HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



277 



his ablest assistants to make analyses of various kinds 

 of coal, in accordance with Count Castracane's direc- 

 tions, and these ashes he (Professor Williamson) 

 had carefully examined, but had been unable to 

 detect any traces of diatomacese. I can confirm this, 

 having myself made many observations on the ashes 

 of various kinds of coal and coal shales ; many of the 

 latter were rich in the remains of equisetums and 

 ferns, and ought to have contained diatoms, if any 

 existed at that period. So acute an observer as 

 Count Castracane could not be mistaken as to the 

 presence of diatoms in the ashes he examined, and 

 we must, therefore, come to the conclusion that their 

 presence was accidental. I have examined very many 

 samples of chalk, not only from this country, but also 

 from various other localities, but have never seen any 

 valves of diatomacece. I should be glad to learn if 

 any other observer has been more successful. — F. 

 Kit ton, Norwich. 



A Collecting Stick. — The following is a de- 

 scription of a collecting stick I have made, and found 

 very useful in collecting diatoms from the bottom of 

 streams, as it does not disturb the mud and sand, like 

 the ordinary collecting bottle. A is a bamboo-cane, 



B 



3© 



Fig. 233. — Collecting Stick. 



with a piece of Indian-rubber tubing running down 

 the centre, such as is used for feeding-bottles ; B is a 

 glass-tube fastened to rubber-tube ; C is an Indian- 

 rubber ball, by squeezing which you force air out of 

 the glass-tube, and then by placing it near the object 

 you wish to get, and letting the ball expand, the 

 object is drawn up into the tube. On squeezing the 

 ball it is then forced out into the bottle. The stick 

 can be also used as an ordinary walking stick. — 

 Albert Smith. 



ZOOLOGY. 



How to Preserve Skins, &c. — I can give your 

 correspondent J. Y. a really good non-poisonous 

 receipt. It has stood the test of fifteen years, and can 

 be well relied on, viz. : — 1. Whiting or chalk, ii lb. ; 

 2. Soft-soap, lib.; 3. Chloride of lime, 2oz. 

 Boil Nos. 1 and 2 with about a pint of water, and add 

 No. 3 while hot. Before adiling the lime see that it 

 is finely powdered, or else it will not work smoothly. 

 Another good one is as follows : — Burnt alum, 1 lb. ; 

 saltpetre, 5 lb. ; pound and thoroughly mix. This is 

 especially for animals, as when well rubbed in it will 

 fix the fur and hair admirably, and penetrate the 

 thickest skin.- — Edward E. Evans. 



Mimicry among Vertebrata. — Mr. Wallace, 

 in his work on "Natural Selection," by way of en- 

 forcing his arguments, quotes instances of mimicry 



among snakes only. In the beginning of 1877, when 

 I was stationed at Shwaegyeng, in British Burmah, a 

 wild dog was brought to me, and on the first glance 

 I thought it was a young deer ! The resemblance 

 was striking in many ways ; colour, form, and mo- 

 tions of small deer were imitated in a wonderfully 

 deceptive manner. The head especially was remark- 

 able for its resemblance to the head of a doe, the 

 ears were long and very mobile, and could be thrown 

 back on to the neck in a way habitual to the female 

 of the common hog deer. These wild dogs are rare, 

 but they are to be found on the plains of Burmah, and, 

 as may be readily inferred, they prey upon the small 

 deer which abound in the grassy plains of that 

 country. I kept the animal for several days ; it was 

 a young one, and was very fierce. I sent it down to 

 Rangoon as an exhibit for the Phayre Museum and 

 Menagerie there, but the creature died on the way, 

 and the person in charge unfortunately threw away 

 the carcase, instead of preserving it. I hope shortly 

 to be able to get another of these animals, and shall 

 do my best to send it alive to England. — Arthur 

 Hough. 



Pronunciation of Scientific Names. — 

 Mr. Browne (see July No.) is no doubt right in his 

 suggestion that the Latin qu was originally pro- 

 nounced like k. In the memoir prefixed to the " De 

 Natitris Rerum " of Alex. Necham (born 1 157) the 

 following anecdote is related. "Necham abandoned 

 his :;chool at Dunstable, and became desirous of 

 entering one of the monasteries, and he first turned 

 his eyes to the great Benedictine monastery in his 

 native town of St. Alban's. He accordingly addressed 

 an application to the Abbot in these terms, Si vis 

 veniam sin autem, &c, to which the Abbot, who 

 appears to have been somewhat of a wag, replied, Si 

 bonus es venias, si nequam nequaquam " (If you are 

 good, come ; if bad, by no means come). Nequam 

 of course being pronounced necham, this pun on his 

 name offended him, and he did not join the St. 

 Alban's monastery. — F. Kit ton. 



The Alternate Generation of theEchino- 

 dermata.— Professor Haeckel has recently sent the 

 following to the San Francisco Microscopical Society : 

 — " The palingenetic development of the Echinoder- 

 mata, ordinarily known as metamorphosis, which 

 leads to important inferences as to their race history, 

 is to be considered as a genuine alternation of 

 generations, and especially for this reason, that the 

 two succeeding generations are destroyed in order to 

 make possible the change into one another by a 

 single transformation. The first generation, the 

 'Nurse,' or so-called larva, is a solitary, bilateral, 

 limbless individual or 'person,' which consists of only 

 one piece or antimera, and possesses the greatest 

 resemblance to true worm larvce. On the contrary, 

 the second generation, the perfected echinoderm, has 

 the ground-plan of a symmetrical, five-sided pyramid, 



