302 



NATURE 



\_Aug. 12, 1875 



develop the image of the spot in red on a dark ground. A similar 

 method probably may serve to develop the athermic lines in the 

 ultra-red region of the solar and other spectra. 



OUR BOTANICAL COLUMN 



Ferula Alliacea.— The late Mr, D. Hanbury was a valu- 

 able and frequent contributor to the Kew Museums, and the 

 very last contribution made, or rather bequeathed by him, has a 

 scientific as well as a melancholy interest. The specimen in 

 question was a fine umbel, bearing ripe fruits of Ferula alliacea, 

 Eoiss. , the label to which we believe was written at his dictation 

 just before his death. - Seeds of this plant were also received at 

 Kew from him some time before the receipt of this specimen, 

 and these have germinated, and, though healthy, are as yet 

 naturally very small plants. In the " Pharmacographia " Mr, 

 Hanbury refers to this plant as exhaling a strong odour of Asa- 

 foetida, but says it is not known as the source of any commercial 

 product. In contradistinction of this, however, Mr, W, Dymock, 

 Professor of Materia Medica at Bombay, writing on the Asa- 

 foetidas of the Bombay market in a recent number of the 

 Pharmaceutical Journal, says that this plant produces one of the 

 distinct kinds known in the above drug market under the name 

 of " Abushaheree Hing," and is brought from the Persian Gulf 

 ports, principally from Abushaher and Bunder Abbas, and is 

 produced in Khorassan and Kirman, The specimens received 

 at Kew from Mr, Hanbury appear to have been first received by 

 himTirom the author of the paper in question, for he refers to 

 having sent such specimens ; therefore. If the specimens are 

 authentic, there is no reason to doubt the truth of the statement 

 made by Mr. Dymock, that the drug which appears in the 

 Bombay Customs Returns as Hing or Asafoetida, is produced by 

 this plant. It arrives in Bombay either in skins sewn up so as 

 to form a flat oblong package, or in wooden boxei. Its appear- 

 ance varies according to age, being soft, and about the thicknesj 

 of treacle when quite fresh, and of a dull olive brown colour and 

 a pure garlic odour. It becomes hard and translucent and of a 

 yellowish brown colour after being kept some time. Slices of 

 the root are found mixed with the resin in about equal propor- 

 tion. In i872-73Vas many as 3,367 cwt. of this drug were 

 imported into Bombay from the Persian Gulf. The information 

 given in the paper from which we have quoted the above parti- 

 culars seems to be of a trustworthy nature, and will prove a 

 valuable addition to what we already know of the Asafoetidas. 



Diverse Effects of the same Temperature on the 

 SAME Species in Different Latitudes. — In the Comptes 

 Rendus des Seances [de V Acadhnie des Sciences, June 1875, Mr. 

 A. de Candolle gives the results of some experiments instituted 

 by himself last winter to determine the degree of influence of 

 heat on the vegetation of the same species under otherwise 

 diverse conditions. The sudden burst into life and the rapid 

 development of the vegetation of northern regions is proverbial ; 

 the advent of mild weather seems to bring at once into activity 

 the accumulated vital energies, and growth is exceedingly rapid. 

 In the south the same temperature would have far less visible 

 effect on the same species. De Candolle has attempted by 

 direct experiment to ascertain to what extent this influence is 

 exercised!. For this purpose he procured specimens of several 

 common deciduous trees from MontpcUier, and submitted them 

 to the same temperatiure as, and with, specimens of the same 

 species collected at Geneva, In the ordinary course of things 

 the same species came into leaf from three weeks to a month 

 earlier at Montpellier than at Geneva, but the specimens from 

 the south, by the side of the northern specimens, did not unfold 

 their leaves so early as the latter by about three weeks. The 

 White Poplar Hornbeam and Tulip Tree were the principal 

 trees employed. Catalpa, a very late leafing subject, exhibited 

 less diversity in this respect. This phenomenon is equally 

 striking in cereals and other cultivated plants. The learned 

 author attributes these differences in effect mainly to the fact that 

 vegetation, or external growth, neTer entirely ceases in the south, 

 whereas in the north there is a long period during which internal 

 changes and modifications of substances alone is carried on. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS 



The American yournal of Science and Art, July, — The origi- 

 nal articles are : — On the United States Weather Map, by E. 

