September 30, 1920] 



NATURE 



157 



Naturf-studv for its own sake was comparatively 

 modtrn ; the earliest writers, such as Pliny the Elder 

 and St. Basil, looked towards the marvellous and the 

 utilitarian, while passages by St. Gregory depicting 

 scenerv and the beauty of the country were excep- 

 tional. Gilbert White inculcated a love of Nature 

 which might be regarded as a revelation of Divine 

 intelligence. With reference to the " Natural His- 

 ton," Dr. White spoke of its many editions, exceed- 

 ing in number, so it was said, that of any other 

 book excepting the Bible and "The Pilgrim's Pro- 

 gre§s." Its popularity was continuous and progres- 

 sive; it illustrated the steady and quiet devotion still 

 being given to the study of Nature. 



\\ the meeting of the .Association of Economic 



Hiologists held at Kew on September 24 the subject 



discussed was that of immunity to fungus diseases in 



plants. The president. Sir David Prain, was in the 



chiiir. Mr. E. S. S. Salmon dealt with the relation 



of climatic factors, and directed attention to those 



cases where immunity broke down under certain 



weather conditions. His observations showed that 



the wild hop comprises numerous physiological forms 



with distinctive "constitutional" characters with 



\ regard to mildew, ranging from extreme susceptibility 



1 to immunity. The immune forms when grown in the 



f greenhouse remained immune; when grown in the 



<>IH>n, with warm, sunny weather, immunity is 



retained ; with low temperatures and lack of sunshine 



ihcre is a temporary loss of immunity. Clinuitic 



f utors would appear to influence also the degree of 



immunity of certain wheats to "rust." Mr. F. T. 



"nioks spoke on the question of inheritance of 



-•■ase resistance, and dealt chiefly with the work of 



tTen and .\rmstrong on Pxiccinia glumarum. 



though susceptibility and immunity behave as a pair 



I allelomorphic characters segregating in Mendelian 



I ishion, it was pointed out that the "genetic con- 



lution" of "immune" plants is liable to modifica- 



n within narrow limits by environmental condi- 



ins, so that a family rust-free one year may Ix' 



^htly affected by rust another season. Rust-resist- 



ue in wheat behaves as a simple Mendelian reces- 



c, but there is evidence that resistance to mildew, 



1 the other hand, acts as a dominant character. .A 



ief analysis of the meanings attached to the u.se of 



• word "immunity" in plant pathologv was made. 



risumi of a pap«'r by Mr. .\. Howard on the 



iportance of soil factors in bringing about epi<lemics 



u.is read. In the discussion Dr. N. L. Britten and 



Dr. E. J. Butler spoke of conditions in .Xmcrica and 



India respectively. Members were entertained ttr tea 



' the president, nnd .-iftiTwrirds vi'iitrd the nnt.Tnii' 



-irdcns. 



.\MON(i the Turkana tritM* in the Sudan, according 



'" a writer in Sudan Soles and Records (vol. iii., 



'1. 3), a curious system of recording prowess in war 



1- in force. When a man has killed an enemv a 



numbt-r of incisions are made on the victor's body to 



I ord the fact, those on the right sid«- indicating that 



'■ victim was n man, those on the left a woman. A 



')k is inserted in th<' skin, a portion of which is 



■i-iod, in which n cut about half an inch long is 



\". J()57. VOL. 106] 



made. Fat and clay are then rubbed in until tht 

 man can endure no further pain. The endurance 

 of this people may be measured by the fact that many 

 of them are covered from waist to shoulder with such 

 marks. It is only on the first occasion when an 

 enemy has been slain that these marks are made, 

 later deeds of valour being left unrecorded. 



The question of the origins of the Babylonian and 

 .Assyrian scripts has been again raised by M. G. C. 

 Teloni in an article entitled " L'ecriture babylonienne 

 et assyrienne " in Scientia (vol. xxviii.) for 1920. After 

 a full review of various, speculations, M. Teloni thus 

 summarises his conclusions : " Les theories expos^es 

 dans les pages pr^c^entes, et qui sont celles qui 

 prevalent aujourd'hui au sujet de I'origine de l'ecriture 

 babylonienne-assyrienne, se rapportent principalement 

 aux monuments d'dpigraphie sum<5riens et s^mitiques 

 du bassin de I'l-^uphrate et du Tigre. II n'a 6te, 

 jusqu'fi aujourd'hui, examin6 au service de cette ques- 

 tion que bien peu d'autres inscriptions appartenant au 

 syst^me cun^iforme. On peut attendre beaucoup d'un 

 examen approfondi des signes ^lamites (anciens et 

 modernes), vannico-assyriens et persans ; en par- 

 ticulier, le syllabaire ^lamite, rival du babylonien au 

 point de vue d 'antiquity, et le syllabaire persan cundi- 

 forme, dont la derivation de Babylone apparait de 

 jour en jour plus contestable, promctlant de faire la 

 lumi^re sur I'histoire g^n^rale de I'dcriture cun^i- 

 forme." 



An account of a remarkable sculpture recently found 

 on a capstone of a dolmen at Dehus, in the parish of 

 the Vale, Guernsey, is given in the Septemlier issue of 

 Man by Lt.-Col. T. W. M. de Gu<5rin. The figures 

 consist of a face and two hands, with the outlines 

 of a portion of both arms. Below these is a mark 

 possibly representing the girdle so often found on 

 French statue-menhirs. Anthropomorphic figures very 

 similar to that of D6hus are found in France sculp- 

 tured on the props of the Late Neolithic dolmens of 

 the valleys of the Seine and Oise, and also of Col. 

 lorgues, in the Department of Gard, while very 

 similar figures have been noticed in the grottoes of 

 Le Petit Morin, Marne, which arc believed to date 

 from the /Eneolithic period. It is now certain that 

 the cult of the divinity represented by the figures on 

 the Dehus dolmen and the statue-menhir of th« Castcl 

 lasted from early times in Guernsey, for the second 

 statue-menhir, now standing as a gate-post at the 

 C^hurch of St. Martin, is of much later date than that 

 of Castel. It is one of the largest and best-preservcd 

 statue-menhirs in existence, far surpassing in stvle 

 and execution those of south-eastern France. 



Sir James Frazkk in a letter to the 7'i»ri.-.v of 

 September 22 gives a further report of the progress 

 of the Mackie Expedition^ to East Africa conducted 

 by the Rev. John Roscoe. The expedition has been 

 at work among the Banyoro of Lake .Mbert in the 

 Uganda Protectorate. This trib«- or nation is com- 

 posed of two ethnical strata, the Bahuma, a ruling 

 caste of Ivrdsmen of Hamitic stock, and the Bairu, a 

 subject agricultural peasantry of Bantu slock. The 

 whole life of the Bahunia king is devoted to cere- 

 monial observances of a pric^tlv or matjli ;il 1 h.ir.-ii t<T 



