540 



NATURE 



[Oct 21, 1875 



I^assage, Capt. Young prudently determined to retreat, which he 

 did on Sept. 3. Carey Islands were reached on Sept. 11, and 

 Capt. Nares' record discovered. The Pandora arrived at 

 Disco on the 20th, passed Cape Farewell on Oct. 2, and, as 

 we have said, reached Portsmouth on Saturday. Both on the 

 outward and return voyage very rough weather was encoun- 

 tered, although after leaving Disco until Bellot Strait was 

 reached, the weather was on the whole very favourable. The 

 following is Capt. Nares' record referred to : — ".H.M.S. Alert, at 

 Carey Islands, 3 a.m., 27th July, 1875. — Alert and Discovery 

 arrived here at midnight, and will leave at 6 A.M. for Smith's 

 Sound, after depositing a depot of provisions and a boat. We 

 left Upernivik on the evening of the 22nd inst. , and Brown 

 Islands on the evening of the 23rd. Passing through the middle 

 ice during a calm, we arrived at Cape York on the 25 th inst. 

 The season is a very open one, and we have every prospect of 

 attaining a high latitude. All are well on board each ship." 

 Thus the latest news from our Arctic Expedition is entirely 

 favourable. 



Two long letters from Mr, Stanley, the leader of the Daily 

 Telegraph and New York Herald African Expedition, appear 

 in the Telegraph of Friday and Monday last. As might be 

 expected, they are full of interest, and contain many geographical 

 details, too summarily stated, however, to be condensed intelli- 

 gibly, or appreciated without a special map. Such a map Mr. 

 Stanley seems to have sent home, and we hope it will be pub- 

 lished as soon as practicable. Both letters are written from the 

 " village of Kagehyi, district of Uchambi, country of Usukuma, 

 on the Victoria Niyanza " (so he spells the name), dated March i 

 and May 15 respectively. An intervening letter has not come 

 to hand. The lake was reached after a march of 720 miles from 

 the coast, in 103 days. That the expedition has had to encounter 

 more than the usual difficulties and hardships of African explo- 

 ration may be inferred from the fact that Stanley has lost con. 

 siderably more than half his men, including two of his white 

 companions, Frederick Barker and Edward Pocock. Disease 

 carried off the greater number, though many were lost in a fierce 

 fight with the Waturu, a people o f the Leewumbu Valley. The 

 principal additions to our knowledge made so far by the deter- 

 mined leader of the expedition is a pretty full account of the 

 country and the people from Western Ugogo northwards to 

 Nyanza, and a survey of over i,oco miles of the shores of the 

 lake, which apparently is studded with islands. The Shemeeyu 

 River, known by other names in the upper part of its course, 

 which Stanley seems mainly to have followed, and which he 

 regards as the chief tributary of the Nyanza, enters the lake at 

 the village of Kagehyi. Stanley calculates its length roughly at 

 350 miles. At 400 miles from the coast he came upon the base 

 of the watershed of a number of streams which feed the river, and 

 which he evidently regards- as at least one of the Nile sources. 

 According to Stanley's observations, and they seem to have been 

 carefully made, as computed by Capt. George, the height of the 

 Nyanza above sea-level is 3, 740 feet— 68 feet higher than Speke 

 made it out to be. He has made some other corrections on 

 Speke's observations, especially in the matter of latitude. 

 Speke he makes out to be fourteen miles wrong in his latitude 

 along the whole of the coast of Uganda. The mouth of the 

 Katonga, for example, which in his map is a little south of the 

 equator, Stanley makes by meridian altitude to be in N. lat. 

 0° 16'. We sincerely hope the indomitable leader of this ex- 

 pedition will be able successfully to accomplish the large task 

 he has set before him — the exploration of the whole of the lake 

 region of Central Africa. 



Prof. Fawcett's address at the opening of the winter 

 session of the Birmingham and Midland Institute on Monday 

 was, as might be expected, instructive and impressive. The tone 

 of it was mainly that of our article last week on the Yorkshire 



College of Science, that the object of education should be to 

 develop an intelUgence which will be cultured all round, and which 

 maybe applied to any work in life. Prof. Fawcett spol< e mainly of 

 elementary education and of the education which the working 

 classes may obtain in such an institution as the Birmingham and 

 INIidland. He advocated the study of botany and political 

 economy from a disciplinary and 'practical point of view, and 

 very properly discouraged the notion that a good education 

 ought necessarily to make anyone discontented with his position ; 

 it would simply dignify labour of all kinds, and make the life 

 of the artisan brighter and nobler. A somewhat similar tone as 

 to what middle-class education should be, and what a college or 

 middle-class school should be, pervaded the address of the Dean 

 of Durham at the opening of the fifth session of the Newcastle 

 College of Science. In an efficient curriculum science will find 

 its proper place, withal a place of the highest importance. 



The Organising Committee for the International Exhibition 

 of Electricity has held its first general meeting at the Palais de 

 rindustrie, Paris, under the presidency of Colonel Laussedat, 

 one of the delegates appointed by the French Minister of War. 

 The committee approved the regulations proposed by Count 

 Halley d'Arroz, the originator of the scheme, appointed him 

 general director, and divided the exhibition into eighteen groups. 

 Amongst these are the History of Electricity, a section in which 

 will be collected, as far as possible, the instruments which were 

 used by Davy, Faraday, Volta, Arago, Ohm, Oerstedt, Ampere, 

 and others, in making their discoveries. The eighteenth group 

 will be Bibliographical ; a library as complete as possible will be 

 formed of all the books and papers published in the Transactions 

 of the several Academies, and scientific periodicals relating to 

 electricity. A requisition will be sent to the administration of 

 the National Library, asking them to offer, for 1877, their Sys- 

 tematic Catalogue of Electricity. The President of the French 

 Republic will be the head of the Committee of Patronage, and a 

 sub-committee has received instructions to open negotiations with 

 foreign savants and Governments. 



The catalogues of the various departments under the Science 

 and Art Department at South Kensington have long been noted 

 both for the extent and accuracy of the information contained in 

 them, as well as for the low price at which they may be ob- 

 tained. It is with pleasure we note that the catalogues of the 

 contents of the Bethnal Green branch are not behind those of 

 the mother institution in point of detail and careful working out. 

 That relating to the special collection ef waste products brought 

 together by Mr. P. L. Simmonds is before us, and we recom- 

 mend all those who are interested in the subject to obtain this 

 little book, which costs only threepence and contains a fund of 

 information on various matters connected with products of the 

 vegetable, animal, and mineral kingdoms. The usual sequence 

 of the three kingdoms of nature is somewhat altered here, the 

 vegetable products being placed first, and for this reason, that 

 " vegetable products have given more extensive and profitable 

 employment and results, in the utilisation of formerly wasted 

 substances and the recovery of residues from manufactures, than 

 either animal or mineral substances. " Nothing is too small or 

 unimportant to rescue from simple destruction if it can be turned 

 in any way to serve the purpose of man. As an illustration we 

 may mention the fact of the apphcation as fire-lighters of the 

 central portion of the ear of the Indian corn after the seeds have 

 been taken out ; also of the cones of the Scotch Fir {Pinus syl- 

 vestris), which are sold in France under the name of Allumettes 

 des Landes. These are novel applications of what would other- 

 wise be pure waste substances ; but there are others which, 

 though waste from one manufacture, are used to adulterate others. 

 From vegetable marrow, melon, and other cucurbitaceous seeds, 

 many of the so-called sugared almonds of the confectioners are 

 made. In China, the seeds of the water-melon are very largely 



