2i^6 



NATURE 



[April 28, 1910 



should May 14 not be suitable for the excursion, the 

 Luhvorth visit will be postponed to May 18. Full par- 

 ticulars of the excursions can be obtained from Mr. 

 W. P. D. Stebbing, 78A Lexham Gardens, London, W. 



An event of importance in wireless telegraphy is the 

 inauguration by the Marconi Company of a service for the 

 direct transmission of public messages between their 

 stations at Clifden, in Ireland, and Glace Bay, in Canada. 

 Both the stations have been recently reconstructed, and 

 communication will be kept up by them continuously both 

 by day and by night. The latter fact is interesting as 

 showing that the difficulties of transmission during the 

 hours of daylight have been overcome. The system is a 

 directive one, the aerials being so constructed as to emit 

 waves principally in the required direction. The discharger 

 used is of the type invented by Mr. Marconi, in which spark- 

 ing takes place between metal discs cooled by being kept 

 in rapid rotation. By causing the sparks to be formed 

 between equally spaced projections on the discs, the trains 

 of waves emitted are broken up in a regular manner so 

 as to produce in the receiving telephone a musical note 

 which can be clearly distinguished by the operator. The 

 power used for sending is about 400 kilowatts. The 

 service commenced on April 23 by an interchange of greet- 

 ings between the Postmasters-General of Canada and 

 Great Britain. 



The present spring is proving peculiarly free from 

 spells of really warm weather, and the summary of 

 temperature issued by the Meteorological Office with its 

 Weekly Weather Report shows that for the period of 

 seven weeks ended April 23 the thermometer in the screen 

 did not exceed 64° in any part of the United Kingdom, 

 the highest readings ranging between 60° and* 64°. At 

 Greenwich there have, as yet, only been six days this year 

 with a temperature of 60° or above, whilst to the same 

 date last }"ear there were eighteen days with a temperature 

 of 60° or above. The rainfall for the first half of spring 

 is less than the average in all districts, except in the north 

 and east of Scotland and in the south-east of England, 

 the greatest deficiency being i-o8 inches, in the south-west 

 of England. Since the commencement of the year, how- 

 ever, the rainfall is everywhere in excess of the average, 

 and in seven out of twelve districts the excess is more 

 than 2 inches. The mean sea temperature round the 

 British Islands is at present nearly everywhere colder than 

 at the corresponding period last year, and at Kirkwall it 

 is nearly 5° colder. 



Thanks to the energy of Mr. C. E. Fagan, and the 

 generosity of owners, a remarkably fine and representative 

 series of trophies illustrating the big game of the Empire 

 has been brought together and dispatched to Vienna for 

 the forthcoming Sports Exhibition. The specimens lent by 

 the Prince of Wales include the record head of the Javan 

 rusa from Mauritius (where the species has been reduced), 

 together with heads of tahr, markhor, musk-ox, and 

 Newfoundland caribou. The Duke of Westminster is send- 

 ing a magnificent Irish elk skull ; Lord Burton an un- 

 rivalled twenty-pointer Scots stag ; Lord Lamington a pair 

 of Indian lion skins ; Captain Collins, of the* Wau Garri- 

 son, a head of a bull Sudani eland (one of three or four 

 in this country), and Mr. F. C: Selous one of the last 

 really fine heads of the typical South African white 

 rhinoceros. 



For the purpose of publishing the practical and scientific 



results obtained through the medium of the Entomological 



Research Committee (Tropical Africa), it is proposed to 



issue a journal, to be called Tfee Bulletin of Entomological 



NO. 2 1 13, VOL. 83] 



Research. The journal will contain accounts of the 

 observations which have any bearing on the subject of 

 economic enfomology ; descriptions of insect life-histories, 

 with figures of their earlier stages ; reports on practical 

 methods for destroying or keeping in check any noxious 

 species ; papers by specialists dealing with the systematic 

 classification of such groups as are known to be, or are 

 likely to be, injurious to human beings, live-stock, or 

 agriculture ; and so forth. It is proposed to issue not 

 fewer than four parts annually, and additional parts will 

 be published whenever sufficient material is forthcoming. 

 Further particulars may be obtained from the scientific 

 secretary, Entomological Research Committee, British 

 Museum (Natural History), Cromwell Road, London, S.W. 



The report of the council and the proceedings of the 

 Hampstead Scientific Societ}' for the year 1909 show that 

 the society has completed ten years of useful work. 

 During the year with which the report deals, an astro- 

 nomical observatory and meteorological station have been 

 established on the top of Hampstead Hill. The Metro- 

 politan Water Board allows the use for the purposes of 

 the observatory and station of a portion of the surface of 

 the covered reservoir near the Whitestone Pond. Arrange- 

 ments have been made for the meteorological records to 

 be taken twice daily, and the results are published in the 

 monthly return of the Meteorological Office and in the 

 Hampstead and Highgate Express. We notice that Sir 

 Samuel Wilks, Bart., F.R.S., has been compelled, through 

 advancing years, to resign the presidentship of the society, 

 and has been succeeded by Prof. W. M. Flinders Petrie, 

 F.R.S. The membership of the society now numbers 274. 



Dr. Julius Kuhn, professor of agriculture at the 

 University of Halle, virhose death was announced in these 

 columns last week, was one of the band of workers who 

 laid the foundations for the modern development of the 

 scientific side of agriculture. He acquired a great practical 

 knowledge of the subject in his early days when working 

 as a farmer and, after his student days at Bonn were 

 over, as manager of a large estate. This knowledge proved 

 invaluable when, later on, he was appointed to Halle and 

 devoted himself to the more scientific aspects of his subject. 

 Perhaps his best known work is that in connection with 

 the feeding of animals. It had for many years been 

 customary to compare animal foods with one another in j 

 terms of "hay equivalents." The method was necessarily! 

 rough, and capable only of limited development. In 1859 j 

 Grouven introduced feeding standards based on the 

 amounts of the various food constituents — protein, carbo- 

 hydrate, &c. — required by the animal ; knowing these data 

 and the percentage composition of the foods, it was possible 

 to make up rations suited to the different classes of stock. 

 So attractive was this new view that a tendency arose to 

 regard the feeding of animals as a merely arithmetical 

 problem requiring only a knowledge of the standards and 

 of the composition of foods. Kuhn, however, insisted on 

 the necessity of keeping the new work down to the solid 

 ground of fact. Whilst recognising the value and import- 

 ance of the standards, he also recognised the individuality* 

 of the animal and of the crops on which it feeds. His 

 book " Die zweckmassigste Ernahrung des Rindviehes," 

 which appeared in 1861, and went through ten editions in 

 the course of thirty years, thus had a steadying effect on 

 the development of the subject. He also published a 

 number of papers on the parasitic diseases of plants, and 

 is remarkable for his early advocacy of the view thai 

 sugar-beet " sickness " is the result of nematodes, which 

 can be destroyed by burning over the ground. His activit} 



