March 12, 1903] 



NA TURE 



445 



always been urged against cremation is that it might render 

 the detection of crime impossible, as all evidence is neces- 

 sarily destroyed by the process. To obviate this as far as 

 possible, it is recommended that no cremation should be 

 allowed to take place unless the cause of death can be 

 definitely certified by the medical attendant, who is required 

 to fill up an exhaustive certificate, which has to be submitted 

 to, and must be approved by, a medical referee, unless an 

 autopsy has been performed by an expert pathologist 

 appointed for the purpose, or an inquest has been held. 



The applications of electricity in the treatment of disease 

 are now being carefully studied, and almost every hospital 

 has its X-ray department. Introduced originally for diag- 

 nostic and localising purposes, Rontgen rays have been found 

 to possess properties which may in the future revolutionise 

 the treatment of certain diseases. Carelessly applied, the 

 rays may set up considerable inflammation of the skin 

 exposed to their action, while lupus and malignant growths 

 may be considerably benefited, or even be cured, by a 

 number of exposures to these remarkable emanations. The 

 rays seem to possess a selective action, destroying dis- 

 eased tissues and bringing about reparative action, but 

 leaving the healthy ones untouched. In cases of cancer 

 hopeful results have been obtained ; the treatment is pain- 

 less, and it seems to relieve pain and to inhibit the progress 

 of the disease. The mode of action of Rontgen rays is 

 doubtful ; by some it is supposed to be a bactericidal one, 

 but more probably an inflammatory reaction is set up lead- 

 ing to phagocytosis and leucocytosis, whereby the wandering 

 " scavenger " cells of the body accumulate, attack and de- 

 stroy the morbid tissues. 



A pamphlet has been received urging the adoption of Mr. 

 J. Jackson's " System of Upright Penmanship." There can 

 be no doubt that sloped writing necessitates a strained and 

 asymmetrical posture, and has contributed to the production 

 of countless cases of lateral curvature of the spine and of 

 eye-strain, while upright writing is compatible with a 

 natural and healthy posture. This fact alone constitutes a 

 sufficient, and, indeed, urgent, reason for the teaching in 

 all schools of upright in place of the old-fashioned sloped 

 writing. But it seems that some of the advocates of upright 

 writing claim as one of its principal advantages the fact 

 that it can be easily executed with the left hand. They 

 propose to form an association to promote the teaching of 

 upright writing with both hands, believing that the child 

 taught to write equally well with both hands will easily 

 acquire left-handed skill in all other manipulations. This 

 belief is probably well founded, but there are at present no 

 sufficient grounds for the assumption that a child's mental 

 development will be aided by the training of his left equally 

 with his right hand. The balance of probability seems to be 

 against it. It is further proposed to teach children to write 

 different matter simultaneously with the two hands, a feat 

 which appears to have been accomplished in one or two 

 instances. If this proposal should be carried into practice 

 the results should be of great interest to psychologists, but 

 the process may be prejudicial to the development of strong 

 and sane personalities by the subjects of the experiment. 



Two " meters " for testing the penetrating power of 

 Rontgen ray tubes have been described by Dr. B. Walter 

 in the Fortschritte auf dem Gebiete der Rontgenstrahlen. 



Prof. B. Sresnewsky sends us some interesting geo- 

 metrical constructions for the curvature of an air current 

 in the presence of a vortex or cyclone, published in the 

 Bulletin of the St. Petersburg Academy. 



NO. 1741, VOL. 67] 



In the Transactions of the Scotch Institution of Engineers 

 and Shipbuilders, Mr. C. A. Matthey investigates the effect 

 of the inertia of the connecting rod in communicating vibra- 

 tion to an engine, and discusses the possibility of so 

 balancing the engine as to remove the vibration entirely. 



In connection with an epidemic disease discovered among 

 the eels of the ponds at Orbetello, a new bacillus has been 

 discovered by Dr. F. Inghilleri, whose investigations are 

 published in the Atti del Lined. The disease in question 

 is known as the " red plague," and the author considers it 

 undesirable that eels so attacked should be used for food. ' 



The second part of M. Lucien Poincare's annual review 

 of progress in physics is contained in the Revue genirale des 

 Sciences for January 30. It deals with optics ; magnetism 

 and electricity ; mechanics, including acoustics, elasticity 

 and gravitation ; thermodynamics, including the phase law, 

 and low-temperature researches. 



Prof. LuSsana and Dr. Carnazzi discuss in the Nuovo 

 Cimento the effect of interposing a solid dielectric body on 

 the length of the electric spark-discharge in air, anu- in 

 particular the remarkable fact that, by placing the body 

 close to the anode, the length of the spark may be consider- 

 ably increased. 



Profs. Lummer and Pringsheim propose in the Berichte 

 of the German Physical Society a scale of temperature 

 based on the theory of radiation which possesses many of 

 the advantages of the absolute scale, but has the further 

 advantage of being better adapted to the practical measure- 

 ment of high temperatures. 



In connection with the calculation of the self-induction of 

 a ring of rectangular section, Prof. Garbasso (Turin) has 

 communicated to the Nuovo Cimento a demonstration that 

 the assumption that the current is uniformly distributed 

 across the section of the ring leads only to an error of the 

 order of 5 per cent. 



Prof. Augusto Righi has communicated to the Bologna 

 Academy (1902) some researches on the acoustical phenomena 

 presented by the discharges of condensers. The sounds were 

 obtained when the charge took place in a vacuum tube or 

 through a flame, and the phenomena presented several 

 points of difference from the effects observed by Duddell in 

 the case of the electric arc. 



From Signor Ricc6's report in the Atti dei Lincei, we 

 gather that the work connected with the photographic 

 survey of the heavens is making substantial progress at the 

 Observatory of Catania. During the year 533 photographs 

 have been taken, and 31,200 measurements of stars have 

 been made on 170 plates. In addition, the catalogue of 

 stars of reference has been continued, and a number of 

 redeterminations have been made and referred to the year 

 1900. 



From a generalisation of Carnot's cycle, Mr. Sanford 

 A. Moss, writing in the Physical Review, gives a proof that 

 in a gas engine where the working substance may be re- 

 garded as a perfect gas, the efficiency is the same as for a 

 Carnot engine, with the same range of compression 

 temperatures. 



Some observations on the heat produced when powders 

 are wetted have been published in the Atti of the Venetian 

 Institution by Messrs. M. Bellati and L. Finazzi. The 

 results, so far as they concern the influence of the size of 

 the grains, differ from those of Linebarger. The authors 

 further find that the quantities of heat produced by the 

 addition of equal quantities of water decrease as more water 

 is added. 



