182 
NATURE 
[ DECEMBER 24, 1903 
from 1858 to 1881. In 1875 he revised and edited a 
third edition of John Phillips’s ‘‘ Geology of the Yorl- 
shire Coast.’? For many years he devoted all his spare 
time to the preparation of a list of British fossils, 
stratigraphically and zoologically arranged. Of this 
great work the first volume, dealing with the Palzo- 
zoic species, was published in 1888. Two other 
volumes, on the Mesozoic and Cainozoic fossils, have 
remained in MS. In all more than 18,000 species were 
catalogued. 
In 1881 Mr. Etheridge, greatly to the regret of his 
colleagues on the Geological Survey, was appointed 
assistant keeper in the geological department of the 
British Museum, and this post he held with much 
advantage to that institution for ten years, when he 
retired from the public service. 
He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 
1871. In 1880 the Murchison medal of the Geological 
Society was awarded to him, and in the same year he 
was elected president of that Society. The two 
addresses which he delivered at successive anniversary 
meetings of the Geological Society were voluminous 
papers on the analysis and distribution of the British 
Paleozoic and Jurassic fossils. 
These essays, which were based on his great cata- 
logue, formed a foundation for a subsequent elaborate 
book (published in 1885) on ‘‘ Stratigraphical Geology 
and Paleontology.’’ This work, ostensibly issued as 
part ii. of a second edition of John Phillips’s 
of Geology, Theoretical and Practical,’? was almost 
wholly re-written and very much enlarged by Mr. 
Etheridge, so that very little of the original text re- 
mained. No less than 116 tables of organic remains 
were incorporated, and very full particulars were also 
given of the strata in various parts of the British 
islands. 
The stratigraphical knowledge which Mr. Etheridge 
acquired in his early days at Bristol, and afterwards 
with the field officers on the Geological Survey, quali- 
fied him to give expert advice on economic questions 
relating to coal, water-supply, &c. In consequence 
his assistance was frequently sought by engineers and 
others. During recent years he was engaged as geo- 
logical adviser to the promoters of the Dover coal- 
boring, and was occupied on matters connected with 
it until but a short time before his decease. 
A man of untiring energy and vigour, he seemed 
personally never to grow older, and it was not until 
lately that he lost his upright bearing, but he never 
lost the cheery, kindly disposition which endeared him 
fo all his friends and associates. 
He died after a few days’ illness, the result of a chill, 
on December 18, soon after he had completed his 
eighty-fourth year. A good portrait of him was inserted 
by Lady Prestwich in the ‘‘ Life and Letters of Sir 
Joseph Prestwich.”’ H. B. W. 
NOTES. 
Ir is announced that the committee of the Parisian Press 
Association has decided upon the award of the prize of 
100,000 francs placed at its disposal by M. Osiris. The com- 
mittee has resolved to divide this sum between the two in- 
ventions which have in recent times most contributed to the 
honour of French science. The sum of 60,000 francs has 
been awarded to Mme. Curie for the continuation of her 
researches into radium, and 40,000 francs to M. Branly for 
his labours in connection with wireless telegraphy. 
Tue sum of 30,000 frances has been placed at the disposal 
of Prof. d’Arsonval by the Matin, of Paris, in order to enable 
him to continue his researches with 
properties of radium. 
NO 1782, VOL. 69] 
in connection the 
“Manual | 
AmMoNG the numerous special kinds of radiation recently 
discovered, not the least interesting are the n-rays of M. 
Blondlot. These rays, which were first discovered in the 
| radiations from incandescent bodies, pass readily through 
aluminium, glass, black paper, and other substances, but 
are arrested by lead or by moistened paper. They were 
at first studied by means of their action upon small electric 
sparks, but a more convenient means of observing them is 
due to their action upon feebly illuminated phosphorescent 
bodies, the luminosity of which is increased when the 
Blondlot rays fall on them. In a more recent paper, M. 
Blondlot has found that bodies in a state of strain, such as 
tempered steel and unannealed glass, give off these rays 
spontaneously and continuously at the ordinary tempera- 
ture, and in the current number of the Comptes rendus 
M. A. Charpentier shows that these rays are also emitted 
by the human body, especially by the muscles and nerves. 
He points out that this effect may prove to be of the greatest 
importance in the case of the nerves, as up to the present 
no external reactions of the nervous system have been 
observed, and a new field of studies in physiology and 
medicine is thus opened up. 
Dr. Osann, of Berlin, has been appointed professor of 
mechanics at Clausthal, and Dr. Kippenberger and Dr. 
Georg Frerichs have been appointed professors of chemistry 
in the University of Bonn. 
Tue Venetian Academy of Sciences, Letters and Arts, 
offers prizes of 3000 lire under the Querini-Stampaglia 
foundation for monographs on the following subjects :— 
The lakes of the Venetian district, treated from a physio- 
graphic and biological standpoint ; the works of Manuzi as 
a critic of Greek and Latin literature; the origins of 
Venetian painting ; and advances in the projective geometry 
of algebraic surfaces of two dimensions in space of n 
dimensions. Under the Cavalli foundation, a similar prize 
is offered for an essay on the effects of modern social and 
economic conditions, &c., on landlords and farmers, with 
especial reference to the Venetian provinces. Under the 
Balbi Valier foundation an award of the same amount is 
offered for advances in medicine or surgery for the period 
1902-3, and under the Minich foundation a prize of 3000 lire 
is offered for embryological researches on the development 
of the larynx, the trachea, and the lungs in vertebrates and 
birds. The last day for sending in essays for the Stampaglia 
prize, on the Venetian lakes, and the Balbi Valier and 
Minich prizes is December 31, 1903 ; for the remaining prizes 
the essays are due at the end of subsequent years. 
In the course of excavations on the Lulworth Castle 
Estate, in Dorset, a number of bronze relics have been 
found, and have been sent to the Dorset County Museum on 
temporary loan. The most important object is a bronze 
sword, 243 inches long, and, though broken, it is in a fine 
state of preservation. Other relics are a socket celt, a 
gold or heavily gilt bronze finger ring, a socket gouge, a 
hilt of a sword, an object which is believed to be one of 
the fittings of a car, supposed harness fittings, and a bronze 
crook. 
Tue following telegram was received from Mr. W. S. 
Bruce, leader of the Scottish Antarctic Expedition, at the 
offices in Edinburgh on December 17 :—‘* Buenos Ayres. 
Scotia Stanley. December 2. Refitting here. Hydro- 
graph surveyed 4000 miles unexplored ocean ; 70° 25! south, 
17 to 45 W.; 2700 fathoms trawled there; wintered 
Orkneys; detailed survey. Mossman and five men continue 
first-class meteorological, magnetical, biological station. 
Ramsay died August 6. All others robust; Scotia splendid. 
