296 



NA TURE 



\Feb. 10, 1876 



hoped that some of the numerous instruments left behind by 

 Torricelli, Volta, and Galvani, may yet be obtained. Besides 

 instruments which are sacred as having belonged to the pioneers 

 of science, others with which the greatest investigators of modern 

 times have made their famous discoveries will have their place in 

 the Exhibition. The Times article concludes : — " The scientific 

 position of England has been distinctly raised by this step on 

 the part of our Government, and the Lord President is to be 

 congratulated on a step which not only adds reputation to his 

 Department, but promises to aid so greatly the cause of scientific 

 instruction throughout the land." 



Under the direction of Prof. Todaro, the biological depart' 

 ment in the University of Rome has recently been exhibiting 

 great activity. Prof. Todaro himself has published during the 

 last two or three'years a number of important papers, including 

 a monograph upon^the development of Salpa. There has also 

 appeared a volume entitled ' ' Recerche nel Laboratorio de 

 Anatomia della Universita de Roma," which contains a number 

 of valuable contributions both by Prof. Todaro and his pupils. 

 Considering the vigour which is being displayed by the ana- 

 tomists at Rome, it is much to be regretted that the University of 

 the capital of Italy supplies, for biological purposes, accommoda- 

 tion of the mobt meagre kind. 



Mr. Herbert Spencer has been elected a Corresponding 

 Fellow of the Royal Academy of Rome. 



The first and second Cambridge Smith's Mathematical Prizes 

 have been awarded respectively to Mr. J. T. Ward and Mr. 

 W. L. Mollison, the Senior and Second Wrangler. 



At the last sitting of the Lisbon Royal Academy of Science, 

 the members passed a resolution expressing their appre- 

 ciation of Lieut. Cameron's labours in traversing the African 

 continent from east to west. A copy of this resolution will be 

 transmitted to Lieut. Cameron. At the same sitting Mr. Bowdler 

 Sharp and Father Secchi were elected Corresponding Associates 

 of the Academy. 



On Monday next,' Feb. 14, Prof. Flower wilPcommence'an 

 important course of nine Hunterian Lectures at the Royal 

 College of Surgeons, Lincoln's Inn, to be given on Mondays, 

 Wednesdays, and Fridays, upon "The Relation of Extinct to 

 Existing Mammalia, with special reference to the Derivative 

 Hypothesis." This course is a continuation of that of 1873, 

 which we were enabled to report shortly at the time. The dis- 

 coveries since that year among the Monotremata, Edentata, and 

 Ungulata will be described, as well as the American extinct 

 Perissodaclrylates and Arteodactylates. Among the most in- 

 teresting features of the course will be the account of the extinct 

 aberrant Ungulate, Uintatherium, and the quasi-proboscidians of 

 North America, also of Toxodon and Nesodon. The fossil 

 Sirenia, including Halitherium ; the Cetacea, Pinniped Car- 

 nivora, Fissiped Carnivora ; Tillodontia, Insectivora and Chei- 

 roptera, Rodentia and Primates will also be included. The 

 lectures will be fully illustrated by specimens from the Museum, 

 and by diagrams. We shall have the opportunity of giving 

 fairly full abstracts of theselectures, one each week — the first in 

 our next issue. 



M. Cazin sends an interesting note to the last number of the 

 Bulletin International. It seems that M. G. Loppe, the glacier 

 painter, well known to all Alpine tourists, and Mr. James 

 Eccles, of London, attempted on January 20 last the ascent of 

 Mont Blanc. They were only able to reach the Grand Plateau ; 

