The London School Board have now the subject of Natural History Collections before them. The following extracts are from the 'Daily Mail':—"Tempting as may seem the offer of the entire contents of a museum for £51, some members of the London School Board (March 2nd) seemed disinclined to purchase on the principle that it was too cheap to be good. [We are entirely of that opinion.—Ed. Zool.] The collection in question is at present in the possession of the Shoreditch Public Libraries Committee, and consists inter alia of:—Twenty-four cases of birds intact; 9 cases of birds broken, the whole being somewhat dirty; 223 birds unmounted, badly preserved, and probably not worth the trouble of mounting; 15 Emu and 20 Guillemot eggs; 291 eggs and 14 nests; 14 boxes of eggs; 68 jars of reptiles; 57 boxes of shells; cabinet of Lepidoptera (cabinet in bad condition, and the specimens attacked by mites); 43 boxes of Lepidoptera, 32 of Coleoptera, 8 of Hymenoptera, and other Lepidopteral rubbish; 26-drawer cabinet of minerals, fossils, and shells (cabinet very bad); 28 boxes of minerals, very dirty and unclassified; 2 cases and 2 cabinets of minerals; a collection of polished pebbles, garnets, &c, about 1½ tons in weight; groups of coral, coins in cases, cases of medals, bones, tiles, glass jars, boxes, &c. One member was very sceptical as to the worth of the museum. He asked if the word 'mite' was not a misprint for 'mice,' but was informed, amid laughter, that 'mite is right.' In the end the Board resolved to purchase mites and all, provided one and a half tons of loose fossils were thrown in. The whole collection, it was stated, cost about £1000."
The Rev. J. Conway Walter has contributed some interesting notes on "Fox and Dog Hybrids near Horncastle," to the April issue of 'The Naturalist.' Mr. Walter exhibited, at the meeting of the Lincolnshire Naturalists' Union in 1897, a case containing two stuffed specimens of a cross between a Fox and a Dog, the sire being a male Fox (Vulpes vulpes), and the mother a half-bred bitch between Shepherd Dog and Whippet. The mother was bought by M. Suchetet with a view to further experiments. Since then several similar hybrids have been produced in the same neighbourhood. In one case, at Ashby Puerorum, a farm-bailiff, named Cross, tied his Shepherd bitch near a Fox-earth, and the one pup reared is now in the possession of Mr. Frank Dymoke, of Scrivelsby Park. In another case a gamekeeper near Louth tied a bitch in a wood, in the nutting season, to give warning of trespassers, and subsequently the bitch had pups, evidently a cross with a Fox. One of these is now in the possession of Mr. Waltham, dealer in china, High Street, Horncastle. Another is in the possession of Mr. E. Walter, farmer, of Hatton, a cousin of Mr. Stafford Walter, who bred the original hybrids, which were exhibited in 1897.
