OCR Text |
Show 128 MR. SCLATER O N AMHERST'S PHEASANT. [Mar. 10, The male of this Fruit-bat had been purchased on the 27th of May, 1868*. and had been placed in a cage in the Monkey-house along with two other Fruit-bats (Pteropus medius and P. poliocephalus). On the 1st of November, 1869, a female of the same species was obtained by purchase from a dealer at Liverpool, and placed in the same cage (see P. Z. S. 1869, p. 602). The pair immediately became friendly together, and usually remained in a separate corner of the cage, but were never positively seen to copulate. It is therefore possible, though not very probable, that the female might have been pregnant when received. The young one was born covered with short smooth hairs of a nearly uniform pale cinereous, darker at the tips. It hung by its hind-claws to the lower part of the body of the mother, with its mouth usually attached to one of the two mammae, which are placed on the pectoral muscle beneath the wing, as represented in the drawing (p. 127). This was believed to be the first recorded instance of any of the Chiroptera having been observed to breed in captivity. Prof. Owen read a paper, containing descriptions of various bones oi Aptornis defossor, A. otidiformis, Notornis mantelli, and Dinornis curtus, obtained from deposits in various parts of New Zealand, and forming the fifteenth part of his series of memoirs on the extinct birds of the genus Dinornis and its allies. This paper will be published in full in the Society's •* Transactions.' Prof. Flower exhibited a drawing of a Cetacean animal lately captured in a Mackarel-net off the coast of Cornwall, which he identified with Globiocephalus rissoanus (Delphinus rissoanus, Laurill.), a species hitherto only known to occur in the Mediterranean. The specimen was stated to be an adult female, about 11 feet long. Prof. Flower proposed to give a detailed description of the external characters, and an account of the osseous structure of this interesting Cetacean, as soon as its skeleton is prepared. In reference to Mr. Swinhoe's communication at the last Meeting on the locality of the Amherst's Pheasant (Thaumalea amherstice^), Mr. Sclater stated that Mr. J. J. Stone had kindly placed in his hands copies of two letters addressed by Monseigneur Chauveau, Bishop of Sebastopolis and Vicar Apostolic of Lhassa, to Mr. Med-hurst, the English Consul at Hankow, one of which was the letter spoken of by Mr. Swinhoe. There could be no doubt, therefore, that the birds collected by Monseigneur Chauveau were the same as those which ultimately reached Mr. Stone, and that this Pheasant is "exceedingly common" on the hills bordering the western part of * See, for notice of its arrival, P. Z. S. 1868, p. 404. t See antea, p. 107. |