444 



NATURE 



[March lo, 1892 



the elements still show very considerable divergences, the re- 

 searches conducted by Prof. H. F. Weber on boron, silex, and 

 carbon, regarding the dependence of the specific heats upon the 

 temperature, are to be extended to several other elements, 

 prepared as pure as possible, and also to combinations or alloys 

 of them. Further, the densities and the thermic coefficients 

 of expansion of the substances investigated are to be ascertained 

 as carefully as possible." The following are the conditions : 

 the treatises handed in by competitors may be iu German, 

 French, or English, and must be sent in by September 30, 1894. 

 The examination of the treatises will be intrusted to a Committee 

 consisting of the following gentlemen : Prof. Pernet, Zurich ; 

 Prof. A, Hantzsch, Ziirich ; Prof. E. Dorn, Halle-on-the- 

 Saale ; Prof. J. Wislicenus, Leipzig ; Prof. E. Schiir, Ziirich, 

 as member of the Committee offering the prizes. The Prize 

 Committee is empowered to award a first prize of two thousand 

 francs, and minor prizes at its discretion to the amount of one 

 thousand francs. The work to which the first prize is awarded 

 is to be the property of Schnyder von Wartensee's Foundation, 

 and arrangements will be made with the author regarding its 

 publication. Every treatise sent in must have a motto on the 

 title-page, and be accompanied with a sealed envelope bearing 

 the same motto outside and containing the author's name. The 

 treatises are to be sent to the following address: "An das 

 Praesidium des Conventes der Stadtbibliothek, Ziirich (betreffend 

 Preisaufgabe der Stiftung von Schnyder von Wartensee fiir das 

 Jahr 1894)." 



At the meeting, on February 17, of the Russian Geographical 

 Society, the Constantine Medal was awarded to M. V. Pyevtsoff 

 for his work of exploration in Central Asia, especially during 

 the last Tibet expedition. The Count Liitke Medal was 

 awarded to A. I. Vilkitsky for his measurements of pendulum 

 oscillations in Russia. A newly established prize, consist- 

 ing of the interest on a sum collected by public subscription 

 after the death of Prjevalsky, was granted to G. E. Grum- 

 Grzimailo for his researches in Central Asia in 1889-90, and 

 large silver medals, also associated with Prjevalsky's name, 

 were awarded to the companions of his expeditions, V. I. 

 Soborovsky and P. K. Kozloff, to the geologist of the 

 last Tibet expedition, K. I. Bogdanovitch, for his geological 

 work in Central Asia, and to M. E. Grum-Grzimailo for the 

 surveys he made in company with his brother in the Pamir. The 

 great Gold Medal of the Society was awarded by the Section of 

 Ethnography to A. N. Pypin, for his "History of Russian 

 Ethnography," and by the Section of Statistics to A. A. 

 Kaufmann for his researches on the economical conditions of 

 the peasants and indigenes in the Ishim and Tura districts of 

 West Siberia. Four small gold medals and seventeen silver 

 ones were awarded for works of less importance. 



At the same meeting the yearly report of the Society was 

 read, and we learn from it that the Expedition which has been 

 sent out for the exploration of the Chinese province Sy-chuang, 

 and the territory on the slopes of the Tibet plateau, will soon 

 start from Peking. The leader of the Expedition, the zoologist 

 M. V. Berezovsky, is already in P eking, preparing to start on 

 his journey. N. F. Katanoff is hard at work collecting ethno- 

 graphical materials in Mongolia. K. P. Sternberg continued 

 his pendulum observations in South Russia and Crimea ; and 

 A. E. Radd continued to investigate the magnetic anomalies 

 about Byelgorod, in Kursk. L. I. Lutughin has made geo- 

 logical explorations and levellings on the watershed between the 

 Volga and the Northern Dvina ; while the Ministry of the Navy 

 has continued this year the exploration of the Black Sea. In 

 the department of ethnography, the report mentions the work 

 of E. R. Romanoff in White Russia, and MM. G. E. Veres- 

 chaghin and Shilkoff among the Votyaks. The East Siberian 

 branch of the Society has accomplished, as usual, a good deal of 

 NO. I 167, VOL. 45] 



