40 



NATURE 



{May 8, 1879 



The Council of the Society of Arts have awarded to Sir 

 WilUarn George Armstrong, C.B , D.C.L., F.R.S., the Albert 

 Medal "because of his distinction as an engineer and as a 

 scientific man, and because by the development of the trans- 

 mission of power, hydraulically, due to his constant efforts, 

 extending over many years, the manufactures of this country 

 have been greatly aided and mechanical power beneficially 

 substituted for most laborious and injurious manual labour." 



The annual conversazione of the president of the Institution 

 of Civil Engineers has been announced for Monday, May 26- 

 Mr. Bateman, the president, will, by permission of the Lords of 

 the Committee of Council on Education, receive his guests in 

 those galleries belonging to the South Kensington Museum which 

 contain the varied and extensive collection of engineering, naval 

 models, drawing instruments, and machinery. Mr. Bateman 

 invites the members of the profession and others to supplement 

 that collection by the loan for the occasion in question of any 

 similar suitable object. 



The American Naturalist states positively that the President 

 has nominated Mr. Clarence King to the directorship of the 

 U.S. Geological- Survey, and from an article by Mr. A. S. 

 Packard, in the same number, there seems no doubt that the 

 appointment has been confirmed. The actual state of matters 

 now is that the three surveys under Hayden, Powell, and 

 Wheeler are to be discontinued after June 30, and to be replaced 

 by a new U.S. Geological Survey, in charge of Mr. Clarence 

 King. " It was," Mr. Packard states, " as far as we are aware, 

 the original understanding, when the matter was referred by 

 Congress to the National Academy of Sciences, to simply con- 

 solidate the existing geological surveys, but the report of the 

 committee was so worded that these surveys were abolished out- 

 right instead of being consolidated. The amount appropriated 

 for the new geological survey is 100,000 dollars, a httle more 

 than each of the other surveys has formerly received. Thus the 

 work is apparently to be greatly curtailed, and science and the 

 best interests of the Western people will, in a corresponding 

 degree, suffer." We trust that this is too gloomy a view to take 

 of the prospects of the newly-organised survey, though we fear 

 that personal interests have had more weight in bringing about 

 the new state of things than the interests of science of the United 

 States. We understand from Mr. Packard that no provision has 

 been made for carrying on biological observation along with the 

 geological survey, a department hitherto admirably represented, 

 and the work of which has made the U.S. Survey famous all the 

 world over. We are sure it will not be with Mr. Kmg's consent 

 that zoology and botany will be ignored in the survey under his 

 charge, and he may be sure that men of science of all nations 

 will watch with interest the future work of that survey which 

 hitherto has contributed so largely to scientific knowledge. 



The death is announced of Mr. Frank A. Bradley, a well- 

 known American geologist ; he was crushed to death by the 

 caring of a wall of a gold mine in Georgia. 



The United States Congress has appropriated io,ooo"dollars 

 for the completion of the investigation of the Rocky Mountains 

 by the United States Entomological Commission. The work 

 during the coming season will be carried on in Colorado and 

 the Western Territories, particularly Utah and Eastern Idaho. 



Mr. S. II. Brackett, of St. Johnsburg Academy, Vermont, 

 writes to the Scientific American, claiming for Mr. Edward 

 Farrar, of Keene, N.H., the discovery of the principle of the 

 telephone in 1851. In support of the claim Mr. Brackett gives 

 the following extracts from Mr. Farrar's correspondence of the 

 time : — " Each reed of a melodeon is furnished with a small 

 metallic point, which, while the reed is at rest, approaches near 

 to the surface of mercury in a very small cup underneath the 



reed, into which the point dips when set in motion. The reeds 

 are connected with one pole of a battery, and the cups with the 

 other. The current is broken with each vibration of the reed. 

 At the remote end of the wire is a temporary magnet, with an 

 armature fixed upon a spring in near proximity to the magnet, 

 and which is affected as a reed at the other end of the line is set 

 in motion. The effect is that the armature vibrates with the 

 reed set in motion, and, the pitch of a sound depending on the 

 rapidity of vibration, it will be the same in the reed and arma- 

 ture. A tune on the instrument will therefore produce a tune 

 on the armature. What may appear somewhat strange, several 

 different tones may be heard when chords are struck upon the 

 instrument. The object of my inquiry was this : If the current 

 pffiver could be varied by some slight variation of a vibrator tt 

 be affected by the atmosphere as the tympanum of the ear is, the 

 supposition is tJial the sounds of the voice might be reproduced 

 by the means stated above." When it is remembered that Mr. 

 Farrar penned the above in May, 1854, it is to be regretted, we 

 agree with Mr. Brackett, that he was turned aside from so in- 

 teresting an inquiry at so critical a point. 



The chief work now in process of publication by the United 

 States Geological Survey, we learn from Science News, is Dr. 

 Joseph Leidy's "Monograph of the Fresh- water Rhizopods of 

 North America." It will form a quarto volume of several 

 hundred pages, enriched by numerous plates, and w'ill be the 

 twelfth of the series of " Final Reports." The author has been 

 long engaged upon this book, and brings to the elucidation of 

 this subject unequalled knowledge of the branch of which he 

 treats. The introductory chapter furnishes a general account of 

 the rhizopods, giving the characteristics which serve to identify 

 them, telling where they dwell, how they live, in what way to 

 catch them, and the proper method for studying them under the 

 microscope and otherwise. The class khizopoda, Dr. Leidy 

 separates into five orders, as follows: Protoplasta, Ileliozoa, 

 Radiolaria, Foraminifera, and Monera. Dr. Leidy confines 

 himself to those species which inhabit American ponds and 

 rivers. 



The following questions are proposed by the Belgian Aca- 

 demy for competitive treatment (the rewards offered being 

 medals of 800 francs value each, except for the third of the first 

 section, where the value is raised to 1,000 francs) :— I. Section 

 of Mathematical and Physical Sciences— I. Show the state of 

 our knowledge of phenomena known under the name of influ- 

 ence of masses, and indicate why the ideas of Berthelot have 

 yielded to those of Proust ; also indicate, if possible, the way 

 by which a solution of the general problem may be arrived at. 

 2. Find and discuss the equations of some algebraic surfaces of 

 no mean curvature. 3. Complete, by new experiments, the 

 state of our knowledge of the relations which exist between the 

 physical and the chemical properties of simple and of compound 

 substances. II. Section of Natural Sciences— i. Give a de- 

 scription of the tertiary strata belonging to the eocene series, 

 that is to say, terminated superiorly by the Laekenian system of 

 Dumont, and situated in Hesbaye, Brabant, and Flanders. 2. 

 Describe the history of the germinative vesicle in ova capable 

 of developing by parthenogenesis. (The author is free to choose 

 any animal species in which parthenogenetic development has 

 been proved to exist.) 3. New observations on the relations of 

 the poUinic tube with the ovule, in one or more phanerogams. 

 The memoirs to be clearly written in French, Flemish, or Latin, 

 and sent, with motto and sealed packet, to the secretary, before 

 August I, 1880. Great exactness required in citations. Two 

 questions are also proposed for 18S1 :— I. New researches on the 

 germination of seeds, especially on the assimilation of nutritive 

 deposits by the embryo. 2. Extend to eight points of a curve 

 of the third order, the enharmonic property of four points of a 

 conic. 



