APRIL 9, 1914] 
NATURE 
149 
side with the first image. Both images are picked up 
by a reading telescope, and their relative displacement 
when the shaft is twisted may be read easily. The 
advantage of the instrument lies in the fact that the 
scale, as well as the optical parts, rotates with the 
shaft, and the reading telescope requires but little 
adjustment. Other types in which the scale does not 
rotate, require considerable adjustment in a_ place, 
viz., the shaft-tunnel, where adjustment is not easy 
to carry out. 
Other papers read dealt with the stability of ships in 
damaged conditions, and the rolling of ships. Mr. 
H. E. Wimperis described his instrument for the 
measurement of velocity of roll, which depends for its 
action on a small electrically-driven gyrostat. 
PAPERS ON INVERTEBRATES. 
yan REPORT on the Crustacea Schizopoda, collected 
by the Swedish Antarctic Expedition, 1901-3, 
has been published, in 4to form, by G. E. C. Gud, 
of Copenhagen. In his preface, the author, Mr. H. J. 
Hansen, states that this memoir, which is illustrated 
by six plates, should be regarded as a further con- 
tribution to his account of the Mysidacea and 
Euphausiacea (the two main groups of the Schizo- 
poda) of the world. “A considerable number of new 
From Proc. U.S. Nat. Mus. 
Two Calyces of Scyphocrinus. 
species are named, and revised descriptions of others 
previously known to science given, but as these appeal 
only to specialists, they must be passed over without 
further mention. 
Of more general interest is Mr. R. S. Bassler’s 
description (Proc. U.S. Nat. Mus., vol xlvi., pp. 57-9) 
of a remarkably fine slab of fossil crinoids from the 
Middle Paleozoic strata of the Mississippi Valley, 
north of Cape Girardean, Missouri, which has recently 
been placed on exhibition in the American Museum. 
This slab, measuring 4 ft. by 7 ft., contains eighteen 
complete crowns of Scyphocrinus, two of which are 
NO. 2319, VOL. 93]| 
shown in the accompanying illustration, together with 
a number of bulbs of the so-called Camarocrinus; the 
latter, as pointed out by Dr. Bather, really pertaining 
to the former. In some of the specimens the crown, 
or calyx, retains to some extent its original globular 
' form, but in the majority it has been flattened by 
contact with the Camarocrinus bulbs. The strong, 
many-branched arms, are frequently a foot in length. 
The first American representative of the umbrella- 
shaped sponges of the genus Cceloptychium is de- 
scribed by Messrs. Shimer and Powers in vol. xlvi., 
pp- 155-6, of the Proc. U.S. Nat. Mus., under the 
name of C. jerseyense. As the type specimen was 
obtained from the Upper Cretaceous of New Jersey, 
it is strictly contemporaneous, in the geological sense, 
with the European forms of the genus to which it is 
provisionally referred. The American species is char- 
acterised by the rounded, in place of flattened, margin 
of the umbel. 
Hitherto the number of species of oligochaetous 
annelids known from Jersey was only eleven, all be- 
longing to the earthworm family (Lumbricide). A 
collection, including fresh-water forms, recently re- 
ceived from the island has, however, enabled the 
Rev. H. Friend, in an article published in The 
Zoologist for December, 1913, to raise the number of 
known species to fifty, of which three are described 
as new. Of the fifty species, the Enchytreidz claim 
thirty-one, the Lumbricidz seventeen, and the Lum- 
briculidas and Megascolecida one each. 
Roe 
METEOROLOGICAL REPORTS. 
gi report of the Meteorological Service of Canada 
for the year 1909 (pp. xxi+567 and plates), has. 
been published recently. The large mass of data 
furnished by this extensive system is arranged in 
tables giving (1) monthly and annual summaries; (2), 
bi-hourly and hourly temperature and barometric pres- 
sure; (3) mean and extreme temperature, daily range,, 
rainfall, etc.; (4) daily observations from selected 
stations; and (5) magnetic results at Agincourt Ob- 
servatory. Some of the results of observations at the 
Central Observatory at Toronto were quoted in 
NaturE of September 7, 1911. The report includes 
a brief monthly summary of the weather over the 
whole Dominion, and tables showing the number of 
weather forecasts and percentage of fulfilment in each 
district and month. The general percentage of fulfil- 
ment amounted to 86-8, after making due allowance 
for forecasts only partly verified. 
The annual reports of the Philippine Weather 
Bureau for 1910 (parts 1 and 2), containing hourly 
meteorological observations at Manila, and for 1909 
(part 3), containing observations at secondary stations 
have recently been published. Father .Algué 
states in the preface to part 1:—‘‘Were it not 
for a few exceptions, the history of the Weather 
Bureau for the fiscal year 1910 might have been con- 
densed into the three words, ‘ Everything as usual.’”’ 
This statement practically holds good with regard to 
all the parts; the most interesting details relating to 
typhoons, storm-warnings, earthquakes, etc., are con- 
tained in the Monthly Bulletins, to which we have 
frequently referred. The number of earthquakes felt 
in the Philippines during the fiscal year 1910 amounted 
to 121, exclusive of many microcosmic movements. 
The most important far-distant earthquakes recorded 
were those in Mexico, Baluchistan, and Greenland. 
A new magnetic observatory has been established at 
Antipolo, about eleven miles east of Manila, owing 
to the disturbance caused by the electric railroad at the 
‘ latter place. 
