- gers. All freight is transferred into lighters in the open roadstead. Sometimes storms render it impossible to land either passengers or freight, when they have to be carried and landed on the return trip. From the ship at anchor a good view of the city is had, and it is a charming scene. A great number of cocoanut trees grace the lower parts of the town, especially toward the estero, where is a plantation of them. The latitude of the place is just about the northern limit of this palm, and though it is not so fine and large as in more south- ern places, it gives a tropical look to the town. A fine large church is prominent, showing above the low, flat-roofed houses, and on the farther edge of the city is a large building used as a barracks for the few troops which garrison the place. A large, round-topped hill, covered with bushes and thorny jungle forms the background on the left, offering fine airy sites for handsome residences; but such is not Mexican taste, and it is unoccupied, save for a few rows of wretched cabins of poor people along its base. Altogether, to a stranger the view of the city is delightful, and one longs to get on shore to explore the streets, and to view its beauties from every point of vantage. We reached the anchorage before noon, and at once engaged ,a row-boat to take us on shore. The balance of the day was taken up in getting through with the formalities of the oustom house, and in establishing a new home in the town. I was fortunate in securing Mexican Notes. [zoe rooms in the airy second story of a house upon " Calle de Olas Altas" the street of high waves — one of the few houses that front directly upon the ocean, where the breezes come cool and clear directly off the water, and drive away all thought of malaria and mosquitoes. The surf keeps up its perpetual thunder just in front of my windows; while from the rear balcony a magnificent view is had of the city, the estero extending southward like a wide river as far as the eye can reach, the outlying forests and foot-hills, and the blue mountains which at a distance of thirty miles rise to an altitude of 4000 to 5000 feet. The estero is a broad, river-like lagoon which gives an inland pas- sage to boats for sixty miles south, being shut off from the ocean by low sandy islands covered with bushes and thickets. This lagoon is not exactly of stagnant water, yet has but little current from the tides, and none from rivers. With its interlacing swamps and tide- flats and mangrove jungles it affords, I suspect, a fair foothold for fever and malaria in the warmer season. But to the entomologist these features have a pleasant aspect, for those same sandy, flat shores, and tide-flats, and mud-banks bare at low tide,—what homes,, these, for tiger beetles and all those other beautiful things that de- light the soul of the coleopterist! And how they must multiply in clouds, and fly in countless thousands in such congenial retreats I Blue, red, green, crimson and black, shining like flakes of polished metal, I seem to see them scattering before me in their sparkling beauty, like bits of broken rainbow in the warm sunshine, fleeing from before that unheard-of contrivance, a butterfly net. The morning after arrival, like most of the succeeding ones, was cold and cloudy; but after awhile the sun came out warm and pleasant. With net in hand I climbed the hills near the outer end of the peninsula, and found a few butterflies, but as it was winter time the flight was not abundant. Nearly all that I caught were strange to me, although resembling forms of familiar appearance. First to be taken was Agraulis Vanities, then Heliconia^ Pyrgus, Colias, Calephelis, Phyciodes, and others, new and strange, whose generic names I could not even guess at, though none were of the bright, tropical appearance that I had hoped to find, and so I was somewhat disappointed. The plants, too, every one new and strange, yet of ordinary, homely, and even scrubby look, were not so attractive as I had looked for; so I sat down on my plant press- VOL. I.] Mexican Notes. 53 and pondered: " Is this Mexico — this the tropics ?" Then I went about and collected a few of the chilled, depauperate flowering plants, that showed no sign of tropical warmth, or even as though they had ever once been comfortably fed; then with net I swept the scanty herbage for beetles, and got only a dozen very small Cocci- nellidae that looked very ordinary indeed. " Blessed be the man who first invented sleep," for a night's rest restored my balance, and after breakfast I struck out for the island side of town. Some acacia trees were in blossom, but no insects were on them. A tall coarsely-flowering bean ran over a small tree, looking very pretty. A big flock of blackbirds nearly as large as crows were all about the roadside bushes. Some gay orioles soon caught my eye; then a large fly-catcher that went screaming with anger into the thicket. A little goatsucker sat on the top rail of a fence in the deep shade of a tree, and I had a mind to catch it in my net for a butterfly. I crossed an old cornfield, the weeds in which gave me a few flowering plants. Then across an open pasture field where some fine cows were feeding; here also I got a few plants in flower. Presently, coming near to a low, wet place, I saw, flying high in air, a large Scepsis with white apices and red basal spots; this captured my fancy so much that I waited and walked about the place for two or three hours, getting meanwhile a number of other things, until I had seven or eight of the coveted insects. I planned that the next day's route should be over on the estero side of town, among the mesquit hedges, and along the bushy side of the tide-water. Here, farther away from the more chilly air of the immediate beach, the air was comparatively warm, and more flowers might be expected. So in the morning I took a street-car through the city, and came out upon the banks of the lagoon to the east of the city. Here, a mile from town, were warm nooks, grassy little arroyos and charming glades, the air odorous with blossoms, and banks and fences over-run with a delicate cucurbit vine, and a small passion vine. A few nimble butterflies flitted about the flowering mesquit trees; these insects were rather small, but some were of bright colors and with new and strange forms like some I have seen from South America. The star-like blossoms of the cucurbit vine I found to be frequented by some of the butterflies, and there was a white flower resembling yarrow upon which I caught a gorgeous metallic-blue tropical butterfly of the £tcdamusf pattern, while upon 54 A New Perityle. [zoe the flowers of an unknown tree I caught two of the same style, but with broad tails an inch long. On my way home I overtook a little Mexican boy who had gath- ered a basket-full of the fruit of the cucurbit vine. He said that the fruit was good to eat (but then these people will always say " si" to anything you may ask them), and then I asked him if he would sell me some? His eyes danced with delight, and he eagerly said "Si, senor," and I asked how many he would give for " un tlaco," and he hurriedly selected five and offered them to me, whereat I began to be ashamed of myself for leading him to think he would get money, while I had already a pocket-full of the fruit, and did not wish to buy, but only to exercise my Spanish. So I got the copper coin and gave it to him, but declined to take the fruit; but I think that he was so glad to get the money—probably his first coin— that he is to this day ignorant whether he gave me the fruit or not. These fruits I afterward saw sold in the market; they are fed to canaries, but are not used as food by people. The outside is of deep lemon color, roughly verrucose, while the seeds are of a bright cardinal red; altogether a most lovely fruit. A NEW PERITYLE. BY T. S. BRANDEGEE. Perityle cuneata. Annual, erect 4-7 dm. high, branching above, pubescent and glandular; leaves opposite on the stem, alter- nate on the branches, broadly obovate, truncate or somewhat cord- ate at base, irregularly serrate and minutely ciliate, 5-10 cm. long, on slender petioles of variable length; branches.few; heads rather large and showy, 6-8 mm. high on slender peduncles 1-3 em. long; rays yellow, oblong, 3-crenate, 6-8 mm. long, rather'numerous; akenes obovate, somewhat cuneate; margin callous often reddened, short hirsute; pappus 2 broad lacerate squamellae about \ the length of the akene, and two slender, upward scabrous awns about twice as long as the scales. Sierra de Laguna near Todos Santos, Baja California, growing in loose soil on the sides of canons about the base of the mountains. Differing from all the other annual species in its upright growth, the few branches springing from the upper part of the stem. The apex of the akene, and in consequence the pappus, is often oblique. t THE BARRACUDA. BY CARL. H. EIGENMANN. The barracuda (Sphyrczna argentea) is one of the most import- ant of Californian food fishes. It is a long, slender, spindle-shaped, sharp-snouted fish, evidently well calculated to swim rapidly. In summer it is abundant on the whole coast of California from San Francisco southward, but it is probably more abundant southward than in the neighborhood of San Francisco. During the winter it disappears from the coast of California, but is taken on the coast of Lower California. It probably migrates bodily southward, but stray individuals undoubtedly remain in the waters of southern Cal- ifornia throughout the year, for two or three days of exceptionally fine weather invariably brings them into the market. It is likely that these stray individuals live in deep water during the winter, and come to the surface on bright days. It is quite possible, though not probable, that a great part of those disappearing descend to deeper water. The fact that they are taken only by the troll or by gill nets sufficiently explains why they should not be caught in deep water. Their movements have been watched through an entire season at San Diego, and as these observations may be valuable to serve as a basis for comparison, they may be stated here. During January, 1890, none were seen. During February, 1890, four were taken on the 7th, one on the nth, and two on the 28th. All these dates were at the end of a succession of days of excep- tionally fine weather. On March 1, 1890, two were taken. On March 26, 1889, a few were caught, and on the following day they were abundant and remained so, with occasional lapses, throughout the summer. At the beginning of July they were with ripe spawn. During September few were taken, but on the 29th, 30th and 31st of October they were again abundant. On November 6th one was taken, on the 7th another, on the 15th one young one was caught with a hook in the bay,, and on the 18th another young one was brought from off Point Loma. On the 16th of December, one young individual, evidently of the preceding summer's spawning, was taken in the bay, and on the 30th a large one was caught off Point Loma. The adult never or very rarely enter the bay, but in spring the Naturalized Plants. [zoe young, those not yet a year old and measuring about a foot in length, enter the bay in large schools, and are then destroyed in quantities with seines or Chinese bag nets. About San Diego the troll is the only means used in catching them. It is simply a piece of white rag, or, more commonly, a fragment of bone, to which a hook is lashed. One or more of these is dragged behind a boat made usually after the pattern of the Columbia River salmon boats. The amount of the catch depends largely on the wind. A slack wind, even when barracuda are abundant, brings but few fish. The largest catch reported for a single day is eleven hundred by one boat with two men. Rarely more than forty are taken. They average from six to twelve pounds, and from two and a half to four feet in length, and retail at ten cents a piece. Large numbers are salted and dried. About Monterey they are taken with the gill net. In 1890 the first individuals reached Monterey on March 10th. Like most of the surface and shore food fishes the barracuda feeds chiefly on the anchovy (Stolephorns ringens). \ NOTES ON THE NATURALIZED PLANTS OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA. II. BY S. B. PARISH. The Morning Glory (Ipomcza pzirpurea) is reported in the synop- tical flora from San Diego, collected by Mr. Cleveland, and Dr. Gray suggests that it may be indigenous there, a conjecture that is repeated in the Botany of California.