October 13, 1904] 



NA TURE 



581 



According to the Paris correspondent of the Daily 

 Chronicle, Dr. Laveran, of the Pasteur Institute, has dis- 

 covered a remedy for sleeping sickness, and has already tried 

 it with success upon animals previously inoculated with the 

 disease. 



.\t the meeting of the Royal Microscopical Society on 

 Wednesday, October 19, a demonstration entitled " The 

 Re-construction of a Fossil Plant " will be given by the 

 president, Dr. Dukinfield H. Scott, F.R.S. 



A Reuter telegram from Paris states that a radiographic 

 station has been opened at Ushant for the purpose of com- 

 municating with ships at sea. The station will transmit 

 messages from the mainland, and will receive messages for 

 addresses in France, Algeria, Tunis, Monaco, and Andorra. 



The Chemist and Druggist states that a congress of 

 chemistry and pharmacy, organised under the auspices of 

 the Pharmaceutical Association of Liege and the Chemical 

 Society of Belgium, will be held in connection with the 

 International Exposition to be held at Li^ge in July, 1905. 

 Communications should be addressed to one of the secre- 

 taries, M. J. Raymond, i6 Place des Carmes, Lifege, or 

 M. J. Wauters, 83 rue Souveraine, Brussels. 



The Childhood Society announces that a course of four 

 public lectures will be delivered at the Parkes Museum, 

 Margaret Street, \V., on Thursday evenings at 8 p.m. The 

 dates, subjects, and lecturers are : — on October 20, discussion 

 on physical deterioration, to be opened by Mr. E. W. 

 Brabrook, C.B. ; on October 27, physical condition of work- 

 ing class children, by Dr. T. J. Macnamara, M.P. ; on 

 November 10, mental hygiene in childhood, by Dr. T. B. 

 Hyslop ; and on November 24, education of girls, by Miss 

 M. E. Findlay. 



The session of the London School of Tropical Medicine 

 was opened on Friday last with an inaugural address by 

 Sir Charles Bruce, G.C.M.G., ex-Governor of Mauritius, 

 Sir John Craggs presiding. Sir Charles Bruce detailed 

 some of his e.xperiences in the colonies, and gave interest- 

 ing particulars, from the layman's point of view, of tropical 

 diseases with which he had come in contact, notably the 

 remarkable outbreaks of malaria and of surra in Mauritius. 

 Sir Patrick Manson, in the course of proposing a vote of 

 thanks, directed attention to the munificence of Sir John 

 Craggs in giving a scholarship and prize to the school, and 

 expressed a hope that funds for endowment might soon be 

 forthcoming. 



I.N the October number of the Century Magazine Mr. 

 Gilbert Grosvenor, in an article entitled " Inoculating the 

 Ground," describes the method of preparing and using the 

 cultures of nitrifying micro-organisms which are now being 

 employed as fertilisers under the name of nitragin ; photo- 

 graphs are given of two plots side by side, one of which 

 had been planted with inoculated and the other with un- 

 inoculated seeds, also of the average plants from each plot. 

 There is a surprising difference between the two, the crop 

 from the inoculated plot being much the more lu.xuriant, 

 and Mr. Grosvenor expresses the opinion that there is not 

 a section of the United States which will not profit by the 

 use of nitragin. 



The New York correspondent of the Lancet announces 

 that the Bureau of Chemistry of the National Department 

 of Agriculture is about to establish a laboratory in New 

 York for the examination of imported foods and the detec- 

 tion of adulterations and imperfections. The occasion 

 NO. 1824, VOL. 70] 



which led the national authorities to create this laboratory 

 was the result of a recent investigation which proved that 

 in the last two months three shiploads of food products 

 imported into New York were returned to the ports whence 

 they came on account of the adulterations found. The new 

 law requiring a thorough examination of the food products 

 imported into the United States is being rigidly enforced, 

 and this new laboratory is a proof that the investigation 

 is to be on a large scale. 



We have seen with regret the announcement of the death 

 of Mrs. Isabella Bishop, the well known traveller and author, 

 at the age of seventy-two. Mrs. Bishop was the eldest 

 daughter of the Rev. Edward Bird, and became a traveller 

 on account of her continued ill-health. A visit to Prince 

 Edward Island resulted in her first book of travel. Later 

 sea voyages were ordered to the Mediterranean, America, 

 .Australia, and New Zealand, and Miss Bird returned by way 

 of the Sandwich Islands, w'hcre she spent some months, and 

 she also visited the Rocky Mountains, describing her 

 adventures in two books which were published in 1873 and 

 1874. Miss Bird next began her travels in the East. She 

 seems to have been the first European woman who made her 

 way into the heart of Japan, and her " Unbeaten Tracks 

 in Japan " (1880) records her experiences. Her " Journeys 

 in Persia and Kurdistan," in two volumes, appeared in 

 1892 — the year when she w'as elected the first lady fellow 

 of the Royal Geographical Society — and " Among the 

 Tibetans " in 1894. In 1896 she published an interesting 

 collection of photographs which she had herself taken in 

 western China and Korea. Her travels in Korea, Siberia, 

 and China lasted for three years, and their results are 

 shown in " Korea and her Neighbours " (1898). Since then 

 have appeared from her pen " The Yangtse Valley and 

 Beyond " (1899), and " Pictures from China " (1900). 



Prof. Friedrich Ratzel, whose death occurred on 

 .'\ugust 9, was one of the foremost in the band of ardent 

 geographical students who have done so much, on the 

 Continent at least, to win for their subject recognition, both 

 as a valuable intellectual discipline and as a fundamental 

 part of the training of all who aspire to a leading place in 

 public affairs. W'hile not confining himself to any one 

 branch of the subject, it is as an exponent of the geography 

 of man that Ratzel will be principally remembered. By his 

 development and clearer definition of the principles 

 enunciated by Carl Ritter and his school, of the influence 

 exercised throughout human history by natural environ- 

 ment, he may almost be said to have created a new depart- 

 ment of study, which, under the somewhat clumsy name 

 of anthropogeography, has taken a firm hold in the 

 educational curricula not only of Germany, but of France 

 and other European countries, while his influence has like- 

 wise been felt, if in a less degree, in our own country. 

 Brought up as an apothecary's assistant, Ratzel seized every 

 opportunity of improving his scientific knowledge, zoology 

 being in these early days his favourite study. But it was 

 as a travelling correspondent (1869-75) '" central and 

 southern Europe, in the United States, Mexico, and the 

 West Indies that his geographical leanings first found 

 .scope, the utilisation of which brought him eventually, as 

 university professor, to the distinguished chair at Leipzig, 

 where for the rest of his life he continued to exercise a 

 predominant influence on the progress of higher geo- 

 graphical education in Germany. In addition to his 

 " Anthropogeographie, " by which he is perhaps best known, 

 Ratzel was the author of important works on the United 

 States, on the races of man, and on political geography 

 from the comparative standpoint. 



