DECEMBER 17, 1903] 
NATURE 
167 
separate morphological entities, are based on an artificial 
conception of the structures involved.—In a paper by Dr. 
Arthur Willey, F.R.S., an account was given of twenty- 
eight species of littoral Polychate worms from South Africa, 
of which four are new. The specimens had been carefully 
prepared, and the author is satisfied with the results. He 
comes to the general conclusion that the annelid fauna of 
the Indo-Pacific region may be said to be composed of an 
assemblage of endemic, Caribbean, and Mediterranean con- 
stituents.—Notes on Myriactis Areschougtt and Cotlodesme 
californica, by Miss May Rathbone. The species of 
Myriactis in question is parasitic on Himanthalia lorea, 
forming very small tufts with a cushion of large torulose 
colourless cells, deeply sunk in the thallus of the host. 
Material was obtained from Cumbrae in March which shows 
penetrating rhizoids belonging to some parasitic alga; they 
start from the base of the cushion and travel far in the 
tissues of the host, and the conclusions of the author are 
that these rhizoids act as stolons for propagating the plant, 
which seems rather to be an endophyte than a parasite. 
Anthropological Institute, December 8.—Mr. H. Balfour, 
president, in the chair.—The Rev. R. A. Bullen exhibited 
a series of polished and other slate implements from Harlyn 
Bay, Cornwall. The implements were found on the site 
of a late Celtic cemetery, the graves of which are lined with 
slate, buried some twelve feet beneath blown sand. Mr. 
Bullen was of opinion that the implements showed unmis- 
takably the hand of man, but, in the discussion which 
followed, Mr. C. H. Read expressed his firm conviction that 
the implements had been worn, not by man, but by the 
sand which for centuries had been drifting continually over 
them. Most of the implements, he considered, were simply 
chippings from the slate linings of the graves, worn by 
the sand to their present shape.—Dr. William Wright read 
a paper on skulls from round barrows in east Yorkshire, 
the skulls in question being now in the Mortimer Museum 
ai Driffield. About eighty of them were examined. The 
interments, from the evidence of the finds, appeared to date 
from the early Iron or late Stone age. As to the skulls 
themselves, Dr. Wright showed that almost every variety 
of cranial shape was found among them, such widely 
different types as Sergi’s Ellipsoides Pelasgicus Longissi- 
mus, Sphenoides Latus, and Cuboides Procerus being pre- 
sent, while the cephalic index ranged from 69 to 92. In 
fact, so varied were the types that Dr. Wright felt that 
it was doubtful whether, in a community of the present 
day, it would be possible to find a more mixed series of 
skulls. 
semblance, in many cases, between the skulls from any one 
barrow, in fact it was so striking that Dr. Wright felt 
inclined to attribute it to the barrows having been family 
burial-grounds. The resemblance was particularly notice- 
able in nine skulls taken from one barrow. Four of these 
had the metopic suture unclosed, and it was interesting, and 
somewhat unexpected, to find that metopism occurred in 
long rather than in broad skulls. The conclusion drawn from 
Dr. Wright’s paper was that Thurnam’s dictum of ‘* round 
barrow round skull ’’ was not even approximately accurate 
so far as skulls from the round barrows in Yorkshire were 
concerned. 
MANCHESTER 
Literary and Philosophical Society, November 17.— 
Prof. H. B. Dixon in the chair.—Prof. Lamb exhibited and | 
described two photographs, taken at the Isle of Man by 
Mr. Hiller, one of which showed very clearly the inter- | 
ference between the direct and reflected waves on the sea 
coast. The points of intersection of the two systems 
of waves were particularly well marked. Mr. T. 
‘Thorp exhibited a small glass tube containing a little, 
radium bromide at the sealed end, and terminating in a 
bulb at the other end. The whole formed a vacuum tube, 
and .was a very convenient and portable instrument for 
showing the fluorescence ‘of radium bromide on a barium 
platino-cyanide screen in the dark. He also stated that the 
bulb caused a charged electroscope to discharge very rapidly. 