* It is not however well- founded, the plant in the southern counties being too often a very troublesome weed in orchards, vineyards or gardens. As such it has long had a bad reputation among horticulturists, who find it nearly impossible to eradicate it from grounds in which it has once become established. It is especially troublesome in, vineyards, which can only be cultivated early in the season, and where the clambering stems can easily overrun the low stocks to which the grape is pruned. Mr. Lyon tells me of a forty-acre vineyard near Los Angeles entirely ruined by this climber. In orchards it can be kept down by frequent cultivation, but it is exasperatingly persistent, as I have proved by my own experience. Some twelve years ago I *Vol. ii, 470. VOL. I.] Naturalised Plants. 57 planted it for ornamental purposes, but learning its dangerous char- acter, carefully destroyed the plant before the end of the summer. They had however scattered considerable seed and the next spring there was an abundant crop. Constant vigilance was exercised to destroy them beiore they could produce seed and has been exercised annually since, but every year a few vines continue to make their appearance where the first ones were planted twelve years ago. Al- though so persistent when once introduced it confines itself to par- ticular localities, and does not tend to become commonly diffused, as do weeds whose seeds are better provided with facilities for trans- portation. In most cases where it has become a weed its origin is probably directly due to cultivation as a flower. Of the Mustards, two species are common all through this region. Hardly a grain field is entirely free from Brassica nigra, and on the rich adobe lands of Los Angeles it is exceedingly luxuriant and abundant, in places taking entire possession of the soil and overtop- ping horse and rider. B. campestris is mainly a wayside weed, somewhat less common than the former species, but in my neighbor- hood increasing of late years. B. adpressa has been observed only about San Bernardino, where it is quite common by roadsides. A fourth series, B. sinapistrum is reported* as "sparingly naturalized in Southern California," but it has not been found, so far as I can learn, in the counties to which I have restricted that term, and is ex- cluded from the list of our weeds. The Fuller's Teasel (Dipsacus Fullonwn) seems to have estab- lished itself only about San Diego. It has been collected at Los Angeles by Mr. Lyon, but as an evident escape. At San Diego Mr. Cleveland obtained it as long ago as 1876 among the stony hills of the Cajon Valley, where it is still growing, and Mr. Orcutt reports it as naturalized at the Old Mission. San Diego being a seaport is more exposed to the invasion of for- eign plants than are the inland towns, and, as might be expected, it does in fact afford a number of species not known elsewhere in the southern counties. The most interesting of these is Sonchus iener- rimus, for which San Diego is the only known station in the synop- tical region. Collected long ago by Nuttall, who published it as an indigenous speciesf it escaped the notice of succeeding botanists, until recently rediscovered by Mr. Orcutt. Yet according to him it *Bot. Cal., ii, 40. tTrans. Am. Phil. Soc. vii, 438. Naturalized Plants. [zoe is not especially rare, and it is to be found on the west side of Point Loma and at other places about the city. Two other sow-thistles, 6". asper and 5*. olo-acea are universally prevalent weeds in cultivated ground. Coiula australis is found in the south only at San Diego, although not uncommon at the north, whence it has probably reached us. Mr. Cleveland has collected it sparingly in city yards. Its congener, C. coronopifolia is common everywhere, its abundant yellow discs brightening the margins of brooks and ponds. Another common northern weed which is known here only at San Diego is the objectionable Centaurea solstitialis. It is reported as quite common, and is probably destined to become as universally diffused as its ally, C. Melitensis. Of the Xanthiums, X. Canade?ise is a common pest, especially of pastures and the borders of highways. X. spinosum, the Spanish Needle, is as yet fortunately rather rare, but is to be seen here and there by the roadside and is slowly increasing. This may also be said of the handsome but most pernicious Milk Thistle, Silybum Marzanum, so common on the San Francisco sand-hills. Ten years ago I first noticed a half-dozen of these thistles by the Southern Pacific Railway in the San Mateo canon. Their introduction was doubtless due to the railroad. A few years later a single plant ap- peared near Kehls Mills, a mile south of the town of San Bernardino. The mottled foliage of the unknown waif found favor in the eyes of the owner of the adjoining land, who carefully protected it from ac- cidental destruction " to see what it would come to." It came in a few years to occupy the most of the road, and its early protector has paid for his mistaken charity by assiduous but only partially suc- cessful efforts to eradicate it.^ It is as yet by no means common, but it is to be seen every year in new places and evidently has a future before it. A thistle of still more recent introduction is Cnicus edzdis, whose indigenous range extends from British Columbia to the bay of San Francisco, but which first appeared here in 1884. In that year a single plant was observed on Arrowhead Avenue, near San Ber- nardino. It is now quite common along this road for nearly a mile south of the original plant. None are to be found north of it, a cir- cumstance due to the prevailing direction of the winds during its fruiting season. It is one of the least obnoxious of thistles, and is readily eaten by horses and cattle. VOL. I.] Naturalized Plants. 59 Another composite, indigenous in the Sacramento valley, I have seen in the south at a single station, and that such as to render it very probable that it was there an introduced species. This is Heni- izonia Fitchii, and it was growing quite abundantly in a large wheat field on the Mojave river. As it is not known to occur elsewhere so far from its range it is reasonable to suppose that it owed its presence at this place to imperfectly cleaned seed wheat brought from the region in which it is native. I have not revisited the place (Bur- cham's Ranch) where it was observed, and am unable to give its subsequent history, but I have little doubt that it still continues to propagate itself. The showy Verbesina encelioides possibly may be indigenous in the valley of the Colorado, as it is in Arizona and eastward, but at El Monte in Los Angeles county it is an abundant roadside weed and certainly not native. In the city of Los Angeles Melampodium perfoliatum is plentiful in damp waste grounds and along ditches. It is a Mexican species, and the extent to which it has established itself indicates that it was an early introduction. Another Mexican plant which has been long naturalized is Bidens pilosa, also an in- habitant of ditch sides, and not rare in the southern counties. Mayweed, Anthemis cotula, which here justifies its popular name by early flowering, is now a common roadside weed in the San Ber- nardino valley, although a dozen years ago it was comparatively scarce. Sebastodes goodei.—This species was recently described by us in the Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences. All of our specimens were procured at San Diego. It is of considerable interest, therefore, to find that this species is found as far north as San Francisco, where two specimens were procured on April 17, 1890. They are now in the collections of the California Academy of Sciences, and numbered 1130. Carl H. Eigenmann. Mr. C. G. Pringle's set for 1889 of Plantae Mexicanae, numbering 335 species (Nos. 1990-2600), is of the usual excellence of those issued by this best of American collectors. They have been named by Dr. Sereno Watson, who describes as new, two genera and one- fifth of the species. NOTES ON LEPIDOPTERA. BY JAMES BEHRENS. On a trip to Gilroy Springs in 1862, I caught on April 5th more than a dozen specimens of that most charming butterfly, Lyccena regia. W. H. Edwards congratulated me on the capture, as it was the northermost station from which it had been reported. Remem- bering the circumstance, I felt prompted in 1887 to revisit the spot in hopes of a new catch. I reached the place near the end of March, found it cold, dreary and rainy, and such weather continued for the whole month of April. Patient waiting for nearly two weeks brought me, in a few rays of sunshine, at intervals, six specimens, and I felt greatly pleased that after twenty-five years I should find the beautiful insects at the same old spot to welcome me, and give them fame in a museum box instead of leaving them a prey to birds or " devil's darning needles," or decay under fallen leaves. I described the exact spot later to C. F. McGlashan, of Truckee, and believe that in April he, favored by fine weather, made a remarkable haul. N In the western part of Siskiyou County, near the Sacramento River, while crossing a field at 9 o'clock in the morning, I found hundreds of Papilios feeding upon wet sand. A slap of my net brought me only seven specimens, though I had expected twenty; the others circled away without returning, and I sought them in vain the next morning at the same spot. My catch proved to be Indra, Rutulus, Enrymedon, Zolicaon and Daumis—five species, the whole list of our California Papilios, except the common Phi- lenor, which does not occur there. RECENT LITERATURE. ZOOLOGY. In the April number of the Auk, Mr. Frank Bolles contributes a lengthy and exceedingly interesting study of "Barred Owls in Cap- tivity." Two young birds were taken from the nest and studied in relation to their habits, choice of food, and especially the effect upon other birds when one of the owls was exposed in wooded dis- tricts or open fields. As a magnet for a mere bird collector such a pet owl would be an important auxiliary; to Mr. Bolles the study and not the slaughter of birds seems to have been his incentive. In the Recent Literature. 