November 2, 1905] 



NA TC r RE 



>5 



At a largely attended meeting of the Brighton and 

 Sussex Medico-Chirurgical Society held at Brighton on 

 October 27, Sir Frederick Treves gave an address on the 

 Army Medical Service. He pointed out that in the South 

 African campaign the admissions to hospital were 746 per 

 1000 on account of disease, and only 34 per 1000 for 

 wounds. Our present medical department is totally in- 

 adequate, and a sufficient reserve must be created. Sir 

 Frederick concluded by pointing out what appeared to 

 him to be needed to make the Army Medical S< :r\ ii ■■ as 

 perfect as possible. The points were: — (1) The Director- 

 General should be the head of his department and be 

 responsible for its efficiency and economical administration; 

 (2) he should have direct access to the Army Council and 

 Secretary of State; (3) he should have control of the money 

 voted for the medical service ; (4) the service remaining, 

 as at present, " under the supervision of the Advisorj 

 Board"; (5) an efficient Army Medical Reserve should be 

 formed ; (6) the combatant officer should have some 

 knowledge of hygiene as applied to campaigning and 

 barrack life, and a like knowledge, of a still more elemen- 

 tary character, should be possessed by the private soldier ; 

 (7) the Army medical officer should be vested with such 

 authority and provided with such personnel as would enable 

 him to carry out those sanitary arrangements in the field 

 which experience had proved to be absolutely essential to 

 secure the minimum loss of life from disease. 



Dr. J. Hlber, of Pard, has sent us a separate copy 

 of his paper on the formation of colonies in the ant Attn 

 sexdens, from the Biol. Centralblatt, to which brief refer- 

 ence has already been made in these columns. 



The annual report of the Geological Survey of New 

 Jersey for 1904 includes an illustrated account by Mr. C. R. 

 Eastman of the Triassic fish-fauna of New Jersey, pre- 

 faced by a general popular dissertation on fossil fishes. 

 This Triassic fish-fauna is singularly limited but remark- 

 ably constant throughout the eastern United States, from 

 Virginia northwards, comprising only half a dozen generic 

 types, of which four are severally represented only by a 

 single spei 



We have received five numbers of the Proceedings of the 

 I ,S. Nat. Museum, the contents of four of which are 

 devoted to the invertebrate faunas of America and the 

 Philippines. New- generic types of South American moths 

 are discussed by Mr. H. G. Dyar in No. 1419, while other 

 new forms of the same are described by Mr. W. Warren 

 in No. 142 1. A revision of North American fleas, by Mr. 

 C. F. Baker, forms the subject of No. 1417, in which the 

 author directs attention to the circumstance that fleas 

 infesting rats in the tropics are more near akin to those 

 which attack man than is the case with the rat-fleas of 

 cooler climates, and to the bearing of this fact on the pro- 

 pagation of plague. Hymenoptera from the Philippines 

 form the subject of No. 1424; while in No. 1425 Mr. 

 W. H. Dall discusses the " Universal Conchologist " of 

 Thomas Martyn, published in 17K4, and the value of the 

 technical names employed therein. 



Much interesting information with regard to scientific 

 progress in India will be found in the report of the 

 Madras Government Museum and Connemara Public 

 Library for 1904-5, drawn up by Mr. E. Thurston, who 

 recently returned to his charge after a period of 

 furlough in this country. The scheme for a systematic 

 ethnographical survey of India, recently sanctioned by tie 

 Government, enters largely into this report, Mr. Thurston 

 pointing out the difficulties connected with making such 

 ' survey in a country of the size of India, and referring 

 NO. 1S79, VOL. J2>~\ 



to the somewhat unsatisfactory nature of the replies 

 received from some of those who have undertaken to fill 

 up papers connected with the subject. The museum is 

 fortunate in having acquired tie' valuable series of pre- 

 historic objects collected by Mr. R. B. Foote, late of the 

 Indian Geological Survey, during his long residence in 

 Madras. It may interest numismatists to learn that 

 certain ancient lead coins kept in a wooden cabinet 

 enclosed in an iron safe were found to be reduced to 

 powder, the metal having been converted into carbonate. 



We have received sepal tte copies of two papers by 

 Francis Baron Nopcsa, the one from the Geological 

 Magazine for July, and the other from the Annals and 

 Magazine of Natural History of the same date. In the 

 former the author describes, with a restored figure, a 

 large portion of the skeleton of a large carnivorous dino- 

 saur from the Oxford Clay of Oxford in the collection 

 of Mr. J. Parker of that city. In place of referring this 

 splendid specimen to the well known genus Megalosaurus, 

 Baron Nopcsa considers that it indicates a genus apart, 

 and he identifies it with Streptospondylus, typified by a 

 few vertebrae and limb-bones in the Paris Museum from 

 the Kimeridgian of Havre. Among other peculiarities, the 

 Oxford dinosaur is stated to differ from Megalosaurus in 

 possessing four (in place of three) hind-toes. It may be 

 mentioned in this connection that Phillips, in his descrip- 

 tion of the typical species of the last named genus, ex- 

 pressly stated that he was uncertain whether there might 

 not have been a fourth hind-toe. In the second paper the 

 author gives a new interpretation of the problematical fossil 

 Kerunia, from the Egyptian Eocene, which has been re- 

 ferred by one authority to a cephalopod and by a second 

 to a hydractinian polyp. According to the author, both 

 these authorities were to a certain degree right, for he 

 regards Kerunia as a hydractinian in which a cephalopod 

 look up its residence (symbiosis). The union of the two 

 organisms was apparently so intimate that while the 

 encrusting zoophyte undertook the construction of the shell 

 of the mollusc, the latter controlled to a certain exti nl 

 the growth of the zoophyte. 



A RETURN has been published, we learn from the Pioneer 

 Vail, regarding the measures adopted for the extermination 

 of wild animals and venomous snakes during the year 1904. 

 The total mortality among human beings reported to have 

 been caused by wild animals was 2157, against 2749 in 

 1903. The most noticeable decrease occurred in Madras 

 and the United Provinces, namely, from 438 and 404 in 

 1903 to 237 and 193 in 1904 respectively. In the Central 

 Provinces (including Berar), also, there was an appreciable 

 decrease — from 470 to 351. The destruction of human life 

 by tigers in 1904 was smaller than in the previous year, 

 the number being 786 against 866. As usual, the greatest 

 mortality occurred in Bengal. The year's returns show a 

 marked decline in the number of deaths caused by wolves 

 — from 463 in 1903 to 244 in 1904, the decrease occurring 

 principally in the United Provinces, where the mortality 

 from this cause fell from 278 to 90. It is pointed out that 

 the number of wolves destroyed in the United Provinces 

 has fallen from more than 1200 in each of the years 1902 

 and 1903 to 650 in 1904 ; and the belief is expressed that 

 this points to a genuine decrease in their numbers. The 

 mortality from snake-bite rose from 21,827 t0 21,880. It 

 is reported that in the Seoul district of the Central 

 Provinces anti-venin was used with success in two cases, 

 and the question of introducing more generally the treat- 

 ment of snake-bite by potassium permanganate is under the 

 consideration of the local Government. The total number 

 of snakes killed was 65,378. 



