May 2, 1889] 



NA TURE 



21 



Anatomy, a subject on which a brief volume from his pen would 

 be very acceptable. Prof. Foster's course is on the Physiology 

 of the Senses this term. 



Among the numerous courses of demonstrations in the Caven- 

 dish Laboratory we may note those of Mr. Wilberforce on 

 Dynamo- Electric Machines (Alternating Current Generators and 

 Transformers), 



Two lectures will be given in the Literary Schools on f une 4, 

 and June 8 at 2.15 p.m., by Dr. Fiancis Warner, on the Study 

 of Mental Action and the Classification of Pupils according to 

 their Brain Po\\ er. 



London. — The following appointments of Examiners in 

 various branches of Science in the University of London were 

 made on Wednesday, April 24 : — Prof. Hill and Dr. Larmor as 

 Examiners in Mathematics and Natural Philosophy ; Prof. Fitz- 

 Gerald and Mr. Glazebrook as Examiners in Experimental 

 Philosophy ; Dr. Pole and Sir John Stainer as Examiners in 

 Music ; Prof Tilden as Examiner in Chemistry ; *Prof. H. E. 

 Armstrong, F.R.S., as Examiner in Chemistry ; Prof Bower and 

 Prof. Ward as Examiners in Botany and Vegetable Physiology ; 

 Mr. Sedgwick as Examiner in Comparative Anatomy and 

 Zoology ; *Sydney J. Hickson as Examiner in Comparative 

 Anatomy and Zoology ; Prof. Boyd Dawkins as Examiner in 

 Geology and PaI;\:ontology ; *Prof. Charles Lapworth, F.R.S. , 

 as Examiner in Geology and Palceontology. The asterisks denote 

 new appointments. The gentlemen to whose names no asterisks 

 are prefixed held the same appointments last year. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS. 



American Journal of Science, April. — Contributions to 

 meteorology, by Elias Loomis. In this paper, which was read 

 before the National Academy of Sciences, November 14, 1888, 

 the chief subjects discussed are the relations of rain areas to 

 areas of high and low pressure. From these studies it appears 

 generally that no great barometric depression with steep gra- 

 dients ever occurs without considerable rain ; that in great 

 rain-storms the barometric pressure usually diminishes while the 

 rainfall increases ; that the greatest depression of the barometer 

 generally occurs about twelve hours after the greatest rainfall ; 

 that a great rainfall is favourable to a rapid progress of the 

 centre of least pressure. It also appears that in Great Britain 

 the amount of rain with a falling barometer is twice that with a 

 rising barometer ; but this ratio diminishes rapidly eastwards, 

 the precipitation in Central Europe being greater when the 

 barometer is rising than when it is falling. — The sensitive flame 

 as a means of research, by W. Le Conte Stevens. These ex- 

 periments, which take as their stajting-point Lord Rayleigh's 

 memoir on " Diffraction of Sound "(Proceedings of the R. Institu- 

 tion, January 20, 1888), tend to show that the sensitive flame 

 is not applicable for purposes of exact measurement, though it 

 is much more nearly so than has been generally supposed. 

 Without its aid it would have been impossible to establish the 

 important analogies here shown to exist between light and 

 sound. — The Denver Tertiary formation, by Whitman Cross. 

 In this paper a succinct account is given of the newly determined 

 Tertiary formation about the Denver district, Colorado, which 

 had hitherto been assigned to the Laramie Cretaceous. Although 

 of limited geographical extent, this formation possesses features of 

 special importance in several respects. The vertebrate remains 

 here occurring present some very remarkable associations, which 

 appear to be in direct conflict with all past observations. — Events 

 in Nortii American Cretaceous history illustrated in the Arkansas- 

 Texas division of the south-western region of the United States, 

 by Robert T, Hill. Here are embodied the results of the 

 author's investigation of the stratigraphic and palseontological 

 conditions in the northern and eastern termination of the Texas 

 Cretaceous, which are brought into relation with the corresponding 

 formations in the Gulf and Western States. — The distribution of 

 phosphorus in the Luddington Mine, Iron Mountain, Michigan, 

 by David H, Browne. The results are here given of some 3000 

 analyses of ore from the Luddington Mine made during the 

 last three years by the author while acting as chemist to the 

 Lumberman Mining Company. Although no generalizations 

 are attempted, these analyses tend to throw much light on one 

 of the most diffictflt problems in the chemistry of iron ore — the 

 distribution, throughout the vein, of Bessemer ore, and its 

 relation to the formation of the deposit. — Papers were con- 

 tributed by C. S. Hastings, on a general method for deteraiininjj 



the secondary chromatic aberration for a double telescope 

 objective, with a description of a telescope sensibly free from 

 this defect ; by G. Baur, on Palaeohatteria, Credner, and the 

 Proganosauria ; and by O. C. Marsh, on some new .Vmerican 

 Dinosauria, with a comparison of the principal forms of the 

 Dinosauria of Europe and America. 



