1 ^o 



NA TURE 



[December 7, 189; 



such a laboratory has long been felt, and although good work 

 has been done in several asylums by enthusiastic workers, these 

 investigations have hitherto been carried out at a great disad- 

 vantage, chiefly owing to the want of assistance on the part of 

 the governing bodies. So great have been these difficulties that 

 in many asylums pathological science has been totally neglected. 

 The task of electing a pathologist will not be an easy one. It 

 is to be hoped the choice will falljon one who has made his 

 mark in all the various branches of neurological science ; for 

 the study of cerebral disease is so bound up with that of the 

 spinal cord and nerves, that a knowledge of cerebral pathology 

 -must prove useless if not combined with a thorough mastery of 

 the clinicd.1 phenomena of spinal and peripheral nervous 

 diseases, of their lesions, and of the methods of clinical and 

 experimental neurological investigation. 



As might have been expected, the anti-vivisectionists, headed 

 by the Lord Chief Justice of England, have memorialised the 

 Viceroy of India and the members of the Executive and 

 Legislative Councils. In this document the usual sentimental 

 arguments against vivisection are stated. If with reference to 

 the Indian Bill now under consideration for the regulation of 

 vivisection experiments, it should be deemed advisable to legis- 

 late on the subject, the signatories suggest (a) that the higher 

 animals, such as horses, asses,«mules, dogs, and cats, for which 

 special certificates are granted in England, and also monkeys, 

 should be wholly exempted from experimentation ; {b) that it 

 should be made essential to keep the animals under an anaes- 

 thetic throughout the investigation ; {c) ^that the use of curare 

 should be entirely prohibited ; {d) that :it should be provided 

 that one inspector at any rate shall be selected on account of his 

 recognised humanity, not his scientific knowledge. The execu- 

 tive committee of the Society for the Protection of Animals 

 from Vivisection have also recently transmitted to the Viceroy 

 and the members of the Executive Council a protest against the 

 establishment of a Pasteur Institute in India. They represent 

 that similar institutes in Paris and elsewhere have so far failed 

 to prevent deaths from the bites of dogs and other animals 

 alleged to be rabid, and that 256 persons have died in spite of 

 the preventive treatment invented by M. Pasteur. It is also 

 remarked that the Pasteur system involves and depends 

 upon the cultivation and perpetuation of the malady of rabies in 

 series after series of sentient animals, to their great misery and 

 suffering, but the benefits that mankind derives from it are 

 naturally ignored. 



During the week ending the 2nd inst. several depressions 

 passed across these islands, causing'gales on our northern coasts. 

 In the rear of these disturbances northerly winds set in, with a 

 great fall of temperature ; on the 1st and 2nd inst. the thermo- 

 meter fell to 20", or less, in nearly all parts. In Scotland the 

 lowest readings were between 12" and 15°. But by Sunday, the 

 3rd inst., the temperature rose rapidly in the north and west, 

 and subsequently the rise extended to the southern parts of the 

 country. 



The Meteorologische Zeitschrift for November contains a 

 paper on the frequency of halo phenomena, by G. Hellmann. 

 Few text-books have dealt with this subject, and those that 

 have done so state that lunar halos are most frequent, an error 

 which appears to date from the time of Aristotle. Certainly 

 the moon offers less opportunity for such phenomena. Prof. 

 Hellmann points out that only such observatories as record 

 hourly observations afford the necessary materials for giving a 

 satisfactory answer to the question. He has examined various 

 records, and especially those of the Upsala observatory, the 

 result being that the solar phenomena exceed the lunar by about 

 five to one, by far the most frequent halos being those of 22' 

 radius. The halos as well as mock-suns and mock-moons 

 show a distinct yearly period. The solar phenomena are most 



NO. 1258, VOL. 49] 



frequent from April to June, and the lunar phenomena are 

 most frequent in the winter half-year, being dependent on the 

 length of the nights. These results are supported by observa- 

 tions made in the United States, and also in Japan. 



The Pioneer Mail, of November 9, contains an article on the 

 past monsoon in India, based upon the official reports of rainfall 

 between June i and October 15. These reports show a 

 generally satisfactory state of affairs, about half the country 

 having had excessive, and half deficient rainfall ; some regions 

 which generally receive only moderate rain had an excessive 

 amount, while those which usually receive an excessive amount 

 had a relatively light fall. The causes which bring about this 

 half-yearly reversal of the winds are of especial interest, and 

 offer a large field for study. Among the generally accepted 

 theories, one attributes the origin of the rain-bearing current to 

 the intense heating of the plains of Upper India, while another 

 IS that the chances of a good monsoon vary inversely with the 

 amount of snow during the preceding winter. The writer 

 thinks that these theories have failed in the present instance, 

 while admitting that the distribution of heat and, under some 

 circumstances, the snowfall exercise an influence on the 

 monsoon. He sets up another theory, viz. that the monsoons 

 are caused by the heated air of Asia rising up and overflowing 

 at a great height to the southern hemisphere, where it settles 

 down and is impelled northward by its own energy and by 

 pressure in the rear. A reference to the " Memorandum on 

 the Snowfall, &c." issued by the Meteorological Reporter on 

 June I last, shows that the general forecast was to the effect 

 that the rainfall might be deficient to a moderate extent in 

 north-west India, and would very probably be at least normal 

 in other parts. If any modification of the accepted theories be 

 necessary, it will doubtless be shown by a study of the daily 

 charts of the Indian monsoon area, to which we recently alluded, 

 and the publication of which began with the present year. 

 One of the special objects in preparing these charts is to 

 elucidate the conditions which determine the advances, and 

 variations in strength of the monsoon currents 



Some interesting observations on the velocity at which crys- 

 tallisation proceeds in a super-cooled substance are communi- 

 cated by Mr. Moore to the current number of the Zeitschrift 

 fiir Physikalische Chemie. The method of experiment resembles 

 that originally used by Gernez. The substance is contained in a 

 carefully cleaned U-tube, made of thin glass,which is immersed in 

 a bath of liquid maintained at constant temperature, and which 

 during an observation is kept open at both ends. When crys- 

 tallisation sets in, in such a tube, the line of demarcation be- 

 tween solid and liquid can readily be followed by eye, and the 

 time can easily be noted which is taken by the crystallisation to 

 travel a definite distance down a limb of the U tube. Satis- 

 factory observations cannot be taken when the crystallisation is 

 rising in a limb of the tube, owing to the disturbing effects of 

 the thermal changes attending solidification. Experiments on 

 acetic acid showed that at any temperature the velocity is uni- 

 form, and is independent of the diameter of the tube, and obser- 

 vations on acetic acid, phenol, [and mixtures^of phenol with water 

 and with cresol, show that the velocity increases with the 

 amount of super-cooling, and at a diminishing rate. For 

 phenol it is -6 cm. per sec. with 4° -4 super-cooling, and 2-9 cm. 

 with 15^-8 super-cooling. The addition of water and of cresol 

 to phenol largely reduces both the velocity of crystallisation and 

 the rate at which it increases with the amount of super-cooling. 

 Several of the curves indicate a maximum velocity as the extent 

 of super-cooling increases. Attempts to observe this maximum 

 were rendered fruitless, however, by the spontaneous crystal- 

 lisation of the substances. 



Diurnal movements of the ground have been noticed at 

 Santiago for some years, and,have usually been attributed to the 



