April 9, 1896] 



NATURE 



551 



dition it had been obtained in the pre-glacial forest-bed at 

 Cromer. — Mr. Clement Reid also exhibited some wood forwarded 

 by Mr. H. N. Ridley from the jungle near Singapore. It 

 appeared to have been eaten into a honeycombed mass of peculiar 

 character, and was found only in wet places, but always above 

 ground, the entire tree rotting. Neither Mr. Ridley nor Mr. 

 Reid had seen anything like it in England ; and the latter, while 

 suggesting that the small lenticular unconnected cavities in the 

 wood were probably caused by insects or their larva;, thought 

 they were unlike the work of either beetles or white ants. — A 

 paper was read by Dr. Otto Stapf on the structure of the female 

 flowers and fruit of Sararanga, Hemsley. The materials 

 utilised consisted of female flowers and fruits of Sararanga 

 sinuosa, Hemsley {Jonrii. Linn. Soc. , vol. xxx. p. 216, t. 11), 

 which had been collected by the officers of H.M.S. Penang in 

 New Georgia, Solomon Islands, and were in excellent preserva- 

 tion. There were also photographs and a description, taken upon 

 the spot, of the tree, about 60 feet high, shortly branched at the 

 top, with terminal, nodding, white-flowered, very compound, and 

 gigantic panicles. The leaves are like those of an ordinary 

 screw-pine. The flowers consist of a rudimentary, sinuously 

 bent, saucer shaped perianth, and a sub-globose, sinuously lobed 

 gynsecium, with very numerous (70-80), dark, discoid, or reni- 

 form stigmas which are arranged in double rows over the dorsal 

 ridges of the main body and the lobes, having between them 

 minute pores which end behind some way below the surface. 

 There are as many ovary-cells as stigmas, each containing one 

 anatropus ovule from the base of the inner angle. The vascular 

 bundles of the gynascium end below the stigma in a cluster of 

 tracheids, and supply it probably with a viscid or sugary liquid. 

 The base of the pore is surrounded by a compact, thin- walled 

 parenchyma, very rich in plasma. It is suggested that the pollen- 

 tubes grow from the stigma down into the pore, and descend 

 from here through the conductive tissue to the ovule. The ripe 

 fruit is a succulent drupe with numerous pyrenes, in shape 

 like the flower, but much larger. The endocarp is bony, the 

 albumen copious and oily ; the embryo is as in Pandanus. The 

 complex structure of the flower is explained as a modification of 

 the type represented, e.g. in Pandanus titilis, and in accord- 

 ance with Count Solms-Laubach's theory of the flower of the 

 Pandanacese. On this paper some critical remarks were offered 

 by Mr. Rendle. — On behalf of Mr. G. S. West, a paper was 

 read by Prof. Howes on two little-known Opisthoglyphous 

 Snakes. The author had examined and compared, in respect of 

 the structure of the buccal glands and teeth, specimens of the 

 grooved and non-grooved \&r\QX.\es q{ Erythroiainprus (vsctilapii, 

 as recorded by Dr. Glinther (" Biologia Centr.-Amer.," part 

 cxxi. p. 166), and he proved that the latter were rightly referred 

 to the species. 



Geological Society, March 25. ^-Dr. Henry Hicks, 

 1 .R.S., President, in the chair. — On submerged land-surfaces 

 at Barry, Cilamorganshire, by A. Strahan, with notes on the 

 fauna and flora by Clement Reid, and an appendix on the 

 Microzoa by Prof. T. Rupert Jones, F. R.S., and F. Chapman. 

 Excavations for a new dock at Barry have disclosed a series of 

 freshwater or slightly estuarine silts with intercalated peats, 

 below sea-level on the north-eastern side of the island. The site 

 of the excavation was overflowed by the tide until the year 1884, 

 when the docks were commenced. The newest deposits seen 

 are, therefore, blown sand, Scrobicularia-c\2iy, and sand or 

 shingle with recent marine shells. These rest on an eroded 

 surface of blue silt, with sedges in position of growth. Four 

 peat-l>eds occur in this silt, at 4, li, 20, and 35 feet below 

 Ordnance datum respectively. The uppermost peat contains a 

 seam of shell-marl, partly composed of the shells of ostracoda, 

 and partly of Bythtnta, Limnaa, &c. The second is a mass of 

 matted sedges. The third is a land-surface, and in places con- 

 sists almost wholly of timber with the stools and roots in situ. 

 The fourth is also an old land-surface, as is proved not only by 

 the presence of roots in place beneath it, but by numerous land- 

 shells. A fragment of a polished flint-celt was found by Mr. 

 Storrie embedded in the lower par^ of the uppermost peat. By 

 a comparison with the existing maritime marshes of the neigh- 

 bourhood, it was shown that the fourth peat indicates a sub- 

 sidence of not less than 55 feet. The sea encroached upon the 

 area in consequence of this subsidence. It entered by the lowest 

 of three low cols in the southern water-parting of the Cadoxton 

 River, thus isolating the portion of land now known as Barry 

 Island. A slight further movement would have converted 

 the water-jKirting into a chain of islands. — On a phosphatic 



NO. 1380, VOL. 53] 



chalk with Holaiter planus at Lewes, by A. Strahan, with an 

 appendix on the ostracoda and foraminifera by Y. Chapman. 