useful work. Prof. Kofzynski has explored the Amur region, 

 with especial reference to the advantages it offers for culture and 

 colonization : V. A. Obrutcheff continued the exploration of the 

 Olekma and Vitim highlands ; MM. Yadrintseff, Klementz, and 

 Levin took part in Prof Radloff's expedition to the valley ot 

 the Orkhon in Mongolia ; and Dr. Kiriloff continued his studies 

 of Mongolian medicine. The Museum at Irkutsk has been en- 

 larged, and further enriched, by new collections. The publica- 

 tions of the Society included : the work of the Novaya Zemlya 

 Polar Station ; the ornithology of North-west Mongolia, by MM. 

 Berezovsky and Bianchi ; several volumes of Memoirs ; and the 

 Bulletin {Izvestia). The new monthly periodical, meteorological 

 Vyestnik, and the " Living Antiquity " {Jivaya Starina) have 

 been issued regularly during the past year. 



We are glad to be able to report an advance in the Meteoro- 

 logical Service of Roumania. For some years the official 

 publication of that country has been limited to the yearly 

 volume containing the observations for Bucharest. From 

 January I last, however, the Meteorological Institute has begun 

 the issue of a monthly bulletin containing observations taken 

 three times daily at Soulina, Bucharest, and Sinaia, 6 feet, 269 

 feet, and 2821 feet above the sea, respectively. The various 

 weather phenomena are represented by the symbols adopted for 

 international meteorological publications. 



The Danish Meteorological Institute and the Deutsche See- 

 warte, conjointly, have recently issued daily synoptic weather 

 charts, for the North Atlantic Ocean and adjacent continents, 

 for the year ending November 1887, completing the series from 

 September 1873, with the exception of the following dates : 

 December 1876 to November 1880, being the period which 

 elapsed from the death of Captain N. Hoffmeyer, who com- 

 menced the work, to its resumption by the two above-named 

 institutions ; and September 1882 to August 1883, being the 

 period for which the Meteorological Office published its elaborate 

 synchronous charts for the same area. For three years ending 

 November 1886, the Deutsche Seewarte has published a separate 

 text explanatory of the general conditions of weather for the area 

 embraced by the charts, and showing the effect of the conditions 

 upon the navigation of vessels, together with charts, selected 

 for various periods of special interest, showing the position and 

 movements of barometrical maxima and minima. The work 

 furnishes the best possible materials for studying the connection 

 between the weather of the Atlantic and that of our islands. 



Observations of air-pressure during a total solar eclipse 

 reveal an influence of the latter phenomenoh on the former. 

 In a recent number of the Annalen der Hydrographie, Herr 

 Steen studies the eclipse of August 29, 1886, in this respect, 

 using the records (at intervals of a quarter of an hour) of four- 

 teen Norwegian ships between Panama and Madagascar, of 

 which four were in the zone of totality, and at least four others 

 quite close to it. Having first eliminated the daily period of 

 air-pressure, he groups the observations of the ships, and forms 

 means ; and he finds both these and the individual records 

 reveal two maxima of air-pressure, separated by a minimum. In 

 the totality zone the first maximum is 35m., and the second 

 2h. 15m., after the middle of the eclipse ; in the partial zone, 

 the first is 25m. before, and the second ih. 40m. after, the 

 middle. This double wave, Herr Steen explains thus. During 

 a solar eclipse, day is changed to night for a short time, and 

 the transition is much like the ordinary change frooa day to 

 night in the tropics, where the twilight is but short. There the 

 curve of air-pressure has regularly a maximum about 10 p.m., 

 some time after sunset, and a minimum about 4 a.m., shortly 

 before sunrise ; while a second maximum appears about 10 a.m. 

 It is natural a total solar eclipse should act similarly. The dis- 

 I placement of the " epochs " of the air-pressure wave in the partial 



