December 9, 19 15] 



NATURE 



403 



taking- two photographs by X-rays on the same 

 plate. Its position, including its depth, was 

 worked out from the photograph by an elegant 

 geometrical construction. He reduced the method 

 to sufficient simplicity for its general use by 

 surgeons, and it has proved of great value when 

 the bullet is deeply and awkwardly placed. He 

 used this method at Netley, where he served as 

 expert adviser during his last long" vacation. 

 His offer to resume his work there during the 

 coming" Christmas vacation was accepted in a 

 letter which reached his house shortly after his 

 death. 



His sincerity and loyalty, his ever-ready 

 sympathy, and his faithful discharge of the many 

 duties he gladly undertook, endeared him to his 

 colleagues and to many generations of students, 

 who were quick to recognise and to appreciate his 

 worth. A man of strong convictions, and one 

 who had the courage fearlessly to uphold them, he 

 won the admiration even of those who differed 

 from him. Within the University, and far 

 beyond its precincts, he was rich in the friendship 

 which attaches to characters such as his. He 

 leaves a widow, who has shared with him the 

 affection and esteem in which he was held, and 

 two sons, who now hold commissions in the Army. 



NOTES. 



By the death of Mr. Henry Eeles Dresser, from 

 heart failure, at Cannes, on November 28, at the age 

 of seventy-seven, ornithology has lost one of its most 

 distinguished students. Attracted to the study of birds 

 from his early boyhood, Mr. Dresser devoted the 

 leisure hours which he could spare from the arduous 

 duties of a city life to the elucidation of the avifauna 

 of the Palaearctic region, and gave up his well-earned 

 holidays to extensive travel in Europe, Asia, and 

 America in prosecution of his favourite study. He 

 made his first contribution to scientific literature in 

 the pages of the Ihis in 1865, and for a period of 

 almost fifty years he continued to write on ornitho- 

 logical subjects in that journal and in the Proceedings 

 of the Zoological Society. His most noteworthy con- 

 tributions to ornithology are, however, his " History 

 of the Birds of Europe," in eight quarto volumes, 

 1871-81, followed by a supplementary volume In 

 1895-96; "A Monograph of the Meropidae," 1884-86; 

 "A Monograph of the Coracildae," 1893; "A Manual 

 of Palaearctic Birds," 1902-3; and "The Eggs of the 

 Birds of Europe," in two volumes, 1910. For the 

 purposes of these monographs he gradually acquired 

 a magnificent collection of the skins and eggs of 

 Palaearctic birds, now in the Manchester Museum, each 

 specimen in which is fully authenticated and adequately 

 labelled. The care with which he attended to these 

 matters has rendered his collection one of the most 

 valuable in the country. His work Is marked by 

 thoroughness, rigid accuracy of description, and care- 

 ful attention to detail, while the coloured plates, made 

 mainly from drawings executed by Joseph Wolf and 

 J. C. Keulemans, illustrating his monographs are 

 among the most beautiful and accurate in ornitho- 

 NO. 2406, VOL. 96] 



logical literature. Ornithology is indeed the poorep 

 by his death. 



We regret to announce that Dr. Robert Caird, of 

 Messrs. Caird and Co., shipbuilders, Greenock, died 

 suddenly of heart failure on December i, in his sixty- 

 fourth year. We are indebted to Prof. A. Gray for the 

 following appreciation of his activities in scientific 

 fields : — Dr. Caird was well known as an engineer 

 and naval architect, and for many years had been 

 recognised as one of the leading authorities on marine 

 engineering and the construction of ships. After some 

 time spent In America, at the works of the Pullman 

 Car Company, he joined in 1888 the firm founded by 

 his father (who in his day was a leading Clyde ship- 

 builder), and, with his brothers, Patrick and Arthur 

 Caird, built nearly all the present vessels of the Penin- 

 sular and Oriental Company's fleet, and many other 

 great liners. From 1899 to 1901 Dr. Caird was presi- 

 dent of the Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders 

 in Scotland, and he was also a fellow of the Royal 

 Society of Edinburgh. In 1900 the University of 

 Glasgow conferred on him the honorary degree of 

 doctor of laws for his services to applied science. But 

 it is perhaps not so widely known that Dr. Caird was 

 keenly interested in pure science, especially applied 

 dynamics, and did much in many ways to promote its 

 progress. About thirteen years ago he entered con 

 amore Into the movement for the better equipment of 

 the University of Glasgow ; his firm gave a large sub- 

 scription to the fund, and Dr. Caird himself took a 

 very special interest in the foundation and equipment 

 of the splendid new Natural Philosophy Institute, 

 which was one of the results of the movement. To 

 every detail of that building he gave the most careful 

 attention, and the Natural Philosophy Department owes 

 much to his practical interest and generosity. He had 

 previously been an active member of the committee 

 of Clyde engineers, to whom the University is in- 

 debted for the erection and equipment of the James 

 Watt Engineering Laboratories. 



Mr. C. J. WoLLASTON, who died recently at ninety- 

 five years of age, was not personally well known among 

 the younger generation of present-day telegraph en- 

 gineers, for he retired from active work fifteen years 

 ago with a well-merited recognition of his services in 

 the introduction of submarine telegraphy. His name, 

 however, will go down to posterity as that of a mem- 

 ber of the small company to which was transferred 

 the concession granted by Louis Napoleon for laying 

 a telegraph line under the English Channel. He was 

 one of the engineers In charge of the operations on 

 the Goliath, which started on August 28, 1850, from 

 Dover to lay the line thence to Cape Grisnez, and 

 reached its destination in the evening, from which 

 point messages were exchanged between England and 

 France "under the strait and through it for the first 

 time." The line consisted of a single gutta-percha 

 covered wire i/io in. diameter coiled on. a drum 

 mounted amidships on the vessel, and weighing five 

 tons. It was paid over a roller at the stern, and sunk 

 to the bottom of the sea by means of leaden clamps. 

 Within three days from being laid the line was 

 destroyed, but the possibility of submarine telegraphy 



