January 14, 1892J 



NA TURE 



259 



maximum in summer, and, except in the south-eastern districts, 

 the frequency in autumn is greater than in spring. In July and 

 August the great fails extend over very large districts, and at 



•Other seasons are generally regulated by the course of the baro- 

 metric depressions. The following is the average yearly 



frequency of the heavy falls for the whole Empire, arranjjed 



according to seasons^ winter, o*8 ; spring, I4'3 ; summer, 

 Io6'4 ; autumn, 20"8. The maximum amount which fell in any 



<lay was over 8 inches, in Bessarabia. 



The floating of the particles of cloud or fog, Herr von 

 Frank, of Graz, seeks to explain {Met. Zeit. ), by the presence 

 of an envelope of aqueous vapour. As an approximate average 

 value for the diameter of droplet with envelope he gives 07 mm. 

 Supposing one cubic metre of cloud to hold 3 grammes of 

 water, there would be an interval of 0*2 mm. between the 

 envelopes. When clouds pass over the sun, the shadows of 

 objects are perceptibly lengthened when the darkening occurs, 

 and the author attributes this to refraction by the vapour 

 envelopes. Again, it is difficult to see how water droplets in 

 the form of cloud or fog could exist at such various temperatures, 

 did not the vapour envelopes, as bad conductors of heat (com- 

 pare Leidenfrost's drops), guard the droplets to some extent 

 from evaporating and freezing. The minute particles must soon 

 be dissipated by the sun's rays, if they were not in a kind of 

 spheroidal state. This heating expands the envelopes, so that 

 the cloud tends to rise ; and various phenomena in Nature may 

 be thus explained {e.g. the rise of mist in Alpine valleys). Once 

 more, liquid droplets have been observed (by Assmann) floating 

 in air of - 10" C. On meeting a solid body these froze to ice- 

 lumps without crystalline structure. Here, according to Herr 

 von Frank, the vapour-envelopes prevent freezing, till they are 

 ruptured by the solid ; the droplet thus loses the bad conductor of 

 heat which protected it, and solidifies so quickly that no crystals 

 can form. The author supposes that with much aqueous vapour 

 in the air, larger drops form, the clouds floating lower ; with less. 

 aqueous vapour, the drops are smaller and the clouds higher ; 

 the thickness of envelope, however, being the same for large 

 and small drops under like conditions of temperature and 

 pressure. 



On January 5 slight shocks of earthquake were felt at Verona, 

 Peschiera on the Lago di Garda, Illasi, Parma, Modena, and 

 Chiavari ; and on January 6 slight shocks were felt at Rochester, 

 New York. A telegram from Athens, dated January ir, states 

 that several severe shocks of earthquake, accompanied by sub- 

 terranean noists, had been felt in Thessaly, especially in the 

 neighbourhood of Larissa. 



On January ii a fresh stream of lava was issuing from the 

 base of the great cone of Mount Vesuvius on the northern side. 



Mr. Herbert Jones, to whom has been intrusted the charge 

 of the animal and vegetable remains found at Silchester during 

 the excavations last year, writes to the Times that all the bones 

 which are sufficiently perfect will be carefully measured for 

 comparison with those of modern animals and with bones found 

 on other ancient sites. This examination is yet very far from 

 complete, but Mr. Jones is inclined to think that the remains of 

 the red deer are those of animals considerably larger than are 

 common at the present day. The roe deer appears to have 

 been of about the ordinary size. The bones of the ox, of which 

 the only variety met with is apparently Bos longifrons, and those 

 of the sheep are very small ; also the horses' bones, two varieties 

 of which are present in the collection. It is probable that the 

 horses were of about the size of Exmoor or New Forest ponies, 

 the cattle much like the Kerry or Brittany breeds, and the sheep 

 similar to those now found on the island of St. Kilda. These 

 NO. II 59, VOL. 45] 



results are quite tentative, but Mr. Jones points out that so far 

 as they go they confirm the deductions made by Lieut. -General 

 Pitt- Rivers, F. R.S., from the animal remains found by him at 

 his excavations of a Romano-British village, near Rushmore, on 

 the borders of Wilts and Dorset. 



Last week we referred to a " new herbarium pest" to which 

 Dr. C. V. Riley calls attention in Insect Life. Writing on the 

 subject in the Gardener s Chronicle, Mr. R. McLachlan points 

 out that an insect of similar habit has been known in Europe for 

 nearly a century. In 1798, Fabricius described a moth, now 

 known as Acidalia herbariata, and says of it, " Habitat in 

 herbariis folia plantarum exsiccatarum exedens, Mus. Dom. 

 Bosc." This moth has occasionally been found in England, 

 and has been recorded as infesting herbalists' shops ; it has been 

 found nearly all over Europe, and usually in herbaria. A com- 

 plete account of its transformations by Dr. Heylaerts is given in 

 the Annates de la Socieic Entomolo^ique de Belgiqtie (tom. xxi. 

 pp. I to 8, 1878). 



Mkssrs. Pratt and Son, Brighton, state in the current 

 number of the Zoologist that they have recently set up a speci- 

 men of the spotted eagle which was shot at the Sudbourne Hal/ 

 Estate, Wickham Market, Suffolk, and sent to them for preserva- 

 tion. It proved on dissection to be a male, and its stomach 

 contained the remains of a water rat and a partridge. It was 

 killed on November 4. Another bird had been seen in it 

 company, and was no doubt the one caught at Colchester, as 

 recorded by Mr. H. Laver in the Zoologist. The bird sent to 

 Messrs. Pratt and Son was in perfect plumage, beautifully spotted, 

 and evidently in its second year ; it weighed 3^ pounds. 



The U.S. Commission of Fish and Fisheries has issued 

 a full and very interesting Report on the fisheries of the 

 Great Lakes. The review is based mainly on data obtained in 

 1885. While commercial fishing is the chief and practically the 

 only subject considered, the importance of pleasure-fishing on 

 the lakes has been incidentally referred to. Although there are 

 no statistics to show the amount of fish caught by sportsmen 

 and other pleasure-seekers, it is known that the quantity and 

 value of the fish so taken are very considerable. Mr. J. W. 

 Collins estimates, from his own observations, that no less than 

 10,000 dollars" worth of fish is taken every year from the break- 

 water at Chicago by men, women, and children who go there in 

 summer for a day's " outing." 



Prof. Putnam has received 20,000 dollars from a Con- 

 necticut gentleman, whose name is withheld, to enable him to 

 search in South America for objects of anthropological interest, 

 to be exhibited at the Chicago] Exposition. A part of the 

 exhibit in Prof. Putnam's department will be a fine collection 

 of cliff-dwellers' relics, gathered by the Rev. C. H. Green in 

 Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, and Arizona. 



Much interest has been excited in New York by the use of 

 electricity in a representation of "Julius Ccesar" which is being 

 given in that city by the Meiningen company. The thunder- 

 storm in the third scene of the first act is said by Electricity to 

 be the finest achievement of the kind ever seen in New York. 

 The lightning effects are " exceptionally lurid and realistic." 



The Report of the President of the Johns Hopkins Univer- 

 sity for 1891 has been issued, and all who are interested in the 

 higher education in the United States will be glad to learn from 

 it that the attendance of students was larger than it had been in 

 any previous year, while their quality was satisfactory. The 

 number of graduates also showed a marked increase. The Pre- 

 sident notes that electrical engineering has received especial 

 attention, " at a considerable though still inadequate outlay." 



