14 



NATURE 



[June 4, 189: 



paper. This figure shows a little emargination in the second 

 marginal scute, which might seem accidental, but as it is exactly 

 repeated in the specimen belonging to the U.S. National 

 Museum, and as the emargination exists in the bony carapace, it 

 is probably a constant specific character. Dr. GUnther gives 

 Indefatigable Island as the locality of T. ephippiuin, and if this 

 be correct the species occurs on at least two islands of the group. 

 Besides the Duncan Island Tortoise, examples of 7! vicina and 

 T. nigrila are now living in the Zoological Park, while the 

 U.S. National Museum possesses skeletons of T. abingdoni 

 (imperfect), T. vicina, and T. nigrita. The locality of this 

 last-named species is still imcertain, but there is some 

 reason to suppose that it may be from Chatham Island. 

 T, nigrita has the most arched carapace of any species, T. 

 ephippiuin and T. abingdoni the longest and anteriorly most 

 compressed and elevated carapaces. Between these lie in the 

 order named T. mici-ophyes and T. vicina. There is a direct 

 correlation between the anterior height of the carapace and the 

 length of the neck, the rule being the higher the carapace the 

 longer the neck, T. nigrita and 7. abingdoni having respectively 

 the shortest and longest necks. Mr. Townsend writes that 

 tortoises are now extremely rare on Duncan Island. 



The June number of the Zoologist contains an interesting 

 paper on the habits of the moose, by Mr. J. G. Lockhart. One 

 of the points noted by the author is, that moose generally lie 

 with the tail to windward, trusting to their senses of hearing 

 and smelling, which are remarkably acute, to warn them of 

 approaching danger from that quarter ; they can use their eyes 

 to warn them from danger to leeward, where hearing, and 

 especially smelling, would be of little use. While they are 

 sleeping or chewing the cud, their ears are in perpetual motion, 

 one backward, the other forward, alternately. They also have 

 the remarkable insight to make a short turn and sleep below 

 the wind of their fresh track, so that anyone falling thereon and 

 following it up is sure to be heard or smelt before he can get 

 within shooting distance. 



Mr. L. Upcott Gill has published as a pamphlet a paper 

 read by the Rev. H. A. Soames before the Bromley Naturalists' 

 Society on the scientific measurement of children, Mr. Soames 

 says he finds such measurements as he describes, taken every 

 term, a good guide as to whether his pupils may be pressed with 

 work or not. "If the increase is regular and the weight fair, 

 according to the height, I do not fear to press them ; but if, on 

 the other hand, the weight is low, or if the height increases and 

 not the weight, or if the increase in height is too rapid, I think 

 it a very fair excuse for laziness, and take great care that too 

 much work is not expected from them." 



The first volume of Sir William Thomson's "Popular 

 Lectures and Addresses" (Macmillan), has reached a second 

 edition. The third volume has also just been published, and 

 the author hop^s that the second volume may appear in the 

 course of a year or two. 



The new number of the Journal of the Anthropological In- 

 stitute (vol. XX., No. 4) opens with a paper in which Lady 

 Welby calls attention to what she calls an apparent paradox in 

 mental evolution. The number also includes a paper, by Mr. 

 F. W. Rudler, on the source of the jade used for ancient im- 

 plements m Europe and America ; and the Presidential address 

 delivered by Dr. Beddoe, 



The Botanical Society of Edinburgh has issued the eighteenth 

 volume of its Transactions and Proceedings. Dr. Aitchison's 

 "Notes on the Products of Western Afghanistan and of North- 

 Eastem Persia," forming the first part of the volume, may be 

 -obtained separately. 



Two new parts (62 and 63) of the elaborate dictionary of 

 Chemistry mcluded in the "Encyclopaedic der Wissenschaften " 

 NO. I 127, VOL. 44] 



(Breslau : Eduard Trewendt) have appeared. The eighth part 

 of the hand-book of Physics, in the same Encyclopedia, has also 

 been published. 



The ninth edition of "Telegraphy," by W. H. Preece and 

 J. Sivewright (Longmans), has been published. The edition is 

 described as " almost a new book." No fewer than 24 figures 

 have been altered and 44 excluded, and there are now 265 as 

 compared with 194 in the last edition. The authors have aimed 

 at " providing such a general introduction to the art and science 

 of telegraphy as will enable the student to proceed to the study 

 of more advanced works, and give to the operator an intelligible 

 explanation of the apparatus with which he has to deal." 



Messrs. Longmans, Green, and Co. are issuing the tenth 

 edition of Quain's " Elements of Anatomy." It will appear in 

 three volumes, and is being edited by Prof. E, A. Schafer and 

 Prof. G. D. Thane. The second part of the first volume— by 

 Prof. Schafer— has just been published. The subject is general 

 anatomy or histology. 



Part 32 of Cassell's "New Popular Educator" has been 

 published. Besides illustrations in the text, it contains a 

 coloured map of Switzerland. 



The Geological Survey Department of Canada has issued the 

 first of a series of descriptive and illustrated quarto memoirs on 

 the Vertebrata of the Tertiary and Cretaceous rocks of the 

 Canadian North- West Territory, prepared for the Survey by 

 Prof. E. D. Cope, of Philadelphia. The Report is devoted 

 exclusively to a consideration of the species from the Lower 

 Miocene deposits of the Cypress Hills, in the district of Al'ierta, 

 and consists of twenty-seven pages of letterpress, illustrated by 

 fourteen full-page lithographic plates. The second part, which 

 will contain illustrated descriptions of the Vertebrates of the 

 Laramie formation of the North-West Territory, by the same 

 author, is now in course of preparation. 



Mr, Percy F. Kendall has prepared a little volume en- 

 titled " Hints for the Guidance of Observers of Glacial Geology." 

 It is intended to serve as an answer to the requests for guidance 

 which have been made by members of the North- West of 

 England Boulder Committee. The work is printed only on 

 alternate pages, so that students using it will have space for 

 occasional brief notes. 



"An approved Treatise of Hawks and Hawking by 

 Edmund Bert," 16 19, has just been reprinted, with an intro- 

 duction by Mr, J. E. Harting. It is the rarest of English 

 books on falconry, and no copy has come into the market for 

 nearly twenty years. The reprint is as nearly a facsimile as it 

 is possible to make it without the aid of photography, and a 

 hundred copies only have been printed. It is issued by Mr, 

 Quaritch. 



Indigocarmine, the commercially important disulphonic 

 acid of indigo, has been synthesized in an extremely simple 

 manner by Dr. Heymann in the laboratory of Messrs. Bayer and 

 Co. of Elberfeld, and a description of the mode of operation is 

 given in the new number of the Berichtc. The reaction merely 

 consists in acting with excess of fuming sulphuric acid upon 

 phenyl glycocoll, CgHs- NH— CH^- COOH, the aniline deri- 

 vative of glycollic acid. When a quantity of fuming sulphuric 

 acid is poured upon a tenth of its weight of phenyl glycocoll in a 

 test tube, the phenyl glycocoll rapidly dissolves, the acid be- 

 coming coloured yellow and slightly elevated in temperature, 

 while sulphur dioxide commences to be evolved. If the solution 

 is then poured over ice the greenish-blue colour of indigocarmine 

 is at once obtained. The best conditions for working the pro- 

 cess on the large scale are as follows. One part of phenyl 

 glycocoll is mixed with ten to twenty times its weight of fine 

 sand so as to avoid local superheating during the process of 

 addition to the fuming acid. The mixture is then introduced 



