SeI'TEMBER 2 2, 1904] 



NATURE 



511 



of the atniospherp, in connection with weather recently 

 oxperienced. 



The Biological Survey of the U.S. Department of Agri- 

 culture has issued a Circular (No. 44) giving the names and 

 ^iddresses of oflTK-ials connected with the preservation of 

 birds and game in the United States and Canada. 



\\e have received N'os. 17 and 18 of vol. xlviii. of the 

 Memoirs of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical 

 Society. In the latter Dr. Hoyle gives a diagnostic 

 key to the recenl genera of dibranchiate cephalopods. In 

 (he former Prof. Dawkins describes a molar of the straight- 

 (U'^'ied elephant {Elcplias anliqiitis) from glacial strata at 

 MlacUpool. .\propos of fossil elephants, it may be mentioned 

 that a few days ago workmen disentombed in a sand-pit 

 at Erith an entire skull of a mammoth, which fell to pieces 

 when brought to the surface. This is much to be regretted, 

 as the specimen might doubtless have been saved had 

 palaeontologists been informed of the discovery before 

 attempts were made to remove it from the bed. 



The August number of the Brooklyn Edison, published by 

 (he Edison Electric Illuminating Co., of Brooklyn, New 

 York, contains several striking pictures of decorative and 

 spectacular electric lighting at Coney Island, one of which, 

 from a photograph taken at night, is here reproduced. 

 Within a year (he amount of electric illumination at this 

 famous pleasure resort has more than trebled ; ;inH probably 



a photograph I 



; n.ghi. 



there is not now to be found anywhere in the world a place 

 where the decorative possibilities of the electric incandescent 

 lamp are so strikingly demonstrated. The Brooklyn Edison 

 Co., which has successfully carried out the scheme of light- 

 ing at Coney Island, supplies light and power to an area 

 of seventy-seven square miles and a population of nearly 

 one and a half millions. 



An important discovery in connection with cotton-growing 

 in the southern United States is recorded in Bulletin No. 49 

 of the Entomological Division of the U.S. Department of 

 Agriculture. It appears that an anc has been discovered 

 in Guatemala which preys on the adult cotton boll-weevil 

 (Inthonomus grandis) and thus checks the ravages of this 

 insect, and so permits the grow-ing of cotton in districts 

 where it would otherwise be impossible. It has been found 

 that the kelep, as the ant is called in Guatemala, can be 

 easily removed, and colonies have accordingly been intro- 

 duced into the cotton plantations of Te.xas in the hope of 

 checking the dev.istation caused by the weevil. It only 

 remains to ascertain whether the kelep will he .[ble to with- 

 stand the winter climate of Tesas. 



Tme last published part of liiomctriha contains a valuable 

 paper by Dr. H. E. Crampton demonstrating the existence 

 of natural selection during the pupal stage of Pliilosainia 

 cynthia, a silk-producing mcth. Dr. (raniplcn's i bsrrv- 



KO. 1821, \CL. ;oJ 



ations differ from the experiments conducted by Prof. E. 15. 

 Poulton, Mr. F. Merrifield, and Miss C. Sanders in the 

 fact that his pupx- were not exposed to the attacks of 

 enemies ; so that the elimination, which took place on a 

 large scale, must presumably have been due to internal 

 rather than external causes. In the author's opinion, the 

 actual basis for selection in this particular instance is not 

 use-advantage, but correlation. Prof. Pearson's important 

 Huxley lecture on the inheritance of the mental and moral 

 characters in man has been already noticed in the pages of 

 N.iTURE. An elaborate memoir, illustrated by a very fine 

 series of photographs, on the variation and correlation of 

 the human skull, is contributed by Dr. W. R. Macdonell. 

 The material discussed is the splendid series of skulls dis- 

 covered some eleven years ago in Whitechapel, and now in 

 the possession of Prof. Thane. Dr. Macdonell concludes 

 that these crania, which date most probably from the time 

 of the Great Plague, are in general appearance and bio- 

 metric constants remarkably close to the Long Barrow 

 British As the result of an investigation on inheritance 

 of coat-colour in the greyhound, A. Barrington, A. Lee, 

 and K. Pearson conclude that the ancestral law of de- 

 creasing correlation holds no less for their present material 

 than for man and horse. Prof. Weldon's research on the 

 form of the shell spiral in a race of Clausilia itala failed to 

 disclose the existence of any selective elimination between 

 the voung and the adult stage ; reasons for this result are 

 suggested. The number ends with an elementary proof ot 

 Sheppard's formula:, with which are associated certain other 

 formula; for dealing with the ordinates and adjacent areas 

 of frequency curves. 



Though graphical work is now rightly regarded as an 

 essential part of an elementary course of mathematics, many 

 teachers are still unfamiliar with the new methods and do 

 not comprehend clearly all that is implied in graphs. Ihe 

 '• Solutions of the Examples in Hall's ' Graphical Algebra, 

 by Mr. H. S. Hall, assisted by Mr. H. C. Beaven, just 

 published by Messrs. MacmiUan and Co., Ltd., will be of 

 great service to those teachers and students to whom 

 graphical methods are novel, in showing how problems may 

 be easily and accurately so4ved by plotting graphs. The 

 book will assist the introduction and extension of graphical 

 methods in mathematical classes. 



A CATALOGUE of apparatus for electric heating and cook- 

 ing just issued by Messrs. Isenthal and Co., 85 Mortimer 

 Street, London, W., contains particulars of many attractive 

 ways in which electricity is used for heating purposes. The 

 advantages of electric heating from a hygienic point of view 

 are obvious ; and, economically, the consumption of electric 

 energy is not so excessive as is usually assumed. Messrs. 

 Isenthal's list includes radiators of various types, ornamental 

 stoves, cooking ranges and ovens, appliances for heating 

 and boiling liquids, hot water geysers and cisterns, 

 sterilisers, soldering bits, hot plates for chemical laboratories 

 or photographic purposes, evaporators, and numerous other 

 devices which would add to the comfort and cleanliness of 

 many operations in laboratories as well as in houses. The 

 adaptability of the electric current, and the efficiency of the 

 various forms of apparatus described in Messrs. Isenthal's 

 catalogue, should encourage the use of electric energy as a 

 source of heat. 



In the August number of the Gazzi-lta E. Paterno and 

 E. Pannain have established that, under certain conditions, 

 electrolysis converts potassium cyanide in aqueous solution 

 containing potash completely into cyanate. The latter 

 separates during the electrolysis in a pure state in the form 

 of white crystals. 



