Dec, 20, 1877] 



NATURE 



155 



Austria. — The Austrian Government has for a number of 

 years been accustomed to bestow liberal grants to the more 

 promising students in the universities, under the condition that 

 the recipients shall make use of them to undertake a course of 

 study in the German universities. The results of this plan seem 

 to be satisfactory, for we notice that this winter an unusually 

 large number of students in all branches have been sent to the 

 various universities in Germany, 



A Berlin Polytechnic, — Berlin, with all her numerous 

 educational establishments, has lacked hitherto a polytechnic 

 such as is to be found in most of the German industrial centres 

 at the present day. This want will soon be repaired, a com- 

 mission having completed the plans for an extensive institution 

 which will embrace nearly every branch of technical education. 

 The plans for the necessary buildings have already been prepared, 

 and as there is but little doubt that the Prussian Chamber of 

 Deputies will grant the 9,300,000 marks required, the work of 

 erection will commence next spring, l On account of the exten- 

 sive character of the proposed edifices, five years will be required 

 for completion. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES 



London 



Mathematical Society, December 13. — C. W. Merrifield, 

 F.R.S., vice-president, in the chair.— The Rev. W. Ellis was 

 elected a member. — Mr. S. Roberts read a paper on normals, 

 which contained theorems depending on the invariants and co- 

 variants of the quartic equation representing a pencil of four 

 normals to a conic, and drew attention to the remarkable cubic 

 locus of the points of possible concurrence of these normals at 

 the vertices of a given inscribed triangle. — Dr. Hirst and Mr. 

 J. J. Walker spoke on the subject. Prof. Cayley, F.R.S., read 

 a paper on * ' the geometrical representation of imaginary 

 quantities and the real (nt, n) correspondence of two planes." 



Linnean Society, November 15. — Dr. Gwynjeflreys, F.R.S., 

 vice-president, in the chair. — Mr. J. Jenner Weir exhibited a case 

 of Alpine butterflies, interesting for their similarity to,, though not 

 specifically identical with, those obtained by the naturalists of the 

 Polar Expedition. — Three papers on the Arctic fauna followed. 

 I. Report on the Insecta including Arachnida, collected by 

 Capt. Feilden and Mr. Hart during the recent Arctic expedition, 

 by R. McLachlan. It seems there were obtained of Hymenop- 

 tera 5, Coleoptera i, Lepidoptera 13, Diptera 15, Hemiptera 

 I, Mallophaga 7, Collembola 3, Araneida 6, and of Acarida 6 

 species, namely, a total of 57 species. Bearing in mind these 

 are from localities between 78° and 83° N. lat., that among them 

 are thirty-five specimens of gaily- coloured butterflies and two 

 species of humble-bees, and it becomes evident the insect-fauna 

 of this so-called " land of desolation " is, after all, not so meagre 

 as anticipated. The paucity of beetles and abundance of butter- 

 flies are each striking features. From variations in certain well- 

 known species obtained, Mr. McLachlan suspects they represent 

 a local fauna, and he regards the latter as having affinity to the 

 Lapland fauna, inclining to think both are but lingering rem- 

 nants of a once former and extensive circumpolar fauna. — IL 

 Preliminary notice on the surface fauna of the Arctic Seas 

 as observed in the recent Arctic expedition, by Dr. Edw. L. 

 Moss (late surgeon, H.M.S. Alert). The author observes that 

 the seas north of the Greenland settlements are subject to such 

 varying conditions at different seasons of the year that their 

 surface-fauna cannot be supposed to be very constant. Never- 

 theless, judging from what fell under his observation during the 

 voyage, he divides the watery area into three zoological regions : 

 (a) A district in the latitude of Melville Bay, temporarily mono- 

 polised by infusoria, Peridinea : (b) a north- water region inhabited 

 by Pteropods, Tunicates, and Hydrozoa ; and {c) a sub-glacial 

 region comparatively lifeless, so far as sea-surface implies. — III. 

 On the annelids of the British North Polar Expedition (1875-76), 

 by Dr. W. C. Mcintosh. This collection, dredged between 70° 

 and 82° N. , was not so rich in numbers or species as that pro- 

 cured by the storeship Valorous in Davis Straits, but some eight 

 species were got which were not among the latter's collection. 

 None are new, but notwithstanding they help to render clear 

 some points in the geographical distribution of the marine worms, 

 so far as the circumpolar area is concerned, — Dr. H. Trimen 

 exhibited specimens of the Olibanum, or Frankincense tree 

 (Boswellia carterii, Birdw. ), gathered by Mr. J. Collins from the 

 trees planted at Aden. Dr. Trimen, in making some remarks 



on the variability of the foliage of the species of Boswellia, ex- 

 pressed the opinion that j9. Bhau-Dajiania, Birdw. , was not speci- 

 fically separable from B. Carterii. B. Frereana, which yields the 

 fragrant resin called " Luban Metyi," and which Hanbury con- 

 sidered to be the African "Elemi," is much chewed by Orientals, 

 but rarely imported into England. It is found in the Somali 

 land, where Hildebrandt recently collected it. —The following 

 gentlemen were elected Fellows of the Society : Mr. W. S. 

