ii8 



NATURE 



[May 30, 1889 



tion, oedemi, and ecchymosis, and gastro-intestinal irritation, 

 with extrusion of foeces and blood ; the general symptoms being, 

 first, a great fall of body temperature, and a condition of stupor, 

 ending in death. 



(3) The activity of bath these proteids is destroyed by moist 

 heat. In solution, the activity of the globulin is destroyed at 

 between 75° and 80° C, and that of the albumose between 80" 

 and 85° C. 



(4) That abrus-poison resembles snake-venom in chemical 

 .composition, in the local lesions produced, in producing a fall 



of body temperature, in causing semi-fluidity or fluidity of the 

 blood after death, and, to some extent, in the effect of moist 

 heat on it. Abrus-poison is, however, much less active than 

 snake-venom. 



The following table shows a comparison between the activity 

 of the venom of various snakes and of Abrus :— 

 Vipera berus (common 



adder) ... .■ Fatal dose in man, 0'002i gramme per 



kilogramme of body weight (Fontana). 

 Hy f>locephalus curtus 

 (Australian tiger- 

 snake) Fatal dose in dog, 0*00485 gramme per 



kilogramme of body weight ; \ grain 

 in medium size dog (15 pounds). 



Cobra Fatal dose in dog, 0000079 gramme 



per kilogramme of body weight ; yV 

 grain in dog weighing 18 pounds 

 (Vincent Richards). 

 Abrus-poison — 



Globulin Fatal dose, o'oi gramme per kilogramme 



of body weight. 



Albumose Fatal dose, 006 gramme per kilogramme 



of body weight. 

 Peptic albumoses ... Fatal dose in dog, any dose over 0*3 

 gramme per kilogramme of body 

 weight (PoUitzer). 



"Appendix to paper on Descending Degenerations following 

 Lesions in the Gyrus marginalis and Gyrus fornicatus in Monkeys." 

 By E. P. France. Communicated by E. A. SchJifer, F.R.S. 



Linnean Society, May 24. — ^Anniversary Meeting. — Mr. 

