Feb. 26, i 



NA TURE 



4° 3 



Physical Society, February 14. — Annual General 



it, in the chair. — Prof. G. Fuller was 

 elected a Member of the Society 1 



Report of the Council, in which the Society was congratulated 

 upon the number of original communications read — forty-three 

 daring the past year. Among the works undertaken by the 

 Society in. 1 the publication of the first volume of 



"Joule's Scienti ime, containing ac- 



counts of researches conducted by Mr. Joule in conjun 

 ! shortly. — Tin- 

 presented a highly satisfactory report. — The Council for the 

 ensuing year was then elected, the result of the elect 

 : Prof. F. Guthrie, Ph.D.. 

 who have filled the office of President! : 1 M. J. 

 f. W. G. Adams. Sir W. 

 . Prof. k. B. Clifton; its: Prof. YV. E. 



-I clf.nl Bidwell, Lord Rayleigh, Prof. W. C. Roberts; 

 Secretaries : Prof. A. W. Reinold and Walter Baily ; Treasurer : 

 Dr. E. Atkinson; Demonstrator: Prof. F. Guthri 

 Members of Council: C. Vernon Boys, C. W. Cooke, Prof. G. 

 of. F. Fuller, R. T. Glazebrook, Dr. J. Hopkinson, 

 Prof. H. McCleod, Prof. J. Perry, Prof. J. H. Poynting, Prof. 

 S. P. Thompson ; Honorary Member: Prof. M. E. Mascart. — 

 The customary votes of thanks to the Committee of the Council 

 of Education and to the President, Secretaries, and other 

 iving been passed, the meeting resolved itself into an 

 ordinary meeting of the Society. — Miss Marks described a new- 

 line and area divider. This instrument consists of a hinged rule 

 with a firm joint. The inside edge of each limb is bevi 

 presents a straight edge. One limb is divided on both edges 

 into a number of equal parts, and is fitted by a groove on its 

 outer edge to a plain rule, along which it can slide. To divide 

 1 a given number of equal parts, tire hinged rule is 

 •he plain rule till the «th division from the joint is 

 opposite a fixed mark on the plain rule ; it is then placed on the 

 that the «th division on the graduated straightedge 

 coincides with one end of the given line, and then opened till 

 the straight edge on the inner edge of the other limb passes 

 through the other extremity. The plain rule is then pressed 

 firmly down and the hinged rule slid along it. As each division 

 of the graduated edge passes the fixed mark, the intersection of 

 the moving edge with the given line is marked, and thus the 

 livided into n equal parts. The instrument may be 

 used in this way to draw any given number of equidistant parallel 

 cen two given points. It may be conveniently used 

 in working out indicator diagrams and measuring areas. — Mr. 

 Walter Baily described certain improvements made in his in- 

 tegrating anemometer, which has been previously described. 

 The improvements consist in the substitution of mechanical 

 counters for electrical ones, as it was found, in the recent obser- 

 vations with the instrument at Kew. that the extra friction of 

 the "contact" was sometimes sufficient to stop the motion. 

 The mechanical counters were found to work satisfactorily in 

 every respect. — Prof. Guthrie showed some specimens exhibiting 

 the similarity of fracture of Canada balsam and glass. The 

 been cracked by heating a metal ring to which it was 

 attached ; the Canada balsam had been overheated in a small 

 dish and allowed to cool. 



Zoological Society, February 17. — Osbert Salvin, F.R.S., 

 Vice-President, in the chair. — Mr. F. E. Beddard, F.Z.S., read 

 a paper upon the structure of the Cuckoos (Cuculida;), and 

 pointed out the differences in the pterylosis and the structure of 

 the syrinx in the various forms which he had examined. It was 

 proposed to divide the family into three subfamilies : Cuculinae, 

 Phcenicophaina;, and Centropodina;. — Mr. F. E. Beddard read 

 a paper upon the heart of Apteryx, and called attention to the 

 variations in the condition of the right auriculo-ventricular valve 

 observed in different individuals of this bird. — A communication 

 was read from Mr. M. Jacoby, containing the first pari of an 

 account of the Phytophagous Coleoptera obtained by M. G 

 Lewis during his second journey in Japan, from February, 1880, 

 mber, 1881. 

 Geologists' Association, February 6.— \V. H. Hudleston, 

 l'.R.S., in the chair. — The annual meeting was held at Univer- 

 sity College. — The following Officers were elected for the ensuing 

 vear :— President : W. Topley, F.G.S., Assoc.Inst.C. E. : Vice- 

 Si Trof. J. F. Blake, M.A.. F.G.S., T. V. Holmes, 

 F.G.S., W. H. Hudleston, F.R.S., F.G.S., F.C.S., Henry 

 Hicks, M.D., M.R.C.S., F.G.S. ; Treasurer: J. Hopkinson, 

 F.G.S., F.L.S. ; Secretary: John Foulerton, M.D., F.G.S. ; 



Editor: Prof. G. S. Boulger, F.L.S., F.G.S. ; Librarian: J. 

