84 



NA TURE 



[November 25, 1897 



founders, and whose President he afterwards became. 

 In addition to these and other papers of a geological and 

 mineralogical nature, he undertook, in 1858, the revision 

 and practically the editorship of Greg and Lettsom's 

 '•'• Mineralogy of Great Britain and Ireland," to which 

 he made many original contributions. He also wrote 

 the article "Mineralogy" for the last edition of the 

 *' EncyclopiEdia Britannica.'' In 1878 he received the 

 Keith medal of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. Until 

 a i&w weeks before his death he was engaged on an 

 exhaustive work upon the mineralogy of Scotland, 

 bringing together the results of all his investigations and 

 analyses. This he left almost complete, and it is to be 

 hoped that it may shortly be published. 



In the long course of his mineralogical activity Dr. 

 Heddle gathered very large and valuable collections of 

 minerals, both general and Scottish. The latter of 

 these, the fruit of many journeyings, was three years ago 

 acquired by the Museum of Science and Art, Edinburgh, 

 and is now on exhibition there, arranged and labelled 

 by Dr. Heddle himself 



Although a specialist in mineralogy, Dr. Heddle's 

 sympathies were not by any means confined to this 

 subject, and embraced not only cognate sciences, such 

 as chemistry on the one side and geology on the other, 

 but extended to many other branches of science. As a 

 chemist he was most painstaking and exact, and has 

 published several hundreds of analyses of Scottish 

 minerals, collected and carefully picked by himself 

 He was always most particular to indicate the possible 

 impurities as a geologist. He published detailed maps 

 of Shetland and Sutherland, and contributed to the un- 

 ravelling of the problem of the North-west Highlands. 

 He was a very observant student of the influence of 

 geological structure upon the scenery of a country. In 

 some respects he was in advance of his time as a 

 geologist, and has lived to see suggestions, which were 

 ignored when made by him, worked out by others and 

 generally accepted. Many of his papers, which were 

 founded on a wide research, are extremely suggestive 

 and instructive. Perhaps among the best known are 

 those where he expounds his law of pseudomorphous 

 replacement, and where he enunciates the connection 

 between the colloidal and crystalline states of a substance 

 and its specific heat. 



Dr. Heddle had an acute and exact eye, a clear in- 

 tellect, and a wonderful memory. He was a good 

 draughtsman, and his crystal drawings were most ad- 

 mirable. He grudged no trouble in smoothing the path 

 of the tyro in his favourite science, and was most 

 generous in his recognition of any work done by others. 

 His kindly and genial disposition endeared him to a 

 wide circle of friends. J. C. 



NOTES. 



M. MouREAUX has just completed the installation of the 

 new magnetic department of the Pare St. Maur Observatory ; 

 and it will be set in operation on December i. The work at 

 the old magnetic rooms will be continued until January i, in 

 order to supply M. Moureaux with a sufficient number of 

 observations for a reduction of the valuable records obtained 

 continuously during a number of years. 



Prof. James B. Hatcher, curator of the department of 

 vertebrate palteontology of Princeton University, sailed from 

 New York a few days ago for Rio Janeiro, en route for 

 Southern Patagonia. He expects to land finally at Punta 

 Arenas, and thence work northward along the eastern base of 

 the Andes as far as the Argentine territory of Chubut, study- 

 ing the pakieontology and geology of the country. The ex- 

 pedition will be gone three years, and aims to bring home a 



NO 1465, VOL. 57] 



complete collection of birds and mammals from the Tertiary 

 deposits of Patagonia. 



In the course of next month, the American Philosophical 

 Society will award the Magellanic gold medal to the author of 

 what is adjudged to be the best discovery, or most useful 

 invention, relating to navigation, astronomy, or natural 

 philosophy (mere natural history — the words are the Society's 

 own— only excepted). The prize was founded in 1786 by John 

 H. de Magellan, of London, and consists of a medal "of solid 

 standard gold of the value of ten guineas." 



Sir William Crookes will be the guest of the evening at 

 the Club House Dinner of the Camera Club on December 7. 



At the meeting of the Entomological Society of London last 

 week, the Chairman referred with regret to the death, while 

 serving on the Indian Frontier Expedition, of Captain E. Y. 

 Watson, Fellow of the Society, and well known for his writings 

 on Oriental Rhopalocera. 



The Paris Academy of Medicine has been authorised to 

 accept the legacy of forty thousand francs bequeathed to it by 

 Dr. Eugene Dupierris. The legacy is to be used to found a 

 biennial prize for the best work on anaesthesia, or on diseases of 

 the urinary canals. 



A NEW medical society has been formed in St. Petersburg ; 

 it will be known as the St. Petersburg Ophthalmological 

 Society, and its first president is Prof. Dobrovolski. 



The Aikemetim states that the first meeting of the present 

 session of the German Chemical Society at Berlin was devoted 

 to a Geddchtnisfeier in honour of the late Prof. Victor Meyer. 



Jubilee medals have been conferred upon Dr. Cninther, 

 President of the Linnean Society, Prof. Dewar, president ot 

 the Chemical Society ; and Prof. R. Meldola, late president ot 

 the Entomological Society. 



Prof. A. Bauer has been obliged, on account of ill-health, 

 to decline the office of president of the third International Con- 

 gress for Applied Chemistry, which is to be held next year at 

 Vienna, and Dr. H. R. von Perger has been elected in his 

 stead. There will be twelve sections in connection with the 

 Congress. Among the subjects to be discussed is the intro- 

 duction of uniform methods of analysis of chemical products. 



The Paris correspondent of the Lancet notes the return ot 

 M. Raoul from Malaita, where he has for some time been 

 engaged for the Government in making researches as to the 

 existence of indigenous plants that might be turned to account 

 scientifically or commercially. Several members of M. Raoul's 

 party were bitten by snakes of different kinds, and were injected 

 with Dr. Calmette's serum with very great success. 



Dr. a. Lustig, writing in the Atti dei Lincei, describes 

 some important observations made in India on vaccination as a 

 preventive of bubonic plague, and also on sero-therapic methods 

 of treatment. At the time when the plague was raging in 

 Bombay last June, Dr. Lustig made a number of experiments 

 both on human subjects and on monkeys. Thirty persons 

 suffering from the disease were inoculated with serum, and of these 

 only four died during the treatment. In conjunction with Dr. 

 G., Galeotti, the same writer made experiments on rats with a 

 view of ascertaining whether there existed any hereditary trans- 

 mission of the immunity conferred by vaccination. It was 

 found that in no case did vaccination of either or both parent 

 animals at any stage prevent the progeny from taking the 

 disease. 



In the Budget of the French Minister of the Interior, the 

 grant of 106,000 francs for the therapeutic serum service of the 



