NOVEMJBER lO, 1 910] 



NATURE 



I Besides, I considered it of the utmost interest to attempt 

 ' some hauls far out from the coast-banks on an oceanic 

 • deep plain with depths descending to 3000 fathoms. Alto- 

 i gether we have carried out twenty-two hauls at various 

 depths-with this large trawl. 



It will be seen that our trawl had a greater capacity 



I than any of the appliances previously employed, and that it 



! can therefore, without doubt, be recommended for investi- 



I gations of the deep-water tish-fauna. This is especially the 



case where it is requisite to have many individuals for 



examination. For invertebrate organisms, on the other 



' hand, smaller and more handy appliances may be 



preferable. 



Essentially new types of fishes the trawl cannot be said 

 to have taken. But the material we possess furnishes a 

 good picture, especially of the uniform fish-fauna to be 

 met with along the slopes of the coast-banks of Europe 

 ; and .Africa from the Wyville Thomson ridgo down to 

 Cape Bogador, and it also shows clearly the sharp tran- 

 sition from the southern to the northern side of the Wyville 

 : Thomson ridge, which the Triton, the Knight Errant, and 

 my own investigations, amongst others, had previously 

 demonstrated. 

 5 The hauls at great depths (about 5000 metres) were no 

 ] doubt few, perhaps too few ; but they accorded with each 

 other and with the hauls made by . previous expeditions, 

 more especially those of the Challenger, : Travailleur, and 

 ; Talisman, in indicating that the actual eastern deep-ocean 

 ' plain of the .Atlantic is especially poor in all kinds of higher 

 I organisms and particularly in fish. It might, by some 

 naturalists, be regarded as a desert region. A fuller 

 discussion of our observations must, however, be reserved 

 ■ a more comprehensive publication. 



JOHAX HjORT, 



THE ASSOCIATION OF TEACHERS L\ 

 TECHNICAL INSTITUTIONS. 

 '. 'THE annual meeting of the .Association of Teachers in 

 ■*■ Technical Institutions was held at the Northern 

 i Polytechnic, London, on Saturday, November 5. In 

 i moving the adoption of the annual report of the council, 

 Mr. J. Wilson (Battersea Polytechnic), the retiring presi- 

 dent, stated that any further extensive progress in the 

 ' general technical and scientific education of this countr>- 

 depends upon" the adoption of certain educational reforms, 

 for most of which public opinion is now ripe. These 

 ; reforms may be briefly summarised as follows : — 

 (i) ehmentary education to be more practical or construc- 

 ; live; ^2) compulsory attendance at day or evening (prefer- 

 1 ably day) continuation schools, with a limitation of the 

 hours of labour of adolescents ; (3) the institution of 

 ' "technical-secondary" schools; (4) the linking of the 

 elementary school through the continuation and secondary 

 school to the technical school ; (5) the increased provision 

 I of scholarships, with adequate maintenance grants, so that 

 I the qualified day and evening technical student mav receive 

 ( the highest possible technical and scientific training. 

 These suggested reforms are all quite practical, and their 

 adoption would entail but relatively little strain upon the 

 financial resources of this country-, while the commercial 

 ; and educational results would be of incalculable benefit. 

 I .Attention was directed to the promise held out in the 

 Prefatory .Memorandum to the recent Board of Education 

 regulations for technical schools, that the Board would 

 I take action, in the near future, with respect to certain 

 ; of the more pressing of the educational reforms just 

 I referred to. .A significant statement in the memorandum, 

 I relatmg to the payment of grants for technical instruction 

 to institutions of university rank, together with the recent 

 ; formation of a " University Branch " at the Board of 

 1 Education, emphasises the modern tendency towards bring- 

 i ing the English universities within the purview and in- 

 • fluence of the national educational authorities The hope 

 ' was expressed that this would result in the opening wider 

 ! of the doors of the university to the communitv, and a 

 ' closer connection of the universities with all phases of 

 I educational effort in this country. 



