304 



NA TURE 



\yan. 24, 1889 



large and marked tree near the landing-place. The tidal 

 wave on this portion of New Pomerania had rendered 

 completely desolate a coast formerly covered with dense 

 forest for a breadth of about 1 kilometre. Large spaces 

 had been reduced to a swamp covered with trees heaped 

 above one another, broken coral rocks, sea-sand, and a 

 quantity of putrid fish. Measurements made at the de- 

 clivities here give a height for the tidal wave of 12 metres 

 (39 feet). 



"As was to be expected, the tidal wave had also left its 

 mark on other coasts of the German Protectorate, without 

 having, however, caused any serious damage. In Hatz- 

 feldt Hafen, on the coast of New Guinea, a noise like 

 firing was heard on March 13, shortly after 6 a.m.,from a 

 north-north-easterly direction, and at 6.40 a.m. came an 

 astonishingly high tidal wave from the north that rose 

 2 metres (6i feet) above the highest flood-mark, and then 

 receded with such violence that half the port was dry. 

 The sea now rose and fell at intervals of three to four 

 minutes, which lasted until 9 a.m. 



"At 8 a.m. the height of the tidal wave stood at 7 to 8 

 metres (23 to 26 feet), so that the station was in imminent 

 danger. In the course of the forenoon the movement 

 gradually subsided, although the water still continued to 

 rise and fall with steady intervals until 6 p.m., when it 

 resumed its normal condition. 



" In Kelana, the newly- established plantation near Cape 

 King William, the phenomenon occurred from north-east 

 at 6.30 a.m. The first wave forced itself 25 feet on the land 

 the fourth, however, 35 feet ; this was the greatest of the 

 twenty waves observed, which came about every three 

 minutes. The phenomenon was not observed here to be 

 longer than an hour in occurring. No other circum- 

 stance of a striking nature was perceptible. The weather 

 was calm and dull. On the morning of the 14th of March 

 the whole coast to some distance was strewn with small 

 pumice stones. 



" From Matupi it was reported that from 8.15 until near 

 II a.m. the sea receded at times from the island 12 to 15 

 feet below the lowest water mark, and then rose in several 

 waves to the same height above high water mark. The 

 phenomenon appeared chiefly on the south-east and 

 north side of the island, the west side remaining un- 

 touched. The waves came partly from south, partly from 

 west-north-west. The water appeared disturbed in its 

 depths ; it had a dark appearance, and carried dis- 

 coloured foam. Neither earthquakes nor any subterranean 

 rumblings were noticed. The weather was clear, with a 

 gentle south-east breeze. On the south side of Gazelle 

 Peninsula the phenomenon was also noticed by a ship 

 ying at anchor. 



" So far the report in the ' Notices of Kaiser Wilhelm's 

 Land and Bismarck Archipelago.' Of the further move- 

 ment of the tidal wave, nothing is as yet known, although 

 it is not improbable that it spread further. 



" In Sydney (Australia) and Arica (South America), ex- 

 traordinary commotions of the sea were observed between 

 the 14th and 17th of March, which may possibly have been 

 in connection with this tidal wave. In Arica, as appeared 

 in the Mercurio of Valparaiso of the 23r'i of March, an 

 immense wave was observed on the 14th of March tov/ards 

 5 p.m., in the distance, which, increasing as it drew nearer, 

 broke with great force near the pier. Three great waves 

 followed quickly, one after another. Cf the vessels busied 

 in taking in cargo, several were shattered, and others 

 capsized. The sea was for some time so agitated that the 

 shipping of merchandize was attended with difficulty. 

 On the island in front of the port the sea broke for a still 

 longer period with great violence. 



" According to the English journal Nature (vol. xxxviii. 

 p. 491), the tidal curves on the self- registering water-gauge 

 in Sydney, showed on the ifth, i6th, and 17th of March, 

 deviations from their customary form which may have 

 been caused by the waves of an earthquake," 



NOTES. 

 The fifteenth general meeting of the Association for the 

 Improvement of Geometrical Teaching was held on Saturday 

 last at University College, London. After the reading of 

 the Report of the Council, Mr. R, B. Hayward, who had 

 been President for eleven years, resigned the presidency, and 

 the post was conferred on Mr. G. M. Minchin, Professor of 

 Applied Mathematics in the Royal Indian Engineering College 

 at Cooper's Hill. In the place of Mr. Moulton, Q.C., Mr. 

 Hayward was elected a Vice-President ; while the other Vice- 

 Presidents— the Rev. G. Richardson, Mr. R. Levett, and Mr, 

 R. Tucker— retain their posts. In the course of his valedictory 

 address, the retiring President remarked that, though they had 

 not quite attained the expectations of some of their more ardent 

 reformers, still they had met with a fair measure of success. 

 Their influence was rather indirect than direct, and it must be 

 expected that their advance would be, while steady, yet com- 

 paratively slow. The new President (Prof. Minchin) read a 

 paper on "the vices of our scientific education." 



In the correspondence of Mrs, Austin, just published by her 

 granddaughter, in the work entitled, " Three Generations of 

 Englishwomen : Memoirs and Correspondence of Mrs. John 

 Taylor, Mrs. Sarah Austin, and Lady Duff Gordon," there is an 

 interesting and whimsical letter from Humboldt, dated Sans 

 Souci, 1844. Mrs. Austin had written to him, suggesting a transla- 

 tion of his work, ' ' Ansichten der Natur, "into English. He jokes 

 about the defects of his book from the translator's point of view, 

 with its notes larger than the text, its " Teutonic sentiment- 

 ality," and the impossibility of finding a title in English for it. 

 He then proceeds : — " Alas ! you have got someone in England 

 whom you do not read, young Darwin, who went with the Ex- 

 pedition to the Straits of Magellan. He has succeeded far 

 better than myself with the subject I took up. There are ad- 

 mirable descriptions of tropical nature in his journal, which you 

 do not read because the author is a zoologist, which you imagine 

 to be synonymous with ' bore.' Mr. Darwin has another merit 

 — a very rare one in your country — he has praised me," 



On Tuesday, January 15, a new wing of the Leeds Mechanics' 

 Institute, comprising the School of Science . and Technology 

 and Boys' Modern School, was opened by Sir James Kitson. 

 ) The Leeds Mechanics' Institute was founded sixty-four years 

 ago, and, like some other establishments of the same kind 

 in various parts of the country, it has always recognized the 

 need, not only from an intellectual but from an industrial point 

 of view, of scientific education. Thanks, in part, to the whole- 

 some influence of the Yorkshire College, Leeds, there has been 

 lately in all the manufacturing centres of Yorkshire a remarkable 

 growth of opinion as to the importance of this question ; and 

 the action taken by the Mechanics' Institute in adding to its 

 buildings a set of rooms for scientific training must be regarded 

 as a characteristic and eminently satisfactory sign of the times. 

 The extension has involved a total cost of nearly ;i{^7000. The 

 building is three stories high. The class rooms on the ground- 

 floor will be used for the Boys' Modern School. On the first 

 floor a series of rooms will be used jointly by the Boys' Modern 

 School and the School of Science and Technology. On this 

 floor there is a physics lecture theatre, with a sloping gallery 

 capable of accommodating about fifty students. The metallurgical 

 laboratory, the balance room, and the chemical laboratory 

 occupy the second floor, which is reached by a wide stone stair- 

 case. In the former twenty-two students will be able to woik 

 at the same time. 



Everyone who is in the habit of using Whitaker's Almanac 

 is now familiar with the issue for 1889. It may not, however. 