61 White Mountains of New Hampshire, where his observations were made, he recognized 9782 birds, representing 95 species, between July 6 and October 14. Mr. Jonathan Dwight, Jr. publishes his study of "The Horned Larks of North America," based upon an examination of no less than 2012 specimens " and material is still wanting." How well Mr. Henshaw did his work upon this group six years ago with only 350 specimens is shown in the present paper, which leaves his results practically unchanged. Mr. Dwight describes two new races and adds one from the MS. of Mr. Chas. H. Townsend as follows: Otocoris alpestris adusta Dwight. Scorched Horned Lark. Hab. Southern Arizona and New Mexico, Western Texas and southward into Mexico. Oiocoris alpesiris merrilli Dwight. Dusky Horned Lark. Hab. Eastern Oregon, Washington and British Columbia, between Cas- cade and Rocky Mountains; southward in winter into Nevada and California. Otocoris alpestris pallida Townsend, MS. Hab. Lower California and Sonora. The paper concludes with a key to the horned larks in all plum- ages and a map of North America indicating the range of the eleven known forms. Mr. F. Stephens has described a new vireo from Southern Califor- nia, Vireo vicinior californicus, California Gray Vireo, but fails to designate type specimens or define closely the habitat of the new form. Such neglects in the past have occasioned inconveniences and errors, and should be studiously avoided. w. e. b. Report on the Explorations made during 1888 in the Alleghany Region of Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennessee, and hi "West- ern Indiana, with an account of the Fishes found in each of the River Basins of those Regions. By David Starr Jordan. Ex- tract. Bull. U. S. Fish Comm., vol. viii, for 1888. Washington, 1889. Dr. Jordan had the assistance of several of his former students in ichthyology in making these explorations which, as he states, were made for two general purposes: First, to ascertain the general character of the streams in question, their present stock of food-fishes and their suitability for the introduction of other species; second, to catalogue the fishes native to each stream in order to 62 Recent Literature. [zoe complete our knowledge of the geographical distribution of each species, and to throw light on the laws which govern geographical distribution. In his general conclusions Dr. Jordan says "Addi- tional confirmation has been given to the idea that the lowland swamp fishes of the United States are remains of an earlier and, in fact, now extinct fauna. * * * The upland fishes seem to be mostly of more recent origin, the species of Notropis and Etheostoma probably latest of all." The following summer was spent in making similar explorations in the remaining states as far west as Colorado and the Yellowstone Park. The result of these last have not yet been published. It is to be hoped that the Pacific Slope may be as well explored at an early day. r. s. e. Descriptio?i of a New Cottoid Fish collected by the U. S, Fish Comviission. By Tarleton H. Bean, Ichthyologist; U. S. Fish Commission. Proc. Nat. Mus., vol. xii, No. 787, advance sheet, March 4, 1890. In this paper Dr. Bean describes the new species and new genus Synchirus gilli which constitutes the new subfamily Synchirinae. The most distinctive features are the pectoral fins completely united around the breast, having all the rays supported by actinosts, and the remote, though thoracic, ventral fins. r. s. e. botany. Neue Arten von Nyctagineen. Engler's Botanische Jahrbuch, xi, 84-91, t. ii, by Dr. A. Heimerl. Among the new species Dr. Hei- merl describes^Mirabilis Watsoni from Guatemala, Berberis gracil- livia from Mexico, collected by Hartweg, and again in 1885 by Pringle (No. 665), and Abroniapogonantha collected by Parish (No. 1345) " on the sandy banks of the Mojave River." Garden and Forest, No. 109.—A newly imported Rose Saw-Fly (Emphyhis cinctus) J. G. Jack. New or Little Known Plants ( Asterptarmicoides) with figure. No. 110.—Sports, by M. T. Masters. New or Little Known Plants (Syringa Pekinensis) with plate. No. in.— Exotic Palms in Florida, by Theodore L. Mead. New or Little Known Plants (Lye or is sqnamigera) with plate. No. 112.— Notes on North American Trees, xvi; A Question of Nomencla- ture, by C. S. Sargent. Plant Notes; Two American Honeysuckles, (Lonicera flava, Lonicera Sullivaniii) with plates, by C. S. Sargent. vol. i.] Proceedings of Societies. 63 Botanical Gazette, Febr. Undescribed Plants from Guatemala, vii, ( Oxalis dimidiata, Hanburia parviflora, Styrax Guatemale?ise, Solanum olivcsforme, Campanea picturata, Carpinus Americanus, var. tropicalis, Tradescantia subscaposa, Nephrodium duale, with pi. iii, iv.) by John Donnell Smith. A Revision of North American Cor- naceae, i (Cornus Baileyi and C. Greenei n. sp.) New Mosses of North America, iii (Dicranella Langloisii, Dicranum co?isobrimtm, Didymodon Hendersonz, Grimmia tenerrima, Coscinodon Re?iauldi, Orthotrichum Uendersoni, Orthotrichzon ulotceforme, Bryum Hen- dersoni) by F. Renauld and J. Cardot. Bull. Torr. Club, March. An Enumeration of the Plants col- lected by Dr. H. H. Rusby in South America, xi ( Tibouchina Rusbyi, T. Britto?iiana, T. lanceolata, T. stenophylla, T. purpzirasce?is, T. oc- topetala, Axincea speciosa, Meriania Bolivie?isis, Leandra stellulata, Miconia persicarieefolia, M. multiflora, all named by Cogniaux,) by N. L. Britton. The Carices of the Upper Half of the Keweenaw Peninsula, Carex Notes xiii, by L. H. Bailey. Pinus Banksiana at the West, by E. J. Hill. PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES. California Academy of Sciences. March 3, i8go. President Harkness in the chair.. Dr. C. H. Eigenmann read a paper on "Some Features of the Freshwater Fauna of South America," in which the following points were brought out: First—The great extent of the South American freshwater fauna as compared with that of other continents, there being 126 species of freshwater fishes in Europe, 600 in North America, and 1200 in South America. Second—The relation of the fauna to that of other continents. All but two of the genera, exclusive of marine forms entering rivers, are peculiar to South Amer- ica, and no species of fish is common to tropical America, and any other continent. The fauna is much more nearly related to the African than to that of North America. Third—The origin of the fauna is but very remotely connected with other faunas, and with the exception of the Dipnoi and certain other old forms, the genera, and at least ten of the families, are autochthons. Fourth—All the genera were grouped according to their distribution, and it was found that the number of species of any genus varied directly as the extent of its distribution. The Brazilian subregion was divided into the following provinces: I, Pacific; 2, Andean; 3, Colombian; 4, Orinocan; 5, Guianan; 6, Amazonan; 7, San Franciscan; 8, Atlantic; 9, La Platan. Dr. Carrington Bolton, of the New York Academy of Sciences, was present at the meeting, being on his way to the Hawaiian Islands to visit the "singing sands " found there. He gave a very interesting account of a recent visit to a hill of sonorous sand in Arabia. 64 Proceedings of Societies. Professor Ward, of Rochester, who had visited the same hill more than thirty years before, gave an accouut of his experiences during the journey, which was then much more difficult, and corroborated Dr. Bolton's report of the form of the hill and the sound produced by movement. Professor Ward afterward described a recent voyage around South America, and told in graphic words the story of his trip down the western side of the continent. From latitude 420 south, opposite the Island of Chiloe, there extends along the coast for more than a thousand miles an inland passage navigable for small ves- sels the entire distance, but in places too tortuous and narrow for large ones. He described the natives of the southern western coast as a miserable, naked and degraded race, and gave some amusing instances of their apparent indifference to cold. April 20, 1890. President Harkness in the chair. Some specimens of Coprimes of extraordinary size presented by Mr. C. H. Clark were exhibited. They were found growing under brandy casks in the storage cellar of Mr. Kohler's winery near Glen Ellen. The largest was over six inches in breadth, with a stipe an inch in diameter, and sixteen inches in length. Dr. Harkness made some remarks explaining the place of the plant in classification, and its usefulness as food. Mr. C. H. Eigenmann spoke of some fishes collected near the mouth of the Sac- ramento River calling especial attention to the young of the quinna,t salmon of which a number were procured, and the young of the smelt, Osmerus thaleichthys. He also called attention to the large number of species of Scopelidre recently added to the Californian fauna. Six Hew species were found in the neighborhood of San Diego. All these possess phosphorescent organs. They were all obtained from the stomachs of rock cod in stormy weather. During calm weather they do not get in the reach of rock cod, probably living nearer the surface. San Francisco Microscopical Society. April 9, 1890. President Wickson in the chair. The President read a communication from Dr. Sydney J. Hickson, of England, regretting that he was not able from lack of time to meet with the society and give them a short account of his studies on coral reefs. Dr. Henry Ferrer briefly addressed the society on the motility of the color cells of the eye. Mr. Riedy exhibited a new American concentric stand recently made for the Sec- retary by the Bausch & Lomb Company, which showed several new and very desi- rable improvements. April 23, 1890. President Wickson in the chair. A communication was read from Professor Hanks stating that the society having been organized June 4, 1870, would on the next anniversary be twenty years old. The President thereupon appointed a committee of arrangements to make the occa- sion one of special interest. A communication on the use of carbon made from the down of the milkweed, as a flash light for photography, was read by the Secretary. Professor E. W. Runyon exhibited a fine series of micro-photographs, and explained in detail his method of procedure. L. PLATE I. 9 DEFORMITIES OF DENDROMECON. ZOB A BIOLOGICAL JOURNAL Vol. I. MAY, 1890. No. 3. THE POINT LOMA BLIND FISH AND ITS RELATIVES. . With Plate II and III. BY CARL H. felGENMANN. San Diego Bay is in part surrounded by mud flats which are covered by water at high tide. Where the channel approaches the shores, sand beaches take the place of mud fiats. On the ocean shores a sandy beach stretches several miles to the southeast from the mouth of the bay, while on the west rises the point of land called Point Loma. The entire ocean beach at the base of this prom- ontory is rocky. In many places all the earth has been removed by the action of the waves, leaving the bare rock; in other places, and more especially between the outer point and Ballast Point, large boulders lie imbedded in the sand. These are all covered at high tide, while but a few small pools remain about the rocks at low tide. Many of them are covered