H 



NA TURE 



[November 6 t 1902 



what would be the general character of the motions of bodies 

 in space of four dimensions. The most interesting feature of this 

 line of inquiry is the possibility which is pointed out of con- 

 structing representations of the phenomena of electromagnetism 

 by means of vortex motions in four-dimensional space. Thus a 

 vortex with a surface as its axis affords a geometric image of a 

 closed circuit, and there are rotations which by their polarity 

 afford a possible definition of static electricity. Has it occurred 

 to the author that the property that electricity which is free to 

 move in a conductor assumes a superficial distribution may 

 enable us to form a conception of matter in four-dimensional 

 space assuming a three-dimensional distribution ? 



The work done by Prof. Barrett and Messrs. W. Brown and 

 R. Hadfield on the properties of alloys of iron is of very high 

 importance to all engineers, whether electrical or civil. The 

 third part of a paper on the subject is published in the Scientific 

 Transactions of the Royal Dublin Society for September ; the 

 two first parts were published in 1899. In the present section, 

 non-magnetic alloys of iron and alloys more magnetic than best 

 Swedish charcoal iron are considered. Manganese added to 

 iron to the extent of about 13 per cent, gives an alloy which is 

 practically non-magnetic ; a still more remarkable effect isseenwith 

 manganese-nickel-steels ; magnetic alloys of iron with manganese 

 or nickel can be made non-magnetic by adding a suitable amount 

 of the other metal. There is possibly a great future for such 

 alloys in shipbuilding. The alloys more magnetic than the best 

 commercial iron are made with nickel, silicon and aluminium. 

 The authors suggest that an iron alloy containing silicon and 

 aluminium will very probably prove to be the best material to 

 use for transformers. The great value of this work is obvious, 

 and we should like to be able to deal with it more fully ; 

 fortunately, the results are easily accessible, as a paper covering 

 practically the same ground as all three of the Dublin papers 

 was read by the authors before the Institution of Electrical 

 Engineers last February (Journal I.E. E., vol. xxxi. p. 674). 



The Health Department of the City of London has had a 

 number of samples of ice-creams bacteriologically examined. 

 A large proportion of the samples was found to be unsatisfactory ; 

 in several micro-organisms were very numerous, while in some 

 virulent organisms of the Bacillus coli type were present ; one 

 contained pyogenic organisms and produced abscesses in guinea- 

 pigs, and another contained an anaerobic organism, perhaps 

 the bacillus of malignant cedema. Many of the ice-creams 

 from which samples were examined had set up gastro-enteritis 

 in boys employed by the Post Office. The London County 

 Council (General Powers) Act, 1902, which came into force on 

 November 1, contains clauses relating to ice-creams, regulating 

 their manufacture, &c, and notices in Italian have been printed 

 for distribution among the vendors. 



With the publication of the October number (vol. ii. No. 4), 

 the Journal of Hygiene completes its second volume and its 

 second year of issue. Messrs. Wright and Windsor contribute 

 a paper upon the bactericidal effect of human blood in vitro, and 

 find that whereas human blood-serum has a powerful bacteri- 

 cidal action upon the typhoid bacillus and cholera vibrio, it is 

 without action upon the M. pyogenes, B. pestis and M. 

 melitensis. Dr. Haldane details the results of a lengthy ex- 

 perimental investigation upon the air of factories and work- 

 shops, Prof. Tunnicliffe discusses the digestibility of the 

 various albuminous constituents of human milk and its sub- 

 stitutes, and Dr. Ritchie concludes his survey of the current 

 theories regarding immunity. 



Piously minded people have a tendency to accept as 

 ancient anything which pretends to be a monument of 

 Biblical history ; as a consequence of this trait, Jewish shekels 



NO. I723, VOL. 67] 



and half-shekels have been forged and even invented to supply 

 the demand. An interesting exposure of these frauds is given 

 by Mr. G. F. Hill in the Reliquary and Illustrated Archaeologist 

 for October. There are other illustrated papers in this journal 

 dealing with ecclesiastical architecture and stone-carving. 



A tart from the superstition bound up with the use of native 

 medicinal remedies of the North American Indians, it is 

 probable that their knowledge of herbs is much more extensive 

 than that of the white man. Mr. V. K. Cheshunt, who has 

 endeavoured to elicit from the Indians of Mendocino County, 

 California, trustworthy information respecting the uses to which 

 they put various indigenous plants, attributes our knowledge of 

 Cascara sagrada to these tribes and suggests that other plants, 

 such as Ceanothus, Croton and Eriogonum, would well repay 

 investigation. The diet of the inland tribes is peculiar, as they 

 regard young clover shoots as a delicacy, and make use of acorns 

 and the variety of horsechestnut known as" buckeye " for making 

 a porridge or baking into bread. The method adopted is to 

 pound up the seeds into very fine flour and wash out the tannin 

 and other stringent ingredients with water. A porridge or 

 thick soup is formed by boiling the flour, while a favourite 

 recipe for making bread consists in mixing the dough with red 

 clay. The product is a heavy, black, cheese-like substance, in 

 which the clay probably absorbs the oil and converts the last 

 trace of tannin into a more digestible form. Another curious 

 custom previously in vogue was the use of poisonous plants, soap 

 root and turkey mullein, which were thrown into streams to 

 poison the fish. These were then caught and eaten without any 

 deleterious consequences. 



New fields for research are continually opening up ; the last 

 illustration of this is the discovery by Prof. G. Elliot Smith that 

 it is possible to map the convolutions of the brains of non- 

 mummified ancient Egyptians. The brain is naturally preserved 

 in the vast majority of the bodies in Egyptian cemeteries from 

 predynastic to recent Coptic, the favourable conditions being 

 burial in dry soil and removal from all direct access to the air. 

 Prof. Elliot Smith gives an illustrated preliminary paper on the 

 natural preservation of the brain in the ancient Egyptians in the 

 Journal of Anatomy and Physiology (vol. xxxvi. p. 375). In a 

 memoir, which will be published in a short time, he intends to 

 give a full account of the structure of the brain in the predynastic 

 and protodynastic Egyptians. 



In the Report of the Madras Museum for 1901-1902, the 

 appointment of the director, Mr. E. Thurston, as superinten- 

 dent of the Ethnographic Survey of Madras is an announce- 

 ment which will be read with satisfaction by all anthropologists^ 

 The papers on the hill and other primitive Madras tribes already 

 published by Mr. Thurston have placed him in the first rank 

 among the students of anthropology and ethnography, and he 

 will now doubtless have fuller opportunities of pursuing these 

 subjects. Anthropological studies have, it appears, an amusing, if 

 not a somewhat embarrassing, aspect in Madras. When on tour 

 in one district, for example, Mr. Thurston was reputed to be 

 collecting for the Victoria Memorial, inoculating for the plague 

 and recruiting for the Boer war, the measurements that he 

 took giving rise to the idea that he was an army tailor ! The 

 ethnographic reports of native assistants are, moreover, not 

 exactly what they should be, as witness the following : — "They 

 know how to make fire; i.e., by friction of wood as well as 

 stone, &c. They take a triangular cut of stone and one flat 

 oblong size flat. They hit one another with the maintenance of 

 coir or copper, then fire sets immediately and also by rubbing 

 the two barks frequently with each other they make fire." 



The account of the " Plants of Chatham Island," which 

 formed the subject of an address by Mr. L. Cockayne to the 



