December 28, 1905J 



NA TURE 



verging on the centre, will become visible, and, as the' 

 circles narrow, the waves get higher and more conspicuous 

 until the centre is reached again. So the earthquake 

 waves may become too small to be registered as they 

 spread out from the origin, but again affect a seismo- 

 graph as they converge towards its antipodes. Doubtless 

 it is not onlv the earthquakes of the newly discovered 

 region in which this takes place, but the present distribu- 

 tion of teleseismographs is not such as will allow of its 

 being established in the case of other earthquake regions. 



Apart from these results, which seem well established, 

 there are many suggestions contained in the paper, two 

 at least being important ones. The first of these concerns 

 a peculiarity in the distribution of the stations at which 

 earthquakes are recorded ; for instance, those originating 

 in the region to the south-west of New Zealand will be 

 recorded along a band, of about 20° in width, starting in 

 a north-westerly direction, but not at stations lying, 

 nearer the origin, on one side or other of this band. So, 

 too, earthquakes originating off the west coast of South 

 America have been recorded in western Europe and, near 

 their antipodes, in Siberia, but not at stations which we 

 should expect them to affect were they propagated with 

 equal intensity in an opposite direction. 



The other suggestion, which may prove of great import- 

 ance, concerns the diurnal east and west movement of the 

 horizontal pendulum. This only affects pendula which 

 point north and south and swing east and west; it is only 

 noticeable on days when the sun shines, and has been 

 attributed to the action of the sun's rays in heating or 

 drying up the ground on either side of the recording 

 station. These explanations have not proved satisfactory, 

 and it is now suggested that the movement may be due 

 to some other indirect effect of the sun, probably of an 

 electrical nature. The Milne pendulum, with its silk fibre 

 suspension and agate cup bearing, is practically insulated, 

 and Prof. Milne finds that one of his pendula, after being 

 electrically connected to earth, and therefore preserved at 

 the same potential as the outer case and walls of the 

 observatory, does not show the extensive movements it did 

 prior to being earthed. This line of research is being 

 carried forward with the cooperation of Dr. C. G. Knott, 

 of Edinburgh, and we look forward to seeing some interest- 

 ing results in due course. 



We have indicated the most interesting of the results 

 which have come from the seismographic records of the 

 Antarctic Expedition ; want of space forbids us to detail 

 the many other suggestions and possibilities set forth by 

 Prof. Milne, but what has been noticed is enough to show 

 the good use that has been made of the record which, 

 taken by itself, has little value, and only becomes 

 important when correlated with those of the thirty-eight 

 other stations where the Milne type of instrument is now 

 installed. 



TECHNICAL EDUCATION FOR FISHERMEN. 

 A BOUT six years ago the Lancashire Sea Fisheries 

 Committee instituted practical classes for the in- 

 struction of local fishermen in the natural history of the 

 common marine edible animals. " Technical education " 

 in the strict sense of the word was not the object aimed 

 at. For some time previously the committee had experi- 

 enced considerable difficulty in enforcing the restrictions 

 on methods of fishing contained in their by-laws on 

 account of the determined opposition of the fishermen, and 

 the object of the classes was rather to remove this opposi- 

 tion by showing the rationale of the by-laws, and to 

 create a common ground on which both officers and fisher- 

 men could meet. The committee had no funds which they 

 could apply to this work, and the classes were only made 

 possible by the cooperation of the Technical Instruction 

 Committee of the Lancashire County Council, which made 

 an annual grant of 250/. to be spent for this purpose. 



Practically all this money is expended in providing 

 fisheries exhibitions " of the value of 5!. each. One or 

 more of these is allotted to each fishing centre in the 

 administrative county of Lancaster, and the men selected 

 to attend are chosen in various ways. In some cases they 

 are selected by the fishermen's associations, and in other 



NO. IS87, VOL. 73] 



cases they are chosen by the officers of the committee. 

 The grant of 5L is intended to recompense the fisherman 

 exhibitioner for the loss of his labour during the time he 

 attends the class, and to provide for his expenses during 

 this period. 



The first two experimental classes were held at the 

 (then) University College of Liverpool, but subsequently 

 the work was transferred to the Lancashire Fishery 

 Station at Piel, in the Barrow Channel, where tanks and 

 other apparatus for the study of living organisms are 

 provided by the fisheries committee, and where living 

 material can easily be landed by the committee's vessels. 

 The men are brought to Piel and taken away again by the 

 patrol steamer, and lodge in the neighbourhood of the 

 station. Each class consists of fifteen men, the maximum 

 number which can be taught at one time with advantage. 

 Twenty two-hour lessons are given during each course. 



The course of instruction was drawn up by Prof. Herd- 

 man and Mr. Johnstone, and great care was taken to 

 arrange a logical sequence of lessons. The structure of a 

 typical fish is the first lesson, and this is followed by an 

 account of the life-history of a typical mollusc such as the 

 mussel. A short demonstration of the main chemical and 

 physical processes involved in the respiration of marine 

 animals is then given, and the manner of feeding of two 

 such divergent types as the fish and mussel is then con- 

 sidered, a discussion which naturally leads up to three or 

 more lessons on the nature and occurrence of plankton 

 and on the economic importance of the latter. The 

 remaining lessons deal with the life-histories of other 

 economic marine animals, the cockle and oyster among 

 Mollusca, and the shrimp and crab among the Crustacea. 

 The life-histories of various fishes, such as the flat-fish 

 and skate, are also considered, and the development of the 

 flounder is studied from the process of fertilisation up to 

 the time when the embryo issues from the egg. Although 

 lantern and other demonstrations are given, the instruc- 

 tion is in the main practical in character, each man being 

 provided with a good microscope and a set of dissecting 

 tools. 



On the whole the results of the classes have been very 

 satisfactory ; the main object, that of bringing about a 

 better understanding between the fishermen and the com- 

 mittee, has been attained, and though there is still con- 

 siderable opposition on the part of the fishermen towards 

 the by-laws, yet the relations are much less embittered 

 than was formerly the case. Another result of considerable 

 importance has been attained in that the shell-fish trans- 

 plantation operations carried on at Morecambe (an account 

 of which was given recently in Nature, August 31, p. 430) 

 have been traced directly to the stimulus afforded by the 

 classes. This work was originated by the Morecambe 

 fishermen themselves, and it was in this district that the 

 fishery classes were most appreciated and supported. 



J- J- 



LIFE-HISTORY OF THE EMPEROR PENGUIN.' 

 THE emperor is the largest of all the penguins, and is 

 limited strictly to the ice-covered regions of the 

 Antarctic. The interest of its life-history lies chiefly in 

 the fact that its breeding ground was first discovered 

 during the recent expedition made by the Discovery into 

 the Antarctic. Its young and its eggs were brought home 

 for the first time when the Discovery returned to England 

 in September, 1904. 



In reviewing the life of this bird, the difficulties of 

 investigating its breeding habits were explained as the 

 result of certain peculiarities ; for example, that of laying 

 the eggs in the middle of the winter darkness ; each hen 

 laying a single large egg, which it incubates as it stands 

 in an upright position on sea-ice, keeping the egg from 

 contact with the actual ice by holding it on the dorsum of 

 the foot, and allowing a heavily feathered fold of skin to 

 fall over it from the abdomen, thus completely obscuring 

 it from view, and keeping it closely appressed to the 

 abdomen, warm enough to hatch out, probably in some 

 seven weeks. In the coldest month of the whole vear. 



