JANUARY I, 1914] 
NATURE 
993 
interest of some private gentlemen and to some pro- 
fessors of modern botany who ‘spend their whole 
leisure from their professional duties in the arduous 
labour of palzobotanical research.” 
But ‘there is no professorship of palzobotany at 
any of our universities or colleges. There is no lec- 
tureship or readership in paleobotany at any of our 
universities or colleges; and Cambridge alone has a 
demonstratorship, which is so ill-paid that it might be 
thought libellous to state the official salary attached. 
There is no post of palzobotanist to our Survey. ... 
There is no post of palazobotanist at our great national 
Natural History Museum.” 
After having shown what has been done for palzeo- 
botany at Berlin, Stockholm, and Washington (U.S. 
Geological Survey), and after having developed the 
reasons—scientific and economic—why palzobotany 
should receive official support in Britain also, the 
author asks: ‘“‘What should be done?” and supplies 
the following answer :— 
“Much in the future. For the present what is 
urgently needed are professorships and lectureships at 
one or two of the universities—a professorship, for 
instance, in London, which would reach the geological 
students who go out from the School of Mines to all 
parts of the world. Then two posts at least should 
be established at the British Museum of Natural 
History: one for a palaobotanist of standing and 
repute who has travelled, who with a wide knowledge 
of the subject could fitly represent the science, and 
- who, keeping abreast of the subject, could direct the 
work of a junior, and ultimately of several juniors.. 
In our museum at present there are many specialists 
on animal fossils, and an important department of 
animal paleontology, while the palzobotanical depart- 
‘ ment does not exist, and though there is a valuable 
1 
; 
collection of fossil plants the authorities only get in 
outside specialists from time to time to write mono- 
graphs on them. 
“What is ultimately wanted for the science is a 
properly equipped institute of palzobotany, which 
should represent all its sides—with a well-arranged 
museum, an academic and also economic side to its 
activities. The immediate need for the foundation of 
_ some posts in paleobotany should give trustees and 
_ governors food for thought, and might give some 
_ millionaire, anxious to be of service to his day and 
generation, an opportunity to do a unique and service- 
able deed in endowing this neglected but important 
science.”” 
The same appeal for the recognition of palzeobotany 
‘as in the article referred to has recently been taken 
up again by Dr. Marie C. Stopes, in a lecture de- 
livered at University College (University of London), 
-on October 17; and published in an abridged form in 
Nature of November 20, 1913. To the question what 
the palzobotanist in the future will demand the fol- 
lowing answer is given :—‘ That in at least one insti- 
tution in each civilised country there shall be a recog- 
nition of his science and adequate accommodation for 
it.” after which the plan and details for such an 
institution, according to the opinion of Dr. Stopes, are 
fully developed for which the number of this journal 
cited should be consulted. 
It is earnestly to be hoped that this proposition will 
| be realised, and at the same time realised 
’ in the right way. As keeper of the palzo- 
botanical department of the State Museum of Natural 
| History (Naturhistoriska Riksmuseum) at Stockholm, 
: 
} 
ey Ce 
which was specially mentioned in the article referred 
to, I may be permitted to express my opinion regard- 
eing the proposed palzobotanical institution. I have, 
it is true, no idea of the present position of the ques- 
tion here discussed, nor if there is any possibility of 
But I 
_ the realisation of the plan proposed below. 
: NO. 2305, VOL. 92] 
hope that my British fellow-workers will not consider 
my suggestion as an intrusion, since they are probably 
aware of my deep interest in British palzobotany, by 
which I have profited so much myself during repeated 
visits to Britain. 
I quite agree with Dr. Stopes that the establish- 
ment of a properly equipped British institute of palzeo- 
botany is a most urgent need, which ought not to be 
postponed. But in order to give such an institute an 
opportunity for working under the best conditions 
possible, I consider it almost necessary that it should 
be established in connection with the Royal Botanic 
Gardens, Kew. The reason for such a connection is 
simply this: that the scientific study of palzeobotany 
signifies a constant and repeated comparison of the 
fossil plants with the recent ones. For the botanical 
determination of Palzozoic and Mesozoic plants the 
palzobotanist must compare the recent Pteridophytes 
and Gymnosperms, especially the tropical ones; and 
there exists no better opportunity than in the Kew 
Gardens, where the hothouses, temperate houses, 
museums, and herbaria offer the most excellent and 
complete materials possible for such work. The same 
holds true for the determination of dicotyledonous 
leaves of the Cretaceous and Tertiary. The deter- 
mination of those leaves is a most difficult task, for 
which an extensive and repeated comparison with the 
leaves of trees and shrubs of the arboretums and gar- 
dens, of the temperate houses and hothouses, and, 
ultimately, of the herbaria is necessary. There is no 
other place in the United Kingdom which offers such 
excellent opportunities for this work as the Kew 
Gardens; and the same holds true for the determina- 
tion of leaves, fruits, and seeds from the Quaternary 
also. It therefore seems evident that the Kew Gardens 
are the right place for the establishment of a palzo- 
botanical institute, the headquarters for the British 
palzobotany of the future. A. G. Natruorst. 
Stockholm, December 12, 1913. 
Electrodeless Spectra of Hydrogen. 
Waite making experiments on the apparent pro- 
duction of neon and helium during electric discharges, 
I have noticed an effect which may be of interest to 
spectroscopists. A powerful oscillatory discharge is 
produced in eight or nine coils of wire from two 
Leyden jars, with a spark-gap of about 2 in. in 
parallel, connected to a large coi! which is run from 
the main supply. Set in the coils of wire is a glass 
bulb of about 300 c.c. capacity provided below with a 
small bulb containing cocoanut charcoal, and con- 
nected by a side-tube and tap with a mercury pump. 
After evacuating, heating, and “washing out,’’ the 
bulb with hydrogen, when pure hydrogen is admitted 
at a fairly low pressure and the discharge is passed, 
the glow is bluish in colour, and shows both hydrogen 
and mercury spectra ; but if the charcoal bulb be cooled 
in liquid air so that mercury vapour and any other 
impurities are completely removed, the glow is of a 
brilliant rose colour, and shows only hydrogen lines. 
If the pressure is reduced, however, to a value some- 
where below 1 mm., there appears in the middle of the 
rose ring a fairly bright blue zone; and whereas the 
former shows both the simple and complex spectra of 
hydrogen, the blue zone shows nothing but the 
elementary line spectrum; and, moreover, the blue 
line 44861 is more intense than the red line. Further 
reduction of pressure causes the obliteration of the 
blue zone by the spreading inwards of the rose ring. 
As I have not found any mention of this isolation of 
the primary spectrum, with weakening of the a line, 
in pure dry hydrogen, the fact is possibly worth 
recording. IRVINE Masson. 
University College, London, December 11. 
