86 



HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



purely crystalline substances may imitate the forms of 

 organic structures, as in the dendrites which build up 

 such exquisite imitations of vegetable foliage, to 

 assume that a mineral structure should agree in so 

 many points, alike in internal structure and external 

 form, would require a series of coincidences in the 

 highest degree improbable. They further pointed 

 out that we have strong reasons for the belief that life 

 did then exist, besides the evidence already referred 

 to, based on the graphite, calcite and iron ores. Sterry 

 Hunt maintains that he has discovered in the beds of 

 iron ore, traces of subaerial decay that point to the 

 reducing and solvent action of substances produced in 

 the decay of plants. Dawson believes he has found 

 some plants in the graphite of the Clarendon lime- 

 stone, also worm burrows at Medoc, and some bodies 

 that he has named Archeospherinre. 



The objection that, even if Eozoon or any other 

 organism had lived in Laurentian times, its relics 

 could never have survived the metamorphism which 

 the rocks have since undergone, Gumbel answers by 

 denying that the rocks have been metamorphosed, 

 declaring they are now in their original condition ; 

 while Dawson says,* "I call this a prejudice," and 

 proceeds to demolish it by referring to what he 

 considers the analogous case of the casts of corals by 

 calcite and silicates, and of the body chambers of 

 foraminifera by glauconite, the latter of which are so 

 well known as fossils from the greensands, and in 

 recent seas as in the Gulf Stream and the Egean. 

 Dawson maintains that such would be obliterated by 

 nothing short of the actual fusion of the rock, and he 

 adduces Sterry Hunt's opinion, that the association 

 of serpentine with Eozoon is exactly on a par with 

 these cases, and that as glauconite is a hydrous 

 silicate of iron and potash, and serpentine a hydrous 

 silicate of magnesia, if we assume that in the 

 Laurentian ocean magnesia played the role of iron 

 and potash in recent seas, we can understand how 

 the Laurentian serpentine was deposited under con- 

 ditions similar to those of modern greensand. 



Briefly summarized, such are the arguments on 

 which Eozoonists rest their case, and from their 

 plausibility and their acceptance by such geologists 

 as Lyell, Dawson and Gumbel, such authorities on 

 the foraminifera as Carpenter and Rupert Jones, such 

 biologists as Schultze, or such mineralogists as Dana 

 and Hunt, the theory held a position which could be 

 stormed only by years of steady work and con- 

 troversy. Hence it was, with every confidence in its 

 accuracy, that Dawson conjured up his "Restoration 

 of Eozoon." As shown in the figure (Fig. 42) it 

 consisted at its base of simple layers which higher 

 up became " acervuline owing to the deficiency of 

 nourishment of the central and the lower layers 

 making greater and greater demands on those above, 

 and so the skeleton became thinner " ; f above it 



' Dawn of Life," p. 93. 



■j" Ibid. p. 46. 



gave rise to a series of long pseudopodia extended 

 into the ocean to catch the Archeospherinae and 

 other contemporary organisms as its prey, which, as 

 the temperature of the water is estimated by Dana at 

 200° F., it would find ready cooked and stewed. 



[To be continued!) 



GOSSIP ON CURRENT TOPICS. 



By W. Mattieu Williams, F.R.A.S., F.C.S. 



A Venerable University. — In the midst of 

 Jubilees and jubilations, it is noteworthy that Italy 

 had decided to celebrate in the spring of 1888 the eight 

 hundredth anniversary of the University of Bologna. 

 It is well for the education of young Italy that it should 

 publicly honour the great intellectual achievements 

 and early intellectual superiority of old Italy, rather 

 than direct its pride towards the gross though energetic 

 brutality of ancient Rome. When we reflect on the 

 general condition of Europe in the eleventh century, 

 this awakening from the dark period when its intel- 

 lectual culture was mainly dependent upon wandering 

 missionaries from Ireland, the foundation of an uni- 

 versity was a great event, and it is doubtful whether 

 any other continental university can boast so ancient 

 a record as that of Bologna. 



Petroleum and Health. — Dr. Bielczyk pub 

 lishes in a Polish medical journal the results of his 

 observations among workmen employed in petroleum 

 wells. He found that when the gas existing in the 

 shafts of the wells was freely breathed, violent delirium 

 of a maniacal character was produced. This, how- 

 ever, quickly ceased when the workman was brought 

 to the surface. Speaking generally, he says that the 

 mortality among those workmen is not particularly 

 high, and that they seem to be remarkably free from 

 diseases of the respiratory organs, both of an inflam- 

 matory and tubercular character, and also from 

 infectious diseases. They are, however, subject to 

 an eruption like acne, affecting the extremities. Dr. 

 Bielczyk found that raw petroleum is an excellent 

 application for fresh as well as for old and foul or 

 torpid wounds. 



Having been engaged during a few years in the 

 distillation of cannel coal and shale, which thus 

 produces a compound almost identical with petroleum, 

 I am able to add my testimony to that of Dr. 

 Bielczyk. My men were not so severely exposed to 

 the gaseous exhalations as those who descend petro- 

 leum wells, and therefore I saw nothing of the 

 delirium. The retorts were worked in the open air. 

 The worst casualty to which the men were exposed 

 was that of having their faces burned when they 

 opened the retort doors. The inflammable vapour 

 filling the retorts, which were much larger than gas 

 retorts, flashed forth somewhat explosively when 



