33° 



NA rURE 



[August i, 1901 



MISS ELEANOR A. ORMEROD. 



UNIVERSAL regret will be felt at the death of al- 

 most our only prominent lady entomologist, and 

 nur best authority on farm and garden entomology. Miss 

 Otnierod was born at Sedbury, in Gloucestershire, and 

 breathed her last on July 19, 1901. in her seventy-fourth 

 year, at Torrington House, St. Albans, where she re- 

 sided for some years with her sister, Miss Georgiana 

 Elizabeth Ormerod, who died in 1896 at the age of 

 seventy-three. 



At tlie time when Miss Eleanor Ormerod turned her 

 attention to injurious insects, no popular English work 

 existed on the subject ; for Curtis's " Farm Insects " was 

 too large and costly for wide circulation. We do not know 

 if Mr. E. A. Fitch, who had been projecting a work on the 

 subject himself, suggested it to Miss Ormerod, or whether 

 the initiative came from her; but in 1877 appeared 

 the first part of the well-known " Notes of Observations. of 

 Injurious Insects," by E. A. Ormerod, T. A. Preston and 

 E. A. Fitch. About this time Mr. Fitch found that 

 pressure of business prevented him from giving much 

 attention to entomology ; but for twenty three years 

 afterwards appeared annual reports, under the editorship 

 of Miss E. A. Ormerod, embodying the observations of 

 a great number of observers on those species of insects 

 which had been most destructive, or which had attracted 

 special attention during each year. From time to time 

 she published detached observations in different journals 

 on subjects of much importance connected with her 

 favourite subject, supplementary or preliminary to her 

 reports, and she also published several books which had 

 a wide circulation, and some of which went through 

 several editions. Among the most important of her 

 separate works are the following : — " A Manual of 

 Injurious Insects, with Methods of Prevention and 

 Remedy for their Attacks to Food Crops, Forest Trees 

 and Fruit, and with short Introduction to Entomology" 

 (first edition, 1881) ; "Guide to Methods of Insect Life, 

 and Prevention and Remedy of Insect Ravage" (1S84) ; 

 republished in 1892 under the title of "A Text-book of 

 Agricultural Entomology" ; "Notes and Descriptions of 

 a few Injurious Farm and Fruit Insects of South Africa, 

 compiled by E. A. Ormerod, F.R.Met.Soc, &c., with 

 Descriptions and Identifications of the Insects by 

 Oliver E. Janson '' (1889) ; and "A Handbook of Insects 

 injurious to Orchard and Bush Fruits, with Means of 

 Prevention and Remedy '' (1S98). 



Miss E. .A. Ormerod was assisted in her work by her 

 sister Georgiana, who was likewise an ardent entomologist, 

 though we are not aware that she ever published any- 

 thing under her own name. Both the sisters were 

 Fellows of the Entomological Society of London, having 

 joined in 1878 and 1880 respectively, and at one period 

 they were regular attendants at the meetings. For some 

 years Miss E. A. Ormerod held the appointment of con- 

 sulting entomologist to the Royal Agricultural Society. 

 She was also an examiner in agricultural entomology to 

 the University of Edinburgh ; and in 1900 that body 

 conferred upon her the honorary degree of D.C.L. 



W. F. K. 



NOTES. 



The French Minister of War has asked the Paris Academy 

 of Sciences to give an opinion as to the possibility of 

 danger arising from the establishment of wireless tele- 

 graphy stations in the neighbourhood of magazines con- 

 taining powder or other explosives. It is suggested that 

 the nature of the cases containing the explosive may be 

 an important matter for consideration in connection with 

 the subject. 



NO. 1657, VOL. 64] 



Three prizes have been offered to the Marine Biological 

 Association of the West of Scotland by Sir John Murray, 

 K.C.B., in memory of the late Mr. Fred. P. Pullar, who was 

 associated with him in the bathymetrical survey of the Scottish 

 fresh water lochs, and lost his life on Airthrey Loch, Bridge of 

 Allan, in February last. There will be a prize of 50/. for a 

 paper on each of the following subjects : — (i) The seasonal dis- 

 tribution and development of pelagic algoe in the waters of the 

 Clyde sea area. (2) The reproduction, development and dis- 

 tribution in the Clyde sea area of the genera Nyctiphanes and 

 Boreophausia. (3) The formation and distribution of glauconite 

 in the deposits of the Clyde sea area and llie adjacent seas of 

 Scotland. These prizes are open to investigators from any part 

 of the world who conduct observations in the several subjects 

 at the Millport Marine Station, and who produce, at any time 

 before January I, 1905, papers which, in the opinion of a com- 

 mittee of three scientific men, to be nominated by the committee 

 of the Association and by Sir John Murray, shall be deemed of 

 sufficient value to merit- publication. The honorary secretary of 

 the Association is Mr. John A. Todd, 190, West George Street, 

 Glasgow. 



The anfiual meeting of the British Medical Association 

 was opened at Cheltenham en Tuesday, when Dr. G. B. 

 Ferguson, the president, delivered an address on " Scientific 

 Research as the ' Indispensable Basis of all Medical and 

 Material Progress." In the course of his remarks, Dr. 

 Ferguson said that medical progress owed more to the 

 biologists and to the men of pure science than to the so- 

 called practical men. The cell theory, for instance, originated 

 entirely with the biologists. It led up to bacteriology, the 

 most imposing and the most impressive department of medical 

 biology. Bacteriology itself now rested on cultivation and 

 staining ; and if year by year more and more of the germs of 

 disease were recognised, it was because of the improved methods 

 of colouring and making them visible. All this strengthened 

 his contention that the basis of modern medicine was essentially 

 scientific. Then in surgery the discovery of the Rontgen rays 

 had been of priceless benefit, but most certainly Rontgen was 

 thinking of nothing less than of surgery when he made that 

 discovery. Antitoxins, which are among the most valuable 

 resources of remedial art, medical men owed to strictly 

 scientific investigators. Personally, he placed much faith in 

 the anti-typhoid inoculations of Prof. Wright, of Netley, 

 and in the anti-tetanus serum, and he felt sure that many 

 more equally effective means would soon be available. Dr. 

 Ferguson next recalled the splendid work — purely scientific 

 again — of the French and Italian investigators of malaria, to- 

 gether with Major Ronald Ross, Dr. Manson, and other 

 English observers, by whom the mosquito theory had been 

 worked out. Turning to ophthalmology, he asked what would 

 have been its state to-day without the invention of the ophthalmo- 

 scope by the physicist Helniholtz. Then there was the marvel- 

 lously successful treatment of lupus by the chemical rays of the 

 electric arc devised by Finsen, of Copenhagen. And where would 

 medical men be without the chemists, who had provided iodine, 

 bromine, iodoform, chloroform, chloral and cocaine ? As the 

 result of several visits to the continental capitals he had been 

 struck with the thoroughness and scientific spirit everywhere 

 there manifested, very different from the anti-scientific spirit 

 characterising most of the wealthier and more cultivated classes 

 in this country. France, Germany and the United States edu- 

 cated at their Universities approximately one student in every 

 1500 of the population, but we were content with less than one 

 in 2000. Vet the matter was one of life or death for the country, 

 for more and more every year the victory and the predominance 

 would pass to the possessors of the latest knowledge, the 

 deepest science and the most perfect and economical processes. 



