288 



NATURE 



[November 12, 1914 



" The Supply of Chemicals to Britain and her Depend- 

 encies; December 2, Dr. W. R. Ormandy, "Britain 

 and Germany in Relation to the Chemical Trade " ; 

 December 9, Mr. W. A. Young, "Domestic Metal 

 Work of the Eighteenth Century"; December 16, Sir 

 William Abney, "Testing Pigments for Permanence 

 of Colour"; December 17, Dr. F. Mcllwo Perkin, 

 "The Indian Indigo Industry." 



We notice with satisfaction that various scientific 

 societies are welcoming Belgian refugees who are 

 interested to attend their meetings. The Society of 

 Engineers has opened the offices of the society at 17 

 Victoria Street, Westminster, daily from 10 a.m. to 

 4 p.m. (Saturdays, 10 a.m. to i p.m.), to Belgian 

 engineers who are now in England on account of 

 the war, and they are invited to apply to the secre- 

 tary when they are in need of any information. Bel- 

 gian engineers who are unable to call are invited to 

 send their names and addresses to the secretary so 

 that they may be in touch with their colleagues and 

 receive invitations to the meetings. A committee of 

 the Linnean Society has been empowered to invite 

 Belgian botanists (whether ladies or gentlemen) to 

 attend the meetings of the society and to 

 make use of the library. The council of the 

 London Natural History Society, too, invites any 

 Belgian refugee interested in natural history to attend 

 the meetings of the society and offers them the use 

 of the society's library and collections. Particulars of 

 the meetings, which are held at Hall 20, Salisbury 

 House, London Wall, E.C., at 7 p.m. on the first and 

 third Tuesdays of the month, can be obtained from the 

 honorary secretary, Mr. J. Ross, 18 Queen's Grove 

 Road, Chingford,^ N.E. 



Mr. H. W. Codrington, of the Ceylon Civil Ser- 

 vice, has compiled a useful catalogue of the collection 

 of the European (exclusive of Roman) and Muham- 

 madan coins in the Columbo Museum. The Indo- 

 Portuguese and the Dutch coinage of the period 

 1640-1796 are well represented in the collection, and 

 this catalogue, which is illustrated by a good series of 

 process plates, will be of considerable interest to 

 numisrnatists. 



The Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of 

 Ireland for September is largely occupied with a guide 

 to the antiquities of Dublin and the neighbourhood 

 provided for the use of the meeting which was held in 

 June last. This publication is written by the most 

 competent authorities, is well illustrated, largely from 

 old engravings, and contains a fuller and more judi- 

 cious account of the local antiquities than can else- 

 where be procured. The description of St. Doulagh's 

 Church, with its remarkable anchorite's cell, is 

 specially to be commended. 



In Man, for November, Mr. J. Reid Moir discusses 

 the question of the striation of flint surfaces in rela- 

 tion to the speculations of Dr. W. Allen Sturge, who 

 attributes the markings on flints found in north-west 

 Suffolk to at least six minor glaciations which 

 occurred in Neolithic times, and he thus pushes back 

 the advent of Neolithic man to a period about two 



NO. 2350, VOL. 94] 



hundred thousand years ago. Mr. Reid Moir, a<> the 

 result of experiments on flint scratches, points out 

 that this substance is far from being homogeneous, 

 and that the belief in its hardness applies only to a 

 freshly broken, unchanged sound flint. Exposure to 

 the atmosphere produces patination or softening. It 

 is thus impossible that flints long exposed to the 

 weather could retain these scratchings for a length- 

 ened period, and those found lying on the surface may 

 owe their striation to ordinary causes, possibly con- 

 nected with agricultural operations. The composition 

 and character of flint are so important in connection 

 with the age attributed to implements made of this 

 material, that a more thorough examination of flint 

 structure and its susceptibility to striation is an in- 

 quiry which should be systematically undertaken by 

 a committee of competent geologists and archaeo- 

 logists. 



In the Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries 

 of Ireland for September Mrs. Brunicardi contributes 

 an interesting summarj' of our existing knowledge of 

 the shore-dwellers of ancient Ireland. The map shows 

 the curious distribution of their kitchen-middens. 

 They appear at only three sites on the east coast, 

 while on the west and south they are fairly numerous, 

 chiefly in Donegal, Galway, Clare, Kerry, and near 

 the harbours of Cork and Waterford. The writer 

 discusses these remains in great detail with references 

 to the original authorities. Verj' little pottery and no 

 evidence of the use of metal are found in them, and 

 Mr. Knowles regards them as among the earliest 

 remains we possess of the Neolithic age. These 

 shore-dwellers appear to have been a distinct race, 

 probably a degraded one, living almost entirely on 

 shell-fish, periodically migrating in search of food, but 

 possessing what may be termed headquarters to 

 which the whole tribe sometimes returned, and this 

 they regarded as their home. 



In Folk-Lore for September Mrs. B. Z. Seligmann 

 discusses the curious customs of demon possession 

 and devil-dancing known in Egypt as the Zar. After 

 a full description of the rites, she arrives at the con- 

 clusion that they may have a double origin, from 

 Abyssinia and the .Sudan. The word Zar is clearly 

 Abyssinian, and must have been recognised in Egypt 

 before the opening of the Sudan by Mahomed Ali and 

 the consequent importation of black slaves. It must 

 be remembered that the Red Sea route has been open 

 for more than 2000 years, while intercourse with the 

 Upper Nile has been intermittent, generally confined 

 to raiding and plundering. This route, again, was 

 barred by the Christian kingdom of Aloa, which up to 

 the fifteenth century formed a barrier between Egypt 

 and the Sudan. But whatever date may be assigned 

 to the introduction of the ZSr into Egypt, there can 

 be no doubt that its present popularity among the 

 higher classes is due to the influence of black slaves 

 received into the harems on a footing of perfect 

 equality. Hence their cult of the dead was soon 

 modified into a general belief in spirits which rein- 

 forced that which had perhaps already reached Egypt 

 from Abyssinia. Mrs. Seligmann 's graphic account 

 of these rites may be usefully compared with that 