Bulletin ile V Acculemie Royale de Belgique, March.— On the 

 discovery of some fossil remains of mammals anterior to the 

 diluvium at Ixelles near Brussels, by Michael Mourlon. These 

 deposits, brought to light in .August 18S8, were all found at a 

 lower level than that of the rolled Quaternar)' gravels, and at 

 some points were overlain by several beds of undisturbed shingle. 

 They include remains of the cave bear, of Elephas antiquus, of 

 Bison priscus. Bos privtigenius, the hare, Equus caballus, and a 

 smaller equine species here described under the name of Equus 

 intcrmcdius, altogether forty four individuals, representing five 

 known and four not yet determined species, and presenting a 

 general resemblance to the mammalian fauna of the English 

 forest-bed. — On the physical properties of the free surface layer 

 of a fluid, and on the contact layer of a fluid and a solid, by G. 

 Van der Mensbrugghe. The experiments here described lead to 

 results opposed to the capillary theories of Laplace and Poisson ; 

 they further show that the theory of Gauss is intimately asso- 

 ciated with the surface tension of fluids, one leading inevitably to 

 the other, and confirming the author's previous conclusion that 

 the demonstrated existence of tension justifies the theory of 

 Gauss. — Note on a theory of the secidar variation of terrestrial 

 magnetism deduced from experimental data, by Ch. Lagrange. 

 Several arguments are advanced in support of the author's new 

 hypothesis that the secular magnetism of the earth is due to a 

 magnetic potential interior and not exterior to the surface of the 

 globe. The solid globe itself is thus regarded as a magnet, or a 

 solenoid — that is, as a magnetic body properly so called, or as a 

 conductor traversed by circular currents. — A paper is contributed 

 by P. De Ileen on the determination of the theoretic formula 

 expressing the variations of volume experienced by mercury with 

 the changes of temperature. 



Rendico7iti del Reale Istituto Lombardo, March 28. — -Influence 

 of the digestive juices on the virus of tetanus, by Prof. G. 

 Sormani. A series of experiments are described, which the 

 author has carried out on rabbits, guinea-pigs, rats, and dogs, 

 from which are drawn the following conclusions : (l) the flesh ot 

 animals dying of tetanus may be consumed with impunity ; (2) 

 the bacillus of tetanus swallowed by carnivorous and herbivorous 

 animals passes through the system without causing death or any 

 special disturbance ; (3) the gastric juices of herbivorous animals 

 neither kill, nor diminish the virulence of, the bacillus ; (4) an 

 animal may with impunity swallow a quantity of the virus ten 

 thousand times more than would suftice to kill if introduced by 

 hypodermic inoculation ; (5) the facts here determined throw 

 some doubt on the accepted theory that the effects of tetanus are 

 due to the absorption of poisonous alkaloids derived from the 

 bacillus. — G. Somigliana contributes a paper on differential 

 parameters, explaining a process by which they may be formed, 

 and demonstrating the invariability of those of the first order. 

 Certain relations, either new or more general than those hitherto 

 studied, are also established between the parameters of the first 

 and second orders. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 



Royal Society, April 4. — "The Ferment Action ct 

 Bacteria.'" By T. Lauder Brunton, M.D., F.R.S., and A. 

 Macfadyen, M.D., B.Sc. 



The chief objects of this research were, (A) to discover 

 whether microbes act on the soil upon which they grow 

 by means of a ferment ; and (B) whether such a ferment can 

 be isolated, and its action demonstrated on albuminoid gelatine 

 and carbohydrates, apart from the microbes which produce it, 

 in the same way that the ferments of the stomach and pancreas 

 can be obtained apart from the cells by which they were 

 originally secreted. 



The microbes used were Koch's spirillum, Finkler's spirillum, 

 a putrefactive micrococcus, scurf bacillus, and Welford milk 

 bacillus (Klein). 



The results of the inquiry were as follows : — 



(i) The bacteria which liquefy gelatine do so by means of an 

 enzyme. 



