November i, 1894J 



NA TURE 



19 



The London Mathematical Society, having been on October 

 23 duly registered as a corporation under Section 23 of the 

 Companies Act, 1S67, will hold its first general meeting at its 

 office, 22 Albemarle Street, on Thursday evening, November 

 8 next, at eight o'clock. The meeting is empowered by the 

 Articles of Association to elect a council and officers, to frame 

 bye-laws and to pass resolutions with regard to the affairs of 

 the Society. The following gentlemen have been recommended 

 by the present council (acting under Article Si for election 

 as th e new council and officers for the ensuing session : — 

 President, Major Macmahon, R.A., F.R.S. ; vice-presidents, 

 Messrs. M. J. M. Hill, F.R.S., A. B. Kempe, F.R.S.,and A. 

 E. H. Love, F.R.S. ; treasurer, Dr. J. Larmor, F.R.S. ; hon. 

 secretaries, Messrs. M. Jenkins and R. Tucker ; other members, 

 Messrs. A. B. Basset, F.R.S., and G. H. Bryan, Lieut. -Colonel 

 J. R. Campbell, Lieut. -Colonel A. J. C. Cunningham, R.E., 

 Messrs. E. B. Elliott, F.R.S., J. W. L. Glaisher, F.R.S., A. G. 

 Greenhill, F.R.S., E. W. Hobson, F.R.S., and \V. H. H. 

 Hudson. At the close of the preceding business, an address 

 will be delivered by the retiring President (A. B. Kempe, 

 K.R. S.), on "Mathematics," after which the meeting will pro- 

 ceed to the ordinary business. 



During this month, the following lectures will be delivered at 

 the Royal Victoria Hall, Waterloo Bridge Road, S.E. : — Novem- 

 ber 6, Prof. A. W. Rucker, F.R.S., on " The Electric Spark " ; 

 November 13, Mr. H. R. Mill, on "Unexplored England"; 

 November 20, Miss Hope Rea, on " The Grand Canary and 

 its People" ; November 27, Miss F. Routledge, on "China." 



It is proposed to hold a " Light and Heat Exhibition" at 

 Woodhouse Park next year. The park is situate at Shepherd's 

 Bush, and is, therefore, in direct communication with all parts 

 of London and the suburbs. The exhibits will be classified 

 into eight divisions, viz. : — Gas lighting ; electric lighting ; 

 various illuminants ; heating and cooking apparatus ; naval and 

 military; scientific apparatus ; photography; historical. The 

 promoters' intention is to hold a series of technical exhibitions 

 on the same site. Further information can be obtained of 

 the Hon. Secretary, Woodhouse, Shepherd's Bush, W. 



Prof. W. M. Flinders Petrie will lecture on " Primitive 

 JigyP'i" ^t 'lis London Institution, on November 12. The 

 following are among the other lecturers and subjects for the 

 session ending March 4, 1S95 : — " Wonder- Working Plants," 

 by Dr. David Morris, C.M.G. ; " Climbing in the Himalayas," 

 by Mr. VV. Martin Conway ; " Extinct Monsters," by Rev. W. 

 N. Hutchinson; " The Newtonian Constant of Gravitation," by 

 Prof. C. V. Boys, F.R.S. ; "The Fauna of Rivers and Lakes," 

 by Prof. Sydney Hickson ; " Twenty Thousand Feet above the 

 Sea," by Mr. Edward Whymper ; "The Netherlands," by Mr. 

 H J. Mackinder ; "Waves of Water and Waves of Light," 

 by Mr. A. P. Laurie : " Nerves and Nerve Centres in Action," 

 by Mr. Henry Power ; " Comets," by Sir Robert Ball, F.R.S. ; 

 "The Germination of Barley," by Mr. A. Gordon Salamon ; 

 " Electric Currents in the Body," by Prof. Victor Horsley, 

 F.R.S. ; "The Beautiful as seen in Minute Nature," by the 

 Rev. Dr. Dallinijer, F.R.S. ; "Theory and Practice of Pre- 

 ventative Inoculation," by Dr. E. E. Klein, F.R.S. 



