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HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



News appears in the " Pall Mall Gazette " from 

 Miss Marianne North, who is at present in Chili and 

 wrote last December. Speaking of the embothrium, 

 which has sprays six or eight feet high covered with 

 pure vermilion flowers., she says: "But I saw none 

 grow into such a tree as I saw in my cousin's garden 

 in Cornwall last year ; perhaps it may enjoy a new 

 soil and climate, and treat England as our common 

 weeds do Chili ; they have quite driven the natives 

 out on the great plain or valley of Santiago, and show 

 unbroken masses of camomiles, thistles, turnips and 

 cornflowers, far stronger than those of Europe." 



MICROSCOPY. 



Liverpool Microscopical Society. — At the 

 last monthly meeting of the above society, Dr. W. 

 Carter called attention to some further investigations 

 of Monsieur Pasteur which proved that no germina- 

 tion of seeds could take place in sterilised earth, and 

 referred to some experiments of his own with 

 mustard seeds. Afterwards, Dr. J. Sibley Hicks 

 read a paper on "The Aphides and their Habits." 

 He referred to the wide distribution of these insects, 

 and how each plant has its peculiar species of aphis 

 which occasionally works immense destruction. The 

 ravages of the hop aphis were specially referred to, 

 and details given of the enormous loss incurred by 

 hop growers through this pest, which in the year 

 1S82 amouuted to £1,750,000. This damage is 

 explained by the fabulous reproductive power of the 

 aphis ; a single female may see in her own lifetime a 

 progeny of over 4500 million individuals. Another 

 destructive species occurs on apple-trees, and is 

 known as American blight, which was first observed 

 in 1785 in an orchard near London. In more recent 

 times the vine aphis phylloxera has done immense 

 damage in the vineyards of France, where it was 

 first found, in 1865; these species attack the leaves 

 and roots, &c. Fortunately the aphides have numer- 

 ous enemies, notably the ladybird and its caterpillars, 

 especially the latter, each of which will devour forty 

 to fifty daily. Other enemies are the lacewing fly 

 and its grub, the ichneumon fly, which deposits its 

 eggs in the body of the aphis, where they are 

 hatched, &c. 



The Quekett Club.— The March number of the 

 Journal of the above club contains the inaugural 

 address of the president, Dr. Carpenter, in which he 

 gives an account of the structure of Orbitolites. The 

 paper is well illustrated, and concludes with some 

 remarks addressed to would-be workers in science. 

 At the November meeting of the same club, Dr. 

 M. C. Cooke, and apparently also Dr. Carpenter, 

 agreed with the opinion expressed in a paper by 

 Mr. Bates, that at present there is no sufficient 



ground on which to assert the distinct sexuality of 

 the threads of the Zygonemacese. At the same 

 meeting Mr. E. M. Nelson announced that he had 

 recently been successful in detecting a flagellum on 

 the cholera bacillus. 



Royal Microscopical Society. — Mr. F. R. 

 Cheshire, F.R.M.S., contributes to the Journal of the 

 above Society (February) a paper, accompanied by 

 illustrative plates, on the receptaculum seminis and 

 adjacent parts of bees and wasps. In it he describes 

 minutely the anatomical structures bearing on the 

 vexed questions of the reproduction of bees. The 

 same number contains also a paper on Variations in 

 the Development of a Saccharomyces, by Mr. G. F. 

 Dowdeswell ; Notes on Tyroglyphidse, by Mr. A. D. 

 Michael ; and the usual capital summary of current 

 researches. 



Cole's "Microscopical Studies." — These wel- 

 come serials are issued with remarkable punctuality. 

 Part 3 of the "Studies in Microscopical Science" 

 deals with Vaucheria racemosa (illustrated by a 

 coloured plate and slide showing oogonia and 

 anthrozoa) ; with the " ovary of kitten ; " alveolar 

 pneumonia," and "foot of spider" — all illustrated 

 by plates and slides, whilst the letter-press descrip- 

 tions are remarkably lucid and terse ; in fact, they 

 are models of scientific teaching. 



Crystals for the Polariscope. — I should be 

 glad to know if any of the crystals of the various 

 salts mounted for polariscopic objects are really per- 

 manent. "A thing of beauty is a joy for ever," 

 says the poet. About the beauty of the crystals 

 there cannot be two opinions ; but, alas ! so far as 

 my experience goes, it is of a decidedly fleeting 

 character. I have slides by Topping and others, 

 nearly all of which show signs of deterioration, and 

 in some the crystals have vanished altogether. This- 

 cannot arise from damp, as my cabinet is kept in an 

 exceptionally dry room, in proof of which I may 

 state that such a thing as mould I have never seen 

 in my cabinets of entomological specimens. Before, 

 therefore, I expend anything more on this class of 

 microscopic mounts, I would ask for the advice of 

 microscopists, and information as to the durability of 

 crystals. — Joseph Anderson, jun. 



Staining Nerve and Muscles. — Would any of 

 your readers furnish me with the most delicate stains 

 and tests for the elucidation of very obscure nervous 

 and muscular structure in fresh minute organisms, 

 with best mode of application 1—E. B. L. Brayley. 



Unrecognised Birds. — A correspondent says 

 he saw two strange birds on a Yorkshire moor. 

 They were probably stonechats (Saxicola rnbicola), 

 birds which are almost confined to heaths and moors. 

 — H. Lamb, Maidstone. 



