July i6, 1903] 



NATURE 



253 



Institute of Preventive Medicine, though it is only fair to 

 Lord Lister to say that this name was chosen by his 

 colleagues against his own strong personal wish. 



At a meeting of the Wilts County Council last week, it 

 was decided not to take over the powers and duties of the 

 Amesbury Rural District Council in regard to the alleged 

 rights of way to Stonehenge. Steps are being taken to 

 ensure that the question of right of way shall be brought 

 before a legal tribunal for decision, as the negotiations 

 between the Government and the landowner for the purchase 

 of Stonehenge have come to an end. 



The Times correspondent at Cape Town reports that on 

 July 9 a slight earthquake was felt there at 11.37 a-m., 

 followed by a second shock at 12.6 a.m., the latter being 

 the heaviest known at Cape Town for twenty years. No 

 damage was caused. 



It is proposed to hold an International Exhibition at 

 Manchester in 1905. At a meeting recently held in that 

 city, a committee was appointed to take such steps as they 

 consider necessary to ascertain the views of those likely 

 to be interested in such a project. 



In reply to a question asked in the House of Commons 

 on July 8, Mr. Balfour stated that the King had expressed 

 the wish that the Celtic gold ornaments declared by the 

 judgment in the Court of Chancery to be treasure trove, and 

 therefore the property of the Crown, should be presented as 

 a free gift to the treasurer of the Irish Academy. The 

 ornaments will therefore be taken from the British Museum 

 and sent to Ireland. 



The whaler Terra Nova has been bought by the Admiralty 

 to be sent to the relief of the Discovery in the Antarctic. 

 The Terra Nova left St. John's for the Tay on July 9, and 

 is to be fitted out, by instructions of the Admiralty, by the 

 Dundee Shipbuilders' Company, who constructed the 

 Discovery. 



A Paris correspondent writes :— Last week a visit was 

 paid to the Moisson Aerodrome by the scientific committee 

 of the Aero Club, when the Lebaudy balloon made a 

 successful performance, controlled by M. Juchmfes and two 

 assistants. During about twenty minutes the balloon 

 travelled at an altitude of about 300 metres, and travelled in 

 different directions for about a kilometre, in spite of a 

 wind blowing at a measured rate of 6 to 7 metres in a 

 second. The influence of the motion of the air was per- 

 ceptible only by a great diminution of this velocity and 

 large vibrations testifying to the effort exerted. 



Among the subjects of resolutions adopted in general 

 conference of the International Fire Prevention Congress, 

 held in London last week, the following are of interest :— 

 that in all reports dealing with questions of fire-resistance 

 and tests, the metric system of measurement, weight, and 

 temperature shall be adopted, as well as any local system ; 

 that there should be established testing stations for fire- 

 resisting materials, and a universally recognised method 

 of testing adopted; that courses of study should be pro- 

 vided in universities, technical colleges and schools, for the 

 instruction of engineering and architectural students in the 

 fire-resistance of building materials and the methods of 

 construction as based on investigation ; that having regard 

 to the neglect of precautions against damage caused by 

 lightning, the subject should have the serious consideration 

 of the Government and local authorities, the technical pro- 

 fessions, and the fire service. 



Mr. H. C. Richmond, of Southport, appreciating the 

 highly interesting work of Jeremiah Horrox, is endeavour- 

 ing to have erected to his memory some suitable memorial 

 NO. 1759. VOL. 68] 



in Southport. Doubtless Mr. Richmond feels that the 

 forthcoming meeting of the British Association in that 

 town will awaken some scientific interest, and make easier 

 the task to which he has applied himself. We can wish 

 him all success in his praiseworthy effort to keep alive the 

 memory of one whose genius has been the admiration of 

 successive generations, and whose early death lent a 

 pathetic interest to his work. Already a suitable tablet to 

 the memory of Horrox exists in the Church of S. Michael 

 in Liverpool, a window and memorial chapel commemorate 

 his scientific zeal in the church at Hoole, and on the walls 

 of Westminster Abbey there is other acknowledgment. Is 

 another tablet precisely the form which the memorial should 

 take? It would be just as fitting, and productive of more 

 lasting benefit to the community, to found a Horrox 

 scholarship for astronomy in the new University of Liver- 

 pool. 



Dr. E. C. Hovey gives reasons in Science why the now 

 celebrated volcano on the island of Martinique should be 

 called by the French name Mont Pel6, and not the Angli- 

 cised Mount Pelee, in which there is little suggestion of 

 the true pronunciation of the name. 



Mr. W.4LTER Rosenhain has sent a reprint of a paper 

 read before the Optical Society of London on June 15, on 

 some properties of glass. It deals with the crystallisation 

 of glass due to heating, the effect of light on the colour 

 of glass, the chemical instability of many of the most 

 desirable optical glasses, and the thermal properties of 

 glass, with especial reference to production of internal 

 strains. 



M. F. Worms de Romilly, whose funeral took place on 

 May 3. has bequeathed to the French Physical Society a 

 sum of 150,000 francs, together with his library and the 

 whole of his apparatus. His telescope, the silvered glass 

 mirror of which was made by L6on Foucault, is either 

 to remain the property of the society or to be given to the 

 National Observatory. 



The electrophorus is such a convenient apparatus for 

 producing electricity for class experiments that the un- 

 satisfactory explanations of. its action given in many text- 

 books are to be regretted. Dr. Otto Geschoser, in the 

 Beitrage of the Oels Gymnasium, describes simple experi- 

 ments tending to show that the action of the electrophorus is 

 to be attributed to " electromotive force of contact " between 

 the resin disc and the metal plate, and that, so far from 

 these acting as the plates of a condenser, the efficiency of 

 the apparatus depends on the perfection of the contact 

 between them. A modified form of electrophorus, in which 

 the contact is rtiade between silvered glass as a dielectric 

 and copper as a conductor, is described. 



The Bulletin. of the French Physical Society announces 

 the opening of the new Laboratoire d'Essais du Con- 

 servatoire des Arts et Metiers. This laboratory has been 

 founded with the assistance of considerable endowments 

 from the Chamber of Commerce, for the purpose of under- 

 taking measurements and determinations for commercial 

 purposes. It consists of five sections, namely, physics, 

 metals, building materials, machines, and vegetable pro- 

 ducts. M. Perot is director of the laboratory, and M. 

 Raveau head of the physical department. Among other 

 objects of the laboratory may be mentioned the testing of 

 thermometers, and the standardisation of weights and 

 measures where great precision is not required. 



In the Proceedings of the Royal Philosophical Society of 

 Glasgow, Mr. R. F. Muirhfead discusses a generalisation 

 of Lord Kelvin's statement of the formula for direct refrac- 