with sea weeds, actineans, and especially large chitons. All these localities are inhabited by relatives of the Point Loma blind fish. The sloughs traversing the mud flats of the bay are inhabited by Gillichthys mirabilis, the young of which is represented in fig. 15, pi. iii. In every tide-pool as large as a man's hand, and larger, in the mud flats are found Clevelandias, fig. 4, pi. ii; nearer low-water mark in similar localities are found, but less abundant than Cleve- landia, the Lepidogobiusy-cauda represented in fig. 5, pi. ii. On digging in the sandy beaches of the bay specimens of another species of this genus, Lepidogobius gilberti, are sometimes found buried in the sand. In the crab holes under the rocks about Point Loma occurs the most remarkable of this family, the Point Loma blind fish ( Typhlo- gobius californiensis ) figs. 6 and 7, pi. iii. 66 The Point Loma Blind Fish. [zoe In the deep water off Point Loma the Albatross has recently taken still another goby (Gobius nicholsoni). It is thus seen that almost every nook available has been taken possession of by these diminutive fishes. All of them have the two ventrals united along the median line, and a thin membrane stretched across their bases to form a pouch. By appressing the ventrals and then raising them, a partial vacuum is formed in this pouch, and the fish is enabled to cling to any substance with which its ventral happens to be in contact. In confinement the blind fish frequently utilizes the surface of the water of an aquarium for a sur- face of attachment. Most of these have also a peculiarly enlarged maxillary bone in the adult stage. In Gillichthys this bone becomes quite phenomenal with age, reaching to the pectoral fins. This fish increases in bulk out of proportion to its development, so that the young of a size equal to the adult, Clevelandia or Lepidogobius, have a much shorter max- illary bone than the latter, although in the adult of Gillichthys this growth is larger in proportion than in any other goby. The adult of Lepidogobhis gilberli, y-cauda and Clevelandia longipinnis have until the past year been confounded with the young of Gillichthys. In collecting about San Diego I soon noticed this fact, but supposed Lepidogobius y-cauda., on account of its large maxillary, to be the young of Gillichthys, and described the young of Gillichthys with short maxillaries as a new species of Gobius* All the species in the bay have the habit, if disturbed, of hiding in crab or clam holes. Clevelandia will sit on its tail and pectorals, until the hand is near it. Then with a quickness which would do honor to a Johnnie Darter, with a flirt of the tail and a stroke of the pectoral, it disappears in its hole from which it, however, at once thrusts its head to await developments. Several of them frequently take refuge in the same hole. Gillichthys is the largest of these gobies, and is found from San Francisco to San Diego, or somewhat further south. It then disap- pears and is found again at the head of the Gulf of Mexico. About San Diego the young are abundant throughout the year. The adult can be caught with hook and line in quantities, especially just at the * We discovered our mistake sometime before the description of the new species was printed, and hoped to make the necessary corrections in the proof, which never reached us. c. H. & r. s. e. VOL. I.] The Point Loma Blind Fish. 67 return of tide during summer. Towards their spawning" season they retire to their respective crab holes, and no morsel, be it ever so tempting, will lure them forth. They first spawn at San Diego about the end of March. The young, when first observed, have but a few color cells. They are very active, jumping several times their own length, if left dry in a watch crystal. Under the micro- scope a series of slender threads are seen to extend out from the lateral line (figs. 18 and 19), and similar threads are grouped about the head. Provided with such delicate tactile organs and well-de- veloped eyes, the young Gillichthys is well equipped for its early existence. As hinted above the young, not larvae, of this species but little resembles the adult. The maxillary does not reach beyond the eye, the color is in more or less well-defined cross-bars, and the scales which in the adult are cycloid, have several large teeth, fig. 16, pi. iii. The color under the microscope still resolves itself into distinct cells, fig. 17. The skull is also quite different from that of the adult in specimens even more than an inch long. In short, the young is a Gobius, while the adult is a Gillichthys. The two species of Lepidogobius have but recently been discovered. The one figured (5, pi. iii) was first described from Guaymas, and was but the past year recorded from California waters. It was col- lected by Jordan and Gilbert, as early as 1880, and several speci- mens have also been in our collection for sometime, having been taken from the stomach of a larger fish. The L. gilberti was dis- covered while a Chinaman was digging for "craw-fish" in the beaches between Roseville and La Playa. In the little pools formed in the holes dug by the Chinaman little fishes were soon seen swim- ming about; all but one of them proved to be this species. Pro- fessor Gilbert, for whom the species was named, has since found it in many places along lower California, including the gulf coast. It is thus seen that both of these species have a wide distribution. Clevelandia is by far the most abundant of the gobies, and in fact the most abundant of any fish in the bay of San Diego. They are found everywhere between high and low-water mark, and doubtless form an important item of the food of the larger fishes; they spawn in the early part of May. The young, fig. 1, pi. iii, rise to the surface at night, and are then sometimes taken in the surface dredge. They can, however, be procured more abundantly 68 The Point Loma Blind Fish. [zoe in the latter part of May in the pools left at low tide about the piles of wharves. They beautifully illustrate the metamorphosis under- gone by the tail from the lophocercal to the heterocercal and homo- cereal stages. This fish has until the past year been known from only four specimens. Three of these were from Los Animas Bay, and one from San Francisco. The most remarkable of the gobies is undoubtedly the blind one inhabiting the crab holes under rocks at Point Loma. It has been found nowhere else about San Diego, but has been taken at Ensen- ada. Its habitat is, as far as known, quite limited. In its pink color and general appearance it much resembles the blind fishes in- habiting the caves of southern Indiana. Its peculiarities are doubt- less due to its habits. The entire bay region is inhabited by a car- ideoid crustacean which burrows in the mud. It, like the blind fish, is pink in color. Its holes in the bay are frequented by Clevelandia, etc., while at the base of Point Loma, where the waves sometimes dash with great force, the blind fish is its associate. On rough days few fish are seen, though ever so many stones are overturned, a task rendered somewhat laborious and bad for the fingers by the numerous worn tubes, etc., attached to the rocks. On mild days, on the contrary, on very low tides quantities are found and almost invariably in company with one of the crustaceans men- tioned above. Sometimes the fishes live quite out of water on the damp gravel and sand under a rock, but more frequently small pools of water fill all the depressions under the rocks, and the fishes swim rapidly away in their attempt to hide in the crab holes, several of which always branch from the cavity in which the rock has lain. In the bay the gobies habitually live out of the holes into which they descend only when they are frightened, while at Point Loma they never leave their subterranean abode, and to this fact we must attribute their present condition. How long these fishes have lived after their present fashion it would be hard to conjecture. The period which would produce such decided structural changes cannot be a brief one. The scales have entirely disappeared, the color has been reduced, the spinous dorsal has been greatly reduced; not only have the eyes become stunted, but the whole frontal region of the skull and the optic nerves have been profoundly changed. vol. i.] The Point Loma Blind Fish. 69 The skin, and especially that of the head, has become highly sensitized. The skin of the snout is variously folded and puckered, and well supplied with nerves; the nares are situated at the end of a fleshy protuberance which projects well forward, just over the mouth. At the chin are various short tentacles and a row of pa- pillae, which very probably bear sensory hairs similar to those rep- resented in 18 and 19, extends along each ramus of the lower jaw, and along the margin of the lower limb of the preopercle. The eye is, however, the part most seriously affected. In the young, fig. 7, it is quite evident, and is apparently functional. Objects thrust in front of them are always perceived, but the field of vision is quite limited. With age the skin over the eyes thickens, and they are scarcely evident externally. As far as I could determine they do not see at this time, and certainly detect their food chiefly, if not altogether, by the sense of touch. A hungry individual will swim over meats, fish or a mussel, etc., intended for its food without per- ceiving it by sight or smell, but as soon as it comes in contact with any portion of the skin, especially of the head region, the sluggish movements are instantaneously transformed, and a stroke of the fins brings the mouth immediately in position for operations. I have not been able to raise the fishes from the egg. The youngest individual ever seen is represented in fig. 7. In this specimen the membranes of the fins were thin, the color cells were well formed and arranged not unlike those of the young Gillich- thyS, fig. 15. The movements were similar to those of the other gobies, and not at all sluggish like those of the adult. Their favorite position is standing or sitting, one with the broad pectorals extending out at right angles to the body. In this position the fish can, with a sudden stroke of its pectorals, move quickly and rap- idly. In the old the fins are thick and smaller in proportion, and all the vivacity seems to have disappeared. The color has degen- erated, or at least not developed in proportion to the growth of the fish. The minute structure of the eye was not examined on account of the entire lack of the proper facilities for sectioning, etc. The eye and optic nerve have been isolated by treatment with 20 per cent, nitric acid, and by simple dissection of alcoholic specimens. The lens is large in proportion to the size of the eye, which does not materially differ in size in the smallest and largest The Point Loma Blind Fish. [zoe specimens examined. The optic nerve is very slender and long as compared with that of any of the other gobies. All these gobies are tenacious of life, especially the blind one. Several of the latter have been kept in a half-gallon jar of water for several weeks without change of water, and others have been kept several months in confinement in my laboratory. When the water becomes somewhat stale they frequently rise to