 Bradford. F.G.S. ; Council : J. Logan Lobley, F.G.S., F.R.G.S., 

 Ed. Litchfield, A. C. Maybury, F.G.S., J. Love, F.G.S., 

 F.R.A.S., W. H. Bartlett, F.G.S., T. Davis, F.G.S., T. J. 

 H. Teall, F.G.S., R. Meldola, F.C.S., J. Slade, F.G.S., J. S. 



Gardner, F.G.S., Prof. T. Rupert Jones, F.R.S., B. B. W 1- 



ward, F.G.S.— Prof. T. R. Jones, F.R.S., gave an address on 

 Foraminifera, recent and fossil, and Mr. F. W. Rudler one on 

 some points in connection with volcanic action ; both were illus- 

 trated by lantern views exhibited by Mr. G. Smith.— Many 

 instructive objects were exhibited, amongst them a series of 

 Palaeolithic implements from France, Spain, and England, by 

 Dr. J. Evans, F.R.S. 



Edinburgh 

 Royal Society, February 2. — Mr. Thomas Stevenson, Pre- 

 sident, in the chair. — The President delivered an addres-, in 

 which he discussed the erection of training-walls at the mouth 

 of the Mersey. He would strongly condemn such a procedure, 

 asserting that the inevitable result would be the silting up of the 

 approaches to Liverpool. — Prof. Tait submitted a paper on con- 

 densation and evaporation. He pointed out that the present 

 mode of treating the conditions of a liquid in presence of its 

 vapour were not rigorous, inasmuch as the pressure is un- 

 doubtedly different in the two parts, while in the surface layer 

 between them there is a complex form of stress. If attention be 

 confined to the isothermals of the interior parts of a liquid, or of 

 its vapour, the present method will apply rigorously. With this 

 proviso the isothermals under the critical point consist of two 

 parts separated by an asymptote — one belonging to the liquid, 

 the other to the vapour. This accords with the fact that liquids 

 can be subjected to hydrostatic tension, and that Aitken has 

 shown that true vapour cannot be condensed without a nucleus. 

 — Mr. John Rattray, of the Granton Marine Station, communi 

 cated a note on Ectocarpus. — The Rev. J. M. Macdonald ex- 

 hibited some specimens from Philadelphia which had the appear- 

 ance of large vegetable fossils. Mr. John Murray and Prof. 

 Duns pronounced them to be merely inorganic accretions around 

 reeds. 



Mathematical Society, February 13. — Mr. A. J. G. 

 Barclay, President, in the chair. — Prof. Tait communicated a 

 note on a plane strain, which was read by Mr. W. Peddie ; 

 Dr. Muir gave an account of a paper by Mr. P. Alexander on 

 Boole's proof of Fourier's double integral theorem, and after- 

 wards enunciated several theorems of his own on the arbelos ; 

 Mr. Peddie discussed reflected rainbows ; Mr. Allardice gave a 

 note on spherical geometry : and Mr. A. Y. Fraser made some 

 remarks on a problem in plane geometry. 

 Cambridge 



Philosophical Society, February 2. — Prof. Foster, Presi- 

 dent, in the chair. — Prof. C. S. Roy, M.A., was elected a 

 Fellow. — The following communications were made : — On the 

 Zeta-function in elliptic functions, by Mr. J. W. L. Glaisher. — 

 On a certain atomic hypothesis, by Prof. K. Pearson. Com- 

 municated by Mr. H. T. Stearn. — On a Young's eriometer, by 

 Mr. R. T. Glazebrook. 



Paris 



Academy of Sciences, February 16. — M. Bouley, Presi- 

 dent, in the chair. — On the inaccuracies committed in the em- 

 ployment of the usual formulas in the reduction of the polar 

 stars anil in determining the astronomic collimation. The correct 

 terms required to remove these errors. Method of observing 

 the polar stars at any meridian distance, byM. Lcewy. — Descrip- 

 tion of the nervous system of Ancylus Jluviati/is, by M. H. de 

 Lacaze-Duthiers. — On the order of appearance of the first vessels 

 in the leaves of the cruciferae ; third part, Crambe mai itima, 

 juncea, and cordifolia, by M. A. Trecul. — Experiments on some 

 phenomena of the movement of water in an apparatus employed 

 to raise the liquid by means of a mechanical fall without piston 

 or lifting valve, by M. A. de Cabgny. — On the resistance of 

 keels in connection with the velocities of 20 and 21 knots an 

 hour recently obtained without special extra motor power, by 

 M. A. Ledieu. — On the oidium, Phoma vitis, mildew (Peronospora 

 viticela), and some other cryptogamic diseases prevalent for 

 some years past in the European vineyards, by M. H. Mares. — 

 On the density and figure of the earth, by Gen. L. F. Menabrea. 

 The author's researches tend to confirm the anticipations of 

 Newton that the mean density of the earth would be found to 

 lie between five and six times that of water. — On the develop- 

 ment of the vascular apparatus, and of the reproductive organs 



