294 



NATURE 



[June 7, 1917 



almost without a ripple. A fishery for these whales 

 began in 1810, and in 1887 a single ship captured 

 about fifty in a year. The fishery continues still, the 

 whole carcass being utilised, the flesh for feeding 

 cattle, and part of it and the bones forming manure. 



Rudolphi's rorqual, again, is rare, and Its oil con- 

 tains less stearine than in other whales. The baleen, 

 however, is the finest of the series, and many of the 

 blades are pure white. Sibbald's rorqual is likewise 

 rare, and goes under the name of the " sulphur-bottom 

 whale," though there is no ground for such a term 

 from its actual coloration. Its fingers are indicated ex- 

 ternally in the flipper, even in the foetus, and the 

 skull has a broader rostrum, agreeing in this respect 

 with the small finner. Little is known of the 

 age of such huge whales, yet the occurrence in the 

 Antarctic seas of giant forms, approaching 90 ft. in 

 length, of a species apparently identical with this 

 would appear to support the view of long life. The 

 small finner or little piked whale is not uncommon, 

 but the author, in mentioning the plicae of the throat, 

 does not allude to their forking. He found this whale 

 occasionally "breaching" — that is, leaping clear of 

 the water — and that no " spout " was visible, thus in 

 both features differing from the British representatives. 

 Its food on the shores of the United States is chiefly 

 capelin and herrings. Scammon described another 

 closely allied species, viz. Balaenoptera Davidsoni, 

 which the author rightly ignores. It refers only to 

 the foregoing. In his account of the last species, the 

 humpback whale, he gives a careful description of the 

 coloration of the flippers (called "fins" throughout 

 the memoir), the upper surface being chiefly white, 

 but that the extent may vary with age, that of the 

 Scotch "example harpooned in the Tay in 1884, and 

 described by Struthers, being entirely white. These 

 huge organs (about 12 ft. long and 9 in. thick in a 

 40-ft. whale) are supposed by the author to be used 

 for swimming, but in the example from the Tay they 

 were used for sounding, especially when efforts were 

 made to drive it on the beach. This form has a rudi- 

 mentary femur. The vigour and tenacity of this 

 whale and its frequent leaps during its gambols are 

 remarkable. On the whole, the external characters, 

 and even the internal and external parasites of these 

 American Cetaceans, conform to the conditions found 

 in our own waters, a result to be anticipated in forms 

 possessing a range so extensive. 



The memoir is illustrated by sixteen excellent litho- 

 graphic plates and several text-figures, efforts being 

 made even to show the fimbriae on the edge of the 

 powerful flukes of the humpback whale, but the small 

 outline in this and other cases falls much short of the 

 condition in Nature. Various tables of measurements 

 and records of captures are also interpolated in the text. 

 The Boston Society of Natural History and the pains- 

 taking author are to be congratulated on this mono- 

 graph, which places in the hands of the public a 

 succinct yet compreh^sive account of each form occur- 

 ring in the waters of New England. 



^ W. C. M. 



COMMERCIAL AERONAUTICS. 



THE lecture delivered on May 30 at the Central 

 Hall, Westminster, by Mr. Holt Thomas, on 

 " Commercial Aviation," should awaken a consider- 

 able amount of interest In the commercial possibilities 

 of aircraft after the war. The lecture was in effect 

 a prelude to the meeting of the Civil Aerial Transport 

 Committee, of which Lord Northcliffe is chairman, 

 which has recently been mentioned in these columns. 

 The serious consideration of commercial aeronautics 

 will involve a great deal of scientific work, since the 



NO. 2484, VOL. 99] 



machines which will be necessary for commercial trans- 

 port will differ in many ways from the types which 

 have been developed to meet the demands of war. 

 Speed will still be an important factor, though not of 

 such paramount importance as in the military aero- 

 plane. Mr. Holt Thomas pointed out that an aerial 

 mail to Paris could be worked profitably at a charge 

 of one halfpenny per ounce, the time of transit being 

 about three hours, and this one instance is sufficient 

 to show the great advantages which aerial transport 

 could confer upon modern commerce. The influence 

 of winds would necessarily render such a mail service 

 more erratic than those now in operation, but the 

 greatly increased speed would more than compensate 

 for this, especially in the case of journeys which now 

 involve both land and sea transport. The question of 

 passenger conveyance is much more complicated than 

 the establishment of aerial mails, as it will be neces- 

 sary to design machines to give a reasonable amount 

 of comfort to the passengers, especially on the longer 

 journeys. Such difficulties of design are by no means 

 insuperable, and it is practically certain that passenger 

 services will be established in the near future, especially 

 to places not easily served by railway. As Mr. Holt 

 Thomas remarked, the aeroplane could be used to 

 develop outlying places until they grew sufficiently 

 large to warrant the construction of a railway line. 

 The aerial mail will probably come first, owing to the 

 obvious benefits such a rapid service would bring, and 

 to the fact that it would not involve any radical 

 changes in the design of the necessary machines. 



Mr. Louis Coatalen, the well-known designer of the 

 Sunbeam Company, delivered an interesting lecture on. 

 "Aircraft and Motor-car Engine Design" on May 16 

 before the Aeronautical Societ}^ He commenced by 

 pointing out the wide differences between the aero- 

 plane engine and the type of engine previously de- 

 veloped for motor-cars. The chief desiderata in the 

 aeroplane engine are lightness and the ability to work 

 continuously at maximum power, and these considera- 

 tions scarcely affect the design of the car engine at all. 

 The engines designed for racing cars are much more 

 nearly analogous to the aircraft type, and the lecturer 

 remarked that the experience gained on such racing 

 engines was of great value in the early days of aero- 

 nautics. The extent to which design had progressed 

 was illustrated by tha fact that in two years the 

 weight of aeroplane engines had been reduced from 

 4-3 to 2-6 lb. per horse-power, and that without sacrific- 

 ing trustworthiness. The question of valve design 

 received a good deal of attention, the lecturer stating 

 that' in his opinion the best arrangement was to use two 

 inlet and two exhaust valves, and to place the sparking- 

 plug in the centre of the cylinder head. Coming from 

 such an experienced and successful designer as Mr. 

 Coatalen, the paper is full of valuable information, and 

 should be read bv all who are interested In light petrol 

 motors, whether for aviation or for other purposes. 



THE PAST WINTER. 



WITH the publication of the Monthly Weather 

 Report of the Meteorological Office for April 

 observations are now complete for the five months 

 December, 1916, to April, 1917, which embrace the 

 abnormally cold and wintry period experienced gener- 

 ally over the British Islands. Temperature results 

 are given in great detail In the reports, and the data 

 afford a most thorough examination of the excep- 

 tional character of the weather. 



Cold conditions set in towards the close of Novem- 

 ber and continued until nearly the close of April. 

 The report for December shows a deficiency of tem- 

 perature everywhere In the British Islands, except at 



