July 26, 191 7] 



NATURE 



429 



was a Dane by birth, settled in the north of England 

 in 1843, and five years later, in 1848, founded the 

 Portland cement works now known as Otto Trech- 

 mann, Ltd., at West Hartlepool, which are among 

 the oldest works of the kind in the kingdom. Dr. 

 Trechmann studied chemistry under Bunsen, and ob- 

 tained his doctorate of philosophy at Heidelberg. On 

 returning home he entered his father's business, and 

 it was largely to his energy and ability that the 

 development and prosperity of the works were due ; 

 on the conversion of the business into a limited 

 liability company, he became chairman and managing 

 director, a position he held until his death. While 

 at Heidelberg he became interested in minerals, and 

 started the formation of the collection which consti- 

 tuted the principal hobby of his life. Being a crystallo- 

 grapher, he had a keen eye for a w-ell-cr\stallised 

 specimen, and at his death the collection had grown 

 to a considerable size and comprised specimens of 

 much scientific value. At one period he was attracted 

 by the minerals occurring in the famous quarry just 

 off the valley of the Binn, and one of the sulphar- 

 senites of silver found there was named trechmannite 

 after him by its discoverer, Mr. R. H. Solly. He 

 bequeathed some of the best specimens in his collec- 

 tion to the British Museum. Despite the calls of busi- 

 ness, he contrived to find time to engage in crystallo- 

 graphical research, and published many papers, 

 several of them dealing with the minerals found at 

 Binn ; his work was characterised by careful observa- 

 tion and skilful draughtsmanship. In later years he 

 turned to entomology as a recreation, paying^ especial 

 attention to exotic Rhopalocera and to Diptera. of 

 which he made a local collection of considerable scien- 

 tific value. 



Mr. Henry Balfour discusses, in the July issue of 

 Man, certain primitive forms of agricultural imple- 

 ments from the Naga Hills, Assam. A remarkable 

 form used by the Sema, Lhota, and some eastern 

 Nagas consists of a slip of bamboo, with a sharp 

 edge, twisted into a shape like a necktie, which is 

 used for eradicating weeds from crops. This has the 

 disadvantage of being very perishable and, becoming 

 supplanted by iron-i)laded hoes, shows signs of obso- 

 lescence. But it is noteworthy that the original type 

 of the bamboo weeder has been reproduced in iron. 

 Thus, as the final result, we have four types : first, the 

 bamboo "necktie" hoe; secondly, the copy of it in 

 iron; thirdly, a two-tanged blade, hafte'd to two 

 wooden rods, forming prolongations of the tangs, the 

 ends of which are crossed, and so retain the "neck- 

 tie" shape of the prototype; and, lastly, the same type 

 of blade, hafted to a Y-shaped handle cut froni a 

 single piece, in which the single grip replaces the 

 awkward X-shaped handle, the result being an emin- 

 ently serviceable tool. The series is an admirable 

 instance of clearly marked stages in the evolution of 

 agricultural implements. 



Prof. Flinders Petrie notices a series of photo- 

 graphs from Abu Simbel depicting various racial tvpes 

 in Ancient Egypt (part ii., 19 17). One of the most 

 interesting represents a man with a long retreating 

 forehead running up to a peak to the back of the 

 head, with rolls of flesh on the back of the neck below 

 the occiput. The same form of head is characteristic 

 of the Armenians of to-day, though accompanied by a 

 larger nose, and the Egyptian example seems to 

 belong to a nation east of Asia Minor, somewhere 

 about the head-waters of the Euphrates. Another, 

 classed as North Arabian, has traces of an earring, 

 which is an Assyrian characteristic, and this man mav 

 come from a region not greatly geographically 

 separated from that of the first example. The Hittite 

 type is marked by the thickness of hair ending in a 

 NO. 2491, VOL. 99] 



curl below the shoulder. Another specimen, wearing a 

 long cap with a sort of hanging tassel, is shown by 

 the analogy of a type represented on the gates of 

 Balawat to be that of a Phoenician boatman. Thus, 

 of the ten examples, two seem to come from Armenia 

 or its neighbourhood, and the others belong roughly 

 to North and South Galilee. 



The expedition which Dr. Hamilton Rice led to 

 the Amazon returned to New York this spring. 

 From the Geographical Review for June (vol. iii.. 

 No. 6) we learn that after an ascent of the Amazon 

 to Iquitos, the expedition returned to Manaos to 

 undertake the ascent of the Rio Negro, which was 

 to be the principal work of the expedition. In a 

 river steamer the expedition reached Santa Isabel, 

 and thence in a steam launch successfully traversed 

 the difficult stretch of river to Sao Gabriel. Further 

 progress proved to be impossible on account of low 

 water. An attempt was made to ascend the Pada- 

 uir}', a left tributary of the Rio Negro, but an im- 

 mense sandbank blocked the way. The expedition 

 then descended to Manaos, and Dr. Rice decided to 

 return to the United States on account of the war 

 news and other circumstances. 



In the Geographical Review for June there are 

 two articles which deal in a most instructive way 

 with the Eastern theatre of war in Europ>e. The first 

 is by Prof, de Martonne on the Carpathians. Atten- 

 tion is paid particularly to the physical features con- 

 trolling human movements, and the article gives a 

 clear presentment of the complicated relief of the 

 region. There is a good coloured relief map, besides 

 several diagrams. The second article, by Mr. 

 D. W. Johnson, on the conquest of Rumania, de- 

 scribes the geographical features of the counlr}-, 

 especially in relation to the campaign of 19 16. The 

 author shows how geographical conditions favoured 

 a Rumanian invasion of Bulgaria through the Dob- 

 rudja, but political considerations overruled this plan 

 and embarked Rumania on an invasion of the 

 Transylvanian plain, a project which materially 

 assisted the success of the German plan for the con- 

 quest of Rumania. 



In a paper published in the Scottish Geographical 

 Magazine for June (vol. xxxiii.) entitled "The Weddell 

 Sea : An Historical Retrospect," Dr. W. S. Bruce has 

 been at great pains to clear up the fog of obscurity 

 which hitherto has enveloped the early history of ex- 

 ploration in that part of the Antarctic. With the 

 exception of Mr. E. S. Balch's work on early American 

 explorers, this paper is almost the first scholarly con- 

 tribution to the history of the Antarctic, and, in view 

 of the uncertainty that has prevailed regarding ques- 

 tions of priority in the Graham Land region and the 

 trustworthiness of early accounts, this work was much 

 needed. By persistence in following up clues Dr. 

 Bruce has unearthed much previously overlooked mate- 

 rial and several original log-books. The earliest ex- 

 plorers of the Weddell Sea were William Smith and 

 Capt. Ed. Bransfield, R.N., in the brig Williams, early 

 in 1820, subsequent to Smith's discoven,- of the South 

 Shetlands in 1819. On this voyage they were the first 

 to sight the mainland of the Antarctic continent, which 

 Bransfield named Trinity Land. This point is of great 

 interest, because it was previously held that the claim 

 of the American sealer, N, B. Palmer, in 1821, has 

 priority. As regards the discovery of the group known 

 as the South Orkneys, Dr. Bruce recalls that priority 

 belongs to Powell, who sighted them in December, 

 182 1, and that Weddell six days later named them 

 South Orkneys. Powell had regarded them merely as 

 an extension of the South Shetlands, but they appear 

 as Powell Group on the chart of 1822. Dr. Bruce, 



