Abstract
THERE can be no question that the establishment of a journal in connection with a scientific institution is one of the very best methods of promoting the interests of the latter and obtaining for it more extended support. While the institution remains in one place, its journal travels about the world, makes its most recent acquisitions known to its supporters and correspondents, and encourages them to promote its welfare by further donations. Such being the case, Dr. Meyer has acted most wisely in endeavouring to resuscitate the somewhat decayed zoological branch of the Royal Museum of Dresden, by starting the present periodical. Dr. Meyer's recent travels and discoveries in the Eastern Archipelago have brought him much and deserved credit, to which, no doubt, he partly owes his present appointment. They have likewise supplied him with abundant materials for contributing valuable memoirs to his journal. Not unnaturally, therefore, the first number of the new periodical commences with papers containing the results of some of his own researches in the Eastern Islands. The first of them contains an account of a new Bird of Paradise, not actually discovered by Dr. Meyer himself, but by one of his correspondents since his return to Europe. Diphyllodes Gulielmi III., as this splendid bird is named, in honour of the King of Holland, is said to be from the little known Papuan island of Waygiou, and vies in brilliancy of plumage and elaborate excess of feathered ornaments with the finest species of this gorgeous family. Descriptions of other novelties in the class of birds discovered by Dr. Meyer himself, together with additional notes on little known species, complete this interesting memoir. Another paper by Herr Kirsch contains descriptions of new beetles from Malacca, from a large collection sent by Herr Eichhorn to the Royal Museum, and a third, which will be of special interest to our anthropological friends, is devoted to an account of 135 Papuan skulls obtained in New Guinea and Mysore by Dr. Meyer himself. We observe that a second part of the Mitlheilungen is announced for publication early in the present year, so that we may expect shortly to have an opportunity of bringing further labours of Dr. Meyer and his assistants to the knowledge of our readers.
Mittheilungen aus dem k. Zoologischen Museum zu Dresden. Herausgegeben mit Unterstützung der Generaldirection der k. Sammlungen für Kunst und Wissenschaft.
Dr.
A. B.
Meyer
Von, Director des königl. zoologischen Museums, 1 Heft mit Tafel i.-iv. (Dresden: Verlag von R. v. Zahn, 1875.)
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Mittheilungen aus dem k. Zoologischen Museum zu Dresden. Herausgegeben mit Unterstützung der Generaldirection der k Sammlungen fur Kunst und Wissenschaft. Nature 13, 464 (1876). https://doi.org/10.1038/013464a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/013464a0