the surface and use the surface of the water as a plane to which they attach them- selves by means of their ventrals. It was my intention to study the development of the eyes, etc., of this fish, and with this end in view I kept many specimens alive and made frequent trips to Point Loma to procure fresh individuals in order that too long confinement might not have impaired the reproductive function. They spawn in the latter part of May and June, but I have not found the eggs in nature. Those deposited in confinement would not develop, and attempts at artificial fertiliza- tion of freshly-caught individuals were not successful. An absence from San Diego prevented me from visiting their habitat during July, and in August the tides were not favorable. The earliest date at which I procured young was October 25th, the smallest caught at that/ time is represented in figure 7. Though I did not secure developing eggs, those procured enable me to describe the remarkable membranes of the egg, which are probably similar in many other gobies. The covering of the ovarian egg consists first of a finely striate membrane, the zona radiata of all telostean eggs. Exterior to this is a network of threads with the meshes coarsest at the ento- dermic pole and forming almost a continuous membrane at the ectodermic pole, figs. 4 and 5. The eggs were examined from the surface only, and I am not able to say how intimate the connection between the threads and the zona is in the ovary. When the eggs are deposited the meshwork of threads is stripped off the egg and remains attached to the zona radiata around the micropyle, figs. 1, 2, 3 and 5. In the eggs deposited naturally by the females in con- finement the threads had been wound together to form a cord at the micropylar end of the egg, fig. 1. The cords of many of these eggs were attached to each other, and the eggs thus came to be laid in bunches like those of grapes. Whether this is usual or not I am not able to say. The bunches of eggs resemble so closely those of the VOL. I.] The Point Loma Blind Fish. crustacean with which this fish is associated, and which spawns at the same time, that the idea of a highly specialized mimicry at once sug- gests itself. The similarity between the eggs is heightened by the fact that they are both bright yellow. In females with ripe eggs they can frequently be seen forming a yellow band along the flanks. The yellow of the blind-fish egg is entirely confined to the yolk which contains many oil globules. The granular potoplasm is opaque. In the eggs deposited naturally the water space remained quite small, while in those forced from the ovary it soon became enor- mous, being many times the size of the egg proper; the egg shell assumes an ovate shape at the same time. Which of these two forms is the natural one I am not able to say. Hoffman * gives the figure of the egg of Gobius minutus, which resembles fig. 3, pi. and may be the normal condition. PLATE II. 1. Young Clevelandia or Lepidogobins taken with the surface dredge. 2. Tail of a young Clevelandia. \ 3. Tail of a more advanced individual. 4. 4a. Clevelandia longipinnis, adult X2%. 5. 5a. Gillichthys y-cauda, adult X 3- PLATE III. 1. Egg of Typhlogobius californiensis undergoing the first cleavage. 2. Micropylar region of an egg of the same species under pressure, showing the margin of the attachment of the outer membrane. 3. An egg forced from the ovary. A very large breathing chamber has been formed. Abnormal (?). 4. A portion of the network of the outer membrane remote from the micropyle of the egg represented in fig. 3. 5. Micropylar region of the egg represented in fig. 3. 6. Adult Typhlogobius, natural size, in the position usually assumed in the aqua- rium. 7. Young Typhlogobius X4&. showing color markings and the eye. 8. Dorsal view of skull of Typhlogobius X %¦ 9. Lateral view of same X %• 10. Ventral view of same X ^Vz- 11. Eye, optic nerves and portion of brain of same, showing the very much elon- gate slender optic nerves and the comparatively large lens as compared with the cup of the eye X 24, from nitric acid maceration of a specimen % inch long, Jan- uary 29, 1888. 12. An isolated eye after treating with nitric acid showing the film of translu- cent substance surrounding it. *Zer Ontogonie der Knochenfische, pi. iii, fig. 9, 1881. 72 Song's of Californian Zo7ioti'ichice. [zoe 13. The same eye in a later stage of maceration, the film entirely removed, the optic nerve torn. 14. Dorsal surface of brain of Typhlogobius showing cranial nerves, the 2d, 3d and 4th pairs removed. 15. Gillichthys mirabilis X4|-- 16. A single scale of same more enlarged. 17. Several scales with color cells from the tail of same. 18. Sense organs of the lateral line of a younger specimen of Gillichthys, from about the middle of the body. 19. Solitary sense organ of the same from the base of the caudal. SONGS OF SOME CALIFORNIAN ZONOTRICHI^E. BY CHARLES A. KEELER. As the distinction between the songs of Gambel's white-crowned sparrow (Z. leucophrys gambeli) and the golden-crowned sparrow (Z. coronata) does not seem to be generally recognized by ornithol- ogists, a few remarks on the subject may not be out of place. Neither of these birds possess any great powers of song, the notes of both being high, fine, long-drawn whistles, very similar in the quality of the tone. There is, however, one distinction between the songs which is present, I think/ in all their variations, viz., that the song of Gambel's white-crowned sparrow begins on an ascending scale, while the song of the golden-crowned sparrow begins on a descend- ing scale. The typical song of Gambel's white-crowned sparrow is as follows: Sva The typical song of the golden-crowned sparrow is much simpler, being represented by the following notes: Sva. •0- &0- vol.i.] Songs of California!! Zonotrichice. 73 The above songs are by far the most common; in fact, any de- parture from them is quite the exception. Variations of both songs are always sufficiently near to these types to be immediately rec- ognized, and generally consist of a simplification of the above. Thus the golden-crowned sparrow frequently omits the last note, and sometimes sings nothing but the first. Occasionally, also, the final note is not flatted, so that the last two notes are the same. I have not noted down any of the variations of the songs of Gam- bel's sparrow, but these can always be identified from their simi- larity to the song given. Sometimes on a mild day during the win- ter or spring, when numbers of these birds are congregated in a garden, several variations of their usual song will be heard, the birds seemingly vying with one another in producing changes, but under other circumstances I have seldom heard any but the song here recorded. The golden-crowned sparrow sings all winter from the time of its first appearance in the fall until its departure in April. During the cold rains of winter, however, its song is generally hushed and its ordinary tsip is its only note. This is most commonly heard when a flock are started out of the brush. Gambel's white-crowned spar- row also utters a call note indistinguishable from that of the prece- ding species. It has in addition a note heard only at the beginning of the mating season, generally in March, which is characteristic of this species. It consists of a low trill or rattle uttered while the wings are rapidly vibrated. I have never heard this note uttered when the female was in sight. The night song of Gambel's white-crowned sparrow is of great interest. Late in the night, when all the world is wrapped in slum- ber, a wild burst of song will rise on the silent air, then subside, and all is again quiet. Only a single bar is sung, and I have never heard the strain repeated on the same night. I first heard this night song on February 26, 1888. The day had been warm, but a thick fog came on in the evening which darkened the sky. It was nearly half past ten when the bird sang, and the effect of this song, coming through the dark, still night, was very peculiar. On March 7 of the same year, the song was heard at eleven o'clock at night, and on the 12th inst. it was heard at nine o'clock. In both cases the night was dark and foggy. If these night songs were uttered only on clear, moonlight nights they could be more easily 74 The Economy of Nature. [zoe explained, but the fact is they are much more frequently heard on dark nights. The songs are always heard early'in the mating sea- son, generally in March, and the most reasonable explanation, it seems to me, is that the birds are unusually excited at this time, and, awakening in the night, involuntarily break forth into song. That it is involuntary and unpremeditated, all who have heard this song will certainly agree. THE ECONOMY OF NATURE AS EXEMPLIFIED BY VEGETABLE AND ANIMAL PARASITES. II. BY H. H. BEHR. The concatenation of cause and effect which produces the harmony in nature cannot be interrupted with impunity by interferences of violent character. The violent destruction of one evil almost always opens the door to a series of new evils, because the immense net- work of cause and effect called Nature being once disturbed it is im- possible to know at what point the given impetus will stop. It cannot be helped that our own interests interfere with the har- mony in nature. Neither cultivation of the ground nor raising ot stock is possible without disturbance of the original forms of or- ganic life, because the very object of all agricultural pursuits is to promote the prevalence of certain animals and plants useful to man to the more or less complete exclusion of the organisms previously occupying the same ground. We will first notice the immediate consequences of the interfer- ence in favor of the more desirable species at the expense of the original fauna and flora. Every species, animal and plant, is decimated or limited in its multiplication by other species, or else the variety of organic life now inhabiting and decorating the surface of this earth would have disappeared a long time ago, and would have made room to mon- otony. Each climatic girdle would be covered by a vegetation closely resembling cultivated grounds, each inhabited by one herb- ivorous animal, serving as food to one carnivorous animal. There is no place on this earth where such state of things actually has taken place, the agencies just mentioned preventing. Nature favors variety and opposes equality, the only things in which all organisms are equal, being birth and death. In all other vol. i.] The Economy of Nature. 