552 



NA TURE 



{Oct. 4, 1888 



NOTES. 

 We regret to have to record the death of the well-known 

 traveller, Mr. William Gifford Palgrave. He died in his sixty- 

 third year at Montevideo, where he was British Minister. Mr. 

 Palgrave will be remembered chiefly as the author of the famous 

 *' Narrative of a Year's Journey through Central and Eastern 

 Arabia, 1862-63," one of the most brilliant and fascinating books 

 of travel of modern times. 



Dr. Carnelly, of University College, Dundee, has been 

 appointed Professor of Chemistry at the University of Aberdeen, 

 in the room of Dr. Brazier, who has resigned. 



The Emperor of Japan has conferred the Order of the Rising 

 Sun, of the Fourth Class, on Mr. Thomas Alexander, Pro- 

 fessor of Engineering, Trinity College, Dublin, for services in 

 the Imperial University of Japan. 



Mr. Edgar Thurston, Superintendent of the Government 

 Museum, Madras, expects to arrive in England early in October. 

 We understand that Mr. Thurston has made some valuable 

 collections of corals and other marine animals. 



Dr. Latham will deliver the Harveian oration at the Royal 

 College of Physicians on Thursday, October 18, at 4 o'clock. 



The Exhibition held by the Photographic Society of Great 

 Britain was opened on Monday at 5A Pall Mall East. It will 

 remain open daily, and on Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday 

 evenings, until November 14. Every Monday evening trans- 

 parencies will be shown with the Society's optical lantern. 



The French Government has reorganized its system of war 

 aerostation. Henceforward the activity of the director of this 

 department will be chiefly concentrated on the manufacture of 

 captive balloons for the several corps iVarmee and fortifications. 



Within a month a new central station for the electric light 

 will be opened at the Palais Royal, Paris, for the shops, the 

 galleries, the Conseil d'Etat, the Cour des Comptes, the Theatre 

 Francais, and the Palais Royal. The building of the cave in 

 which the engines are to be placed in the courtyard is almost 

 finished. 



On Tuesday the seventh International Congress of Americanists 

 was opened at Berlin, in the large hall of the Rathhaus, before 

 a brilliant gathering of archaeologists. The opening address was 

 delivered by Herr von Gossler, Minister of Public Worship, 

 who warmly welcomed his hearers in the name of the German 

 Emperor and the Prussian Government, and referred to the 

 distinguished services rendered by the brothers Humboldt in 

 unfolding the secrets of the New World. The Congress will 

 sit till Saturday. 



At the recent meeting of the American Association for the 

 Advancement of Science, Dr. Daniel G. Brinton read an interest- 

 ing and suggestive paper on the alleged Mongoloid affinities ot 

 the American race. He held that the asserted Mongolian or 

 Mongoloid connection of the American race cannot be proved 

 either by linguistics or by physical resemblances. Speaking ot 

 the typical, racial American culture, he maintained that it is as 

 far as possible, in spirit and form, from the Mongolian. " Com- 

 pare," said Dr. Brinton, "the rich theology of Mexico or Peru 

 with the barren myths of China. The theory of government, the 

 method of house-construction, the position of woman, the art of 

 war, are all equally diverse, equally un-Mongolian. It is use- 

 less to bring up single art-products or devices, such as the 

 calendar, and lay stress on certain similarities. The doctrine of 

 the parallelism of human development explains far more satis- 

 factorily all these coincidences. The sooner that Americanists 

 generally, and especially those in Europe, recognize the absolute 

 autochthony of native American culture, the more valuable will 

 their studies become. " 



The following changes have recently taken place in the 

 editing of German botanical journals. The place of Prof, de 

 Bary, as editor of the Botanische Zeitung, has been supplied by 

 Prof. Graf zu Solms-Laubach, of Tubingen, who has recently 

 succeeded the late Dr. Eichler in the Botanical Chair at Berlin ; 

 he will act in conjunction with the late Prof, de Bary's coadjutor, 

 Dr. Wortmann. Dr. Kohl, of Marburg, has associated himself 

 with Dr. Uhlworm in the editorship of the Botanisches Central- 

 blatt, in the place of Dr. W. J. Behrens, who has been com- 

 pelled to relinquish the editorship from the pressure of other 

 engagements. r 



The interesting and valuable reports on colonial fruit, which 

 have been appearing in the Kcio Bulletin, are continued in 

 the October number. Much information is given as to fruit in 

 Sierra Leone, the Gold Coast, Lagos, Natal, Malta, Cyprus, 

 Ceylon, the Straits Settlements, and St. Helena. 



The late Mr. Samuel Miller, of Lynchburg, bequeathed to 

 the University of Virginia 100,000 dollars, the income from 

 which was to be expended for "the advancement of agriculture 

 as a science and as a practical art by the instruction therein, and 

 in the sciences connected therewith, of the youth of the country." 

 A part of the income is to be used to maintain the work in agri- 

 cultural chemistry already carried on at the University ; but, 

 according to Science, the larger portion of the income will be 

 spent in promoting instruction and research in biology. A 

 biological laboratory is being fitted up, and the equipment has 

 been ordered. The instruction will be by lectures, with associated 

 laboratory work, and will cover general biology, zoology, com- 

 parative anatomy, and biology applied to agriculture. The 

 Professor-elect is Mr. Albert H. Tuttle, recently Professor of 

 Biology in the Ohio State University at Columbus. 



An interesting gas, allene, the isomer of allylene, the second 

 member of the acetylene series of hydrocarbons, has been 

 obtained in the pure state, and its constitution thoroughly 

 investigated, by Messrs. Gustavson and Demjanoff, of Moscow. 

 Very little, and that contradictory, has hitherto been published 

 concerning this gaseous hydrocarbon, which differs so remark- 

 ably from ordinary allylene, and yet is represented by the same 

 empirical formula, C 3 H 4 . The new method of obtaining it i 

 very simple, consisting in the action of zinc dust upon an 

 alcoholic solution of dibrom-propylene. Practically one starts 

 with glyceryl tribromide, C 3 H 5 Br 3 , allowing it to gradually 

 drop from a stoppered funnel into a flask containing pieces of 

 caustic potash, and connected with a condenser. The flask is 

 heated in a paraffin bath to about 150 C, when the propylene 

 dibromide distils over as an oil of acrolein-like odour. When 

 the requisite quantity of the glyceryl tribromide has been added, 

 the temperature is allowed to sink to 130 , and water run into the 

 flask. On continuing the distillation the rest of the oil passes 

 over in the steam. The dried and re-distilled oil is then used 

 for the preparation of allene. It is allowed to slowly pass in 

 drops into a second flask furnished with an upright condense 

 and containing zinc dust and 80 per cent, alcohol. The flasi 

 heated in a water-bath, and after about twenty drops of 

 dibromide have entered, the evolution of gas begins, and 

 be nicely regulated by the speed of dropping. The gas p; 

 by a leading tube from the condenser, and may be stored over 

 water in a gas-holder, being far less soluble than allylene. The 

 gaseous allene thus obtained is colourless, has a peculiar smell, 

 reminding one of its isomer, and burns with a smoky flame. 

 Unlike allylene, however, it yields no precipitate with ammo- 

 niacal copper or silver solutions, but gives white precipitates 

 with aqueous solutions of mercury salts. It combines rapidly, 

 under considerable rise of temperature, with bromine, forming a 

 colourless tetrabromide, C 3 H 4 Br4, liquid at ordinary temperatures 

 with a camphor-like odour, but condensing to a crystalline 



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