April 12, 1900] 



NA rURE 



571 



NOTES. 



The Huxley Memorial Statue will be unveiled at the Natural 

 History Museum on April 28, at 1. 15 p.m. Sir J. D. Hooker, 

 (..C.S.I., F. R.S., who was Huxley's life-long and most intimate 

 friend, will present the statue on behalf of the subscribers, and 

 li.R.H. the Prince of Wales will receive it on behalf of the 

 Trustees of the British Museum. Invitations are being sent out 

 to the subscribers, and seating accommodation is being prepared 

 for about three hundred persons expected to attend ; there will be 

 additional accommodation for those who are content to stand in 

 the galleries overlooking the ceremony. The statue, which is 

 in white marble, is the work of Mr. O. Ford, R.A., and will be 

 mounted on a marble pedestal, and placed under the arch of the 

 first right-hand recess on entering the Hall of the Museum. 

 This position has been decided upon after careful consideration, 

 and trial with others, as fufiUing the conditions of lighting, &c., 

 which will enable the statue to be seen to the best advantage. 



Invitations have been sent out for the first (or gentlemen's) 

 soiree of the Royal Society, to be held on Wednesday, May 9. 



The eighth "James Forrest" lecture of the Institution of 

 Civil Engineers will be by Sir William Preece, K.C.B., F.R.S., 

 on Monday, April 23, the subject being "The Relations 

 between Electricity and Engineering." The lecture will be 

 repeated on the afternoon of the following day. 



Prof. W. Hittorf, professor of physics at Miinster, has 

 been elected a correspond ant of the Paris Academy of Sciences, 

 in succession to the late Prof. Wiedemann. The election of Sir 

 George Stokes as Foreign Associate of the Academy left a 

 vacancy for another correspondant in the section of physics, and 

 Prof. Van der Waals has been elected to fill it. 



The next meeting of the Physical Society will be held on 

 April 27, at 8 p.m., at the Solar Physics Observatory, South 

 Kensington, when Sir Norman Lockyer, K.C.B. , will give a 

 short account of the physical problems now being investigated 

 at the Observatory, and their astronomical applications. If the 

 night is fine, the 36-inch reflector, and lo-inch and 9-inch 

 refractors, will be used for the observation or photography of 

 celestial objects and their spectra. The large Apps-Spottis- 

 woode coil and Rowland grating will also be shown in 

 operation. 



The following are among the lecture arrangements at the 

 Royal Institution, after Easter : — Dr. Hugh Robert Mill, three 

 lectures on studies in British geography ; Dr. Alexander Hill, 

 two lectures on brain tissue considered as the apparatus of 

 thought ; Prof. Dewar, four lectures on a century of chemistry 

 in the Royal Institution ; Prof. Stanley Lane-Poole, two lectures 

 on Egypt in the Middle Ages ; Dr. Alfred Hillier, two lectures 

 on South Africa, past and future. The Friday evening meetings 

 will be resumed on April 27, when a discourse will be given by 

 the Right Hon. Lord Kelvin on nineteenth century clouds over 

 the dynamical theory of heat and light ; succeeding discourses 

 will probably be given by Prof. T. E. Thorpe, Prof. J. A. 

 Ewing, Mr. Francis Fox, Sir Henry Roscoe, and others. 



On the recommendation of the Fire Brigade Committee 

 the London County Council have agreed to accept the offer 

 of the Wireless Telegraph and Signal Company (Marconi 

 system) to instal and maintain for a period of two years, in 

 consideration of an annual payment of 50/., the necessary 

 electrical instruments to enable communication to be main- 

 tained between the fire-station at Streatham Green and a 

 temporary sub-station in Mitcham Lane, Streatham. 



Prof. A. R. Forsyth, F.R.S., has been elected a member 

 of the Athenaeum Club under the provisions of the rule which 

 empowers the annual election of nine persons " of distinguished 

 eminence in science, literature, the arts, or for public services." 



NO. 1589, VOL. 61] 



The first of a series of four zoological lectures will be de- 

 livered in the Zoological Society's meeting-room on Thursday 

 next, April 19, at 4.30 p.m. Mr. A, Smith Woodward will 

 speak on the subject of the animals of Australia, and will 

 discuss the difficult question of the origin of Australian fauna. 



Dr. W. S. Church has been re-elected president of the Royal 

 College of Physicians of London, by a practically unanimous vote. 



The British Medical Joiuital states that, by a recent order 

 of the French Army Medical Service, medical officers are 

 directed to use injections of antitetanus serum in large and 

 repealed doses in all cases of pronounced tetanus. This order is 

 based on the fact that experience has shown that such injections 

 have a favourable effect in many cases. 



The exhibition of pictures by the National Record Association, 

 at the rooms of the Royal Photographic Society, will close on 

 Saturday, April 21. On Wednesday, April 25, Mr. F. H. 

 Evans will inaugurate an exhibition of his photographs (mainly 

 architectural) at 8 p.m. with an address. Tickets may be had 

 on application to the secretary of the Society. 



To afford an opportunity for observing the total solar eclipse 

 of May 28, from the deck of a ship, the Orient Line have 

 arranged to navigate the Royal Mail 3teamer Orviuz so as to 

 bring the ship upon the central line of totality, off the coast of 

 Portugal, at the time of the eclipse. The journey will be from 

 London or Plymouth to Gibraltar or Marseilles, and the Ormuz 

 will leave London on May 25. Passengers will be able to 

 return from Gibraltar or Marseilles by sea, or can travel back 

 from Marseilles overland. The complete journey can be made 

 in fifteen days. 



Science states that Princeton University will send a parly 

 to Wadesboro', North Carolina, to observe the eclipse of May 28, 

 that place having been selected because it is the most easily 

 accessible of the stations where the weather probabilities are 

 equally good. The party will probably consist of Profs. Young, 

 Brackett, Magie and Reed, Mr. McClenahan, Mr. Russell and 

 Mr. Fisher, with perhaps one or two others. The work under- 

 taken will be mainly spectro'scopic, including particularly a 

 determination, both photographic and visual, of the position of 

 the corona line. A set of photographs of the corona will also 

 be taken, and careful visual observations will be made to 

 determine the relations between the corona and the solar 

 prominences. 



Sir Andrew Douglas Maclagan, whose death is an- 

 nounced, was born at Ayr on April 17, 1812. He was Surgeon- 

 General to the Queen's Bodyguard, Scotland ; vice-president 

 of the Royal Society, Edinburgh ; honorary member of the 

 Royal Medical Society, Edinburgh ; professor of medical juris- 

 prudence and public health in Edinburgh University from 1862 

 to 1892, when he retired ; president of the Royal College of 

 Physicians, Edinburgh, 1884 ; and president of the Royal 

 College of Surgeons, Edinburgh, 1859-60. 



We have just received news of the death of Mr. George High- 

 field Morton, well known for his researches on the geology of 

 Lancashire and North Wales. The first edition of his "Geology 

 of the country around Liverpool " was published in 1863 ; a 

 second edition, which included an account of the north of Flint- 

 shire, was issued in 1891, and an appendix to this work, with a 

 geological map of the district, was published in 1897. Mr. 

 Morton contributed many papers to the Liverpool Geological 

 Society, of which he had been president ; his more important 

 researches being on the Glacial and Triassic deposits near Liver- 

 pool, and on the Lower Carboniferous rocks and fossils of North 

 Wales. He was elected a Fellow of the Geological Society in 

 1858, and was awarded the Lyell medal in 1892. He was a 

 constant attendant at Section C of the British Association, and 

 was highly esteemed by all who knew him, as a quiet, unostenta- 



