332 



NA TURE 



[August 3, 1893 



scholastic year 1892-93. Though the record cannot be regarded 

 as the best criterion of efficiency, owing to the fact that many 

 of the scholarships are confined to certain schools, and that 

 their values vary considerably, still an indication is obtained of 

 the attention paid by schools to different subjects. The highest 

 number of science scholarships, four, was obtained by Man- 

 chester. Epsom and St. Paul's follow with three each, and 

 then Charterhouse, Dulwich, Shrewsbury, and Tonbridge with 

 two each. In mathematics, Clifton, Tiverton, and Merchant 

 Taylor's each obtained three scholarships. The following 

 schools obtained two : Christ's Hospital, St. Paul's, Bristol, 

 Chester, Leatherhead, Liverpool, Wolverhampton, Liverpool 

 Institute, and Wellingborough. 



The vote 01 ;£ 6,200, 000 for public education in England and 

 Wales which was agreed lo on Monday, is the largest that has 

 ever been requested for that purpose. In his speech on the 

 subject, Mr. Acland referred to the suggestion that the Bethnal 

 Green Museum should be handed over to the London County 

 Council, and said that if the Council should desire to have the 

 site and the building on reasonable conditions for educational 

 purposes, the Government would be glad to meet them in a 

 reasonable way. 



Mr. R. W. Stewart, Assistant Lecturer and Demonstrator 

 in Physics in the University College of North Wales, Bangor, 

 has just been granted the degree of Doctor of Science by the 

 University of London. Mr. Stewart's thesis contained the results 

 of a series of experimental determinations of the thermo-conduc- 

 tivities of iron and copper, made in the Physical Laboratory of 

 the University College of North Wales. The results are em- 

 bodied in a memoir which was recently communicated to the 

 Royal Society by the President (Lord Kelvin), and which has 

 been accepted for publication by the Council of the Society. 



The British Medical Journal says that several changes have 

 recently taken place in the teaching slafTof St. Bartholomew's 

 Medical School. Among them we note that Dr. F. D. Chat- 

 taway has been elected to the Demonstratorship of Chemistry ; 

 and Mr. Alfred Howard has been appointed to the Assistant 

 Demonstratorship. Mr. J. S. Edliins, at present George 

 Henry Lewis student, and late Senior Demonstrator of Physi- 

 ology at Owens College, Manchester, has been elected 

 Demonstrator of Physiology. 



Mr. D. T. Macdougal has been appointed Instructor in 

 Vegetable Physiology at the University of Minnesota. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS. 



