43° 



NATURE 



\August 30, 1888 



Henry Elliott, 25, mechanical engineer, Glasgow ; (^"50 each) Jas. 

 H. Binfield, 23, engineer student, Preston ; George U. Wheel sr, 

 20, engineer apprentice, London ; William Day, 22, fitter, 

 Wolverton ; Samuel Lea, 25, turner, Crewe ; Evan Parry, 22, 

 engineer student, Bingor ; Thomas O. Mein, 23, engineer, 

 Stratford, E. ; Benjamin Conner, 23, apprentice engineer, 

 Glasgow ; Thomas J. Bourne, 23, marine engineer, Tunbridge 

 Wells ; George Ravenscroft, 25, fitter. Crewe ; Thomas F. 

 Parkinson, 22, engineer student, Bury, Lancashire. 



The following is the list of successful candidates for Royal 

 Exhibitions, National Scholarships, and Free Studentships, 

 1888 : — National Scholarships : John B. Coppock, 23, student, 

 Nottingham ; James G. Lawn, 20, mining surveyor, Barrow-in- 

 Furness ; Herbert Grime, 19, teacher, Manchester; Alfred 

 Stansfield, 17, student, Bradford ; John Eustice, 24, engine 

 fitter, Camborne ; Edwin Wilson, 19, student, Bradford ; 

 Lionel M. Jones, 18, student, Llanelly ; Joseph Jefferson, 20, 

 student, Bradford ; Henry T. Bolton, 15, student, Newcastle- 

 on-Tyne ; Ben. Howe, 18, student, Manchester ; John Yates, 



20, draughtsman, Manchester; Harry Cavendish, 17, student, 

 Manchester. Royal Exhibitions : Thomas S. Fraser, 17, labora- 

 tory assistant, Glasgow ; Benjamin Young, 23, electrical 

 engineer apprentice, Belfast ; James Harrison, 29, shoemaker 

 (rivetter), Northampton : John D. Crabtree, 16, student, Brad- 

 ford ; Joseph Burton, 19, student, Manchester ; John Taylor, 



21, engineer, Glasgow ; Joseph Husband, 17, student, Sheffield. 

 Free Studentships : Thomas Bcatham, 16, student, Newcastle- 

 on-Tyne ; Charles H. Kilby, 20, engineer apprentice, Crewe ; 

 George H. Gough, 17, student, Bristol ; Henry E. Cheshire, 

 24, fitter, Crewe ; Ernest W. Rees, 20, engineer apprentice, 

 Carnarvon ; Stanley H. Ford, 17, student, Bristol. 



University College, London.— Gilchrist Engine, ring 

 Scholarships. — An entrance scholarship will be offered next month 

 (September). The valueis ^35 per annum, tenable during two 

 years, and the competition is limited to those who have not pre- 

 viously been students of the College, and who will not complete 

 their nineteenth year before October 1. Every candidate must 

 declare his intention of taking, at least, the two first years of 

 one of the engineering courses, and the second payments will 

 depend upon his success during the first year and the arrange- 

 ments he makes for the second year's study. The subject of the 

 examination will be mathematics, and any two or more of the 

 following five subjects : mechanics, mechanical drawing, an 

 essay on a given subject, French or German, and the use of 

 tools. A senior scholarship of ^80 will be awarded at the close 

 of the session. Candidates must have attended College classes in 

 the following subjects during the whole of the session : applied 

 mathematics, physics, engineering, engineering drawing, and 

 geology. The results of the class examinations will decide the 

 obtainment of the scholarship, providing sufficient merit has 

 been shown to justify the award. There are also entrance and 

 other exhibitions and scholarships given at University College 

 for mathematics, physics, chemistry, classics, German, French, 

 art, Greek, Hebrew, jurisprudence and political economy, 

 philosophy of mind and logic, English literature, medicine, 

 surgery, pathology, and physiology. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS. 



The Quarterly Journal of Microscopical Science for July 1888 

 contains the following: — On Haploiiscus pi^er, a new pelagic 

 organism from the Bahamas, by W. F. R. Weldon, M. A. 

 (plate 1). The body is ellipsoidal in outline, the antero-posterior 

 diameter being the shortest ; in an average specimen the long 

 diameter measured 1-3 mm., the short I'l mm. The dorsal surface 

 is slightly convex, the ventral flat, but concave on muscular con- 

 traction. There is a cuticular body wall ; a muscle layer on the 

 ventral surface ; the innermost body layer is a protoplasmic tunic, 

 embedded in which are numerous mucous glands opening through 

 the cuticle. At the anterior end of the body, embedded in the 

 protoplasmic tunic, is the brain. The alimentary tract occupies 

 the centre of the body. It has an oval opening : the tract itself 

 consists largely of protoplasm, which even protrudes, pseudopodia- 

 like, from the oval opening. A pair of ovaries and a testis are 

 present. Yellow cells are scattered quite irregularly throughout 

 the body. The systematic position is doubtful. The author 

 suggests that it may be a free-living Cestode.— On the true teeth 

 and on the horny plates of Ornithorhynchus, by E. B. Poulton, 



M.A. (plates 2-4). The species of Ornithorhynchus have 

 always been described as without true teeth ; bat, as is well known, 

 they possess eight horny plates — two on each side of each jaw. 

