July 2, 1903J 



NATURE 



215 



following order of succession prevailed in the Lower Carbon- 

 iferous rocks of that region : — (i) at the base, the Whita 

 Sandstone resting on the Birrenswark volcanic platform ; 

 (2) the cement stone group ; (3) the Fell Sandstones ; (4) 

 the Glencartholm volcanic group with Scorpion Bed ; (5) 

 a group of marine limestones, sandstones, and shales, with 

 coal seams on two horizons — a lower, the Lawston Linn 

 and Muirburn coals (Scremerston position), and an upper, 

 the Kilnholm coals (Lickar position). The Upper Carbon- 

 iferous Rocks of that region, embracing the Canonbie 

 Coalfield, have been referred by Mr. Kidston to the Lower, 

 Middle, and Upper Coal-measures, in virtue of the evidence 

 obtained from the plants. The bores sunk in recent years 

 near Rowanburn prove that the Rowanburn coals (Lower 

 Coal-measures) overlie the marine limestone group with 

 the Kilnholm (Lickar) coals ; and that, further, the Red 

 Sandstones and shales referred by Mr. Kidston to the 

 Upper Coal-measures pass downwards into a series of thin 

 coals which may be the upper part of the Byreburn series. 

 Ai> important economic question arises as to the extension 

 of this coalfield, for it appears that there is good ground 

 for the belief that the sandstones and shales of the Upper 

 Coal-measure age overlie the Middle and Lower Coal- 

 measures. In conclusion, it was shown by means of vertical 

 sections that the Carboniferous succession in Eskdale and 

 Liddesdale resembles more closely that of Northumberland 

 than that of central Scotland. — As an important supple- 

 ment to the foregoing, Mr. Kidston communicated lists 

 of the fossil plants of the Calciferous Sandstone series of 

 Dunfermline, of the Carboniferous Limestone of Eskdale, 

 of the Lower Coal-measures of Canonbie, of the Middle 

 Coal-measures of Byreburn, and of the Upper Coal- 

 measures of Jockie's Syke, Cumberland, which borders on 

 Dumfriesshire. Tables showing the horizontal distribu- 

 tion of the species were given, and some new and interest- 

 ing species described, among these a new species of 

 Pinakodendron (P. Macconochiei) being the first record of 

 the genus in Britain. — A paper by Prof. Evwart on the wild 

 horse will be printed in full in these columns. 



Dublin. 

 Royal Dublin Society, May 19.— Prof. W. F. Barrett, 

 F.R.S., in the chair. — Prof. T. Johnson gave an illus- 

 trated account of a tylose which he had found in a tracheide 

 in the xylem of the rhizome of a bracken fern (Pteris 

 aquilina, L.). He suggested that the disturbance in the 

 transpiration current resulting from cutting the bracken 

 might produce tyloses in the underground stem. — Mr. 

 Richard J. Moss read a paper on an Irish specimen of 

 dopplerite. This interesting substance does not seem to 

 have been previously recorded as occurring in the United 

 Kingdom, though it would appear from a reference to a 

 peculiar form of peat in a report issued by the Commission 

 on Bogs in Ireland in 181 1 that the substance named 

 dopplerite by Haidinger in 1849 had previously been 

 observed in Ireland. The dopplerite recently found in a 

 peat bog in the county of Antrim was in the form of an 

 elastic jelly, velvety-black in colour, and drying to a solid 

 of jet-like appearance, with a bright conchoidal fracture. 

 In chemical composition it differs little from the peat in 

 which it was found. It is shown that mineral matter, 

 chiefly iron oxide and lime, which constitutes 5 per cent, 

 of the dry substance, may be removed by steeping the jelly 

 in hydrochloric acid without altering the consistence or 

 appearance of the substance. The original jelly is acid to 

 litmus, and liberates carbon dioxide from calcium car- 

 bonate. Assuming that it consists chiefly of monobasic 

 humic acid with a molecular weight of 350, the gas liber- 

 ated corresponds to 73 per cent, of humic acid in the dry 

 substance. The peat in which the dopplerite was found 

 liberates carbon dioxide corresponding to 60 per cent, of 

 the dry substance. — Prof. VV. F. Barrett exhibited and 

 described Ililger's direct-reading wave-length spectroscope. 

 —Prof. E. J. McWeeney gave a description of Streptothrix 

 nigra, an organism occurring in soil, and producing a 

 bright brown pigmentation of the nutrient medium. 



Royal Irish Academy, May 25.— Prof. R. Atkinson, presi- 

 dent, in the chair. — Reports were presented by Dr. R. F. 

