220 NATURE 



[A, 



colour, with a dit!! r'>'^ i.-:,i' .;..w.. -.., iv,,. ,.^.,.,:..^ r^.-i.- 

 It was imperfectly 



and bone, but wiiliwi., .,i,> i,.i. . .<, ..,,.■, .m ...- 



form of limestone. 



Among the pressing wants for the • • 

 of human culturr in those islands is 



■I t"'l; 'nil i it.iin tli'' iiuiiiikuis arcliaic iinple- 



'i"""'- ■!■: i :: lu lir found ill ilic more secluded 



pa' ' .1 uliiih .-irr iinw r.'ipidly 



inj;. > Miiscuiu at Oxfoid doos 



to fill tliis gap in our collections, and if its accommoda- 

 tion nnd resources could be increased, the work of form- 

 .irr.ini^in^ mii h a ((I'l.ction could not be placed 

 ■ li.iiiiK Ml. Ill i!it>-,r of its present curator, Mr. H. 

 '^•illoiit. M: I'.iitington, in the April number of 



•^^"". ill.i^i! abundance of such material by 



li'x 1 :l.;!i-, with lir.iwings, a series of such primitive 

 donvstii, ini])l.in.nis and vessels collected from farm- 

 liiiu>. - in \..mIi \\,i1.^, wli.i, ili-y are rapidly disappear- 

 in.:; h'.in u->>-. Many of these are of a very primitive type, 

 Mill .1-. the collar used to control rams in the rutting 

 -■ I '!■, curious spades and knives, a dish used for the 

 <iil)pin,i,< of iu,h li.uht^, and a grooved rolling-pin for 

 making oat cakes. 



The Bio-Chemical Journal for March (vol. v., Nos. 8 

 and 9) contains a memorial notice of Dr. Christian A. 

 Herter, of New York, who recently died at the early age 

 of forty-five. His greatest work was his study of the com- 

 plex elusive diseases set up by the development of an 

 abnormal bacterial flora in the intestinal canal. 



A CHART containing the essential features required for 

 the description and identification of bacterial species has 

 been issued by a committee of the Society of American 

 Bacteriologists, consisting of Messrs. Chester, Gorham, 

 and Erwin Smith. The chart is a most comprehensive 

 one, and includes a glossary of terms ; it deserves the 

 serious consideration of all bacteriologists. 



No. 39 of the Scientific Memoirs of the Government of 

 India is by Lieut.-Colonel Sutherland, and discusses in 

 much detail the applicability to rnedico-legal practice in 

 India of the biochemical tests for the origin of blood 

 stains. As regards the precipitin test, the age of the blood 

 stain, at least up to twenty-seven months, makes no differ- 

 ence in the applicability of the test. 



The report of Dr. Bashford, the delegate of his Majesty's 

 Government to the second International Conference on 

 Cancer Research, held at Paris in October last, has 

 recently been issued. Among other subjects he directs 

 attention to a paper dealing with certain tumours occurring 

 in the sugar-beet and allied plants. These tumours can be 

 grafted on to other healthy plants, and no causative para- 

 site can be detected in them. From their general bio- 

 logical behaviour it appears justifiable to assign to them 

 in the vegetable kingdom a position analogous to that 

 occupied by cancer in the animal kingdom. 



The fatality of fractures of the leg and of lobar pneu- 

 monia as deduced from hospital monality rates, 1751-1901, 

 is the subject of a statistical study by Messrs. Greenwood, 

 jun., and Candy (Journ. Roy. Statistical Soc, Ix.xiv., part 

 iv., 191 1). It seems that the fatality of lobar or ordinary 

 pneumonia has changed little during the last fifty years, 

 the fatality of compound fractures of the leg has steadily 

 diminished down to the present time, and the fatality of 

 simple fractures of the leg diminished greatly and steadily 

 down to fifty years ago, but since then the change has not 

 been regular. The curious point is brought out that cases 

 NO. 2163, VOL. 86] 



,.< ..;..,„i.. f,-,,-. ■■.... ;^ the old days 

 1 sometimes for 

 ,..111.111-. ii-;i|Li...io_Y developed !>'•''-■■ 

 condition, which resulted in deu' 



jll 



hospital 



and the 

 .ahealthv 



])aper (Poraii/- iii., No. 3, 



hiplfv records ■ • s of penta- 



> and .Afrit ui) reptiles, in- 



r .roph.Tliis from the tortoise 



1 the paper, 



• >' an Indian 



croco<^l the rivcr Hooghly, of 



Linguii hitherto known only 



from t^ an Caiman scicropi. 



No. 00 ' ' ' '. the Records ot ni',- 



Inulan Mu revision, by Miss 0. 



Ricardo, of tiie Urjental -f the genus Tabanus. 



No fewer than forty ne , including one from 



Celebes (which the author e.\cludes from the Oriental 

 region) and three from other regions, are described in the 

 monograph ; on the other h.uul, a large number of reputed 

 species are relegated to synonym<;. 



The Rugby School Natur.il society, of which 



we have received the report fi^. -v . -^ to he congratu- 

 lated on a marked increase in the number of its members, 

 of which the total is now 425. The activity of the various 

 section-, li.i- 1m 11, on the whole, well maintained, while 

 some of thiin ■ 'libited remarkable energy and 



enthusiasm in t ;. An interesting innovation in 



the prr^i nt report is a record of the scientific work of old 

 nil nilii I-. of the society. 



A coNTKiuuiioN to our knowledge of the modern reptile 

 fauna of Africa is made by Mr. F. Siebenrock in vol. 

 cxix., part vii., of the Sitzher. k. Akademie der Wissen- 

 schaften, Vienna, who describes, with four plates, a large 

 collection of chelonians made by Messrs. Pock and Brunn- 

 thaler in the south and south-west. Eleven species — none 

 new — are recorded, of which Honiopus boulengeri and 

 Testudo bergeri are figured. Special attention is directed 

 to a series of T. ocuUfcra, which is regarded as of import- 

 ance in connection with the evolution of the colour-pattern. 

 In the author's opinion, this species and T. geometrica 

 constitute in this respect a subgroup phylogenetically dis- 

 tinct from the other members of the same group. 



Scales of fishes brought home by Dr. F. Hatch from 

 the Ecca Shales, near Ladysmith, of which an account is 

 given by Dr. Smith Woodward in part ii. of the second 

 volume of the Annals of the Natal Museum (pp. 229-31), 

 are of interest as affording further evidence of the exist- 

 ence of an abundant fauna of Paljeoniscidae in southern 

 Africa during early Mesozoic and late Palaeozoic times. 

 Scales of the same general type have been previously 

 obtained from the Karu formation of the Cape and the 

 Per mo-Carboniferous of Rhodesia and Nyasaland. The 

 last-named were referred by Dr. Traquair in the Quart. 

 Journ. Geol. Soc. for 1910 to Colobodus, while the 

 Rhodesian and the new Natal specimens represent the 

 genus Acrolepis, of which there may be two species. 



The Times of March 27 devotes an article to the wild 

 fauna of South Africa in connection with the forthcoming 

 display in the Zoological Society's Gardens in Regent's 

 Park of a representative series of South African animals, 

 to be called the King's collection. The collection, which 

 already inci ^e number of species, is to be pre- 



sented to i _ ~rv in commemoration alike of his 



Coronation and of the establishment of the Union of South 

 Africa. According to the latest information from the 