75 respects, organization, conditions of life, relation to each other, they differ so much that already in ancient time Aristotle arranged them in classes, and modern science talks in a rather unphilosophical way about higher and lower animals and plants. As a general rule the so-called higher forms of life exercise their influence by individuality, the lower ones chiefly by their numbers— the one endangers our interests by organs of destruction, the other by their unlimited powers of multiplying. Now as to what takes place when the original variety of organ- isms in an area is superseded by the exclusive cultivation of one or several organisms introduced by man: Each species has its antagonists, and these rise and multiply in proportion to the facilities offered to them. These facilities are of two kinds; first, an ample supply of food; second, protection against the species to which they serve as food themselves, and which we call, by a not quite exact expression, their enemies. As long as the ground is covered by a varied vegetation, inhab- ited by different kinds of animals, the enemies of the different spe- cies lose a great deal of their feeding time by searching and select- ing the peculiar plant or animal that serves them as food. As soon as a plant or animal occupies the ground to a more or less complete exclusion of other plants and animals, its enemies do not lose much time in the search for food, and will multiply at a more or less undesirable rate. The enemies of the species that formerly occu- pied the ground and are now excluded, will disappear at the same rate as the species disappear that formed their food when the orig- inal flora and fauna occupied the ground. In studying the multitude of phenomena developed during and after the change of a so-called wild state into the state of cultivation we find some the most striking developed in the insect world. At the same time it is indispensable to refer frequently to phe- nomena of a different order, because, with all her variety, nature is a unit, and it is only in text books that the citizens of the two king- doms may be studied in isolation. The first change produced by cultivation is an increase of the en- emies of the cultivated species. We have seen that nature opposes any predominance that would end in monotony, so she has recourse to the same remedy used against the prevalence of the cultivated species and corrects her own remedy by raising an enemy to the enemy. 76 The Economy of Nature. [zoe This enemy of the enemy is the friend of the cultivated species, and as such our own, because in agriculture as in politics and war- fare, the enemy of the enemy is an ally. Some forty years ago financial considerations had gradually in- fluenced forest culture in northern Germany in such a way that a predominance of coniferous plantations had developed. The con- sequence was an increase of such insects as feed on the pine and spruce. These insect pests developed to such a degree that great damage was done by the destruction of entire forests, and for a con- siderable time all remedies proved futile in the afflicted districts. The first enemy of the enemy was the bird. Insectivorous birds soon took care of those insect larvae not covered with hair, nor having a disagreeable smell indicating some poisonous substance. So the naked caterpillars of Sphinx Pinastri and Trachea Piniperda were speedily reduced to a proportion no more interfering with the harmony in nature, but the hairy ones of Gastropacha Pint and the Tenthredo larvae full of irritating substance, remained almost unmo- lested, as the only European bird feeding on hairy caterpillars is the cuckoo. But then a gradual increase of two classes of insects took place, the carnivorous and the parasite. The carnivorous was chiefly rep- resented by the beautiful rainbow-colored Calosoma Sycopha?ita, the parasite first by the ubiquitous Tachina, afterwards by whole hosts of minute parasitic wasps, of the Ichneumon and Ophion tribes, that laid their eggs on the injurious larvae, and the maggot developing devoured the insect pest from inside. The sick and dying larvae offering a wide field for the dissemination of vegetable parasites, different fungi, especially those of the Saprolegnia and Torrubia types, spread from the sick to the healthy and destroyed whole annual generations by epidemics. Here is seen clearly the means applied by nature to restore the disturbed balance of power. Nevertheless it must be confessed that nature did not do the work quite alone. It is true that the com- bined efforts of whole communities, collecting the caterpillars, throwing them into ditches and destroying them by fire, did but little good and considerable evil, because it disturbed the insect- feeding birds. The system was also soon abandoned. But laws passed for the protection of insect-feeding birds took good effect, and finally the gradual change in the system of forest culture, by vol. i.] The Economy of Nature. 77 which the uniformity of the coniferous plantation was more fre- quently relieved by interspersed birch, oak, beech, or mixed plan- tations, produced a favorable change. The insect pests of course did not become extinct—nature takes as much care as possible even of her naughty children—but they ceased to be pests; Variety of plantation, therefore, prevents to a certain degree in- sect pests, or at least diminishes their power. It is very probable that the prevalence of insect pests in this country to some extent is owing to the uniformity of cultivation, as compared to the variety in other countries where agriculture and stock-raising are much more combined on the same farm, and the fields themselves are cultivated to and grown over by a greater variety of plants. This is the place to discuss a class of insect pests not created by the monotonous cultivation of the soil, but owing their origin to an analogous condition of things without human interference. I refer to those pests that owe their origin to the monotony of desert lands. There are certain regions where a dead level of the surface, the chemical compound of the soil, absence of water, or imperfect drainage, oppose vegetation in general. Still there are certain or- ganisms adapted to conditions detrimental to the existence of the majority of types. The vegetation of such localities in some in- stances can exist only under the very conditions of the locality; in other instances it could exist in cultivation, but would be super- seded by the more powerful organization of other types, so that it is driven to the desert regions by its inability to stand competition. The number of types that are original inhabitants or adapted im- migrants in such localities is naturally a limited one, but the small number of species is frequently made up by an enormous number of individuals. The sage-brush vegetation of our alkali plains, the heath (Erica) that covers the plains of northern Europe, the lichen tundra of the Arctic, the pampas of the Argentine Republic, the Russian and Siberian steppes, and many other regions, are well characterized instances of this state of things. The small number of species and great number of individuals produces monotony, and the monotony is the cause of a series of phenomena similar to those produced by exclusive occupation of cultivated grounds by one or a few species. The differences in the 78 The Economy of Nature. [zoe phenomena on desert lands and cultivated grounds consists chiefly in the intensity and rapidity of their development on the former, and their proportions are quite in keeping with the expanse of horizon and unrelieved monotony of the surface. As long as the inordinate multiplication of the species affects only the desert region it is of the highest biological, but of little prac- tical interest. Unfortunately in many instances even the immense extent of the desert cannot hold the swarms of suddenly accumu- lated beings. Like a cup filled to the brim it foams over and sends its myriads into distant regions to destroy and to be destroyed, be- cause enemies in the shape of birds follow the wandering host, and even in their own bodies the wanderers carry the parasitic germs of animal as well as fungoid destroyers. I have had no opportunity to study the wandering grasshoppers which occasionally, from southern and western deserts, are poured into California, and so I do not know if they are followed by a host of birds as are those in the Hungarian puszta, the Russian steppes or the Sahara. In Europe it is especially a little hawk or falcon, Tinnimculus, whose swarms appear almost with the wander- ing pest when an hour before no bird was visible. The only enemy of the grasshspper whose acquaintance I have had an opportunity to make is a beetle of the Cantharid order, a Tigrodera. I have always received a certain number of specimens of this useful insect during a grasshopper year, never at any other time, and as I am frequently consulted about insects, espec- ially when they are as showy as the Tigrodera, I conclude that under ordinary circumstances the species is rather rare and only multiplies in proportion to its larva food, the grasshopper. Judging from analogy the larva of the Tigrodera needs several years before it turns to a beetle, the only stage in which I have seen it. All the related insects are carnivorous and parasitic on other insects, de- vour first eggs, then young larvae, and generally in the last stage of their larval existence are parasitic. I am inclined to consider this insect also parasitic in its last lar- val stage, but have not yet had opportunities to collect evidence. I suspect that the frequent deaths occurring amongst the herds of turkeys that are led out against the grasshopper are not owing to indigestion caused by greediness of the bird, but to having swallowed a grasshopper infested by this parasite which contains, vol. i.J The Economy of Nature. 79 like all beetles of this group, a considerable amount of canthara- dine. So the phenomenon of the grasshopper swarm demonstrates the same tendency of nature to destroy the prevalence of a single spe- cies or a small group of species (in our case the Artemisia or the Chenopodiacecz of the alkali lands), but there is a difference in the means which nature applies in the destruction of the destroyer, or, let us say, in the second part of the phenomenon. It is not only that nature raises a destructive enemy in the parasite, and calls in the enemy in shape of birds which assemble around the swarms, and the coyote that follows them. Nature uses besides these remedies another and a most effective one. She implants in the locust swarm an irresistible instinct to wander. Millions are drowned in the riv- ers, others are crushed and mangled in the density and confusion of the wandering swarm, the bodies of others cover the ground at the foot of cliffs, walls of cities, and other insurmountable obstacles. Perhaps I should mention here an incident that to the non-ento- mologist is scarcely credible, but which is well calculated to give an idea of the destructive character of the migratory instinct as well as of the multitudes of the destroyers which perish. In the year 1844, when, on a voyage to Australia, the vessel passed the heights of the Cape Verde Islands, we sailed for more than two days through the bodies of grasshoppers, most of them dead or dying, but some still sufficiently strong to crawl out of the bucket which was used to draw the water for washing the deck. It is easy to understand that in presence of phenomena of such magnitude man is powerless. The grasshopper, or, as it is called in the English translation of scripture, the locust, is recorded as a periodical plague in all countries bordering on desert lands. Measures against this pest always have proved futile. Prayers have been ordered by all creeds at all times, by the authorities, and pro- fanity in all languages has been practiced by the suffering farmer, with equal success, till the calamity was removed by the remedies the plague carried along in