Feb. 7, 1878] 



NATURE 



293 



week. On Christmas Day excursions were made by steamer on 

 the Mississippi River. In former years the river was generally 

 frozen over on that day. 



The Vienna Society for the Protection of Animals offers a 

 prize of thirty ducats in gold for the best pamphlet recommending 

 the protection of animals. The little work must be of general 

 interest and must be written specially for teachers. It must be 

 in the German language and Is'not to exceed six sheets in print. 

 Competitors must send in their manuscripts, on or before July i 

 next, to the Committee of the Society at Vienna (Johannes- 

 gasse, 4). 



In the Geographical Magazine for January and February will 

 be found Language Maps of India and Further India, in- 

 cluding the Indian Archipelago, with accompanying text, by 

 Mr. Robert Cust. Mr. Cust announces that he is collecting 

 materials for a language map of Africa. Such a map already 

 exists in Stanford's "Compendium of Geography — Africa," 

 constructed by Mr. A. H. Keane, who, besides, gives there 

 material for such a map to which, we should think, it would 

 be scarcely 'possible to add. Is not Mr. Cust's work one of 

 supererogation ? 



The Geographical Magazine or February contains a curious 

 and interesting autobiography of an Eskimo, Hans Hendrik, 

 who served in the Arctic expeditions of Kane, Hayes, Hal), and 

 Sir George Nares. It was written in Eskimo and translated 

 by Dr. Henry Rink, who writes an introduction. 



Ethnologists will be interested in a paper in the February 

 number of the GepgrapJiical Magazine, by Fr. A. de Roepstorff, 

 on the inland tribe of the Great Nicobar. The author concludes 

 that this tribe is certainly not Negrito, the specimen he saw 

 having Mongolian characteristics. 



The mathematical reader will peruse with interest the eleventh 

 number of the Bulletin of the Belgian Academy of Sciences 

 (voL xliv.), where he will find a paper by M. Ghysens, on the 

 determination of volumes and superifices, being the application 

 of an ingenious and new general formula to several difficult and 

 interesting problems ; an interesting note by Prof. Catalan, on a 

 new principle of subjective probabilities ; and a^.first paper by 

 Pro^ Folie, on the extension of the notion of the anharmonic 

 relation. 



The movements of sediments in the sea it has been common 

 to regard as exclusively an effect of wave-motion. M. Fuchs 

 has recently pointed out that while this is an obvious cause, it 

 is not the only one. Another factor (and one which is probably 

 more powerful in its action), consists in the accumulations which 

 the water undergoes periodically, partly through the flood-tide, 

 partly through winds prevailing on the coasts. Suppose the sea 

 on a coast heaped up ten to thirty feet (and this is not un- 

 common), the hydrostatic equilibrium must be thereby greatly 

 disturbed, and a current must arise in the depths from the point 

 of greater to that of less pressure, i.e., from the coast to the 

 deeper parts. If a calculation be made of the excess of weight 

 caused by such accumulations of water, such enormous sums are 

 obtained that it is easy to see how the current generated will be 

 strong enough to move not only fine detritus, but large blocks, 

 towards the depths. 



The additions to the Zoological Society's Gardens during the 

 past week include a Banksian Cockatoo {Calyptorhynchus 

 banksii) from New South Wales, presented by the Lady Elles- 

 mere ; a Common Badger {Melcs taxtis) from Scotland, presented 

 by Lord Saltoun ; a Brown Bear ( Ursus arctos) from North 

 Europe, presented by Mr. J, N. Allen ; a Yaguarondi Cat 

 {Felis yaguarondi), two Yarrell's Curassows {Crax yairelli), two 

 White-bellicd Guans {Ortalide albiventris), a White- fronted Guan 

 [^Penelope jacucaca), a Common Trumpeter (Psophia crepitans), a 

 Sun Bittern {Eurypyga helias), an American Kestrel ( Tinnun- 

 cuius sparverius\ all firom South America, purchased. 



AMERICAN SCIENCE 



'T'HE eighth paper of Prof. Loomis' interesting series of " Con- 

 tributions to Meteorology (American Journal of Science and 

 /fr/j for January, 1878), treats of the origin and development of 

 storms, violent winds, and barometric gradient, the data being 

 obtained from the United States Signal Service observations. 

