Gift to the University Museum.

The University has lately received a very generous gift from Professor Thomas Kirk, of Wellington, New Zealand. Two immense logs of the famous rata or so called sycomore, of New Zealand, have just been safely brought to the University Museum. The seeds of the rata germinate in the forks of lofty trees, sending down aerial roots which reach the earth and draw therefrom an increased supply of mineral matter, while the young plant above sends out branches with foliage to appropriate from the air the other requisite materials for food. The root increases in thickness, the branches contunue their growth until this intruder actually crowds out of existence the tree upon which it first began to grow. These roots, thus growing in the air, attain sometimes great size; logs from twenty to fifty feet in length and four feet square are obtained in large quantities. The magnificent specimens obtained by the University are respectively four and four and one-half feet in diameter.