June 12, 1879] 



NATURE 



163 



23111. To the right a new ray had formed, which attained a 

 much greater height than the other parts of the protuberance, 

 viz., to 61", or 46,000 kilometres, and which lasted only for a 

 short time. 



It might perhaps be thought possible that the vertical rays 

 over the middle of the segment and the larger protuberarices 

 originating there, had yet been in connection with the sun's 

 surface, the dark segment having formed the foreground, so 

 that dark and dense gases of this segment might have hidden the 

 parts behind them from view. But then the segment ought to have 

 appeared as a sun spot later on, if it had not happened to appear at 

 the very extreme limb. On account of the enormous dimensions 

 a spot of this kind could not have disappeared entirely until the 

 following day, on July 23, therefore, at least some remains 

 should have been observed really as a spot. But there were not 

 any spots on the sun's disk neither on July 23 nor on the follow- 

 ing days, except two small spots on the northern hemisphere on 

 July 26. At the same time we miglit remark that in the high 

 southern latitude of the protuberance so large a spot has never 

 appeared before ; this we know by experience. 



The examples of July 24 and of August 9 are equally important, 

 if indeed less grand in proportions. In both cases the protu- 

 berance, seen detached from the solar surface, could not be due 

 to the action of storms, but, like the one described above, 

 rather appeared to favour the hypothesis of the origin in higher 

 regions. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE 



The Cambridge Museums and Lecture Rooms Syndicate have 

 issued their thirteenth annual report, in which they give details 

 of the progress made in the buildings in course of construction. 

 They report that they have no hope that the necessary expendi- 

 ture upon the various departments of the museums can again be 

 brought within the limits of the existing allowance for their 

 maintenance. Having regard to the present state of the Uni- 

 versity finances, they have directed a curtailment of expenditure 

 in all directions. This economy, however, although unavoidable 

 at present, will, if persisted in, lower the standard of scientific 

 education in the University, for it will be impossible to maintain 

 the departments in their present state of efficiency. They hope 

 that at no distant date the University will be in a position to 

 increase the fund to a sum sufficient for their proper mainten- 

 ance on the enlarged scale rendered necessary by the erection of 

 the new buildings and the increased number of students. 

 Appended to the report are the reports of the various professors, 

 the superintendent of the Museums of Zoology and Comparative 

 Anatomy, the Strickland Curator, and the Trinity Praelector of 

 Physiology on the conditions of their several departments. 



A MEETING of the curators of the University of Edinburgh 

 was held on Friday, the 6th inst., with reference to the vacancy 

 in the Chair of Mathematics caused by the death of Prof. 

 Kelland, and it was resolved to hold another meeting early next 

 month as to the appointment of a successor. Meantime, it is 

 requested that the applications of intending candidates, accom- 

 panied by any testimonials desired to be submitted, be forwarded 

 by Saturday, July J. The emoluments, which are derived from 

 a fixed endowment and from class fees, amount to between 

 1,200/. and 1,500/. per annum. Any details desired can be 

 obtained from the Secretary to the Senatus Academicus. 



The ninth Annual Rejxirt of the Wellington College Natural 

 History Society has to record a good deal of satisfactory work 

 done, as is evident, indeed, from the very full lists and reports 

 appended in the various departments. We should like to see the 

 recommendation adopted given to those Fellows who do not play 

 cricket, that they should devote themselves in the afternoons to 

 the observations of birds and insects. A very fair proportion of 

 the members, however, seem to do work. 



The new university building of Marburg was inaugurated on 

 May 29 in the presence of Dr. Falk, the German "Cultus- 

 minister." 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES 

 London 

 Royal Society, May 15. — "On the Capillary Phenomena of 

 Jets," by Lord Rayleigh. 



In this paper are given the results of observations and their 

 discussion on water issuing under varying pressvire from orifices 

 of various shapes. 