 This rock, which occurs at the base of the upper chalk, at the 

 horizon of the chalk rock, does not exceed i^ feet in thickness, 

 and persists for a few yards only. In composition and micro- 

 scopic character it presents a close analogy to the Taplow 

 phosphatic deposit, which, however, occurs at the top of the 

 upper chalk. Like it, it consists of brown phosphatic grains 

 embedded in a white chalky matrix. The grains include a large 

 number of pellets, attributable to small fish, phosphatised 

 foraminifera, chips of bone, &c. Fish-teeth also occur in 

 abundance. To complete the resemblance, the Lewes deposit 

 rests on a floor of hard nodular chalk, beneath which is a white 

 chalk traversed by irregular branching pipes filled with the 

 brown variety. Such " floors " were attributed to concretionary 

 action ensuing upon a pause in the sedimentation. The piped 

 chalk was compared with the structure known as Spongia para- 

 doxica. It was concluded that phosphatised deposits may occur 

 at any horizon in the chalk ; that the phosphatisation is due to 

 small fishes, attracted by an unusual abundance of food ; that 

 they are shallow- water deposits, and associated with a pause or 

 change in the sedimentation. Mr. Chapman furnished a list 

 of 42 species and varieties of foraminifera, and 6 species of 

 ostracoda. The former indicate a deeper water origin than do 

 those of the Taplow chalk. He noted the occurrence for the 

 first time in this country of Gypsina Coetic, Marrson. — On the 

 classification of the strata between the Kimeridgian and the 

 Aptian, by Dr. A. P. Pavlow, Professor of Geology in the 

 University of Moscow. In this paper the author discussed the 

 new evidence respecting the palaeontology of the Lower Cretaceous 

 and Upper Jurassic deposits of Russia, which had come to light 

 since the publication, by Mr. I^mplugh and himself, of *' Les 

 Argiles de Speeton et leurs Equivalents" (Moscow, 1892). 



Dublin. 

 Royal -Dublin Society, March 18.— Prof. G. F. Fitz- 

 gerald, F.R.S., in the chair. — A paper was read on the Rontgen 

 X-rays, by Mr. Richard J. Moss (see Nature, April 2, p. 523). 

 — Prof. Arthur A. Rambaut read a note on the rotation period 

 of dark spots on Jupiter. — A memoir on the carboniferous 

 Ostracoda of Ireland, by Prof. Rupert Jones, F.R.S., and Mr. 

 J. W. Kirkby, was communicated by Prof. W. J. SoUas, F.R.S. 



Paris. 



Academy of Sciences, March 30. — M'. A. Cornu in the 

 chair. — On the properties of the invisible radiations emitted by 

 uranium salts, and by the antikathodic wall of a Crookes' tube, 

 by M. Henri Becquerel. The rays given off by uranium salts 

 are doubly refracted by tourmaline, a parallel experiment with 

 a Crookes' tube giving a negative result. — On the variations in 

 the brightness of the star Mira-Ceti, by M. Dumenil. — On the 

 inversion of systems of total differentials, by M. P. Painleve. 

 — Extension of the theorem of Cauchy to more general systems 

 of partial differential equations, by M. E. Delassus. — On the 

 penetration of gases into the glass walls of Crookes' tubes, by 

 M. Gouy. Glass which has been exposed to intense kathodic 

 rays gives off numerous bubbles of gas on heating. — On 

 the use of non-uniform magnetic fields in photography 

 with the X-rays, by M. G. Meslin — The time of ex- 

 posure in photography by the X-rays, by M. J. Chappuis. 

 The effect produced by a Crookes' tube upon a gold-leaf electro- 

 scope was studied under varying conditions. An increased 

 action was obtained by concentrating the rays by a strong 

 magnetic field, and especially by replacing the ordinary metallic 

 contact-breaker by a Foucault's interrupter. — Action of the X- 

 rays upon electrified bodies, by MM. Benoist and Hurmuzescu. 

 In reply to criticisms by MM. Righi, Dufour, and Borgmann 

 and Gerchun, the authors have repeated their original experi- 

 ments with additional precautions, and find that the discharge 

 of an electrified body by the rays is complete, and is independent 

 of the sign of the original charge. Different metals appear to 

 be discharged at different rates, a result difficult to explain by 

 the theory advanced by Prof. J. J. Thomson, that dielectrics 

 become conductors under the action of the X-rays —On the 

 refraction of the Rontgen rays, by M. F. Beaulard. With a 

 prism of ebonite no clear evidence of deviation could 

 be obtained. — On the diffraction and polarisation of the 

 Rontgen rays, by M. G. Sagnac. —Stereoscopic photographs 

 obtained with the X-rays, by MM. A. Imbert and H. Bertin- 

 Sans. — Determination of the exact position of a foreign body in 



