286 



NA TURE 



{Jiily 1 8, i88'9 



types. — Hallstatt in Austria, its places of burial, and its civiliza- 

 tion, by Dr. Homes. This is an extremely interesting summary 

 of the important discoveries made within the last few years in 

 the Hallstattian burying-grounds of Slavonian Austria, more 

 especially at Watsch in Carniola, where the beauty and finish of 

 the carved baldrics and belts have led contemporary palasonto- 

 1 ogists to regard them as an evidence of the existence in Central 

 Europe of an early civilization which had already attained to 

 considerable artistic culture before its extinction under the weight 

 of advancing hordes of barbarian invaders. The necropolis of 

 Hallstatt, for our acquaintance with which we are indebted 

 to Baron Sacken, still remains unrivalled for the splendour and 

 variety of its antiquities, notwithstanding the marvellous results 

 of the recent Carniolian and Croatian finds. Between 1846 and 

 1863, Sacken and Ramsauer published reports of their explora- 

 tions of nearly 1000 tombs ; while since that period the number 

 of graves explored has risen to nearly 1900. Both at Hallstatt 

 and Watsch the rites of interment and incineration had been 

 followed with nearly equal frequency, but although in the case of 

 the latter the graves appear to have been most richly supplied with 

 gold ornaments and carved bronze arms, the abundance of yellow 

 amber, and of decorative objects of the toilet which are found 

 buried with the unburnt skeletons render it difficult to decide 

 which of the two methods of disposing of the dead was regarded 

 as the more distinguished. The cranial type is generally dolicho- 

 cephalous, with a retreating forehead and long slightly prognathic 

 face, resembling what is known in Germany as the " Reihen- 

 grabertypus. " According to Sacken, the necropolis of Hallstatt 

 dates from the third or fourth century K.C., revealing the 

 presence in those regions of the Eastern Alps of the so-called 

 Galli Faurisci, who prior to the Roman domination must have 

 been familiar with an advanced stage of civilization and decora- 

 tive art, in which the influence of Greek art is undeniable. This 

 is indeed strongly manifested both in the workmanship and the 

 forms of multitudinous objects revealed by the exploration not 

 merely of the Hallstattian tombs, but of the prehistoric station of 

 Salzberg, whose discovery last year has added new interest to the 

 still contested problem of the origin of the early culture of the 

 Alpine races of Central Europe. 



RivistaScientifico-Indtistriale, May 15. — On sand showers, by 

 Prof. P. Francesco Denza. His protracted observation of this 

 meteoric phenomenon leads the author to infer that it is not 

 sporadic, as is commonly supposed, but periodical, though 

 subject to occasional disturbances. Its recent reappearance in 

 several parts of Italy, after a considerable interruption, confirms 

 the opinion already advanced by him, that the sands have their 

 origin in the North African deserts, whence they are borne by 

 the high southern gales as far as, and occasionally even beyond, 

 the Alps. About the beginning of May atmospheric waves of 

 low pressure advanced from West Africa across the Mediter- 

 ranean to South- West Europe, causing a heavy rainfall as far 

 north as the British Isles. In Sicily and Piedmont the showers 

 were mixed with sands, while elsewhere the foliage was covered 

 with a perceptible layer of dust. On May 12 a violent sand- 

 storm raged in the North Sahara, as announced by telegrams 

 from Biskra (Algeria), and this was soon followed by fresh 

 downpours and by another shower of sand in North Italy far 

 more intense than the first. In many parts of the Ligurian Alps 

 and of Lombardy not only the vegetation, but the roofs of 

 houses, terraces, marble monuments (in Turin and Milan), were 

 strewn with fine particles, specimens of which were collected in 

 various districts. The coincidence of the African simoom and 

 the Mediterranean scirocco charged with sand leaves no doubt 

 as to the real origin of the phenomenon popularly attributed to 

 the effects of the April hma rossa ("red moon "). Prof. Denza's 

 interesting communication is dated from the Observatory of 

 Moncalieri (Piedmont), May 18, 1889. 



Bulletin de l' Academie Royale de Belgique, May. — On a new 

 method of testing for bromine, by Frederic Swarts. This 

 method, which yields excellent results, is based on the well- 

 known fact that resorcinic phtalin (fluorescin) is transformed 

 to its tetra-bromuretted derivative (eosine) characterized by a 

 beautiful pink colour. The reaction consists in liberating hydro- 

 bromic acid, which is immediately oxidized by the hypochlorous 

 acid. The bromine thus obtained then acts on the fluorescin, 

 converting it into eosine, which is transformed to a pink salt 

 under the influence of a slight excess of alkali. This reaction 

 is so sensitive that it succeeds with a tenth of a cubic centimetre 

 of water containing a hundred thousandth of potassium bromide/ 



a quantity corresponding to a thousandth ( of a milligramme of 

 this salt. In the case of iodine, it detects the presence of 

 bromine in sea-water without submitting it to any preliminary 

 treatment. — G. Van der Mensbrugghe describes a curious ex- 

 periment in capillary attraction, the explanation of which is 

 reserved for a future communication. The subject has engaged 

 this physicist's attention since the year 1883, when he announced 

 a simple method of demonstrating the contractile force of flui :s 

 which cannot easily be reduced to thin seams {lames). 



