57: 



NA TURE 



[October 3, 1901 



is granted by the State. In Denmark, 108,000/. is granted ; in 

 Canada, 156,000/. ; and in the United States, 26,000/. More- 

 over, a comparison of the assistance given to agriculture with 

 that given to the towns shows that out of the Science and Art 

 grants given by the Board of Education, no less than 505/. 

 out of 506/. goes to the towns, and only i/. to the rural popula- 

 tion. Referring to the value of agricultural colleges and 

 scientific work to the practical farmer, Mr. Hanburj- remarked 

 that it was sometimes asked, What is the good of science ? He 

 took science to mean this, however practical a man might be, 

 it was impossible for him, in his own experience, to have learned 

 everything. What science meant was, that other people had 

 been experimenting, and had found that those experiments had 

 been a success, and that it made money to work in that way. 

 He therefore asked them not to be afraid of the word 

 " science " ; and, above all, not to think, because they were 

 practical men, that they knew everything, for there was no 

 trade in the world in which there was any man who had 

 occupied the whole region of science, or the whole region of 

 knowledge. He thought they made a mistake in making 

 experiments over and over again. He was a little afraid the 

 County Councils, in too many instances, were going over the 

 same ground over and over again. What was to be of some 

 use to farmers was that those experiments had been made, and 

 the results proved to be true. He should like to see more 

 demonstrations made all over the country — not mere pocket 

 handkerchief demonstrations over a small field, but, if they were 

 to be any good, over several fields of a farm. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIAL. 



American Jotirnalof Mathematics, vol. xxiii. No. 4. — Memoir 

 on the algebra of symbolic logic is the second part of a paper 

 by Mr. A. N. Whitehead, which treats of the theory of substi- 

 tutions under the heads, types of transformation, relations be- 

 tween the coefficients of a substitution, the reverse substitution, 

 the group of substitutions, substitutions satisfying special condi- 

 tions, congruence of functions, the identical group of a function, 

 and common subgroups of identical groups. — Secular perturba- 

 tions of the planets, by G. W. Hill, follows up Halphen's 

 presentation of Gauss' procedure ( Wcrke, vol. iii. pp. 33 1 -35 5). 

 The author thinks that, though a remarkable degree of elegance 

 is attained by Halphen's changes, additional statements are 

 needed to show the connection with the astronomical problem 

 which originally suggested the investigation ; for Halphen, like 

 Gauss, treats only the attraction of a certain form of ring. This 

 ignores the second integration which the problem demands. 

 The present memoir attempts to supply the lacuna. — Repre- 

 sentation of linear groups as transitive substitution groups, by 

 L. E. Dickson, is a piece of work on the well-known lines of 

 this mathematician. — .\ class of number- systems in six units, 

 by G. P. Starkweather, is a further contribution to the same 

 subject which was treated of by the author in vol. xxi. No. 4. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 



P.\KIS. 

 Academy of Sciences, September 16. — M. Bouquet de 

 la Grye in the chair. — Demonstration and use of the formula.' 

 relating to the refractometer, by M. A. Cornu.— On the elastic 

 arch, by M. G. Poisson. — On the simultaneous employment of 

 multiplex and ordinary telegraphy in the same circuit, by 

 M. E. Mercadier.— On the molecular weight of chloral hydrate 

 at the temperature of its boiling point, by M. de Forcrand. 

 By a discussion of thermochemicaldata the author arrives at the 

 conclusion that at the boiling point chloral hydrate is not totally 

 dissociated, from 4 to 5 per cent, remaining undissociated.— On 

 dunite from Koswinsky-Kamen, in the Ural, by MM. K. Duparc 

 and F. Pearce. The results of a microscopical and chemical 

 study of the dunites from this district.— A new cave with 

 drawings on its walls of the Palajolilhic period, by M.M. L. 

