May 19, 19 10] 



NATURE 



;59 



published complete official statistics. The United States 

 is placed first on the list with 212,956 students in institu- 

 tions of higher education, or one such student to 394 of 

 the population. Of the larger European countries France 

 takes first place with 50,935 students, or one to 771 of 

 the population. Germany comes next, where, including 

 '■ hearers," the numbers are 73,020 and 830 respectively. 

 Then we have in order Austria-Hungary, 51,691 and 909; 

 Italy, 33,174 and 1014 ; United Kingdom, 41,305 and 

 1068 ; Spain, 15,642 and 1204 ; and the Russian Empire, 

 54,208 and 2754. Prof. Marx points out that the total in 

 the case of the United Kingdom excludes 22,159 evening 

 students, and that Prof. B. Menschutkin, writing to 

 Nature, claimed 76,900 students for the year 1908-9 for 

 Russian nigher educational institutions, with the surmise 

 that possibly there were 20,000 more in private higher 

 roilegcs. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 



Physical Society, April 22.— Prof. H. L. rpllpir^a'. 

 F.R.S., president, in the chair. — W. A. Scoble : Further 

 tests pf brittle materials under combined stress. A former 

 paper described tests on cast iron, which is the brittle 

 material which is most commonly employed in engineering 

 practice. The tests described in the present paper were 

 made on hardened cast steel. The specimens were J-inch 

 diameter and 30 inches effective length, and were tested 

 under combined bending and torsion. Neither the maxi- 

 mum shear stress nor the maximum strain was constant 

 at fracture, but the results indicated that the maximum 

 principal stress is the best criterion of strength for a brittle 

 material under combined stress. In general, the harden- 

 ing did not affect the strength of a bar to resist bending, 

 but it doubled the torque which was required to cause 

 failure. — C. Cheneveau, with an appendix by A. C. 

 Jolley : The magnetic balance of MM. Curie and C. 

 Cheneveau. This balance is intended for the determina- 

 tion of the coefficient of specific magnetisation, suscepti- 

 bility, and permeability of feebly paramagnetic and 

 diamagnetic bodies. The body under investigation is 

 suspended from one arm of a torsion balance, which 

 measures the force exerted on the body when it is placed 

 in the non-uniform field of a permanent magnet. The 

 torsion balance is formed by a horizontal rod suspended 

 by a long fine platinum wire, and carrying at one end a 

 hook from which the substance under investigation can 

 be suspended in a small enclosing glass tube. On the other 

 end of the torsion arm a copper sector is fixed which 

 moves between the poles of an auxiliary magnet, and thus 

 provides efficient damping. A second branch arm is also 

 provided, upon which may be placed suitable counter- 

 weights to balance the specimen. The suspension carries 

 a mirror, and the movements are read on a translucent 

 scale in the ordinary way. 



Zoo Ogical Societv, May 3. — Dr. A. Smifh Woodward, 

 F.R.S., vice-president, in the chair. — Dr. H. B. 

 Fantham : (1) The morphology and life-history of Eimeria 

 (Coccidiimt) avium, a sporozoon causing a fatal disease 

 among young grouse. A detailed account of the morpho- 

 logy and life-history of the Coccidium which destroys the 

 epithelial lining of the duodenum and caeca of grouse 

 chicks, causing enteritis accompanied by diarrhoea. 

 (2) Observations on the parasitic protozoa of the red 

 grouse (Lagopus scoticus). Observations on some seven 

 other protozoa parasitic in the blood or in the digestive 

 tract of grouse. None of these parasites, however, could 

 be said to be either numerous or very harmful to the birds 

 examined. (3) Experimental studies on avian coccidiosis, 

 especially in relation to young grouse, fowls, and pigeons. 

