February 27, 1896] 



NATURE 



407 



course of healing, with the assistance of seven or eight ants' 

 heads. The species of ant referred to was a large-headed 

 Camponotus, not unlike one found in India. Mr. Middleton 

 recalled the fact that a similar observation, concerning a species 

 of ant in Brazil, had been recorded many years ago by Mr. 

 Mocquerys, of Rouen {Ami. Soc. Entom. France, 2'""^ ser. 

 ii. 67), as quoted by Sir John Lubbock in his work on ants, 

 bees, and wasps ; but the observation, strange to say, had not 

 been confirmed either by Bates or Wallace during their travels 

 in South America. Dr. John Lowe pointed out that in this 

 operation apparently no attention was paid to the usual 

 antiseptic precautions which are regarded as indispensable in 

 modem surgery. Sir William Flower considered the observation 

 of much interest from an ethnological point of view, as showing 

 the independent existence of the same custom in countries so far 

 apart as Brazil and Asia Minor. 



Mathematical Society, February 13. —Prof. M. J. M. 

 Hill, F. R.S., Vice-President, in the chair. — The Chairman read 

 the opening paragraphs of a paper by Prof. Forsyth, F. R.S., 

 entitled " Geodesies on a Quadric, not of Revolution." — Prof. 

 Elliott, F.R.S., gave an account of a paper by Mr. A. L. 

 Dixon, on the potential of cyclides. — Mr. Love, F.R S. (Hon. 

 Sec), communicated a paper on solid ellipsoidal vortex, by 

 Mr. R. Hargreaves. — Dr. J. Larmor, F.R.S., and Lieut. -Colonel 

 Cunningham took part in the discussions on the papers. — The 

 Chairman (Mr. M. Jenkins, Vice- President /;-(? tern., in the chair) 

 and Mr. Tucker (Hon. Sec.) made short impromptu communi- 

 cations. The latter was to the effect that if any square PQRS 

 be inscribed in a circle ABC, and the Wallace lines of P,Q,R,S, 

 with regard to the triani^le ABC be drawn, they form by their 

 intersection a quadrilateral the mid-points of whose three 

 diagonals are the centre and ends of a diameter of the nine- 

 point circle of ABC. 



Zoological Society, February 18. — Prof. G. B. Howes in 

 the chair. — A communication was read from Dr. Arthur G. 

 Butler on the butterflies obtained in Arabia and Somaliland by 

 Captain Charles G. Nurse and Colonel J. W. Yerbury in 

 1894-95. — -^ communication was read from Lord Walsingham, 

 F.R.S., and Mr. G. F. Hampson, on the moths collected at 

 Aden and Somaliland by the same naturalists and by other 

 collectors. — Mr. F. E. Beddard, F.R.S., communicated (on 

 behalf of Miss Marion Newbigin) a paper dealing with the 

 metallic colours of humming-birds and sun-birds. It had been 

 held that these peculiarly coloured feathers played some special 

 part in the economy of the bird, for they could not be of much 

 use for flight owing to the disconnected barbules. The author 



■iibated this view, pointing out in the first place that the 



:cment of fact did not apply to all humming-birds, in the 



...uiallic feathers of which the barbules were often connected by 



cilia. It was urged in the next place that the very perfection of 



the flight of humming-birds led to correlated variations in 



feather structure productive of their especially brilliant metallic 



tints. The difficulty of the plain-coloured swifts — possibly near 



allies of the humming-birds — was met by the suggestion that the 



latter have fewer enemies, and had therefore had greater scope 



of possible colour-variation. — Mr. C. W. Andrews read a note 



• on a skull of Orycteroptis gaudryi, an extinct species of ant-bear 



in the Lower Pliocene deposits of Samos, originally dis- 



ored and described by Dr. C. J. Forsyth- Major. — Mr. Frank 



! . Beddard, F.R.S., read a paper upon the anatomy of the 



Scissor-fjill (Rhynchops), in which the structure of the viscera 



I and muscles of this bird were described. The muscular anatomy 



was found to differ greatly from that of the gulls, skuas, and 



terns, and was held amply to justify its separation as a distinct 



subfamily Rhynchopina. 



Paris. 



Academy of Sciences, February 17. — M. Cornu in the chair. 

 — Preparation and properties of cerium carbide, by M H. Mois 

 san. This substance, of which the composition is CeCo, is produced 

 in the electric furnace from charcoal and CeO.j. Its properties 

 and reactions are similar to those of other carbides previously 

 described, water, however, giving a gas containing ethylene (4 

 per cent.), methane (21 per cent.), and acetylene (75 per cent.), 

 the composition of the gas obtained in different experiments 

 being very constant. A small proportion of the carbon is ob- 

 tained in the form of liquid and solid hydrocarbons. — On carbide 

 of lithium, by the same. This carbide, LiCj, forms a transparent 

 crystalline mass, which, on account of its high percentage of 

 carbon (69 per cent.), acts as a powerful reducing agent. It is 



NO. 1374, VOL. 53] 



volatile at the temperature of the electric furnace, with partial 

 decomposition into its elements, and on treatment with water 

 yields pure acetylene. — Observations of the Perrine comets 

 \a 1896 and c 1895) made at the Observatory of Paris, by M. G. 

