450 



NA TURE 



[March 8, 1900 



The Paris correspondent of the Times announces the death, 

 at the age of seventy-four, of M. Emmanuel Liais, Mayor of 

 Cherbourg. For many years he held posts at the Paris 

 Observatory, and he was sent in 1857 to South America to 

 observe the solar eclipse. He organised telegraphic meteor- 

 ology in France, and devised the use of chronographs in 

 determining longitude by electricity. He also devised a system 

 of automatic magnetic registration by photography, and applied 

 the method of the polarisation of light to the investigation of 

 the solar corona. He bequeaths his property to the munici- 

 pality of Cherbourg in trust for scientific purposes. 



The death of the distinguished geologist. Dr. Hans Brupo 

 Geinitz, is announced in the Geological Magazine for March. 

 Born on October 16, 1814, at Altenburg, in Saxony, he was 

 educated at the Universities of Berlin and Jena, and gained the 

 foundations of his geological knowledge under Quenstedt. In 

 1850 he became Professor of Mineralogy and Geology in the 

 University of Dresden. He was elected a Foreign Member of 

 the Geological Society of London in 1857, and received the 

 Murchison Medal in 1878. His labours were devoted mainly 

 to the geology and palaeontology of the Palceozoic and 

 Cretaceous rocks of Saxony, and in particular to the fauna and 

 flora of the Dyas or Permian formation. He died a. Dresden, 

 on January 28, aged eighty-five. 



A RATHER severe earthquake was felt throughout the greater 

 part of Venetia on March 4, at about 5 p.m. (G.M.T.), strong 

 enough to produce a stampede from the churches in Padua, 

 Venice and Verona, but not causing much damage to buildings, 

 and, so far as known, unaccompanied by loss of life. The 

 epicentre of the earthquake appears to have been not far from 

 Monte Baldo, near Verona. This is a well-known seismic 

 district, the earthquakes of which, and especially that of June 7, 

 1891, have been discussed in a valuable memoir by Dr. M. 

 Baratta, published in the Annali of the Central Office of 

 Meteorology and Geodynamics of Rome. 



The last letters received from Mr. J. E. S. Moore's expedi- 

 tion are dated from Ujiji, on Lake Tanganyika, on November 12, 

 1899. The other members of the party had proceeded to the 

 north end of the lake, where Mr. Moore was proposing to join 

 them so soon as the necessary number of porters had been 

 assembled. The expedition had been fairly successful both in 

 collecting zoological specimens from the lake and in studying 

 the geological features of the surrounding district. They had 

 obtained numerous living specimens of the curious forms of 

 mollusca of the lake, besides a good series of fishes and 

 crustaceans. The celebrated jelly-fish {Liimiocvida tanganjicae) 

 had been met with in great numbers. Mr. Moore had escaped 

 fever altogether, but most of the other members of the party 

 had had a touch of it. 



The pair of Grevy's zebras presented to the Queen by the 

 Emperor Menelek, and placed by Her Majesty under the care 

 of the Zoological Society of London, on August 14 last, have 

 now completely recovered the effects of their journey, and 

 appear to be in fine health and condition. It will be evident to 

 all who see these splendid animals that Grevy's zebra (Eqmts 

 grevii) is by far the finest and most distinct species of the group 

 of " striped asses," excelling its brethren both in size and in 

 beauty of markings. There are pairs of both the Mountain 

 zebra (_Equus zebra) and the Burchell's zebra {E. burchelh) in 

 the Society's zebra-house, only the extinct Quagga {E. quagga) 

 being unrepresented in the series. 



The "Zoological Lectures" of the Zoological Society of 



London will be delivered this year in the Meeting-room at 



Hanover Square, instead of at the Gardens. They will be 



given on Thursdays, April 19, May 17, June 21 and July 19, at 



NO. 15^4, VOL. 61] 



4.30 p.m. (after the General Meeting). The first lecture, on 

 April 19, on the " Animals of Australia," will be delivered by 

 Mr. Smith-Woodward, of the British Museum. 



During the last week, Mr. Garstang, of the Marine Bio- 

 logical Laboratory, Plymouth, carried out the fifth of his 

 periodic surveys of the plankton and physical conditions of the 

 mouth of the English Channel. This concludes the series 

 provided for by the British Association at the Bristol and 

 Dover meetings, and the Committee may be congratulated on 

 the successful termination of an interesting series of experiments, 

 a full account of which is promised for the Bradford meeting. 

 Compared with the corresponding observations made at the 

 same stations in February 1899, the water temperatures at all 

 four stations on the last cruise showed a distinct fall, which 

 amounted to a mean- reduction of 1*3" F. in mid-Channel, 2'0° 

 F. off .Ushant, 07° F. off Parson's Bank, and i'5° off Mount's 

 Bay. Nevertheless, an axis of warm water running up Channel 

 in a north-east direction was again observed, thus tending to 

 establish this condition as a normal phenomenon for the winter 

 period. The vertical and closing nets showed the existence of 

 suspended sand and mud in the water to a height of more than 

 40 fathoms above the bottom — a convincing testimony of the 

 force of recent gales. 



A French translation of two of Prof. W. H. Corfield's three 

 Harveian Lectures on disease ("and defective house sanitation, 

 delivered in 1893, has been published in the Bulletin of the 

 Royal Society of Public Health of Belgium, of which Society 

 Prof. Corfield is a " Membre d'honneur." 



The Istituto Lombardo announces the following as the sub- 

 jects for future prizes:— The Institution prize for 1900 will be 

 awarded for an essay on collective proprietorship in Italy ; 

 competition closes April 30, 1900; for 1901, on differential 

 equations occurring in electrical problems; closing April i, 

 1901. The two triennial medals for 1900 are for industrial 

 and agricultural innovations in Lombardy. One Cagnola 

 prize for 1900 is for an essay on " toxin and antitoxin "; closing 

 April 30 ; and the subject for 1901 is a study of the storms, 

 especially hail-storms, on the slopes of the Alps ; last day,. 

 April I. For the remaining Cagnola prizes the subjects have 

 been chosen by the founder, viz. the cure of pelagra, the 

 nature of miasma and contagion, the control of flying balloons, 

 and the methods of preventing the forgery of a document ; the 

 closing day being December 31. The Brambilla prize, as in 

 preceding years, is awarded for improvements in manufacturing 

 industries in Lombardy. For the Fossati prize, the themes for 

 next year is " regeneration of the peripheric nervous fibres in 

 vertebrates," and for the two succeeding years, " illustration 

 of some fact in the macro- or microscopic anatomy of the 

 encephalus of the higher animals ; entries close about the end 

 of April. The Kramer prize is restricted to Italian engineers. 

 For the Secco Comneno prize for 1902 the subject is a descrip- 

 tion of the deposits of natural phosphates in Italy, the competi- 

 tion closing on April 30, 1902. The subjects for the Pizza- 

 miglio prize are, for 1901, secondary education ; and for 1902, 

 influence of socialistic doctrines. The Ciani prizes are to be 

 given for the best Italian popular book, the type of book 

 selected being scientific or educational for 1901, historical lor 

 1904, and " narrative or dramatic " for 1907. The Tommasom 

 prize is to be given for the best life of Leonardo da Vinci ; and 

 the Zanetti prize for Italian improvements in pharmaceutical 

 chemistry. The prizes, with certain specified exceptions, are 

 open to competitors of every nationality, and the essays may be 

 written in French, Italian, or Latin ; but for full particulars we 

 must refer to the Society's Rendiconti, vol. 33, part i, or to the 

 Secretary, Signor Ferrini, Palazzo di Brera, Milan. 



