/ 1 aA \ 1 Moiillilv Micnisc-oplcal 



NOTES AND MEMOKANDA. 



The Mechanism of Suppuration. — Experiments of M. Hayen 

 brought before the French Academy of Medicine by M. Vulpian, 

 overturn the theories of Virchow and Eobin, by showing that the 

 globules of pus are not formed at the expense of the connective tissue 

 or of the blastema, but they come from the blood, and constitute its 

 leucocytes. M. Hayen's exj)eriments were made with frogs, but M. 

 Vulpian and after him MM. Volkmann and Stradener have shown 

 that in erysipelas a considerable extravasation of the white globules 

 occurs, which is easily proved by cutting the skin. A Dutch jDhysio- 

 logist, M. Costa, has demonstrated this extravasation of white globules 

 in inflamed spots. — Cosmos. 



Microscopic Crystals in Minerals. — Mr. Isaac Lea has a paper 

 on this subject in the 'Proceedings of the Academy of Natm-al 

 Sciences, Philadelphia.' He found minute acicular crystals in a thin 

 piece of fractured gravel from North Carolina. This led him to 

 examine other stones, and he found in garnets a much larger propor- 

 tion with crystals than M. Babinet had noticed, no less than 48 with 

 acicular crystals in 154. In precious garnets from Green's Creek, 

 Delaware Co., Peun., out of 310 specimens he found 75 with similar 

 crystals. In a second paper Mr. Lea mentions his examination of a 

 star sapphire with six rays, in which he discovered exceedingly minute 

 crystals, short, of pearly lustre, at three different angles, these pro- 

 ducing the bands which form the rays in three directions of 60° each. 

 In a bluish sapphire in Prof. Leidy's collection, he discovered some 

 arrow-headed crystals, which he thinks may be t>vin crystals of some 

 imknown substance. He says they remind him of certain silicate 

 crystals from the Paris basin, and resemble in form the cuneiform 

 inscriptions on Babylon bricks. In an amethyst from Thunder Bay, 

 Lake Sui^erior, he noticed some remarkable globules, some orange- 

 yellow, and others dark green ; they are visible to the naked eye, but 

 are not spherical, some being cup-shaped. A brilliant ruby, looking 

 like an Oriental, but which may be Spanish, was full of long acicular 

 crystals. Figures of many of these crystals are given in the paper. 



Amoebae and Monads. — In the ' Proceedings of the Bristol Natu- 

 ralists' Society,' just issued (vol. iv. part 2), Dr. Fripp gives a paper on 

 the above subject, in which he describes the views held by Greef and 

 Cienkowski, and adds some interesting observations of his own. Dr. 

 Fripp is, we believe, a pupil of Kolliker's, and is so well known for 

 his laborious researches in certain departments of comparative anatomy, 

 that this fact alone would render his paper attractive. But apart from 

 this, we can assure our readers that they will find in Dr. Fri])p's com- 

 munication to the Bristol Society a very long and important account 

 of recent continental researches on the Amoeba and the Monad. 