 Bigourdan. — Observations on the Perrine comet made with the 

 large equatorial at the Observatory of Bordeaux, by M. L. Picart. 

 — On the integration of some partial differential equations, by 

 M. Le Roy. — On Taylor's theorem, with approximation to the 

 third degree, by M. N. Bougaief. — On groups of substitutions, 

 by M. A. Miller.— On sensitive flames, by M. E. Bouty. A 

 study of the influence of the nature of the gas on the sensibility 

 to sound. The sensitiveness of a pure hydrogen flame is very 

 small, but it can be increased by the addition of a suflicient pro- 

 portion of an inert gas, such as nitrogen or carbon dioxide. 

 Pure acetylene gives only a moderately sensitive flame, but a 

 mixture of equal volumes of hydrogen and acetylene responds 

 readily to the ticking of a watch.— On the lowering of the 

 statical and dynamical explosive potentials by the X-rays, by 

 M. R. Swyngedauw. — ^Electric phenomena produced by the 

 Rdntgen rays, by M. A. Righi. — Action of the Rontgen rays 

 on the electrostatic charges and the explosive distance, by 

 MM. J. J. Borgman and A. L. Gerchun. — New researches 

 on the X-rays, by MM. Benoist and D. Hurmuzescu. — 

 Photographic researches on the Rontgen rays, by MM. Auguste 

 and Louis Lumifere. — An experiment showing that the X-rays 

 proceed from the anode, by M. de Heen. — Photographs 

 obtained with the Rontgen rays, by MM. A. Imbert and H. 

 Bertin-Sans. — On the property possessed by phosphorescen*^ 

 rays of passing through todies opaque to solar light, by 

 M. G. H. Niewenglowski.— Nature and properties of dark light, 

 by M. Gustave Le Bon. — Photographic prints obtained in the 

 dark, by M. A. Brian9on. — On a rapid method for the estima- 

 tion of arsenic, by MM. R. Engel and J. Bernard. The arsenic 

 is precipitated in hydrochloric acid solution by hypophos- 

 phorous acid, and titrated with standard iodine solution in 

 presence of sodium bicarbonate. The results of the test 

 analyses are satisfactory. — Partial synthesis of geranic acid 

 and constitution of lemonol and lemonal, by MM. P. 

 Barbier and L. Bouveault. — On some derivatives of eugenol, 

 by M. Ch. Gassman. — On the composition of fire-damp, 

 by M. T. Schloesing, jun. A careful examination of the 

 combustible gas in sixteen samples of fire-damp, from 

 various mines, showed that in thirteen cases the hydrocarbon was 

 pure methane ; in the other three, besides methane, traces of 

 ethane (from 2-4 per cent. ) appeared to be present. — Walking and 

 running ^«7f^jr/^«, by MM. Comte and Regnault. A study of 

 a new method of walking and running called en flexion, on 

 account of a sud.den bend of the knee at a particular point of the 

 stride. It is shown that in this method, which has already been 

 proved to be of great practical advantage in the movement of 

 troops, the vertical oscillations of the body are rendered more 

 gradual, besides being reduced in magnitude. A dynamographic 

 study of the variations of the pressure on the feet also brings out 

 the same point, sudden variations of pressure disappearing from 

 the curve — On a new application of photography, by M. G. 

 Gueroult. — Some applications of a mode of production of colour, 

 hitherto unexplained, by M. C. Henry. — Undulatory irradiation 

 of luminous impression, by M. A. Charpentier. — Assimilation 

 and activity, by M. P. Vuillemin. — On an epidemic of pneumonia 

 of the hare, caused by Strongylns retortteformis, Zeder, by M. E. 

 Yung. — The lacunar apparatus of the starfish, by M. L. Cuenot. 



Berlin. 

 Physiological Society, January 10. — Prof. Munk, Presi- 

 dent, in the chair. — Dr. Joachimsthal spoke on a supposed self- 

 regulative process in muscles as based on the observation that 

 the calf-muscles are long and thin in negroes, but short and 

 thick in whites. This depends on the relative lengths of the 

 calcaneum. In the negro the muscle is inserted on a longer arm 

 of this bone, and this necessitates a more extended contraction 

 of the muscle ; in a white man the arm is shorter, but this 

 requires a correspondingly greater force, and hence the muscle is 

 shorter and thicker. An experiment had been made by Marey 

 on rabbits with reference to the above and the speaker described 

 some recently made by himself on a cat in support of his views. 

 In the subsequent discussion considerable objection was raised 

 against the validity of the experiments, some of the results being 

 attributed to muscular atrophy. — Prof Zuntz reported on experi- 

 ments made by Dr. Lewin, of New York, in which, using a dog, 

 the stomach had been connected directly with the intestine so as 