[ The recent regulations of the Board of Education respect- 

 j ing the registering of the attendance of dav and evening 

 I Students , at technical institutions were criticised adverselv. 



inasmuch as by considerably increasing the time, and atten- 

 tion to be devoted by the teacher to the merely mechanical 

 work of registration, they inevitably detract from the 

 efficiency of the teaching as a whole. 



In discussing the first volume of the minutes of evidence 

 submitted to the Royal Commission on University Educa- 

 tion in London, Mr, Wilson stated that in this evidence 

 there appears vague and unjust criticism of the higher 

 work of the London polj technics, generally based upon 

 want of knowledge of the work these institutions are now- 

 doing. 



The president of the association for 1910-11 is Mr. 

 Barker North, of the chemistry and dyeing department, 

 Bradford Technical College. 



NO. 2 141, VOL. 85] 



METEOROLOGICAL RELATIONSHIPS. 



pROF. H. HILDEBRAND HILDEBR-ANDSSON is 

 continuing his important series of papers on the 

 centres of action of the atmosphere, and the fourth com- 

 munication, recently received, is entitled '* Sur la Com- 

 pensation entre les types des Saisons simultanes en 

 differentes regions de la Terre " (_Ktingl. Si'cnska 

 Vetenskapsakademiens Handlingar, Band 45, No. 11 '. In 

 his third paper he suggested that the principal cause of 

 the different types of seasons depended very probably on 

 the condition of the ice in the polar seas, and the evidence 

 he brought forward was such as to show that this view 

 had very much in its favour. In the present communica- 

 tioa he makes a closer study of these compensations 

 between the types of simultaneous seasons in both winter 

 and summer seasons, and extends his researches to North 

 .America. He further directs attention to some analogous 

 results which he finds exist in the southern hemisphere. 

 Thus he finds both in winter and in summer that there 

 occurs an opposition between the north and south of both 

 Europe and of North .America, and also probably between 

 the sub-polar regions and sub-tropical regions of the 

 southern hemisphere. There is also, in general, an opposi- 

 tion between the north of Europe and Siberia. 



Special attention is directed to some regions where this 

 opposite nature of seasons is in some years less -pro- 

 nounced, and Prof. Hildebrandsson points out that these 

 districts are intermediate between the main centres of 

 typical action, and are therefore dependent on the intensit)' 

 of the latter. This communication is accompanied by 

 several plates of curves, and these should be closely studied 

 in connection with the text. There is little doubt that 

 these researches will in time open up a field for the future 

 forecasting of seasons, but it is important to bear in mind 

 that so intimate are the meteorological associations 

 between very widely separated regions on the earth, it 

 behoves the investigator to take a ver\' broad view of the 

 subject, and not confine himself to one small portion of 

 the earth's surface. 



Mr. E. T. Ouaylc, of the .Australian Commonwealth 

 Meteorological Bureau, has recently (Bulletin No. 5, 

 March) published the results of his investigations in rela- 

 tion to the possibility of forecasting the approximate rain- 

 fall for northern Victoria. .At the outset he states that 

 it has long been his conviction that ordinary statistical 

 methods must prove inadequate, and that they do not 

 enable the essential differences between the weather of 

 successive years to be grasped. In his study of the storm 

 systems as they have affected Victoria he has made a 

 classification of them, and on this he bases his method 

 of forecasting. The storms which affect Victoria and 

 bring the rain belong to two main systems, one called 

 " .Antarctics, *' which originate in the southern seas, and 

 the other called " Monsoonals," which are of tropical 

 origin. The first-named he divides into two classes : — 

 (a) .Antarctics, when their centres are too far south to be 

 identified ; and (6) .Antarctic cyclones, when their centres 

 can be located inland or over Bass Strait. The monsoonal 

 low depressions he divides into three groups : — (a) mon- 

 soonal troughs ; (6) monsoonal dips ; and (c) monsoonal 

 cyclones. 



By the use of isobaric charts the number of occurrences 

 of each t>"pe of disturbance was taken out for each month 

 for the years 1888 to igoq. .As the northern districts of 

 Victoria receive most rain chieflv from monsoonal de- 



