March 17, 192 1] 



NATURE 



85 



what is described by the Daily Mail is nothing more 

 than Bruckner's cycle, which corresponds approxi- 

 mately to the length of three sun-spot periods. 



The Report of the Museum Committee of the 

 Borough of Warrington deals with the four years 

 ending June 30, 1920. In May, 1920, Mr. Charles 

 Madeley, who had been director and librarian for 

 forty-four years, died, and the opportunity was taken 

 to separate the museum from thei library and to 

 provide each institution with an independent staff. 

 This undoubtedly is a move in the right direction. 

 The new keeper of the museum is Mr. G. A. Dunlop. 

 The collections have received a number of accessions, 

 among which those of local interest are predominant, 

 and include many specimens collected and determined 

 by the Lancashire and Cheshire Fauna Committee, 

 notably 290 Diptera and 77 Hymenoptera obtained by 

 Col. Fairclough in his own garden. 



In spite of difficulties connected with the delayed 

 progress of the new building and the large amount 

 of work entailed by the visit of the British Associa- 

 tion, the thirteenth annual report of the National 

 Museum of Wales records considerable progress in 

 all departments. In the natural sciences and in 

 archaeology the museum is becoming, as it ought, 

 the headquarters of investigation in the • Principality. 

 Thus Dr. Ethel Thomas, keeper of botany, has set 

 going a primary vegetation survey of Wales in co- 

 operation with field-clubs and school-teachers. Dr. 

 Simpson, keeper of zoology, has started a faunistic 

 survey of Glamorgan in conjunction with the Cardiff 

 Naturalists' Society— an effort that is obviously 

 capable of extension. The archaeologists of Wales 

 assembled in congress have expressed the opinion 

 that all finds should be preserved in museums for the 

 control and maintenance of which effective provision 

 has been made, and that local museums should be 

 affiliated to the National Museum. 



The Museum Journal of the University of Penn- 

 sylvania for September, 1920, contains a well-illus- 

 trated article by Dr. W. C. Farabee on several col- 

 lections of ancient American gold objects that have 

 lately come into the possession of the museum. These 

 objects are of extraordinary interest in the develop- 

 ment of art, and many of them are of great beauty. 

 A number of Sumerian tablets, some of which were 

 described by Dr. Stephen Langdon in 1917 as part of 

 a law code, are here translated for the first time by 

 Pere V, Scheil, of Paris, and prove the existence of 

 a code at least 1000 years before the famous code of 

 Hammurabi (circa 2000 B.C.). Other articles deal with 

 the gold treasure in the Temple of Baal at Nippur 

 (1300 B.C.) and with ancient Peruvian textiles. The 

 latter is illustrated by coloured plates. We may envy 

 our American friends these treasures of art and 

 learning, but a museum that makes its riches so 

 promptly known in this interesting manner deserves 

 to possess them. 



The study of soils as pursued in agricultural insti- 

 tutes deserves far more attention from geologists 

 than it ordinarily receives. W, G. Ogg and J. 

 Hendrick have made interesting experiments (" Studies 

 NO. 2681, VOL. 107] 



of a Scottish Drift Soil," Journ. of Agric. Set., vol. x., 

 P- 55) o" the absorptive power for ammonia of pow- 

 dered granite. The considerable result obtained is 

 not dependent on the presence of weathered material, 

 nor does the amount taken up increase as rapidly as 

 the increase of surface due to finer powdering of the 

 sample. When afterwards treated with water, the 

 powdered granite behaves like a soil, since a part of 

 the ammonia remains fixed, probably by adsorption, 

 on the particles of the rock. 



The Norfolk and Norwich Naturalists' Society has 

 recently published a new number of its Transactions 

 (vol. xi., part i). The issue includes Mr. J. H. 

 Gurney's presidential address. Prof. Boswell's long 

 and authoritative study of the surface and dip of the 

 chalk in Norfolk, and the report of the Blakeney 

 Point Committee. This report is excellent reading; 

 for Blakeney Point throughout the war had its work 

 of national defence, and good stories are told of quiet 

 English men of science mistaken for spies, and of 

 treasure-trove of wreckage washed ashore. Now the 

 "military authorities" are gone, and the men of 

 science are come back to the Point; as it is said 

 by a writer of admirable prose but shockingly bad 

 poetry : Cedant arma togae : concedat laurea laudi. 

 We wish all success to this famous and hard-working 

 society in this fifty-second year of its life; and to 

 Dr. Sidney Long, who has done so much for its 

 welfare. 



In a recent paper (Journal of Genetics, vol. x.. 

 No. 4) Prof. Punnett and the late Major P. G. Bailey 

 publish some results on the inheritance of egg-colour 

 and broodiness in poultry. The crosses were chiefly 

 between Black Langshans on one hand and Brown 

 Leghorns or Hamburghs on the other. Both broodiness 

 and egg-colour were transmitted by the cock as well as 

 by the hen. Although there is evidence of association 

 between these two characters in inheritance, yet it 

 is found to be possible to establish a non-broody race 

 laying brown eggs. As regards egg-colour, F, birds 

 laid eggs of an intermediate tint, and in F^ there 

 was segregation, with a series of intermediate tints 

 as well as the pure white and dark brown grades. 

 In the reciprocal crosses between Brown Leghorn 

 and Langshan a great difference was found in the 

 eggs laid by F^ offspring, a preponderance of 

 eggs approaching the colour of the eggs of the female 

 parent in both cases. It is considered, however, that 

 this may have been a coincidence owing to a difference 

 in the composition of the Leghorn strain employed 

 in the two crosses. Broodiness is found to be highlv 

 complex, birds sometimes showing the character in 

 one year and not in another, F^ hens from a cross 

 being usually broody, while in F, the proportion of 

 broody to non-broody birds shows great variation in 

 different crosses, and the condition may be due to the 

 action of more than one genetic factor. 



Articles v.-vn. in vol. xlii. of the Proceedings of 

 the U.S. National Museum are by Mr. A. C. Kinsev, 

 who writes on the American Cynipidae or gall-wasp's! 

 These contributions are particularly welcome, as 

 students of the family have been few, and there are 

 still large areas of the world from which practically" 



