June 7, 1883] 



NA TURE 



i33 



the " tornadoes " of the Gold Coast (which are merely 

 severe squalls) a fall of the barometer occurs. In some 

 squalls, especially in the Indian and China seas, a change 

 of wind occurs to nearly an opposite point of the compass, 

 and in these instances there is sometimes a diminution of 

 pressure : during the passage of the squall. These squalls 

 I should regard as small typhoons. 



The clouds which mark the front of an actual typhoon, 

 as described by Dampier- and subsequent navigators, 

 seem to be very similar to those which accompany the 

 true squall, wherever observed. These consist of a dense 

 curtain of ice-cloud in the higher regions of the atmo- 

 sphere, usually permeated, except in the extreme rear, 

 by mountainous cumuli from beneath, and having, when 

 viewed at a distance, a very white and shining appear- 

 ance. In the final stage of the squall, when it is di- 

 minishing in seventy, these cumuli commonly disappear. 

 A watchful outlook for these clouds, not least of all when 

 coming off a high windward shore, may save many sailing 

 vessels, as it might in all probability have saved the 

 Eurydice, from destruction. W. Clement Ley 



NOTES 



As we anticipated some weeks ago (p. 41), Prof. Lord 

 Rayleigh has been nominated by the Council of the British 

 Association as President for the Meeting at Montreal in 1884. 

 The death of the late Prof. H. J. S. Smith having caused a 

 vacancy among the vice-presidents elected at Southampton for 

 the meeting at Southport in the present year, the Council have 

 nominated Dr. J. M. Dawson, C.M.G., F. R.S., Principal of 

 McGill College, Montreal, to be a vice-president. 



Prof. Huxley's Rede Lecture will have for its subject "The 

 Origin of the Existing Forms of Animal Life : Construction or 

 Evolution?" It will be delivered in the Senate House (Cam- 

 bridge) on Tuesday next at noon. 



The death is announced of M. Charles Bresse, on May 22, at 

 the age of sixty-one years. He was, since 1855, Professor of 

 Mechanics in the School of the Ponts et Chaussees, and also for 

 the last few years at the Ecole Polytechnique. 



A series of conferences will be held in connection with the 

 Fisheries Exhibition, in which the foreign commissioners, jurors, 

 and others connected with or visiting the Exhibition, will be 

 invited to take part. The first meeting of the Congress will be 

 held on Monday, June 18, at 12 noon, when Prof. Huxley will 

 deliver an introductory address. H.R.H. the Prince of Wales, 

 K.G., has graciously consented to read a paper by H.R.H. the 

 Duke of Edinburgh, K.G., entitled " Notes on the Sea Fisheries 

 and Fishing Population of the United Kingdom," on Tuesday, 

 June 19, at 12 o'clock. At all other conferences, the chair will 

 be taken by the appointed chairman at 1 1 o'clock a.m. precisely. 

 Paper.-, will be read, and discussions on them will follow. The 

 conferences will be held on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and 

 Fridays. 



The Company of Grocers have announced as the matter of 

 competition for the first quadrennial discovery prize of icoo/. 

 the following problem : — "To discover a method by which the 

 vaccine contagium may be cultivated apart from the animal 

 body, in some medium or media not otherwise zymotic : the 

 method to be such that the contagium may by means of it be 

 multiplied to an indefinite extent in successive generations, and 

 that the product after any number of such generations shall (so 

 far as can within the time be tested) prove itself of identical 

 potency with standard vaccine lymph." The prize is open to 

 universal competition, British and foreign. Competitors for the 

 prize must submit their respective treatises on or before Decem- 



1 Schiick. AnnaieH dcr Hydrographic. March. 1877 ; Quart. Jour/t. 

 Met.Soc.voV'vi p. 78. * "Voyages.* ii. 36. 



ber 31, 1886, and the award will be made not later than May, 

 '887. In relation to this prize, as in relation to other parts of 

 th<; Company's scheme in aid of sanitary science, the Court acts 

 with the advice of a scientific committee which at present con- 

 sists of the following members :— Me>srs. John Simon, F.R.S., 

 John Tyndall, F.K.S., John Burdon Sanderson, M.D., F.R.S., 

 and George Buchanan, M.D., F.R.S. 



A corresponden r in Wet Australia writes to us that the 

 Exploring Expedition to Kimberly District, North-West Aus- 

 tralia, to which Mr. E. T. Hardman, of the Geological Survey 

 or Ireland, is attached as geologist, reached Roebuck Bay, 

 Kimberly (Iat. iS° 10' S., long. 122° E.) on April 9, after a 

 favourable voyage from Fremantle of ten days ; all well, with 

 the exception of a native who, in a fit of delirium, jumped over- 

 board and was lost. Mr. Hardman proceeds with Mr. John 

 Forrest, Surveyor-General, a well-known and experienced ex- 

 plorer, on a preliminary examination of the district for some 

 months, and will then accompany the main party about to make 

 a trigonometrical survey of the country along the Fitzroy River 

 traced in 1S79 by Mr. Alexander Forre--t. The party, which 

 consists of thirty-two, all told, with fifty horses, left Fremantle 

 in the Mactdon, on March 25, but were shipwrecked on Rottnest 

 Island, and subsequently went on in the steamer Rob Roy. The 

 field-work will be continued until the middle of next November, 

 and will probably be resumed next year. Previous explorers 

 pronounce this district to be one of the best in West Australia. 



We have received a communication from Herr Sophus Trom- 

 holt, dated B .ssekop, May iS, in which he informs us that his 

 work at Kautokeino having been finished he has paid a visit 

 both to the Finnish station at Sodankyla and the Norwegian at 

 Bossekop. Herr Tromholt now intends to proceed to Bergen, 

 and promises, when settled, to send an account to Nature of his 

 final researches on the aurora borealis. He states, however, that at 

 neither of the above-mentioned stations has any photograph of 

 the aurora been obtained. Next winter, Herr Tromholt informs 

 us, he will spend in Iceland, in order to proceed with his 

 studies of the aurora borealis there, chiefly on the principle 

 laid down by Prof. Lemstrom, and with the apparatus invented 

 by the latter. 



Sir John Lubbock has given notice that he intends on 

 Friday three weeks to draw attention to the fact that the Minister 

 « hose duty it is to bring forward the Educational Estimates has 

 no power to appoint officers, and to move that it is de-irable 

 that there should be a separate department of education. 



It is stated that M. Jules Verne, the world-known novelist, 

 will offer himself as a candidate to fill the chair vacated 

 in the Academie Franchise by the recent death of M. Jule- 

 Sandeau. 



An Exhibition of Hygienic Dress and Sanitary Appliances, 

 intended to illustrate as far as possible the aims and objects of 

 the National Health Society, was opened by the Lord Mayor 

 on Saturday afternom, in Humphreys Hall, Knightsbridge. 

 The Exhibition, which will continue for a fortnight, includes 

 cloihing, food products, everything connected with the sanita- 

 tion of the house and hygienic decoration, appliances for the 

 sick-room, home nursing, and home education, industrial dwell- 

 ing and cottage hygiene, heating, lighting, and cooking appa- 

 ratus, fuel, &c. Perhaps, however, the greatest attention will 

 be devoted to the stands of the Rational Dress Society, and 

 another close to it, where are shown examples of ladies' dresses 

 made on purely hygienic principles. 



Tourists with entomological proclivities who may be about 

 to visit the Alps, Pyrenees, Norway, or other parts of Europe, 

 will find Dr. H. C. Lang's " Butterflies of Europe" (L. Reeve 



