April 24, 1879] 



NATURE 



595 



\V, S. S.— On the movements of diatoms and Oscillatoria, by 

 Th. W, Engelmann. — On the preparation and conservation of 

 inferior organi.-^ms, by R. Blanchard. — On the influence of 

 motion and rest upon life, by Dr. A. Hon^'ath. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES 

 London 

 Chemical Society, April 17. — Dr. Roscoe in the chair. — 

 The following communications were made : — On heptane, from 

 ri7ius sabiniana, by T. E. Thorpe. Wenzell, in 1872, described, 

 under the name of abietene a hydrocarbon obtained by distilling 

 the exudation of the Calif ornian "nut pine." The author has 

 ibjected the crude oil (which occurs in commerce in San Fran- 

 co) to an exhaustive chemical and phy^ical examination, and 

 ids that it consists of nearly piu-e heptane. This discovery, 

 lat a paraffin is playing the part of oil of turpentine in a tree 

 HOW living is exceedingly interesting, as our on'.y natural sources 

 of this hydrocarbon are petroleum and fos il fish oil. — On the 

 determination of tartaric acid in lees and inferior argol, by B. J. 

 Grosjean. The author suggests several improvements in the 

 well-known oxalate process of Warington. The employment of 

 the method of filtration suggested by Casamajor, the addition of 

 potassium chloride to render the precipitation of the potassium 

 bitartrate complete, precipitation of the latter salt by stirring, 

 &C. By these improvements the author has shortened the time 

 required for an e.-timation to four hours. — Conditions affecting 

 the equilibriimi of certain chemical systems, by M. M. P. Muir. 

 The author has carefully studied the influence of time, tempera- 

 Mre, and mass on certain reactions: i. Bismuth ous chloride, 

 ydrochloric acid, and water. 2. Calcium chloride and potas- 

 -ium or sodium carbonate. — On the action of oxides on salts, 

 Part II., by E. J. Mills and J. W. Pratt. The authors have 

 examined the actions of aluminic, ferric, and stannic oxides on 

 potassic carbonate at a temperatnre of 735°. — Examination of 

 substances by the time method, by J. B. Hannay. The author 

 has arrived at the following conclusion : — Two hydrated salL^, in 

 forming a double salt containing the normal amount of water, 

 expend one half of the affinity of the anhydrous salt for its water 

 of crystallisation, in combining with each other, showing that the 

 formation of double salts is comparable with other forms of 

 chemical action. — Preliminary note on certain compounds of 

 naphthalene and benzene with antimony chloride, &c., by 

 Watson Smith. The author has obtained white needles, which 

 he believes to be trinaphthylstibine or naphthyloxystibine. He 

 has obtained other crystalline compounds, which have not yet 

 been examined. 



Anthropological Institute, April 8. — Mr. Hyde Clarke, 

 ■vice-president, in the chair. — Mr. Coutts Trotter, of the Bengal 

 Civil Service, was announced a Member. — Prof. W. H. Flower, 

 LL.D., F.K.S., read a paper entitled "Illustrations of the 

 Method of Preserving the Dead in Darnley Island and South 

 Australia." A mummy from Erroob or Darnley Island, in 

 Torres Strait, inhabited by a Papuan race, was first described. 

