September 20, 1894] 



NA TURE 



5'3 



Intension Series: — "Insect Life," by F. \V. Theobald, 

 illustrated. 



In Mr. Edward Arnold's Hit we finl : — " Psycholo:;/ for 

 Teachers," by Prof. C. Lloyd Morgan; " Systematic Science 

 Ti-achinq," liy Kdward G. Howe 



The S.P.C.K. announce: — "Edible and Poisonous Mu>h- 

 looms : what to eat and what to avoid," by Dr. M. C. Cooke, 

 uiih eighteen coloured plates illiutrating fortyei'jht species. 



Messr>. G. P. Putnam's Sons will i-sue: — "Diagnosis, Dif- 

 ferential Diagnosis, and Treatment of Diseases of the Eye," 

 by Dr. A. F,. Adams. 



Messrs. \V. 13. Whittingham and Co give notice of a book 

 entitled " What is Heat ?— a Peep into Nature's most Hidien 

 Secrets," by Frederick Hovenden. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE. 



Major Craicie, the Director of the Salislical Department 

 of the Hoard of Agriculture, has prcsenied a report on the 

 distribution of grants for agricultural education in Great 

 Britain in the financial year 1S93-94. From a summnry in 

 ihe limts, it appears that out of tne tot.nl vote of £Sooo 

 entrusted to the Board of .\griculture for educational purposes 

 ;'ie necessaiy provision had been made for the cost ol inspec- 

 lion, and ilie sum of £ti^^o, which reinaine<l available, had 

 lieen applied in the form of specific grants, a small swvn being 

 devoted to the reproduction of the records of the Koihamsted 

 experiments for the past fifty years. The Board had been 

 confirmed by fiulher experience ia their estimate of the value 

 ■ if establishing fully-equipped agricultural departments in col- 

 legiate institutions capalile of aiding the work of distinct 

 groups of local authorities charged widi \\\-t provision of tech- 

 nical education. The collegiate centres established by the 

 several University colleges at Bangor, Leed-, Xewcastle, and 

 Vlierystwytli ha<l continued to develop and to extend their 

 jsefulness as centre; of educational energy for the surrounding 

 . lunties. Further centres had been fully equipped and new 

 :i.;ricullural teaching organisations definitely set on foot, on 

 lines more or less similar, at Cambridge, Nottingham, and 

 Reading. In Scotland, where the institution of definite centres 

 was being more slowly developed than in England, several of 

 ilie south-western counties had continued to mike use of the 

 i.icilities for .agricultural inuruction oii'ered by the central classes 

 jirovided. and t>y the itinerant lecturers supplied for lo:nl work 

 by the Glasgow and West of Scotland Technical College, 

 liesides assi>iing institutions such as the Darham College of 

 Science and the Glasgow Technical College, where lectures on 

 certain foreslry subjects were included in the general curriculum, 

 ihelJjard had again been able to repeat the g' ant towards the cost 

 • >i the special forestry class established in the University of 

 Edinburgh. An endeavour had been made to continue, all hough 

 necessarily on a reduced scale, 1 he assistance given to experiment.il 

 work, and provision had also been made for experiment stations 

 or demonstration plots at each of the Welsh colleges. .\ begin- 

 ning in the same direction had been m.ade at Reading. The 

 grants awarded by the liiard during the year range from £,'S>oa, 

 IJiven to the University College of North Wales, at Bangor, the 

 Yorkshire College, Leeds, and the Dijrham College of Science, 

 Newcastle-on-Tyiie, to £1^ given to the Dounliy Science 

 ijchool, Orkney. In all mere were twenty grants, eight being 

 for work in collegiate centres, five for agricultural experiments, 

 three for dairy instruction, one for special cheese research and 

 agricultural experiments, one lor lorotry work, and two for 

 special classes. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS. 



American Jounml of Science, September. — The efi'ect of 

 glaciation ana of the glacial period on the present fauna of 

 North America, by Samuel II. Scudder. Statistics of the 

 number of genera and species found in the areas formerly 

 covered by the ice-sheet and the drifiless areas respectively, 

 and of the number common to both, would indicate whether 

 the northern fauna had recovered from the effects of glaciation. 

