208 



NATURE 



Sjfune 26, 1879 



enterprise in this respect is nothing more nor less than the im- 

 portation of half-a-dozen live Zulu Caffres ! 



Dr. Elliott Coues's Bibliographical Appendix to his 

 "Birds of the Colorado Valley" has proved, the New York 

 Nation states, the occasion of one of the highest compliments 

 paid of recent years to American science. A memorial has been 

 addressed to him, signed by Prof. Flower, Huxley, Darwin, 

 Mivart, Wallace, Gould, Sclater, Giinther, Newton, and 

 numerous other eminent English zoologists, declaring his special 

 fitness to undertake a complete Bibliography of Ornithology, 

 and urging the importance — the indispensableness, in fact — of 

 his visiting the older European libraries in 'order, for the non- 

 American portion, to consult every work mentioned at first hand. 

 They express the hope that the same official liberality which 

 has permitted Dr. Coues to remain in Washington for the prose- 

 cution of his bibliographical labours, will grant him leave of 

 absence and provide the means for carrying out the wishes of 

 the memorialists ; and they promise him a warm welcome to 

 England and every assistance in their power. Such a call, the 

 Nation thinl<s, ought to be irresistible, and .has every reason to 

 believe that it will be heeded. 



The fine collections, consisting mainly of insects, of Dr. A. 

 Boucard, the results of many years' gathering from all parts of 

 the world, are for sale. 



Prof. Dubois-Reymond showed in 1859 that the polarisa- 

 sation of amalgamated zinc electrodes in aqueous solution of 

 zinc sulphate was, with use of very weak polarising currents, 

 extremely small, and he called such a combination " unpolaris- 

 able." This mere approximation seems to have been since mis- 

 apprehended, and it has been quite overlooked that the non- 

 polarisability is 'quite lost with increasing strength of current. 

 In experiments lately made by Herr II. F. Weber, in order to 

 test the laws of hydro-diffusion ( Vierieljahrsschrift tier natiirf. 

 Ges, zu Zurich, vol. xxiii.), it has appeared that between amal- 

 gamated zinc plates in zinc sulphate solution, a very definite 

 polarisation occurs, and may even be employed as a method of 

 measurement for the progress of the difTusion. This polarisa- 

 tion, however, is not the consequence of electrolytic processes 

 at the electrodes, but of changes of concentration in the layers 

 of zinc sulphate solution in contact with the electrodes, pro- 

 duced by passage of the ions. A sample experiment with amal- 

 gamated zinc plates, not placed vertically opposite each other, 

 but horizontally, one over the other, proves the correctness of 

 this assertion. 



The Scinde CiiH and Military Gazette describes a remarkable 

 hailstorm that burst over Hala on May 8. The storm, we believe, 

 was purely local. It commenced about four o'clock in the 

 afternoon, coming up from the north-west with a strong wind 

 and preceded by a heavy dust-storm. On the first burst the 

 hailstones were, in form, flattened cones, with a central belt of 

 snow-like ice and outer belts of clear ice. After the first fall of 

 hail and rain the storm swept on to the south. There was a 

 short lull, when the storm, working apparently in a circle, again 

 broke over Hala, this time coming up with the wind from 

 the south. Thunder and lightning were now continuous, [the 

 thunder, in fact, never ceasing for an instant, and a fall of enor- 

 mous hailstones took place. These, unlike those of the first 

 fall, were spherical in shape, snow-like in appearance, and in 

 size larger than the largest marble — one, whose diameter was 

 estimated, being an inch and a half across — as large, that is, as 

 an ordinary hen's egg. For some time after the storm the 

 ground was thick and white with the monstrous hailstones ; ex- 

 cept under trees, where beds of leaves and branches lay, broken 

 and beaten off from above. The storm continued from first to 

 last for about one hour and a half, and went off towards the 

 north-east. 



The Henry Gifiard captive balloon has been inspected by 

 the pviblic authorities of Paris, and opened to the public for 

 ascents. 



In a recent medical report from Chinkiang, on the Yangtsze- 

 kiang, in the neighbourhood of which there are immense depots 

 of salt. Dr. A. R. Piatt mentions that he has observed a form of 

 skin disease, presenting all the essential symptoms of ecthyma, 

 yet with others that do not properly belong to that affection, and 

 all so aggravated as to make the variety unique in his experience. 

 It appears to be peculiar to workers in salt, judging from the 

 four cases Dr. Piatt has seen, all of whom were females, and all 

 engaged in salt smuggling. They did not hesitate to attribute 

 their condition to their daily habit of carrying large quantities of 

 salt in girdles next the skin, so as to be concealed by their 

 clothing, though, as the eruption first appeared on the hands, 

 they were more inclined to lay it down to the preparation of the 

 packages than to the transportation, and informed Dr. Piatt that 

 it was quite common among the people at the salt stations whence 

 they procured their illicit supplies. Dr. Piatt in his report 

 furnishes a detailed account of the symptoms exhibited in the 

 cases referred to, and of the line of treatment which he adopted 

 with very satisfactory results. 



The Municipal Council of Paris has adopted a proposal made 

 by M. de Villiers, Chief Engineer of Ponts-et-Chaussees, for 

 establishing at the Trocadero a stone which will be the zero point 

 of levelling for Paris and the Seine Department. It is stated 

 that the Minister of Public Works will order such a stone to be 

 erected In the chief city of each department. All these stones 

 will be related to each other by the Bourdaloue levelling which 

 was made many years ago, and which takes for zero the mean 

 level of the Mediterranean at Marseilles ; this last is supposed, of 

 course, as invariable. 



The French Minister 'of Agriculture has published a report 

 on the agricultural educational institutions of France, which 

 shows an immense variety. The head establishment is the 

 Ecole Superieure of Agriculture at the Conservatoire des Arts 

 et Metiers. Next to this institution are the regional schools 

 of agriculture as at Grignon and several other places. A 

 number of special subjects have schools devoted to them, as 

 the veterinary school at Alfort, schools of gardening at 

 Versailles, schools of draining and irrigation in Brittany; a 

 school of pisciculture has been established at Huningue, which 

 was lost to France with Alsace ; there are also schools for sheep- 

 rearing, vine-growing, &c. The Vincennes farm and some 

 others are devoted to experimental agriculture. Farmers' schools 

 are located in several parts of the country, and kept by private 

 individuals at their own expense, with a subsidy from townships 

 or departments for training young men in several agricultural 

 specialties. We may also consider as a part of these institutions 

 the School of Arboriculture in the Luxembourg, and the School 

 of Insectology in the same garden ; although they have no 

 registered pupils, they have lecturers and museum and experi- 

 mental grounds at their disposition. 



A TRANSLATION of Fau's " Anatomie Artistique," by Dr. 

 Carter Blake, of Westminster Hospital, will shortly be published 

 by Messrs. Bailliere, Tindall, and Cox. 



A Russian paper gives an account of a plague of locusts 

 near Elisabetpol, which forced a detachment of troops on the 

 march to retrace their steps. They settled so thick on the 

 soldiers' faces, uniforms, and muskets, that the major, driven to 

 desperation, ordered firing at them for half an hour, but this 

 produced no effect, and a march back was ordered. The swarm 

 covered an area of thirty-five square versts. 



A SWARM of butterflies passed over Worms on the 13th and 

 14th, proceeding from north-west to south-east. 



