NATURE 



[May 12, 1892 



which latter institution he was made a Fellow in 185 1, in 

 recognition of his services to science. In 1854 he was awarded 

 a Royal Medal for his " Memoirs on the Molecular Constitution 

 of the Organic Bases." Some of his discoveries led to industrial 

 results of the highest importance. The high respect in which 

 Prof. Hofmann was held in Germany was shown at his funeral, 

 which took place on Monday. It was very largely attended, 

 and, according to the Berlin correspondent of the Standard, 

 "was in all respects worthy of a prince of science." The 

 correspondent says: — "The Empress Frederick, immediately 

 on receiving the news of the Professor's death, telegraphed to 

 his widow, ' My deepest sympathy in your great, your irre- 

 parable loss. I am deeply shocked by the quite unexpected 

 news of your dear husband's death.' Her Imperial Majesty 

 sent a splendid laurel wreath bearing her initials, to be placed 

 on the coffin, and a Court Chamberlain represented Her Majesty 

 at the funeral. The Minister of Education and numerous officials 

 of his Department, all the members of the Berlin Academy, and 

 almost all the professors and students of the University, accom" 

 panied the funeral procession to the cemetery." 



We regret also to have to announce the death of Dr. James 

 Thomson, F.R. S., Emeritus Professor of Civil Engineering in 

 the University of Glasgow, Lord Kelvin's brother. Dr. Thomson 

 died on Sunday last. He was seventy years of age. 



There are vacancies for zoological students at the Cambridge 

 University's tables in the Zoological Station at Naples, and in the 

 Marine Biological Society's Laboratory at Plymouth. Applica- 

 tions are to be sent to Prof. Newton, Chairman of the Special 

 Board for Biology and Geology, by May 30. 



General Isaac T. Wister, President of the Philadelphia 

 Academy of Sciences, has placed in the hands of trustees for the 

 benefit of the University of Pennsylvania, 100,000 dollars for 

 the erection of a Museum with laboratories, to contain the 

 Wister and Horner Museum of Human and Comparative 

 Anatomy. He has also given an endowment of 3000 dollars a 

 year for the maintenance of a curator, whose occupation shall 

 consist largely of original research. 



We referred lately to the interesting Horticultural Exhibition 

 for which preparations were being made at Earl's Court. The 

 Exhibition was formally opened on Saturday last by the Duke of 

 Connaught, and promises to be a great success, 



A German scientific expedition under Dr. Erich von 

 Drygalski started from Copenhagen for West Greenland on 

 May I. Dr. von Drygalski is accompanied by Dr. H. Stade, the 

 meteorologist, and Dr. E. Vanhoffen, the zoologist. They were 

 to make in the first instance for Umanak Fjord. They do not 

 intend to return until the autumn of 1893. 



We are glad to welcome a third edition of Clerk Maxwell's 

 great "Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism" (Clarendon 

 Press). The task of seeing the proofs through the press could 

 not be undertaken by Mr. W. D. Niven, who had charge of 

 the second edition ; so the duty has been fulfilled by Prof. J, J. 

 Thomson, who, we need scarcely say, has done his work 

 admirably. Twenty years have passed since the work was 

 written, and during that time the sciences of electricity and 

 magnetism — thanks in part to the influence exerted by this 

 treatise — have made rapid progress. Prof. Thomson explains 

 that when he began to prepare the present edition he intended 

 to give in foot-notes some account of the advances made since 

 the publication of the first edition, not only because he thought 

 it might be of service to students, but because all recent in- 

 vestigations have tended to confirm in the most remarkable 

 way Maxwell's views. He soon found, however, that if this 

 intention were carried out the book would be disfigured by a 

 disproportionate quantity of foot-notes. His notes have ac- 

 NO. II 76, VOL. 46] 



cordingly been thrown into a slightly more consecutive form, 

 and will be published separately. A few foot-notes relating to 

 isolated points which could be dealt with briefly are given. 

 Prof. Thomson has added something in explanation of the 

 argument in those passages in which he has found from his 

 experience as a teacher that nearly all students find consider- 

 able difficulties. He has also attempted to verify the results 

 which Maxwell gives without proof. He has not in all instances 

 succeeded in arriving at Maxwell's results, and in such cases he 

 has indicated the difference in a foot-note. Maxwell's method 

 of determining the self-induction of a coil is reprinted from his 

 paper on the dynamical theory of the electro-magnetic field. 



At the time of our last issue, an anticyclone lay over the 

 whole of the British Islands and part of the Atlantic, with north 

 and north-east winds of some force, under the influence of a de- 

 pression existing over North Germany. Daily temperatures were, 

 generally, considerably below the normal values ; slight snow 

 fell on the south coast on the morning of the 6th, and the grass 

 thermometer fell as low as 18° on that night in London. The 

 anticyclone afterwards moved southwards, while a depression, 

 which had set in at the northern stations, spread towards the 

 North Sea, the winds shifted to west and north-west, and 

 temperatures gradually increased ; the maxima exceeded 60° 

 over the inland parts of England on Sunday, and even reached 

 70° at several stations on Monday, with fine weather generally. 

 The amount of rainfall is considerably below the average. The 

 Weekly Weather Report for Saturday last shows that the 

 deficiency, since January 3, amounts to 7*7 inches in the 

 west of Scotland and to 5-3 inches in the south-west of 

 England. During the last few days this country has again been 

 under the influence of an anticyclone, with fine, warm weather 

 generally. 



The Pilot Chart of the North Atlantic Ocean, in its review of 

 weather during April, says that the storms on the Atlantic, like 

 those of the preceding month, were confined almost entirely to 

 the American coast and the western part of the ocean, and they 

 again followed somewhat abnormal northerly tracks. Two of 

 the most severe storms whose tracks are plotted on the chart, 

 occurred during the last few days of March. During the first 

 week of April, pleasant anticyclonic weather prevailed along the 

 American coast south of Hatteras, but two severe storms moved 

 eastward over Labrador on the 3rd and 6th respectively, the first 

 of which was followed by a storm of slight energy that formed 

 south of Cape Race on the 4th, and the second by one that 

 reached Hatteras from inland the morning of the 8th, but 

 neither of these, nor those of the 9th to nth, and 15th to i6th, 

 along the Nova Scotia coast, were at all severe. The only 

 remaining storms of any noteworthy severity, so far as indicated 

 by data received at the office of the Pilot Chart up to date of 

 publication, were those that originated between the Grand 

 Banks and Bermuda on the 13th and i8th respectively. The 

 track of a depression of considerable energy is indicated near 

 the Azores on the 6th, 7th, and 8th, and another, but of slight 

 energy only, in the English Channel on the 15th and i6th. 

 The persistent anticyclonic weather over the British Isles and 

 Central Europe during the last week of March and the first half 

 of April, may be said to have turned to the northward the 

 storms that formed over the ocean, and it seems probable that 

 the persistent northerly winds thus caused off" Labrador and 

 Newfoundland helped along the ice that is now working its 

 way southward off the Grand Banks. Fog has been reported in 

 increasing quantities, also, and it will continue to increase unti 

 midsummer. 



We note the publication of two new monthly meteorological 

 bulletins for Russia, which are issued nearly closely up to date, 

 viz. by Prof. A. Klossovski, Odessa, with Russian and German 



