igo 



NA TURE 



[December 22, 1904 



only a limited number have been found capable of digesting 

 fibrin. Prof. \'ines has ascertained that in certain cases 

 fycast. mushroom) the tissues contain a mixture of erepsin 

 ■with a fibrin-digesting enzyme, a result which finds its 

 analogue in N'ernon's researches on pancreatic trypsin. 



Entomological iiociety, December 7. — Frof. E. B. 

 Poulton, F.R.S., president, in the chair. — Mr. H. St. J. 

 Donisthorpc exhibited Otiediiis uigrocoendctis, taken by 

 Mr. H. C. Dollman in a rabbit-hole at Ditchling, Susse.x, 

 this being the fourth recorded British specimen. — Prof. 

 T. Hudson Beare exhibited a specimen of the rare Longi- 

 corn Tetropium castatieutu, taken about two years ago in 

 the vicinity of the quays at Hartlepool, and probably intro- 

 duced from abroad. — Mr. G. J. Arrow exhibited a series 

 of the Lamellicorn beetles from the Burchell collection, and 

 remarked that Burchell had at the time of their capture, 

 some seventy years ago, already noted their powers of pro- 

 ducing musical sound. — Mr. C. O. Waterhouse exhibited 

 drawings illustrating the development of the front wing in 

 the pupa of the Tusser silk moth, showing the relation of 

 the tracheas to the veins, prepared for exhibition in the 

 Natural History Museum. He also exhibited some coffee 

 berries from Uganda injured by a small beetle belonging 

 to the .Scolytidiae, and two coleopterous larvae from the 

 Burchell collection from Brazil, submitted to him for deter- 

 mination by Prof. Poulton. One wiis a heteromerous larva 

 two inches long, much resembling the larva of Helops. The 

 more interesting one W'as noted by Burchell to be luminous, 

 and appeared to be the larva of an Elaterid. — Mr. J. J. 

 Walker exhibited the type-specimen of Haplothorax 

 burchelli, G. R. Waterhouse. from the Hope collection, a 

 remarkable Carabid discovered by Burchell in .St. Helena. 

 It is now exceedingly rare, if not entirely extinct, in its sole 

 locality, the late .Mr. Wollaston, during his visit to the 

 island in 1875-6, having entirely failed to find the beetle 

 alive, though its dead and mutilated remains were often 

 met with. — The President exhibited cases showing the 

 results of breeding experiments upon Papilio cenea con- 

 ducted by Mr. G. F. Leigh, who had for the first time bred 

 the trophonius form from trophonius itself. He also e.x- 

 hibited a photograph, taken by Mr. .Alfred Robinson, of 

 the O.xford Universitv Museum, showing the Xylocopid 

 model and its Asilid mimic, exhibited by Mr. E. E. Green 

 at a recent meeting. The example w^as particularly interest- 

 ing, inasmuch as Mr. Green's record of the mimic circling 

 round its model tended to support the view that the bee 

 is the prey of the fly. — Erebia palarica, n.sp., and Erebia 

 stygnc, chiefly in regard to its association with E. evias, in 

 Spain ; Dr. T. A. Chapman, The author described 

 Erebia palarica, a new species from the Cantabrian range ; 

 he said it was phylogenetically a recent offshoot of E. stygnc, 

 and the largest and most brilliant in colouring of all the 

 known members of the family. — Entomological experiences 

 during a tour through India and Ceylon, October 10, 1003, 

 tr> .March 26, 1904 : Dr. G. B. Long^staff. 



Geological Society, December 7. — Dr. J. E. Marr, 

 E.R.S., president, in the chair. — The chemical and mineral- 

 ogical evidence as to the origin of the dolomites of 

 southern Tyrol : Prof. E. \V. Skeats. Recent work on 

 modern coral-reefs has shown that these limestones contain 

 very little, if any, insoluble residue. The study of the re- 

 lative proportions of the organisms composing these reefs, 

 and the alterations that they undergo, has further shown 

 that corals play a subordinate part in them, and that cal- 

 careous alg^e, foraminifera, and other organisms form the 

 bulk of the rocks of the reefs. The author has applied this 

 information in the examination of collections from the much 

 debated area of the dolomites of southern Tyrol. The 

 chemical examination of numerous specimens from the 

 Schlern dolomites of the Schlern, the Langkofl, the Marmo- 

 lata, the Sella, the St. Cassian district, the Richthofen Reef, 

 and numerous other localities is described, so far as relates 

 to the proportions of lime and magnesia and of insoluble 

 residue. These results are compared with similar analyses 

 of limestones from lower and higher horizons. 



Physi.al Society, December 8.— Dr. R. T. Glazebrook, 

 F.R..S., president, in the chair. — On a rapid method of 

 approximate harmonic analysis : Prof. S. P. Thompson. 

