502 



NATURE 



yOcL 7, 1875 



neral de Bayer. M. Faye spoke in the name of the French section, 

 which had invited a number of eminent men of science to take 

 part in the proceedings. A number of reports of the Permanent 

 Section having been read, the assembly adjourned to the follow- 

 ing day. On the following evening a number of the delegates 

 visited the Observatory of Paris. It is stated that the longitude 

 of Palermo and Lisbon will be determined electrically with the 

 instruments which have been used for determining the longi- 

 tudes of Vienna and Algiers. 



A PAIR of Sea Lions are shortly expected at the Brighton 

 Aquarium, from the coast of California. They most probably 

 are specimens of Steller's Sea Lion ( Otaria stelleri), or of Gillies- 

 pie's Sea Lion {O. japonica), iuigmgirom the locality whence 

 they were obtained. It must be remembered that the name 

 Sea Lion corresponds with the genus scientifically known as 

 Otaria, and that there are several species, two of which — 

 0. jubata, and 0. pusilla, both from the Falkland Islands— are 

 represented in the collection of the Zoological Society in Regent's 

 Park. Further information with reference to these interesting 

 animals, from some species of which the so-called sealskin of 

 commerce is obtained, will be found in our abstracts of two 

 lectures delivered in the Zoological Gardens by Mr. J. W. 

 Clarke during_the early summer of this year (Nature, vol. xi. 

 p. 514, and vol. xii. p. 8). 



The organisation of the French meteorological regions is pro- 

 gressing satisfactorily. The example was set by Montpellier for the 

 southern Mediterranean . region. The northern Mediterranean 

 region has now been centralised at Marseilles, and will very shortly 

 commence operations. A special Meteorological Congress will 

 be held in Poitiers for the western and south-western regions. 

 The date is not quite determined, but a day in the end of 

 October will probably be chosen." 



A NEW Physical Observatory is to be erected at Pawlowsk, in 

 connection with the Imperial Russian Physical Observatory at 

 St. Petersburg. 



Mr. W. B. Hemsley has been appointed librarian to the 

 Lindley Library, at the rooms of the Royal Horticultural Society, 

 South Kensington, in the place of Prof. Thiselton Dyer. 



The Astronomical School established at Montsouris under 

 the authority of the French Bureau des Longitudes was 

 opened on Monday morning at eight o'clock by Capt. Mouchez, 

 the director, and Admiral Paris. The pupils are six in number, 

 all of them being lieutenants in the national navy. The 

 period of study is six months. Every two months two pupils 

 will leave and be replaced by two other naval lieutenants. A 

 number of sailors will be attached to the establishment. The 

 students will be taught the practice of celestial photography, 

 spectroscopy, meridian observations, &c. 



We noticed the establishment of a School of Anthropology as 

 being in preparation in Paris some months ago. We are in a posi- 

 tion now to give the complete list of professors and the subjects for 

 the course of lectures : — Broca, anatomical anthropology ; Dally, 

 ethnological anthropology ; De Mortillet, prehistoric anthropo- 

 logy ; Plovelaeque, linguistic anthropology ; Topinard, general 

 anthropology ; Bertillon, statistical and geographical anthropo- 

 logy. MM. Broca, Dally, and Bertillon are connected with the 

 press, and leading members of the Paris Anthropological Society ; 

 M. de MortUlet is the Conservator of the Prehistoric Museum 

 at St. Germains, 



A Meridian-room, intended for the observations of the 

 French Bureau des Longitudes, was opened last Saturday by 

 M. Dumesnil. The Bureau is now an independent establishment, 

 having an office for meetings of members and computers in a 

 pavilion belonging to the National Institute. 



It is proposed to hold an Electrical Exhibition in Paris in 

 1877. It will be held in the Palais de I'lndustrie, the object 

 being to illustrate all the applications of electricity to the arts, to 

 industry, and to domestic purposes. This project, which was 

 initiated by Count Hallez d'Arros, has been received with 

 general favour both by the scientific and industrial worlds, and 

 the necessary funds have been already guaranteed. An orga- 

 nising committee is being formed, and the provisional offices of 

 the Exhibition have been established at 86, Rue de la Victoire. 



There has been recently published in Russia a work by MM. 

 Mendeleef and Kirpetschoff, on the Compressibility of Gases. 

 The authors have been led to several results which ought to 

 attract the attention of physicists ; they tend, in fact, to prove 

 that Mariotte's Law does not hold good at low pressures, and that 

 some of the results of Regnault's experiments do not agree with 

 those obtained in other conditions. 



The Swedish Arctic Exhibition arrived at Hammerfest on 

 Sept. 26, in perfect health and condition. They have brought 

 back a rich naturalist collection and several important hydro- 

 graphic reports. The mouth of the Jenisei river was reached on 

 the 15th of August, and Professors Nordenskjold, Sundstroem, 

 and Stuxberg took leave of the expedition four days afterwards. 

 They will return to Sweden vid Siberia. 



The following pretty optical experiment is sent us by Prof, 

 F. E. Nipher. Observe a white cloud through a plate of red 

 glass with one eye, and through green glass with the other eye. 

 After some moments transfer both eyes to the red glass, opening 

 and closing each eye alternately. The strengthening of the red 

 colour in the eye, fatigued by its complementary green, is very 

 striking. The explanation of the phenomenon is of course well 

 known, and many modifications of the experiment will readily 

 suggest themselves. 



It is known to many experimenters that pulverised magnetic 

 oxide of iron is to be preferred to iron filings in making magnetic 

 curves. It is easily pulverised to any desired fineness. We do 

 not know why filings are so universally recommended by writers 

 on this subject. 



The Botanical Society of France has been recognised as an 

 establishment of public utility by a presidential decree of Aug. 26. 

 French botany has [recently sustained a great loss in the' death 

 (at the age of seventy-two years) of M. Boreau, director of the 

 Botanic Garden of Angers. M. Boreau was the author of a 

 " Flora of Central France and of the Basin of the Loire, " a work 

 which has reached its third edition. Many papers by him have 

 appeared in the Memoirs of the Societe Academique de Maine- 

 et-Loire. 



At the International Medical Congress at Brussels, Prof. 

 Marey gave before a large and interested audience a simple, 

 clear, and very complete account of the principal advances in 

 physiology which are due to the introduction of the graphic 

 method into its means of investigation. The application of 

 the methods of mechanics and physics, he believes, has shown 

 what vast horizons are open to the researches of the physiologist, 

 by proving that [now we may calculate exactly infinitely small 

 quantities in space and time. 



The August part, just published, of the Bulletin of the French 

 Geographical Society contains a very curious and interesting 

 paper by M. E. Cortambert, on "the geogi-aj^hical distribution of 

 celebrated persons in France, or the density of the intellectual 

 forces in various parts of France." It is intended to accompany 

 a map in which, by various tints of colour, it is attempted to 

 indicate the proportion of notable men which have been born in 

 the various departments of the couniry. M. Cortambert goes 



