September 



898] 



NATURE 



423 



ferring to the descriptions and figures of the brain in the salmon 

 and the wolf-fish. Besides, who has proved that the function 

 of memory depends on the brain-cortex of the human subject ? 

 I have seen many a curious case in the pathological room, the 

 history of which would not have led us to this conclusion." 



Mr. W. L. Sclater, Director of the South African Museum, 

 reports that the state of the collections is satisfactory, and in- 

 creasing use is being made of the museum by workers in different 

 branches of natural science. The collections are now in the 

 new museum building, which was formally opened on April 6. 

 During the year covered by the report, 6380 specimens were 

 added to the collections, 289 of them being species new to the 

 museum. A complete list of the acquisitions to each depart- 

 ment is given in the report. The number of insects received 

 by the department of entomology was 2309, representing 766 

 species. As usual, the order Coleoptera predominates in the 

 accessions, and Mr. L. Peringuey is able from the data now 

 available to estimate that the number of South African Cole- 

 optera will prove to be no less than 12,000. Mr. Peringuey refers 

 to the interesting discovery of the existence of a representative 

 of the curious family EmbiidcB of the order Neuroptera, not 

 before recorded in South Africa ; and the curious parallelism of 

 some coleopterous forms inhabiting the Cape and the Canary 

 Islands, as exemplified by captures made by M. A. Raffray in 

 the immediate vicinity of Cape Town. M. Raffray lately dis- 

 covered a species of Metophthalmus (family Lathrididae), three 

 species of which are represented in the Canary Islands ; he also 

 discovered an eyeless species of Weevil (nov. gen. ), and another 

 the eyes of which have only six facets. These insects, belonging 

 to the sub-family Cossonime, are very closely allied to similar 

 ones occurring in the Canary Islands, and which are also found 

 in the extreme south of Europe. Wollaston, as far back as 

 1 86 1, described a Colydid (gen. Cossyphodes) from the Cape, 

 belonging to a genus known at the time as occurring only at 

 Madeira. Another species was later on discovered in Abyssinia, 

 It is a singular coincidence that both Cossyphodes and Metoph- 

 thalmus should be discovered in such opposite directions. Mr. 

 Peringuey thinks the true explanation is that the minute insects 

 ■of Africa have not yet been properly collected, and that the 

 genera mentioned will be found to have a larger area of 

 distribution than at first imagined. 



Since the Liverpool Biological Committee transferred its 

 headquarters to Port Erin, the station on Puffin Island has been 

 worked by a committee of residents in North Wales, under the 

 direction of Prof. White, of Bangor. The report for 1896 and 

 1897, which has recently appeared, shows that the Committee is 

 extending its sphere of action to the study of the fauna and flora 

 of the North Welsh littoral, as well as to the archaeology of 

 Puffin Island itself. It contains papers by Prof. Phillips on the 

 brown seaweeds of Anglesey and Carnarvonshire, on an interest- 

 ing form of Ectocarpus confervoides, and on a new variety of the 

 alga Epicladia Jlustrts ; by Mr. Daniel A. Jones, on the moss 

 flora of the Harlech coast ; by Prof. White, on some fishes 

 observed in the Menai Straits, and on Welsh fishery exhibits 

 at the Imperial Institute ; by Mr. Harold Hughes, on excava- 

 tions on Puffin Island ; and a description, by Sir William 

 Turner, of a skeleton recently discovered in the course of these 

 ', excavations. 



Mr. Bernard Quaritch has just issued a catalogue of 

 * many rare and valuable works on zoology offered for sale 

 !■ by him. 



! In addition to the usual bi-monthly summary of current 



researches relating to zoology, botany, and microscopy, the 



fournal of the Royal Microscopical Society for August contains 



several short papers of special interest to microscopists. The 



NO. 1505, VOL. 58] 



President, Mr. E. M. Nelson, contributes an article on the 

 errors to be corrected in photographic lenses, and Mr. P. E. 

 Bertrand Jourdain describes a new apochromatic objective 

 constructed without the use of fluorite ; a method of adjusting 

 the sizes of the coloured images yielded by the Cooke lens ; and 

 the construction of the planar lens, and its use in low-power 

 photomicrography. 



In his " Electricity and Magnetism," published at St. Louis 

 by the John L. Rowland Book and Stationery Co., Prof. 

 Francis E. Nipher gives a mathematical exposition of the 

 fundamental principles of these subjects, for students who have 

 commenced the calculus. A second edition of the volume, 

 revised and with additions, has lately appeared, and the elec- 

 trical engineerjwho is first of all a student, can acquire from it 

 a sound knowledge of the machinery of mathematics, while the 

 results may be safely applied to the work of designing electrical 

 machinery. 



We have received a copy of a statement, being a report to the 

 Lawes Agricultural Trust Committee, prepared by Sir J. Henry 

 Gilbert, F.R.S., on the origin, plan, and results of the field 

 and other experiments conducted on the farm and in the 

 laboratory of Sir John B. Lawes, F.R.S. Other evidence of 

 the activity of the investigators at Rothamsted is afforded by 

 three papers, which have come to us with Sir Henry Gilbert's 

 report, dealing with the growth of sugar beet and the 

 manufacture of sugar in the United Kingdom ; the valuation of 

 the manures obtained in the consumption of foods for the 

 production of milk ; and, the Royal Commission on agricultural 

 depression, and the valuation of unexhausted manures. 



A VOLUME of "Agricultural Statistics of British India, for 

 the years 1892-93 to 1896-97," compiled by the Statistical 

 Bureau of the Government of India, has just been published. 

 From the immense amount of material therein contained, we 

 note one or two points of interest concerning the progress of 

 cultivation of tea, coffee, and cinchona from 1885 to 1897 in 

 British India and the native States. In 1885 the number of 

 acres upon which tea was cultivated was 283,925, and the 

 total production of tea was 71-525,977 lbs. In 1896 the 

 number of acres under tea was 433,280, and the total production 

 was 156,426,054 lbs. Coffee does not show the progressive 

 increase of cultivation exemplified by tea. In the year 1885 

 the number of acres under coffee was 237,457, and the yield 

 34,959,295 lbs., but in 1896 the larger area of 289,084 acres 

 only produced 26,086,902 lbs. As to cinchona, the number of 

 acres under cultivation, and the number of trees in permanent 

 plantations, have decreased since 1885, the quantity of bark 

 collected in 1896-97, viz. 1,491,566 lbs., being the least obtained 

 since 1889. 



The third part of vol. liv. of the Quarterly Journal of the 

 Geological Society has just been published. From the large 

 number of papers which are here printed, two or three are 

 especially worthy of mention. Mr. T. Codrington discusses 

 the submerged Rock-valleys in South Wales, Devon, and Corn- 

 wall. Mr. F. W. Harmer gives the results of a valuable series 

 of borings which he has made with the object of arriving at a 

 satisfactory conclusion as to the relation of the Lenham Beds 

 and the Coralline Crag. Prof. Bonney deals with the Garnet- 

 Actinolite schists on the southern side of the St. Gothard Pass. 

 Mr. Y. A. Bather elucidates the structural characters and 

 affinities of Petalocrinus, and shows that its base is dicyclic and 

 not monocyclic, as originally thought. Moreover, axial canals, 

 covering-plates, the articular facet, and various minor structures 

 are described in this genus for the first time. Miss G. L. Files' 

 exhaustive account of the Graptolite-fauna of the Skiddaw 

 Slates confirms the chief conclusions of Prof. Nicholson and 



