May 9, 1 901] 



JVA TURE 



39 



NOTES. 



Sir W. Roberts-Austen, K.C.B., on leaving the chair as 

 president of the Iron and Steel Institute, at the meeting on 

 Wednesday, announced that Mr. Andrew Carnegie had increased 

 the gift of 6500/., which he made last year to the research fund 

 of the Institute, to 13,000/. 



At the recent meeting of the U.S. National Academy of 

 Sciences, Mr. Alexander Agassiz was elected president of the 

 Academy. The Henry Draper Medal was awarded to Sir 

 William Huggins tor his work in astro-physics. The following 

 were elected foreign associates : — Dr. J. Janssen, M. Lrewy, 

 director of the Paris Observatory, M. E. Bornet, Prof. Hugo 

 Kronecker, Prof. A. Cornu, Prof. F. Kohlrausch, Sir Archibald 

 Geikie and Prof. J. H. van 't Hoff. 



The movement in Cambridge to secure a portrait of Prof. 

 Cr. D. Liveing has already received large and influential support. 

 The secretaries think that there are many friends of the professor 

 both in Great Britain and abroad who would like to join in the 

 proposal and who have not yet had notice of it. Such friends 

 should apply to Prof. Lewis, Cambridge, who will be glad 

 to receive their names. 



Mr. W. Langdon has been nominated for election as the new 

 president of the Institution of Electrical Engineers. M. Mascart 

 has been elected an honorary member of the Institution. 



Prof. Zeiller, professor of pahi;obotany at the Paris School 

 of Mines, has been elected a member of the section of botany of 

 the Paris Academy of Sciences, in succession to the late 

 M. Chatin. 



A MEETING of the Institution of Mining Engineers will be 

 held in the rooms of the Geological Society, Burlington House, 

 on May 23-25, with Mr. H. C. Peake as chairman. Among 

 the subjects of papers to be read or taken as read are the field- 

 work of photographic surveying as applied in Canada ; gold- 

 dredging ; the production of copper and its sources of supply ; 

 geology of the mineral deposits of the Transvaal ; and auxiliary 

 ventilation. 



An expedition against the Anopheles mosquito will be de- 

 spatched this month to West Africa, under Major Ronald Ross, 

 by the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine. A leading 

 Glasgow citizen has placed at the disposal of the school and 

 Major Ross a sum of money sufficient to defray the expenses of 

 one year's trial in some malarious city. 



A sPECi.iL committee has been appointed by the Trinity 

 House, with the deputy-master, Captain G. R. Vyvyan, as 

 chairman, to carry out numerous practical experiments with 

 sound-producing instruments as coast fog signals at St. Cather- 

 ine's Point, in the Isle of Wight, including comparisons between 

 different forms of sirens and reed instruments sounded by means 

 of compressed air, the observations being made from the Trinity 

 steamer Irene at various distances and under varying conditions 

 of weather, &c. The committee will have the advantage of 

 Lord Rayleigh's advice and assistance in the investigations. 

 Representatives of the Admiralty, the Board of Trade, and of 

 the Northern and Irish Lighthouse Boards will also be present. 



Reference has frequently been made in these columns to 

 the enlightened and progressive way in which agriculture is 

 carried on in New South Wales and other Australian colonies. 

 Every advantage is taken of modern methods, and the bearings 

 of scientific investigations upon agricultural practice seem to be 

 well appreciated. We are, therefore, not surprised to see in the 

 Natal Mercury that Mr. F. R. Moor, Secretary for Native 

 Afl'airs, who has been on a visit to Australia, has returned to 

 NO. 1645, VOL. 64] 



Natal with strong convictions as to the urgent necessity for 

 radical improvements in the methods of agricultural industry in 

 that colony. It is acknowledged that in the past the colony 

 has been depending more upon commercial business as a dis- 

 tributing medium for the interior States than on its productive 

 resources ; but the changing conditions demand that the pro- 

 ductive capacity should be increased if Natal is to prosper. The 

 obsolete methods of farming now adopted must give place to a 

 system based upon science and carried on with appliances which 

 modern inventive genius has placed at the disposal of agriculture. 

 As Mr. Moor is a member of the Ministry, as well as a farmer 

 of more than average ability, his visit to Australia should not 

 only direct attention to the need for progress in the science and 

 art of agriculture, but also lead to changes which will in the 

 course of time bring Natal into line with other progressive 

 colonies. 



The Board of Trade has given its decision in the inquiry held 

 with reference to the regulation allowing the consumer to veto 

 any change in the pressure at which he is supplied with electric 

 energy. ."^ summary of the evidence given at the inquiry has 

 already appeared in Nature (vol. Ixiii. p. 5S7). As was 

 generally anticipated the decision now given is in favour of the 

 undertakers depriving the consumer of the absolute power 

 of veto which he has hitherto possessed. In future, when the 

 consumer shall refuse to consent to the change after the under- 

 takers have offered to comply with the conditions laid down by 

 the local authority and to pay the reasonable costs of making 

 the change, the undertakers can appeal to the Board of Trade. 

 The Board may give their consent to the change under such 

 conditions as they may think fit, and this consent shall reckon 

 as equivalent to the consent of the consumer. The Board may, 

 if they consider it desirable, refer to a single arbitrator the 

 question as to what terms and conditions it would be proper to 

 impose, the arbitrator being appointed by themselves. 



The recent conversazione held by the American Institute of ' 

 Electrical Engineers at Columbia University appears to have 

 been a great success. According to an American contemporary, 

 one of the most interesting exhibits was that made by Mr. P. C. 

 Hewitt, who showed a number of electric vacuum-tube lamps. 

 The lamps consist of glass tubes filled with mercury vapour, 

 through which a current of electricity is passed. The positive 

 elecirode is of iron and the negative of mercury. The lamps 

 are arranged to burn directly on the ordinary 100- or 200-volt 

 lighting mains, but they need an extra high voltage to start 

 them, this being obtained by the use of a Wehnelt interrupter 

 or by other suitable means. The light is said to be \ery steady 

 and brilliant, but poor in red rays ; the disagreeable colour due 

 to this defect can, it is stated, be avoided by the use of red 

 reflecting screens. Lamps of 500 and 1000 candle-power were 

 shown burning on the ii5-volt direct current mains, the con- 

 sumption of energy being only half a watt or less per candle. 

 This is much in advance of any other artificial light, and if the 

 lamps can be made commercially in a convenient form and for 

 small candle-powers they should have a great future before them. 



We have received from Dr. J. M. Pernter, director of the 

 Austrian Meteorological Service, an interesting account of the 

 present state of modern " weather-shooting " as practised in 

 Austro- Hungary and Italy— being a reprint of an article con- 

 tributed to the journal Die Kidliir (Vienna). The modern 

 experiments were inaugurated by M. Stiger, Burgomaster of 

 Windisch-Feistrilz in Steirmark, and the apparatus, consisting 

 of a mortar with a long funnel, was improved by M. Suschnig, 

 of Graz. The theory is that by firing large charges of gun- 

 powder a series of atmospheric rings or whirls are generated 

 and that they penetrate the clouds with sufficient force to pre- 

 vent the formation of hail, or to disperse it. The idea gained 