 the wind raised thick clouds of snow dust, which threatened to 

 bury the party. Thermometric observations were made, and 

 they show that the temperature varies little in the high Alpine 

 regions. The lowest temperature (- 13°) observed on the Grand 

 Plateau (3,932 metres) is no lower than the temperatures 



observed in the same place during summer. The provisions — 

 meat, bread, wine, tea — were frozen, and the wind made the cold 

 insupportable. The following are the temperatures observed 

 during the ascent and at Chamounix : — 



On the Mountain, 



Jan. 19. Junction of the glaciers, 2,600 metres, 4.30 p.m. - s'^ 

 ,, „ Grand Mulets ... 3,050 ,, 8.30 ,, - 7 

 M 20 ,, ,, ... ,, ,, 2 A.M. - 7 



„ ,, Small Plateau ... 3,635 „ 8.30 ,, -12-5 

 ,, ,, Grand Plateau ... 3,932 ,, 9.30 ,, -13 

 ,, ,, Grand Mulets ... 3,050 ,, i p.m.- 8 '5 



At Chamounix the temperature on Jan. 20 at 7 a.m. was - 11", 



at 8 A. M. - 10°, at 10 A.M. - 9°, at 1 1 a.m. - 8°. The sun began 



to appear at 11.30. 



At a meeting of the Edinburgh Medico-Chirurgical Society, 

 held on Monday, Jan.|^3i, Dr. Matthews Duncan read a paper on 

 the alleged epidemic character of erysipelas and puerperal fever. 

 From an elaborate set of diagrams showing the weekly and 

 yearly deaths registered in London from 1848 to 1875, it was 

 pointed out that during the whole of this time erysipelas and 

 puerperal fever have on no occasion exhibited any approach in 

 their death-rate_to such diseases as cholera, small-pox, and scarlet- 

 fever, allowed by all to be epidemic in their character, but that 

 the weekly and annual fluctuations in their death-rate are prac- 

 tically identical with those of rheumatism. It was therefore 

 concluded that erysipelas and puerperal fever should be classed 

 not as epidemic but as endemic diseases. 



Prof. E. QuETELEThas published the climatological elements 

 of Brussels in a series of eighteen tables, with descriptive letter- 

 press, for the ten years ending 1873, as part of a public statistical 

 document of Brussels relative to this ten-year period, and which 

 has been printed with the title " Statistique generale de la Ville 

 de Bruxelles." 



In a circular letter addressed to the Presidents of the Depr.rt- 

 mental Meteorological Commissions, dated January 29, M. 

 Leverrier points out that, in developing the system of weather- 

 forecasts for agriculturists, attention must be paid not only to the 

 quantity of rain which falls, but also to the way in which the fall 

 is propagated from canton to canton and from department to 

 department. The manner of propagation of the rainfall it is 

 proposed to represent by means of curves, and the Commission 

 are requested to assist in the work so as to render it possible to 

 construct such charts for the whole of France, and in considera- 

 tion of the immense labour of the undertaking, skilled meteoro- 

 logists are invited to lend their assistance in the preparation of 

 these novel but highly-important charts. Still greater precision 

 in stating the local circumstances connected with remarkable 

 hail-storms is insisted on, particularly when it is considered that 

 though everyone knows hail to fall in very different quantities in 

 districts immediately contiguous to each other, and individual 

 cantons and communes to be notorious for their destructive hail- 

 storms, yet the influence of woods, forests, river-courses, and 

 hills is a question still unsolved. This conception of Leverricr's 

 with reference to the vitally important bearing on the meteoro- 

 logy of a country of a comprehensive observation of the rainfall, 

 hail, and thunderstorms, by numerous observers possessing 

 sound local information, is not merely eminently just in science, 

 but augurs well for a satisfactory solution of the peculiarly im- 

 portant but difficult problem he has taken in hand. 



The "Annuaire meteorologique et agricole de I'Observatoire 

 de Montsouris pour I'An 1876 " (pp. 442) has just appeared, 

 containing a good many matters not included in previous issues, 

 of which the most interesting are a chart showing the lines of 

 equal magnetic declination for France and parts of the countries 

 adjoining, a table showing the successive values of the declina- 

 tion from 1550 to 1875, a chapter on atmospheric electricity, a 



