HAHDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



277 



the podura test sliarply ami witliout colour, and 

 having plenty ol' light. Its magnifying power is i,000 

 diameters with the A eye-piece, with an angular 

 aperture of 160°; it bears the B and C eye-pieces, 

 with no other detriment than some loss of light, 

 and works well through covering glass '003 thick_ 

 Should Mr. Powell be able to produce these glasses, 

 they promise to be an important addition to our 

 microscopic powers. — //. 11. 



Coal Section.— Can any contributor kindly say 

 if there is any way of judging what piece of coal is 

 likely to form a good section ; as you may try a good 

 many without getting a decided vegetable struc- 

 ture ?— ^. T. Scoti. 



A SiNGULAK Plotifer.— We should have stated, 

 in our notice of Pedalion mira of last month, that 

 this object was llrst figured and described in the 

 Monthly Microscopical Journal of September, 1S71, 

 where the reader will find a detailed account of it. 



ZOOLOGY. 



The Exploring Expedition, under the charge 

 of Professor Wyville Thomson, was to sail in tlie 

 middle of November. The vessel fitted out for this 

 purpose is the Challenger, of 2,30G tons burden, 

 commanded by Captain Nares. The scientific staff 

 of the expedition includes: Professor Wyville Thom- 

 son, P.ll.S., Director ; Mr. J. J. Wild, of Zurich ; 

 Mr. J. Y. Buchanan, Chemist to the Expedition ; 

 Mr. H. N. Moseley, M.A., Naturalist; Dr. Von 

 Willemoes Suhm, of Munich, Naturalist ; and 

 Mr. John Murray, Taxidermist. Dr. Willemoes 

 Sulim and Mr. Moseley undertake the Invertebrata, 

 and Mr. Murray the Vertebrata; Mr. Moseley also 

 undertakes the duties of botanical collecting, &c. 

 An experienced photographer also accompanies the 

 party. The Challencjer has been specially litted for 

 the work, with two engines of 400 horse-power 

 each ; and stages amidship from which the dredges 

 will be worked. Several hundred miles of the best 

 whaling line have been prepared for dredging, and 

 the vessel carries out with her no fewer than forty 

 dredges. The route, which is not yet definitely 

 fixed, is supposed to be as follows:— The Challenger 

 will probaljly go round to Porlsmouth, and sail from 

 thence in the beginning of December for Gibraltar, 

 the first haul of the dredge being made in the Bay 

 of Biscay, if the weather should chance to be 

 favourable. Prom Gibraltar she will proceed to 

 ]\Iadeira, thence to St. Thomas, the Bahamas, Ber- 

 muda, the Azores ; from thence to Bahia, touching 

 at Fernando Norohua ; then across to the Cape of 

 Good Hope, and, after a stay in that neighborhood, 

 southwards to the Crozctts and Marion Islands and 

 Kerguelen's Laud. A run southwards will then be 

 made as far as possible to the ice, and the course 



theuce be made to Sydncj', New Zealand. The 

 Campbell and Auckland groups, Torres Straits. 

 New Guinea, and New Ireland will then be visited, 

 A long cruise of perhaps a year will then be made 

 amongst the Pacific Islands; thence the expedition, 

 passing betwen Borneo and Celebes, and visiting 

 Luzon and its neighbourhood, will proceed to Japan, 

 where a stay of two or three mouths is expected. 

 Thence northward to Kamtschatka, whence a run 

 will be made northwards through Bchring's Straits, 

 and then through the Aleutian Islands, southward 

 to Vancouver's Island, and so through the deep 

 eastern region of the Pacific by Easter Island, and 

 possibly by the Galapagos Archipelago to the Horn, 

 and thence home. The voyage is expected to take 

 about three and a half years. 



IIed Viper {Pelias bents). — Allow me to record 

 in your pages the capture of a specimen of this 

 viper at Cheeton, a few miles from hence, last 

 month. It measures about eleven inches in length, 

 being about the size of that mentioned in Bell's 

 " British Beptiles," p. 67, and the colouring very 

 bright. I shall be obliged if any of your corre- 

 spondents can inform me whether or not this variety 

 is generally distributed throughout the British 

 isles. — E. B. Kemp-Welch, Bourneuioulh. 



Popular Natural History. — An interesting 

 and well got-up brochure has been issued by 

 Messrs. Millikin and Lawley, giving a series of 

 Popular Lectures for the Magic Lantern. In 

 addition to the general historical and other subjects, 

 a large portion is devoted to astronomical, geo- 

 graphical, and natural history questions. The 

 illustrations for the latter have been selected from 

 typical and well-known forms, so that the teaching 

 of the leading principles of zoology has been 

 reduced to its simplest elements. The descrip- 

 tions of "Underground Life," as shown in coal 

 and metal mines, are particularly good, and these 

 include a good deal of geological phenomena. 



A Fly 5[istaken for an Annelid.— The flies 

 in the bottle sent were bred, the one from a larva 

 which is the supposed Annelid, iJiplolis hjalina of 

 Montague, the other from a pupa found at the 

 same time and place. Montague mistook the head 

 of the grub for its tail, the two ear-like append- 

 ages being at the anal extremity. I found it 

 pretty abundant among drifts, sea-weed, &c., at 

 high-water mark, in company with Orchestia litto- 

 rulis, at Colwyn Bay, in October. It struck me at 

 once that it was probably the larva of one of the 

 numerous flies on the sea-weed. One lived som.e 

 hours in salt water, but seemed very helpless, and 

 out of its clement. The anal appendages might 

 perhaps be suckers, by which the grub attaches 

 itself to sea-weed at high tides, to avoid being 

 washed away, but I must say that it did not use 