 Carruthers, F.R.S. , President, in the chair. — A portrait of John 

 Jacob Dillenius (1687-1747), the first Professor of Botany at 

 'Oxford, copied from the original picture at Oxford, was pre- 

 sented to the Society by the President, who gave a brief outline 

 of his career, and of his personal acquaintance with Linnaeus. — 

 The Treasurer having made his annual statement of accounts, 

 and the Librarian's and other reports having been read, a ballot 

 took place for the election of officers and Council for the ensuing 

 year. The President, Treasurer, and Secretaries were re-elected, 

 and the changes recommended in the Council were adopted. — The 

 President then delivered his annual address, to which we refer 

 •elsewhere. — A unanimous vote of thanks to the President for his 

 address, coupled with a request that it might be printed, having 

 been passed, the ceremony of awarding the Society's gold medal 

 took place. This medal, having on the obverse a fine bust of 

 Linnsevrs and on the reverse the arms of the Society, below which 

 is engraved the name of the recipient, was founded last year in 

 ■commemoration of the Society's centenary anniversary, and is 

 bestowed upon a botanist and zoologist alternately, for distin- 

 guished services to biological science. This year it was av/arded 

 to the eminent botanist Prof. Alphonse de Candolle, and in his 

 unavoidable absence was handed to his grandson M. Austin de 

 Candolle, who attended on his behalf to receive it. Addressing 

 fiis representative, the President said : — " Monsieur de Candolle, 

 it is a great satisfaction to me to place in your hands, for trans- 

 mission to your distinguished grandfather, the Linnean gold 

 medal, in recognition of his many important services to botanical 

 science. These services have been so great, and are so universally 

 acknowledged, that it is unnecessary for me to do more than to 

 refer to them. His many systematic monographs justify his 

 being awarded any honour that botanists can confer. His 

 philosophical treatment of the geographical distribution of plants 

 has greatly advanced this department of science, and his suc- 

 cessful codification of the laws of botanical nomenclature has 

 been of the greatest practical service to systematists. But 

 botanists will always look with gratitude to Alphonse de 

 Candolle for the successful carrying on of the gigantic enterprise 

 inaugurated by his father when he undertook the publication of 

 the ' Prodromus Systematis Naturalis Regni Vegetabilis.' By 

 his own work, by securing the aid of accomplished r^Z/a^^ra/^wfj-, 



and perhaps not least by the plodding toil of reading the proof- 

 sheets of volume after volume of dry systematic descriptions 

 during the thirty-two years in which he took charge of the 

 ' Prodromus,' he has laid science under a debt which cannot be 

 estimated. The work as now completed contains descriptions 

 of all the Dicotyledonous Phanerogams, and of Gymnosperms, 

 which were known w-hen the different volumes were published, 

 amounting to nearly 60,000 species. By his numerous labours 

 Alphonse de Candolle has added lustre to a name that had already 

 obtained a first place amongst botanists. His son Casimir, by 

 his scientific researches, maintains the credit of that name ; and 

 now, in handing this medal to you. Monsieur Austin de 

 Candolle, the representative of the fourth generation, may I 

 venture to hope that this imperfect estimate of the services 

 rendered to science by Alphonse de Candolle may help you to 

 realize the honour of the name you inherit, and encourage you by 

 similar true and honest labour to transmit it with added renown 

 to posterity." — The presentation having been suitably acknow- 

 ledged by Dr. Marcet, F.R.S., a countryman and relative of the 

 recipient, the proceedings terminated with a vote of thanks to 

 the President and officers. 



Anthropological Institute, May 14. — Prof. Flower, C.B., 

 F.R.S., Vice-President, in the chair. — Mr. Arthur Thomson 

 read a paper on the osteology of the Veddahs of Ceylon, and ex- 

 hibited a complete skeleton and several skulls of these people. 

 Although the skeleton was said to be that of a man of twenty-six 

 years of age, many parts were not completely ossified. The 

 fifth lumbar vertebra was less wedge-shaped than amongst the 

 higher races of man, and hence there was a distinct tendency 

 to a backward ;:urve in this region. Attention was drawn to the 

 fact that the left clavicle was longer than the right by no less than 

 lomm., and this may probably be explained by the employment 

 of the left arm in the use of the bow ; the left arm was also slightly 

 larger than the right. The scapulae were small and slender, and 

 the high index, 71 'i, indicates a marked difference in shape 

 from that of Europeans. The femora and tibiae were remarkable 

 for their 'great length, and in each case the left was the longer. 

 On the anterior borders of the lower extremities of both tibias 

 were semilunar facets articulating, in extreme dorsiflexion of the 

 foot, with correspondingsurfacesonthenecksof the a-tragali. The 

 extreme length of the articulated skeleton was 1578 mm., which 

 was somewhat above that of the average Veddah, as calculated 

 by Virchow. It appeared from examination of all the available 

 crania that the average capacity of the Veddah male skull is 

 1321 cc, and that of the female skull 1229 cc. The cephalic 

 index is 70*9. From the data given in the paper the author in- 

 ferred that, if the Veddahs be not of the same stock as the so- 

 called aborigines of Southern India, they at least present very 

 strong joints of resemblance both as regards stature, proportions 

 of limbs, cranial capacity, and form of skull ; and that, if physical 

 features alone be taken into account, their affmities with the hill 

 tribes of the Neilgherries, and the natives of the Coromandel 

 Coast and the country near Cape Comorin, are fairly well 

 established.— Some notes by Mrs. R. Braithwaite Batty, on the 

 Yoruba country, and a paper by Mr. H. Ling Roth, on saluta- 

 tions, were also read. 



Paris. 



Academy of Sciences, May 20. — M. Des Cloizpaux, Presi- 

 dent, in the chair. — On the telluric origin of the oxygen rays in 

 the solar spectrum, by M. J. Janssen. — On the complete corre- 

 spondence between the continuous fractions which express the 

 two roots of a quadratic equation whose coefficients are rational 

 numbers, by Prof. Sylvester. — On the impossibility of diamag- 

 netic bodies, by M. P. Duhem. The author's researches lead to 

 the general inference that the existence of diamagnetic bodies is 

 incompatible with the principles of thermodynamics. The so- 

 called diamagnetic bodies are simply magnetic bodies plunged 

 in a more powerful magnetic medium, in accordance with 

 Becquerel's hypothesis, which assumes that for these bodies there 

 exists one distribution of equilibrium and one only, that this 

 distribution is stable, and that a diamagnetic body is always 

 repelled by permanent magnets. — On the artificial reproduction 

 of the mirage, and on the interference fringes that may accompany 

 this phenomenon, by MM. J. Mace de Lepinay and A. Perot. 

 A process is described, by means of which conditions are realized 

 which are analogous but inverse to those that give rise to the 

 natural mirage. — On the expansion of quartz, by M. H. Le 

 Chaielier. The experiments here described show that quartz 

 undoubtedly undergoes considerable expansion between 480° and 

 570° C. Above the critical temperature of 570°, it ceases to 



