May 30, 1 901] 



NA TURE 



in 1900 by the British Association. The work will be done by 

 civil officers in addition to their own duties, Mr. Risley being 

 appointed director of ethnography. The annual .'expenditure 

 will be 40,000 rupees, and the total cost is estimated at \\ lakhs, 

 excluding the cost of printing. The Government hope that 

 ethnologists and scientific societies in Europe and America will 

 assist the director with advice, refer to him the points they 

 desire to make the subject of inquiry in India, and supply him 

 with copies of publications bearing on the researches about to be 

 undertaken during the next four years. 



The third series of trials of motor vehicles for heavy traffic is 

 arranged to take place in Liverpool and neighbourhood during 

 the five days commencing Monday, June 3. Referring to the 

 results of previous trials, the Times points out that in 1898 the 

 wheels of the four competing vehicles proved structurally 

 defective when subjected to the hammering action of granite sets 

 and cobble sets, whilst minor troubles arose in respect to adhesion 

 and with the condensers, &c. The second trials, which took 

 place in 1899, provided satisfactory evidence that the tire and 

 adhesion difficulties had been overcome, for none of the wheels 

 gave the smallest trouble, and five out of six of the competing 

 vehicles in the hill-climbing tests successfully surmounted 

 gradients varying between one in nine and one in thirteen with 

 as heavy a load as six and a half tons. Yet the judges found 

 that the strength of these vehicles was " below what is compat- 

 ible with a satisfactory life in commercial work " — a state of 

 things which they attributed mainly to " the difficulties imposed 

 by meeting the limit of three tons tare under the Locomotives on 

 Highways -A.ct, 1896." In order to see whether manufacturers 

 could improve their designs so as to produce an efficient com- 

 mercial vehicle under the three-ton limit of tare, the Liverpool 

 Self-propelled Traffic Association has allowed an interval of 

 two years between the second trials and the third series now about 

 to be held. For the coming trials an entry of thirteen vehicles 

 has been secured, which will compete in four classes. Class A 

 is for comparatively light vehicles propelled by internal combus- 

 tion engines using deodorised naphtha or petroleum spirit, and 

 carrying a load of only one and a half tons. The vehicles entered 

 under the other three classes are all steam propelled, electricity 

 being again unrepresented. The steam waggons, however, 

 comprise a great variety of design, including several boilers of 

 the Hash, or instantaneous generation, type. 



The Report of the Council of the Royal Agricultural Society 

 of England, read at the annual meeting on Wednesday of last 

 week, was not an altogether satisfactory one. The total number 

 of governors and members is more than ten thousand, but since 

 last year there has been a nominal reduction of 633 — which 

 includes 314 voluntary resignations. A few of these have with- 

 drawn from the Society on account of the decision of the Council 

 to discontinue the annual migratory shows after 1902, because 

 of the serious losses the last three have involved. The show 

 this year will be held at Cardiff, from June 26 to July I, and in 

 1902 the last of the series will be held at Carlisle. These 

 migratory shows will be superseded by a permanent showyard at 

 Twyford Abbey — a few miles out of London. For the prizes of 

 40/. and 20/., offered by the Society for portable oil engines, 

 eight entries have been received, the trials of which will take 

 place in the Cardiff showyard in the week previous to the show. 

 For the similar prizes offered for agricultural locomotive engines, 

 no entry has been received ; and for the prize of 15/. offered by 

 the Society for the best small ice-making plant suitable for a 

 dairy, only one entry has been made. The council report that 

 at the Woburn Experimental Farm the feeding experiments 

 have shown that sheep fatten perfectly well, and without any 

 drawbacks, when fed on mangels instead of swedes. Gorse has 

 been proved to be a useful food, but the results were slightly 



NO. 1648, VOL. 64] 



inferior to those obtained by the use of hay. Progress is being 

 made with the usua^ field experiments and with the investiga- 

 tions of various agricultural problems, including the eradication 

 of farm weeds. At the pot-culture station experiments are being 

 continued in connection with Hills' bequest. Much attention 

 has been given to the value of seeds, and reports have been 

 supplied to members of the Society in regard to the purity and 

 germination of 116 samples of different seeds. A disease in the 

 cherry orchards of Kent, which has seriously affected the cherry 

 crop, has been investigated by the Society's consulting botanist, 

 and a description and figures of the disease have been printed as 

 a leaflet and extensively circulated in Kent and other fruit-grow- 

 ing districts. The Zoological Department has been chiefly con. 

 cerned during the past six months with pests injurious to stored 

 produce and with such insects as are troublesome all the year 

 round. Some of the more important applications have had 

 reference to forestry, and advice has been given with regard to 

 various insects attacking plantations of coniferous and other 

 trees. 



A Dls.\STROUS explosion occurred at the Universal Colliery, 

 situated at the top of Aber Valley, a few miles from Caerphilly, 

 on Friday last, no less than eighty-three men having perished 

 through the accident. Mr. Dyer Lewis, assistant inspector of 

 mines, is reported by the Times to have said that there was no 

 longer any doubt that the explosion was caused by coal dust, 

 adding that the long continuance of the north-east wind, which 

 practically prevailed for three weeks, might probably have had 

 the effect of drying up the air passing through the workings and 

 thus have caused the coal dust to become drier. 



We understand that the Admiralty is proceeding energeti- 

 cally with the fitting of wireless telegraphy to the ships of the 

 British Navy. The " Apps-Newton " coil has been adopted as 

 the standard pattern, and a large number of coils and trans- 

 mitters have been ordered. 



A complete installation of Marconi's wireless telegraphy 

 specially suitable for signalling purposes as used in the Navy 

 has been fitted on board the Elder, Dempster Beaver liner 

 Lake Chaiiiplain. This installation is the first which has been 

 fitted on any of the .Atlantic liners sailing from Liverpool. The 

 Lake Champlain left the Mersey for Halifax last Tuesday with 

 more than 1000 passengers, and arrangements were made to 

 establish communication between the vessel and the Marconi wire- 

 less telegraph station at Holyhead. The Times states that at 9.37 

 p.m., when off the Skerries, communication was obtained with the 

 Holyhead station, the vessel being then thirteen miles distant. 

 Numerous telegrams were then forwarded from passengers to 

 friends in all parts of the United Kingdom, each message being 

 acknowledged by the receiving operator. Constant communica- 

 tion with the station was continued until r a.m., the vessel being 

 then thirty-seven miles distant. Communication was established 

 with the Marconi station at Rosslare, and at 4.30 a.m. a fresh 

 batch of telegrams was forwarded, notifying the vessel's arrival 

 off the Tuskar light to the owners, Messrs. Elder, Dempster 

 and Co. The position of the ship was nineteen miles from 

 Rosslare telegraph station. The last telegram was forwarded 

 at 7.30 a.m., at a distance of nearly thirty miles from Rosslare. 



Our paragraph directing attention to the proposal to erect a 

 memorial to the late Right Hon. Prof. Huxley in Ealing has 

 elicited one noteworthy response. The contributor, who gives 

 neither name nor address, begins his covering letter : " In the 

 current issue of Nature " (which presumably he had seen at a 

 free library) " the reader is informed of a movement on foot in 

 Ealing for a memorial to the memory of Huxley. With glad- 

 ness I hasten to contribute my mite," and concludes an able, if 

 lengthy, epistle as follows: "I enclose a postal order for is. 



