tage to the lemming is known to have ever resulted from
these long and arduous marches. The losses in swimming large rivers,
from fire, the attacks of predatory animals, hunger, and fatigue, are so
great that but few reach the sea, and the remnant always perish there.
Mr. W. Duppa Crotch, who has studied the habits of these animals for ten
years, now suggests that they are moved by an hereditary instinct, and
that their prehistoric home was some country west of Sweden, and now
covered by the Atlantic. The same kind of reasoning would allot an
Atlantic origin to the progenitors of the grasshoppers, which have been
such plagues in this country for a few years, for, as stated in the
August "Galaxy," those which moved eastward in 1875 did not halt until
they perished on the ocean beach or in its waves. Mr. Crotch has thrown
new light on some of the habits of the lemming. According to him, says
"Nature," the migration is not all completed in one year, as formerly
supposed, nor do they, as stated, form processions and cut their way
through obstacles; but, breeding several times in the season, they
gather in batches, and at intervals make a move westward. Their
pugnacity, he states, is astonishing, and the approach of any animal, or
even the shadow of a cloud, arouses the anger of this small creature
like a guinea pig, and they back against a stone or rock uttering shrill
defiance. Our author found, in most examples, a bare patch on the rump,
due to their rubbing against the said buttress of support when at bay.
He wonders why a bare patch, and not a callosity, should not result from
this innate, apparently hereditary habit.

NEW DISCOVERY OF NEOLITHIC REMAINS.

A very interesting discovery of human remains has been made in a cave in
Cravanch, about two miles northwest of Belfort, France. Some workmen,
excavating in a quarry of Jurassic limestone, found the opening to the
cave, the bottom of which was covered with stalagmites, while there were
no corresponding stalactites hanging from the roof. Some of these
calcareous columns appear to be artificial piles covered with the
limestone sheeting. Between them, and also covered with stalagmite, were
a quantity of human skeletons, with the skulls raised above the rest of
the bodies. A number of weapons and implements, together with a mat of
plaited meshes, have been found, all belonging to the polished stone
period. It is thought that careful search may uncover remains of an
earl