January 26, 1905] 



NATURE 



303 



The International Congress of Psychology will meet this 

 year at Rome on April 26-30. We learn from the British 

 Medical Journal that there will be four sections. The 

 section of experimental psychology, the president of which 

 is Prof. G. Fano, of Florence, will deal with psychology 

 in its relations to anatomy and physiology, psycho-physics, 

 and comparative psychology. That of introspective psycho- 

 logy will, under the presidency of Prof. R. Ardigo, of 

 Padua, devote itself to psychology in its relations to philo- 

 sophical sciences. The section of pathological psychology, 

 the president of which is Prof. E. Morselli, of Genoa, 

 will discuss hypnotism, suggestion, and analogous pheno- 

 mena, and psycho-therapeutics. The programme of the 

 section of criminal, paedagogic, and social psychology, which 

 is under the presidency of Prof. Lombroso, of Turin, has 

 not yet been published. The president of the congress is 

 Prof. Giuseppe Sergi, of Rome; the general secretary. Dr. 

 .Sante de Sanctis, to whom all communications relative to 

 the meeting should be addressed at the Istituto 

 Fisiologico, 92 \ia Depretis, Rome. 



We are informed that Dr. Carl Otto Weber, the well 

 known chemical authority on india-rubber, died suddenly 

 on January 14 at his residence in Massachusetts, U.S.A. 



On November 16 last the University of Lehigh was 

 tereaved of its president. Dr. Thomas Messinger Drown, 

 and a brief obituary notice is contained in the Popular 

 Science Monthly for January. Dr. Drown was born on 

 March 19, 1842, at Philadelphia, and he graduated in 

 medicine at Pennsylvania, subsequently studying chemistry 

 in Germany and America. He held the chair of chemistry 

 at Lafayette College for seven years, and at the Massa- 

 chusetts Institute of Technology for seven years. He was 

 secretary and editor of the American Institution of Mining 

 Engineers for ten years from its foundation, and was 

 elected president in 1897. His researches in quantitative 

 analysis were devoted in the first place to devising standard 

 methods in the analyses of iron and steel, and in the second 

 place to water analysis, especially in connection with the 

 natural waters of the State of Massachusetts, and the dis- 

 tribution of normal chlorine. He was elected president of 

 Lehigh University in 1895, at a time when that institu- 

 tion's influence was at a low ebb, and since his appoint- 

 ment the efficiency of the college has developed in many 

 important directions. 



Renter's Agency has been informed by the Pacific 

 Cable Board that by an arrangement between the Washing- 

 ton and Sydney Observatories, with the cooperation of the 

 telegraph administrations concerned, time signals were 

 sent on New Year's Eve from the Washington Observ- 

 atory to the Sydney Observatory at 3h., 4h., ^h., and 6h. 

 The mean interval between the times when these signals 

 were sent and when they were received was 2.90s. 

 The distance separating Sydney and Washington 

 is more than 12,000 miles. The signals through the 

 Vancouver-Fanning cable, the longest cable span in the 

 world (345776 nautical miles), were sent by automatic 

 apparatus, and were recorded, as they passed, at the 

 Vancouver station on an instrument placed in the artificial 

 line which balances the cable for the purpose of duplex 

 working. The signals consisted of second contacts, 

 omitting the thirtieth and last five of each minute, except 

 the last minute of the hour, when the thirtieth and all 

 after the fiftieth second were omitted, the circuit closing 

 with a long dash on the even hour. The signals were 

 sent for five minutes before the hour from 3 p.m. to 

 ^ p.m., Sydney time; equivalent to midnight to 3 a.m. 

 Washington time. 



NO. 1839, VOL. 71] 



Writing from Amsterdam, Dr. C. M. van Deventer 

 desires to direct attention to an interesting fact observed 

 by a schoolboy. Two years ago, during a lesson in 

 physics given at the high school at Batavia, one of the 

 boys, called Van Erpecum, told Dr. Deventer, as an 

 observation of his own, that the water in a glass, filled 

 to the brim with water and floating ice, does not flow 

 over when the ice melts. The observation was com- 

 municated to Profs. Van der Waals and Zeeman, who 

 judged it worthy of being the subject of a note presented 

 by them to the Royal Academy of Amsterdam. Dr. 

 Deventer says that the observation of his pupil tells only 

 the half of the phenomenon — the truth being that the 

 water neither rises nor sinks. He therefore states the 

 proposition that " In a vessel containing water and float- 

 ing ice, the level stays at the same height when the ice 

 melts." Or, speaking more generally, "When a vessel 

 contains a solid floating in its own liquid, the level of 

 the latter does not change by the melting of the solid." 

 This proposition Dr. .Deventer proposes to call the "law 

 of the permanent level." The law can be deduced from 

 Archimedes's principle ; but it is only rigorously exact 

 when the weight of the air is neglected. 



At the meeting of the Society of Antiquaries on 

 January 19 Mr. A. J. Evans communicated an account of 

 the tombs of Minoan Knossos. Mr. Evans's last season's 

 work at Knossos was devoted largely to the search for the 

 tombs in relation with the Minoan palace and city. On a 

 hill about a mile north of the palace a cemetery was dis- 

 covered. One hundred tombs were opened, and the con- 

 tents showed that the bulk of them belonged to the period 

 immediately succeeding the fall of the palace. The 

 character of the art displayed by the relics found showed 

 the unbroken tradition of the later palace style. The 

 jewelry and gems discovered were of the typical " mature 

 Mycensean " class, and a scarab found in one of the graves 

 is of a late eighteenth dynasty type. The tombs were of 

 three main classes : — (a) Chamber tombs cut in the soft 

 rock and approached in each case by a dromos ; in many 

 cases these contained clay coffins, in which the dead had 

 been deposited in cists, their knees drawn towards the 

 chin, (b) Shaft graves, each with a lesser cavity below, 

 containing the extended skeleton, and with a roofing of 

 stone slabs, (c) Pits giving access to a walled cavity in 

 the side below ; these also contained extended skeletons. 

 A number of skulls have been secured, and are to be sent 

 to England. On a high level called Sopata, about two 

 miles north again of this cemetery, an important sepulchral 

 monument was discovered. This consisted of a square 

 chamber, about eight by six metres, constructed of lime- 

 stone blocks, and with the side walls arching in 

 " Cyclopean " fashion towards a high gable. The back 

 wall was provided with a central cell opposite the blocked 

 entrance. This entrance, arched on the same horizontal 

 principle, communicated with a lofty entrance hall of 

 similar construction, in the side walls of which, facing 

 each other, were two cells that had been used for sepulchral 

 purposes. A second blocked archway led from this hall 

 to the imposing rock-cut dromos. A number of relics 

 were found scattered about, including repeated clay im- 

 pressions of what may have been a royal seal. Specially 

 remarkable among the stone vessels is a porphyry bowl of 

 Minoan workmanship, but recalling in material and execu- 

 tion that of the early Egyptian dynasties. Many imported 

 Egyptian alabastra were also found, showing the survival 

 of middle empire forms besides others of early eighteenth 

 dynasty type. Beads of lapis lazuli were also found, and 