Das Wetter (Brunswick) for June contains an article, by Dr. 

 B. Andries, on the cold period of May, which generally obtains 

 about the loth of that month ; the nth to 13th being known as 

 the three "ice saints." There is no doubt that each year frosts 

 occur in May, afier several days of warm weather have led us to 

 hope for continued increase of temperature. But the author 

 shows, from long series of observations at Bremen and Paris, 

 that the same thing occurs in April and June, and that the 

 weather of May is more uniform than all the other months, ex- 

 cept October, which exhibits the same regularity in decrease of 

 temperature that May does in the increase of the same. The 

 variability arises from the influence of cyclones advancing from 

 the Atlantic. In the interior of the Continent, the temperature 

 becomes more constant, as the influence of the ocean becomes 

 less. Dr. R. Assmann (the editor of the journal) contributes an 

 article on the microscopic observations on the structure of hoar- 

 frost, &c., made on the Brocken and elsewhere. His observa- 

 tions seem to show that hoar-frost is not always crystalline, but 

 that, if the temperature is only slightly below the freezing-point, 

 the hoar-frost, or rime, is often composed of amorphous particles 

 of ice. A third article, by an anonymous writer, deals with the^ 

 winters of the south coast of the Crimea. The climate is far 

 froja unpleasant ; in a normal year, a brilliant autumn follo\vs a 

 dry summer, and a soft air continues far into November. De- 

 cember is generally cold and wet, and January fine ; hard frosts 

 do not occur till February, and then the struggle between winter 

 and spring lasts until April. An interesting phenological table 

 is added, showing the different eflfects upon vegetation between 

 a wet or dry November and December. 



Bulletin de f Academie des Sciences de St. PHersbottrg, 

 nouvelle serie, i. (xxxiii,), No. i. — With this number the' 

 Bulletin begins a new series, printed in a handy octavo shape. 

 — On the rattle-apparatus of Crotalus dicrissus,hy A. Feoktistoff. 

 — On a simplification of Wild's photometer, by H. Wild. — On 

 the solution of mechanical problems resulting in hyperelliptic 

 differential equations, by C. Charlier. — Entomological contribu- 

 tions, by A. Morawitz, being a description of two new Central 

 Asian species of Carabus {C.pnpulus and C. eons), and a detailed 

 monograph of many species of the same genus. — On the embryo- 

 \rigy oi Pteromy2on Jluviatilis, by Ph. Owsjannikoff'. — Researches 

 relating to the basicity of antimonic acid, by F. Beilstein and O. 

 Blaese. — On the preparation of rubidium, note by N. Beketoff". 

 — On a new Central Asian Siluroid {Exostoma oschanini), by S. 

 Herzenstein. — On the absence of the common squirrel in Caucasia, 

 by E. Biichner. Although Pallas, Nordmann, and Menetries 

 mentioned the Sciurus vulgaris as occurring in the Caucasus, 

 there is not the slightest mention of it in the descriptive parts of 

 their works, nor any representative of it in Menetries's otherwise 

 remarkable collection, kept in full at the Academy. The 

 common squirrel could not be discovered in the Caucasus by 

 the late M. Bogdanoff, nor by MM. RossikofT, Mlokossewicz 

 and Ananoff, who searched for it for years. It may have been 

 that Pallas, Nordmann, and Menetries simply reported the 

 words of the Caucasus Cossacks, who give the Russian name of 

 byelka — usually applied to the squirrel — to Myoxus glis, which 

 really appears in the Northern Caucasus. It \i also worthy of 

 note that the common squirrel does not appear in the Crimea. — 

 Hydrological researches, by Carl Schmidt. Analyses of the 

 thermal springs at Saniba, in the north of Mount Kazbek. — 

 Analyses of the sulphate of aluminium, by Beilstein and 

 Grosset. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 



London. 



Entomological Society, July 3. — Lord Walsingham, F. R. S. , 



President, in the chair. — A letter was read from Mr. E. J. 



Atkinson, Chairman of the Trustees of the Indian Museum, 



Calcutta, in which assistance was asked from British entomo- 



