NATURE 



[December 20, 19 17 



been issued as separate bulletins during the past year, 

 and some have already received notice here. Special 

 interest attaches to the report by Prof. R. A. Berry on 

 the results of experiments with cows and dairy pro- 

 duce, of which it is only possible to mention the studies 

 of the variation in the character of milk throughout 

 the lactation period, and the separate study of the 

 changes in the composition of Cheddar cheese during 

 ripening. A further report by Prof. Berry on "The 

 Utilisation and Eradication of Bracken " adds very 

 materially to previous knowledge on this important 

 subject. 'Special attention must also be directed to 

 the exhaustive report on medicinal plants by Mr. A. 

 Hosking, to which is appended a very comprehensive 

 list of hardy herbs, trees, and shrubs used in medicine. 

 The concluding report by Principal Paterson on experi- 

 ments in the manuring of oats is very illuminating as 

 to the possibility of raising the average yield of oats 

 in Scotland by the judicious use of manures. The 

 average yield on the fully manured plots in these ex- 

 periments was about 30 per cent, above that obtained 

 on the unmanured plots, and fully 33 per cent, in 

 advance of the average yield for Scotland. 



The fir^t number has reached us of the Journal of 

 Dairy Science. This publication, which is of American 

 origin (Baltimore : Williams and Wilkins Co. ; Lon- 

 don : Cambridge University Press), is intended to serve 

 as the official organ of the American Dairy Science 

 Association, and to be the medium for scientific dis- 

 cussion of the problems connected with dairying. The 

 value of such a journal, if conducted on the right lines, 

 must be very great, for in it the higher chemical and 

 bacterial questions can be dealt with in a manner 

 which is scarcely possible in the publications which are 

 at present available. The first article in the journal is 

 the text of the address delivered at the opening of the 

 new dairy buildings of the University of Nebraska. 

 The subject-matter of the address is well chosen, and 

 the striking facts brought forward by Prof. R. A. 

 Pearson are worthy of close consideration, par- 

 ticularly at the present time. Messrs. R. S. Breed 

 and W. A. Stocking write on the results of a large 

 number of bacterial analyses of milk. Special atten- 

 tion is directed to the errors which arise in making 

 the counts, and the varying results obtained by the 

 direct and plate methods in the hands of different 

 workers. A very full report is made by the Committee 

 on Statistics of Milk and Cream Regulations regarding 

 the ordinances which obtain in the cities and towns 

 of the United States. This report is of special interest 

 as showing on what lines those responsible for the 

 local administration of dairy laws and regulations are 

 working. It is to be hoped that English dairy inves- 

 tigators will slipport and contribute to this publication, 

 for the questions they have to elucidate are largely 

 those which concern all nations. 



The Department of Statistics of Calcutta has pub- 

 lished vol. ii. of the agricultural statistics of India 

 for 1914-15, which deals with the area under crops, 

 live stock, land revenue assessment, and transfers of 

 land in the Native States. Unfortunately, this volume 

 is much less complete rhan vol. i., which dealt with 

 British India. The total area of the Native States is 

 given as 777,000 square miles, but agricultural statis- 

 tics are available only for one-sixth of that area. 

 Detailed statistics are given, however, of the States 

 which furnish returns. 



We have received from the Brooklyn Institute of 

 Arts and Science a copy of a short illustrated guide 

 to the geographical models in the Children's Museum 

 in Bedford Park, Brooklyn, New York. The models, 

 which seem to number eleven, are attempts to present 



NO. 2512, VOL. 100] 



scenes from different lands, so chosen as to illustrate 

 simply and in a sttiking way the relation of man to* 

 his surroundings. The scenes represented are in 

 Greenland, Lapland, Antarctica, the South Seas, Cen- 

 tral Australia, the Brazilian forests, the Sahara, East 

 Africa, Patagonia, and the hills of Afghanistan. So 

 far as can be judged by the photographs of the models, 

 they are well executed, but much of their value must 

 necessarily depend on colouring and perspective. No 

 indication of the scale is given, but we gather that 

 the models are life-size. 



Under the title of "The Use of Mean Sea-level as 

 the Datum for Elevations," Mr. E. L. Jones, of the 

 U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, has collected the 

 opinions of a number of engineers and others through- 

 out the United States on the datum to which eleva- 

 tions should be referred. All agreed that mean sea- 

 level should, be chosen, and that it should be adopted 

 without further delay. Great confusion arises in some 

 places owing to the number of datum lines used. 

 Thus, in Salt Lake City the corporation, the weather 

 bureau, and the two railway companies all use different 

 levels of reference. To facilitate the adoption of mean 

 sea-level as the standard, Mr. Jones points out that it 

 is essential that precise levelling should be extended 

 over the whole of the United States. At present it is 

 entirely inadequate, being only 1-2 miles per 100 square 

 miles of territory. The extension of the net, as quickly 

 as possible, would allow arbitrary data to be dis- 

 carded, and would result in increased usefulness in 

 American maps. The paper is published as No. 60 of 

 the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey Series. 



As a seismic region, the Middle Mississippi valley 

 will always be of interest owing to the series of great 

 earthquakes which occurred at New Madrid in the 

 years 1811 and 1812. Since then, few years have 

 passed without one or more slight shocks in the dis- 

 trict, one of the strongest being that which occurred ■ 

 on April 9 last. This earthquake, which is briefly 

 described by Mr. R. H. Finch in the current Bulletin 

 of the Seismological Society of America (vol. vii., 

 pp. 91-96), is chiefiy remarkable for its extensive dis- 

 turbed area. Though the damage caused by the shock 

 was slight, the earthquake was felt over a district 

 covering about 200,000 square miles. The author 

 infers in consequence that the origin was deeply seated. 

 In the same bulletin Dr. Otto Klotz makes several 

 suggestions for the study of earthquakes in the United 

 States. He insists on the importance of prompt pub- 

 lication of monthly bulletins b)' the numerous observa- 

 j tories in the country, and recommends the foundation 

 of a central bureau in Washington. Mr. Hamlin's 

 short paper (pp. 1 13-18) shows how frequently earth- 

 quakes are now occurring in southerq^ and eastern 

 California. 



Attention may be directed to a very fine geological 

 and topographical atlas of the Gympie Goldfields by 

 the Chief Government Geologist, recently issued by the 

 Queensland Geological Survey. This atlas comprises 

 thirty-six sheets, drawn to the somewhat inconvenient 

 scale of 1/4752, or six chains to the inch, beautifully 

 executed, and apparently worked out in elaborate detail 

 with the utmost care. The district is one of the more 

 important of the goldfields of Queensland, which at 

 one time produced a good deal of alluvial gold, though 

 more recently its output has been chiefly reef-gold, 

 derived from veins of quartz connected genetically, it 

 would seem, with a group of altered diabasic rocks, 

 tuffs, etc. The geological relations of these rocks to 

 the adjoining slates, etc., are well brought out by this 

 series of maps. 



