32 
not be tolerated for an finstant, as any patent lawyer would 
know. 
As a matter of fact, there isa case pending which shows the 
risk of inventing new law. A company has brought an action 
for the infringement of a patent for making dynamite, the ques- 
tion being whether a man infringes a patent by acting as custom- 
house agent for admitting into this country a quantity of dyna- 
mite made abroad in infringement of an English patent. The 
Court of Appeal has given its judgment, and the case may go 
to the House of Lords. None of the six pleas eaumerated in 
the draft bill will raise the question. And they will not raise 
another question which came up during the trial, The plaintiff 
company was formed to take over the dynamite patent from a 
prior company which then ceased to exist. The prior company 
assigned the patent to the plaintiffs with some very large words 
as to legal rights, and it became necessary to decide whether or 
not the second company could sue for infringements of the 
patent committed while the first company held it. The defence, 
that the right to sue for a tort is not assignable, could not have 
been raised under the proposed statutory pleas. Any plea 
which puts in issue the title of a complainant is inadmissible. 
Lastly, as to the trial of a complaint of infringement :— 
By Section 59 a complaint is to be heard in the first instance 
by the expert commissioner who is best acquainted with the 
subject matter. This judge is to be guided by a legal assessor, 
who will direct his mind into legal channels. 
‘© From the decision of the tribunal thus constituted ” (szc) an 
appeal will lie to the three commissioners, that is to say, to the 
original expert who has given his decision, to his brother expert, 
who is not experienced in the subject matter, and to the legal 
expert. 
In cther words, suppose the patent to be for a mechanical 
invention, and that we have three commissioners, A, B, C, 
of whom A is an engineer, B is a chemist, C is a lawyer. 
A hears the case and gives his judgment ; B knows nothing of 
mechanics, and reviews A’s judgment with the advantage of 
having A at his side to keep him in the right path according to 
A’s views, while C acts as a sort of legal adviser, it being part 
of the scheme that there shall be no models, without which it 
can scarcely be hoped that B and C will ever get so far as to 
understand the inveution. 
This is the mode of trial which it is gravely proposed to sub- 
stitate for the present inquiry in a court of law, with a right of 
appeal, first, to the Court of Appeal, and afterwards to the 
House of Lords. 
Here ends one part of the new bill. The procedure in ob- 
taining a patent can only be carried out if commissioners are 
appointed according to the provisions already discussed. This 
would appear to be too improbable to justify any further en- 
croachment upon your space. Lex 
‘‘The Lepidoptera of Ceylon.” 
THE Colonial Government has recently presented to the 
library of this establishment Parts I. and II. of the work 
above named, for the publication of which it granted a large 
sun of public money. ‘The origin of the book was the exist- 
~enze here at Peradeniya of a very fine series of original drawings 
made during a course of years by the well-known botanical 
draftsman in the employ of the Gardens—Mr. William de Alwis 
—under the careful supervi-ion of my eminent predecessor Dr. 
NATURE 
Thwaites. The plates now published are copies of these figures | 
(the originals are in the Colombo Museum), and to these, Mr. 16 
Moore has added brief technical de-criptions. As a botanist it 
would be presumption in me to express an opivion as to the 
merit of the text of an entomological book. There are thirteen 
new genera in the first part and six in the second, but only three | 
out of the nineteen contain any new species ; so at all events we 
get plenty of changes in the names of many long and well-known 
butterflies. But in the interests of scientific literature in general, 
I feel bound to enter a protest against the legend priuted at tke 
foot of every plate, ‘‘F. C. Moore, del. et lith.”, as it is in- 
correct as to the facts. I have already stated by whom the figures 
were really drawn; it is however only fair to the unassuming 
Sinhalese artist to allow that as put on the stone and published 
they are very greatly inferior to the admirable originals. One 
would like to think that it was a consciousness of this that led 
Mr. F. C. Moore to substitute his own name for that of W. de 
Alwis.° But however this may be, it is time that some explana- 
tion was given by him of what looks like very shabby treatment | 
[Vov. 10, 1831 
of one of the best and most deserving natural history artists of 
the East. HENRY TRIMEN 
Royal Botanical Gardens, Peradeniya, Ceylon, October 10 
An Alleged Diminution in the Size of Men’s Heads 
WHEN the hatter’s note was brought before the Council of the — 
Anthropological Institute, I supported its reception and pinlermy 
tion ; my own observations have led me to the same conclusions. 
