1897] NOTES AND COMMENTS 231 



Funafuti 



The third part of the Memoir of the Australian Museum on the Atoll 

 of Funafuti contains further interesting additions to knowledge of the 

 zoology of that island. Mr E. R. Waite has described the collection 

 of mammals, reptiles and fishes made by Mr Hedley. The most 

 interesting part of Mr Waite's memoir is an account of the habits 

 of the fruit-eating Pacific rat, for which, following Thomas, he 

 adopts Peale's name of Inus cxulans. An interesting fact is recorded 

 in reference to the edibility of fishes : at the time the expedition was 

 on Funafuti the natives would only eat fish caught in the lagoon, 

 all those from the reefs being condemned. The native explanation 

 is that the pumice which was then being washed on to the beach ren- 

 dered the fish poisonous ; but as the pumice is harmless, Mr Hedley 

 concludes that some marine organism arrived with it which rendered 

 the fish unwholesome. Mr Waite quotes a remark of Wyatt Gills 

 that good food fish become poisonous by eating the worms of the 

 genus Nereis. The two species of Enteropneusta collected are 

 described by Mr J. P. Hill ; one of the two is a new species 

 (Ptycliodera hedleyi). Mr Whitelegge's account of the Alcyonaria 

 includes a description of four new species and a redescription of 

 several previously very imperfectly known. We regret to find that 

 some remarks concerning the publication of this Memoir, made in 

 reference to Part II. (Natural Science, July 1897, Vol. xi., p. 5) 

 were based on a misunderstanding. 



l O' 



The Great Indian Earthquake 



At five o'clock in the afternoon of June 12, 1897, Calcutta and 

 north-eastern India were startled by an earthquake which is re- 

 garded as having exceeded even the famous Lisbon earthquake 

 in the area affected. The Geological Survey of India immedi- 

 ately set to work to collect the data for a complete investigation. 

 An immense amount of information has already been obtained, 

 which it will take considerable time to digest. Sufficient has, 

 however, been done to enable Mr R. D. Oldham to contribute a 

 preliminary note to the Records of the Geological Survey. The 

 area affected by the shock included more than a million and a 

 quarter square miles, while its effects appear to have been felt 

 even in Edinburgh and Rome. The shock was most destructive 

 in Assam : at Shillong in the Khasi Hills it is said that hardly 

 one stone has been left standing on another. Heaps of road metal 

 have been scattered into layers a few inches deep. All masonry has 

 been shattered into pieces, so that the roofs fell bodily down on 

 to heaps of ruins. A cylinder seismometer had fortunately been 