For the last week or so the weather in these islands has been 

 of a very unsettled character generally. Several areas of low 

 barometric pressure have reached us from the Atlantic, and were 

 accompanied by strong gales on nearly all our coasts, and in 

 the Channel very rough weather has been experienced, while 

 thunder and lightning have also occurred in many places. The 

 rainfall has been very heavy, especially in the west of Ireland 

 and south of England, where it amounted to nearly four and a 

 half inches during the week ending October 27, while in the 



NO. 1305, VOL. 51] 



Midland counties the fall reached about two inches. Since the 

 beginning of the year the rainfall has about reached, or exceeded, 

 the average in all districts except the Midland counties, where 

 the deficiency is three inches, and the west coast of Scotland, 

 where it is two and a half inches. 



Prof. Cleveland Abbe include; the following among his 

 notes in the Monthly Wtather Revir.v for July :— On June 3 a 

 tornado passed north-eastward through the counties of Harney, 

 Grant, and Union, in Eastern Oregon. The most novel feature 

 attending the disturbance was the hail. It is stated that the 

 formation was more in the nature of sheets of ice than simple 

 hailstones. The sheets of ice averaged three to four inches 

 square, and from three-fourths of an inch to one and a half inches 

 in thickness. They had a smooth surface, and in falling gave 

 the impression of a vast field or sheet of ice suspended in the 

 atmosphere, and suddenly broken into fragments about the size 

 of the palm of the hand. During the progress of the tornado 

 at Long Creek a piano was taken up and carried about a 

 hundred yards. 



Mr. a. Trevor-Battye, about whose safety some anxiety 

 has been felt, has reached Archangel from the island of Kol- 

 guef, where he had been studying bird-life. The proposed re- 

 lief expedition, for which subscriptions had been invited, is 

 consequently no longer necessary. 



The German collector, J. Menges, describes, in the last num- 

 ber of Petermanns Mitleilungen, his travels in the Habr Auel 

 district of Somaliland, inland from Berbera. He visited the 

 country in 1S82, and gives a detailed account of his routes in 

 pursuit of big game. 



The last Washington letter published by the American 

 Geographical Society states that the boundary line between the 

 United Slates and Mexico has been resutveyed, and a series of 

 monuments erected along it at intervals for a distance of 700 

 miles. The field operations for the survey of the Alaskan 

 frontier aie also completed, and the height of Mount Logan has 

 been confirmed as 19,500 feet, thus overtopping Mount St. 

 Elias by 1500 feet. Another interesting result of the joint ex- 

 ploration is to show that both these mountains lie within British 

 territory. 



The Indian! Reservations of the United States in which the 



aboriginal inhabitants are secure against aggressive civilisation, 



j are fast diminishing in number and extent. The last number 



I of the Bulletin of the American Geographical Society men- 



I tions that four million acres of reserved land in the north-east 



I of Utah, containing great mineral wealth, and hitherto the 



home of the Uncompahgre and Uintah Indians, is about to be 



opened to settlement, while nearly a million acres in South 



Dakota are to be withdrawn from theexclusiveoccupancy of the 



Indians of South Dakota, Oregon, and Idaho. 



Consul C. S. Smith gives an account of the .\nglo-German 

 frontier survey in East Africa, in the November number of the 

 Geographical Journal. The survey, which was carried from 

 the mouth of the Umba River on the east coast to Kilimanjaro, 

 was effected in 1892, Mr. Smith being assisted by Mr. Imam 

 Sharif, the Indian surveyor, who subsequently accompanied .\Ir. 

 Bent to Arabia, and Lieut. G. E. Smith, R. E., and the German 

 party with uhcm they co-rperaled was under th- charge of Dr. 

 Peters. The route by the Umba Valley to Kilimanjaro was 

 found to be a practicable one, and the country traversed was, 

 as a rule, characterised by fertile soil ; but the land suffered 

 from the want of settled inhabitants, on account of the raids of 

 the Masai. Consul Smith suggests that immigrants from Indi.i 

 be encouraged to colonise parts of the Umba Valley ; and if 

 trade is ultimately attracted there, he points out that the seaport 

 of Wasin, although smaller than Mombasa, would be found 

 quite practicable for steameis. 



