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Show 184 LETTER FROM DR. R. O. CUNNINGHAM. [Mar. 12, Washington, January 31st, 1868, announcing that he had forwarded to the Society, on behalf of the Smithsonian Institution, an electrotype copy of a drawing on wood of a young Californian Vulture (Cathartes californianus), in return for a similar copy of the woodcut of the adult of the same bird iu the Society's « Proceedings' for 1866. The woodcut had been taken from a photograph of the same individual (which was now living in the Society's Gardens, having been presented by Dr. Canfield in June 1866) when quite young and in the down. It was stated that the details of the bill were perhaps not quite accurate. The following extracts were read from a letter addressed by Dr. Robert O. Cunningham, Naturalist to the Magellan Straits Survey Expedition, to Professor Huxley, and communicated by him to the Meeting. « H.M.S. ' Nassau,' Rio de Janeiro, September 23rd, 1867. " M Y D E A R S I R , - W h e n I had the pleasure of calling on you rather more than a year ago, before proceeding to the Straits of Ma-gelhaens, as Naturalist to a Surveying Expedition under the command of Captain Mayne, you were kind enough to invite m e to write to you when I felt so disposed, and now, after m y first year's experience of the Strait, I send you a few notes principally relating to its zoology. W e left England last September, and, after visiting Madeira, St. Vincent (Cape de Verdes), Rio de Janeiro, Monte Video, and Maldonado, arrived at our destination near the end of December. There, with the exception of a visit to the Falkland Islands to provision and coal, we remained till about the middle of June, when, the severity of the weather putting an end to surveying-operations, we moved northwards, and arrived at Rio in the beginning of July. Our work, except a cruise of a few days, when we were engaged piloting H.M.S. 'Zealous' through the northern portion of the Strait, has lain between the Chilian settlement of Sandy Point and the eastern entrance, and consequently has embraced some of the wider portions of the Strait. The country on either side of this tract is for the most part formed of low-lying undulating plains, the geological formation being almost exclusively boulder-clay, and presenting but few eminences of any considerable elevation, at all events near the sea. These plains are covered with grass and occasional barberry-bushes; and it is not till we reach Cape Negro that the wooded country, which is of a more elevated character, begins. Thence to the westward the woods increase in thickness till they become almost impenetrable in their character. The climate of this eastern portion may be described as remarkably fine, the atmosphere being singularly bright and clear, and the rainfall very small, the principal drawback being the prevalence of wind. This latter circumstance, and the great force and rise and fall of the tides, constituted two of the chief difficulties with which we had to contend during our sojourn last season, and made a heavy demand on our |