July 14, 1898] 



NATURE 



255 



that so much attention was paid to the scientific side of photo- 

 graphy. The President (Mr. John Stuart), in the course of his 

 very interesting opening address, said concerning photography : 

 " It has made the astronomer more than ever master of the 

 heavens. By its aid he has mapped out the starry firmament, 

 and been apprised of the existence of stars the most powerful 

 telescopes had failed to show. In the investigations into the 

 composition of the sun and its corona photography has been an 

 invaluable agent. In the registration of storms in the body of 

 the sun it plays a very important part. In the registration also 

 of the barometric and thermometric variations it is in daily use. 

 . . . Its utility in microscopic work has been abundantly proved 

 of late ; bacterial science has made rapid strides by its assistance, 

 and every day seems to produce a more startling discovery than 

 the day before. ... In the medical profession photography 

 promises to become one of the most beneficent agents science 

 has as yet placed at the service of the healing art. The X-rays, 

 or radiography, are now an indispensable adjunct in every well- 

 equipped medical school. A flourishing society has been started 

 to specialise in this hopeful field, and already developments are 

 daily taking place almost beyond our conception. " During the 

 meeting a large number of slides illustrative of solar, lunar, and 

 stellar photography, radiography, and slides in colours by 

 various methods were shown, and everything done tended to 

 bring home to those present the almost universal application' of 

 photography to art and science. 



We are glad to learn from Nature Notes that the Guildford 

 Natural History and Microscopical Society have practically 

 achieved the object of their memorial to the War Office on the 

 making of Wolmer Forest a sanctuary for the preservation of 

 birds, the War Office having adopted the opinion previously 

 expressed by the Commissioner of Woods and Forests, to 

 which reference has already been made in these columns. 

 The forest came under the management of the Aldershot 

 Game Preserving Association in 1895, since which time all 

 l)irds have been strictly protected ; no birds, except game birds, 

 have been allowed to be shot, and hawks, owls, and other 

 birds have been carefully preserved as far as possible. The 

 heronry has gradually increased from one nest a few years ago 

 to about twenty nests now, and nearly fifty young herons flew 

 from the nest in 1897 ; foxes are also strictly preserved. The 

 Secretary of the Association states, however, that to make the 

 l^reservation a success a large area round the outskirts of the 

 forest should be included in the scheme for protection, as at 

 present the destruction of birds and animals is still carried out 

 on private land round the forest. 



The Kew Gardens authorities have many problems submitted 

 to them to solve in the course of a year. Many they succeed in 

 unravelling, but occasionally they are baffled. The June number 

 of the Biilletiii places on record one of the most curious of the 

 tasks brought before the authorities, and one that they have had 

 but little success with. The specimens referred to in the follow- 

 ing letter, which was received from Mr. Kenneth Scott, of Cairo, 

 were carefully examined by Dr. D. H. Scott, of the Jodrell 

 Laboratory, who could only conjecture that they were fragments 

 of the palcK of some grass. " For some time now malingering 

 Egyptian soldiers have been sent in to the Kasr-el-Aini hospital 

 under my care, suffering from extreme oedema and intense in- 

 flammatory injection of the conjunctiva of one or both eyes ; the 

 cornea unajffected. No discharge from the eye. The condition 

 is entirely unlike that which they also produce by putting in the 

 juice of Euphorbia, slaked lime, seed of ' melocheeya ' (.? Cor- 

 chorus olitcrius) and other things. I obtained the specimens 

 sent you by covering the eye with a thick collodion dressing so 

 as to completely seal it up. The man at the end of five days had 

 evidently feared the inflammation might subside, and therefore 

 NO. 1498, VOL. 58] 



raised the dressing and renewed the baneful application, part of 

 which I found on the face of the dressing lying against the eye. I 

 have been entirely unsuccessful in obtaining here any information 

 on the matter, nor have I been able to obtain further quantities 

 of the leaf. The patient either began to fear the consequences 

 of the affair, or his stock of the drug became exhausted, as he in 

 no way interfered with the next collodion dressing which was 

 applied, the eye being quite cured, and the dressing intact after 

 a period of five days." 



Mr. J. BURTT Davy has recently presented to the Kew 

 Museum the ingredients of a Chinese prescription purchased by 

 him at China Town, San Francisco, particulars of which, as far 

 as their identification can be made out, may be of interest. The 

 ingredients include fruit-heads- of an Eriocaulon, apparently 

 E. cantontense. This plant has a reputation in China for various 

 diseases, such as ophthalmia, especisUy in children, as a styptic 

 in nose-bleeding, and in affections of the kidney. Spiny hooks 

 from the stems of the Gambler i^ldinX. {Uncaria g^ambier, Roxb. ), 

 which have astringent properties, and are mostly used in infantile 

 complaints. Some very thin transverse sections of the stem of 

 Akebia quinata, a climbing berberiadaceous plant, also occur 

 in small quantities, as well as the bark of Eucominia uhnoides 

 known as the " Tu Chung." Tonic and invigorating properties 

 are ascribed to the latter, and its cost is therefore considerable. 

 Among other ingredients which have not been identified, are 

 crushed flower-heads of a composite plant, and slices of a slender, 

 twig-like stem, probably a willow. 



The Times of July 11 states that the sum appropriated by 

 Congress for the service of the United States Department of 

 Agriculture for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1899, shows an 

 increase of 326,300 dollars over that for the fiscal year just 

 ended, the principal additions being for the Weather Bureau 

 and the Bureau of Animal Industry. Under the Weather 

 Bureau provision is made for the establishment of sixteen new 

 stations, and the erection of a small building on the Government 

 reservation at Sault Saint Marie (popularly known as "the 

 Soo "). 



EngineerUig has the following interesting note on the most 

 ancient steam engine in existence : — "The oldest engine in the 

 world is in the possession of the Birmingham Canal Navigations, 

 this engine having been constructed by Boulton and Watt in 

 the year 1777. The order is entered in the firm's books in that 

 year as a single-acting beam engine, with chains at each end of 

 a wood beam, and having the steam cylinder 32 inches in 

 diameter with a stroke of 8 feet, and erected at the canal 

 company's pumping station at Rolfe Street, Smethwick. 

 During the present year (1898) this remarkable old engine, 

 which has been regularly at work from the time of its erection 

 to the current year, a period of, say, 120 years, was removed to 

 the canal company's station at Ocker Hill, Tipton, there to be 

 re-erected and preserved as a relic of what can be done by 

 good management when dealing with machinery of undoubted 

 quality. It is worthy of note that the Birmingham Canal 

 Navigations favoured Boulton and Watt in 1777 with the order 

 for this engine, and in 1898, or 120 years afterwards, the 

 company have entrusted the same firm, James Watt and Co., 

 Soho, Smethwick, with the manufacture of two of their modern 

 triple-expansion vertical engines, to be erected at the Walsall 

 pumping station, having 240 horse;power and a pumping 

 capacity of 12,713,600 gallons per day. 



According to the Pharniaceulical Journal, a fresh use for 

 seaweed is claimed to have been discovered by a Norwegian 

 engineer, who exhibited an invention at the Stockholm Exhibi- 

 tion for producing paper-glue, dressing-gum, and soap from sea- 

 weed. The first establishment for this branch of manufacture 



