Lots A and H were sold to Prince Demidoff; C, D, and E to Mr. Gurney: B and G to a Mr. Allen. Lot F died before the sale, as did also one of D, two of E, and two of H.

GOLD PHEASANT, Thaumalea picta, Linnæus.

AMHERST PHEASANT, Thaumalea Amherstia, Leadbeater. These species, both natives of China, and a third and more recent one, T. obscura, from Japan, constitute the genus Thaumalea, remarkable for their rich and varied colouring and their ample crests, tippets, and flowing tail feathers.

The Gold Pheasant has long been an ornament to our aviaries, and has freely bred in confinement.

The Amherst Pheasant was described in the Transactions of the Linnean Society of London, vol. xvi, 1828, pl. xv, p. 129, by Mr. Benjamin Leadbeater, F.L.S., at that time the leading stuffer in London.

"Two males of this new and beautiful species came originally from the mountains of Cochin China, and were presented by the King of Ava to Sir Archibald Campbell, who gave them to the Countess Amherst. Her ladyship

retained them in her possession about two years, and ultimately succeeded in bringing them both to England alive, but they only survived the voyage a few weeks." One of these birds passed into the possession of Mr. Leadbeater, and was purchased from him by the 13th Earl of Derby at a high price, traditionally stated at £75. This type specimen, after the removal of the collection to Liverpool, was lent to Mr. Gould from which to draw his illustration of the species for his great work on The Birds of Asia, and his thanks for the favour are duly recorded in the text.

Notwithstanding the efforts made by Lord Derby to add rarities to his living collection, he never obtained any example of this species. The first Impeyan Pheasants imported to Europe lived and bred at Knowsley; and the first Japanese Pheasant also lived there and established his race, as above stated. But it was not until many years after his Lordship's death, in 1851, that the rapid development of ocean steamships shortened the long sea-voyages and gave other facilities for the safe transit of living creatures from far distant lands. The Zoological Society succeeded by these later advantages where Lord Derby in earlier years, and under less favourable circumstances, had failed.

It was thus that in 1869 the Society received, through the kind offices of Mr. J. J. Stone, F.L.S., after many unavailing efforts, several living examples, five males and a female, of the Amherst Pheasant; the first importation into Europe, and the female being the first of the sex seen by naturalists, who found it, as was to be expected, closely resembling the hen of the Gold Pheasant. The species freely bred in the Society's Gardens, and freely crossed with Gold Pheasants, and in a few years became abundant. So far abundant that a male and female hybrid and a male Gold Pheasant, all in full plumage and

fine condition, were purchased by myself in St. John's Market for the Museum, within the last few weeks, and are now exhibited, mounted in a pictorial group by Mr. Henry Reynolds, the skilful Taxidermist of the Museum. In fact, it is to this acquisition that the present communication is due, from their own intrinsic beauty, from their bearing on the subject of hybridity, and from their supplying another example of seeming fertility of hybrids to those mentioned by Darwin, in the following quotation from his Origin of Species, first edition, 1859, p. 253, in which the few instances named among birds are all Pheasants, those between Phasianus colchicus and P. versicolor being based on the Knowsley experiments above referred to.

66

DARWIN ON HYBRIDISM AND STERILITY.

Although I do not know of any thoroughly well-authenticated cases of perfectly fertile hybrid animals, I have some reason to believe that the

Although Darwin omits mention of the versicolor in his sixth edition, Sclater in his text to Wolf's Zoological Sketches, First Series, 1861, speaks as quoted above, and Gould in his Birds of Asia, vol. vii, plate 40, published in 1857, says that the P. colchicus, the P. torquatus, and the P. versicolor readily breed with each other, and contrary to the usual course of nature, the progeny of either two are capable of reproduction.

EIGHTH ORDINARY MEETING.

ROYAL INSTITUTION, February 7th, 1887.

DR. CARTER, PRESIDENT, in the Chair.

The Rev. S. FLETCHER-WILLIAMS read a Paper on "Robin Hood: a History and Vindication." *

NINTH ORDINARY MEETING.

ROYAL INSTITUTION, February 21st, 1887.

DR. CARTER, PRESIDENT, in the Chair.

The Rev. H. H. HIGGINS made some remarks on two medieval examples of the Astrolabe, which he exhibited from the Mayer collection. He regarded all the modifications of the instrument as intended, like the armillary sphere, or the modern planetarium or orrery, to give a representation of the relative positions of the celestial bodies at a given moment-say, of the birth of a celebrated man. The use of such an instrument dated from the earliest historic period, and was familiar to the Egyptians.

Mr. G. H. MORTON, F.G.S., described a section of the strata between Church Street and Leece Street, recently obtained from the excavation of the Mersey Railway Company, and also made some general observations on the Keuper strata under Liverpool.

Mr. JOSIAH MARPLES exhibited specimens of some recent improvements in the methods of book illustration, and described the process of their production.

* See page 125.

The Rev. H. H. HIGGINS exhibited and made explanatory remarks upon the following objects from the Free Public Museum :

A specimen of the rare Siphonogorgia Godeffroyi, and a specimen of the rare Shell, rare Shell, Bulimus labeo, lately purchased from Mr. Robert Damon, of Weymouth, with numerous other valuable selections from the late Godeffroy Collections at Hamburg..

TENTH ORDINARY MEETING.

ROYAL INSTITUTION, March 7th, 1887.

DR. CARTER, PRESIDENT, in the Chair.

The Rev. H. H. HIGGINS exhibited a specimen of Shale or Cannel Coal from the Brackenridge range of mountains in Kentucky, and recently presented to the Free Museum by Mr. C. J. English, with the following memorandum :"There are 3,000 acres of it, which are estimated to contain about six million tons of the Shale. It gives about 4 cwt. of good coke and about 40 gallons of coal-tar per ton, and costs sixty shillings per ton delivered in Liverpool. The gas is 45 candle power."

The following communication was then read :

BIRDS OF PALESTINE.

Copy of Report on the Birds of Palestine and other specimens collected by the late Mr. H. Heywood Jones, and presented to the Free Public Museum of Liverpool.

BY THOMAS J. MOORE,

CORR. MEMB. Z.S.L., CURATOR.

The Curator begs to report to the Library and Museum Committee the receipt of the birds from Lark Hill, West Derby, collected by