540 



NA TURE 



[April 5, 1^94 



sterilisation of sewage, I am of opinion that the process, so far 

 as the late trials have gone, has therefore failed to produce the 

 icyults which are claimed for it by its inventor." This is the 

 firs*; time M. Hermite's system has been publicly tested in 

 England. I 



Dk. H. R. Mill and Mr. E. Heawood have made a careful | 

 bathyniftrical survey of Haweswater, thus completing the \ 

 foundings necessary for the construction of contoured maps of ] 

 all the larger lake-basins in England. The greatest depth j 

 found was 103 feet, rather less than one-third of the depth ' 

 which local tradition assigned to the lake. Haweswater presents 

 an interesting example of a long narrow lake which has been 

 nearly separated into two sheets of water by the large delta of a 

 mountain torrent, illustrating a stage in the history of such 

 severed lakes as Buttermere and Crummock, or Derwentwater 

 and Bassenthwaite. The temperature of the mass of water 

 in the lake was, on March 26, 39° 7 F, with a surface 

 temperature of4i"5 in the deep, and 43° in the shallow parts 

 of the lake. 



We have received from the Diutsche Seewarte, part vi. of 

 Deutsche tiebeiseeische meteorologische Beobachtimgen, containing 

 observations made at six places in Labrador,one at Walfisch Bay, 

 one at Apia (Samoa), four on the east coast of Africa, and one 

 at Chemulpo (Corea). The stations in Labrador were first 

 established in 1882, and furnished a very important addition to 

 the international polar observations made in that year, as they 

 formed a link between the stations in Canada and West Green- 

 land. The establishment of the other stations is mostly due to 

 the efforts made by Germany to extend her colonial possessions, 

 and to the praiseworthy desire of having scientific observations 

 made wherever her countrymen gain a footing. The result is 

 the publication of a valuable series of observations in remote 

 places, made with good instruments, and upon a uniform plan. 

 The readings are made three times daily, while the state of the 

 weather, &c. is represented by international symbols. We 

 think it would add to the value of the work if each part con- 

 tained the key to these symbols, as they are probably unknown 

 to many persons into whose hands the volumes fall. 



L\ the last Report of the Meteorological Society of Scotland 

 i: was stated that an inquiry had been completed into the 

 diurnal variation of the barometer on Ben Nevis during the 

 days of clear weather on the one hand, and days of fog or mist 

 on the other. The results gave two sets of curves essentially 

 different from each other ; and as these suggested important 

 applications to other meteorological inquiries, it was resolved to 

 submit the barometric observations at the Fort-William Observ- 

 atory to a similar discussion. The same days were selected 

 that were used in the discussion for the top of Ben Nevis. 

 At the general meeting of the Society on March 29, the 

 Council reported that the discussion has been completed, 

 with the highly important result that, just as happens at the top, 

 the hourly diurnal curves for clear and foggy weather re- 

 spectively are essentially different from each other. The result, 

 broadly stated, is that for clear weather, the diurnal curves are 

 strongly pronounced forms of the curves for dry continental 

 climates about the latitude of Fort-William ; and those for 

 foggy or misty days strongly pronounced forms of the curves for 

 wet climates on the coasts In similar latitudes. Further, the 

 combination of these curves for widely different types of 

 weather is identical with the curves calculated from all the 

 observations. This resolution of the Fort-William diurnal 

 barometric curve is new to the science and is of the highest 

 importance. 



Mk. a. F. Miller has made a spectroscopic examination of 

 the light emitted by the small luminous beetle, Photinia 

 NO. I 275, VOL. 49] 



corruscus {Transactions of the Astronomical and Physical 

 Society of Toronto). The light emitted appears to be of two 

 different kinds. From the lower part of the insect's abdomen 

 a glow of a pile greenish tint, like that of phosphorus or a 

 phosphorescent substance, was pretty constantly visible. This 

 light gave a faint spectrum consisting of a wide green band 

 situated between K 5160 and A. 5805 approximately. The 

 second kind of light was emitted in flashes lasting generally 

 about a quarter of a second, though sometimes the insect 

 emitted several in quick succession. The source of this light is 

 in the same region of the abdomen, but the luminous intensity 

 is much greater than in the former case. The flash has a pale 

 green colour, and its spectrum is perfectly continuous through 

 the region it occupies, that is, from about A 5000 to about A 

 6605. The specimens examined did not seem to give any 

 emission of blue or violet light, though there might have been 

 faint radiations in this region imperceptible to the eye through 

 the sudden character of the flash, and the overpowering prepon- 

 derance of the less refrangible waves. It would be of interest 

 to test the action of both kinds of luminosity upon a photo- 

 graphic plate. Mr. Miller's observations go to show that the 

 whole energy devoted by the insects to light-production is 

 expended in originating those rays which powerfully affect the 

 visual organs. They thus support the conclusion of Prof. S. P. 

 Langley, that nature produces the most economic kind of 

 light. 



At a recent meeting of the Academic des Sciences (Paris) 

 M. Lippmann presented a paper by M. N. Piltchikofif, on a 

 new method of studying the electric discharge. This method 

 consists in joining one pole of a Voss electric machine to a 

 metallic point which is held over a layer of castor oil contained 

 in a copper dish, connected to the other pole of [the machine. 

 If the point is positively charged a large depression is formed, 

 at the centre of which a secondary depression is seen if the 

 distance between the point and the oil is diminished. Ifa 

 small screen is placed between the point and the oil, an eleva- 

 tion is produced at the centre of the depression ; the shape of 

 this elevation being the same as that of the shadow that would 

 be formed if the electrified point were luminous. The level 

 inside thisshadow is the same as that of the unaffected liquid, so 

 that it appears that the screen stops the action and produced an 

 electric shadow. This curious effect is shown in a very striking 

 manner by the employment of mica screens cut into various 

 geometrical forms ; in every case the " shadow " formed on the 

 depression was an exact reproduction of the screen. One can- 

 not help being struck with the resemblance of the above experi- 

 ment to some of those of Prof. Crookes. The same pheno- 

 mena are produced with the negative discharge. The discharge 

 acts in a very powerful manner, and the phenomena show 

 themselves even when a strong blast of air is caused to play 

 between the point and the oil. Using different gases the author 

 finds that at the ordinary atmospheric pressure the electric 

 shadows are in all cases the same ; the only differences obtained 

 were in the secondary depressions which appear when the electri- 

 fied point is very near the surface of the oil. With very low 

 pressures, however, the shadows are not formed. The author 

 has succeeded in photographing the depressions and the 

 shadows, and has obtained sharp and well-defined negatives 

 with an exposure of about twenty seconds, showing that, at any 

 rate for this length of time, the phenomenon does not change 

 appreciably. 



The current number of the Istituto d'lgiene speriinentau 

 di Roma contains an exhaustive and very important memoir 

 *' Sul veleno del Tetano," by Dr. Fermi and Dr. Pernossi. It 

 covers close upon sixty pages, and records numerous experi- 

 ments on the behaviour of the toxic soluble products of tetanus 