 Lawson, Mr. W. Joshua, and the Rev. M. A. Mactherd. 



Geological Society, December 5. — Prof. P. Martin Duncan, 

 F.R.S., president, in the chair, — Dr, Isaac Bayley Balfour, David 

 Burns, Samuel Cooke, Henry Drummond, Sandford Fleming, 

 Rev. John Hodgson, William Etheldred Jennings, Henry Merry- 

 weather, Robert Robinson, Martin Stewart, George Eastlake 

 Thoms, Robert F. Tomes, and Irwine J. Whitty, were elected Fel- 

 lows of the Society. — A portrait of Mr. J. Evans, D.C.L., F,R,S., 

 V.P.G.S., was presented by the President. — Tlie following com- 

 munications were read : — On the building-up of the White Sinter 

 Terraces of Roto-Mahkna, New -Zealand, by the Rev. Richard 

 Abbay, M.A., F.G.S. — Additional notes on the Dimetian and 

 Pebidian Rocks of Pembrokeshire, by Henry Hicks, F.G.S. 

 The additional facts communicated by the author show that at a 

 distance of about ten miles to the east of the Dimetian axis of 

 St. David's there is another ridge of these rocks, which also runs 

 nearly parallel with it. This is also flanked by Pebidian and 

 Cambrian rocks, and made up of rocks like those in the St. 

 David's axis. The Dimetian formation, so far as it is at present 

 known, consists chiefly of the following rocks : — i. Quartz por- 

 phyries, containing frequently perfect quartz crystals (double 

 pyramids), subangular masses of quartz, and crystals of felspar 

 in a felspathic matrix. 2. Fine-grained greyish quartz-rocks, 

 very compact, and interstratified with the above. 3. Ashy- 

 looking shales of a dull green colour, sometimes highly indur- 

 ated, but usually showing lines of lamination. Microscopically 

 these show basaltic characters, and are probably greatly altered 

 interbedded basaltic lavas. 4. Compact granitic-looking rocks. 

 5. Quartziferous breccias. 6. A series of compact quartzites 

 and crystalline schists, interstratified by green and purple altered 

 basaltic lavas, with a slaty and schistose foliation, and by some 

 dolomitic bands. Of the Pebidian formation new areas were 

 added, and the portions described in the author's previous paper 

 were further extended, and details as to the chief mineralogical 

 characters added. At the base of the series resting unconform- 

 ably on the Dimetian is seen an agglomerate composed of large 

 angular masses of a spherulitic felstone, pieces of quartz and 

 quartzites, indurated shales, crystalline schists, &c., cemented 

 together by a sea-green matrix of felstone. These are followed 

 by conglomerates of the same materials, which are again sue 

 ceeded by indurated shales, often highly porcellanitic in charac- 

 ter, with a conchoidal fracture. These are followed by a thick 

 series of silvery white and purplish shales and green slates, alter- 

 nating with fine and rough ashes, often conglomeritic, hornstone 

 breccias, felstone lavas, &c. The series, as exhibited at St. 

 David's, has a thickness of over 8,000 feet ; and as it is every- 

 where, so far as yet seen, overlapped unconformably by the 

 Cambrians, it may probably be of much greater thickness. It 

 evidently consists very largely of volcanic materials, at first 

 derived from subaerial, but afterwards from submarine, volca- 

 noes. These materials, however, were also undoubtedly con- 

 siderably aided by sediments of a detrital origin. The whole 

 series shows that the sediments have undergone considerable 

 changes, but yet not sufficient to obliterate the original charac- 

 ters, and the lines of lamination and bedding are usually very 

 distinct. That they were altered nearly into their present state 

 before the Cambrian sediments were deposited upon them, is 

 clear from the fact that the pebbles of the Cambrian conglome- 

 rates which rest immediately on any portion of the series are 

 almost invariably made up of masses of the rocks below, cemented 

 by gritty materials on an unaltered matrix, and from which the 

 pebbles may be easily removed. The great conglomerates at 

 the base of the Cambrians, everywhere in Wales, indicate that 

 there were beach- and shallow-water conditions over those areas 

 at the time, and that the sea was then encroaching on an uneven 

 land, becoming gradually depressed to receive the subsequent 

 Cambrian sediment. — On some pre-Cambrian (Dimetian and 

 Pebidian) rocks in Caernarvonshire, by Henry Hicks, F.G.S. 

 In this paper the author gave an account of the special examina- 

 tion of the great ribs of so-called intrusive felspathic and quartz 

 porphyries which are found associated with the Cambrian rocks 

 in Caernarvonshire, made by him in company with Prof. Hughes, 



