260 
NATURE 
[May 7, 1914 
Zoological Society, April 21.—Dr. Henry Woodward, 
vice-president, in the chair.—Surgeon J. C. Thompson : 
Further contributions to the anatomy of the Ophidia. 
—Rev. T. R. R. Stebbing : Crustacea from the Falk- 
land Islands. At intervals during a period of some 
fifteen years Mr. Rupert Vallentin has used prolonged 
opportunities for collecting, among other things, the 
crustacean fauna of the Falkland Islands. An initial 
report on this subject was made to the society in the 
year 1go0. In January of the present year Dr. 
Thomas Scott, in the ‘“‘Annals and Magazine of 
Natural History,’ has discussed some of the Cope- 
poda.. The contribution now offered has to do chiefly 
with the Malacostraca. Five new species are pro- 
posed.—J. S. Huxley: The courtship of the great. 
crested grebe; with an addition to the theory of sexual 
selection.—S. Hirst: The Arachnida (other than 
spiders) and Myriopoda obtained by the British 
Ornithologists’ Union and Wollaston Expeditions to 
Dutch New Guinea. The collection is only a small 
one, but contains two new species of Acari parasitic 
on mammals and three new species of millipedes. 
A new species of parasitic mite collected by Prof. F. 
Forster on various mammals in German New Guinea 
is also described.—Major J. Stevenson Hamilton: The 
coloration of the African hunting-dog (Lycaon pictus). 
—C. Tate Regan: Note on Aristeus goldiei, Macleay, 
and on some other fishes from New Guinea.—Miss A. 
Carlsson: Two species of fossil Carnivora, from the 
Phosphorites of Quercy, contained in the collections 
of the Zootomical Institute at Stockholm. 
Challenger Society, April 29.—Prof. E. W. MacBride 
in the chair.—Prof. E. W. MacBride: Conditions of 
cross-fertilisation in the sea. The factors hindering 
crossing between different species of Echinoderms 
were discussed.—C. Tate Regan: The distribution of 
antarctic fishes. It was pointed out that the distri- 
bution of coast fishes south of the tropics calls for 
the recognition of three zones—south temperate, sub- 
antarctic, and antarctic. The subantarctic zone in- 
cludes the Magellan and Antipodes districts; the 
antarctic zone the Glacial and Kerguelen districts. 
Nearly all the antarctic fishes are Nototheniiformes, 
and nearly all the genera and species are peculiar to 
the zone; in the subantarctic zone Nototheniiformes 
are present, but there is also a number of south 
temperate types. 
DUBLIN. 
Royal Irish Academy, April 27.—Rey. J. P. Mahaffy, 
president, in the chair.—Rev. Canon Lett: A census 
catalogue of the mosses of Ireland. Part i. This 
paper gives a short account of all deceased botanists 
who have paid any attention to the mosses of Ireland, 
together with a note of all known publications on the 
subject, from the Fev. John Ray, whose synopsis 
(1690) is the earliest work in which Irish mosses are 
mentioned, down to the present day. The list given 
by the writer contains the names of 636 mosses indi- 
genous to Ireland, and with each is given the first 
known and the latest records, together with the date 
and name of the collection.—W. D. Haigh: The 
Carboniferous volcanoes of Philipstown, in King’s 
County. This paper deals with the small volcanic 
district of Croghan Hill, north of Philipstown, in 
King’s County. In an area of about four square 
miles a number of volcanic necks breaks through the 
Carboniferous Limestone. The ash is interbedded 
with the limestone at and above the cherty zone which 
separates the Lower from the Middle Limestone.. The 
volcanic activity was thus contemporaneous with the 
major outbursts in the Limerick district. The latter 
portion of the paper deals with the petrography of 
the igneous rocks, which consist chiefly of dolerites 
and basalts passing into the more basic variety, lim- 
NO, #2323. VOL: 03 || 
| burgite. Glomero-porphyritic structure is a common 
feature of these intrusive rocxs.—A,. C, Forbes: Tree 
growth (in connection with the Clare Island Survey). 
Although no plant worthy of the name of tree now 
exists on Clare Island, abundance of scrub, consist- 
ing of oak, birch, mountain ash, holly, hazel, willow, 
etc., occurs on the east side of the island, suggesting 
that at no very distant date woodland was more or 
less general botn over Clare Island and the adjacent 
islands and mainland. ‘Tree remains in the bogs show 
that pine and birch were originally common on the 
lower parts of the island, followed at a later’ date by 
oak, which is found under mountain peat up. to an 
altitude of 4oo ft. The disappearance of this wood- 
land was primarily due to a lowering of the summer 
times. The original forest flora of the island un- 
doubtedly dates back to a time when a connection 
with the mainland existed on the south-east, which 
was probably not interrupted until oak, hazel, and 
other species had established themselves, and sup-. 
pressed or took the place of the pine of an earlier 
period. The most remarkable omissions from the pre- 
sent forest flora of the island are ash and elder, the 
latter being not only common on the mainland, but 
difficult to eradicate from grazed or uncultivated land.— 
G. P. Farran: Tunicata and Hemichorda (in connec- 
tion with the Clare Island Survey). The paper sum- 
marised the published records of the group, together 
with some additional records added: in the course of 
the Clare Island Survey. 
Paris. 
chair.—The President announced the death of. Prof. 
Suess, foreign associate.—H. Deslandres : 
mental research of a solar electrical field. Stark has 
recognised. a new effect of the 
on the light emitted by the canal rays; the. bearing 
nitrate is fused between two glass plates and allowed 
to solidify. 
below its melting point, and slightly compressed by 
pressure at one point of the plate. New crystals 
appear which grow at the expense of the original. 
crystal, and there is no relation between the orienta- 
tions of the new and the old crystals. 
the author is led to modify his views on the poly- 
morphism of camphor, which he now holds to be tri- 
morphic and not quadrimorphic.—F. Becke was elected 
A mirror astrolabe. .The prism of the ordinary in- 
half silvered. The arrangement possesses the follow- 
ing advantages: homocentricity of the two rays, 
increase of power of definition, possibility of construct- 
ing large astrolabes cheaply, and the suppression of 
the difficulties arising from the want of homogeneity 
of the glass of the prisms.—J. Clairin: Certain 
systems of partial differential equations of the second 
order with two independent variables.—W. Blaschke : 
New evaluation of distances in functional space.— 
Marcel Riesz: An interpolation formula for the differ- 
ential of a  trigonometrical polynomial.—Bertrand 
Gambier : The surfaces susceptible of being formed in 
several different ways by the displacement of an 
invariable curve.—Louis Roy: The motion in three 
dimensions of indefinite viscous media.—F. Jager: 
The application of the method of Ritz to certain 
problems of mathematical physics, and in particular to 
4 
temperatures, and an increase of wind off the sea, 
probably brought about by a higher sea-level in recent | 
Academy of Sciences, April 27.—M. P. Appell in the 
Experi-. 
electric field — 
of the Stark effect on the study of the solar radiations | 
is fully discussed.—Fred Wallerant: The mobility of | 
the molecules in a solid crystal. A crystal of potassium , 
It is now heated to a temperature well. 
From this. 
a correspondant for the section of mineralogy in the. 
place of the late M. Rosenbusch.—Henri Chrétien : | 
strument is replaced by two mirrors placed at an. 
angle of 60°, one being fully silvered and the other. 