 Scharfr, R. L. PrAogor, Prof. G. A. J. Cole, Prof. D. J. 

 Cunning-ham, F.R.S., G. CofTey and others on the re- 

 NO. 1757. VOL. 681 



suits obtained during their exploration of the Kesh Caves, 

 Co. Sligo. The reports detailed the results obtained from 

 an exploration of the deposits of clay, rock-fragments, and 

 stalagmite found in the caves situated on the slopes of 

 Keishcorran Mountain in Co. Sligo. Several weeks were 

 spent by the committee in excavating these caves in 1901. 

 The zoological results possess many points of interest. The 

 brown bear was found to have inhabited these caves in 

 great numbers in former times ; in Ireland remains of this 

 animal have hitherto been found only very locally. The 

 other animals found in the caves which are now extinct 

 in the country in either a wild or domesticated state were 

 the reindeer, wolf, and Arctic lemming, the last of which 

 is an addition to the Irish fossil fauna. Man was chiefly a 

 late inhabitant of the caves, a single polished axe being the 

 only Neolithic object found. Several implements of cran- 

 nog type were found, and abundance of charcoal. 



June 8. — Prof. R. Atkinson, president, in the chair. — 

 The intrusive gneiss of Tirerrill and Drumahair, by Prof. 

 Grenville A. J. Cole. The northern end of the gneissic 

 axis of the Ox Mountains consists of an intrusive granite, 

 which contains blocks of amphibolite, derived from an 

 earlier series. The banded phenomena presented by it are 

 connected with its flow, and the contrasts of mineral con- 

 stitution in the bands are connected with the abundance of 

 basic inclusions, which have become streaked out in the 

 fluidal mass. Though brought into their present promin- 

 ence by Caledonian and Hercynian movements, the crystal- 

 line rocks of the chain may still be of Archaean age, as 

 originally suggested by Prof. Hull. 



P.^RIS. 



Academy of Sciences, June 22.— M. Albert Gaudry in 

 the chair. — Two fluid batteries ; electromotive force, con- 

 densations, transformations of energy at the electrodes, by 

 M. Berthelot. — On the structure and history of the lunar 

 crust. Observations suggested by the seventh number of 

 the photographic atlas of the moon, by MM. LoeiMy and 

 P. Puiseux. This volume contains photographs which 

 show clearly the frequent distribution of the eruptive orifices 

 along the lines of cleavage. From the mode of diffusion 

 of the scoriae there would appear to have been, at a remote 

 period, an atmosphere, and from the state of these deposits 

 it is clear that there can be no running water on the 

 surface. — On the loss, in time of drought, of a spring fed 

 by infiltration of a sheet of water, by M. J. Boussinesq. 

 —On a property of the o-rays of radium, by M. Henri 

 Bocquerel. If the o-rays, placed in a field of magnetic 

 intensity H, have a real or fictitious mass m, carrying an 

 electric charge e, they ought to describe a circular 

 trajectory of radius R, with a velocity v, and the relation 

 RH=vm/c ought to hold between these quantities. From 

 this RH ought to be a fixed quantity for the a-rays, but 

 this is not the case, since Prof. Rutherford has given 

 RH =3-9x10*, and in the experiments now described values 

 of RH, varying continuously between 2-91x10' and 

 3-41 X 10', have been obtained. From this it follows that 

 in a uniform magnetic field the radius of curvature of the 

 trajectory of the o-rays deviated by the field increases with 

 the length of the trajectory, and this may be attributed to 

 the presence of air. — The preparation of carbides and 

 acetylene acetylides by the action of acetylene gas upon 

 the hydrides of the alkalis and the alkaline earths, by 

 M. Henri Moissan. At a temperature of 100° C. the 

 hydrides of the alkalis and the alkaline earths react with 

 acetylene, liberating hydrogen and giving compounds of 

 the type C^K^.C^H, and CXa.C,H„. These compounds, 

 heated in a vacuum, dissociate readily into acetylene and 

 the corresponding carbide, and hence form a new method 

 for the preparation of the carbides at a low temperature. 

 Neither methane nor ethylene react at 100° C. with these 

 hydrides. — The influence of the solvent on the rotatory 

 power of certain molecules, by MM. A. Haller and 

 J. Mingruin. Details are given of experiments on several 

 camphor derivatives. In solution in benzene and its homo- 

 logues, which are non-ionising liquids, the rotatory power 

 of cyano-camphor was found to be nearly zero, whilst in 

 other solvents, especially in alkaline liquids, which are 

 strongly ionising, the rotatory power was very high. 

 Other camphor derivatives showed similar results, although 

 the differences were less marked. — The differences between 



