590 



NATURE 



[Oct. 20, 1 88 1 



and perhaps subsequently to some university. There are now 

 2000 children and 200 pupil teachers under science instruction in 

 Birmingham, and the results so far have been most encouraging. 



Major-General Maitland, writing to the Times in connec- 

 tion with the Bordeaux Phylloxera Congress, makes a suggestion 

 which appears quite worthy of attention. He believes that all 

 the remedies hitherto applied or proposed are open to the re- 

 proach to which all empiric treatment of disease is obnoxious — 

 viz. the attacking of a symptom instead of the essential root of 

 the disease, and thus betraying a want of right apprehension of 

 its true origin. "This, in my humble view," General Maitland 

 says, "is to be attributed to exhaustion of the vitality of the 

 plant, induced by unduly and unnaturally overtasking ils pro- 

 ductive powers. In this respect the phylloxera of the French 

 vineyards bears a close analogy to the red spider of the Indian 

 tea garden, to the leaf-worm of the Indian, American, and other 

 cotton fields, and, in short, to parasitic growth wherever proving 

 fatally destructive throughout the vegetable kingdom. The 

 mode in which this law of nature, as it may be termed, operates, 

 may be understood by reference to the physiological paradox, 

 'Life dies; death lives.' Wherever the vitality of a plant is 

 abnormally diminished by over-plucking, over-pruning, and un- 

 ceasing inexorable demands to produce more, more, when natiu'e 

 demands rest and repose to recruit exhaustion, the sap, the 

 plant's life-blood, becomes poor, sluggish, and enfeebled. 

 Parasitic life is then evolved, and preys upon the little re- 

 maining life that injudicious culture has left the plant. If the 

 above view in regard to the origin of phylloxera be accepted as 

 an approximation to the truth, the remedy would seem to be 

 self-indicated — repose. Give the vineyards rest." 



An extraordinary report of four large expeditions fur Africa 

 being organised in Brussels, was lately given in the /'a// Mali 

 Gazette, and has this w-eek been reproduced by the Daily Neivs. 

 There is, however, absolutely no foundation for the statement. 



The Colonies and India states that the unusual spectacle of 

 snow was seen on Table Mountain on August 16. Such an 

 occurrence has been recorded only once since 1813, viz. in 1878. 



The first list of the honorary council of the Internation il 

 Electric Exhibition which is to be held at the Crystal Palace, 

 comprises the following names of well-known men of science : — 

 Mr. James Abernethy, President Institute Civil Engineers ; Prof 

 W. G. Adams, F.R.S., Sir James Anderson, Prof. Ayrtoa, 

 F.K.S., Sir Heiiry Cole, K.C.B., Mr. William Crookes, F.R.S., 

 Capt. Douglas Galton, C.B., F.R.S., Dr. Gladstone, F.R.S., 

 Col. Gouraud, Sir John Hawkshaw, C.E., F.R.S., Dr. 

 J. Hopkinson, F.R.S., Prof. Fleeming Jenkin, F.R.S., Sir 

 E. J. Reed, C.B., M.P., Mr. B. Samuelson, M.P., Dr. C. 

 W. Siemens, F.R.S., Mr. W. Spottiswoode, President Royal 

 Society. The following gentlemen will be the chief officers 

 for the Exhibition : Manager, Major S. Flood Page ; secretary, 

 Mr. W. Gardiner ; superintendent, Mr. P. L. Simmonds ; assis- 

 tant engineer for Exhibition, Mr. R. Ajiplegarth, C.E. ; clerk 

 of works, Mr. W. Carr. 



The Programme of the Technological Examinations of the City 

 and Guilds Institute for 1SS1-2 contains several new subjects 

 and arrangements — improvements on previous programmes. 

 The examination papers set for iSSi are intere-4ing. 



We LOtice in the Russian journal, Old atid New Russia, an 

 interesting paper on M. Tyaghin's wintering at Novaya Zemlya, 

 on hunting in that land, together with a good sketch of the bird 

 Ufe in the neighbourhood of the wintering place. 



