May 7, 1891] 



NATURE 



19 



Kiwi, by Prof. T. J. Parker ; on the breeding habits of the 

 European sparrow in New Zealand, by T. W. Kirk ; the humble- 

 bee in New Zealand, by G. M. Thomson ; some notes on the 

 occurrence of the trap-door spider at Lyttelton, by R. M. 

 Laing ; on the discovery of the nickel-iron alloy Awaruite, by 

 Prof. G. H. F. Ulrich. 



In the paper on the humble-bee in New Zealand, Mr. Thom- 

 son says that, wishing to find how far these insects are adapting 

 themselves to new flowers in the colony, he has for a consider- 

 able time kept a record of the flowers they visit and of those 

 they leave alone. He has noticed them on many species of 

 introduced plants which they never appear to visit in Europe. 

 They seldom approach white flowers ; and, will) two exceptions, 

 he has never heard of their visiting the flowers of indigenous 

 plants. The exceptions are Fuchsia excorticata and the Ngaio 

 {Myoponim hrtnm). 



Messrs. R. Etheridge, Jun., and Mr. A. Sidney 

 Olliff have produced in common a paper which forms a valu- 

 able addition to the Memoirs of the Geological Survey of New 

 South Wales. The title is " The Mesozoic and Tertiary 

 Insects of New South Wales." 



Messrs. Baii.likre, Tindai.i., and Cox publish a second 

 edition of Dr. Thomas Button's practical treatise on " Sea- 

 Sickness." Sensible readers will at once be favourably im- 

 pressed by the author's statement that there is "no absolute 

 specific " for this distressing malady. 



Messrs. Cassell and Co. have issued Part 31 of their 

 " New Popular Educator," which will be completed in 48 parts. 

 Besides illustrations in the text, there is a carefully prepared 

 page representing coloured reactions characteristic of certain 

 metals, &c. 



Mr. T. II. Cornish, of Penzance, has a note in the current 

 number of the Zoologist on some remarkably large catches of 

 fish on the Cornish coast. On March 18 last, 12,000 grey 

 mullet, Mugil capita, were captured, by means of a draw seine, 

 by the fishermen of Sennen Cove, at Whitsand Bay, Land's 

 End. The fish were of fine quality, one being brouj^ht to Mr. 

 Cornish which measured 2 feet in length, I foot 3 inches in 

 girth, and weighed 6 pounds 10 ounces. On the 31st of the 

 same month a Lowestoft mackerel driver, fishing some leagues 

 south-west of the Lizard, took 48, 000 mackerel. No such catch 

 of mackerel, for one night's fishing, had ever been heard of before 

 at Penzance, and what makes it more extraordinary, says Mr. 

 Cornish, is that it should have taken place in March, when the 

 catches usually average a few hundreds only. Later on in the 

 season, in the fishing west of Scilly, 20,000 to 25,000 is regarded 

 as a heavy catch. The catch sold for £l^o. 



With reference to our note (vol. xliii. p. 521) on an award 

 made by the Japanese Government to Dr. Shohei Taiiaka for 

 "the invention of a new musical instrument," Mr. J. W. 

 Goundry, of Gosforth, Newcastle, writes to us that over twenty 

 years ago he patented an arrangement for giving enharmonic 

 intervals in all keys on the ordinary unaltered keyboard, and 

 that he has had both an organ of 31, and a harmonium of 36, 

 sounds per octave, playing Bach's fugues and Handel's choruses, 

 &c., on the system. He claims that, although his patents were 

 very crude and imperfect, they contain at least the germ of a 

 complete solution of the problem of reconciling just intonation 

 with the ordinary manual. "They embody a system of sounds," 

 he says, " which I believe to be theoretically the truest and 

 practically the simplest possible, and which has nowhere else 

 been described." 



