May 26, 1 9 10] 



NATURE 



;79 



amount of error which the employment of telegraphic 

 si^'nals can correct. Of course, the error accumulates with 

 the time at sea, but a ship that carries three chrono- 

 meters, the usual number in a well-found ship, should not 

 after 100 days be in doubt about the longitude by a 

 greater quantity than twenty seconds ; usually it is much 

 less. At the equator this would amount to an uncertainty 

 of about five miles, in the longitude of Paris correspond- 

 ingly less; but the number of time signals scattered over 

 the world is now so large that every steamer has the oppor- 

 tunity of correcting its chronometers much more frequently 

 than is suggested here. While, therefore, we welcome 

 every advance which increases accuracy and demonstrates 

 tile value of scientific application, we cannot consider that 

 the practical benefits of the scheme will be immediately 

 apparent. 



Mr. J. B. Tyrrell has been elected president of the 

 Canadian Institute, the oldest scientific society in Canada. 



We regret to see the announcement of the death, on 

 May 23, at eighty years of age, of Mr. J. B. N. Hennessey, 

 F.R.S., late deputy surveyor-general in charge of the 

 Trigonometrical Surveys, Survey of India. 



In consequence of the death of King Edward, the council 

 of the Institution of Civil Engineers has decided not to 

 hold a conversazione this year. The eighteenth " James 

 Forrest " lecture will be delivered at the institution on 

 June 22, at 8 p.m., as already announced. 



Prof. R. W. Wood, of the Johns Hopkins University, 

 Baltimore, will spend the coming autumn, winter, and 

 spring in England and on the Continent. He has accepted 

 invitations to deliver the Thomas Young oration of the 

 Optical Society and the Traill Taylor lecture before the 

 Royal Photographic Society, and will arrive in London 

 early in October. 



Ox Tuesday next. May 31, Mr. C. J. Holmes will 

 begin a course of two lectures at the Royal Institution on 

 "Heredity in Tudor and Stuart Portraits"; on Thurs- 

 day, June 2, Major Ronald Ross will deliver the first of 

 two lectures on "Malaria"; and on Saturday, June 4, 

 Prof. J. A. Fleming will commence a course of two 

 lectures on " Electric Heating and Pyrometry " (the Tyn- 

 dall lectures). 



The King, on the recommendation of the Home Secre- 

 tary, has approved of the reconstitution of the Royal Com- 

 mission on Mines for the purpose of an inquiry into the 

 health and safety of persons employed in metalliferous 

 mines and quarries. The new commission will consist of 

 Sir Henry Cunynghame, K.C.B. (chairman), Mr. R. A. S. 

 Redmayne, Dr. J. S. Haldane, F.R.S., Mr. John S. Ains- 

 worth, M.P., Mr. R. M. Greaves, Mr. R. Arthur Thomas, 

 Mr. R. T. Jones, Mr. W. Lewney, and Mr. U. Lovett. 



During the Whitsimtide excursion of the Geologists' 

 .Association to Swanage, Mr. John Newton obtained a well- 

 preserved upper jaw of the small mammal Triconodon 

 from the Lower Purbeck beds. The specimen was found 

 in the fresh-water limestone above the well-known 

 mammal-bed, which was carefully examined at two places 

 in Durlstone Bay without success. It appears to be the 

 first discovery of a mammalian fossil in the Purbeck beds 

 since 1880, when Mr. Edgar Willett obtained the lower jaw 

 of Triconodon now in the Museum of Practical Geologv. 

 Mr. Newton has placed the new fossil in the British 

 Museum (Natural History), where it will be exhibited with 

 the Beekles collection. 



NO. 2 II 7, VOL. 8^ 



During the next few weeks the Somersetshire Archaeo- 

 logical and Natural History Society will commence the 

 e.xcavation of the lake village at Meare, three miles north- 

 west of Glastonbury. Besides interesting mediaeval build- 

 ings, such as the Fish House and the Manor House, the 

 parish contains the remains of a lake village much larger 

 than that of Glastonbury. Trial excavations have already 

 disclosed many interesting objects, and the thorough 

 examination of the site will certainly prove to be of much 

 importance in elucidating the history and antiquities of 

 the late Celtic period, dating back a century or two before 

 the Christian era. - .Assistance, which is much needed in 

 support of the excavation fund, will be gladly received by 

 the secretaries, Taunton Castle, Somerset. 



The series of aeronautical calamities which figures so 

 prominently in the issue of the Deutsche Zeitschrift fur 

 Luftschiffahrt for .April 20 is continued in the issue for 

 May 4, where the destruction of the Zeppelin II. at 

 Weilburg, and that of the Delitzch balloon, which was 

 struck by lightning on .April 6, are described and figured. 

 In addition, there are figures and references to accidents 

 to Rougier's and Chavaz's machines at the Nice aviation 

 meeting, the former having fallen into the sea and been 

 picked up by a steamer. 



M. Jacques de Lesseps, grandson of the engineer of the 

 Suez Canal, crossed the English Channel on May 21 in a 

 Bleriot monoplane. Instead of a three-cylinder Anzani 

 motor of 25 horse-power, such as was used by M. Bleriot, 

 M. de Lesseps employed a seven-cylinder Gn6me rotary 

 engine of 50 horse-power. He started from Les Baraques, 

 near Calais, at 3.40 p.m., and landed close to Wanston 

 Court Farm, near St. Margaret's, at 4.17 p.m. Accord- 

 ing to the F'rench Press, the crossing took thirty minutes, 

 as compared with M. Bl^riot's thirty -one minutes' flight. 

 M. de Lesseps reports that he travelled at a height of from 

 350 to 400 metres to avoid the fog, which obscured his 

 view, and that he was unable to make use of a compass 

 on account of the effect of the great vibration upon the 

 instrument. By his successful flight M. de Lesseps wins 

 the Ruinart prize of 500/. and the looZ. cup offered by 

 the Daily Mail for the second airman to cross the Channel 

 in the air. 



In an article on the London to Manchester flight 

 (N.ATUKE, May 5) reference was made to the desirability, 

 now that the possibility of long-distance flights has been 

 clearly demonstrated, of devising means for encouraging 

 the pursuit of aviation without taxing the physical 

 endurance of aviators or subjecting them to risks more 

 than was necessary. F'rom an article in the Deutsche 

 Zeitschrift fur Luftschiffahrt we gather that the arrange- 

 ments made at the Nice aviation week afforded an excel- 

 lent example of what could be done in this direction. In 

 the first place, the long-distance flights were performed 

 mainly over the sea between Cap Ferrat and Cap d'Antibes, 

 where steamers were available (in the language of the 

 Zeitschrift) to " fish out " any aviator who descended, and 

 this actually happened to Latham ; in the next place the 

 prizes offered included a cumulative prize for the longest 

 total distance covered, excluding individual flights of less 

 than 5 kilometres, and prizes were also offered for the 

 quickest flight performed on each day, the best start and 

 the best landing, so that the chances of success were less 

 dependent on meteorological conditions than they would have 

 been if competitions at fixed hours had alone been provided 

 for. That progress is being made in aerotechnics was shown 

 by the fart that while at Berlin last year flights were only 

 made when the wind velocity was less than 3 metres per 



