198 



NA TURE 



[December 30, 1897 



include density, change of state, viscosity, capillarity, 

 indices of refraction, calorimetry, and photometry. For 

 each of these constants, the author briefly describes 

 the most exact and convenient methods of determining 

 them, and gives in tabular form the results of observa- 

 tions made on various substances. In the descriptions of 

 methods of experimentation, preference is given to those 

 which are actually used in practice outside the physical 

 laboratory, so the book will be a real aid in technical 

 work. Physicists and physical chemists will find the 

 volume a handy epitome of methods and results. 



By Roadside and River: Gleanings from Nature's 

 Fields. By H. Mead Briggs. Pp. 204. (London : 

 Elhot Stock, 1897.) 

 " The hand of destiny has scattered broadcast through 

 the land the seeds of hope, and yet how many of them 

 all have reached the harvest of ambition." If we rightly 

 understand the purport of these opening words of the 

 preface, the author is expressing some anxiety as to the 

 fate of his literary efforts, and wondering whether his 

 work will be appreciated. We wonder also what becomes 

 of the host of books like this one, well printed and 

 daintily produced, but amorphous in structure, and having 

 no particular aim. There are, we suppose, people who 

 enjoy reading insipid remarks based upon casual ob- 

 servations of nature, and to their kind attention we 

 commend this book. A scientific mind soon wearies of 

 trying to pick out the slender threads of fact which 

 meander through the mass of sentiment. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 



[The Editor does not hold himself responsible for opinions ex- 

 pressed by his correspondents. Neither can he undertake 

 to return, or to conespond with the writers of, rejected 

 manuscripts intended far this or any other part of NATURE. 

 No notice is taken of anonymous commum cations. '\ 



The Dugong. 



In the Hakluyt Society's last book, "The Christian Topo- 

 jjraphy of Cosmas, an Egyptian Monk" (London, 1897), there 

 are some interesting notices of " Indian Animals " with figures, 

 copies of those in " the Florentine Codex " ; which, in their turn, 

 may have been "drawn by Cosmas himself (or under his direc- 

 tion)," according lo an excellent modern critic. 



In one passage Cosmas says " the flesh of the turtle, like 

 mutton, is dark-coloured ; that of the dolphin is like pork, but 

 dark-coloured and rank ; and that of the seal is, like pork, 

 white and free from smell." 



For reasons too long to give here, I suppose Cosmas' " seal " 

 (phoke) to be the dugong ; (halicore), which is generally de- 

 scribed as very eatable ; but I cannot anywhere find its colour, 

 vsjiieat, described. 



dotted dugong " from Queensland was on the London 

 market not long ago ; and I tried it, once. It was much of the 

 colour of potted tongue. 



The figure is more like a conventional sea-horse than any- 

 thing else, and cannot be relied on much. It is, perhaps, a 

 little less unlike to a dugong than to a seal. 



The confusion of dugongs with seals still exists amongst sea- 

 men ; though, of course, dying out amongst officers. 



W. F. Sinclair. 



Potato-Disease. 



In the " Life and Letters of Charles Darwin," Darwin writes 

 as follows : — 



" Mr. Torbitt's plan of overcoming the potato-disease seems 

 to me by far the best which has ever been suggested. It con- 

 sists, as you know from his printed letter, of rearing a vast 

 number of seedlings from cross- fertilised parents, exposing them 

 to infection, ruthlessly destroying all that suffer, saving those 

 which resist best, and repeating the process in successive 

 seminal generations " (vol. iii. p. 348). 



Can any of your readers inform me whether the plan was ever 

 carried out, and if so with what amount of success ? 



Newcastie-on-Tyne, December 11. G. W. Bulman. 



NO. 1470, VOL. 57] 



THE PREVENTION AND CURE OF 

 RINDERPEST. 

 T N the second fortnightly number for October of the 

 -*- Agricultural Journal of the Cape of Good Hope 

 is given a long report of a Conference between the Hon. 

 Mr. Faure, Minister for Agriculture, Mr. Hutcheon 

 (C.V.S.), Dr. Turner, Dr. Edington and Dr. Kolle on 

 the question of inoculation against rinderpest. This 

 account is followed by the Resolution of Conference, by 

 a letter from Dr. Edington and by one from Mr. 

 Hutcheon, in the latter of which is given a review of the ;, 

 different methods of inoculation now used for the -" 

 purpose of obtaining a certain degree of immunity 

 against rinderpest in the cattle of South Africa. As 

 so many different statements concerning the exact 

 methods used at the Cape by Koch, by Edington, 

 and by Turner and Kolle, and also by Messrs. Danyz 

 and Bordet, have been promulgated, a summary of these 

 various methods may be of interest. 



In Koch's method of using the gall obtained from sick 

 animals as a protection against rinderpest, the bile is 

 taken from animals that have contracted the disease by 

 natural infection. It was at first recommended that 

 only green bile and bile free from blood should be used ; 

 later this recommendation was modified by Drs. Turner 

 and Kolle, who say "that the difficulty of obtaining good 

 bile has been much exaggerated. If the animals destined to 

 produce immunising gall are injected with a small dose of 

 really virulent blood, say i c.c, and are killed at the end 

 of the sixth day of the fever, at least four out of five will 

 give typically good galls, and the gall of the fifth will, in 

 all probability, be fit for use. As a matter of fact, all 

 galls which do not smell, and which are not absolutely 

 red from the presence of a large quantity of blood, can 

 be used without danger by Koch's process " ; it is after- 

 wards stated that those galls which have the highest 

 specific gravity appear to possess the highest immunising 

 power. It would appear, however, that the gall-produced 

 immunity is only temporary, and that before long the 

 animals again become susceptible to infection by rinder- 

 pest. Another of the great drawbacks to this method 

 of inoculation is the fact that in certain cases the galls 

 appear to contain septic organisms, which not only 

 diminish the immunising power of the gall, but also in 

 some instances seem to have set up a septic condition 

 in the cattle injected. 



Applying the method now in vogue in connection with 

 the preservation of vaccine lymph. Dr. Edington added 

 a quantity of glycerine to the gall with the object, 

 first, of preserving for some time the gall in a pure con- 

 dition, and, secondly, of killing any septic germs which 

 might be present in the gall before it was drawn off from 

 the gall-bladder of the infected animal. Of course it 

 was necessary to use a somewhat larger quantity of this 

 mixture in order to produce immunity. Dr. Edington 

 injected from 15 to 25 c.c. into the subcutaneous tissue of 

 the dewlap. Animals so protected when injected with 

 small quantities of virulent blood, certainly appeared to 

 take the disease in a milder form ; in some cases this 

 was accompanied by local reaction and by a rise in 

 temperature, and wherever this occurred there was a 

 marked degree of active and more lasting immunity con- 

 ferred on the animal. When 1th of a c.c. of virulent 

 blood — that is, blood taken from an animal suffering from 

 an acute attack of rinderpest — was injected, a local re- 

 action was, in most instances, obtained, but in certain 

 cases the preliminary temporary immunity was so slight, 

 that the animal succumbed to the disease set up by the 

 second injection. If, on the other hand, only y^th of a 

 c.c. was used, the local and constitutional reaction was 

 not always obtained, and although a much smaller 

 number of animals succumbed to the contracted disease, 

 a much larger proportion remained susceptible to natural 

 infection. In connection with this bile method, also, it 



