January 28, 1897] 
NATURE 
299 
Polytechnique. M. Faye’s numerous friends and pupils at this 
school offered him a group in bronze. M. Faye was the favourite 
pupil of Arago, and is now eighty-three years of age. 
_Inconnection withthe International Committee of Aeronautics, 
the second ascent of sounding balloons will take place on Monday 
next, February 1, at If a.m., local time, at each station parti- 
cipating in the work. The balloons are fitted with instruments 
for registering temperature and altitude, and have an ascending 
force more than five times greater than that due to the total 
weight. Any one who should happen to witness the descent of 
one of the balloons should carefully look after the records, and 
send them to the office of the derophile, 14 rue des grands 
Carrieres, Paris. 
Ir will be of interest to botanists and zoologists throughout 
the world, to learn that a biological survey of Alabama has been 
organised and put into operation. The survey will be carried 
on under the auspices of the Alabama Polytechnic Institute, and 
will be manned by the specialists engaged at that institution 
in the various lines of biological investigation. It will 
have for its object the study, in field and laboratory, of 
all plants and animals occurring in the State, and of the various 
conditions affecting them. The work will be done systematically 
and thoroughly, and all the results published. Ina region so 
interesting and little worked as this portion of the Southern 
United States, careful and extended research will be sure to yield 
results of the greatest value. Large quantities of material in all 
groups of plants, and of animals (especially insects) will be col- 
lected and properly prepared. In connection with the survey 
there has been founded an Exchange Bureau, from which will be 
distributed all duplicate material. Any one desiring to correspond 
relative to specimens, literature, or the work of the survey, should 
address, ‘‘ Alabama Biological Survey, Auburn, Alabama.” 
At the General Horticultural Exhibition to be held in 
Hamburg from May to September in the present year, there 
will be a scientific department, managed by a committee, 
of which Dr. Zacharias and Dr. Klebahn are members. Ex- 
hibitions are invited and prizes offered in the following 
special subjects: (1) Diseases of cultivated plants produced 
by mechanical causes, or by conditions of atmosphere or 
soil; (2) animal and vegetable enemies of horticulture and 
fruit-growing; (3) animal and vegetable friends of horticulture ; 
(4) abnormalities and sports ; (5) comparative experiments on 
manures ; (6) wild ancestral forms of cultivated plants ; (7) 
living exotic useful plants in pots ; (8) collections of the most 
important exotic useful plants (dried specimens), or of prepara- 
tions from them ; (9) collections of plants, or parts of plants, 
from morphological or biological points of view; (10) results 
of scientific experiments on pollination ; (11) scientific aid to 
horticulture—implements, tables, models, &c. 
intended exhibits should be sent to the Director of the Botanic 
Garden, Hamburg, before March 1. 
MM. Cornu has been elected President of the Botanical 
Society of France for the current year. 
Tue Annual Meeting of the German Botanical Association 
will be held this year in Frankfurt-a-Main, commencing on 
September 22, 
A BorantcaL Museum has been established at Weimar, at 
the sole cost of Prof. Haussknecht. It is designed to be ‘‘a 
Central Institution for investigations in systematic botany,” 
and will be under the control of the Thuringian Botanical 
Union. 
A VIOLENT earthquake is reported to have occurred in the 
district of Delvino, in Epirus. Several villages are stated to 
have been destroyed, and it is feared that there has been serious 
loss of life. 
NO. 1422, VOL. 55 | 
Information of | 
| 
THE death is announced of Mr. T. Gwyn Elger, well known 
by his numerous contributions to selenography, both in the form 
of drawings and notes of the principal features of the lunar sur- 
face. Mr. Elger became a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical 
Society in 1871, and was in his sixtieth year at the time of his 
death. 
WE notice with regret the announcement of the death of Dr- 
Edward Ballard, author of many papers and works on medical 
and scientific subjects. Dr. Ballard was elected a Fellow of the 
Royal Society in 1889. He was eminently distinguished as an 
investigator of causes of disease, and as a promoter of scientific 
sanitary administration. Among numerous other works, he pub- 
lished a valuable paper ‘* On the influence of weather and season 
on public health, based on the statistical study of 272,000 cases 
of sickness (1857-68).” He was also the author of many im- 
portant reports to the Local Government Board on particular 
outbreaks of disease, local, or more or less general. 
Towarpbs the end of last year, George Daniel Eduard 
Weyer, the Professor of Mathematics and Astronomy at 
the Kiel University, passed away. Prof. Weyer was a great 
favourite among the students, and was as well known among 
the officers of the Merchant Service of Germany as he was 
among those of the Royal Navy. Onaccount of his astronomical) 
calling, he was familiarly known as ‘‘alte Seni,” and every one 
loved him—from Admiral to Lieutenant—for nearly all of then 
had been his pupils at some time or other, and this was how they 
expressed their familiarity for their old teacher. A brief sum- 
mary of the positions Prof. Weyer held during his lifetime will 
serve, perhaps, to show how he eventually became so closely 
connected with the Navy. Born at Hamburg in the year 1818, 
he spent four years (1839-43) at the Hamburg Observatory. 
For the next two years he studied astronomy and mathematics 
in Berlin, From 1847-50 he was assistant at the Hamburg 
Observatory, and teacher at the School of Navigation in con- 
nection with the observatory. When the School for Naval 
Cadets was established in Kiel, Weyer accepted a position there. 
In 1852 he was a ‘‘Privatdocent” at the University, and was 
made ‘‘ Ordentliche” Professor in 1869. His connection with 
the Navy may be said to have now begun. In 1864 he was the 
Examiner in Navigation for the Prussian Navy, and lectured for 
| more than twenty years at the Marine-Akademie in Kiel. 
Weyer was the author of many works, most of which related to 
nautical astronomy, and his aim throughout was directed to the 
improvement of the methods of determination of position at sea. 
His death will be felt by all his friends and pupils, for he was 
widely known, and last, but not least, by nautical science, which 
loses a faithful student. 
‘* Mein Sohn, nichts in der Welt ist unbedeutend, 
Das erste aber und Hauptsachlichste 
Beim allem ird'schen Ding ist Ort und Stunde.” a 
(Seni in Wallenstein's Tod, 1. Part.) 
For the last month (says the 7%es) the Colonial Office, the 
Natal and Cape Governments, and the Board of Agriculture 
have been in communication as to the best means of preventing 
the cattle plague in South Africa from spreading into either 
Natal or the Cape Colony. Various inquiries have been made 
as to what steps should be taken, and on Thursday last, at the 
Board of Agriculture, a special conference of heads of depart- 
ments concerned was held to consult together on the subject. 
The chief officials concerned of the Board of Agriculture and 
the Colonial Office met the Agents-General of Natal and the 
Cape Colonyand other Cape authorities. Further meetings will 
be held on the subject, and it is contemplated that the Govern- 
ment will sanction every effort to save the colonies of Natal and 
the Cape from rinderpest. 
SINCE the plague was officially recognised in the Bombay 
mortality returns on September 26, and despite the decrease in 
