86 



NA TURE 



[November 26, 1891 



University in Arts and Engineering. He came out to India 

 in 1869 as Professor of Civil Engineering in the Engineering 

 Department of the Presidency College, Calcutta, and when that 

 Department was amalgamated in 1880 with the Dehree Training 

 School, and transferred to Seebpur with the title of Government 

 Engineering College, Mr. Downing was chosen as first Principal 

 of the new College. In no College in Bengal has so strict a 

 system of discipline been introduced. The beneficial results of 

 that system, consistently adhered to in the face of strong native 

 opposition, have long been apparent ; and the present flourishing 

 condition of the College affords the best monument which could 

 be erected to the indomitable perseverance and uniform justice 

 of the administration of its late Principal." 



The death of Mr. Thomas Wharton Jones, F.R.S., is an- 

 nounced. He was nearly eighty years of age. Prof. Huxley, 

 who was one of his pupils forty years ago, gives in the British 

 Medical Journal a bright and pleasant account of his intercourse 

 with his "old master." 



The third series of Hooker's " Icones Plantarum" (vols. 

 xi.-xx, of the whole work) is now complete, and the Bentham 

 Trustees, who are continuing the work under the editorship of 

 Prof. D, Oliver, are offering a limited number of sets of this 

 series of ten volumes, for ;i^5 the set. It contains figures of a 

 thousand new plants, including the most interesting discoveries of 

 the last thirty years, and the most striking of the new genera 

 described by Bentham and Hooker during the progress of their 

 "Genera Plantarum." As the whole impression consists of 

 only 250 copies, the work will soon become unpurchasable. 

 Thanks to the provision made by the late Mr. Bentham, the 

 trustees are issuing a fourth series at the rate of one volume, of 

 lOO plates, annually, at the very low price of i6.f. Persons 

 wishing to secure a copy of the third series should apply at once 

 to Dulauand Co., 37 Soho Square, W. 



The external part of the laboratory which is being built in the 

 Paris Museum of Natural History for Prof. Chauveau, from the 

 designs provided by him, is now being finished. This laboratory 

 will be used only for original research in physiology and bac- 

 teriology, and when completed will be the finest laboratory in 

 France. But the Museum is deeply in debt, and this may cause 

 some delay. 



Members of the Royal Microscopical Society, and the several 

 London and provincial Societies of a kindred nature, have been 

 invited to subscribe to a fund for the benefit of the family of the 

 late Mr. John Mayall. An influential Committee has been 

 formed to secure the success of the scheme. Communications 

 should be addressed to Mr. T. Curties, treasurer to the Com- 

 mittee, 244 High Holborn, W.C. The Committee has issued 

 a circular setting forth Mr, Mayall's great services to the science 

 of microscopy. 



According to a telegram despatched to the Standard from 

 Bangkok on Monday night, Chaiya and Bandon, towns situated 

 on the coast of the Gulf of Siam, have been practically destroyed 

 by a cyclone. The loss of life is estimated at three hundred. 



Some details of the earthquake which caused so much havoc 

 in Japan at the end of October have been received. A large 

 part of the Empire was affected, the shocks being strongly felt 

 in no fewer than thirty-one provinces. In the provinces of 

 Ezozi, Mino, and Owari, several towns and villages were 

 ruined, 3400 persons being killed and 43,000 houses destroyed. 

 An up train and a down train on the Tokaido Railway were 

 just meeting at the station of Gifu when the first shock was felt 

 there. It was accompanied by subterraneous rumblings and 

 violent oscillation, which put the passengers of the train into 

 a great state of alarm. They were further terrified by seeing 

 cracks in the earth, two or three feet wide, opening and closing 

 NO. II 52, VOL. 45] 



in all directions, some of which threw up volcanic mud and 

 ashes. A number of the passengers alighted and made their 

 way into the town. Many houses had already fallen, and im- 

 mense heaps of ruins were visible on every side. Other build- 

 ings which were then standing were so severely shattered that 

 further earth-tremors which followed threw them to the ground. 

 There was a marked subsidence of the earth for a considerable 

 area round Gifu. Very soon after the houses collapsed, and 

 while hundreds of persons remained buried under the ruins, 

 flames burst out and spread with such rapidity that the citizens 

 were compelled to desist from the work of rescue. The fire was 

 not subdued until the next morning, when it was found that 

 almost the whole town had been destroyed. The potteries in 

 the prefectures of Owari and Mino, and at Seto and other 

 towns, were reduced to ruins. At Gobo, a temple belonging 

 to the Shin sect of the Buddhists, which was crowded with 

 persons, suddenly collapsed, burying fifty of the worshippers. 

 A slight shock occurred at Nagerio on the night of Octo- 

 ber 25. On the following Wednesday morning, \»hile 

 forty Christians were assembled in the Methodist school, 

 the building began to totter, and the worshippers fled, 

 several being killed or fatally injured. Many streets 

 were blocked with fallen houses, and others were rendered 

 all but impassable by the crowds of panic-stricken people 

 who were endeavouring to make their escape. Hundreds 

 of persons were killed by the collapse of a thread factory, and a 

 large brick building. A castle four hundred years old, however, 

 remained intact and suffered no damage. It is estimated that 

 in the three towns comprising the city of Nagoya from 750 to 

 1000 persons lost their lives. From the time of the first dis- 

 turbance up to the morning of October 30, no fewer than 368 

 distinct shocks were reported. Fissures 2 feet wide and several 

 feet deep appeared in the earth, while railway metals were 

 twisted, iron bridges broken, river embankments engulfed or 

 destroyed, and fields flooded. A lake 600 yards long and 60 

 wide was formed at the foot of the Hukusan Mountain in the 

 Gifu prefecture, and great cracks were formed in the ground 

 near the hills. Water sprang from the cracks, and that in the 

 wells was changed to a brownish tint and rendered unfit for 

 drinking. The embankments of most of the rivers were de- 

 stroyed, and in the Gifu district it will be necessary to rebuild 

 them for a distance of 350 miles. The general appearance of 

 the Mizushima division of the Mortosu district underwent a com- 

 plete transformation, and at Nogo in one district there was a 

 marked subsidence of the earth. Of 700 temples in the Gifu 

 prefecture, over one-third were destroyed, and it will take many 

 months to repair the river embankments. In some parts of the 

 town of Gifu boiling mud spouted from the fissures for over two 

 hours. The top of the sacred mountain of Fusiyama was rent 

 asunder, a chasm being formed 1 200 feet wide and 600 feet deep. 

 In a special report to the Secretary of Agriculture, Mr. Mark 

 W. Harrington, Chief of the U.S. Weather Bureau, has pre- 

 sented a general summary of the operations of the Weather 

 Bureau during the three months which followed its transfer to 

 the Department of Agriculture on July i, 1891. The Service 

 has been reorganized with a view of carrying out the expressed 

 intention of Congress to develop and extend its work with 

 special reference to agriculture. The office force in Washing- 

 ton has been formed into three principal divisions, called re- 

 spectively the Executive Division, the Records Division, and the 

 Weather-Crop Bulletin and State Weather Service Division. 

 Outside of Washington, local forecast officials have been 

 appointed, the person chosen being in every case selected from 

 the most experienced and competent observers of the Service 

 These officials have been placed in the larger cities, with 

 authority to make predictions for their stations and vicinity, 

 giving the weather more in detail than the Washington fore- 



