October 22.. 1914] 



NATURE 



209 



Government. The Scenery Preservation Act of 1903, 

 consolidated in the Act of 1908, provided a total sum 

 of ioo,oooJ. Each j'ear a portion of this is authorised 

 for expenditure; a balance now remains of 27,136/. 

 It is curious that the native Maoris are the only 

 section of the population that does not approve 

 of the movement. Among details of interest the fol- 

 lowing may be cited. Deer are extremely detrimental 

 to forest. The lakes of New Zealand have been 

 formed b)'- the erosive action of huge bodies of ice or 

 by volcanic action ; but \\'aikaremoana was formed 

 by an immense fault in the stratification of the 

 countr}-. The greater part of forest is beech, with 

 its two varieties of black and red (Nothofagus 

 solauderi and fusca). Native flowers and birds are 

 well looked after in these reser\es, and the National 

 Society for the Protection and Preservation of New- 

 Zealand Forests and Bird Life has just been formed. 

 "Each member of the society- should consider himself 

 an unofficial ranger." It is noteworthy that most of 

 these reserves coincide with health resorts and sport- 

 ing centres. Perhaps the most beautiful of them all 

 is Day's Bay, only forty minutes from Wellington, 

 and a favourite excursion. This bit of forest is as it 

 was 1000 years ago. Another gem is the reserve on 

 the Waganui river, which is "the finest sight of its 

 kind in the whole world." " It is no compliment," 

 said a Russian traveller who had seen the great rivers 

 of the world, " to call the Wanganui ' the New- 

 Zealand Rhine.' " 



Ix Publication Xo. 4 of the Meteorological Insti- 

 tute of Chile Dr. W. Knoche gives a ver\ interesting 

 discussion of the hourly obser\-ations specially made 

 at Mataveri, Easter Island, for one year ended April, 

 1912. From a meteorological point of view- the posi- 

 tion of the island is important for the study of atmo- 

 spherical circulation ; it lies in the south-east Pacific 

 Ocean (approximately 27° 10' S., 109° 26'. W.) in one of 

 the permanent areas of high barometric pressure, and 

 within the limit of the trade-winds, especially in sum- 

 mer. Notw,-ithstanding the uniformitj- of the climate, 

 one year is naturally too short a period to deal with satis- 

 factorily, and w-e are glad to see that Dr. Knoche has 

 been able to make arrangements for observations to 

 be continued, although on a smaller scale. The mean 

 barometric pressure (M.S.L.) was : Januar}-, 3008 in., 

 July, 3006 in., year, 30-06 in. ; but conditions are 

 said to differ considerably in different j-ears, probably 

 owing to the shifting of large masses of air in the 

 high-pressure area. Rainfall during the summer 

 half-year amounted to 22-2 in., and in other months 

 to 27-9 in. The mean of the hottest month was 74-8° 

 in February, and of the coldest 64-2° in October. 

 The absolute extremes were 878° in February, and 

 51-1" in July. An unpleasant feature of the island is 

 that it is infested by large swarms of mosquitoes. 

 The volume is well illustrated by cur\-es and 

 diagrams. 



The Journal of the Washington Academy of 

 Sciences for September 19 contains a short account 

 of the results obtained by Messrs. G. K. Burgess and 



XO. 2347, VOL. 94] 



J. N. Kellberg, of the Bureau of Standards, during 

 an accurate investigation of the changes of the elec- 

 trical resistance of pure iron wire up to a temperature 

 of 1000° C. A platinum and an iron wire of about 

 an ohm resistance were wound on porcelain insu- 

 lators in an evacuated quartz tube, heated in an 

 electric furnace. The resistance of each wire was 

 determined by the bridge method with an accuracy- of 

 o-ooooi ohm., during the slow heating and cooling of 

 the furnace. That of the platinum wire served to 

 determine the temperature of the iron wire. The 

 resistance of pure iron on heating was found to in- 

 crease at a rate which itself increases up to 757° C, 

 the temperature at which the iron ceases to be ferro- 

 magnetic. Above that temperature the rate of in- 

 crease again decreases, so that at 895° C. the resist- 

 ance reaches a maximum, and at 906° C. a minimum 

 beyond which it appears to increase regularly. On 

 cooling the minimun> occurs at 880° C, the maximum 

 at 870° C, and the change in the rate of decrease 

 again at 757° C. The authors attribute the non- 

 reversible change at the higher temperatures to re- 

 crystallisation, but they have not beer^ able to detect 

 any- crystalline change at the 757° C. point. 



The forthcoming books of the Cambridge UtiiversUy 

 I Press include : — A Theory of Time and Space, by 

 ; A. A. Robb ; The Surface of the Earth : Elementary, 

 j Physical, and Economic Geography, by H. Pickles; 

 I The House-Fly, by Dr. C. Gordon Hewitt (in the 

 j Cambridge Zoological Series) ; A Book of Simple Gar- 

 dening, by D. Lowe ; and (for the University of 

 I Chicago Press) Water Reptiles of the Past and Pre- 

 ■ sent, by S. W. W'illiston ; and Assyrian and Baby- 

 i Ionian Letters, edited by R. F. Harper, vol. xiv. ; and 

 Mr. John Murray announces : — ^A Hunter-Naturalist 

 in the Brazilian Wilderness, by Theodore Roosevelt, 

 illustrated ; Emma Darwin : a Century- of Family 

 Letters, 1792-1896, edited by H. Litchfield, two vols., 

 illustrated (the second volume of the work will con- 

 tain many unpublished letters of Charles Darwin, 

 supplementing his biography by giving some idea of 

 the more intimate side of his life) ; Concerning Animals- 

 and other Matters, by E. H. Aitken ("EHA"!. 

 with a Memoir of the author by Sui^eon-General 

 W. B. Bannerman, illustrated; A History- of the Gold 

 Coast and Ashanti, from the Earliest Times to the 

 Beginning of the Twentieth Century, by W. W. 

 Claridge, two vols. ; a new and enlarged edition of The 

 Rudiments of Practical Mathematics, by- A. Conster- 

 dine and A. Barnes. 



Many rare and valuable books and papers relating 

 to mathematical, phy-sical, and natural sciences, and 

 to technology, are included in a catalogue, "Biblio- 

 theca Chemico-Mathematica," part x., just received 

 from Messrs. Henry Sotheran and Co., 140 Strand, 

 W.C., and 43 Piccadilly, W. The catalogue contains 

 descriptive notes upon a large mmiber of the books 

 and authors, and should be of assistance to bibliophiles 

 in search of important scientific works. We notice 

 particularly books by, and on, Pasteur. Paracelsus, 

 Priestley, Reaumur, Regiomontanus, Respighi. and 

 many other authors, both ancient and modern. 



