NOTES 64s 



which has been used in dirigibles is effected by the use of charcoal at low 

 temperatures, the entire plant required for this purpose being carried from 

 place to place on two railway cars. 



Capt. G. H. Wilkins, who accompanied the 0i<esi expedition under the late 

 Sir Ernest Shackleton in the capacity of naturahst, left England on February 

 20 for Australia, where he is to lead a small party to Northern Queensland in 

 order to obtain a collection of the mammals of the Australian tropics. The 

 expedition, which is under the direction of the trustees of the Natural History 

 branch of the British Museum, is expected to last two years. The other 

 members will be gathered in Austraha and will include an ornithologist, 

 a mammalogist, a zoologist, an entomologist, a taxidermist, and prob- 

 ably a geologist. They will travel by caravan to Northern Queensland 

 and thence by schooner to the coast islands, for it is intended to direct special 

 attention to the alterations in animal life consequent on island isolation. 

 Two American expeditions have aheady visited these regions and have ob- 

 tained excellent collections for the museums of New York and Washington. 

 The collection in the British Museum, however, is very inadequate, and since 

 it is anticipated that within ten years certain species will be entirely extinct, 

 the need for the expedition has become most urgent. 



During the year 1922 there were about a hundred fatalities due to 

 accidental gas poisoning, and considerable uneasiness has been caused by the 

 fact that a Committee, appointed by the Board of Trade under the Gas Regula- 

 tion Act of 1920, recommended that there should be no limitation upon the 

 proportion of carbon monoxide in public gas supplies. In a letter to The 

 Times, dated January 10, Prof. Bone states that a straight coal-gas 

 contains not more than 7 or 8 per cent, of carbon monoxide, a not very dan- 

 gerous proportion. At the gas-works, however, it is customary to mix 

 with the coal-gas blue water gas which contains from 42 to 45 per cent, of 

 carbon monoxide, and is, therefore, very dangerous indeed. As far as London 

 is concerned, the of&cials of the various gas companies have declared that 

 there has been no substantial change in the composition of the gas since 

 19 1 4. This makes it difficult to explain the accidents which are now so 

 frequently reported ; at the best it shows that the gas supplied for domestic 

 use is aheady sufficiently dangerous and that no increase in its poisonous 

 content should be permitted. It is of course possible that no large increase 

 in the number of fatalities has really occurred because, once public attention 

 is directed to accidents of a particular kind, every case is reported in the 

 Press. (It is understood, for example, that therein lies the explanation of 

 the apparent increase in the number of anthracite stove explosions in France.) 

 Pending evidence of this kind, there would appear to be real ground for un- 

 easiness, and if further fatalities occur the demand for an official inquiry 

 should be irresistible. 



The Report of the Council of the Royal Society for 1922 shows that the 

 affairs of the International Catalogue of Scientific Literature are in a very 

 serious condition. At the International Convention summoned to consider 

 them on July 22 and 24 last, the Royal Society stated that it could no longer 

 accept the responsibility for the publication of the Catalogue and that it 

 proposed to use all the material in its possession to assist in discharging the 

 liabilities of the Catalogue. These amount to nearly ;^i2,ooo, including a loan 

 of ;^7,5oo from the Royal Society, ^1,200 accrued interest thereon, and ;^2,242 

 for printer's bills upon which interest is being paid. The Convention agreed 

 to these proposals and, looking forward to the time when publication may 

 be resumed, expressed the hope that the work of the Regional Bureaux might 

 be continued so that, thereby, the international organisation might be kept 

 in being. 



Technical Paper No. 5 of the Fuel Research Board (H.M. Stationery Office, 

 price 3£^. net) is entitled An Apparatus for the Measurement of Specific Gravity 



42 