Geological Society, May 28. — Henry Clifton Sorby, F.R.S., 

 president, in the chair. — Edward Garlick was proposed as a 

 Fellow of the Society. — The following communications were 

 read : — On the endothiodont reptilia, with evidence of the spe- 

 cies Eitdolhiodon imiserie!, Owen, by Prof. R. Owen, C.B., 

 F.R.S. The author referred to the cliaracters assigned by him 

 to his Endothiodon bathystoma, which had the alveolar borders 

 of both jaws toothless, perhaps covered with horn during life, 

 as in the Chelonians ; whilst within this border there were three 

 series of teeth both in the palate and the mandible. He next 

 described a new species, under the name of Endothiodon nni- 

 series, founded upon the fore-half of a skull, having only a 

 single row of teeth in the palate, a character which may prove 

 to be of generic importance. The author finally discussed the 

 relationships of this genus, which he regarded as belonging to 

 the order Anomodontia, and as showing, like Oudenodon, traces 

 of derivation from Dicynodon in the presence of caniniform pro- 

 cesses in the upper jaw. The development of teeth interior to 

 the alveolar margins in both jaws was to be regarded as a cha- 

 racter of family value, and the author remarked upon the interest 

 of the continuance of a common ichthyic and batrachial dental 

 character in exceptional cases among the reptilia up to the esta- 

 blishment of the crocodilian type, above which, in the vertebrate 

 series, calcified palatal teeth no longer appear.— Note (third) on 

 Eiicamerotus, Hulke, Ornithopsis, Seeley, = Bothriospondylus 

 magmis, Owen, = Chondrosteosaurus magnus, Owen, by J. W. 

 Hulke, F.R.S. — Description of the species of the ostracodous 

 genus Bairdia, M'Coy, from the carboniferous strata of Great 

 Britain, by Prof. T. Rupert Jones, F.R.S., and James W. Kirkby. 

 The long persistence of the %e.mxi Bairdia,ixora the siliurian period 

 to the present day, and its essentially marine character, were first 

 noticed ; also the relatively rare occurrence of any species of 

 Leperditia, Beyrichia, and Kirkbya (associates of Bairdia in car- 

 boniferous strata) in fresh-water or estuarine beds. Carbonia, 

 on the other hand, was confined to the fresh or brackish waters 

 in which the coal-measures were formed. The difficulty of 

 defining the species of Bairdia from carapace-valves alone, with- 

 out limbs and soft parts, and the possibility of several genera 

 being grouped under this head, were mentioned. The species 

 of Bairdia described and figured in this paper were, it is be- 

 lieved, all that have been found in the British carboniferous 

 rocks, with the exception of M'Coy's B. gracilis. Two of 

 Count Munster's Bavarian Bairdia, from Hof, have not yet 

 occurred with us ; neither have four of Dr. d'Eichwald's Rus- 

 sian carboniferous species, nor the Australian B. affinis, Morris. 

 Including these, there are twenty-three known carboniferous 

 species of Bairdia. Seven of these are recurrent in the over- 

 lying permian limestones, which have yielded twelve species of 

 this genus. With six Silurian forms, there are altogether thirty- 

 four recorded palaeozoic species of Bairdia. — Report on a collec- 

 tion of fossils from the Bowen River coal-field and the limestone 

 of the Fanning River, North Queensland, by R. Etheridge, jun., 

 F.G.S. — On a fossil Squilla from the London clay of Highgate, 

 part of the Wetherell collection in the British Museum, by H. 

 Woodward, F.R.S. — On Necroscilla Wilsoni, a supposed stoma- 

 topod crustacean from the middle coal-measures, Cossall, near 

 Ilkeston, Derbyshire, by H. Woodward, F.R.S.— On the dis- 

 covery of a fossil Squilla in the cretaceous deposits of Hakel, in 

 the Lebanon, by H. Woodward, F.R.S.— On the occurrence of 

 a fossil king-crab {Limulus) in the cretaceous formation of the 

 Lebanon, by H. Woodward, F.R.S. 



Zoological Society, June 3.— Prof. W. H. Flower, LL.D., 

 F.R.S., president, in the chair. — The Secretary exhibited and 

 made remarks upon two volumes of original drawings of the 

 birds of India, which had been deposited in the Society's Library 

 by Brigadier-General A. C. McMaster. The volumes contained 

 about 270 figures of the birds of India, most of which had been 

 drawn by soldiers in General McMaster's house at Secunderabad. 

 — Mr. Sclater exhibited and made remarks on a small collection 

 of birds forwarded to him by Dr. A. Ddring, of the University 

 of Cordova, in the Argentine Republic— Mr. W. Ottley gave a 

 description of the blood-vessels of the neck and head of the 

 ground hornbill.— Mr. Edward R. Alston read a paper on the 

 specific identity of the British martens, in which he pointed out 

 the distinguishing characters of Martes sylvatUa ^-ai. M. foina, 

 and showed that the former species only is found in this country. 

 —Messrs. Sclater and Salvin gave an account of the birds col- 

 lected by the late Mr. T. K. Salmon in the State of Antioqma, 

 United States of Columbia. Mr. Salmon's collections w-ere 

 stated to have been very extensive, havi.ig been the product ot 



