270 



NATURE 



[June 5, 1919 



valleys at the time of deposition of this drift. The 



paper provides further evidence of the influence of 



the Glacial epoch on the older superficial deposits 

 of southern England. 



Mr. a. L. Hall furnishes a complete review of the 

 minerals used as asbestos and of the requirements of 

 the trade in a memoir on "Asbestos in the Union of 

 South Africa" (Mem. 12, Geol. Surv. S. Africa, 1918, 

 price 55.). Crocidolite naturally receives full treat- 

 ment, and the author's new species amosite, with a 

 long, flexible, and strong fibre, is recommended as 

 being less fusible than crocidolite, which contains 

 more soda. Amosite, indeed, seems to rival chrysotile 

 in its commercial qualities. 



Prof. W. M. Davis contributes, a further compre- 

 hensive paper on "The Geological Aspects of the 

 Coral-reef Problem" to Science Progress (vol. li., 

 p. 420, 1919). Mr. W. G. Foye, in a memoir on 

 "Geological Observations in Fiji" (Proc. Amer. Acad. 

 Arts and Sciences, vol. liv.. No. i, 1918), states that 

 he finds no evidence of the wave-cut Pleistocene plat- 

 form which is postulated by Prof. R. D. Daly in his 

 theory of the post-Glacial origin of the reefs, and he 

 remarks that "if the Glacial-control theory is still 

 adhered to, the atolls must be pre-Pleistocene in age." 

 The Fiji area shows that elevation has here taken 

 place in differing degrees, leading to various states 

 of erosion. At present " all of the islands are being 

 rapidly reduced to sea-level by atmospheric solution.," 

 Subsidence has already followed on the last uplift, 

 and some of the most eroded islands have, in con- 

 sequence, deep lagoons. 



A " TSUNAMI " is the name given in Japan to any ab- 

 normally high water that causes damage to property. 

 Most " tsunamis " are due to submarine earthquakes or 

 volcanic eruptions. The sea-level then suddenly rises 

 or falls, after which a train of waves succeeds, which 

 may last a few hours or days. Other " tsunamis " are 

 caused by heavy winds along the coast or by 

 typhoons. These different forms of " tsunamis " are 

 considered by Mr. S. T. Nakamura in a paper read 

 before the Tokyo Mathematico-Physical Society (Pro- 

 ceedings, vol. ix., 1918, pp. 548-55), in which special 

 reference is made to the " tsunami " caused by an 

 earthquake off the eastern coast of North Japan on 

 September 8, 19 18. Mr. Nakamura explains the wide 

 variation in the height, of the waves by supposing 

 that movements in adjacent quadrants are opposite in 

 direction, so that the height of the waves would be 

 zero or very small on the boundaries of the quadrants, 

 and greatest along their central lines. The evidence 

 of the recent " tsunami," so far as it goes, favours 

 this explanation. 



The Danish Meteorological Institute has published 

 its report for 19 18 on the state of the ice in the Arctic 

 Seas. The year was a very favourable one for navi- 

 gation to Spitsbergen. From April until October the 

 west coast was practically free from ice, except for a 

 little around the South Cape in May and June, and 

 a good deal of pack in Bell Sound and Horn Sound in 

 September. The east coast, so far as reports go, seems 

 to have been fairly open late in the summer, and the 

 north coast from June onwards was navigable. In the 

 Greenland Sea, on the other hand, the ice reached far 

 eastward, and seems to have been unusuallv heavy. 

 Conditions in the Barents Sea and around Iceland seem 

 to have been fairly normal. There was little informa- 

 tion from the Kara Sea, except the report of Capt. 

 Amundsen, who found it filled with ice in the middle 

 of .\ugust. The entrance to the White Sea was not 

 navigable before May, but the sea remained open until 



NO. 2588, VOL. 103] 



late in the autumn. The report, which is printed, as 

 usual, in Danish and English, is well illustrated with 

 maps. 



Bulletin No. 105 of the University of Illinois con- 

 tains an account of hydraulic experiments with valves, 

 orifices, hose, nozzles, and orifice buckets. Ordinary 

 gate, globe, and angle valves were purchased in the 

 open market and tested as received ; the valves were 

 I in. and 2 in. in diameter, and were tested with settings 

 ranging from one-fourth open to full open. It was 

 found that the loss of head caused by small valves 

 varies as the square of the velocity in the pipe for all 

 the valve openings. When wide open, a globe valve 

 causes more than twice as much loss of head as an 

 angle valve of the same size ; while a gate valve causes 

 much less loss of head than either a globe or an angle 

 valve, the velocity in the pipe being the same in the 

 three cases. With equal velocities in the pipe, the 

 loss of head for an angle valve is somewhat less when 

 about three-fourths open than when wide open The 

 form or shape of the passageways through a globe 

 or angle valve has a large influence on the loss of 

 head for the small valve openings ; the f>ortion of the 

 passageways in which the form seems of greatest 

 importance is in the exit from the valve rather than 

 in the passageways leading to the valve disc. Graphs 

 of the results and tables of the coefficients obtained 

 are included in the paper. 



In an address given to the chemical section of the 

 American Association for the Advancement of Science 

 in December last. Prof. W. A. Noyes emphasises the 

 fact that the theory of valency is one of the most 

 important theories in chemistry. Scarcely any other 

 except the atomic theory, with which it is inseparably 

 connected, has been so fruitful in results which have 

 led to practical applications, and also to the develop- 

 ment of chemical knowledge. But in spite of these 

 results, which no one can dispute, the theory just now 

 is more or less in disrepute, especially among physical 

 chemists and teachers of inorganic chemistry. In 

 many elementary text-books structural _ formulae are 

 used so sparingly that they make no impression on 

 the student, and in some they are not even mentioned. 

 This attitude is due, in part, to a reaction from the 

 over-emphasis given to the subject at a time when 

 nearly all chemists were working on the structure of 

 organic compounds. In part also it is due to con- 

 fused ideas on the philosophy of science; to some 

 persons science is only an orderly description of 

 phenomena which we can see and handle, weigh and 

 measure, and connect by mathematical processes. But 

 the positive achievements of the valency theory are 

 so great that no one can doubt that there is in the 

 relations of atoms some reality which corresponds 

 with the theory. At the same time our knowledge 

 is vague and indefinite at many points, so that we 

 cannot yet consider the theory satisfactory- The most 

 important recent advance has been the interpretation 

 of valency in connection with the electron theory, 

 and the beginning which has been made towards the 

 study of positive and negative atoms in organic com- 

 pounds. As a basis for the better understanding of 

 valency there is need for a more definite knowledge 

 of the structure of atoms. Whatever other con- 

 clusions mav be reached, it seems certain that this 

 structure will be found to be dynamic rather than 

 static; it is hard to conceive of a quiescent electron. 



As is well known, the industry of ferro-cerium flints 

 was practically in the hands of Germany when war 

 broke out. Since then one French manufacturer has 

 succeeded in establishing the industry in France on a 

 scale sufficient to supply the requirements of that 