 Capitan and H. Breuil. An account of the discovery of a cave 

 situated at Combarelles, in Tayac (Dordogne), about two kilo- 

 metres from the Mouthe cave. The cave is about 225 metres 

 long, and about 119 metres from the entrance drawings can be 

 seen on the walls, which continue to the end of the cave. They 

 are engraved upon a cretaceous rock, but the greater number 

 are covered with a stalagmitic deposit, which is sometimes so 

 thick that the lines cannot be seen through it. No less than 

 109 figures can be clearly made out, including drawings of the 



NO. 1666, VOL. 64] 



horse, cow, bison, reindeer, mammoth, and wild goat. It 

 would appear that these drawings, the antiquity of which cannot 

 be doubted, could only have been executed by artists reproducing 

 animals that they saw. Hence they are clearly Palaolithic, and 

 go back to the epoch when the mammoth and the reindeer lived 

 in France. — Luminous rays diverging at iSo' from the sun, by 

 M. Jean Mascart. 



September 23. — Binary systems and couples of kinematic 

 elements, by NL G. Koenigs. — Lecithin in tuberculosis, by 

 MM. H. Claude and \. Zaky. Experiments on animals and 

 on man showed that lecithin, owing to its specific action on the 

 elimination of phosphates by the urine, has a remarkable action 

 on the nutritive exchanges, and it must be considered as a 

 valuable adjunct to the various modes of treatment of tuber- 

 culosis. — On the ravages of the pyralis in the Beaujolais, and on 

 the destruction of the night moths by means of luminous traps 

 fed with acetylene, by MM. G. Gastine and V. Vermorel. 

 The traps consisted of b asins containing water covered with a 

 layer of oil, above the centre of which was placed a small acetyl- 

 ene lamp to attract the insects. By this method between 

 August 13 and 31 no less than 1 70,000 pyrales were destroyed. — 

 The distribution of acidity in the stem, leaf, and flower, by M. 

 A. Astruc. The acidity of the stem diminishes with the dis- 

 tance from the top. In the case of the leaves the acidity is 

 greatest in the youngest leaves, and in general it is always the 

 youngest parts of the plaht which present the maximum acidity. 

 — A new cave with figures on its walls of the Paleolithic period, 

 by MM. L. Capitan and H. Breuil. A description of the draw- 

 ings on walls of a cave at Font-de-Gauine, situated in the valley 

 of the Beune, about two kilometres from the cave of Combarelles. 

 The drawings consist largely of animals, of species resembling 

 those represented in the cave of Combarelles. These drawings 

 are noteworthy for the fact that difterent colours have been used, 

 black, red, and brown. They are probably not so ancient as 

 the drawings on the walls of the cave at Combarelles. 



New South Wales. 

 Royal Society, August 7. — Prof. T. W. Edgeworth David, 

 F. R.S. , vice-president, in the chair. — Notes on some analyses 

 of air from coal mines, by A. A. Atkinson and F. B. Guthrie. 

 The authors gave the analyses of several samples of air from the 

 return air-ways at Wallsend and Burwood collieries, and of 

 gases produced by fires in the Gunnedah and Greta collieries, 

 the latter was an old gob. fire. The analyses were compared 

 with published analyses of air in the return- ways of English 

 collieries made by Dr. Haldane, and the question of the effects 

 of diminution of oxygen, presence of carbonic acid, black-damp 

 and other injurious gases found in the air of coal-mines, discussed 

 in relation to their action on men and lights. — Symmetrically 

 distorted crystals of Cassiterite from Western Australia, by 

 W. G. Woolnough. 



CONTENTS. PAGE 



A Scientific Engineer 549 



North American Insects 549 



Our Book Shelf:— 



Watts: " Nature Teaching" 550 



" Cassell's Eyes and No Eyes Series " 550 



Letter to the Editor : — 



Long-tailed Japanese Fowls.— Frank Finn .... 551 



Prof, a! F. W." Schimper • . . 551 



Notes 552 



Our Astronomical Column : — 



Diameter of Venus 556 



Spectrum and Appearance of Nova Persei 556 



Elements of Comet 1901 1 557 



The Glasgow Meeting of the British Association : — 



Section K.— Botany.— Opening Address by Prof. 



I. Bayley Balfour, F.R.S., President of the 



Section 557 



Section L.— Education.— Opening Address by the 

 Right Hon. Sir John E. Gorst, F.R.S., 



President of the Section 562 



Geology at the British Association 564 



Zoology of the Twentieth Century. By Prof. C. B. 



Davenport 566 



The Carnegie Technical School at Pittsburg ... 570 



University and Educational Intelligence 571 



Scientific Serial , . , . 572 



Societies and Academies 572 



