The following interesting fact in natural history was communicated by
Dr. Weatherhead, to the committee of science of the Zoological Society,
at their last meeting.
For the last five-and-twenty years naturalists in Europe have
been striving to obtain the carcass of the impregnated female
_Ornithorhynchus paradoxus_, for the purpose of ascertaining its mode
of gestation, but without success; for it is by dissection alone that
the hitherto doubtful and disputed point concerning the anomalous
and paradoxical manner of bring forth and rearing its young can be
satisfactorily demonstrated. This long-sought-for desideratum is at
length attained. Through the kindness of his friend, Lieut. the
honourable Lauderdale Maule, of the 39th regiment, Dr. Weatherhead has
had the bodies of several _ornithorynchi_ transmitted to him from New
Holland, in one of which the ova preserved; establishing, along with
other curious circumstances ascertained, the extraordinary fact, that
this animal, which combines the bird and quadruped together in its
outward form, lays eggs and hatches them like the one, and rears and
suckles them like the other.--_Proc. Zool. Soc._
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