JuN'E. igi5. 



KNOWLEDGE. 



1S5 



The Chemical Society have resumed the publication of 

 abstracts from German scientific literature, and the follow- 

 ing notes are based on sr.me of these appearing in the April 

 number of the Journal of the Chemical Society. 



RADIATION FROM THORIUM-X.— In a paper pub- 

 lished in 1912 Hahn and Meitner brought forward e\-idence 

 to show that thorium-X gives off soft (3 radiation, as well 

 as the o rays necessary for the formation of thorium ema- 

 nation. Baeyer, Hahn. and Meitncr [Phvsikalische Zeit- 

 schrift, 1915, page 6) now state that these rays are not due 

 to thorium-X as hitherto supposed, but proceed from 

 radio-thorium. 



RADIUM-II. — In the same number of that journal Meitner 

 also disproves the existence of this hvpothetical element 

 which Fajans and Towara alleged to have discovered (see 

 " Knowledge," Radio-activity Notes, April, 1915). 



THE QUESTION OF ISOTOPIC ELEMENTS (Hevesy 

 and Paneth, Monalshefte fUr Chemie, 1915, page 75). — 

 These authors have added to the already long list of studies 

 of the electro- chemistn,- of the radio-elements made by 

 them. In this communication the decomposition potential 

 of solutions of radium-E and thorium-B has been studied. 

 Further e.xperiments were made in which a quantity 

 of radium-D was grown from a very large amount of radium 

 emanation, decapng in a closed vessel, and the radium-D 

 was deposited as peroxide on a platinum wire. The film 

 obtained was \isible, and it was found that electro- 

 chemically its behaviour was identical in all respects 

 with a similar film of ordinarv lead peroxide. Thus no 

 evidence was obtained that isotopic elements were at all 

 capable of separation from one another by chemical means 

 after they had been mixed together in solution. 



ZOOLOGY. 



By Professor J. Arthur Thomson, M.A., LL.D. 



NEW APODOUS FISH.— Professor Louis Roule de- 

 scribes from the Atlantic abvsses (nine hundred and fifty 

 metres) to the north of Faval a new eel-like fish, which he 

 names Pseudophichthys latidorsalis. It has its counterpart 

 in Promyllantor from the Indian Ocean, and in the interest- 

 ing Nemichthys scolopaceits from the Mediterranean. Most 

 of these apodous forms are abyssal in their earliest stages 

 and in adult life, but there may be a more or less prolonged 

 bathypelagic larval period, and even a littoral phase. In 

 the eels, as is well known, the littoral phase is followed by a 

 long-dra^NTi-out period of growth in fresh water. 



MISDIRECTED INDUSTRY.— A large volume hes 

 before us, " Histoire de I'lnvolution NatureUe " (Paris 

 and Lugano, 1915), in which Dr. Henri ^larconi, of Terni, 

 seeks to show that we have all been looking at evolution the 

 wrong way round. The process has been from the complex 

 to the simple, not from the simple to the complex ; from 

 man to amoeba, not from amoeba to man. Everyone admits 

 occasional retrogressive evolution or degeneration, as in 

 parasitism, but the author's wholesale topsy-turs'y inter- 

 pretation, which has been tried before, \\ill not work at all. 

 But the attempt to make it work extends over five hundred 

 finely printed pages. 



RINGS ON OYSTER SHELLS.— It is supposed by many 

 that the age of an oyster can be ascertained by counting 

 the rings, or groups of rings, on its deep valve, each group 

 being regarded as a year's growth. Miss \x\r\t L. Massy 

 has tested this in reference to specimens from the oyster 

 station at Ardfry, at the head of Galway Bay ; but she does 

 not recommend the method. " All I can honestly say 

 I have learnt from a patient scrutiny of over six hundred 

 samples of various ages, from eighteen months to six years, 

 is that an oyster of eighteen months or two summers appears 

 to possess at least two rings, but may have as many as five. 