Setting aside for the moment the consideration of the authenticity — 
of the statement—and I am not surprised that Prof. Flower ; 
should ask for more evidence—I would beg to call attention to 
the statistical results affecting infantine mortality, which are so { 
well known to us in the statistical world. As we all know, it is 
a matter of congratulation that the rate of mortality in the periods 
from birth to two years, and from that to seven years, has much 
diminished in this country. This being so, the result is inevitable 
that many of the weaker infants that in a bygone day did not 
survive have no v been saved ; and their survival means the sur- 
vival of so many weaklings. It appears to me that this is going 
on in the United States and in many neighbouring parts of 
Europe. The question of degeneracy under sanitary influ- 
ence is well worthy of attention and investigation. While on the 
one hand we see in the streets fewer cases of deformity and of 
squinting owing to orthopedic advances, there are many stunted 
individuals. The ears appear to me to be below the old stan- 
dard in menand women. A well-formed ear was much more 
common in England than now. It also seems to me that the 
period of maturity in men (not puberty) is often later. The 
remark has been made that frigidity is more prevalent in 
women. It has come under my notice that the children of — 
fine parents are often stunted, not belonging to the short races in 
the country, but being really stunted. We must always allow for a 
portion of the offspring belonging to the tall races, and a portion 
to the short races in the same familyin England. My own belief 
is that the women are better than the men, and that when the 
effects of sanitary and medical improvement have become constant, 
that even the inferior women will exhibit a greater tendency to 
normal production. It is possible that the evil may be to some 
—- 
; extent corrected by barrenness and frigidity. Looking back, I 
can find no effective cause in tight-lacing, as bad formerly as 
now, thicker or thinner hair since wigs, nor in wearing the hat. 
32, St. George’s Square, S.W. HYDE CLARKE 
Sound-producing Ants 
WITH reference to a remark of Mr. S. E. Peal’s (NATURE, 
vol. xxiv. p. 484) to the effect that white ants emit sounds, but 
not in rbythm, I have to observe that I have frequently heard 
white ants emit sounds with the most perfect rhythm, when, in 
the years 1857-1860, I was engaged in the Geological Survey of 
Trichinopoly, &c. On several occasions it happened that my 
tent was pitched on a piece of ground infested with whire ants, 
and it was the custom of my servants to spread a thin layer of 
straw beneath the safvinji or cotton carpet that was laid on the 
tent floor. Often, when sitting in the tent in the quiet of the 
evening, I have heard the white ants at work in the straw, 
emitting perfectly rhythmical waves of sound at intervals of 
about a second, or perhaps rather more. If they were disturbed 
by raising the sa¢vimji, the sounds ceased : to be resumed however 
after a minute or two, when all was quiet again. 
Simla, October 15 H. F. BLANFORD 
Song of the Lizard 
Any one who has been in the South of Europe in the summer 
may have often heard a peculiar sound in the fields or amongst 
low herbage. The sound is like wheet-Pwheet repeated two or 
three times at short intervals. I have often been puzzled as to 
what animal it proceeded from, and should have supposed it to 
be some orthopterous insect, but that on getting to exactly 
where the sound had come from, it would again be heard at a 
distance of some five or six yards without having been seen. 
Last June, near Ajaccio, I believed I solved the puzzle. After 
the whe.t-wheet a small lizard darted across some unusually 
bare ground, and, once again under cover, recommenced its 
song. Our great authority, Dr. Giinther, is not aware of any 
true lizard having any vocal power (geckoes have a échet-tchet— 
not often heard—are generally nocturnal, frequenting houses 
or old walls, occasionally hiding under stones during the day). 
