84 



NATURE 



[November 17, 1910 



took a series of vertical plankton hauls from various deep 

 localities off the west coast of Scotland. A comparison 

 of the collections show (i) that there is a constancy year 

 after year in the nature of the plankton at certain locali- 

 ties, and (2) that some of the localities, not very far apart, 

 differ considerably from one another in the nature of their 

 plankton at the same time of year (July). 



The general committee of the Mansion House fund for 

 providing a memorial to King Edward in London has had 

 under consideration numerous proposals as to the form 

 the memorial should take. The only decision which has 

 as )et been arrived at is that, apart from the provision 

 of a larger memorial of his Majesty, a statue of King 

 Edward VII., with suitable accessories, be erected in some 

 prominent and appropriate position in London, and that 

 ti fund be immediately opened for the purpose. Other 

 schemes are still under consideration. Originally 164 pro- 

 posals were received by the committee, but, according to 

 the daily papers, these have been ruled out, with a few 

 exceptions, as unsuitable or impracticable. The general 

 committee has still to decide finally ; but among schemes 

 recommended to them by the executive committee are 

 Lord Esher's proposal for an historical museum in London 

 on the lines of the Mus6e Carnavalet in Paris. Secondly, 

 the scheme of Lord Avebury for the building of a great 

 hall for the University of London, to be used for degree 

 and ceremonial purposes, and also for examinations. 

 Thirdly, Lord Northcote's suggestion that a portion of the 

 fund should be devoted to a scheme " for the protection of 

 human life in the tropics by a great extension of that 

 campaign against tropical disease which has already abated 

 so largely the sum of human suffering." This last pro- 

 posal has the support of the Society of Tropical Medicine 

 and Hygiene, and a letter, signed by Prof. Ronald Ross, 

 F.R.S., and other of^cers of the society, outlining the 

 valuable work for the Empire which could be done by 

 such an endowment of the study and prevention of 

 tropical diseases, appeared in the Times of November 5. 

 Lord Rosebery, as Chancellor of London University, has, 

 In a letter to Lord Avebury, expressed his hearty approval 

 of the scheme put forward by Lord Avebury. 



On November 8 Major Sykes delivered an interesting 

 lecture to the Royal Geographical Society describing two 

 short journeys which he took recently in north-eastern 

 Persia the ancient Parthia, and HjTcania. This district 

 has alwaj's been one of special interest to the historian. It 

 formed part of the patrimony of the earliest Persian kings ; 

 in it originated both the religion of Zoroaster and the 

 Parthian dynasty, which measured its strength successfully 

 with Rome ; it has always been the debatable land on the 

 border between Iran and Turan ; and now it seems within 

 measurable distance of falling, finally, into the possession 

 of Russia, without any of the clamour, nay, danger, of 

 war which such an advance of the Muscovite would have 

 caused in England a few years ago. Such are the ways 

 of high politics. The cities of north-eastern Persia are 

 interesting also. Meshhed is a great centre of caravan- 

 routes ; ancient Nishapur* is renowned as the birthplace 

 and abiding-place of Omar Khayyam ; Turshiz is the tradi- 

 tional town of Zoroaster, where the great prophet con- 

 verted Vishtaspa the king and. planted the sacred cypress ; 

 Budjurd and Astrabad are interesting as really Turanian 

 rather than Iranian towns. The dividing line between 

 Hyrcania and Parthia was never drawn definitely. In the 

 inscription of Darius the Great at Bisitun (Behistun), the 

 lands of " Parthva and Varkana " are mentioned together. 

 The name of Hyrcania (Varkana) survives in that of the 

 modern river Gurgan. Major Sykes had previously visited 

 the valley of the Atrek, in which Budjurd lies. His route 



NO. 2142, VOL. 85] 



on this journey was taken from Meshhed to Budjurd. 

 thence to Astrabad, and back by way of Shahrud, Subza- 

 war, and Nishapur (the well-known old trade-route) to 

 Meshhed. On the way he made several interesting explora- 

 tions, and identified some ancient sites, notably that of 

 Paras, which is probably the ancient Parthian capital. 

 On his second journey he went to Nishapur and Turshiz. 

 At Nishapur he identified the sites of several ancient cities 

 which have been built near the spot from the original 

 Niv-Shapur of Sapor I. to the mediacv.'il Nishapur of Om.ir 

 KhayyAm and the entirely different modern town. .At 

 Turshiz Major .Sykes also made interesting discoveries. 



In spite of having presented his unrivalled collection to 

 the nation. Lord Walsingham, as evident from a papf 1 

 on Madeiran Tinerinae in the November number of th' 

 Entomologist's Monthly Magazine, continues to devoii 

 attention to his favourite Micro-Lepidoptera. Two new 

 species are described in this communication. 



Witiierby's British Birds for November contains a lon^^ 

 list of birds marked in the British Isles which have been 

 recently recovered in various places, either at home or 

 abroad. Among the items may be noted a teal marked 

 in Essex in February and taken off Schleswig in August, 

 and a tern ringed in Cumberland in July and captured 

 south of Oporto in September. 



In a paper on the tooth-billed bower-bird {Scenopceetes 

 dcntirostris) published in the Emu for October Mr. S. ^^". 

 Jackson states, as the result of continued observation, that, 

 as a rule, during the height of the breeding season thr>i 

 birds do not visit their play-grounds or indulge in mimic ^ 

 vocalisation in the daytime, but reserve the latter per- 

 formance for the periods before sunrise and after sunset, 

 when they are in the tree-tops. During the nesting season., 

 the play-grounds are silent, unoccupied, and, most signifi- 

 cant of all, untidy. 



To the November number of Pearson's Magazine Mr. 

 Walter Brett contributes an appreciative notice of the bird 

 groups mounted in the Natural History Museum at; New 

 York. According to the author's own words, the birds in 

 these groups " positively breathe with life. Their pose is 

 natural ; their surroundings are true to nature ; their 

 throats almost tremble with the song one expects to hear. 

 And the reason of this is that these birds are life studies, 

 scientifically correct as well as artistically perfect. The 

 visitor knows they are stuffed only because he is aware 

 that they are in a museum, not in an aviary." The article 

 is illustrated with reproductions from photographs of 

 several of the groups. 



No. 1766 of the Proceedings of the U.S. National 

 Museum is devoted to an account, by Miss Rathbun, of a 

 collection of stalk-eyed crustaceans, from the coast of Peru 

 and adjacent parts of South America. The most notable 

 additions to the fauna include a small crab of the genus 

 Dromidia — the first of its group from western South 

 America — and Panopaeus bermudensis, previously known 

 from the Atlantic, while examples of two species hitherto 

 represented by the types were also obtained. A noticeable 

 feature is the abundance of Xanthidae and Inachidae and 

 the scarcity of Parth'enopida; and shrimps of all kinds. 

 Many of these Peruvian crustaceans, especially hermit- 

 crabs, are used either as food or for bait. 



At the commencement of a review of the species of 

 venomous toad-fishes of the genera Thalassophryne and 

 Thalassothia, published as No. 1765 of the Proceedings of 

 the U.S. National Museum, Messrs. Bean arid Weed state 

 that these fishes differ from all other members of the class 

 by possessing grooved or perforated spines, analogous to 



