348 



NA TURE 



[August 1 1, 1887 



eligible for admission to technical schools maintained out of the 

 rates ought to be rejected. If adults desire to attend these 

 institutions, there seems to be no good reason why their wish 

 should not be gratified. 



On Wedneslay, the 31-d inst., the Local General Committee 

 appointed to make arrangements for the Manchester meeting of 

 the British Association assembled in the Town Hall, Man- 

 chester, to receive the report of the Executive Committee. Mr. 

 Alderman Goldschmidt presided, and there was a numerous 

 attendance. In the report, which was adopted, the Executive 

 Committee gave a most satisfactory account of the efforts which 

 had been made to secure the success of the meeting. Attention 

 was especially called to the number of eminent foreign visitors 

 who are expected to be present, and it was definitely announced 

 that among these visitors will be th2 Emperor of Brazil, who has 

 been a member since 1871. Of the members of the Association 

 more than a thousand have already expressed their intention of at- 

 tending the meeting, and many ladies and gentlemen have sent in 

 their names as new members or associates. The Executive Com- 

 mittee pointed out that at previous meetings of the Association a 

 large proportion of the visitors had received offers of hospitality, 

 and they expressed a confident hope that Manchester would not 

 fail in this respect. Numerous excursions have been arranged for 

 Saturday, September 3, and Thursday, September 8 ; and offers 

 of hospitable entertainment have been received and accepted in 

 connexion with several of these. The Duke of Devonshire has 

 invited a party to Bolton Abbey ; and invitations have been 

 received from the Duke of Westminster to visit Eaton Hall ; 

 from W. H. Foster, Esq., and Sir Thomas Storey, to visit 

 Hornby Castle and Lancaster ; from W. Morrison, Esq., M.P., 

 to visit Malham and Gordale ; from the Rev. M. Farrer, to visit 

 Ingleborough ; and from the Directors of the London and 

 North-Western and Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Com- 

 panies to visit their Locomotive Works at Crewe and Horwich. 

 Hospitable offers have also been received in connexion with 

 excursi ons to Northwich, Buxton, Stonyhurst, Tatton, Maccles- 

 field, Gawsworth, Clitheroe, the Liverpool Docks, the Long- 

 dendale Reservoirs, and Worsley. The Liverpool Marine 

 Biological Committee have arranged for a day's dredging expe- 

 dition ; an invitation has been received for a visit to the Isle of 

 Man at the close of the meeting ; and several other excursions 

 have been organized. Many of the principal works and mills 

 will be open for inspection during the meeting. 



The following is the programme of the Manchester meeting 

 of the British Association : — ^ Wednesday, August 31, President's 

 Address, in the Free Trade Hall, at 8 p.m. Thursday, 

 September i, Sectional Meetings, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. ; conversa- 

 zione at the Royal Jubilee Exhibition, by invitation of the 

 Executive Committee of the Exhibition, 7.30 to li p.m. Fri- 

 day, September 2, Sectional Meetings, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. ; 

 lecture by Prof. H. B. Dixon, F.R.S., on "The Rate of 

 Explosions in Gases," in the Free Trade Hall, at 8.30 p.m. 

 Saturday, September 3, Sectional Meetings, 11 a.m. to I p.m. ; 

 excursions ; lectufe to working men by Prof. George Forbes, 

 F.R.S., on "Electric Lighting," in the Free Trade Hall, at 

 8 p.m. Monday, Septembers, Sectional Meetings, 11 a.m. to 

 3 p.m. ; lecture by Colonel Sir Francis de Winton, K.C.M.G., 

 R.A., on "Explorations in Central Africa," in the Free Trade 

 Hall, at 8.30 p.m. Tuesday, September 6, Sectional Meetings, 

 II a.m. to 3 p.m. ; conversazione at the Town Hall, by invita- 

 tion of the Right Worshipful the Mayor of Manchester. 