 Of forty-four different storms recorded between September, 1872, 

 and May, 1874, twenty-one (nearly a halQ appear to have 

 originated on or very near the chain of the Rocky Mountains 

 (the others were of various origin). More than two-thirds of the 

 whole originated north of latitude 36°. (We refer to this subject 

 elsewhere.) 



This number of the journal also contains some observations 

 by Capt. Belknap, of the Tuscarora (during her cruise in the 

 Pacific) proving once more that a cold stratum may exist in the 

 ocean between two warmer ones above and below. The case 

 occurred off the Kurile Islands, between 49° and 52° N. lat. 

 and 158" and 167° E. long. The upper part of the stratum in 

 one place, showing a temperature of 33° 7 F., was only twenty 

 fathoms below the surface, while at ten fathoms below the sur- 

 face the temperature was 41°. At a depth of 1 00 fathoms the 

 temperature was 32° ; below that curve to a depth of 200 fathoms 

 the range of temperature was from 34° '5 to 38° 7. The vddth 

 of the cold stratum gradually narrowed to a point m an easterly 

 direction from the coast, or as the edge of the Japan stream was 

 approached. (Several data are furnished regarding the currents 

 in that region.) 



An able revision of the atomic weight of antimony has lately 

 been carried out by Mr. Josiah P. Cooke, jun., and the first 

 portion of his paper to the American Academy on the subject is 

 here given in abstract. A new mineral, pyrophosphorite, an 

 anhydrous pyrophosphate of lime from the West Indies, is 

 described by Prof. Shephard, jun. Prof. Rockwood furnishes 

 notices of some recent American earthquakes ; and Maria 

 Mitchell, observations on Jupiter and his satellites, with the 

 equatorial telescope at the observatory of Vassar College. 

 Attention may also be called to a summary of the field work of 

 the United States Geological and Geographical Survey of the 

 Territories, under the charge of Dr. Hayden, for the season of 

 1877. The surveys in Colorado having been completed during 

 the previous year, the parties prosecuted their work in a belt of 

 country lying mainly in the western half of Wyoming, but also 

 embracing adj acent portions of Utah and Idaho. Among other 

 imp Ttant results. Dr. White has demonstrated the identity of 

 the lignitic series of strata east of the Rocky Mountains in Colo- 

 rado with the Fort Union group of the Upper Missouri River, 

 and with the great Laramie group of the Green River basin and 

 other portions of the region west of the Rocky Mountains. The 

 botany of the Survey was represented (it is known) by Sir Joseph 

 Hooker and Prof. Asa Gray. Mr. Jackson has visited the 

 strange ruins found in Northern New Mexico and Arizona, and 

 procured the necessary data for plastic representation of the 

 pueblos, or communal town dwellings, of Taos and Acorna, 

 models of which he has constructed. Contact with Europeans 

 has somewhat modified their ancient style of building, but one 

 can readily see that they are constructed after their ancient pro- 

 totypes, the dwellings of the forgotten people ; forgotten, because 

 the builders of the modem structures are as ignorant of the 

 ancient builders as we are ourselves. 



The first number of the American Journal of Mathematics 

 will be published early this month, with contributions by Prof. 

 Simon Newcomb, Mr. G. W, Hill, Mr. H. T. Eddy, Cincinnati, 

 O., Dr. Guido Weichold, Zittau, Saxony, Prof. Cayley, Mr. 

 H. A. Rowland, Prof. Charles S. Peirce, Prof. Sylvester, and 

 Mr. William E. Story. 



We recently announced that the American Naturalist has 

 been removed to Philadelphia for publication under the manage- 

 ment of Prof. Cope. This, with other new conditions, has given 

 dissatisfaction to a number of the old contributors. This dis- 

 satisfaction has taken definite form and is expressed in a circular 

 as follows : — " The undersigned, who have in past years con- 

 tributed articles and by other means helped to support the 

 Afuertcan Naturalist, protest against the continued use of their 

 names in the same connection under the new conditions adver- 

 tised in the December number of 1877." The circular is signed 

 by Profs. Agassiz, Gray, Whitney, Hagen, Shaler, Allen, 

 Farlow, Dana, Marsh, Verrill, Newberry, Grote, and Lock- 

 wood. 