 True teeth are, however, developed at an early stage beneath the 

 horny plates ; there are certainly three on each upper maxilla, 

 and while two only have been proved to exist on each of the 

 lower maxilla, it seems extremely probable that an additional 

 pair will be found. The position and structure of these teeth 

 are eminently mammalian, and are treated of in detail. The 

 horny plates gradually intrude into the alveoli of the true teeth, 

 which, ceasing to come to the surface, are absorbed, so that in the 

 adult animal the bone and the under surface of the epithelium 

 are in close proximity.— Note on the fate of the blastopore in 

 Rana tewporaria, by H. Sidebotham (plate 5). Differs from 

 Balfour in concluding that the neural folds do not inclose the 

 blastopore, the closure of the blastopore being effected subse- 

 quently to the meeting of the neural folds ; and still more from 

 Spencer, inasmuch as the anus is not derived from a persistent 

 blastopore, but is formed from an independent proctodieal 

 invagination. — Morphological studies : No. 1, the parietal eye of 

 the Cyclostome fishes, by Dr. J. Beard (plates 6 and 7). Describes 

 the parietal eye in the Amnocoetes of P.tromyzon planeri in its 

 adult form, also in Myxine. — On some Oigopsid cuttle-fish, by 

 F. Ernest Weiss (plates S-10). A very interesting study of 

 some Mediterranean cuttle-fish. — On the organ of Verrill in 

 Loligo, by M. Laurie (plate 11). An examination of the structure 

 of this organ proved it to be glandular. 



In the Journal of Botany for July, Mr. George Murray 

 begins a list of the Marine Algae of the exceedingly rich West 

 Indian region ; Mr. F. J. Hanbury describes some forms new 

 to Britain of the very difficult genus Hicracium ; and Mr. W. B. 

 Grove a new genus of Fungi, Pimina, belonging to the I lyphomy- 

 cetes, parasitic on another Fungus on the leaves of passion-flowers 

 near Dublin. 



In the Botanical Gazette for June, Mr. Charles Robertson 

 begins a paper having for its object an attempt to explain 

 the origin of the zygomorphic form in flowers, on the principle of 

 natural selection. Herr A. F. Foerste describes a number of 

 structures adapted to cross-fertilization in American flowers ; and 

 Mr. F. H. Knowlton a new fossil Chara from the Lower Tertianes 

 in Utah. 



American Journal of Science, July. — Upon the relation which 

 the former orbits of those meteorites that are in our collections, 

 and that were seen to fall, had to the earth's orbit, by H. A. 

 Newton. We printed this paper on July 12 (p. 250). — History of 

 changes in the Mount Loa craters (continued), by James D. Dana. 

 This paper deals mainly with Mokuaweoweo, the summit crater 

 of Mount Loa. The history is given of its eruptions from 1832 

 to 1888, and the subject is illustrated with three plates, giving 

 maps of the island of Hawaii and of Mokuaweoweo with two 

 views of a lava fountain at the eruption of January 1887. The 

 paper is followed by a communication from, W. T. Brigham and 

 J. M. Alexander on the summit-crater of Mount Loa in 1880 

 and 1885. — On an explanation of the action of a magnet on 

 chemical action, by Henry A. Rowland and Louis Bell. These 

 researches have reference to Prof. Ken, sen's di-covery that mag- 

 netism has a remarkable action on the deposition of copper from 

 one of its solutions on an iron plate, and to Prof. E. L. Nichols's 

 inquiry into the action of acids on iron in a magnetic field. 

 Their conclusions differ from those of Nichols, inasmuch as they 

 give the exact mathematical theory of the action, while Nichols 

 gives no theory, and does not notice the action of points.— 

 Wave-like effects produced by the detonation of gun-cotton, by 

 Charles E. Monroe. It is suggested that, in the curious pheno- 

 mena here described, a means may be found for distinguishing 

 between, and perhaps measuring the effects of, different deton- 

 ating explosives. — A mode of reading mirror galvanometers, &c, 

 by Dr. R. W. Willson. Although less accurate than that of 

 telescope and scale, the method here proposed is stated to be 

 often more convenient. — Bertrandite from Mount Antero, 

 Colorado, by Samuel L. Penfield. The specimen of this rare 

 mineral here studied was selected from some materials collected 

 last summer at Mount Antero, in the search for specimens of 

 phenacite. Its hardness is determined at 6-7, and specific 

 gravity 2 '598 ; while analysis yielded SiO,, 5 1 '8 ; BeO, 39'6; 

 H 2 0, 8 '4 ; CaO, 1 o. — W. VV. Dodge determines some localities 

 of post-Tettiary and Tertiary fossils in Massachusetts; E. O. 

 Hovey describes a Cordierite gneiss from Connecticut ; and W. 

 Hallock has a short note on the flow of solids. 



