352 



NA TURE 



[August 1 1, 1904 



ment of cacao canker has occupied considerable attention, 

 also the value of different manures for tea plantations, and 

 of green manures generally. The branch garden at 

 Nuwara Eliya has been utilised for the purpose of experi- 

 menting with grasses and fruit trees upon the patana soil, 

 and a new area of 150 acres has been reserved in the dry 

 zone at Mahailuppalana, where cotton has already been 

 planted, and later the cultivation of rubber and cacao under 

 irrigation will be tried. The Government chemist, Mr. 

 Kelway Bamber, has made an important discovery of a 

 trustworthy test which will determine the amount of 

 adulteration in citronella oil. 



It is instructive to have the opinion of a zoologist on the 

 results obtained by Prof, de Vries in his experiments on the 

 production of new plant species. Prof. A. W. Hubrecht 

 has contributed a critical review to the Popular Science 

 Monthly for July which is interesting not only because it 

 discusses the essential points of de Vries's theory, but also 

 because the writer takes considerable trouble to show that 

 the mutation theory modifies, but is not opposed to, the 

 views expressed in the " Origin of Species." 



In an article contributed to the Journal of Botany (July) 

 Mrs. Gepp contrasts the sporangia of Halimeda gracilis 

 with those of Halimeda Tuna, and describes the methods of 

 communication between the central filaments in the thallus 

 which serve as a basis for a systematic arrangement of 

 the genus. In the same number Canon Lett describes a 

 new hepatic, Adelanthus dugortiensis, from Ireland which 

 appears to represent an ancient flora, since it has affinities 

 with a group of hepatics found in hot climates. 



An elaborately illustrated " Catalogue of E.xhibits of 

 Insect Enemies of Forests and Forest Products " at the 

 Louisiana E.xposition has just been issued by the U.S. De- 

 partment of Agriculture (division of entomology), and will 

 well repay perusal by economic entomologists and all who 

 have to do with forestry operations. The catalogue has two 

 indices, one of scientific and the other of common names. 



The issue of the Proceedings of the Philadelphia Academy 

 for the latter part of April and May contains several papers 

 of interest. Among them is one by Mr. J. P. Moore on 

 polychEetous annelids from California, and a second, by Dr. 

 H. C. Chapman, on the anatomy of the hyrax, in the 

 course of which he raises the question whether the so-called 

 " coney " of the Bible is really the Syrian representative 

 of that group. Of more importance is the article by Mr. 

 A. E. Brown on post-Glacial Nearctic centres of dispersal 

 for reptiles, the title of which has been previously quoted 

 in our columns. The absence in post-Glacial times of a 

 circumpolar reptile fauna renders the retention of a Nearctic 

 and a Palsearctic region convenient when discussing the 

 distribution of this class, although this is no bar to the 

 merging of the two into a Holarctic region for general 

 purposes. Their present distribution points to two post- 

 Glacial centres of dispersal for Nearctic reptiles, one in the 

 south-eastern Austro-riparian, and the other in the Sonoran 

 province, and temperature and humidity have been important 

 factors in regulating such dispersals. 



Vol. xl.. No. 2, of the Proceedings of the American 

 Academy contains an elaborate essay by Mr. G. M. Allen 

 on the heredity of the colour of the coat in domesticated 

 breeds of the common mouse, as illustrative of Mendelian 

 principles. The language now used in studies of this de- 

 scription is so excessively technical that it is almost 



NO. 18 I 5, VOL. 70] 



impossible to give a summary of the author's conclusions 

 which would be intelligible to the ordinary reader. It has 

 been found, however, that complete albinism is a character 

 " recessive " towards pigmentation. The grey of the 

 common mouse (composed of black, chocolate, and yellow) 

 is predominant over the colours of the " fancy " breeds, so 

 that when the latter are crossed with wild mice grey off- 

 spring result. Black mice breed true, and the " golden- 

 agutis " also generally do the same, but may give rise to 

 chocolate forms. The predominant grey may be produced 

 synthetically by crossing blacks with golden-agutis, the 

 three pigments of the former being thus brought together. 

 Finally, black, chocolate, and the golden-aguti strains may 

 be produced by a resolution of the original compound grey. 



Another short communication to hand this week, from 

 Reichenow's Ornithol. Monatsberichte for July and 

 August, contains a continuation of Dr. J. Thienemann's 

 observations on the birds of Rositten, dealing in this instance 

 with the members of the crow family. The author takes 

 the opportunity of thanking all who have assisted him in 

 his investigations, and begs for the continuance of their 

 kind help. 



.Mr. L. W. Lambe has sent us a short extract from the 

 Ottawa Naturalist for 1904 in which he discusses the nature 

 of the squamoso-parietal crest in two species of horned 

 dinosaurs from the Alberta Cretaceous. 



We have received a copy of a paper by Mr. G. H. 

 Carpenter on injurious insects and other animals observed 

 in Ireland during 1903, forming No. 12, part v., of the 

 first volume of Economic Proceedings of the Royal Dublin 

 Society. As was observed during the preceding year, the 

 grubs of crane-flies (Tipulee) are the most serious insect 

 enemies against which the Irish farmer has to contend, 

 although the potato-flea-beetle (Psylliodes affinis) did some 

 amount of harm. 



The contents of the Entomologist for June include de- 

 scriptions of new South American beetles of the genus 

 Chlamys by M. Jacoby, a paper on new African butterflies 

 of the family Lycaenidae by Miss Sharpe, a supplementary 

 list of Lepidoptera from Capri by Mr. C. S. Browne, and 

 the continuation of a paper by Mr. P. Cameron on various 

 new forms of Hymenoptera. 



Prof. Simon Nevvcomb has applied mathematical analysis 

 to an inquiry into the probability of the causes of the pro- 

 duction of sex in human offspring. In the entire Semitic 

 race, over the whole of Europe and America, there is a 

 small and uniform preponderance of male over female births. 

 There is thus on the whole a unisexual tendency in the male 

 direction among parents of the Semitic race. In isolated 

 families the unisexual tendency becomes more marked and 

 may be in either direction ; in some families the offspring 

 may be either mainly male or mainly female. Among the 

 negro race the preponderance of male over female births 

 is either quite small or non-existent. Prof. Newcomb, 

 analysing the data by the method of probabilities, concludes 

 that the sex is not determined at any one moment or by 

 any one act, but is the product of a series of accidental 

 causes, that the functions of the father have probably little 

 influence, the sex being determined wholly by the mother, 

 and that it seems in the highest degree unlikely that there 

 is any way by which a parent can influence the sex of his 

 or her offspring. The first-born child of any mother is more 

 likely to be a male in the proportion of about 8 to 7, and 

 there is probably a smaller preponderance in the case of 



