On July 19th a specimen of the egg of the Great Auk (Alca impennis) was sold by Mr. J.C. Stevens, the well-known natural history auctioneer, of King Street, Covent Garden. The history of this specimen is well known. It was formerly in the collection of Comte Raoul de Beracé, having been bequeathed to him in 1834 by the owner of a fishing vessel at St. Malo. It afterwards passed into the possession of Baron d'Hamonville, who was the possessor of four eggs of the Great Auk, which were figured and described in the Mémoires of the Société Zoologique de France for 1888 and 1891. Of the four eggs belonging to the Baron, three have been sold by Mr. Stevens. The exact sum realized by the specimen sold on July 19th was 300 guineas. The egg was slightly cracked, and the dark markings were chiefly at the larger end, where the egg was slightly stained. The bidding commenced at £100. There was a brisk competition between two bidders, the egg being knocked down to Mr. Middlebrook, of the 'Edinburgh Castle,' Hampstead Road, the purchaser of Baron d'Hamonville's previous specimen, that was sold in June, 1895, at Stevens's, to Messrs. Jays, Regent Street, for sixty-five guineas, and afterwards resold at Stevens's, in July, 1897, to Mr. Middlebrook for 160 guineas.
The Fortieth Annual Report of the Chicago Academy of Sciences for the year 1897, and dated Jan. 11th, 1898, has just reached us (July, 1899). We notice in the Curator's Report of the Museum that, "through the continued generosity of Mr. George H. Laflin, the Academy has acquired the valuable collection of birds lately owned by Mr. F.M. Woodruff. This collection is particularly rich in the birds of the Mississippi Valley, and also includes nearly every species recorded from the Chicago area."
The Duke of Bedford has been elected by the Council President of the Zoological Society of London, to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Sir William Flower.
We recently (ante, p. 96) recorded the death of Mr. A.H. Everett, the travelling naturalist and collector. We now with equal regret record the decease of Mr. John Whitehead from pestilential fever while on a scientific mission in the island of Hainan. Mr. Whitehead's zoological enterprise in the Philippines is well known to zoologists, and, as our contemporary, 'Natural Science,' truly observes, "as a collector, Mr. Whitehead was highly esteemed, and his death, at the early age of forty-three, will be especially felt in the Natural History Museum at South Kensington, the zoological collections in which have been enriched through his industry and skill."
