Sept. 1, 1S66.] 



HARDAVICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



20; 



same catching-box, which is ready again each time 

 for the same purpose very quickly, and with the 

 smaller insects the chloroform vapour remaining in 

 the box is then sufficient to stupefy them at once, 

 or even to kill them. In catching insects with a 

 net, the box is introduced into the net by the hand, 

 confining the insect against the side of the net, and 

 the cover of the box being slipped on outside the 

 net, the insect is chloroformed at once through the 

 cover, and then removed safely in the open box 

 directly it is seen to be dead or sufficiently stupefied. 

 A catching-box about two inches diameter and % 

 inch deep inside is found the most convenient for 

 general purposes, as shown full size in the accom- 

 panying sketch, and a larger size three inches 

 diameter is used for the larger insects, which is also 

 useful for butterflies and moths bred from the 

 pupa. This box is made with the sponge and hole in 

 the centre of the glass bottom instead of being in 

 the cover, and it has the advantage that the glass 

 box can be dropped over an insect running upon 

 the ground, and sufficient chloroform applied on the 

 spot to stupefy the insect for safe removal, without 

 the risk of soiling and injuring it that is incurred in 

 picking the insect up in a box whilst running upon 

 the ground. In this box the sponge could not be 

 fixed by cement to the glass, on account of the dis- 

 solving action of the chloroform, and it is secured 

 by six small holes being drilled through the glass 

 round the centre hole (like the holes in the ends of 

 lustre-drops), and fixing the sponge by a thread 

 sewn all round its edge through the holes. 



The smaller size of this box is readily made by 

 cutting off the bottom of a glass bottle of the 

 required size, grinding the edge smooth, and fitting 

 on the cork-lined cover of a pomatum-jar ; the 

 bottom of the bottle being cut off by a thread 

 clipped in spirits of wine being wrapped round the 

 bottle and set on fire, and the bottle then dipped 

 into cold water, taking care to keep the line of the 

 thread level with the surface of the water. 



TV. P. Marshall. 



QUEKETT THE MICROSCOPIST. 



A T the top of the Royal College of Surgeons, in 

 ■**■ Lincoln's-Inn Eields — a la belle etoile, as the 

 Erench have it, that is to say, under the skylight — 

 lived and laboured Quekett the microscopist. It 

 is now long since he went away from us, and from 

 the great things that are here called little, and the 

 little things which are here held great ; but while he 

 worked in that scientific garret he was a sight to 

 see. Odours, not by any means of Araby the Blest, 

 saluted the nose that invaded the philosopher's 

 sanctum ; but what has Philosophy to do with noses ? 

 Sights not by any means elegant or appetizing met 

 the visitor's glance ; but Science is not squeamish. 

 Perhaps it was a wolf 's liverupon which the Professor 



was working at the moment, hunting for parasites 

 with a microscopic ardour that Leicestershire might 

 envy. A sheep with two heads, a chicken with three 

 legs, the nicely -cured head of a Dyak from Borneo ; 

 strange sea-weeds, odd-looking fish, and viscera of 

 foreign gentlemen who had done with them under 

 stress of curious wounds or mysterious diseases ; 

 new flowers, undescribed birds, egg-shells, feathers, 

 wood, insects, butterflies — such was the collection of 

 curiosities that surrounded the microscopist. 



Some of these articles Mould be decidedly fai- 

 sandes ; but, as we have said, the philosopher was 

 profoundly indifferent. People sent him odd and 

 interesting things from all parts of the world, 

 knowing the patient labours of that scientific garret. 

 It was an honourable but a nasty business to de- 

 liver the Professor's parcels ; for the fish from 

 China would spoil in spite of alcohol, and theDyak's 

 head would not travel well off its owner's shoulders. 

 Then, in the London markets, and at many such 

 places, there were watchful eyes for the Professor ; 

 and when something new or odd in nature turned 

 up, he was sure to get it. The more the better ; for 

 there he sat under the skylights, while Nature 

 rained her oddities and wonders in upon him, like a 

 mother asking her child conundrums. And he w 7 as 

 good at guessing them ; working for ever with for- 

 ceps and reflector and microscope — slicing sections 

 of bone and nerve— searching into infinitely little 

 organisms— ever learning something new, and fixing 

 it on a slide, for others to come and see. Compara- 

 tive anatomist and microscopist, he studied the 

 riddles in large print and small print, showing 

 always the same great answer to be written in both, 

 of beneficent and beautiful design. He worked away 

 for the common information, at the changes which 

 disease effects upon tissues and organizations — 

 changes which only the microscope can reveal, and 

 which even in these revelations of disease and de- 

 gradation of formation present perfect shapes, and 

 forms of curious morbid beauty and colour. He told 

 us a hundred novel things of the way in which Nature 

 builds up her marvellous structures, cell by cell, 

 on one great and simple plan. He studied the 

 blood in health and disease, not as what we see it, a 

 red coagulating fluid, but as what it is, a stream 

 of lymph, with discs like crimson coins, flowing 

 along the channels of vein and artery. He dis- 

 closed secrets of colour and character in the other 

 fluids and substances of the body, by which 

 physicians have been aided to discover and arrest 

 maladies ; and, last, though not least, in his labours 

 with the little glass which gives an admittance to 

 the world of infinity in the decreasing scale, he left 

 us preparations neither of science nor surgery, 

 so much as of simple loveliness — the perfect forms 

 and hues which Dame Nature prepares as care- 

 fully when we cannot see her work as when wc 

 can.— Daily Telegraph, Sept. 5, 1S65. 