The Quarterly [ournal of Microscopical Science, for July, 

 1893, contains : — On the morphology and physiology of the 

 brain and sense-organs of Limulus, by Dr. W. Patten (Plates 

 I to 5). Some two years ago the author published a paper in the 

 Quarterly Journal of Microscopical Science calling attention to 

 many striking resemblances between Arachnids and Vertebrates, 

 and maintaining that the latter are descended from a great group 

 of the former, in which he included the Arachnids, I'rilobites, 

 and Merostomata. Attention was called to the evidences of 

 relationship as shown in the invaginations which in insects give 

 rise CO the optic ganglia, and in scorpions and Limulus become so 

 extensive as to enfold not only the optic ganglia but the eyes 

 and the forebrain as well. A cerebral vesicle is thus formed, 

 from the floor of which arise the forebrain and the optic ganglia, 

 and from the roof a tubular outgrowth, at the end of which lie 

 the inverted retinas of the parietal eye. Such a condition is to 

 be found only in Arachnids and Veriebrates, and the author 

 thinks it affords as trustworthy evidence of relationship as the 

 presence of a notochord or of gill-slits. Other relationships 

 were indicated between the lateral eyes in Limulus and Verte- 

 brates, between the cartilaginous endocranium in Arachnids, and 

 the primordial cranium of Vertebrates, between the subneural rod 

 in scorpions and the notochord, and in the correspondence be- 

 tween the neuromeres and nerves in Arachnids and Verte- 

 brates. To this long array of evidence the author now 

 adds others : identifying nearly all the important lobes and 

 cavities characteristic ot the Vertebrate forebrain in the fore- 

 brain of Limulus ; showing that the coxal sense-organs are gus- 



tatory, and correspond to the supra-branchial sense-organs of 

 Vertebrates, and describing a remarkable organ in Limulus, 

 which has all the characteristic morphological features of the 

 olfactory organs in Vertebrates. The author believes that it 

 may now be regarded as beyond any reasonable doubt that the 

 Vertebrates are descended from the Arachnids. The very in- 

 teresting palaeontological aspect of the subject is promised in a 

 separate memoir. — On the structure of the pharyngeal bars of 

 Amphioxus, by Dr. W. Blaxland Benham (Plates 6 and 7), 

 gives a detailed account of the tongue (or secondary) bar 

 in Amphioxus, and institutes a comparison between it and 

 the primary bar, and there is a resume of the observations 

 of recent observers and an account of certain abnormal 

 bars. — On the perivisceral cavity in Ciona, by A. H. L. New- 

 stead, B.A. (Plate 8). The author found (1), that there are 

 no communications between the perivisceral cavity and the 

 atrial cavity (such as were described by Kupffer, though denied 

 by Roule) ; (2) that definite communications exist between the 

 perivisceral cavity and the pharynx, and as these openings occur 

 in the same position as the orifices described by Kupffer, it is 

 probable that the supposiiion of van Beneden and Julen is 

 correct, that the orifices observed by Kupffer open into the peri- 

 visceral and not into the atrial cavity. The perivisceral cavity 

 is regarded as a specially modified epicardium, which has be- 

 come greatly enlarged. — On the early stages in the develop- 

 ment of Distichopora violacea, with a short essay on the frag- 

 mentation of the Nucleus, by Dr. Sydney J. Hickson (Plate 9). 

 In this paper we have first an account of the early stages of the 

 development of Distichopora violacea from material coJected 

 by the author in North Celebes and by Prof. Haddon in Torres 

 Straits ; then an account of the formation of the germinal layers 

 in the Ccelenterata. A sketch of the developmental histories, as 

 known up to the present, is given, with the typical invaginate 

 gastrula at one end and the multinucleated Plasmodium at the 

 other ; and, lastly, the important question of the " fragmenta- 

 tion" of the Oosperm nucleus is very ably and judiciously dis- 

 cussed, the following conclusions from the evidence adduced 

 being drawn : (i) Fragmentation of the nucleus is a normal 

 method of nuclear division, and is not always a sign of patho- 

 logical change ; (2) in many cases where the nucleus is sup- 

 posed to disappear, there is, as a matter of fact, only a minute 

 fragmentation ; (3) that fragmentation only occurs when there 

 is no cell division ; and (4) that karyokinetic division of the 

 nuclei is caused by the forces in the cell protoplasm which bring 

 about the division of the cytoplasm. The phenomena of pluri- 

 polar mitosis may afford examples of intermediate types. 



Bulletin de I'Academie Royale de Belgique, No 5. — On nega- 

 tivehydrostaticpressure(continued),by G.Van derMensbrugghe. 

 A test-tube is completely filled with water, and another, with 

 thin walls and a little narrower, is plunged into it to about half 

 the depth. On inverting the two tubes the smaller one rises 

 through the water in the other in spite of gravitation, owing to 

 the suction exerted by the water, whose internal pressure is less 

 than that of the atmosphere. If a tube of paper or of waxed silk 

 be substituted for the smaller test-tube, the flexible tube is flat- 

 tened when plunged down inito the other, but regains its circular 

 section on placing the system upside down. Just as it is possi- 

 ble to subject a large vessel to an enormous internal pressure by 

 ordinary hydrostatic pressure, so it is possible, on the other hand, 

 to subject it to a corresponding external pressure by inverting 

 the hydrostatic tube. — Researches on monocarbDn derivatives, 

 by Louis Henry (continued). This contains an account of the 

 mono-chloric, mono-bromic, and mono-iodic oxides of methyl. — 

 Contribution to the study of trichinosis,by Dr. Paul Cerfontaine. 

 A study of some cases of the epidemic of Herstal, near Liege,in 

 January, led to the following conclusions. As soon as the infected 

 meat is introduced into the system, the cysts are destroyed, and 

 the !arv£e liberated in the stomach, whence they pass after some 

 time into the intestine. There they grow rapidly, and fecunda- 

 tion takes place in the intestine after the second day of infection. 

 The males are then expelled from the system, and many of the 

 females penetrate the walls of the intestine and even enter the 

 mesentery, where they produce offspring after the sixth day of 

 infection. This penetration of the walls of the intestine gives its 

 peculiarly fatal character to trichinosis. The young entozoaare 

 dissiminated throughout the system by the lymphatic vessels, 

 which carry them into the blood. Owing to their small size they 

 penetrate into the capillaries, and produce congestion of the 

 blood-vessels and redema. Death is often due to what amounts 



NO. 1240, VOL. 48] 



