76 



NATURE 



[May 26, 1898 



in Northern Russia as the Rasputnya season. Mr. Trevor- 

 Battye describes the season as follows : — 



" Rasputnya, as I have been since informed, means, 

 literally, ' the separation of the roads,' but by some pro- 

 cess of thought has now come to be the term for a fifth 

 season, for the time which lies between autumn and 

 winter ; in short, for the month of October, It means 

 in Northern Russia that the first frosts have thawed and 

 the first snows melted ; that the rivers are blocked with 

 ■streams of broken ice, the morasses like a quagmire, the 

 tracks, where any advance has been attempted upon old 

 forest bog, a mixture of treacle and glue. Finally, it 

 means, as I have said before, that no one dreams of 

 trying to move until the country is sound and hard 

 ■under the settled fa'ost. During the whole of October 

 the Government postal service is stopped, labour con- 

 tracts are off, and the keepers of the stages are entirely 

 freed from their usual obligation to supply the traveller 

 with horses and sleighs." 



Undertaking a journey at such a time seemed an act 

 ■of madness, but ,it certainly was the means of getting 

 an insight into the character of the North Russian 

 peasant, and of seeing a side of it which might not have 

 been revealed under ordinary circumstances. Their 

 kindly good nature is striking, and throughout the 

 journey, although at first objections were raised and the 

 impossibility of accomplishing the various stages of the 

 journey put forward, still some one was always found 

 willing to supply horses and sleighs, and to accompany 

 the travellers. 



After crossing from Kolguev to the mainland, Mr. 

 Trevor-Battye, together with his camp-man Thomas 

 Hyland, and his old spaniel " Sailor," made their way 

 across country to the small village of Askino, on the 

 river Pechora. They were assisted in getting there by 

 the Samoyeds, inhabitants of the tundra in the west. 

 Askino is practically the only place where the Russians 

 speak Samoyed, and where there is any apparent inter- 

 course between the two races. At their next destination, 

 Ust Tsilma, also on the Pechora, and which they reached 

 by boat, the condition was quite changed ^ for on inquiry 

 not one person could be found who spoke Samoyed, 

 although the two places were only about 180 miles 

 apart. 



. From Ust Tsilma the journey was continued overland, 

 from stantsyia to stantsyia, which are log buildings put 

 up by the Government at variable distances apart, and 

 in charge of a yamshstchik (driver), who is bound to 

 supply horses and conveyances to any travellers on pro- 

 duction of a printed permission. The difficulties of 

 getting conveyances, owing to Rasputnya, and the de- 

 scriptions of the numerous adventures, especially those 

 connected with crossing the ice-blocked rivers, are of 

 great interest. Archangel was eventually reached, and 

 the travellers considered their difficulties over. The sleigh 

 drive to Vologda, a distance of about 700 miles, was 

 accomplished without any difficulty, as the track was 

 good. Having reached Vologda, the journey home was 

 continued by rail. 



The book gives us a good insight into the peasant 

 life. The houses, or rather huts, occupied by the peasants 

 are simple in the extreme, and consist generally of two 

 rooms. In a prominent position .in the front room there 

 is always an ikon, before which lamps or candles are 

 NO. 1 49 1,, VOL. 58] 



lighted. Attention is also drawn to the oven or paitch, 

 which forms such a feature in these small buildings; and 

 we are told that a characteristic proceeding of a.yat/i- 

 j^j/iT/^//^ on entering a house, " is to cross himself many 

 times before the t'kon, and the next to climb up to the 

 oven top, from which simmering pulpit he holds forth on 

 the events of the day." 



Except for some references to birds and fishes, natural 

 science does not form the same feature in the present 

 book that it did in Mr. Trevor-Battye's previous one, 

 " Ice-bound on Kolguev." This, however, is to be ex- 

 pected, for the journey had to be made with all possible 

 speed. The book is written in a very instructive and 

 pleasing style, and the map and illustrations by the 

 author add much interest to it. 



OUR BOOK SHELF. 



Vorlesiingen iiber Bacterien. Von Dr. Alfred Fischer, 

 A.O. Professor der Botanik in Leipzig. Pp. 186. (Jena: 

 Gustav Fischer, 1897.) 



It is sometimes alleged that bacteriology has suffered, as 

 a pure science, from its association with medicine, since 

 its pathological side has become disproportionately 

 developed. This statement is certainly no longer justified, 

 for the applications of the science to agricultural and 

 manufacturing industries have been found almost as im- 

 portant to the farmer, the dairyman, and the chemist as 

 they have been to the pathologist. Prof. Fischer's book 

 is one which fills a distinct gap in bacteriological 

 literature. Himself a botanist, he treats the subject 

 from a broad and general standpoint. Without neglect- 

 ing the pathogenic organisms he deals with them only, 

 as it were, incidentally, and the book presents an admir- 

 able and judicial summary of the present state of 

 knowledge of bacteriology in its widest and truest sense. 

 It forms a valuable introduction to the subject from 

 whatever point of view it is to be studied, since it affords 

 a solid groundwork upon which more technical and 

 special knowledge may afterwards be built. 



The earlier chapters deal with morphology and with 

 the intimate structure of bacteria — matters upon which 

 Prof. Fischer's well-known researches on " plasmolysis " 

 render him well quaHfied to speak. In the chapters on 

 specificity and classification he shows himself no advocate 

 of the extreme views on pleomorphism which have been 

 advanced by some. In his remarks on classification he 

 insists, with much justice, that strictly morphological 

 characters must form the basis of generic distinctions, 

 and that this matter lies within the province of the botanist 

 alone. The classification which he proposes is a reason- 

 able one, based largely on the character and distribution 

 of the cilia, and the nature of the spores. The mode of 

 life, and physiological properties of bacteria are next 

 described, the chemistry of aerobiosis and anaerobiosis 

 being fully dealt with ; and two chapters are then 

 devoted to the influence of physical and chemical agents, 

 especially in relation to the problems of disinfection. 

 The most fascinating part of the book will, however, be 

 found in the sections devoted to the circulation of 

 nitrogen and of carbonic acid in nature. The assimilation 

 of free nitrogen by bacteria in the soil and in the nodules 

 of Leguminosas, and the decomposition and nitrification 

 of proteids are set forth by the author with admirable 

 clearness, and the same may be said of the various pro- 

 cesses of fermentation with which he also deals. The 

 last three chapters are devoted to pathogenic bacteria, 

 and contain a short account of some of the more im- 

 portant species and their mode of action, with a sketch 

 on serum-therapeutics and immunity. The writer is 



