14 



NATURE 



[May 5, 1887 



passed inviting ministers of religion, the various professions, and 

 every representative body to petition Parliament to establish a 

 University for Queensland in perpetual commemoration of the 

 Jubilee year of the Queen's reign. A Committee was appointed 

 to prepare a petition and make arrangements for united action. 



According to the Calcutta Englishman, the Indian Govern- 

 ment-has arranged a scheme for the complete and systematic 

 botanical survey of India. The country will be divided into 

 four great districts, the first under Mr. Duthie, Superintendent 

 of the Government Botanical Gardens at Saharunpur ; the 

 second under Surgeon-Major King, Superintendent of the Royal 

 Botanical Gardens at Calcutta ; and the third and fourth under 

 the Madras and Bombay Government Botanists respectively. 



The rich flora of the PhiliiDpine Islands has hitherto been most 

 imperfectly known. In fact, it has been practically only represented 

 in European herbaria by the collections of Cuming, which, 

 though rich, were made in a limited area. It was only, there- 

 fore, to be expected that the explorations made by Dr. Sebastian 

 Vidal, of Soler, Director of the Botanic Garden at Manilla, and 

 of the Connnission for studying the forest flora, would add to 

 our knowledge a profusion of new and interesting species. Dr, 

 Vidal has on two occasions visited Kew with his collections, 

 which have quite realised the expectations that had been formed 

 of them. There was some reason to fear that the work might, 

 on financial grounds, have to be interrupted. But from a com- 

 munication made to Kew by the Spanish Minister, we are glad 

 to learn "that although the Botanical Survey Commission 

 intrusted to Dr. Sebastian Vidal had been at one time sup- 

 pressed in the Budget of 1887-88, it was afterwards re-established 

 in view of the great importance of the work." 



The thirty-sixth meeting of the American Association for the 

 Advancement of Science will be held in New York during the 

 week beginning August 10, 1887. The New York Academy of 

 Sciences has appointed a Committee to secure concert of action 

 among those who are anxious that adequate preparations may 

 be made for the meeting. 



t In his speech at the Royal Academy banquet, Prof. Huxley 

 offered some suggestive and interesting remarks on the relations 

 between science on the one hand and art and literature on the 

 other. "I imagine, he said, "that it is the business of the 

 artist and of the man of letters to reproduce and fix forms of 

 imagination to which the mind will afterwards recur with 

 pleasure ; so, based upon the same great principle by the same 

 instinct, if I may so call it, it is the business of the man of 

 science to symbolize, and fix, and represent to our mind in some 

 easily recallable shape, the order, and the symmetiy, and the 

 beauty that prevail throughout Nature. I am not sure that any 

 of us can go much further from the one to the other. We speak 

 in symbols. The artist places his colours upon the wall ; the 

 colours have no relation to the actual objects, but they serve 

 their purpose in recalling the emotions which were present when 

 the scenes which they depict were acted. I am not at all sure 

 that the conceptions of science have much more correspondence 

 ■with reality than the colours of the artist have ; but they are the 

 symbols by which we are constantly recalling the order and beauty 

 of Nature, and by which we by degrees force our way further and 

 further into her penetralia, acquiring a greater insight into the 

 mystery and wonder which are around us, and at the same time, 

 by a happy chance, contributing to the happiness and prosperity 

 of mankind." Referring to the fact that in these days scientific 

 men are in danger of becoming specialists, occupied with a com- 

 paratively small field. Prof. Huxley maintained that the remedy 

 lies in the recognition of " the great truth that art and literature 

 and science are one, and that the foundation of every sound edu- 

 cation and preparation for active life in which a special 



education is necessary should be some efficient training in all 

 three." He concluded as follows : — " I sincerely trust, Sir, 

 that, pondering upon these matters, understanding that which 

 you so freely recognise here, that the three branches of art and 

 science and literature are essential to the making of a man, to 

 the development of something better than the mere specialist in 

 any one of these departments — I sincerely trust that that spirit 

 may in course of time permeate the mass of the people, that we 

 may at length have for our young people an education which 

 will train them in all three branches, which will enable them to 

 understand the beauties of art, to comprehend the literature at 

 any rate of their own country, and to take such interest not in 

 the mere acquisition of science, but in the methods of inductive 

 logic and scientific inquiry as will make them equally fit, what- 

 ever specialised pursuit they may afterwards take up. I see 

 great changes ; I see science acquiring a position which it was 

 almost hopeless to think she could acquire. I am perfectly easy 

 as to the future fate of scientific knowledge and scientific train- 

 ing ; what I do fear is, that it may be possible that we should 

 neglect those other sides of the human mind, and that the 

 tendency to inroads which is already marked may become in- 

 creased by the lack of the general training of early youth to 

 which I have referred." 



- The first edition of "Scenery of Scotland viewed in Connexion 

 with its Physical Geology," by Mr. Archibald Geikie, was pub- 

 lished twenty years ago. It was one of the first books in which 

 the origin of the scenery of a country was traced out in some 

 detail with reference to geological structure. Since the appear- 

 ance of the work, the author has extended his experience by 

 journeys all over Europe and through the western territories of 

 America, and he is engaged, we understand, upon a general 

 treatise on the origin of the surface features of the land. In the 

 meantime, in response to repeated requests, he has prepared a 

 new edition of his first work on the subject — the " Scenery of 

 Scotland." The book has been thoroughly revised and in great 

 part re-written. The illustrations are almost all new. It is 

 expected that the volume will be ready in time for the visitors 

 who crowd into Scotland in the summer and autumn. 



Messrs. Kegan Paul, Trench, and Co., will publish im- 

 mediately " Three Lectures on the Anatomy of Movement: a 

 Treatise on the Action of Nerve Centres and Modes of Growth," 

 delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons by Dr. Francis 

 Warner, Hunterian Professor of Comparative Anatomy and 

 Physiology. 



Regularly during twenty-five years, on the first of each 

 quarterly month, Mr. Van Voorst published a part of Hewit- 

 son's " Exotic Butterflies," containing coloured figures of new 

 species. The work was completed a few years ago. Since 

 that time, material for its continuation has accumulated in the 

 collection of Mr. Henley Grose Smith, who will now, with the 

 assistance of Mr. W. F. Kirby, bring out another series under 

 the title of " Rhopalocera Exotica." Part i will be published 

 by Mr. Van Voorst's successors, Messrs. Gurney and Jacksom 

 in July. 



In continuation of Hooker and Baker's "Synopsis Filicum," 

 a hand-book of the other orders of Vascular Cryptogamia, by 

 Mr. J. G. Baker, will be published shortly by Messrs. G. Bell 

 and Son. It will include Equisetacese, Fycopodiaceas, Selaginel- 

 laceae, and Rhizocarpese, in which, excluding the fossil types, 

 there are eleven genera and about 700 species. 



Mr. Arthur Dendy, B.Sc of the Victoria University, 

 and Associate in Science of Owens College, has been appointed 

 by the Trustees of the British IMuseum an Assistant in the De- 

 partment of Zoology ia the vacancy occasioned by the resigna- 

 tion of Mr. Stewart O. Ridley, whose work in connexion with 



