April i6, 1896] 



NATURE 



57, 



The Calendar for 1895-96 of the Queen's College, Galway, 

 contains an alteration in the statutes referring to scholarships. 

 We notice that from the beginning of the Session 1896-97, all 

 scholarships and prizes will he open to students of either sex ; 

 junior scholarships in arts of the second year will be tenable for 

 one year only. After the close of the Session 1897-98, the third 

 year's scholarship in law and the senior scholarship or exhibition 

 in the same subject will be abolished. 



The tenth summer meeting of the Edinburgh University 

 Extension Movement will be held at University Hall, Edinburgh, 

 from August 3 to August 29. Among the courses of lectures 

 which have been arranged are philosophy and social science, 

 by Prof. Patrick Geddes ; the relation between science and 

 philosophy, by Dr. R. M. Wenley ; African scenery as influ- 

 enced by climate, by Mr. Scott Elliot ; psychology, education 

 and physiology, hygiene, biology, geography and geology. There 

 will also be several conferences for the discussion of educational 

 problems of the preseYit day. The comprehensive character of 

 the programme should attract a large number to the meeting. 



In the House of Commons on Tuesday, Mr. Carvell Williams 

 asked the First Lord of the Treasury whether the Parliamentary 

 grant to King's College would not only be restored, but con- 

 siderably increased ; and, if so, whether provision was made 

 for such increase in the present Estimates or whether it would 

 be otherwise provided. In reply, Mr. Balfour said no increase 

 was proposed this Session in regard to King's College. In 

 accordance with an undertaking given by the Chancellor of the 

 Exchequer to a deputation which waited upon him, he has 

 appointed three gentlemen, Mr. T. H, Warren, President of 

 Magdalen College, Oxford, Prof. D. G. Liveing, and Mr. 

 Chalmers, of the Treasury, to visit the colleges sharing in the 

 grant made to universities and colleges in Great Britain, and to 

 investigate the character and quality of the university work 

 done, and to inquire generally into the position which each 

 college occupies both financially and in other respects. When 

 their report is received, which the Chancellor of the Exchequer 

 expects will be some time in the autumn, he will be in a position 

 to judge whether a case has been made out for recommending 

 Parliament to increase the sum to each of the colleges sharing in 

 the grant. 



From Science comes news of a notable extension of the 

 University of Pennsylvania, by the establishment of a large 

 number of graduate scholarships and fellowships. Provost 

 Harrison gave 500,000 dols. to the university last June, " for 

 the encouragement of liberal studies and the advancement of 

 knowledge." The specific purposes of the fund are as follows : 

 (l) The establishment of scholarships and fellowships intended 

 solely for men of exceptional ability. (2) The increasing of the 

 library of the university, particularly by the acquisition of works 

 of permanent use and of lasting reference to and by the scholar. 

 (3) The temjx)rary relief from routine work of professors of 

 ability in order that they may devote themselves to some special 

 and graduate work. (4) The securing of men of distinction to 

 lecture, and for a time to reside at the university. Our con- 

 temporary states that in pursuance of the end in view in the 

 foundation, definite action has been taken in the establishment 

 of a considerable number of graduate scholarships and fellow- 

 ships. The recommendations whicli were made regarding these 

 have been approved and will now go into force. There are 

 eight graduate scholarships giving free tuition and 100 dols. open 

 to those coming from the liberal courses in the college of the 

 university ; and there are, with the Hector Tyndale Fellowship 

 in Physics, now fifteen fellowships, fourteen of which, coming 

 from this foundation, are open to students of any university. 

 The amount of the tuition deducted from the full value of the 

 fellowship (600 dols.) does not go into the general funds of the 

 university, but may be used for the purchase of books or 

 apparatus which will aid the student in his work, or may l)e used 

 in the publication of theses. A somewhat unusual feature is the 

 establishment of senior fellowships, open only to those who have 

 taken the Doctor's degree in the University of Pennsylvania. 

 This amounts to the introduction, in a modified form, of the 

 " Decent " system of German universities, the object being not 

 at all to use the Senior Fellow as a teacher for the sake of the 

 value he may be to the university, but to test him and give him 

 an opportunity to do a little teaching in the direct line of his 

 special work. From the Senior Fellowships there is no reduction 

 for tuition. This gives eight Graduate Scholarships, fifteen 

 Fellowships, and five Senior Fellowships, making twenty Fellow- 



NO. 1 38 1, VOL. 53] 



ships in all. Fourteen of the Fellowships are open to men from 

 other institutions, but the Senior Fellowships are limited to 

 those having taken the Doctor's degree from the university in 

 order that some of the best men may be kept in residence there 

 as long as possible, and their influence felt among the students. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS. 



