398 



NA TURE 



[August 25, 1898 



to shipping. Thunderstorms have occurred in the western and 

 central districts of England, and lightning has occurred over 

 nearly the whole kingdom. Very little rain has fallen, except 

 in a few isolated parts, where the thunderstorms have yielded a 

 fair amount. 



The British Pharmaceutical Conference, which opened at 

 Belfast on August 9, was a very successful meeting at which 

 the science of pharmacy was well represented, and many papers 

 of high merit were communicated. The presidential address, 

 delivered by Dr. Charles Symes, was a comprehensive survey of 

 affairs arid advances in which pharmacists are interested. Syn- 

 thetic compounds used in medicine and for various industrial 

 purposes were described, the president pointing to the ever- 

 growing lists of physiologically active synthetic organic com- 

 pounds as evidence for the necessity for pharmacists to keep up 

 with the developments of modern chemistry. Many of these 

 compounds, which have been built up on theoretical considera- 

 tions, have become valuable medicinal remedies. The fancy 

 names given to them, however, rarely afford any definite idea of 

 their composition, and without this pharmacists handle them in 

 a very mechanical way, and lose much of interest that would 

 otherwise attend the dealing with them. Dr. Symes expressed 

 the hope that pharmacists would familiarise themselves as far as 

 possible with the numerous class of substances which he had 

 mentioned, for although they are of a complex nature, they are 

 capable of much simplification by a consideration of the theo- 

 retical constitutions ascribed to them. Mr. Hodgkin read a 

 paper on this subject at a meeting of the Conference held at 

 Leeds in 1890. More recently Dr. Kohn, in an address de- 

 livered at a meeting of the Liverpool section of the Society of 

 Chemical Industry, dealt with the relation which exists between 

 the physiological action and the chemical structure of these 

 bodies. The scientific chemist, remarked Dr. Symes, is now 

 the architect and builder, using certain atoms and molecules to 

 build up chemical structures to meet the wants of the medical 

 profession in the treatment of disease. In Germany, where 

 there are fewer restrictions on experimenting with animals than 

 in this country, the chemist and physiologist work together — the 

 one altering the molecules and molecular arrangement in the 

 chemical, and the other testing and noting most carefully the 

 effects obtained thereby ; hence most of these remedies are pro- 

 duced in that country, and this manufacture has become an 

 extensive chemical industry. Since the publication of Mr. 

 Hodgkin's paper, referred to above, many new synthetic re- 

 medies have been introduced, and Dr. Symes gave a list of some 

 of them, pointing out that of the fifty substances enumerated, 

 a large percentage possess antiseptic, antipyritic, and analgesic 

 properties ; so that their rapid growth would seem to be due 

 more to commercial enterprise than to meeting a real want in 

 medical practice. 



Another chemical industry, which has considerable interest 

 for the pharmacist, was referred to by Dr. Symes at the Phar- 

 maceutical Conference ; it is the production of synthetic esters 

 and odorous substances closely related to the odours of flowers, 

 plants, and animal substances. With artificial musk and vanillin 

 pharmacists have been long familiar, as also with the amyl, 

 butyl, and ethyl compounds resembling fruit flavours, but of 

 more recent date they have heliotropine (heliotrope), ionone 

 and iraldine (violet), cumarine (new-mown hay), terpineol 

 (lilac), bergamiol or linaloyl acetate (bergamotte), nerolin 

 (neroly), jasmin oil, anisic aldehyde (hawthorn), geranol (rose 

 geranium), carvol (caraway oil), safrol (oil of sassafras), &c. So 

 much has this industry grown that not only are these products 

 used for toilet soaps, but they also enter largely into the composi- 

 tion of the essences named after the flowers. They are more 

 persistent than the natural odours, and it is said that the very 

 NO. 1504, VOL. 58] 



popular essence of " Parma Violets " is, as a rule, quite innocent 

 of the flowers, and is prepared from ionone mellowed down with 

 small quantities of other extracts ; and this the public really 

 prefer. To those, however, who are accustomed to handle 

 delicate perfumes, there is not so much difficulty in distinguishing 

 between the artificial and the real, and it still taxes the skill of 

 the chemist and the art of the perfumer to obtain that subtle 

 delicacy of fragrance manufactured and elaborated in nature's 

 own laboratory. 



An observation recorded by Mr, B. B. Osmaston in the 

 Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal (vol. Ixvi. Part 2, No. 4) 

 indicates that, in some birds at least, the social instinct is 

 present in a highly developed form. A young " Shikra," the 

 Indian Sparrow-Hawk {Astiir badius) trained to catch Mynahs 

 and other birds, was sent after a party of " seven sisters" (the 

 Jungle Babbler, Crateroptis canorus) feeding on the ground. 

 The Shikra captured one after a short chase, but the rest of the 

 Babblers, however, hearing the cries of their captured "sister," 

 came down to the rescue without the slightest show of hesitation, 

 and in a short time were engaged in a spirited attack on the 

 Hawk, apparently using both beak and claws in their effort to 

 make her relinquish her hold, which she eventually did. Mr. 

 Osmaston says that he has many times flown a Shikra at C. 

 canorus always with the same result, viz, that so long as he 

 kept out of the way the Babblers would attack the Hawk en 

 masse. 



The article upon William Turner, the " Father of British 

 Zoology," contributed by the Rev. H. A. Macpherson to the 

 August number of the Zoologist, appears at an opportune time, 

 for it draws attention to the important part which Cambridge, 

 where the International Zoological Congress is now in progress, 

 played in training the first naturalists bred upon English soil. 

 Turner was born about 1507, took his degree at Cambridge in 

 1529-30, and was elected a Fellow of Pembroke Hall in the 

 latter year. He spent the next ten years of his life as a 

 Cambridge don, and during that time acquired an intimate 

 knowledge of the habits of British wildfowl by personal 

 observation. He did not, however, confine his field work to 

 the neighbourhood. In 1542 he went abroad, and became 

 acquainted with the habits of birds which he had never met in 

 England. Turner travelled in Italy, and attended the botanical 

 lectures of Lucas Ghinus at Bologna before he journeyed to' 

 Zurich, the home of Conrad Gesner, who alludes to him in 

 terms of sincere admiration. On quitting Zurich, we learn 

 from Mr. Macpherson's article, the English traveller journeyed 

 to Basle, and thence to Cologne, During his residence in the 

 latter city, in 1 544, he printed the first ornithological work that 

 the New Learning was destined to produce. Turner was still 

 comparatively young, probably on the right side of forty, but 

 his scholarly taste had already induced him to apply his critical 

 skill to the difficult task of determining the particular species of 

 birds described by Aristotle and Pliny. Accordingly, he 

 entitled his little book, " Avium prascipuarum quarum apud 

 Plinium et Aristotelem mentio est, brevis et succincta historia 

 ex optimis quibusque scriptoribus contexta," Trifling as this 

 may appear beside the ponderous tomes of Gesner and 

 Aldrovandus, the fact remains that it forms a very important 

 contribution to the science of the sixteenth century. Turner 

 did not confine his attention to ornithology ; he was also keenly 

 interested in the fish fauna of these islands. His Catalogue of 

 British Fishes, compiled when residing in Wissenburg in 1557, 

 was a remarkable production for the middle of the sixteenth 

 century. His Herbal was completed in 1568, r.nd on July 7 of 

 that year the great naturalist quietly passed away. 



The Electrical Review gives particulars (jf the experiments in 

 telegraphy without intervening wires, which have been made 



