April i;. 1920] 



NATURE 



209 



Notes. 



Prof. C. J. Martin, F.R.S., director of the Lister 

 Institute of Preventive Medicine ; Sir William Orpen, 

 K.B.E.; and Sir J. E. Petavel, K.B.E., F.R.S., 

 director of the National Physical Laborator}', have 

 been elected members of the Athenaeum Club under 

 the provisions of the rule of the club which empowers 

 the annual election by the committee of a certain 

 number of persons "of distinguished eminence in 

 science, literature, the arts, or for public service." 



The Royal Danish Society of Science has elected 

 Sir Ernest Rutherford and Sir Joseph Thomson as 

 fellows in the physical and mathematical class, and 

 Sir George Grierson and Prof. W. M. Lindsay fellows 

 in the historical and philosophical class. 



Dr. a. McWilliam, formerly assistant professor of 

 metallurgy in the University of Sheffield, and now a 

 consultant metallurgist in that city, was invested by 

 the King with the Order of C.B.E. on March 20. 

 This honour was conferred upon him for his general 

 war work in India, principally in connection with the 

 supply of steel for war purposes. 



As already announced, the Geological Survey and 

 the Museum of Practical Geology were transferred 

 from the Board of Education to the Department of 

 Scientific and Industrial Research on November i last. 

 The Lord President has now appointed a Geological 

 Survey Board for the management of the work of 

 the Survey and museum, and to submit from time 

 to time recommendations on developments that appear 

 to be necessary as the work progresses. The Board, 

 as at present constituted, consists of Sir Francis G. 

 Ogilvie (chairman). Prof. W. S. Boulton, Prof. J. W. 

 Gregory, Dr. John Home, Prof. J. E. Marr, Mr. 

 Frank Merricks, and Mr. W. Russell. 



Sir Henry Howorth has presented to the Geo- 

 logical Department of the British Museum (Natural 

 History) the collection of mammalian and other 

 remains obtained by Mr. W. J. Lewis Abbott from 

 a fissure near Ightham, Kent. This collection is 

 especially important on account of the care with which 

 the bones of the small animals were extricated and 

 preserved". The ordinary larger specimens belong to 

 the woolly rhmoceros, mammoth, reindeer, stag, roe- 

 buck, horse, and hyena, and show that the greater 

 part of the fauna at least dates back to the latter 

 part of the Pleistocene period. All the circumstances 

 of the discovery were discussed by Messrs. Abbott and 

 E. T. Newton in the Geological Society's Quarterly 

 Journal in 1894. 



Dr. Carlos Ameghino, director of the Argentine 

 National Museum, announces that he has recently 

 discovered the oldest known remains of man at 

 Miramar, near Mar del Plata, on the coast of the 

 province of Buenos Aires. Human remains were 

 fbund in the same district several years ago in asso- 

 ciation with stpne implements and with bones of the 

 extinct Toxodon and ground-sloths; but according 

 tp- the observations of Dr. Ale§ HrdliCka and Dr. 

 Bailey Willis (Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of j 

 NO. 2633, VOL. 105] 



American Ethnology, Bulletin 52, 1912), they are of 

 no great antiquity, and prbbably represent a modern 

 South American race. All the supposed discoveries 

 of early man in America have hitherto proved un- 

 satisfactor>\ and Dr. Ameghino's detailed report on 

 the latest find will be awaited with interest. 



Capt. Vaughan-Williams, who is excavating the 

 supposed site of Edward the Confessor's palace in 

 Windsor Great Park, has discovered what is believed 

 to be the dedication-stone of a Saxon place of worship. 

 Upon the stone are the marks of a cross and what 

 looks like Saxon lettering. Among other discoveries 

 are the remains of a kitchen and banqueting-hall and 

 the traces of what seem to be Roman baths. This 

 confirms the statement of Mr. Forestier that the palace 

 of the Saxon king was built upon the site of a Roman 

 villa, which was provided, as usual, with a series of 

 baths. The remains of the chapel indicate that it was 

 40 ft. long, and, according to Bishop Browne, who 

 recently inspected it, it contained an altar for the 

 worship of God, and one smaller for the worship of 

 devils. 



Nineteen years ago the splendid survivor of the 

 Great Trilithon at Stonehenge was in a very dangerous 

 condition, but it was set upright again, and now the 

 Office of Works, in association with the Society of 

 Antiquaries, is engaged in restoring to a position of 

 safety other stones that are in danger. A question of 

 interest has been raised during the work now in pro- 

 gress. Just inside the Ditch a circle of holes has been 

 discovered in the chalk, which mark the site of an 

 outer circle of stones. In these holes have been found 

 charred human bones, bits of burnt animals' bones, or 

 only a single tine of a stag's horn. Aubrey's map, 

 made in 1666, showed in approximately the position of 

 these newly found holes a series of depressions in the 

 turf which have since then disappeared. In one was 

 shown a stone which has since been removed. The 

 detached stone, well known as the " Slaughtering 

 Stone," which lies in line with the " Hele Stone," 

 appears to fit almost exactly into place in this new 

 circle. Whether it is the last survivor of an outer 

 circle of stones, and whether this outer ring was 

 coeval with Avebury and made before Stonehenge 

 itself existed — these are questions which cannot now 

 be answered until further excavations help to solve 

 the. problem. 



The James Forrest lecture for the present year will 

 be delivered at the Institution of Civil Engineers by 

 Sir Dugald Clerk at 5.30 on Tuesday, April 20. The 

 subject will be " Fuel Conservation in the United 

 Kingdom." 



The fourth Guthrie lecture of the Physical Society 

 of London will be delivered on Friday, April 23, at 

 5 o'clock, by M. C. E. Guillaume, who will take as 

 his subject "The Anomaly of the Nickel-Iron Alloys: 

 Its Causes and its Applications." 



Sir George Newman will deliver the Lady Priestley 

 memorial lecture of the National Health Society on 

 Thursday, April 22, at the Royal Society of Medicine. 



