64 
NATURE 
[ NOVEMBER 19, 1903 
Bushmanland division of Namaqualand has been created a 
game reserve, in which it is unlawful to kill, hunt, or trap 
any description of game animal. Despite the Boer war, 
certain species of antelope, which have long been on the 
verge of extermination, still survive. Blesbok, for instance, 
are stated to be represented by about 650 head in the Steyns- 
burg division, and bontebok by some 250 in Bredasdorp 
and 25 in Swellendam. Reedbuck include about 200 head 
in Komgha, where they are specially protected, and 50 in 
Kimberley. Nothing is, however, said with regard to the 
white-tailed gnu, has been reported extinct, the 
““ wildbeest ’’ referred to being apparently the brindled gnu. 
Of zebra about 340 individuals survive, mostly in Cradock, 
George, Oudtshoorn, and Uniondale. 
which 
WE have on our table two parts (vol. Ixxv., i. and ii.) 
of the Zeitschrift fiir wissenschaftliche Zoologie, from 
among the contents of which a few articles are selected 
for brief mention. In the first part the light-organs of the 
receive attention at the hands of Mr. J. 
Bongardt, while Mr. Haack treats of the glands in the 
mouth of the lampreys. In the second part Dr. E. Rohde 
continues the account of his important investigations into 
the structure of the organic cell, discussing, in this in- 
stance, the structure and mode of division of the wandering 
bodies known as ‘* spheres ’’ and ‘‘ centrosomes ’? which 
are found moving free in many cells and their nuclei. The 
gill-filters of fresh-water fishes form the subject of an 
article by Dr. E. Zander. It is shown that while carni- 
vorous types like the pike have the inner sides of the gill- 
arches, the bones of the branchio-palatal apparatus, and 
the pharyngeals studded with minute villiform teeth, in 
forms like the perch, carps, and herrings there is a strongly 
developed sieve-like appendage (‘‘ Siebfortsdtze ’’) on both 
branches of the gill-arches. The fineness of this filtering 
arrangement is correlated with the habitat and food of the 
groups in which it occurs, attaining its extreme develop- 
ment in this respect in those subsisting on ‘‘ plankton.” 
glow-worm 
To the Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and 
Sciences a list of new flowering plants obtained from Mexico 
and Central America is contributed by Miss J. Greenman. 
Most of the species belong to the Sympetala, so that they 
do not overlap with those recorded by Dr. J. N. Rose, which 
would be mainly included in the Archichlamydez. 
A comparison of the characters of the European and 
Australian Alpine floras is made by Mr. Weinsdorfer in the 
Victortan Naturalist. Flowers in the Australian Alps dis- 
play less brilliancy of colour and are not so strongly scented, 
both of which facts may be correlated with the paucity of 
insects, but a longer vegetative period and a lower summer 
mean temperature must also tend to diminish the marked 
characters which are developed at high altitudes. 
THE report of the Meteorological Service of Canada for 
the year ending December 31, 1901, by Mr. R. F. Stupart, 
the director of the department, has been received from 
Ottawa. The volume runs to 370 foolscap pages of meteor- 
ological statistics. 
Messrs. Crospy Lockwoop anv Son have published a 
second edition of Mr. Tyson Sewell’s ‘‘ Elements of 
Electrical Engineering,’’ which was reviewed in our issue 
for November 20, 1902. The second edition has been re- 
vised, and three chapters dealing with alternating currents 
have been added. 
A copy of the seventh volume of the Transactions of the 
Rochdale Literary and Scientific Society has been received. 
It contains an account of the proceedings of the Society for 
NO. 1777, VOL. 69] 
the years 1900-1903, as well as a number of the papers 
read. before the association during these sessions. The 
Society is to be congratulated upon its flourishing condition, 
both as regards its activity and finances. The Transactions 
are published by Mr. James Clegg, of Rochdale, at 2s. 6d. 
In the review of Prof. Henrici’s ‘‘ Vectors and Rotors ”’ 
in NATURE of October 29 (p. 617), it was mentioned that 
Prof. A. Lodge had suggested the use of the word ** locor ”” 
to indicate a vector which has definite position, but does 
not indicate rotation or any rotative function. Prof. R. H. 
Smith writes to say that the word ** locor ”’ is used in this 
way throughout his book ‘* Graphics,’’ published by Messrs. 
Longmans in 1888, ‘‘ rotor’’ being used for rotative 
quantities. 
Parts g and 1o of the first volume of the Bulletin of the 
Department of Agriculture in Jamaica are devoted to the 
consideration of the best means of improving the breed of 
horses in the island 
We have just received the report for 1902-3 of the work 
done in the Government Laboratory at Trinidad under the 
direction of Prof. Carmody. The results of a large number 
of seedling cane experiments, showing the relative sucrose 
value of different form a special feature of the 
report. 
canes, 
A REMARKABLY graphic map of the British Empire, devised 
by Mr. Stephen Smith, is published in the October number 
of the Geographical Teacher. This map shows the British 
lands each in proportion to its area, and in such a position 
that the direction and distance from London are approxi- 
mately correct. Somewhat similar results are obtained by 
drawing a hemisphere on an equal area projection’ with 
London in the centre, if Australasia is tacked on. Other 
ways of securing equivalence of area are the Mollweide and 
the Sanson-Flamsteed projections, where the world is 
shown within an oval framework. Such an oval map of 
the British Empire has lately been published by Messrs. 
Darbishire and Stanford, Ltd., Oxford. 
THe question of space interference, a phenomenon first 
observed by V. Meyer in the case of ortho-substituted 
aromatic acids which can only be esterified with great 
difficulty, and in some cases not at all, is discussed by Prof. 
Skraup in connection with the cinchonine alkaloids. This 
paper, which indicates that the alkaloids 
a-i-cinchonine, -i-cinchonine, and _ allo- 
probably no fundamentally different 
structure, but the reactions of which differ in 
certain respects by reason of space interference, appears in 
vol. xlii. of the Sitsungsberichte der Wiener Akademie. 
interesting 
cinchonine, 
cinchonine 
chemical 
have 
In the current number of the Zeitschrift fiir physikalische 
Chemie, Prof. van ’t Hoff gives an account of the investi- 
gations which have been going on for some years in his 
laboratory relative to the transformations of gypsum. It 
is shown that gypsum CaSO,.2H,O changes at 107° C. into 
the so-called half-hydrate 2CaSO,.H,O. At this tempera- 
ture, however, these two bodies are only meta-stable, for 
at 93° gypsum changes into the soluble form of anhydrite 
CaSO,, which itself is in reality not stable, for under favour- 
able conditions gypsum actually breaks up at 63°-5, and 
forms insoluble anhydrite found in nature and _ identical 
with dead-burnt gypsum. The laboratory investigation of 
these changes is rendered extremely difficult by the occur- 
rence of retardation phenomena analogous to supercooling 
and supersaturation. 
