HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



57 



Still, we Englishmen express our pharisaical horror 

 of the commercial corruption of New York. We 

 thank God that we are not as those wicked people 

 are, and grumble about commercial depression. 



The season is now approaching for testing the 



question of whether or not the tomato possesses the 



property attributed to it by some of the Cape 



colonists ; that of driving away insects from the land 



on which it is grown. Its cultivation under fruit 



trees is accordingly recommended. It may possibly 



be thus efficacious at the Cape, but not so here. 



Our greenhouses afford better opportunities of 



settling the question than any open air plantations 



can supply ; nothing being easier than to carry a few 



pots of growing tomatoes into an insect-pestered 



house, leaving open doors and windows and noting 



the result. If this were done skilfully, we should 



also learn whether insects generally, or only particular 



species, manifest the alleged aversion to this plant. 



Tatagonian geology is not profoundly studied in 

 this country, but is very interesting nevertheless, as 

 shown by the results of the explorations of Senor 

 F. T. Moreno, communicated to the Argentine 

 Scientific Society. Palaeontological evidence indicates 

 that Patagonia is not, as usually supposed, of marine 

 origin, but that much of it is terrestrial and lacustrine. 

 Senor Moreno concludes that at the beginning of 

 the Tertiary period a vast continent, of which 

 Patagonia was a part, extended east and west. 

 Oscillation is still proceeding in the southern part of 

 the continent, and the depth of the sea around is so 

 small that an elevation of 150 metres would unite 

 Patagonia with Tierra del Fuego and the Falkland 

 Islands, forming a continent there as wide as Africa 

 at the Orange River. Less than 2000 metres of 

 elevation would further unite all this with South 

 Ceorgia, South Sandwich Land, and the Antarctic 

 Continent. 



I doubt whether the conclusions based merely on 

 this shallowness are sound, I mean those suggesting 

 the former existence of such a continent. The sea all 

 thereabouts must be subject to continual shallowing 

 by the deposits from the icebergs which there abound, 

 and are continually thawing. Senor Moreno describes 

 the visible moraines that form the labyrinth of islets 

 in the Straits of Magellan and their neighbourhood ; 

 but besides these, there must be a vast "moraine 

 profonde " ever growing upwards from the sea bottom. 

 One of the results of the introduction of gelatine 

 ■dry plate photography, is the supplying of accurate 

 pictures of the heavens. The fixed stars, so called, 

 -can thus be easily and accurately represented, both in 

 position and magnitude, and by putting together the 

 different pictures of limited areas thus obtained a 

 ■complete self-drawn chart of the heavens is obtainable. 

 Mr. A. A. Common recently exhibited at the Royal 

 Astronomical Society pictures of a part of the 

 constellation Orion, and of the Pleiades, in which 

 stars of the ninth and tenth magnitudes were shown. 



Such pictures supplementing, correcting, and con- 

 firming the star catalogues made in the usual way, 

 supply data upon which may be founded the solution 

 of that great problem of "star drift," representing 

 the greater movements of the universe, compared 

 with which those of our own world in its orbit, or 

 even the wanderings of our sun in space, are but 

 minor creepings. By the spectroscopic method of 

 Dr. Iluggins we learn the approach and recession 

 of stars in the line of sight ; by the photographic 

 pictures we may be shown their movements across 

 that line ; by combining these, the actual direction 

 of travelling. Shall we thus ever learn the position 

 of the universal centre around which all the suns and 

 all their attendant worlds are moving ? 



The barrenness of the Pampas is explained by Mr. 

 Arthur Nicols in an interesting letter to " Nature" of 

 January 29th last. He tells his experience, in the 

 Pampas of La Plata, of the ravages of the omnipresent 

 leaf-eating ant, which clears away the first leaves of 

 any tree that may be planted either naturally or 

 artificially. The animals prove their prowess by 

 shearing off the hard cuticle of the thumbs and 

 fingers of those who pick them up. Nevertheless 

 it is possible to overcome them. Mr. Nicols 

 describes a splendid grove of Kucalypti of several 

 species that were reared from seed by first painting 

 a circle of gas tar around each. The disappearance 

 of the first leaves was thus prevented, as the ants 

 objected to cross the tar, and then by painting the 

 stems with tar during the first three years the trees 

 made such a start as to grow faster than they could 

 be destroyed. Many of these trees were forty feet 

 high, and measured three feet round at three feet 

 above the ground when eight years old. By lighting 

 fires over the nests of the ants during the winter, 

 when the colony is all at home, these pests may be 

 destroyed. From Mr. Nicols' account it appears that 

 their assimilation and distribution of vegetable matter 

 has richly manured the surface, and thus prepared it 

 for the use of men who are sufficiently intelligent 

 and energetic to avail themselves of the services of 

 these ants, and regulate their destructiveness. 



The subject of earth tremors is a very interesting 

 one. There are good reasons for supposing that the 

 so-called "solid" crust of the earth is uplifted in 

 tidal waves, is agitated by big waves, by wavelets 

 and ripples as the ocean is, but accurate observation 

 of these is difficult, one of the chief obstacles being 

 the confusion of artificial with natural vibrations. As 

 everybody knows, the passing of a wagon along an 

 ordinary street, produces earth-waves that can be felt 

 as we sit on our chairs, or lie in bed. These of course 

 are but local and very limited, but beyond these are 

 far reaching natural waves demanding systematic 

 study. Much has already been done in Japan, which 

 is a stormy earth-region continually agitated by earth- 

 quakes, great or little. We reside on a less stormy 

 crust, but one that is by no means absolutely calm. 