Aynerican Journal of Science, March. — Trinidad pitch, by S. 

 F. Peckham and Laura A. Linton. This paper gives an account 

 of the physical and chemical properties of pitch from the Pitch 

 Lake of Trinidad, together with a map of the lake itself. A dry 

 sample of the true lake pitch contained 34*2 per cent, petrolene, 

 l8"8 per cent, asphaltene, If4 per cent, of other organic matter, 

 and 35-6 per cent, of inorganic matter. The pitch as it occurs 

 is a unique substance found nowhere else in nature. It consists 

 of a mixture of bitumen, water, sand, decayed vegetation, and 

 gas in such definite proportions that within certain limits the 

 composition of the entire mass is uniform. — Proofs of the rising 

 of the land round Hudson Bay, by Robert Bell. The old shore- 

 lines in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec sloj^e upward in 

 a north-easterly direction at rates varying in different regions 

 from a few inches to a foot and even two feet per mile. Many 

 former landing-places about the bay are now high and dry. The 

 rising is apparently still in progress. — Experiments upon the 

 kathode rays and their effects, by A. W. Wright. In developing 

 " shadowgraphs,' it is better not to use any alkaline accelerator at 

 all until just at the end of the process. Riintgen rays passing 

 through glass walls do not show magnetic deflection or mutual 

 repulsion ; but when they are made to pass through gold-leaf 

 instead, they show traces of these phenomena, probably owing 

 to the fact that they carry with them small portions of volatilised 

 and electrified metal. — Triangulation by means of kathode 

 photography, by John Trowbridge. The principle of tri- 

 angulation may be applied to kathode photography when 

 determining the situation of metallic particles in the body. 

 By using two vacuum tubes in different positions, two 

 pictures of, say, a bullet embedded in a hand may be ob- 

 tained, and their distance apart gives the depth at which the 

 bullet may be sought. — Notes of observations on the Rontgen 

 rays, by H. A. Rowland, N. R. Carmichael, and L. J. Briggs. 

 Some photographs of a coin obtained by Rontgen's method 

 showed no penumbra when the coin was 2 cm. from the plate. 

 In a very high vacuum tube the source of the active rays was 

 distinctly traced to the anode. 



The Meteorologische Zeitschrift for March contains some in- 

 teresting results of meteorological observations made at Boroma, 

 on the Zambesi, lat. 16° S., long. 33" 12' E., in the years 1891-92. 

 The most prominent feature of the climate is the contrast be- 

 tween the dry and the wet seasons. The approach of the rainy 

 season is announced by lightning in the north and north-east 

 during October ; rain commences in November, and continues, 

 on and off, for about five months ; hail also occasionally occurs 

 during thunderstorms. The dry season commences in April, and 

 until the following November no measurable quantity of rain 

 falls. It is noteworthy that during seven dry months, under a 

 tropical sun, vegetation is not arrested, although even slight dew 

 is very rarely observed. The daily barometric range is very 

 regular, and amounts to about 0*15 inch. The atmospheric 

 waves are so similar that the barometric curves overlie each 

 other as nearly as possible ; depressions such as are frequent in 

 our latitudes do not occur at any part of the year ; even the passage 

 of thunderstorms is not shown upon the barograph traces. The 

 absolute maximum temperature recorded was 109° "9, in Novem- 

 ber, and the minimum 54° "S, in August. The annual rainfall 

 amounted to 296 inches, of which 10 inches fell in December. 

 The greatest amount observed in twenty-four hours was only 

 I '9 inch. 



The last fascicule of the Memoirs ( Travaux) of the St. Peters- 

 burg Society of Naturalists (vol. xxv. livr. 2), which is entirely 

 given to the works done in the zootomical laboratory of the 

 St. Petersburg University, contains an interesting monograph, 

 by B. Sukatchoff, on some new forms of sponges from Lake 

 Baikal, The dredgings were made in the south-western part of 

 the lake, near the issue of the Angara, by means of an apparatus 

 similar to the one used by the C/«a//^«^tfr expedition, the greatest 

 depth reached being 492 feet. The greatest depth at which 

 sponges were found was 273 feet. Most of the sponges obtained 

 belong to already known species of Lubomirskia, described by 