Dr. Gobi, who has investigated during many years the flora 

 of the White Sea, has published his researches in a separate 

 w ork in Russian. 



We notice in a paper published in the Annals of the Spanish 

 Society of Natural History (vol. x. 1881), that Don Fr. Quiroga 



observes that the numerous implements in Spanish museums 

 which are usually described as nephrite are mostly made of 

 fibrolite, this name having been given by Count de Bournon to 

 a variety of sillimanite. Gut of 115 hatchets which were 

 considered as nephrite, and were found . mostly during the 

 geological survey of the provinces of Guadalajara and Cuenca, 

 only one was of nephrite, whilst ill were of fibrolite and three 

 of jadite. The fibrolite is often found among the mica-slates of 

 the provinces of Madrid and Guadalajara. 



The same volume of the Annals contains a paper, by Don 

 S. Calderoa of Arana, on the evolution of the earth. 



A STRIKING instance of the activity of man in destroying 

 forests may be shown by the following figures, which we 

 find in M. Olshevsky's paper in the last issue of the Izvestia 

 of the Russian Geographical Society. After having taken 

 into consideration the surveys which were made in the pro- 

 vince of Ufa before 1841, and the recent distribution of 

 forests in that province, M. Olshevsky shows that the area of 

 forests, which formerly was about 17,577,000 acres, has now 

 diminished by at least 3,500,000 acres ; although the population 

 is still very sparse, that is, less than three souls per square milci 

 and it was yet less some time ago. 



The well-known publishing firm of A. Harlleben (Vienna, 

 Pesth, and Leipzig) have recently published a little work by 

 Heinrich von Littrow, "Carl Weyprecht, der osterreichische 

 Nordpolfahrer. " It contains many characteristic reminiscences 

 as well as letters of the late discoverer of Franz- Josef Land. It 

 is a fitting and touching literary monument to a brave, energetic, 

 highly-cultivated, kind, and modest man of science, whose useful 

 career was unfortunately cut short so prematurely. 



Auf der Hoke is the title of a new international review, edited 

 by Leopold v. Sacher-Masoch, and published at Leipzig by 

 Gressner and Schramm (London : Dulau). The first number 

 (October) contains several interesting articles, though none of 

 them scientific ; among the list of contributors, however, we 

 notice the names of several Continental men of science. 



Dr. King's report on the Government Cinchona Plantation 

 in British Sikkim for the year ending March last, shows a con 

 tinued and highly satisfactory progress — a progress that has been 

 made not only in the extended cultivation of ^^•ell-known and 

 established species, but also in the propagation of valuable and 

 rarer kinds. Most satisfactory results are recorded of the species 

 known as Cinchona Ledgeriana, one of the varieties of Calisaya 

 which, as Dr. King says, is surpassingly rich in quinine, and 

 which has derived its name from Mr. Ledger, a collector who 

 brought the seed from South America. Regarding another 

 valuable kind, namely, the plant yielding the Carthageua or 

 Columbian bark, which is largely imported to this country from 

 the northern part of South America, and of which four plants 

 were sent to the Government Plantations from Kew in January, 

 iSSo, Dr. King says, "They arrived in good condition and 

 during the year they were increased largely by cuttings. Propa- 

 gation went on most favourably for some time, but later on in 

 the year the young plants were severely attacked by the pest 

 only too well known to gardeners as ' thugs.' The usual treat- 

 ment was applied with vigour, but in spite of this, when the year 

 ended the six original plants had been increased only to sixty 

 rooted plants and ninety partially rooted cuttings." Dr. King, 

 however, further says that "every effort will continue to be 

 made to increase the stock of this interesting species." Both 

 the general condition of the plantation and the financial results 

 are reported as satisfactory, and the results as gathered from the 

 quinologist's report, which is appended, are also satisfactory, 

 inasmuch as they show an increased manufacture of febrifuge 

 and_also an increased demand. Dr. King and his co-workers 



