Mr Ingram said he believed that a person in the employ of Mr Lynch had gone , over to the Hospital, and preferred the re quest. At the meeting of the Zoological Society on January 21, among other papers of scien tific interest, a communication was read from Dr J. E. Gray, F.R.S., who is at the head of the Zoological Department in the British Museum, containing a description of the skeleton of the New Zealand right whale Macleay'ms (Awstraliensis), and of several other whales. The paper concluded with a list of all the known species of marine mam malia inhabiting the seas around New Zea land. The learned author referred particu larly to the skeleton of a whale recently forwarded to this country by Dr Haast, the Provincial Geologist of Canterbury, and now deposited in the British Museum. l»r Gray pointed out some very curious facts relating to the geographic range of these "monsters of the deep," and his treatise, when pub lished by the society, will no doubt be read with much interest by scientific students in the Colony. It will be remembered that Dr Gray was the author of the first published list of the fauna of New Zealand, appended to " Dieffenbach's Travels" in 2843; and this veteran zoologist, if we may judge by his numerous papers on the subject, has con tinued his researches with unabated interest to the present day. In a paragraph referring to the Maori set tlemant at the Arahura, the Church News says:— "They (the natives) of late com pleted a very handsome room for the purpose of holding discussions, and for general social purposes. It is very tastefully painted in old Maori style inside, and nicely carpeted with matting. It possesses also an adjunct of Maori oratory, which is highly amusing to an English spectator— a carved figure of an \ old Maori warrior, clud in hand and tatooed with paint, with hideous eyes and teeth of white shell and a flowing wig of horsehair, is fixed on a revolving iron frame in the centre of the room. As each speaker rises from his squatting position on the floor to address hia audience, the figure is carefully turned towards him, as though it were tbe chief listener, and the special' object of the speech. 