 For the study of alternating electric currents and for several 



NO. 1834, VOL. 71] 



other applications, harmonic analysis is simplified by the 

 consideration that all the even terms in the Fourier ex- 

 pansion are absent. In this case the second half-period is 

 similar to the first half-period, but with the ordinates of 

 the corresponding angles reversed in sign. Given a com- 

 plicated harmonic curve containing constituents of the odd 

 orders only, the zero-line can always be drawn so that the 

 constant term vanishes from the Fourier series, the mean 

 ordinate being zero ; and it is then always possible to choose 

 as origin a point for which the ordinates at 0° and 180° 

 are zero. The paper gives a risutyie of the various methods 

 which have been employed for harmonic analysis by re- 

 duction from simultaneous equations, graphical means, and 

 bv harmonic analysers. The method adopted by the author 

 is a simplification of a general method of analysis published 

 by Prof. Runge. — A high frequency alternator : W. 

 Duddell. The author described and showed in action a 

 high-frequency alternator which he had constructed in 1900 

 for some experiments on the resistance of the electric arc, 

 and with which frequencies up to 120,000 ~ per second had 

 been obtained. An illustration will perhaps convey some 

 idea of how high a frequency of 120,000 ~ per second really 

 is. In plotting curves for ordinary frequencies of 50 to 

 100 '*' per second, a scale often adopted is lo inches for 

 ICO -^ . If it were attempted to plot a curve up to 

 120,000 ~ per second to this scale, the curve paper would 

 require to be 12,000 inches, or nearly one-fifth of a mile 

 long. — Exhibition of experiments to show the retardation 

 of the signalling current on 3500 miles of the Pacific cable 

 between \'ancouver and Fanning Island : Prof. \V. E. 

 Ayrton. The experiments were performed upon a cable 

 electrically equivalent to the portion of the Pacific cable 

 between \"ancouver and Fanning Island, the product of the 

 capacity (in mfds.) and the resistance (in ohms) being nine 

 millions. Three dead-beat galvanometers were employed to 

 indicate the current at the beginning, in the middle, and 

 at the end of the cable. It was shown that upon applying 

 an E..M.F. at one end of the cable the current at that end 

 was enormously greater than its steady value, and that 

 one-fifth of a second elapsed before any indications of current 

 were shown at the far end of the cable. By that time the 

 current at the sending end was 3-7 times its steady value, 

 and after two-fifths of a second it had fallen to 23 times 

 its steady value. In about five seconds the current became 

 steady. 



Royal Astronomical Society, December 9. — Prof. H. H. 



Turner in the chair. — On a verv sensitive method of deter- 

 mining the irregularities of a pivot, and on the influence 

 of the pivot errors of the Radcliffe transit circle upon the 

 right ascensions of the Radcliffe catalogue : Dr. Rambaut. 

 The method is a modification of that of M. Hamy, a small 

 steel pin being inserted in each pivot; by means of a lever 

 arrangement horizontal as well as vertical displacements, 

 due to pivot irregularities, can be observed. The apparatus, 

 which had been found entirely satisfactory, was fully de- 

 scribed and illustrated. — On the validity of meteor radiants 

 as determined from three observed tracks : Mr. Chapman. 

 — A note accompanying a photograph of the detached nebula 

 in Cygnus : W. S. Franks. The nebula was the one 

 recently photographed by Dr. Max Wolf : the present plate, 

 taken with the late Dr. Isaac Roberts's 20-inch reflector, 

 showed the details of the nebula on a larger scale. A 

 second note by Mr. Franks upon dark nebulosities was also 

 read ; it was illustrated by four photographs of long lenti- 

 cular nebulae, each of which was sharply divided longi- 

 tudinally throughout its entire length by a dark line. The 

 author suggested that these nebukc, pi-obably spirals seen 

 edgeways, were cooler at their extreme edges, and that this 

 band of cooler matter absorbed their light and caused the 

 appearance of the dark bands seen in the photographs. — 

 Two papers on the lunar theory, one being a note on the 

 completion of the solution of the main problem : Prof. 

 Ernest W. Brown. — .An analysis of 145 terms in the moon's 

 longitude : P. H. Cowell. — On the decline in the magnitude 

 of the variable 150. 1004 Pegasi : Mr. Wickham. 



Zoological Society, December 13. — Mr. Herbert Druce,. 

 vice-president, in the chair. — Some speiimens of a gazelle 

 froTn Palestine ; a new species : Oldtleld Thomas, F.R.S. 

 — The anthropoid apes, illustrated by a large collection of 

 mounted skins, skeletons, and skulls : the Hon. Walter 