 Loomis, which we have already noticed. — On a magnetic proof 



plane, by H. A. Rowland. The apparatus required is a small 

 coil of wire \io\ inch in diameter and containing 10 to 50 and 

 a Thomson galvanometer. Having attached the small coil (or 

 magnetic proof plane, as Mr. Rowland calls it) to the galvano- 

 meter, it has to be laid on the required spot and then suddenly 

 pulled away and carried to a distance, and the momentary 

 deflection of the galvanometer will be proportional to that com- 

 ponent of the lines of force at that point which is perpendicular 

 to the plane of the coil. By a coil of this kind it is possible to 

 determine the intensity of the magnetic field at any point, and 

 thus be able to make a complete map of it. Illustrations of the 

 method are given. — On pseudomorphs of chlorite after Garnet 

 at the Spurr Mountain Iron Mine, Lake Superior, by Raphael 

 Pumpelly, with a coloured plate of a section magnified '^.— 

 A brief note on the application of the horizontal pendulum, by 

 Harcourt Amory. — Explosive properties of methyl nitrate, by 

 Carey Lea. This communication describes a new method and 

 the requisite apparatus for preparing it, so that danger is reduced 

 to a minimum. — On zonochlorite and chlorastroHte, by G. W. 

 Hawes.— On glycogen and glycocoil in the muscular tissue of 

 Pecten irradians. The glycogen has the formula of the sugars 

 of that of the starch group plus a molecule of water. The 

 amount of glycocoil occurring in the tissue is small. Analyses 

 are given. — On Dr. Koch and the Missouri mastodon, by Edmund 

 Andrews. The object of the article is to show that Dr. Koch's 

 testimony contributes nothing reliable on the question of the 

 occurrence of human remains in conjunction with the mastodon, 

 — On the rate of growth of corals, by Prof. Joseph Le Conte. 

 Examining a grove of madrepores he noticed that all the prongs 

 grew to the same level, which at the time were very near the 

 surface ; and that all of them were dead at the tips for about 

 three inches. The varying level of the ocean at the place is 

 known from the Coast Survey Report, and as it seems that 

 during the high water the madrepores grow up, the living 

 points of the madrepores grow up till the descending water- 

 level exposes and kills them down to a certain level; with 

 the rise of the mean level again new points start up- 

 wards. The annual growth, calculated from the known rise 

 and fall of water level, is from 3 J to 4 inches per annum.— 

 Results of dredging expeditions off the New England Coast in 

 1874, by A. E. Verrill. Lists of species are given. — Examina- 

 tion of gases from the meteorite of Feb. 12, 1875, by A. W, 

 Wright. — Discovery of two new asteroids, 144 and 145, by C. PI. 

 Peters, The diameter of 144 is as the loth, and 145 as ii"5. — 

 The discovery of a method of obtaining thermographs of the 

 isothermal lines of the solar disc, by Alfred M. INIayer, We 

 reprint the paper this week. 



yahrbilcher fiir ivissenschaftliche Botanik. Herausgegeben 

 von Dr. N. Pringsheim. Band x. Heft, i, (Leipzig, 1875), — 

 In the first part of the tenth volume of Pringsheim's well-known 

 Jahrbiich we have three papers all of very considerable im- 

 portance. The first is a translation of Count Francesco Castra- 

 cane's paper on the Diatomacess of the Carboniferous period. 

 Ashes of coal from Liverpool yielded, on microscopic exami- 

 nation, several species"of Diatomaceae. The chief forms iden- 

 tified by Count Castracane all belong to fresh-water genera and 

 species, viz. : — 



Fragilaria Harrisonii. Sm. 



Epithemia gibba. Ehrbg. 

 . Sphenella glacialis, Kz. 



Gomphonema capitatum, Ehrbg, 



Nitzschia curvula, Kz. 



Cymbella Scotica, Sm. 

 , Synedra vitrea, ICz. 



Diatoma vulgare, Bory. 

 In addition to these there existed a Grammatophora, a small 

 Coscinodiscus, and probably an Amphipleura {danica ?). These 

 three marine forms were only observed on one occasion, and their 

 presence must have indicated some accidental inroad of sea- 

 water among the vegetation from which the piece of coal was 

 formed. All the fresh-water forms which occurred in the coal 

 are not to be distinguished from the living forms of the 

 same species, a fact of great interest and importance, as it indi- 

 cates the remarkable permanente of these forms in time ; and 

 it is probably an unique instance of the occurrence of species 

 which have remained unmodified through all the lapse of 

 ages which separates the present epoch from the coal period. 

 Count Castracane examined other varieties of coal besides that 

 obtained from near Liverpool, viz., coal from the mines at 

 St. Etienne, another from Newcastle, and a third specimen 



