March 24, 1892] 



NA TURE 



4Q7 



doing much good work. During the past year it prosecuted no 



feiver than 17,847 cases in the courts. Through its efforts 

 49,118 disabled animals were temporarily suspended from work ; 

 34,264 horses, disabled past recovery, were humanely destroyed ; 

 6444 disabled horses were removed from the streets in an 

 ambulance. The number of prosecutions and other official 

 interferences was larger than in previous years, but it does not 

 follow that cruelty is more common than it was. The increase 

 is due to the greater vigilance of the Society's officers. 



In a paper contributed to the current number of the Journal 

 of the Franklin Institute, Prof. Lewis M. Haupt argues strongly 

 in favour of the construction of a ship canal between New York 

 and Philadelphia, connecting the Delaware and Raritan Rivers. 

 Such a canal would, he maintained, extend the Erie Canal and 

 its benefits to Philadelphia, and open to its manufacturers over 

 16,000 miles of waterways in the great basin of the Mississippi. 

 It would reduce the distance by water to New York harbour 

 from 240 to about 60 miles, would afford an inside and safe 

 passage to Eastern, Sound, and Hudson River ports ; would 

 develop a large population along the entire route, and so benefit 

 the railroads traversing the district. " In short," says Prof. 

 Haupt, " the effect would be to reduce the rate per mile, as well 

 as to shorten the distance between the two greatest centres of 

 population on the American continent, or, we may say, in the 

 world ; for nowhere else on the globe is it possible by so short 

 and inexpensive a waterway to connect such large populations 

 and so many and valuable interests." 



The Bethlehem Iron Company, Pennsylvania, is to erect at 

 the Chicago Exhibition a full-size model of its 125-ton steam 

 hammer, said to be the largest in the world. It will span the 

 main avenue of Machinery Hall, and will rise to a height of 

 90 feet. At the last Paris Exhibition great attention was 

 attracted by a similar model shown by the Creusot works, but 

 representing only a lOO-ton hammer. 



Baron von Mueller records, in the Victorian Naturalist 

 for February, that, while elaborating diagnoses of new Papuan 

 plants, he was pleasantly surprised to find among the novelties 

 an Aniholoma. This genus has hitherto been supposed to be 

 restricted to New Caledonia. The Papuan species is dedicated 

 to Prof, van Tieghem. The denticulation of the leaves, the 

 elongation of the setule of the anthers and the three-celled 

 ovulary already separate A. Tieghemi from A. nwntanum. 

 Among the novelties are also Oxalis {Biophytum) albiflora, 

 Sloanea Forhesii, which approaches S. quadrivalvis in many 

 respects, but is petaliferous, and Quintinia Macgregori is 

 particularly remarkable. 



A "Treatise on Physical Optics," by Mr. A. B. Basset, 

 will be issued shortly by Messrs. Deighlon, Bell, and Co. 



The proper title of Mr. A. E. H. Love's woik (included in 

 our list of forthcoming scientific books last week) is " A Treatise 

 on the Mathematical Theory of Elasticity." 



Messrs. Nalder Bros, and Co. have issued price lists, 

 carefully illustrated, of their electrical testing and other scientific 

 instruments, and of their ammeters and voltometers, resistance 

 frames, &c. 



Messrs. Dulau and Co. have issued Part xvii. of their 

 "Catalogue of Zoological and Pala-ontological Books." It 

 contains lists of works on Mollusca and Molluscoida. 



In Mr. George S. Carr's letter on the terms "centrifugal 

 force " and " force of inertia " (Nature, p. 463), in the second 

 sentence of the second paragraph, read " in every case as the 

 reaction to the normal component of the centripetal force " (not 

 ^'^ centrifugaV^). 



NO. I 169, VOL. 45] 



At the meeting of the Belgian Academy of Sciences 

 on March 6, Prof. Spring announced that the late Prof. 

 Stas had left, in an almost completed condition, a long and 

 important memoir describing the results of several further 

 sttichiometrical investigations. It is entitled "Silver," and will 

 forthwith be edited, presumably by Dr. Spring, and published. 

 It may be remembered that, after the publication of Prof. Stas's 

 classical memoir upon the preparation of absolutely pure silver 

 and the atomic weight of that metal, doubts were thrown by 

 Prof Dumas on the validity of the work on the ground that the 

 silver employed was not free from occluded atmospheric gases. 

 Moreover, Prof. Dumas expressed doubts as to the bearing of 

 the work upon the celebrated hypothesis of Prout, according to 

 which the atomic weights of all the other elements are supposed 

 to be multiples of that of hydrogen. P'or, if silver possessed 

 the atomic weight attributed to it by Prof. Stas, the atomic 

 weight of oxygen became 15 '96 and not the whole number 16, 

 and consequently Prout's hypothesis in its original form would 

 be negatived. In order to set these doubts at rest, and to leave 

 his work in a perfected condition, Prof. Stas has prepared a 

 quantity of silver with such extreme precautions that he has 

 succeeded in obtaining it entirely free from occluded gases, and 

 from even the minutest traces of the materials of the vessels 

 employed. So perfect is the purity of this silver that even when 

 heated to the temperature of the melting-point of iridium not a 

 trace of sodium can be detected in the spectrum of the vapour. 

 With this silver he has repeated his former determinations of 

 the atomic weight of the metal, and it is satisfactory to learn 

 that the final number obtained is, as Prof. Stas himself expected 

 it would be, identical with that formerly obtained. Hence, the 

 objection of Prof. Dumas cannot longer be entertained, and 

 the atomic weight of oxygen would indeed appear to be 15 96 

 and not 16, for the numbeis obtained by Prof. Stas agree so 

 remarkably that an error of four-hundredths of a unit would 

 apparently be out of the question. In addition to this im- 

 portant memoir. Prof. Stas has also left the data of a series of 

 twelve separate determinations of the stochiometric relation of 

 silver to potassium chloride, the materials for which were the 

 pure silver just described, and a specimen of potassium chloride, 

 also prepared with a care and precaution quite in keeping with 

 the rest of the work of the great analyst. The results of these 

 determinations are described by Prof Spring a^ agreeing in a 

 most wonderful manner, and will afford another valuable base to 

 which the atomic weights of many other elements may be re- 

 ferred. Besides these two memoirs, a third is mentioned by 

 Prof. Spring, relating to the spectra of several metals which Prof. 

 Stas has obtained in the purest state in which these metals have 

 ever probably been seen. The whole of these memoirs, con- 

 sisting of about fifteen hundred pages of manuscript, it is 

 intended to publish forthwith in three separate treatises. 



The additions 10 the Zoological Society's Gardens during the 

 past week include a Ring-necked Parrakeet (Paheornis torquatus 

 i ) from India, presented by Mr. George H. Whitaker ; a Grey- 

 breasted Pariakeel {Bolborhynchns monachtis) from Munie Video,, 

 presented by Miss Mildred Whitaker ; a Roseate Cockatoo 

 {.Cacatna roseicapilla) from Australia, presented by Mr. J. S. 

 Gibbons ; a Nutmeg Fruit Pigeon {Carpjphaga bicolor) from the 

 Torres Straits, presented by Mrs. Fitzgerald ; two Pike {Esox 

 lucius) from British Fresh Waters, pre.-ented by Mr. P. F. 

 Coggin ; a Manichurian Crane \,Grus viridirostris) from North 

 China, deposited. 



OUR AS'IRONOMICAL COLUMN. 



FuzziNEss OF SOME VARIABLE STARS. — Mr. Cuthbert G. 



Peek has, during the last six years, used his 6i-inch achromatic 



for the investigation of the light-curves of variable stars. In 



