April 25, 1901] 



NA TUBE 



609 



M. Ujfalvy for the first time. Apparently these authors have 

 gathered their ideas from the French writers of the last century, 

 whose knowledge of Chinese was confined to such works as the 

 B'utigkien Kan^mti, or even later works of about as much au- 

 thority as RoHin's " Universal History." 



A good deal of interest attaches to the Yueh- ti. Their original 

 name was possibly Viddhal, and they seem to have had some 

 prehistoric connection with the Yadavas, who took part in the 

 Indian immigration. There never was any doubt about their 

 being the same people afterwards known to Greeks and Arabs as 

 Ephthalitse and Haithals respectively. With the Yueh-ti were 

 associated in ancient Chinese legend the Mats, or Mat-su, ap- 

 parently Maddhals, as in Indian lore Maddhu is associated with 

 the Yadavas, and this brings us to the later branch of the 

 Yueh-ti, who in these authors by a strange mistake are called 

 Yetha. Really the name in modern Chinese is Yenta, a very 

 different sound. In the old language it was I'm-dat. Where 

 the first syllable appears frequently doing duty as merely the 

 initial m, Da, or rather Dat, where final t represents /, stands 

 then for Maddhal. This subtribe seems about the fifth century 

 to have been settled in the neighbourhood of Bamian, and, 

 except that it was less civilised than the other branches of the 

 family, to have had little to distinguish it. 



Both Greek and Chinese authors concur in describing these 

 Ephthalites as being distinctly blond, with full beards, of a 

 handsome type, and of lively manners. Menander calls the 

 king under whose guidance they crossed the Hindukush 

 Catulphus, at whose Teutonic aspect Colonel Yule expresses 

 surprise. The Chinese, however, name him Kitolo, evidently 

 the same word ; most Chinese names consisting of only three 

 words, the remainder is generally omitted in the transliteration 

 of foreign names. Catulphus is, however, evidently the nearest 

 Greek equivalent for Gothic Caedwulf. These allied peoples 

 went amongst the Indians by the common appellation of Hunas, 

 whence the alternative Greek name of White Huns, which has 

 no connection whatever with that of the European Huns of the 

 fourth century, whose swarthy complexions and hairless faces 

 indicate a very different origin. These apparent Gothic con- 

 nections are not confined to the Ephthalites, but occur through- 

 out, the leader of the Scythians, e'/c ttjj 'Aerias, i.e. Wusuns, 

 whom Alexander defeated outside Kyropolis, was, according to 

 Arrian Satrakes, the Greek equivalent for Gothic Sietrich. 



Of Dr. Haddon's Hoa, evidently derived from some mistaken 

 French transliteration, I cannot even guess the origin. There 

 is no such name to be found in the earlier and more authentic 

 Chinese writers. Dr. Haddon is, however, quite correct in 

 identifying the modern Chinese Yuan yoan, or Jwan Jwan, with 

 the Avars of Gibbon. 



Dr. Haddon expresses some surprise at the beardless faces of 

 the later Huna kings ; from the appearance of the king depicted 

 on the coin, and its overhanging brows and prominent nose, he 

 certainly did not belong to the smooth-faced races of the extreme 

 north and east of Asia. So we may be sure that the bareness 

 was artificial ; it was probably the fashion of the time to shave. 



With regard to the type of face and skull represented on the 

 coin of Jayatu Mihirakula, I may remark that I met last night 

 at dinner a gentleman of whom it might be called a portrait. 

 I may describe him almost in Dr. Haddon's words as : Nose 

 large, jaw powerful, neck fleshy, the occipital region of the 

 head deficient, the vertex produced into a truncated cone. 

 This remarkable shape was in his case quite natural. Moreover, 

 With the exception of a moustache his face, as in the coin, was 

 hairless. He had similar overhanging eyebrows, a like marked 

 notch at the bridge of the nose, and an almost identically 

 aquiline nose. His eyes, however, were not oblique, nor had 

 he the slightest trace of the "Tatar," nor did he in any way 

 approach the " Mongolian " type. The gentleman is, in fact, a 

 Parsee of the highest type, polished and affable. 



Shanghai, China, March 13. Thos. W. Kingsmill. 