Ammonium sulphovanadate, (Nll^^aVS^, has been isolated in 

 large crystals by Drs. Kriiss and Ohnmais, and an account of 

 their work, which also includes the preparation of several other 



NO. I 123, VOL. 44] 



sulphosalts of vanadium, will be found in the latest number of 

 Licbig's Annalen. It is well known that when ammoniacai 

 solutions of vanadates are treated with sulphuretted hydrogen a 

 magnificent purple colouration is produced, presumably due to 

 the formation of sulpho-salts. It has not been found possible, 

 however, to obtain such salts by crystallization in vacuo. The 

 method of obtaining the ammonium salt now described is as 

 follows : — A stream of sulphuretted h)drogen is led into an ice- 

 cold saturated solution of ammonium metavanadate, NH4VO3, 

 in the strongest ammonia. The imirediate eff"ect is to produce 

 the violet-red colour, but the colouration soon disappears and a 

 brown solid is precipitated. On continuing the passage of the 

 gas this precipitate slowly redissolves with production again of 

 the deep violet colour. When the re-solution of the precipitate 

 is almost complete the liquid is filtered, and sulphuretted 

 hydrogen again led through the solution. In a short time 

 crystals commence to separate, when the current of gas is- 

 stopped and the liquid left to crystallize in a closed vessel. The 

 crystals thus obtained consist of opaque rhombic prisms very 

 much resembling in appearance those of potassium permanganate. 

 The faces are very brilliant and reflect a steel bluish-violet 

 colour with a greenish tint when the reflection is received at a 

 certain angle. They may be washed with absolute alcohol and 

 afterwards with ether, and finally dried in vacuo. The mother 

 liquors from the first crystallizations deposit magnificent crystals 

 on being allowed to stand some weeks. The substance may be 

 much more quickly obtained and in larger quantity by substituting 

 either potassium or sodium vanadates for the ammonium vana- 

 date used in the above mode of preparation, as these salts are 

 much more soluble in ammonia than ammonium vanadate. It 

 is somewhat remarkable that in this case pure ammonium 

 sulphovanadate should be obtained, no potassium or sodium 

 sulpho-salts being ever found in the product. The crystals of 

 ammonium sulphovanadate are permanent in dry air, but are 

 slowly decomposed with evolution of sulphuretted hydrogen in 

 moist air. They are readily soluble in water, forming a solution 

 which is coloured intensely violet even when very dilute. A 

 solution containing only one part of the salt in 100,000 parts of 

 water still possesses a beautiful rose-red colour. After a short 

 time this solution decomposes, sulphuretted hydrogen being 

 liberated and the colour changing to brown. \\ hen a freshly 

 prepared solution is added to a solution of a salt of the alkaline 

 earthy metals, no precipitate is produced, owing to the solubility 

 of the sulphovanadates of these metals. But in the case o^ 

 calcium a remarkable deepening of the violet colour is produced. 

 If, for instance, a little calcium chloride is added to a dilute 

 solution possessing a just perceptible rose tint, the colour 

 becomes immediately deep violet, owing to the extreme tinctorial 

 power of the calcium salt. 



In our note in vol. xliii. p. 592, upon the preparation among 

 other silicon compounds of silicon chloro-tribromide, SiClBrj, 

 by M. Besson, it was stated that this substance had not been, 

 hitherto prepared. We wish to correct this statement. Silicon 

 chloro-tribromide was prepared by Prof. Emerson Reynolds in 

 1887, and a descriptive note of the work was given in Nature 

 at the time (vol. xxxvi. p. 137). 



The additions to the Zoological Society's Gardens during the 

 past week include a Rhesus Monkey {Macacus rhesus ? ) from 

 India, presented by Mrs. Emily Palmer; two Brazilian Caracaras 

 {Polyhorus brasiliensis) from Terra del Fuego, a Turkey Buzzard 

 \Catharles aura) from the Falkland Islands, presented by Mr. 

 F. E. Cobb, C.M.Z S. ; two Herring Gulls {Larus argentatus)^ 

 British, presented by Mrs. Attenborough ; a Pine Grosbeak 

 {Pinicola enucleator), British, presented by Mr. W. H. St. 

 Quintin ; a Bennett's Wallaby {Hahnaturus bennetti <J ) 

 from Tasmania, two Diamond Snakes {Morelia spi'.otes) from 

 Australia, deposited ; two Tasmanian Wolves ( Thylacinus- 



