54 



NATURE 



[May 20, 1897 



be lost for ever. Some of the most valuable racial curios are 

 now actually unprocurable. The long straight swords of the 

 Mishmi, in the extreme east, were formerly found among all 

 the races north of the valley as far west as the Kuki, and are 

 now a tradition only. The Noga " Kyep," hide cuirass, 

 identical with that of the Niasi, west of Sumatra, are impossible 

 to get hold of, though common here thirty years ago — firearms 

 rendering them useless. 



An organised army of intelligent workers is badly wanted to save 

 the stores of unwritten history seen in customs among all these 

 races. They are pre-Aryan races, and if but a tenth of the time 

 and money now being lavished on the Aryan remains, here and 

 at home, were devoted to these far older, and far more interesting 

 races, the result would astonish home folk. The races of the 

 Pacific, and Archipelago (Australia included), came from India, as 

 Polynesian investigators well know, but cannot easily join the 

 proofs across the Malayan region. 



Can nothing be done to arouse attention to this matter ? Some 

 of the customs are of the greatest possible value in the elucida- 

 tion of the development of early human institutions such as 

 marriage ; and in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, 

 vol. Ixi. pt. ii.. No. 3, 1892, pp. 246 to 269, I drew attention 

 to one of them in " The communal barracks of primitive races," 

 a vast subject, on which alone there is enough to occupy many 

 experts for several years, as its ramifications extend from West 

 Africa to Eastern Polynesia, and from the Himalaya to New 

 Zealand, 



There are many willing and capable workers in the East, but 

 scattered over a vast area ; a central " association " is needed, 

 say at Singapore, to and from which communication is easy. An 

 association of scattered students, railier than a new society, is 

 wanted, and it would cost very little if the local branch of the 

 Asiatic Society took the matter in hand as a branch of its work, 

 charging those engaged in research a tran.smission fee on all 

 that passes. 



At the present moment I am most anxious to get in touch 

 with some one in Formosa, so as to procure photos of the savages, 

 their houses, &c., to compare with our Noga, who, I believe, 

 are the .same race stock, but I am not able to get the names and 

 addresses of workers there ; a central association at Singapore 

 could very probably afford help in such matters. 



The Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland is 

 too far off to give this aid ; besides, it is not a live society, or 

 anthropology would not be in such a pitiable slough as we see it 

 here. The collection of life-sized nude nondescript effigies in 

 the Indian Museum reveals our state at a glance ; they are to 

 amuse the hundreds of natives who gape at them daily. The 

 value of it as a collection is measured by the inunhers who stare 

 and get thoroughly mystified, and this is proudly published every 

 week. As an ethnological collection it is enough to drive an 

 expert mad. S. E. Peal. 



Sibsagar, March 31. 



A Curious Luminous Phenomenon. 



The phenomenon mentioned on p. 31 of Nature (May 13), 

 is undoubtedly subjective, and has to do with the fatigue of the 

 retina. 



I observed it very markedly in the case of an orange round 

 which I was skating on the open-air ice-rinks in the Engadine ; 

 all the country about being white, and the ice, too, being 

 dazzling. 



The blue-violet margin to the orange was zero, or at a 

 minimum, when I fixed my eye on a point on the orange. It 

 was at a maximum when I glanced quickly round the orange, 

 or when the orange rolled. In the latter case it was un- 

 symmetrical and "trailed." 



I satisfied myself, by the experiments that I tried, that the 

 portion of the retina protected from the white glare by the 

 image of the orange, received an impression of blue-violet 

 light when the protection of this image was removed owing to 

 the movement of the eye or of the object ; but that this peculiar 

 condition of the portion of the retina in question was very 

 transitory. 



It is possible that temperature affects the phenomenon 

 indirectly ; since the eye may be more unsteady, and wander 

 more, when the temperature is low. 



Experimenting in England with less white and dazzling ice 

 and landscape I found the phenomenon less marked. It was 

 very brilliant and beautiful in the Engadine. 



