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HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE- GO SSIP. 



gated coal of the Carboniferous era from other 

 locations, as, e.g., a piece of the so-called Cannel 

 coal from Scotland, from Newcastle, and from the 

 mines of St. Etienue. In every one of the nieces, 

 the presence of diatomaceie in greater or less 

 numbers was proved. And in none of the specimens 

 was there a single form found which did not belong 

 to freshwater. The species varied in the three 

 different specimens of coal, but,, as in the case of 

 the Lancashire coal, not even a single new form 

 was discovered, but all closely agreed with the ex- 

 isting freshwater diatomacea?, from which they 

 could not be distinguished by the most practised 

 eye. The shapes of the coverings, the details of 

 the structure, form, and number of the markings, — 

 in short, all the signs by which the species of diato- 

 macea? are generally distinguished, are, in the 

 diatomacea) of the Coal period, identical with those 

 of existing species ; so that these organisms, in the 

 indeterminably long period from the Coal epoch to 

 the present time, have undergone no perceptible 

 modification.—/. S. Hill. 



Yeast in Media free from Oxygen.— M. 

 Traube has described certain experiments which 

 tend to prove Pasteur's doctrine that yeast may be 

 originated in the absence of free oxygen, to be 

 erroneous. When care was taken to exclude free 

 oxygen by means of a stream of carbonic anhydride 

 no yeast was formed, even in the case of fermentable 

 liquids, which rapidly developed yeast on exposure 

 to the air. Ready-formed yeast, however, can in- 

 crease when free oxygen is excluded, but there is 

 reason to believe that the oxygen required for this 

 increase is not derived from sugar, but from albu- 

 menoid substances, as the yeast was found to cease 

 growing while unaltered sugar remained in the 

 liquid. When oxjgen is excluded, yeast can pro- 

 duce fermentation in pure sugar solution ; but in 

 this case the yeast does not increase. It seems 

 probable, therefore, that fermentation is not a purely 

 chemical but a vital process. 



MlCROCHEMICAL EXAMINATION OF ANGUSTURA 



Bark.— The Journal of the Chemical Society states 

 that when thin transverse sections of true Angus- 

 tura bark are examined under the microscope, and 

 compared with [sections of false bark, both being 

 moistened with glycerine, irregularly scattered cells 

 will be observed in the true bark, whereas the false 

 bark presents two zones of sclerogenous cells en- 

 tangled with one another. When the sections are 

 moistened with water, cells containing calcium 

 oxalate are seen in the true bark, but they are 

 absent in the false bark. When true Angustura 

 bark is moistened with nitric acid, a granular sub- 

 stance, supposed to be cusptnin, melts in each 

 cell, with disengagement of gas, into a red liquid, 

 which finally disappears with excess of acid ; but in 



the false bark the coloration spreads through the 

 tissue. When a thin section of the suberous 

 layer of false Angustura bark, first treated witk 

 nitric acid, is immersed in glycerine, the cells are 

 observed to be rounded, empty, and coloured 

 emerald-green on the sides : this appearance is rut 

 observed in the suber of true Angustura bark. 



ZOOLOGY. 



The late Charles Kingsley. — All true na- 

 turalists will mourn the loss of this earnest and 

 genial popularizer of modern science. Our columns 

 have frequently been enriched by his kindly answers 

 to querists, for he was one of those who did not 

 think it beneath him to help a learner out of a 

 difficulty. His memory will live long in the hearts 

 of many young naturalists, whom he introduced to 

 some of the marvels of God's creation ; and our 

 library shelves will long continue to bear his 

 volumes, for the sake, not only of their suggestive 

 science, but for the clear and manly English in 

 which they are written. Charles Kingsley occupied 

 a place in the debatable ground between theology 

 aud science which it will be hard to fill. 



Rare Birds.— It may interest your readers to 

 know that on the 6h ult., on the Burrows, near 

 Bideford, I had the good fortune to observe, among 

 the flocks of larks and other birds, numerous 

 snow buntings. I obtained two specimens, 

 both very fat, their crops being full of small seeds. 

 A specimen of the shore lark was also shot, and 

 others seen. Are not both of these birds rare so 

 far south as Devonshire ? — E. V. 



Pathology of Oak-galls. — At a recent meeting 

 of the Linnean Society, Dr. Hollis read a paper on 

 the pathology of oak-galls. Oak-galls may be 

 divided into two classes, — the unilocular or one- 

 celled, which include the woody marbled oak-galls, 

 the ligneous galls of Reaumur, and the currant leaf- 

 galls ; and the multilocular or many-celled, including 

 the spongy oak-apple and the oak-spangles of the 

 leaves. The author went with some detail into the 

 structure and history of development of each of 

 these kinds, taking a few examples of each. With 

 the exception of the oak-spangles, all the different 

 kinds appear to be formed during the growth of the 

 leaf. The pathological differs from the healthy 

 development in the more rapid growth of its cellular 

 elements and in the larger size they attain : this is 

 gained at the expense of the differentiation of the 

 matrix of the bud. The author traced the origin 

 of the different layers of the gall itself to the 

 different layers of the leaf from which it is pro- 

 duced. 