 The results of many and varied experiments were recorded 

 in this paper, relating to the time of ripening and dura- 

 tion of infectivity of coccidian oocysts, their disjaersal bv 

 insect larvae, &c., and the effects of various reagents on 

 the oocysts. The distribution of the parasites within the 

 host was given, and the results of the transmission of 

 grouse coccidiosis to young fowls and pigeons were set 

 forth. (4) Observations on the blood of grouse. The 



NO. 2 I 16, VOL. 83I 



various blood-cells were described, and the results of blood 

 counts (both of red cells and of leucocytes differentially) 

 of healthy and diseased birds were set forth. Both 

 coccidiosis and strongylosis produce anaemia, and the 

 presence of various parasites is also associated with 

 numerical differences in the leucocytic elements of the 

 blood. — Prof. G. O. Sars : Report on the Ostracoda 

 collected by the third Tanganyika expedition during 

 1904-5. — Dr. R. Broom : Tritylodon, and on the relation- 

 ships of the Multituberculata. The author had re-examined 

 the type and only known specimen of Tritylodon, and in 

 one or two points came to different conclusions from Owen 

 and Seeley. Gidley's recent paper on Ptilodus was criti- 

 cised at some length, and an endeavour made to controvert 

 his conclusion that Ptilodus is allied to the diprotodont 

 marsupials. It was held that while the multituberculates 

 are doubtless very unlike the living degenerate monotremes, 

 they are more primitive than the marsupials, and not at all 

 closely allied to them, and that until the evidence of their 

 affinities is much greater than at present they may well 

 be left as an independent order. 



Linnean Society, Mav i;.— Prof. E. B. P mlton, F.R.S., 

 vice-president, in the chair. — H. Scott : Eight months* 

 entomological collecting in the Seychelles. — ^J. M. Browfn : 

 Some points in the anatomy of the larva of Tipula 

 maxima ; a contribution to our knowledge of the respira- 

 tion and circulation in insects. 



Dublin. 

 Royal Dublin Society, April 26. — Dr. J. M. Purser in 

 the chair. — Prof. G. H. Carpenter : Injurious insects and 

 other animals obser\'ed in Ireland during the year 1909. 

 Among the species recorded are the chalcid fly, Megastig- 

 mus strobilobius, from silver fir-seed, in the county of 

 Wicklow, and the root-knot eelworm, from tomatoes in a 

 greenhouse at Belfast. — W. R. G. Atkins : The cryoscopic 

 determination of the osmotic pressure of some plant organs. 

 A number of fruits and underground organs were pressed, 

 and the freezing points of the juices determined with Beck- 

 mann's apparatus. The mean molecular weights of the 

 solutes were also obtained. The pressures in the same 

 organs of different samples of the same species were found 

 to be tolerably constant, as were also the mean molecular 

 weights. Pressures ranging: from 5*94 to 29'53 atmospheres 

 were met with in fruits, and from 6*47 to i8'67 atmospheres 

 in underground organs, while the mean molecular weights 

 varied from 76 to 304 in the whole series. — Dr. W. E. 

 Adeney : Studies of " streaming " of dissolved atmospheric 

 gases in water. 



P.\RIS. 



Academy of Sciences, May 9. — M. Armand Gautier in 

 the chair. — Gaston Darboux : A particular class of triple 

 orthogonal systems. — M. Jean Bosscha was elected a corre- 

 spondant in the section of physics in the place of the late 

 M. Crova. — A. Bernard and P. Idrac : A second series 

 of researches on H alley's comet and its spectrum made at 

 the Observatory of Meudon. Details of observations 

 following the changes in spectrum and structure com- 

 mencing on January 7, and carried on to May 7. — ^J. J. 

 Landerer : The polarisation of the light from the moon. 

 A reply to criticisms of the method published in 1889. — 

 M. Cogrgria : Observations of Halley's comet made at 

 the Observatory of Marseilles with the 26-cm. Eichens 

 equatorial. Positions of the comet and comparison stars 

 are given for April 16, 17, 18, 21, 23, 26 to 29, and 

 May 2 to 6. The comet could be seen with the naked eye 

 on April 23 as a star of the third magnitude ; on April 26 

 it had increased in brightness to the second magnitude, 

 with a tail of about 1°. By May 5 the tail was about 10** 

 long. — Paul Pascal : The magnetic analysis of some 

 chromophoric groups. A double linkage always reduces 

 the diamagnetism. The application of this to the study of 

 some colouring matters appears to show that the existence 

 of a marked coloration is nearly always correlated with a 

 quinonoid structure, at least in bodies containing oxygen. 

 — Daniel Berthelot and Henri Gaudechon : The chemical 

 effects of the ultra-violet rays on gaseous bodies. Poly- 

 merisation reactions. The action of the ultra-violet rays 

 from a quartz mercury arc lamp on acetylene, cyanogen, 

 and ethylene, either alone or mixed with indifferent gases. 