Graphic Solution of the Cubics. 



The note by Mr. T. Hayashi, published in Nature of March 

 28, suggests to me the following little historical remark. The 

 method given by Mr. Hayashi for the cubics is due to Monge, 

 " Correspondance sur I'Ecole imperiale polytechnique," par 

 M. Hachette, vol. iii. p. 20x ; " Solution graphique de 

 1' equation du troisieme degre, x^-px + q = o" par M. Monge. 



" L'equation proposee resulte de I'elimination de y entre les 

 deux y = x^, y—fx-^rq; I'une est le parabole cubique, . . . 



NO. 1643, VOL. 63] 



I'autre represente une droite. . . . Ayant construit ces deux 

 lignes, les abscisses x des points oil elles se coupent, sont evi- 

 demment les racines de l'equation propofee." 



Monge gives also a practical construction of the curve on a 

 small sheet of paper Nil suh sole novi! G. Vacca, 



Via Bogino, 4, Torino (Italy). 



THE WORK OF THE NATIONAL ANTARCTIC 

 EXPEDITION. 



THE final progran.me of the scientific work of the 

 National Antarctic Expedition had not been ar- 

 ranged at the date of my departure from England, as 

 the Joint Committee of the Royal Society and the Royal 

 Geogr.iphical Society had not issued its full instructions 

 as to the route and plan to be adopted. A provisional 

 summary may, however, be useful by calling forth sug- 

 gestions while there is yet time to use them. 



Field of Operations. 



It is, perhaps, hardly necessary to remark that it is 

 not the object of the expedition to reach the South 

 Pole, but to investigate the Antarctic regions ; and though 

 some of the problems cannot be solved unless the exist- 

 ing southern record is broken, the expedition is not 

 being equipped especially for the attainment of much 

 higher latitudes than have already been reached. Had 

 that been one of the main objects of the expedition, 

 either the ship might have been sent southward on a 

 different line, or the expedition would have been provided 

 with greater sledge-hauling power. 



The operations of the British expedition are restricted 

 to the half of the Antarctic area east of the meridians of 

 90° E. and 90° W., i.e. to the region south of Australia 

 and the Tacific. The western half, including the region 

 south of America, the Atlantic and Africa, is to be ev 

 plored simultaneously by the German expedition under 

 Prof, von Drygalski, by a Swedish expedition under 

 Dr. O. Nordenskjold, and, it is hoped, also by a Scotch 

 expedition under Mr. W. S. Bruce. This division of the 

 field of work between the British and German expeditions 

 was proposed at the Geographical Congress at Berlin, 

 and has now been accepted on both sides and the pla» 

 of work arranged accordingly. So far as can be judged 

 with our present knowledge, this plan, other things being 

 equal, gives the German expedition the chance of the 

 most striking geographical discoveries and the British 

 expedition the opportunities for a richer harvest of 

 scientific results. 



The scientific work of the expedition is directed to 

 cover as wide a field of research as is consistent with the 

 essential objects of the expedition. Of these the object 

 of primary importance is the study of terrestrial mag- 

 netism. It was upon the need for work upon this subject 

 that the appeal to the Treasury for funds was based, and 

 it was to enable the magnetic observations to be properly 

 made that it was thought advisable to provide a new 

 ship rather than adopt the less expensive course of 

 adapting an existing whaler. A new ship — the Discovery 

 — has accordingly been built by the Dundee Ship- 

 building Co. She is a modified whaler of somewhat 

 more than 1500 tons displacement, and with engines of 

 450 horse power. 



The staff of the expedition is as follows : — The execu- 

 tive staff consists of Commander R. F. Scott, R.N., 

 commander of the expedition ; Lieutenant Albert Armi- 

 tage, R.N.R., who distinguished himself in the Jackson- 

 Harmsworth expedition to Franz-Josef Land, second in 

 command and navigator ; Lieutenants Royds, Bam e and 

 Shackleton ; and Mr. Skelton, engineer. The civilian 

 staff consists of Mr. T. V. Hodgson, formerly of the Ply- 

 mouth Biological Laboratory and curator of the Plymouth 

 Museum, biologist ;. Dr. R. Koettlitz, botanist ; Mr. 