 Tables are given showing this for the Coleoptera, as the best 

 known among insects, which are very sensitive to climatic 

 changes. The conclusion arrived at is that, on the whole, the 



NO. T299, ^'^'-- 50] 



fauna has nearly or quite recovered from its enforced removal 

 from the Northern States and Canada.— Tertiary and later 

 history of the island of Cuba, by Robert T. Hill. No positive 

 evidences of subsidence after Ihe beginning of Tertiary time 

 could be discovered. Nowhere do the rivers show any revival 

 or other evidence of subsidence below the sealevel, but all 

 have continuous downward cutting sections. On the other 

 hand, some of these streams ate now forming delta deposits 

 in places outside their mouths, which is more indicative of 

 present elevation than of subsidence. Since the old folding or 

 orogenic movements occupied at least a small portion of post- 

 Tertiary lime, we may reasonably conclude that the periods of 

 uniform uplifting must have taken place at least since Ihe 

 beginning of the Pleistocene. In other words, they are com- 

 paratively modern in geologic time— some of them ahsolutelv 

 recent. — Thermoelectric heights of antimony and bismuth 

 alloys, by C. C. Hutchins. The best combination forathermo- 

 functicn from these alloys is, for one element, bismuth with 

 from 2 to 5 per cent antimony ; and for the other, bismuth with 

 from 5 to 10 tier cent. tin. They may be cast into thin leave; 

 as follows : Two (lieces of plate glass are smoked slightly, or 

 are very finely ground, and rubbed with plumbago. The metal 

 being melted upon charcoal or under fused sodium chloride, a 

 little i)ool is found upon one plate, and the other is applied to 

 it as quickly as possible. Leaves thus obtained can be worked 

 with a fine file as ihin as 003 mm. and are sufficiently tough 

 to stand ordinary treatment. — On the nitrogen content of 

 California biuimen, by S. F. Peckham. Oils from the tunnel- 

 in Wheeler's canon on the south side of the Sulphur Mountain 

 yielded I '1095 percent, of nitrogen. These and other oils of 

 this region issue from strata ])rotei:ted from infiltration of raiii- 

 waier and accompanying oxygen by overlying (ormations. 



Quarterly Journal of Microuopical Science, vol. xxxvi. part 

 3 — Prof. A. G. Bourne gives an exhaustive account of the 

 structure of Moniligai'er grandis ; and adds a revision of the 

 genus, including diagnoses of some new species. Some good 

 coloured figures of the different species accompany Prof. 

 l;ourne's memoir.— Mr. E. W. Macbride has a review of 

 Spengel's monograph on Balanoglossus, and criticises that 

 author's views on the affinities of the Knteropncusta. — Under 

 the name Moiiocyslis lurctiUa, Mr. \V. C. Bosanquet gives a 

 number of observations on the structure and life histoiy of a 

 large Gregarine found in the earth-worm Liiiitl>riciis /lercuUin. 



Wiedemann s Annalen der Physik tin J Chemie, No. 9. — On 

 retractive power and density of dilute solutions, by W. Hal!- 

 wachs. The increase in the difference of molecular refraction 

 previously observed with increasing dilution is ompletcly 

 explained by the peculiar behaviour of the density. The con- 

 stitutive influences analogous to dissociation, which find their 

 most characteristic expression in the changes of electric con- 

 ductivity, have no effect upon the refractive power. — On the 

 motion of dielectric bodies in the homogeneous electrostatic 

 field, by L. Graelz and L. Formm. Mascart and Joubert, in 

 their development of Poisson's original theory, assume that 

 small bodies placed in a dielectric do not exert any forces upon 

 each other. This is contradicted by experiments upon small 

 bars and pla'es of dielectric materials introduced into homo- 

 geneous fields, which tend to turn their axes and planes respec- 

 tively into a direction parallel to the lines of force. When the 

 condenser plates are statically charged, the roLations depend 

 upon the sign of the charge, but in the case of oscillations they 

 are always in the same direction and proportional to the square 

 of the dilVeicnce of potential. A small disc, made of sulphur 

 or p.araffin, suspended between the plates may be used as a 

 "dielectric voltmeter." — On electric oscillations of long 

 duration and their effects, by H. Fbert. The author investi- 

 gates the conditions of obtaining the best luminous effects 01 

 the type of those produced by Tesla. He points oil that the 

 secondary circuit must be turned to the primary, and that the 

 condensers mu>t have the least possible capacity. He describes 

 a "luminescence lamp" made of a glass globe containing a 

 piece of luminous paint. Oscillations are conducted to tinloil 

 armatures on the globe, and produce vivid luminescence. The 

 light effects were al)out one-thirtieth or one fortieth of the 

 amyl-acetate standard. The energy consumed counted by 

 millionths of a watt, so that the economy of the new lamp i> 

 very striking, consuming as it does only about a two- 

 thousandth 01 the energy consumed by the acetate lamp. The 

 difficulty involved in the (act Ihat the high frequency currents 



