Dec. 5, 1878] 



NATURE 



IC9 



Bureau, the Paris Press are 'deprived of all the documents for 

 current meteorology which were put at their disposition by M. 

 Leverrier. 



We are informed that Admiral Mouchez has signed with M. 

 Martin the contract for the polishing of the great lens of the 

 !jreat refracting telescope prepared by M. Leverrier. The 

 lamp, of 75 centimetres diameter, has been placed in the 

 hands of M. Feil, the glass founder, to repair a few defects 

 which have been detected. This operation is done by cutting 

 out the defective' parts and heating the glass to a state of 

 liquidity. This process is sometimes used for central parts with 

 success. Guinault, the originator of the process used now for 

 glass -founding, is said to have so mended eighteen times one of 

 the most celebrated glasses^ produced by him at the end of the 

 last century. 



We regret to announce the death of Dr. Eugen von Gorup 

 Besanez, Professor of Chemistry at Erlangen University, and 

 author of an excellent chemical handbook in three volumes. He 

 had attained the age of sixty-two years. 



BentleyandTrimen's "Medicinal Plants" has now reached 



its thirty-fifth number, and maintains in every way the excellent 

 promise with which it started. Both the letterpress and the 

 illustrations are of sterling quality, and the work, when com- 

 plpted, will be a complete repertorium for the botanico -medical 

 student. 



Near the Rhinefall at Schaflfhausen a cave has been dis- 

 covered which was evidently used as a dwelling-place in prehis- 

 toric times. Flints, broken jars, and bone rests were found in 

 it. The jars were partly of Celtic and Roman origin. 



We have on our table the following works : — "Six Months 

 in Ascension," by Mrs. Gill, John Murray; "Robert Dick, 

 Geologist and Botanist," by Dr. Smiles, John Murray ; " Pocket 

 Book for Chemists," by Thomas Bayley, E. and F. H. Spon ; 

 *'The Mollusca of ^the Firth of Clyde," by Alf. Brown, Hugh 

 Hopkins ; " A Visit to South America," by Edwin Clark, Dean 

 and Son; "Coal: its History and Uses," Edited by Prof. 

 Thorpe, F.R.S., Macmillan and Co. ; " Bau des Eozoon Cana- 

 dense," by Karl Mobius, Theodore Fischer; "Flowers, and 

 their Unbidden Guests," Translated by W. Ogle, Kegan Paul ; 

 ■" Vogelbilder aus fernen Zonen," by Dr. Ant. Reichenon, 

 Theodore Fischer; "Dictionary of Scientific Terms," by 

 William Rossiter, W. Collins and .Sons ; "On Foot in Spain," 

 by J. S. Campion, Chapman and Hall; " Elementary Geometry 

 Books," i.-v.. Fourth Edition, by J. M. Wilson, Macmillan and 

 Co. ; "Treatise on Chemistrj'," vol. ii., part i, by Professors 

 Roscoe and Schorlemmer, Macmillan and Co. ; " The Magic 

 Lantern Manual," by W. J. Chad wick, F. Warne and Co. ; 

 *' The Localisation of Cerebral Disease," by Dr. Ferrier, 

 Smith, Elder, and Co. ; " Cassell's Natural History," vol. ii.. 

 Edited by P. Martin Duncan, F.R.S., Cassell, Fetter, and 

 Galpin. 



The additions to the Zoological Society's Gardens during the 

 past week include a Macaque Monkey {Macacus cynomolgus) 

 from India, presented by Dr. Whately, R.N. ; a Brazilian Tree 

 Porcupine {Sphingtirtis prehmsihs) from Trinidad, presented by 

 Dr. J. F. Chittenden, jun, ; a Common Peafowl {Pavo cristatus) 

 from India, presented by Mrs. Russ ; two Common Cormorants 

 KPhahurocorax carlo), British, presented by Mr. Frank Buck- 

 land, F.Z.S. ; a Water Rail {Rallus aquaticus), British, pre- 

 sented by Mr. W. Thompson ; a Black Lemur {Lemur viacaco) 

 from Madagascar, a Rufous-vented Guan {Pauhpe cristata) from 

 Central America, purchased ; a Red Kangaroo {Macropus rufus), 

 born m the Gardens. 