NO. 1438, VOL. 56] 



I feel sure that if any okserver notices the effect of keeping 

 his eye fixed on some point of the body so as to keep the 

 image on a constant portion of the retina, he will come to the 

 same conclusion as myself. W. Larden. 



R.N.E. College, Devonport. 



Rontgen Rays. 



I HAVE had a focus-tube constructed, in which the distance 

 between the electrodes can be varied, after Mr. Campbell 

 Swinton's pattern, but in which the kathode is made the movable 

 electrode, and the adjustment is made by magnetic control. 

 This is effected by attaching a disc of soft iron to the sliding- 

 rod of the kathode. The advantage of this arrangement is 

 that the kathode can be moved up to, or away from, the anode 

 while the tube is working, so that the best effect can be at once 

 obtained. The resistance is, as Mr. Swinton has pointed out, 

 greater when the electrodes are close together than when they 

 are far apart. The best fluorescent effects are, however, 

 obtained when the electrodes are so close together (about one 

 millimetre apart) that a very bright arcing discharge occurs 

 between them. The screen is now lighted up much more 

 brilliantly than when they are at any other distance apart. 

 The very bright fluorescence is only obtained when the arcing 

 discharge occurs. If the electrodes are brought any nearer 

 together, the platinum anode becomes red-hot, the fluorescence 

 fails, and the resistance of the tube increases very rapidly. I 

 do not remember having seen this noted before. 



Edinburgh, May 10. Dawson Turner. 



7 HE ROYAL SOCIETY SELECTED 



CANDIDA TES. 



'T'HE following are the names and qualifications of 



-*■ . the fifteen candidates selected by the Council of 



the Royal Society, to be recommended for election into 



the Society this year : — 



Robert Bell, 

 M.D., B.A.Sc, LL.D. Assistant Director of the Geological 

 Survey of Canada. lias been actively engaged in the field 

 work of the Survey for thirty-six years. Was concurrently 

 Professor of Chemistry and Geology, Queen's University, 

 Kingston, for five sessions, 1863-68 ; Naturalist and Medical 

 Officer on the Government Expeditions to Hudson Bay, 1884- 

 85 ; Royal Commissioner on the Mineral Resources of Ontario, 

 1888. Distinguished for his services to Canadian Geology, 

 having worked over large sections of the Dominion east of the 

 Rocky Mountains. Has made extensive researches among the 

 Laurentian and Huronian Rocks, and in reference to Glacial 

 phenomena. Has added materially to our knowledge of Zoo- 

 logy and Botany— more especially of the Forestry — of Canada. 

 Has published nearly 100 reports and papers of a scientific 

 character. They include upwards of twenty reports, some 

 accompanied by maps of the Geological Survey, between 1857 

 and 1890, giving the results of geological and topographical 

 surveys and explorations on both sides of Hudson Bay and 

 Straits, along the principal waters between the upper Great 

 Lakes and James Bay, and of those between the Winnipeg 

 Basin and Hudson Bay, the first survey of Lake Nipigon, geo- 

 logical surveys of the Canadian Sudbury Mining Districts, the 

 Gaspe District, the Lake Peninsula of Ontario, and in other 

 parts of the extensive regions of Canada. Although much con- 

 densed, these Reports cover about 930 pp. royal 8vo. Among 

 many additional publications may be mentioned " The Causes 

 of the Fertility of the Land in the Canadian N. W. Territories," 

 " The Petroleum Field of Ontario," "The Huronian System 

 in Canada," " Glacial Phenomena in Canada," "The Geology 

 of Ontario, with special reference to Economic Minerals," 

 "The Laurentian and Huronian Systems North of Lake Huron," 

 "The Origin of Gneiss," "The Forests of Canada," "The 

 Forest Fires in Northern Canada." 



Stippletnentary Certificate. — Since the date of the above 

 certificate Mr. Bell has made further geological investigations of 

 importance north of Lake Huron, and a survey of a large river 

 previously unknown to geography in the country south-east of 

 James Bay, besides a general geological and topographical ex- 

 ploration of an extensive area in that region. He has now been 

 connected with the Geological Survey of Canada for forty years, 