its own nature. As far as I know there is no instance on record of a real intense grasshopper plague having visited the same district in two consec- utive years, a proof of the efficacy of the remedies applied by na- ture herself. These remedies are of four different kinds. First, the individual 80 Migratory Instinct. [zoe destroyer collecting around the swarm, represented by beast and bird; second, the gregarious destroyer multiplying in the midst of an ample supply of food, represented by the carnivorous insect; third, animal and vegetable parasites developed inside the grasshop- per, and acting in the shape of an epidemic, or, better, epizootic; fourth, the migratory instinct leading the destroyer to his own per- dition. MIGRATORY INSTINCT IN CAGED WILD BIRDS. BY W. OTTO EMERSON. I have raised from the nest several pairs of black-headed gros- beaks (Habia melanocephala) during the past three years, that have shown me how true remains the migratory instinct in birds even when kept in confinement. I will attempt to give such notes as I have observed regarding these birds and their evident desire to migrate twice each year. Of three fledglings taken in June, 1885, two males grew to be strong, handsome singing birds. By fall these grosbeaks began to show a desire to fly, but at night only, -between the hours of eight and nine, sometimes as late as ten o'clock. It was not possible to quiet them by any means, and for long afterwards it did not occur to me that this was the premonition of migration showing in these young birds. The uneasy flight of these grosbeaks was not caused by the pres- ence of strange cats, dogs or other animals liable to provoke such a commotion among them after dark. Again it was not caused by the troublesome bird-lice which sometimes makes canaries so un- easy after dark. No amount of cover over their cage or the plac- ing of it in the darkest part of the house had any effect towards quieting them. By the following March, 1886, I had about forgotten this uneasy disposition of the grosbeaks, when one warm, spring-like evening, as the cage hung at the east porch, they all at once commenced an uneasy fluttering of their wings as though suddenly waking up to the instinct of migration, if I may so express it. They kept moving back and forth in the cage, calling to one another in lonesome notes such as I have often noted in the migrating wild birds when passing overhead during the early evenings at my home in Haywards, Cal. They would continue this restless moving for some time, then vol.. I.] The Instinct of Migration. 8r after resting for a few minutes off they would start again, as though migrating from the south to the northern breeding grounds. At the times of seasonal migration, the grosbeaks were apparently- able to see fully as well at night as in the day time, it making no difference in their uneasy flight if they were covered up in total darkness in the house. By the middle of September following they again showed the disposition to migrate as before, which lasted from three to four weeks, and at the end of this time they began to settle down quietly as though the flight southward had ended. Their fore- heads by this time were bare of all feathers from continual beating against the cage wires. On March 3, 1887, the migratory movement set in again; this season they would often break forth in short bars of their song as one may hear the free birds in summer at the first dawning of day. I find that the desire to migrate is of shorter duration in the spring with these grosbeaks than in the fall. This fact leads me to believe that on moving southward in the fall the wild bird is not as liable to be overtaken by stormy weather as in the spring migration, and the desire of reaching the winter home is not as strong as that when coming northward to reach the breeding home. I lost one of these males in December, 1888, but the lone gros- beak showed the same inclination to migrate as early as February 28, 1889, and even began to sing; this I accounted for by the warm open winter of 1888-9. By eight o'clock in the evening he would begin to wake up as if from a dream; he sang a few notes, then hop- ped back and forth along the perches, calling pee-iep, pee-£ep. If I whistled in reply to him he would answer back. I added a female to the grosbeak's cage in June, 1889, and when she had completed her fall plumage, September 20, she began to show the migratory instinct by flying wildly about the cage, from eight to nine o'clock in the evening only. The female seemed to show the disposition to start southward much stronger than the male did. She would sometimes strike the wires so hard that I expected to find her dead some morning. The whole top of her head soon became bare of feathers. It would seem as though these birds, having been brought up from nestlings, would have lost more or less of that wild trait that we look for and see in the wild birds, but each spring and fall they exhibit the same peculiarities. 82 West American Plants. [zoe It was through having these birds caged before me for months, and having made a close study of bird migration during the last ten years, that these grosbeaks have given me a closer insight into the instincts of migratory bird-life, even though they be caged from the nest. The fact of their being the offspring of wild parents that had the habitual desire of migration in the full sense of the word, may have intensified the instinct of the young when confined, but possibly it may be susceptible to diminution through successive generations. Not until as late as March 30, 1890, did I notice a repetition of the spring uneasiness described above. On this date at half-past eight in the evening the pair almost simultaneously were seized with the desire to migrate. The weather was clear and cool, and the moon in about the second quarter. [Dr. R. W. Shufeldt has noted ('Auk, vii, 94) a similar incli- nation in a pair of evening grosbeaks to migrate in spring. He says: '' When it came round to March a noteworthy change came over their night habits, for up to that date the pair invariably roosted together, with their heads under their wings, all night long. But during the early part of March the male only kept his perch, sleep- ing away, while the female bird nearly the entire night incessantly hopped from perch to perch in a restless, uneasy manner. This she persisted in for about a week, when she in turn kept quiet, and then it was the male, who had his week of nights devoted to the same performance."—w. E. B.] NOTES ON WEST AMERICAN PLANTS. I. BY KATHARINE BRANDEGEE. Cleome integrifolia, T. & G. grows on the northern side of the Little Sur, a stream which empties into the ocean about twenty- five miles south of Monterey. It is one of the showy Capparidaceous plants of the interior basin, not, so far as I am aware, before reported from California. Fremontia Californica is reported by Dr. Behr from the vicinity of Loma Prieta, in Santa Clara County. No one else appears to have observed it from that region. Matricaria occidentalis Greene, is found about the streets and vacant lots of San Francisco. Both this species and M. discoidea vol.i .] Encelia Farinosa. 83 have the appearance of being introduced plants, spreading about cities, country roads and barn-yards, and though found in other localities, usually in much less abundance. Palmerella debilis var. serrata Gray, comes from the same locality—which is probably nearly its northern limit. Campanula exigua Rattan, was described from specimens col- lected by that gentlemen on Mt. Diablo, and has since been found along the road between the two summits of Tamalpais and along the trail leading to the summit of Mt. St. Helena. Rhododendron Californicum Hook. There is in the Cal- ifornia Academy of Sciences a painting of this beautiful " Rose Bay " which bears the inscription, " Waddell's Mills, Santa Cruz County, May 10, 1869." It is to be hoped that some enterprising collector will carefully search that locality, as it is not otherwise known so far south. Ledum glandulosum Nutt. grows on Point Reyes, a few miles from Olema, in company with the '' red elder '' Sambucus racemosa (which also grows at Sausalito), and Rubus spec/abilis, which, in this region, bears abundant fruit of two colors, amber and dark red. Lemmonia Californica Gray, in robust specimens.was brought, some years ago, from Mt. Hanna, near Kelseyville, in Lake County. The small Mimulus which was described as M. androsaceus, and reduced by Dr. Gray to a variety of M. Palmeri, has been found on sandy hillsides along the railroad between Felton and the village of Ben Lomond, in Santa Cruz County. Utricularia vulgaris L., grows in a pond on the road to Bo- linas, near the village of Olema, Marin County. Monardella macrantha var. nana Gray, grows about the Little Sur, in Monterey County. ENCELIA FARINOSA Gray. This species has received a synonym by the publication of E. radians in Proc. Cal. Acad., Ser. 2, ii, 176. The synonym was founded on a low, smooth form, upon which the striking silvery- white tomentum was lacking. This tall Encelia, often five feet high, is common in the southern portion of the Peninsula, and is one of the most handsome plants of that region. Its local name is " Inci- enso," so called because a resinous exudation from it is collected and burned as an incense in the churches. t. s. b. BOTANICAL GENERIC NAMES IDENTICAL OR TOO NEARLY ALIKE. BY H. W. HARKNESS. This list in addition to a previous one in Bull. Cal. Acad., i, 176, deals only with such names as are held valid in Durand's Index Phanerog. and in the volumes of Saccardo's Sylloge Fungorum. Of course if the synonomical names were included, the list would be a very long one. Phanerogams. Fungi. Chitonia Moc. & Sesse, DC. Chitonia Fr. Hym. 277. Prod, i, 707. Cladothrix Nutt. in Herb. Hook Cladothrix Cohn, Beitr. ij 3, 204. DC. Prod, xiii, ii, 259. Cryptodiscus Schrenck, Enum. pi. Cryptodiscus Cda, Ic. fung. ii, 37. nov. 65. Didymia Phil. Engl. Jahrbi xiii, Didymium Schrad. nov. pi. gen. 57. i; Rost. Mon. no. Dilophia Thom. Hook. Kew Jour. DilophiaSa.cc. Syll. ii, 357. v, 19. Endodesmia Benth. Gen. PL i, 166. Endodesmia B. & Br. Ann. N. H. n. 1318 Gymnodiscus Less. Syn. Comp. Gymnodiscus Zukal, Ein. Ascom. 89. 8, t. 1. Sacc. Syll. viii, 545. Helicostylis Tr6c. Ann. Sc. Nat. Helicostylum Cda. Ic. Fung, v, ser. 3, viii, 134. 17 & 55. Macropodium R. Br. Hort. Kew Macropodia Fckl. Symb. 331. iv, 108. Micrococca Benth. Hook. Niger Micrococcus Hall, Cohn, Beitr. Fl. 503. Biol. Pflanz. i, 2, 157. Microglossa DC. Prod, v, 320. Microglossum Sacc. Consp. Gen. Disc. 2. Syncephalum DC. Prod, vi, 202. SyncepkalisVanTiegh.& LeMon- nier, Ann. Sc. Nat. 1873, 372. Tipularia Nutt. Gen. N. A. PI. ii, Tipularia Chev. Fl. Par. i, 344. 195- Thozetia F. Mull. Fl. Austral, iv. Thozetia Berk. & F. Mull., Fungi 347. Austral. 388, No. 304. Trichoscypha H. f, Gen. PI. i, 423. Trichoscypha Cooke, Myc. 252. Convolvulus Occidentalis. 