ROYAL SOCIETY^THE PRESIDENTS ANNI- 

 VERSAR V ADDRESS ^ 



Gentlemen, 

 A T the conclusion of this, the fifth and last year during which 

 ^"^ I shall have held the most honourable office of your 

 president, I have the gratifying assurance that the commimica- 

 tions made to the Society and its publications have in no respect 

 fallen off in scientific interest and value. We have not, indeed, 

 been called upon to undertake during the past year such 

 responsible and time-absorbing duties in behalf of the Govern- 

 ment as the Polar, Circumnavigation, Transit of Venus, and 

 other Committees demanded of us during the previous foiu: years ; 

 but some of the results already achieved by those expeditions 

 have been contributed to our publications, and we are in 

 expectation of more. It is also with satisfaction that I can refer 

 to the good attendance at our evening meetings, soirees, and 

 reunions, as e^•idence of the interest taken in our proceedings by 

 the Fellows generally and their friends. 



Before proceeding to touch upon some of the advances made 

 in science during the last few years, I have, as heretofore, to 

 inform you of the Society's condition and prospects, and of those 

 duties undertaken by its Council, for information as to which 

 non-resident Fellows look to the annual address. 



The loss by death of Fellows, twenty-one in number, is but 

 little short of last year's rate, while that of Foreign Fellows (six) 

 is twice as great as last year. On the home list is Sir George 

 Back, the last, with the exception of our late venerable Presi- 

 dent, Sir E. Sabine, of that celebrated band of Arctic voyagers 

 which during the early part of the centurj- added so much to our 

 renown 'as navigators and discoverers. Sir George was fiirther 

 the companion of Franklin and Richardson in that overland 

 journey to the American Polar Sea, in which human endurance 

 was tried to the uttermost compatible with human existence, and 

 the modest but thrilling narrative of which, by the first-named 

 officersjjwill ever hold a unique place in the annals of scientific 

 discovery. Of Indian explorers no less than four have been 

 taken away, namely. Col. Sir Andrew Waugh, for many years 

 Director of the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India ; and 

 shortly afterwards his successor, CoL Montgomerie ; Dr. Old- 

 ham, for a quarter of a century the Director of the Geological 

 Society of India ; and Dr. Thomas Thomson, my fellow-traveller 

 in the Himalaya, the narrative of whose explorations in Western 

 Tibet contains the first coimected account of the physical and 

 natural features ofi that remote and difficult countrj'. Lieut.-Gen. 

 Cameron survived but for one year our late Fellow, Sir Henry 

 James, his predecessor in the Direction of the Ordnance Survey 

 of Great Britain. In the Rev. James Booth we have lost a 

 mathematician of high attainments, and the author of many con- 

 tributions to oiu- own and other scientific journals. The Rev. W. 

 B, Clark, of New South Wales, wrote many papers abounding in 

 excellent obser\ations on Meteorology and Geology, especiidly 

 made in England, the Cape of Good Hope, Australia, and the 

 Pacific. The Rev. R. Main,";the Director of the Radcliffe Obser- 

 vatorj', at Oxford, was'a very eminent astronomer, and for nearly 

 half a century .an indefatigable author. Lastly, Earl Russell, the 

 distinguished statesman and the earnest advocate, whether in the 

 Government or in Parliament, of every measure for the promo- 

 tion of scientific inquiry. 



Of Foreign Fellows our losses are a great chemist in Becquerel, 

 of Paris, whose election took place upwards of forty years ago ; 

 a great physiologist in Claude Bernard, also of Paris ; the father 

 of mycology, and for long the patriarch of Scandinavian 

 botanists, Elias Fries ; a most distinguished physicist and the 

 recipient of both a Rumford and Copley medal in Regnault ; a 

 veteran anatomist in Weber ; and in Secchi, of Rome, an astro- 

 nomer of astonishing activity, the author of more than three 

 hundred separate contributions to the science of which he was so 

 great:an ornament. 



In matters of finance I may with satisfaction refer you to our 

 treasurer's balance-sheets. 



It will be in your recollection that Mr. T. J. PhiUips • Jodrell 

 placed in 1874 a sum of 6,000/. at the disposal of the Society, 

 with the view of its being devoted to the encouragement of scien- 

 tific research by periodical grants to investigators whom your 

 Council might think it expedient thus to aid. Shortly after the 

 receipt of this munificent gift, the Government annoimced its 



' Address of Sir Joseph Hooker, C.B., K.CS.I., the President, delivered 

 at the Anniversary Sleeting of the Reyal Society, on Saturday, November 

 30, 1873. 