—Messrs. R. S. Hutton and J. E. Petavel described some 
experimental work which they have undertaken with the 
view of studying the effect of high gaseous pressures upon 
NO. 1781, VOL. 69| 
A most interesting point was the extraordinary re-, 
electric furnace reactions. The investigation is being 
carried out in the electrochemical laboratory of the Man- 
chester University. The preliminary results only were 
given, progress having been necessarily slow up to the 
present. The several dispositions of the furnace and of the 
arcs were described, and photographs of them thrown upon 
the screen. To obtain satisfactory results it is necessary 
to exceed the laboratory scale of operations. For the 
present the work has been confined to the production of 
calcium carbide, aluminium and nitric acid as effected by 
pressures up to 150 atmospheres. 
DUBLIN. 
Royal Dublin Society, November 17.—Prof. W. F. Barrett, 
F.R.S., in the chair—Sir Howard Grubb, F.R.S., read 
the following papers :—(1) The adaptation of the flotation 
principle to large telescope mountings; a possible solution 
of the difficulties encountered in mounting great equatorial 
instruments; (2) the registration of star-transits by photo- 
graphy ; (3) a new form of dipleidoscope ; (4) a new survey- 
ing instrument for the rapid measurement of horizontal and 
vertical angles; (5) a new form of position-finder for adapt- 
ation to ships’ compasses.—Dr. G. H. Pethybridge ex- 
hibited and described an improved form of potometer.—Sir 
Howard Grubb exhibited some new forms of geodetical 
instruments as already described in the Transactions of the 
Royal Dublin Society in May, 1902. 
Paris. 
Academy of Sciences, December 7.—M. Albert Gaudry 
in the chair.—Some observations relating to the action of 
hydrocarbon vapours on animal microbes and on insects, 
and on the antiseptic réle of oxidising-oxidisable agents, 
by M. Berthelot. In an experiment described by the 
author, the antiseptic properties usually ascribed to naphtha- 
lene were found to be non-existent. There would appear 
to be a relation between the oxidising power of a body and 
its antiseptic power.—On the electromotive forces resulting 
from the contact and the reciprocal action of liquids, by 
M. Berthelot.—On a new Protozoa, Piroplasma Donovani, 
the parasite of an Indian fever, by MM. A. Laveran and 
F. Mesnil. A description of a parasite isolated from a 
case of fever arising at Dum-Dum, near Calcutta. There 
appears to be no essential difference between this parasite 
and the Piroplasma already known, in particular, the type 
P. bigeminum. This genus of parasites occupies an im- 
portant place in veterinary pathology, but this is the first 
time that a human disease has been traced to it.—On the 
property of emitting the n-rays conferred by compression 
on certain bodies, and on the spontaneous emission of the 
n-rays by tempered steel, tempered glass, and other bodies 
in a state of constrained molecular equilibrium, by M. R. 
Biondlot. Numerous substances have been found to give 
off n-rays during compression, recognisable by their action 
on feebly illuminated phosphorescent calcium sulphide. 
Substances such as tempered steel and glass, permanently 
under strain, appear to give off these rays indefinitely.— 
Observations on the Leonids and Bielids made at Athens 
during 1903, by M. D. Eginitis—On a theorem on 
measurable ensembles, by M. Emile Borel.—Generalisation 
of a theorem of Laguerre, by M. A. Auric.—On the quality 
of helices used in aérostats, by M. Charles Renard.—On 
the intensity of the light produced by the sun, by M. Charles 
Fabry. The conclusion is drawn from the experiments 
described that the illuminating power of the sun at the 
zenith, at its mean distance, is, at the level of the sea, 
100,000 candles.—On the direction of permanent magnet- 
isation in certain volcanic rocks, by MM. Bernard Brunhes 
and Pierre David.—The effect of time in the comparison 
of the luminous intensity of coloured lights, by MM. André 
Broca and D. Sulzer. If two lights of different colours 
are compared in a photometer, the equality is affected by 
the time during which the dise is exposed to the light. 
The effects are due to differences in the retinal fatigue for 
the different colours.—On a new mode of calculating the 
heats of combustion of organic compounds, and on some 
of its consequences, by M. P. Lemoult.—Researches on 
azo-compounds. A new mode of formation of the indazylic 
derivatives, by M. P. Freundler.—The action of hydro- 