85 The following names and numerous other are very inconveniently near in sound: Acrospira Welw., Acrospeira B. & Br.; Chamcerops L., Camarops Fr.; Camellia L., Camillea Karst.; Coronilla Tourn., Corynella DC, Corynelia Fr.; Hyaloseris Gr., Hyaloceras Dur. et Mont.; Lachncea L., Lachnea Fr.; Omphalea L., Omphalia Fr. CONVOLVULUS OCCIDENTALIS Gray (C macrostegius Greene.) BY T. S. BRANDEGEE. This species was described by Dr. Gray in Proc. Am. Acad. 89, and is as he writes common in western California on and near the coast. The form is the one with large broad bracts, and is described as having often two and rarely even three flowers from the same pair of bracts. C. macrostegius was collected by Dr. Palmer on Guada- lupe Island and published by Dr. Sereno Watson as C. occidentalis with the following note of Dr. Palmer: "In crevices of high rocks hanging down six feet or more; continuing in bloom from March through the summer. A thousand flowers were seen on a single plant.3' Prof. Greene in Bull. Cal. Acad. i, 208, considers this Guad- alupe plant a distinct species and in Bull. Cal. Acad. ii, 408, reports it as growing upon Santa Cruz Island and also credits it to San Miguel Island. Dr. Gray in Sup. Syn. Flora, 435, gives San Clem- ente Island as a locality, and Mr. Lyon notes its presence upon Santa Catalina Island. Specimens from all these localities are in the herbarium of the California Academy of Sciences and I have carefully observed the plant growing upon Santa Catalina, Santa Cruz, Santa Rosa Islands, and have examined C. occidentalis at many places along the mainland coast. It will be seen that C. macro- stegius has been considered an insular species closely related to a mainland species growing upon the adjacent coast. The description of and notes concerning C. macrostegius all refer to its largest forms. The two extremes in size are common on Santa Rosa, where all forms between those with stems nearly half an inch in diameter and plants less than two feet high bearing a single flower can be found. A form with the apex of the leaf rounded also grows upon Santa Rosa. On Santa Catalina, where it is common, this year I carefully examined many plants and was unable to find any peduncles more 86 Escapes in the Coast Range. than two-flowered. Those on the mainland in the gulches about San Pedro were either one- or two-flowered; otherwise there was no ap- preciable difference in size of plants, color of flowers or habit of twining. On Santa Cruz and Santa Rosa Islands the large robust plants are not good twiners, but the smaller and less luxuriant ones twine equally as well as those of the mainland coast. Young plants about eighteen inches high, from seeds of the mainland form and seeds brought by Prof. Greene from Santa Cruz Island, growing side by side in Mrs. R. F. Bingham's garden at Santa Barbara were ex- actly alike, and twined up their supporting strings as tightly as pos- sible. The most luxuriant mainland form was found common in the moun- tains near Santa Barbara, where the peduncles were often as many as five-flowered, each flower enclosed in large broad bracts after the manner of some of the island forms. It must be apparent from the above notes that no sufficient grounds exist for separating specifically the island from the mainland forms. ESCAPES IN THE COAST RANGE. BY FRANK H. VASLIT. In the moist climate of the Coast Range many garden flowers very easily escape from cultivation, and some of them promise to become quite troublesome in time. The "Sweet Scabious" or " Mourning Bride," Scabiosa atropur- purea, is becoming naturalized in the mountains north of Pescadero, also in lowlands along the San Joaquin. It promises to be nearly as great a nuisance as its relative, the " Fuller's Teasel," Bipsacus fullonum, now so freely dispersed about the Bay of San Francisco. The " Periwinkle," Vinca major, has escaped in numerous places, and though, like many of the plants of similar growth, it seldom forms seed, it spreads so freely by its prostrate rooting stems as to be very difficult of eradication. Some of the Chrysanthemums, now so much cultivated, escape from time to time, and are rather troublesome to get rid of. One of the " Pompons " has apparently established itself on the heights between Redwood City and the sea. THE CURLED LEAF (Ascomyces deformans). BY H. W. HARKNESS. This fungus, too well known to most peach - growers, has been given several generic names, but is, perhaps, best known as As- comyces. It is now mature, and producing the countless spores which give a glaucous bloom to the distorted leaves. No remedy- has been found which promises relief from its ravages, and a circum- stance lately observed leads me to fear that its extirpation will be attended by an unexpected difficulty. At several times during the past few years leaves and twigs of buckeye (ALsculus Californica) have reached me which were covered with an Ascomyces, practically indistinguishable from . A. deformans, the only difference observed being a perhaps slightly more regular narrowing of the asci towards the base. All the specimens sent me, and all that have been observed, so far as I know, have come from the vicinity of infected peach trees. The localities noted are Salmon Falls, El Dorado County; Mormon Island, Sacramento County; San Gregorio Creek, San Mateo County; Scott Creek, near Santa Cruz; and Wildwood Glen, near Sausalito. The fungus affects the buckeye somewhat differently from the peach. The infected tree usually has one or more rather dense bunches of small twigs, often one or two feet in diameter, the whole mass profoundly diseased, the mycelium ramifying to such an extent that the tender leaves are most frequently killed before the fungus matures, and the mass looks as if it had been dipped in boiling water or killed by a sharp frost. The mycelium evidently persists for years in these twigs and small branches, producing annually a crop of diseased leaves, and does not penetrate to the harder and older wood, for in that case it would be generally diffused. There are usually, besides these diseased bunches, scattered spots of infec- tion upon the leaves in other parts of the tree. The difference in the action of the fungus is probably due to the very brief life of the buckeye leaves. In this State they usually fall in the early summer, the bare, white stems which form a conspicuous feature in so many of our hillside landscapes remaining leafless until the following April. The leaves are thus very apt to fall before the ramifying mycelium reaches the twig: this fact also lessens the danger of their infecting other trees. 88 Recent Literature. [zoe The absolute identity of the buckeye Ascomyces with that of the peach can only be proved by a series of direct infections of healthy trees. In the meantime we trust our horticultural friends will pay some attention to their neighboring buckeyes, and furnish us notes as to the extent to which it prevails in various localities. Cornus sessilis Torr. fruits abundantly just below the railroad embankment at Blue Canon and grows in Amador a few miles above Volcano to a much greater height than that given by Mr. Coulter in. Bot. Gaz. xv, 33. The fruit is very dark red. t. s. b. RECENT LITERATURE. From the number of amateur ornithological papers received of late it would seem that this class of literature is steadily increasing. Whether these publications are a benefit or an evil to those who read them is a matter worthy of consideration. There is no doubt that they exercise considerable influence on the rising generation, some of whom are to be our future scientists, but is it a good influ- ence ? This question may best be answered by considering three of these papers of recent date, the Stormy Petrel, the Maine Ornithol- ogist and Oologist, and the American Osprey. The initial number of the Stormy Petrel was published in April of this year at Mendota, 111. It is a four-page monthly which the ed- itors (Smith & Co.) promise to enlarge in a short time, and it is their hope that their readers will help them "in making the Stormy Petrel the best ornithological paper published in America." (!) When we look over this insignificant little paper, this statement seems positively ludicrous. It would be a waste of time to look for a single new fact or even an original observation in its columns. The first page is largely taken up with an extract from '' Oliver Davie's Book," while an advertisement of the same occupies the last page. The other articles are "The Largest Egg in the World" (that of JEpyornis maxzmus), "The Longevity of Birds" and the "Rubby-throated Humming Bird." The April number of the Maine Ornithologist and Oologist, pub- lished at Garland, Me., is but a slight improvement on the paper considered above. It is an eight-page monthly, five pages and a half of which are devoted to editorials and advertisements. The vol. i.] Recent Literature. 89 first article is on the "Nesting of Cooper's Hawk," the introduction to which is so novel that it will bear quoting: " As the habits and plumage, as also the nests and eggs, of nearly all our birds, has been laid before us on an elaborate scale by men of science, about all that remains for we lesser lights, is give our individual experiences, and they certainly have the merit of originality; therefore, my Oological friends do not expect to gain much wisdom from this article." Surely the warning is unnecessary ! This number however has one article of slight interest on " Early Appearances of the Catbird." The American Osprey, the April number (Vol. 1, No. 4) of which is before us, is printed in somewhat neater style, but the class of ar- ticles which it contains is not much in advance of those in the papers just considered. The anonymous article on "The Osprey" is the only thing of any interest in the number, but this contains no more valuable information than the statement that " they never eat any- thing but fish," and others of like value. The article entitled " Hints for Oologists" sounds like a very brief abstract of Ingersoll's Birds' Nesting. From the preceding illustrations I think it is shown that these papers, which are typical of a score or more published in America, possess little of merit or originality. Their defenders may urge that the papers are useful in inciting the young to an interest in natural history, but the objection to this is that they they are inaccurate and misleading, that subscribers are asked to write for them; and conse- quently the beginner in ornithology is induced to attempt to teach long before he has learned anything worthy of being imparted. C. A. k. American Spiders and their Spinning Work. By Henry C. McCook, D. D. In the first volume of this work Dr. McCook has given special attention to the snares and nests of spiders. He has treated of the Pacific Coast species as fully as he could with the ma- terial sent him, not having been able to carry out his desire to visit California and study them in the field. Dr. McCook succeeded in hatching some spiderlings from cocoons sent him from San Diego, and studied several California species from living specimens. Three hundred and fifty-four figures embellish this volume. Some of the illustrations, although original with the author, have appeared with his magazine articles, or with Dr. McCook's contributions to the Proceedings of the Philadelphia Academy of Sciences. r. s. e. Recent Literature. ¦[zoe Descriptio7i of Two New Species of Snakes from California. By Leonhard Stejneger. Smithsonian Inst. Issued Feb. 5, 1890. Dr. Stejneger states that "the genus JLichanura, the only North American genus of the family Boid