550 



NATURE 



[October 8, 1903 



one is conveying nuclei into or making nuclei out of 

 different media." How it comes about that a perfectly 

 definite degree of supersaturation is required to cause 

 condensation on such nuclei, whether an electric field 

 is applied or not, and whether they have been pro- 

 duced by strong or weak radiation or by other means, 

 he does 'not attempt to explain. He brings forward in 

 support of his view the further consideration that, " if 

 a marked difference in efficiency of positive and nega- 

 tive ions is granted, then any ionised emanation 

 neutral as a whole, like that of phosphorus, should 

 produce two groups of nuclei. On condensation there 

 should be two groups of coronal particles inter- 

 penetrating and subsiding through each other in the 

 wav I have frequently instanced in other experiments. 

 No such effect has been . observed. " The answer to 

 this is simply that the nuclei causing the phosphorus 

 clouds are not free ions, like those produced by X-rays. 

 Prof. Barus concludes with a suggestion as to the 

 origin of atmospheric electricity, according to which 

 nuclei become negatively charged as the solution which 

 they contain becomes diluted by absorption of water. 

 C. T. R. Wilson. 



THE GEOLOGY OF AUSTRIA-HUNGARY. 



TO know, even in a general fashion, the provinces 

 of Austria-Hungary, with their immense range 

 of scenic types and their picturesque variety of nation- 

 alities, goes far in itself towards a liberal education. 

 The lover of landscape, as well as the geologist, will 

 find much of interest in the new " Fiihrer fiir die 

 geologischen Exkursionen in Oesterreich," issued in 

 connection with the ninth International Geological 

 Congress in Vienna. This bulky work is divided, like 

 that of the Russian congress, into numerous separate 

 brochures, but forms, none the less, a permanent work 

 of reference for our libraries. To obtain the guide 

 and other publications before they become scarce, a 

 subscription to the secretariat of the congress of 

 twenty-seven shillings or so every three years seems 

 not a heavy price to pay. 



In the Austrian guide we have the work of some 

 forty-five authors, describing in a compact and lucid 

 form the districts that they have made their own. 

 In this respect, though covering a far wider field, it 

 resembles that handbook of English geology, the 

 "Geological Excursions," issued by our Geologists' 

 Association. The names of the writers imply in them- 

 selves the spirit of a scientific congress. We do not 

 see the groups and cliques seated in the parliamentary 

 Chamber in Vienna, and threatening one another with 

 the literal outpouring of ink; but we find instead a 

 body devoted in common to the reception of the 

 stranger, and anxious that in each province he shall 

 find something memorable and distinctive. 



Dr. Jahn opens with the Older Palaeozoic area of 

 Bohemia, which includes the Moldau sections above 

 Prag and the ravine at Karlstein, one of the noblest 

 scenes of mediaeval Europe. Prof. A. Hofmann de- 

 scribes the silver-mines of Pribram, and Prof. Slavi'k 

 and others deal with the Cretaceous of northern 

 Bohemia. _ In this latter paper it is pleasant to note 

 the insertion of the euphonious Tchech names of 

 villages after the German forms, a practice already to 

 some extent imitated in Ireland. August Rosiwal 

 conducts us through the more severely German district 

 of Karlsbad and other health-resorts upon the frontier. 

 Prof. Suess's important theory of the distinction 

 between nascent and " vadose "" waters appearing at 

 the earth's surface is duly referred to. If this series 

 of papers leads to a better appreciation of the rural 

 districts of Bohemia, the writers will have done good 

 service. Few visitors have seen what lies upon the 

 NO. 1 77 I, VOL. 68] 



plateau and outside the towns — the hamlets with 

 bulbous church-towers, set of necessity beside the 

 lakes, which gather in the hollows of the granite ; 

 the broad undulations of a purely agricultural land- 

 scape, broken here and there by some magnificent 

 group of castle-towers ; the crumpled rim of the 

 country on the south-west, where one plunges down 

 through the forest to Bavaria; or the sheer phonolite 

 necks of the north, rising like islands above a haze 

 formed by the smoke of Cainozoic coal. Here, how- 

 ever, we reach the holiday-region of the Elbe, known 

 to dwellers in Dresden, and pleasantly described and 

 illustrated by J. E. Hibsch in a brochure of seventy 

 pages. 



Another important series of papers deals with 

 Galicia, the Miocene salt-beds of Wieliczka being, of 

 course, included. Less visited are the petroleum-beds 

 of Borysiaw, now one of the active fields of enter- 

 prise, where the folding of the Miocene strata assigns 

 a maximum age to the uplift of the Karpathians. 

 Oberbergrat Johann Holobek connects the various 

 deposits of hydrocarbons with the extreme Assuring of 

 the sandstones along the region of overfolding. 

 Nearer the great chain, Oligocene menilite-shales are 

 brought up over the Miocene on the south-west limb 

 of the synclinal, and the oil, though flowing in fissures, 

 appears generally accumulated in the bend. 



What novelty lies before those who visit Drohobycz, 

 Zaleszczyki, Kasperowce, and Worochta, following 

 Drs. Grzybowski and Szajnocha, can only be known 

 to those who have had glimpses of remote Galicia. 

 Not the least interesting feature of Austrian Poland 

 is the view of the drift-covered Russian plateau 

 across the frontier, and the ever-present sensation of 

 that mysterious and arbitrary cordon, along which the 

 white-capped cavalry ride night and day and keep the 

 verge of Europe. 



From a geological point of view, the country of the 

 famous limestone Klippen is of the first importance. 

 Similar tectonic problems arise wherever beds of vary- 

 ing powers of resistance become crushed together. 

 In a neat section V. Uhlig shows the relation of the 

 northern " Klippenzone " to the overfolds and thrusts 

 on the flank of the Tatra range. The fertile basin of 

 Lipto is included on the south of the granite mass, 

 and one can picture again the streams leaping into 

 it from the forest-slopes of the Karpathians, and the 

 grey crags towering up beyond, and the descent north- 

 ward on the rain-swept levels of the Magura. This 

 last region of little disturbed Eocene and Oligocene 

 strata leads on to the highly faulted and upturned 

 "Klippenzone." North of this the Older Cainozoic 

 is strongly folded, whence Herr Uhlig concludes that 

 the massive Klippen protected the corresponding beds 

 on their south flank from the pre-Miocene earth- 

 pressures. These same pressures had, however, con- 

 siderable effect among the Klippen themselves, and 

 have so far squeezed the masses of various ages 

 together as to tend to obliterate unconformities. The 

 author, however, urges that the band of Klippen re- 

 presents a series of true islands of Jurassic strata in 

 an Upper Cretaceous and Eocene sea, the deposits of 

 which at one time practically overwhelmed them. 

 They are thus not detached fault-blocks without roots, 

 although the pre-Miocene movements have influenced 

 their present prominence and position. Fig. 14 shows 

 the bold character of the resulting scenery. The 

 memoir then describes the structure of the Tatra 

 chain, with a series of sections which will be welcomed 

 by all who aspire to look further than the classic ex- 

 ample of the Alps. 



Perhaps one regretfully swings back to Salzburg 

 and the Salzkammergut, though the detailed paper 

 by E. Kittl on the stratigraphy of the latter area is 

 accompanied by an admirable bibliography and a map 



