June 



890] 



NA TURE 



•59 



The Science and Art Department announces that it will 

 make grants for the encouragement of instruction in drawing 

 and of iranual training in classes connected with elementary 

 schools and in organized science schools. The instruction 

 must be (a) in the use of the ordinary tools used in handicrafts 

 in wood or iron ; (b) given out of school hours in a properly 

 fitted workshop ; and [c] connected with the instruction in 

 drawing— that is to say, the work must be from drawings to 

 scale previously made by the students. The instruction may be 

 given by one of the regular teachers of the school if he is suffi- 

 ciently qualified ; if not, he must be assisted by a skilled artisan. 

 The work of the class will be examined by the local inspector 

 of the Department, accompanied, if necessary, by an artisan 

 expert, on the occasion of his visit to examine in drawing. If 

 it appears that the school is properly provided with plant for 

 instruction, and that the teaching is fairly good, a grant of 6s., 

 or, if excellent, of 1$., will be made for every scholar instructed, 

 provided (a) that he has passed the fourth standard ; (0) that he 

 has received manual instruction for at least two hours a week for 

 twenty-two weeks during the school year ; (c) that a special 

 register of attendance is kept ; and {d) that each scholar on 

 whom payment is claimed is a scholar of the day school and has 

 attended with reasonable regularity. The grant may be reduced 

 or wholly withheld at the discretion of the Department, if it 

 appears that the plant is insufficient or that the instruction is not 

 good. 



Australian educational legislators appear to be reconsidering 

 the policy of the payment by results system, and in some in- 

 stances, at least, to have come to the conclusion that it must be 

 abolished. The Minister of Education in Victoria is said to 

 have a measure drafted with the object of substituting fixed 

 salaries for school teachers for the system of payment by results. 



At the annual general meeting of corporate members of the 

 Institution of Civil Engineers, on June 3, it was pointed out in 

 the Report that the meeting was held on the sixty-second 

 anniversary of the incorporation of the Institution by Royal 

 charter. At that time the number of members was 156, and the 

 gross annual receipts were ^447. At the close of the past 

 financial year the number of members was 5872, and the gross 

 receipts for the twelve months amounted to ^'22,478. This 

 increase — thirty-seven- fold in numbers and fifty-fold in revenue 

 — sufficiently indicated the position which the Institution had 

 taken in connection with the profession it was designed to 

 promote. At the same time the members were reminded that 

 a large rate of increase was by no means desirable. 



At the beginning of May it was found at Howietoun that the 

 supply of water from Loch Coulter had been interfered with on 

 ten successive nights. On an examination being made each 

 morning, a number of eels were discovered in the sluice, where 

 the water is 10 feet deep. Thirty altogether were obtained, all 

 of them proving to be females. One of these, 32 inches "in 

 length, and weighing about 2 pounds, was examined. The 

 ovary, which was about 12 inches long in situ, and about 30 

 inches long when unravelled, was calculated to contain 10,077,000 

 eggs in various stages of development, some, 0*25 mm. in dia- 

 meter, being nearly ripe. There is little doubt that these eels 

 formed part of a band migrating to the sea (the smaller speci- 

 mens escaping and the larger being caught) ; and judging from 

 the condition of the ovary, it would appear that they were 

 impelled by the instinct of reproduction. 



The Medical Section of the French Association for the Ad- 

 vancement of Science proposes to discuss thoroughly, at the 

 approaching meeting at Limoges, the various questions relating 

 to influenza. 



The visit of the Iron and Steel Institute to the United States 

 in the autumn is likely to be in every way most successful. 

 NO. 1076, VOL. 42] 



There will be three different sets of meetings — the meetings of 

 the American Institute of Mining Engineers, which take place in 

 New York on September 29 and 30 ; the meetings of the Iron 

 and Steel Institute, which take place in the same city on Octo- 

 ber I, 2, and 3 ; and the international meeting promoted jointly 

 by those two Societies, which will take place about the middle 

 of October at Pittsburg. The excursions which have been 

 planned by the American Reception Committee, of which Mr. 

 Andrew Carnegie is chairman, provide for about 3000 miles of 

 free transportation through the United States. The principal 

 excursions will take place to the iron ore and copper regions 

 of Lake Superior, to Philadelphia, Harrisburg, and Chicago, 

 where there are large iron and steel engineering works to be in- 

 spected, and to the new iron- making district of Alabama. 

 About 300 members of the Iron and Steel Institute and 100 

 German ironmasters have intimated their intention of taking 

 part in the meetings ; and already many have booked passages 

 in the Hamburg-American Company's steamer Normannia, 

 leaving Southampton on September 12. The meetings and 

 excursions will last altogether over a month, and will practically 

 embrace every point of interest in the United Slates within a 

 distance of 1500 miles of New York. Papers have been pro- 

 mised for the meetings by Sir Lowthian Bell, Sir Nathaniel 

 Barnaby, Sir Henry Roscoe, and others. Among those who 

 have intimated their intention of being present at the meetings 

 are Sir James Kitson (President of the Institute), Lord Edward 

 Cavendish, Sir John AUeyne, Sir James Bain, Mr. llingley, 

 M.P. (President of the Iron Trade Association), Mr. Theodore 

 Fry, M.P., Sir J. J. Jenkins, Sir Thomas Story, Mr. Windsor 

 Richards, Mr. Snelus, F.R.S., and Mr. Edward P. Martin. 



In the House of Commons, on Monday, Mr. Norris and Sir 

 Henry Roscoe put questions to Mr. Chaplin with regard to the 

 change made by him in *' the muzzling order." Mr. Chaplin 

 explained that the collar had been substituted for the muzzle 

 only in those districts in which rabies had, it was believed, 

 cea'ed to exist. The number of cases of rabies during last year 

 was 340. ' The muzzling order had never at any time been ex- 

 tended to the whole kingdom, and there were no statistics to 

 show what the effect of the order would be if it were made 

 universal. From the progress made already, he anticipated 

 that rabies might be effectually dealt with without any necessity 

 for so stringent a measure. 



In January of the present year two samples of compressed cr 

 tablet tea were presented to the Museum of the Royal Garden?, 

 Kew, by Colonel Alexander Moncrieff. In the new number of the 

 Knv Bulletin the letter with which these samples were accom- 

 panied is printed ; and much interesting information as to the 

 making of compressed tea is brought together. Repeated 

 attempts have been made to introduce compressed tea into this 

 country, but never with complete success. "A few years ago," 

 says the Kctu Bulletin, "two companies were formed for working 

 it, and at the present time there is a company in London which 

 deals exchisively in this article, a sample of whch is in the Kew 

 Museums. It is claimed for this tea that it has many advantages 

 over loose tea, the chief of which is that the leaves being sub- 

 mitted to heavy hydraulic pressure all the cells are broken, and 

 the constituents of the leaf more easily extracted by the boiling 

 water, thus effecting a considerable saving in the quantity re- 

 quired for use. Its great advantages over loose tea, however, 

 would seem to be its more portable character, and in the case o' 

 long sea voyages, or for use in expeditions, the reduction of its 

 bulk to cne-third. The compression of tea into blocks further, 

 it is said, constitutes a real and important improvement in the 

 treatment of tea. These blocks weigh a quarter of a pound 

 each, and are subdivided into ounces, half ounces, and quarter 

 ounces ; this insures exactitude in measuring, and saves the 

 trouble, waste, and uncertainty of measuring by spoonfuls. It 



