Dec. 1, 1887] 



NATURE 



115 



GEOGRAPHICAL NOTES. 



In the Bulletin of the California Academy of Sciences for 

 June, Mr. C. M. Richter re-examines all the data relating to 

 the ocean currents contiguous to the coast of California, with 

 the result that existing charts are in many cases found to be 

 wrong, and that great diversity of opinion exists as to the real 

 character and origin of these currents. 



In the new number of the ATonvcment GeographiqiieWiO. various 

 rumours that have been afloat as to disasters which have hap- 

 pened to Mr. Stanley's Expedition are examined, and, when 

 tested by known facts and the latest trustworthy information 

 from Mr. Stanley himself and his officers, are shown to be 

 without justification. 



Mr. Montagu Kerr sailed from London last Thursday for 

 Zanzibar, for the purpose of attempting to cross Africa by a new 

 route. It is a mistake to refer to Mr. Kerr's private expe- 

 dition as intended for the further " relief " of Emin Pasha. It 

 has nothing whatever to do with Emin Pasha; though, no doubt, 

 Mr. Kerr will shape his course through Masai Land towards 

 Wadelai as his first stage, and may be guided by Emin's advice 

 as to his further course. His main object after reaching Wadelai 

 will be to proceed in a north-\\ esterly direction towards Lake 

 Chad, solving as far as possible by the way the hydrography of 

 the Welle and Shari regions. After exploring around Lake Chad, 

 Mr. Kerr may make for the Niger, though it is possible enough he 

 will go on northwards in the direction of Tripoli. Since his 

 return from his South African journey, Mr. Kerr has been 

 diligently qualifying himself for scientific observation. 



The paper on Monday at the Royal Geographical Society 

 was one of unusual originality ; it described Mr. A. D. Carey's 

 two years' journey around and across Turkistan and into the 

 north of Tibet. Mr. Carey, who was accompanied by the 

 well-known Central Asiatic traveller, Mr. Dalgieish, de-cribes 

 so many new features that it is impossible to follow his route 

 throughout on any map. Although his route coincided to some 

 extent with those of Prejevalsky, he has been able to supplement 

 the Russian traveller's observations in many directions. Mr. 

 Carey, starting from Leh in Ladak, crossed the western part of 

 Tibet and the western continuation of the Altyn Tagh, to Kiriain 

 the south-w est corner of the great Tarim Desert. Thence along 

 the Khoten Kiver he reached the Tarim, the course of which he 

 followed, with excursions to various places on the route, as far 

 as Lob Nor. The hydrography of this interesting river Mr. 

 Carey has helped considerably to clear up. Some time was 

 spent about the Lob Nor region, and then Mr. Carey, amid 

 many difficulties, endeavoured to penetrate as far as possible 

 into Tibet ; but as his time was limited he did not succeed in 

 getting further than the Ma Chu, about half-way between the 

 Kuen Lun and the Tangla Range. But in his wanderings to 

 and fro in the great marshy and desert plain that lies between 

 the Altyn Tagh Mountains and the Kuen Lun, he has added 

 something to our knowledge of one of the most interest- 

 ing regions of Central Asia. From the Ma Chu, Mr. Carey 

 struck almost direct northwards by Sachu to Hami, across the 

 Gobi Desert. Then by a great sweep he traversed the northern 

 border of Turkistan, by Turfan, Karashahr, Kuchir, Aksu, 

 and Yarkand, back to Leh, two years after he left it. As he 

 says, he thus completed the circuit of Chinese Turkistan, and, 

 Kashgar excepted, vii-ited every important place in it. The 

 chief characteristic of the country is its extreme poverty. It 

 may be described as a huge desert fringed by a few small patches 

 of cultivation, The only really good strip of country of con- 

 siderable size is the western portion, comprising Kargalik, 

 Yarkand, and Kashgar. To the north a succession of very 

 small oases extends along the foot of the Tian Shan Mountains, 

 the stretches of intervening desert becoming longer as the tra- 

 veller goes further to the east. The eastern extremity of the 

 province is desert pure and simple, and so is the southern ex- 

 tremity as far west as Kiria, with the exception of the small 

 oases of Charchand and Chaklik. The central portion is chiefly 

 desert, except along the Tarim and in the Lob Nor region. 

 Mr. Carey gives some useful notes on the diffijrent classes of 

 people he met with, and occasionally a jotting on the natural 

 history of the region. Put the chief scientific result of Mr. 

