Sept. 6, 1877] 



NATURE 



399 



days only. The following orbit by Mr. Hind is founded 

 on positions between February 8 and March 11 : — 

 Perihelion Passage, 1S77, January l9'iS369, G.M.T. 



Longitude of Perihelion 200 4 iS o j M. Eq. 



„ Asrenriin^ No.ie ... 1S7 15 7-0 i 1877-0 



Inclination to Ecliptic 27 5 24 i 



Log. Perihelion Distance 9'9°7'3°3 



M otion — retrograde. 



There seems to be no sensible deviation from the 

 parabola. 



BIOLOGICAL NOTES 



New Work on Birds. — We have received the 

 prospectus of a new work by Dr. A. B. Mayer, 

 Director of the Royal Zoological Museum of Dresdei), 

 to be entitled " Abbildunj^en von Vogel-Skelttten," 

 in which he signifies his indention to publish, in parts, 

 figures of the skeletons of rare or little-known bird.^. 

 Eich part is to contain ten plates of large quarto 

 size, one of which, representing the skeleton of the 

 e.xtremely uncommon parrot from New Guinea, Dasyp- 

 tilus pccqucti (Lesson) accompanies the prospectus. It 

 is a phoio-lithograph, and differs materially from any 

 other wh'ch we have seen in one important particular, 

 namely that the bones of one side only are depicted, 

 which is a great advantage, as it prevents the confusion 

 unavoidably associated with the repre-entation of the 

 whole structure The illumination of each bone and the 

 focus of every part is most satisfactory, more so in many 

 respects than any drawing could possibly be. .Short 

 coiTimentaries, with measurements, will accomp-iny each 

 plate. It is proposed that Part I. shall contain figures of 

 Loiii'uhis cutacissi, Charmosyna josepkince, Meropogon 

 forsteni, Paradisea papuana, dcDiiirus regius, Maiin- 

 coaia chalybea, P/ilopiis spL-a'osus, Otidiphaps iiobilis, 

 and Callus bachiva (from Celebes). In the series is also 

 to be included the skeletons of the several domestic 

 pigeons and fo*ls. We hope that Dr. Mayer will have a 

 large subscription to this valuable addition to ornitho- 

 logical literature. 



The Bodv-Cavitv i.m the He,\d of Verteer.\tes. 

 — It has hitherto been regarded as a point of distinction 

 between the mouth, throat, and gill region of vertebrates, 

 and the rest of the trunk, that in the former no splitting; 

 of the body wall took place in early development, while 

 in the trunk the body-wall becomes sharply separated 

 from the contained viscera, and a cavity arises between 

 them, part of which is the peritoneal cavity. Mr. Balfour 

 {Join: Anal., April, 1877) has announced the discovery 

 in sharks of a head-cavity on either side of the throat, 

 dividing the growing tissue into an inner and an outer wall. 

 When the visceral clefts (future gill-slits, iS:c.) appear, 

 they subdivide these cavities into smaller ones. The 

 head-cavity even grows forwards as far as the eye, and 

 ultimately there is a series of cavities : (i) a premandibular, 

 (2) a mandibular, (3) a hyoid, (4) a series in the branchial 

 arches. These cavities ultimately atrophy, but their walls 

 become developed into muscles, and they answer to the 

 muscle-plates of the rest of the body. Thus this discovery 

 gives inlormation of a most valuable kind as to the seg- 

 mental relations of the head to the rest of the body, 

 besides furnishing a glimpse of a primordial condition in 

 vertebrates which had till now remained unknown. 



Fish-eating Birds.— Mr. Joseph Willcox has recorded 

 an interesting observation on the crow blackbirds of 

 Florida {Quiscalus purpiiyciis). Standing on the bank of 

 a river in Florida, he noticed a commotion among a 

 congregation of crow blackbirds, which were an.xiously 

 looking into the water. A large bass was pursuing its 

 favourite food, the small fry, and the latter, in their frantic 

 efforts to escape, jumped out of the water, and many of 



them fell on the land. The blackbirds, evidently experts 

 at the game, immediately pounced upon the small fish, 

 and swallowed them before they could get back into the 

 water. {Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci., Philadelphia, 1877.) 



Ants' Domestic Animals.— Prof Leidy ( Phila-ielphia) 

 has observed colonies of F.flava in possession of several 

 kinds of insects at once. A comparatively small assem- 

 blage of them had three groups, an aphis, a coccus, and 

 the larva of an insect, apparently coleopterous. The 

 aphides were kept in two separate herds, and these were 

 separ-Tted from a herd of cocci. In a larger colony of 

 ants there was a collection of aphides occupying the under 

 part of one margin of a stone, for ten inches long by 

 three-quarters of an inch wide. A distinct group of 

 cocci, closely crowded, filled a square inch. They all 

 appeared to be carefully attended to by the ants. 



A Whale in the Mediterranean.— M. P. J. Van 

 Beneden ha'j made a short communication to the Aca- 

 demic Royale de Belgique, published in that Society's 

 Bulletin, with reference to a letter by M. Capellini, on 

 a true whale captured in the Mediterranean Sea, near 

 Taranto. The Italian author suggests the new specific 

 name Palana tarantina, but M. Van Beneden much 

 more reasonably thinks it most probable that it is a stray 

 specimen of B. biscayensis. 



THE LATE MR. CASSIOT 

 \^7E last week announced briefly the death of Dr. J 

 ' "^ P. Gassiot, and now give some account of the prin- 

 cipal scientific results obiained by him. Mr. Gassiot, 

 partner in the firm of Martinez Gassiot and Co., wine 

 merchants, Mark Lane, first devoted his spare time to 

 electrical experiments about the year 183S. An Electrical 

 Society was formed about that time in which he took an 

 active part. At one of the meetings it was observed 

 that when the two copper wires forming the poles of a 

 powerful voltaic battery were crossed and drawn asunder 

 so that the voltaic arc passed between them, the positive 

 terminal became heated to incandescence, while the 

 negative remained comparatively cool. This excited 

 great interest in Mr. Gassiot's mind and led him to make 

 several experiments, but without thoroughly explaining 

 the phenomenon. In the course of these experiments he 

 procured powerful batteries, first of Daniell's construc- 

 tion, then of Grove's, and ultimately a large water 

 battery. 



It had been observed by many writers (principally 

 Continental) that while the dynamic and chemical effects 

 of the voltaic battery increased in intensity in proportion 

 to the increasing chemical action in the cells of the 

 battery, the static effects, such as the repulsive action in 

 a gold leaf or pith ball electroscope, the spark, the power 

 of charging a Leyden phial, &c., were more intense when 

 the battery was charged with water and had consequently 

 but a feeble chemical action in the cells. This anomaly 

 puzzled electricians much, and though sought to be 

 explained by various hypotheses, was a great stumbling- 

 block in the way of the chemical theory of the voltaic 

 battery. 



Mr. Gassiot had been led to attach great value to good 

 insulation between the cells of the battery, and he pro- 

 cured to be made a Grove battery (the most powerful 

 chemical battery known) of 100 glass cells, all having 

 long glass stems, and separated from each other. This 

 battery gave very powerful chemical results, and a voltaic 

 arc of great brilliancy ; but, what was of the greatest 

 importance, he found that with this battery the static 

 eflects, or effects of tension, were greater than those of an 

 equally-sized water battery. The puzzling anomaly was 

 thus explained ; the reason why the chemical battery had 

 seemed inferior in tension to the water battery was that 

 from the effervescing liquids, the close approximation of 