 It was fastened in an extended position upon a framework made of 

 pieces of wood, joined together with native cords, and kept in an 

 upright position in the house of the relatives. The surface was 

 covered with red ochre, and a piece of the large Indian volute 

 shell {Alelo indica), fashioned into the shape of a shield, was 

 suspended in front of the body, as worn by the warriors in 

 battle. The whole of the viscera had been removed through an 

 aperture in the right flank, which had been carefully closed by 

 an interrupted suture. Pieces of light wood filled the abdomi- 

 nal and thoracic cavities. The tongue, larj-nx, &c., had been 

 removed through the mouth ; the lips were not closed, but the 

 jaw was kept f I om falling by a piece of cord passing close to 

 the bone, through the nostril, and round the ramus of the man- 

 dible. The orbits were filled with a resinous substance, and 

 imitation eyes of mother-of pearl introduced. The second spe- 

 cimen described was a dried mummy from near Adelaide, in 

 South Australia, presented in 1845 to the museum of the Royal 

 College of Surgeons by Sir George Grey. In this case the limbs 

 were bent jointly, and fixed by a band of native netting close 

 to the side of the body, the knees being behind the shoul- 

 ders, and the feet close to the hips. The internal organs 

 had not been removed, but the mouth had been filled with 

 emu's feathers, and careftilly sewn up, a tassel of feathers 

 hanging from one corner. Both cases showed a consider- 

 able amoiiat of care and trouble bestowed in what was con- 

 sidered the decent and proper care of the body after death ; but, 



as might be expected, a more elaborate development of art was 

 attained in the Papuan than in the Australian. — A paper by Mr, 

 M. J. Walhou-'C was read, on rag-bushes and kindred ob>erv- 

 ances. The author, referring to the custom of tying pieces of 

 rag to the bushes near springs of healing repute and by the tomHs 

 of holy men, once common in England, and still observed on the 

 Continent, adduced evidence of its antiquity, and instances of its 

 occurrence in Europe, Africa, throughout Asia, and all over 

 America from the north to Patagonia. He also described some 

 apparent varieties of custom, w hen other objects than rags were 

 used, but with the same motive, and thought that they, as w ell as 

 the rags, were offered as symbols of sacrifice or gifts, sometimes to 

 deities, sometimes to ghosts, and often as thank-offerings for cures 

 of sickness and other benefits. The worthless form of such offerings 

 might be owing to the sacred spots being frequently in remote and 

 desert regions, where travellers and pilgrims were not likely td 

 have things of value to spare, and would leave trivial scraps and 

 shreds reaxly at hand rather than nothing at all. Or they might 

 be substitutes for more valuable offerings, once generally made, 

 but which have a tendency to decrease in value, and at last exist 

 only nominally as survivals. The Chinese custom of offering 

 mock food and gilt-paper ornaments at tombs, where costly gifts 

 were anciently made, was referred to in illustration of this. It 

 was further suggested that the ex vole offerings, so commonly 

 hvmg in Roman Catholic churches, are a form and development 

 of the rags and shreds tied to bushes, and that may-poles and 

 even Christmas-trees may have had a similar origin. — A number 

 of antiquities from the United States of Colombia were ex- 

 hibited by Mr. W. D. Powles. 



Meteorological Society, April 16. — Mr. C. Greaves, F.G.S., 

 president, in the chair. — The following were elected Fellows of 

 the Society :— R. W. Abbotts, Rev. S. Allen, D.D., E. H. Banks, 

 F. J. BramweU, F.R.S., J. A. Caird, E. H. CardweU, the Earl 

 of Durham, J. Farquharson, W. Gamett, Rev. C. W. Harvey, 

 W. Inskip, the Earl of Powis, and D. Robie. The papers reaa 

 were : On the results of comparisons of Goldschmid's aneroids, 

 by G. M. Whipple, F.R.A.S. — Observations on the temperature 

 of the Atlantic during the month of March, by P. F. Reinsch. 



Entomological Society, April 2. — ^J. W. Ehmning, M.A., 

 F.L.S., vice-president, in the chair. — Mr. McLachlan exhibited 

 the cases of a number of species of Brazilian caddis-flies with 

 the insects bred from the larvae that manufactiu-ed some of them, 

 sent to him by Dr. Fritz Miiller from Santa Catharina, and read 

 extracts (with notes) from Dr. Miiller's letters on the sub 

 ject. In reference to the habits of Mantidae, which had been 

 recently brought under the notice of the Society, Mr. Stainton 

 referred to a larval form of probably Mantis religiosa, which 

 had been forwarded to him in 1866 by Mr. Moggridge, jun., 

 and which, from its saltatorial habits, that gentleman had de- 

 scribed as a " curious grasshopper." De Geer had also drawn 

 attention to the apparent similarity between these insects belong- 

 ing to different orders, and Mr. Stainton considered that the 

 peculiar motion of the young Mantis was an illustration of the 

 remark of Mr. Darwin, that the relationships and affinities of 

 animals are often more expressed in the embryonic than in the 

 adult form. — Sir Sydney Saimders exhibited a bag-like fabrica- 

 tion, said to be the production of a large species of spider in- 

 habiting the Fiji Inlands. — The Secretary read a note from Mr. 

 J. W. Sclater, on insects destroyed by flowers. — Miss E. A. 

 Ormerod communicated a paper entitled " Observations on the 

 Effects of Low Temperature Jon-iLarvse." From an examination 

 of many species belonging to different orders, during the severe 

 frosts of the past winter, none were foimd materially injured by 

 the low temperature to which they were subjected. — Mr. Distant 

 communicated a paper containing descriptions of new species of 

 hemiptera collected by Dr. Stoliczka during the Forsyth expe- 

 dition to Kashgar in 1873-74, to form portion of the general 

 work on the scientific results of the expedition now in course of 

 publication at Calcutta. 



Geological Society, April 9. — Henry Clifton Sorby, F.R.S., 

 president, in the chair. — Rev. Joseph Finnemore, Thomas James 

 Slatter, William H. Twelvetrees, Arthur Pendarves Vivian, and 

 Ernest Westlake, were elected Fellows ; Prof. Bemhard von 

 Cotta, Freiberg, Dr. Nicolai von Kokscharow, St Petersbui^, 

 and Dr. J. J. S. Steen^tmp, Copenhagen, were elected Foreign 

 Members ; and Prof. P. J. van Beneden, Louvain, Prof. 

 Guglielmo Guiscardi, Naples, and Prof. Gerhard von Rath, 

 Bonn, Foreign Correspondents of the Society. — The following 

 communications were read : — On the geological age of the rocks 

 of the southern highlands of Ireland, generally known as "the 