 Carey's journey is the excellent map which Mr, Dalgieish care- 

 fully plotted every day, and which covers many sheets ; it is 

 being reduced, and will be published by the Ro)al Geographical 

 Society. 



The correspondence from Major Barttlet, Mr. Stanley's 

 second in command, from his station on the Aruwimi, shows 

 that all is going well, and that if there are any dangers they will 

 be due to the Arabs, and not to the natives. For the many 

 rumours of disaster to the Expedition there is no foundation in 

 fact ; thciij is positively no news from Mr. Stanley since he left 

 the Aruwimi, and in this case no news is good news, for bad 

 news travels as rapidly in Africa as elsewhere. 



THE ANNIVERSARY MEETING OF THE 

 ROYAL SOCIETY. 

 nPHE Royal Society held its Anniversary Meeting yesterd.i '. 

 ■*■ for the purpose of electing officers and presenting rnedaU. 

 The President delivered the address which we print IjcIow. 

 After the meeting the Fellows dined together at Willis's Ro^ms, 

 and the attendance v, as larger than on any previous occasion, 

 nearly 200 Fellows being present. 



During the past year death has removed from us fifteen of 

 our Fellows and one foreign Member. It is remark- 

 able that no less than six of these had reached the age 

 which the Psalmist takes for the extreme duration of human 

 life, while the average age of the whole exceeds seventy-five 

 years. Within two months after our la^t anniversary Sir 

 Joseph Whitworth died, at the age of eighty-four. Starting 

 from a humble beginning, he attained, through his talent and 

 steady application, a commanding position among constructors 

 of machinery and heavy ordnance, and the truth of surface and 

 accuracy of dimensions of what came from his workshop are 

 probably unrivalled. 



Sir Walter Elliot, who was still older, combined a high 

 official position in India with the pursuit of natural history, and 

 was the author of several papers in scientific serials. John 

 Hymers and Thomas Gaskin were mathematicians well known 

 to Cambridge men of some standing, and were both elected 

 Fellows of our Society nearly half a century ago. The former 

 was the author of various mathematical text-bouks, which for a 

 long time were those chiefly used in their respective subjects by 

 Cambridge students fur mathematical honours. The latter, once 

 a colleague of my own in a mathematical honour examination, 

 was famed for his skill in the solution of problems, though he 

 has not left much behind him in the way of mathematical 

 writings, beyond a book containing the. solution of a variety of 

 problems. In Robert Hunt we have lost an aged Fellow w hose 

 name is well known in connection with the study of the action of 

 light in producing chemical changes, and on vegetation. In 

 Joseph Baxendell we had a man who during a long life was a 

 diligent observer of astronomical and meteorological phenomena. 

 John Arthur Phillips, a geologist who attended most particu- 

 larly to the chemical origin of mineralogical and geological 

 phenomena, was the author of several papers, some of which 

 appeared in our own Proceedings. It is not long since Sir 

 Julius von Haast was among us, apparently in full vigour, haying 

 come to England in connection with the Colonial Exhibition, 

 and now this distinguished geologist and naturalist is no more. 

 The Earl of Iddesleigh was suddenly carried off in the midst of 

 the duties belonging to an important office in the State, whilst 

 Beresford-Hope has succumbed to an illness of some duration. 

 These two joined us under the statute which enables the Council 

 to recommend to the Society for election, in addition to the 

 fifteen who are selected in the ordinary way, and nearly always 

 on account of their scientific claims, persons who are members- 

 of Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, and whose 

 ability is thus attested, though they are not usually men of 

 science. From the list of foreign Members, one name has dis- 

 appeared which has become a household word among the 

 physicists of all civilized nations. The name of Kirchhoft 

 will ever be remembered as that of the introducer, conjointly 

 with Bunsen, of spectral analysis into the regular work of 

 the chemical laboratory, a step which has been so fertile in 

 results. To him too we owe the reference of the dark lines 

 of the solar spectrum to the absorption of portions of light coming 

 from deeper portions of the sun by the vapours of substances 

 which in the condition of incandescent vapour themselves emit 

 bright lines in corresponding positions ; and to him therefore we 

 are indebted for the detection of chemical elements in the sun 

 and stars, though partial anticipations of these discoveries had 

 been made by others. The fertility of these researches, and the 

 attention which they consequently excited, should not make us- 