 Wednesday, September 7, General Meeting ia the Chemistry 

 Lecture Theatre of Owens College, at 2.30 p.m. Thursday, 

 September 8, excursions. 



The Royal Archaeological Institute has had a very successful 

 series of meetings in Salisbury and the neighbourhood. On 



Tuesday, the last day of the Congress, the members were enter- 

 tained at luncheon at Rushmore Park by General Pitt-Rivers, 

 the President. He conducted the party to Woodcutts, where he 

 has lately discovered the remains of a Romano-British village. 

 The skeletons dug up show that the people, whoever they were, 

 that inhabited this village were very inferior in stature, the males 

 being on an average only 5 feet 2 inches in height, and the 

 women only 4 feet 10 inches. General Pitt-Rivers has in his 

 museum a very large collection of articles that must have been 

 in dady use among them, including coins, both British and 

 Roman, brazen, silver, and gilt fibulas, knife-handles, chains, 

 tweezers, bracelets, locks, padlocks, flint arrow-heads, fish- 

 hooks, and horse-shoes, to say nothing of a bowl of Samian ware 

 and the bricks of a hypocaust. The members, having seen all 

 that General Pitt-Rivers had to show them, agreed that he "had 

 kept the most interesting of all the days and the best of his 

 treasures for the last." 



Science announces the death of Dr. Charles Rau, Curator of 

 the Archaeological Department of the National Museum at 

 Washington. America owes to him the excellent arrangement 

 of the large prehistoric collections at Washington. His writings 

 on American archaeology, contained in the annual reports of the 

 Smithsonian Institution and in various journals, and his recent 

 work, " Prehistoric Fishing in Europe and North America," 

 secured for him a high place among American archaeologists. 



The subscription made by some friends of the late Dr. 

 Walter Flight, F.R.S., has resulted in a sum of ;^3i7- This 

 amount has been handed over to Mr. Basil Martineau, of 

 Hampstead, and Mr. Henry Basset, F.C.S., of Barnsbury, 

 who have kindly consented to act as trustees on behalf of Mrs. 

 Flight. The Committee of the Fund, anxious to avoid expense, 

 trust that the subscribers will excuse the printing and circulating 

 of individual notices to the above effect. 



We have more than once refeired to the scheme promoted 

 from Kew for the establishment of minor Botanical Gardens 

 in the several West Indian Islands. The gardens of the 

 Windward Islands are to be in correspondence, as far as relates 

 to the supply of useful plants, and information concerning 

 them, with the chief Botanical Department in Jamaica. The 

 Island of Grenada has been the first to take advantage of 

 the new scheme. Its newly established Botanic Garden was 

 opened to the public on July 18. Barbadoes has recently re- 

 corded its adhesion. We learn with much regret that the 

 members of the group of Leeward Islands decline at present 

 to take any part in the scheme. 



The Annalen der Hydrographic und maritimen Meteorologie 

 of the German Hydrographic Office for July contains the fii-st 

 part of the discussion of the daily synoptic weather charts of the 

 North Atlantic Ocean and adjacent parts of the continents for 

 the autumn of 1883, viz. for the months September to Nov- 

 ember (see Nature, June 16, p. 159), thus commencing from 

 the period undertakea by the Meteorological Council. The dis- 

 cussion is accompanied by nine charts, showing clearly (i) the 

 paths of the barometric minima, (2) the position and changes of 

 the barometric maxima, and (3) the mean position of the isobar 

 of 765 mm. (30'ii9 inches) for fifteen periods of three to nine 

 days each. The same number also contains a comprehensive 

 discussion of the rainfall of Mauritius and neighbouring portions 

 of the] Indian Ocean, compiled from the observations published 

 by Dr. Meldrum and all other available sources, by Dr. W. 

 Koppen. 



The volume of " Hourly Readings " of the self-recording 

 instruments at the Observatories in connexion with the Meteoro- 

 logical Office for the year 1884, the last part of which is just 

 published, contains two elaborate appendixes :—(i) The harmoni 