One of three summers has at least two rings, and may have 

 six. A four-year-old oyster may have only three rings, or 

 may possess seven or eight." 



CLASSIFICATION OF THE SENSES.— In his very 

 interesting experiments on the senses of fishes. Professor 

 G. H. Parker points out that chemical stimulation affects 

 the olfactorj- organs, certain ner%-e-endings in the skin, 

 and the taste-buds in the mouth. He regards the olfacton,' 

 sense as first in this series and taste as last. The " common 

 chemical sense "• — possessed by most aquatic vertebrates 

 — comes in between. These three senses overlap one another 

 and differ in degree rather than in kind. Similarly, oscil- 

 lations and vibrations in the water are perceived by the 

 skin, by the lateral line system, and bv the ear, and the 

 hearing of a \-ibrating tuning-fork bv the ear differs in 

 degree rather than in kind from the jjerception of oscillations 

 in the water, due to some big jar or to the movements of 

 an enemy. 



ADAPTATION IN STOMACH OF OPEN-BILL — 

 The Indian Open-bill {Anastomus oscitaiis), belonging to the 

 stork family, is said to live on shellfish, and Dr. P. Chalmers 

 Mitchell has discovered an interesting adaptation in its 

 stomach. There is a .soft-walled glandular proventriculus 

 and a hard-walled muscular gizzard with stones, and the 

 latter communicates by a wide aperture with a small cardiac 

 chamber which leads into the duodenum. The wall of the 

 gizzard is raised in a strong crescentic fold, which blocks the 

 aperture into the cardiac chamber, the free margin of the 

 fold being frayed into flat plates placed like the teeth of a 

 comb. The fold and plates are covered with the hardened 

 secretion lining the general cavity of the gizzard, and par- 

 ticles of food can reach the intestine only after being squeezed 

 through these plates. 



CORALS AT GREAT DEPTHS.— The collections made 

 by the Prince of Monaco have increased our knowledge of 

 -^ladrepore corals from great depths. Many have been 

 dredged from four to five thousand metres, and some par- 

 ticular kinds seem able to thrive at depths var^nng from 

 forty metres to three thousand. Dr. Ch. Gravier calls 

 attention to some interesting points. Some of the specimens 

 obtained seemed to have been grownng freely in the ooie 

 without any stable substratum. The flesh of most of the 

 abvssal forms was rusty brown or black. The food must be 

 found, for the most part, in the rain of minute dead organisms 

 and particles of organic d6bris. Gravier found some frag- 

 ments of Crustaceans and Ophiuroids in the caWty of 

 Stephanolrochits nobilis, which points to a utilisation of other 

 deep-sea animals. Most of the abyssal corals are solitary', and 

 a single cup may attain a diameter of eight centimetres. 

 Curious associations of species are %-erj- common, but the 

 meaning of this companionship is quite unknown. 



SOCIAL LIFE OF ADELIE PENGUINS— We have 

 already called attention to Dr. Levick's fine study of the 

 social life of the Ad6Iie Penguins at Cape .\dare (Heinemann, 

 London, 1914). A more formal statement of his results has 

 recently been published by the British Museum in the 

 '' Report on the Zoology of the ' Terra Nova ' Exp)cdition." 

 and it is a m.isterpiece of observational nat\iral historj' 

 which should not be missed by anyone interested in the bio- 

 psychological problems of bird life. What are we to think 

 of the long journey of these flightless birds — seeing such a 

 little way ahead ! — across the trackless sea, of the quaint 

 courtship, of the bloody (by your leave) but never fatal 

 fights, of the stealing of stones for nests, of the cock's eye 

 for colour, of the long fast — it may be a lunar month — 

 of the parental co6peration, of the chicks' rapiditv of 

 growth, of the wean,- climbs with bellyfuls of Euphausia 

 and often love's labour lost at the last minute, of the gaiaes 

 and plays on the sea-ice, of the mysterious " drilling." 

 of the autumnal migration, and of the long, long way to the 

 vaguely known winter quarters in the ice-pack .' 



