Feb. 15, 1883] 
NATURE 
271 
wetted by water. This no doubt arises, partly at least, 
from the condensation of gases on the surface, which 
Quincke has shown will produce this effect to a remark- 
able extent under certain conditions described by him. 
To this, also, Barrett and Stoney have referred certain 
modifications of Leidenfrost’s phenomena ; and the float- 
ing shells, &c., of Hennessey are due to the same general 
cause. But a very minute trace of oil on a physically 
clean surface produces the familiar greasy surface. 
Why is this? Oil is not insoluble in water, and 
when the quantity of water used is sufficient to dis- 
solve the quantity of oil placed on the glass, it ought 
to wash off. Every one knows, however, how difficult it 
is to wash oil off glass. Js this then due to a diminution 
in the solubility of the oil in the water owing to its CON- 
DENSATION ox the glass surface? I believe it to be very 
probable that this is the case, and think that the experi- 
mental proof would be possible by placing estimated quanti- 
ties of oil on a physically clean glass surface, and subse- 
quently washing in quantities of water, such as under 
ordinary circumstances would readily suffice to dissolve 
it. By dissolving the oil in a volatile medium, its quan- 
tity might be readily estimated. No doubt other liquids 
of somewhat greater and better known solubility might 
be advantageously substituted for the oil, and perhaps, as 
Dr. Japp has suggested to me, by employing a coloured 
liquid the result might be rendered evident to the eye. 
My inability to complete these experiments at the 
present time, and the great interest attaching to a deter- 
mination as to whether the condensation experienced by 
the liquid-film alters the physical or chemical properties 
of the liquid must be the excuse for the publication of 
incomplete results, which I much hope may be taken up 
by others. J. W. CLARK 
THE STOCKHOLM ETHNOGRAPHICAL 
EXHIBITION * 
R. STOLPE was asked to arrange and describe the 
Ethnographical Exhibition of Stockholm in the 
year 1878. This exhibition was brought together from 
all, or at least nearly all, Swedish public and _ private 
collections ; no less than 217 exhibitors with about 10,000 
objects participated, the King himself opened the gal- 
leries, and general interest was raised by an ethnographi- 
cal exhibition as indeed no other country has realised 
tillnow. We took occasion to visit the exhibition, and 
were astonished to see so rich a material, as well as a 
thoroughly scientific arrangement. 
Both works named below area result of the meritorious 
undertaking. The second was partly a guide through 
some parts of the exhibition, especially China and Japan, 
with a general introduction, and many valuable and 
interesting special remarks, partly, in its second volume, 
a determination of all, about 6200 numbers of the exhibi- 
tion, arranged after the exhibitors. The first-named 
work illustrates in geographical order the more important 
objects of the exhibition, partly in groups, but chiefly in 
single representations. There may be represented in 
all about 1500 objects, and we hear that a fourth supple- 
mentary volume is in the press. 
The first volume of this album contains, on 84 plates, Aus- 
tralia, Oceania, Malaysia, Madagascar, Malayo-Chinese, 
and Tibet; the second, on 116 plates, China, Japan, 
Samoyedes, and Turks; the third, on 78 plates, America, 
Africa, Circassia, Persia, and India. Japan and China, 
as well as Oceania, are relatively best represented ; 
among the last-named division figures the fine collec- 
tion from the Savage Islands, which the expedition of 
the Lugénze brought home in the year 1853. 
1 H. Stolpe, ‘‘Exposition ethnographique de Stockholm, 1878-1879.’" 
Photographies par L. F. Lindberg. 3 vols. 4to. 36 pp. 278 plates. (Stock- 
holm, 1881).—“ Den allmanna etnografiska utstallingen, 1878-1879’" (The 
General Ethnographical Exhibition). 2 vols. 8vo. 80 pp. 1878-1879, and 
Vill. 112 pp. 1880. 
This photographic album must be regarded as the best 
existing ethnographical atlas; it gives, notwithstanding 
the inequality in the representation of the single countries, 
a good idea of a high-class ethnographical museum. The 
editor has had a full appreciation of the problem which 
was to be solved, and no ethnologist who works scien- 
tifically can do well without this album. It was therefore 
right that the International Geographical Congress of 
Venice in the year 1881 should bestow a prize on this 
beautiful work. Copies of the album are, we believe, 
only printed to order, and may be obtained direct from 
Herr Lindberg, R. Archzeological Museum, Stockholm. 
A. B. MEYER 
BARON MIKLOUHO-MACLAY 
ETTERS have been received from Baron N. de 
Miklouho-Maclay from the Suez Canal, the distin- 
guished traveller being now on his way back to Australia. 
During his prolonged and arduous experience of eleven 
years’ life amongst Melanesian and other savages of the 
Pacific his health has, we are sorry to say, suffered very 
seriously, and he returns to Sydney mainly on this 
account, since he finds that the climate of New South 
Wales suits him best. He intends to call at Batavia on 
the way out, where he left a part of his collections in 1878, 
in order to convey these to Sydney, where the main bulk 
of the gatherings of his many journeys is already stored. 
The Emperor of Russia, with enlightened liberality, has 
promised to defray the cost of the publication of the 
scientific account of Baron de Maclay’s results, and the 
collections have been brought together at Sydney in order 
that they may be available for the preparation of the 
work for the press there. 
Baron de Maclay hopes to be able to get ready the 
whole of his numerous diaries, notes, and papers for 
publication in about two years’ time. The complete 
work to be issued by him will, if his present plan be 
carried out, consist of an anthropological and ethnogra- 
phical section, a section treating of comparative anatomy, 
and a general narrative of his travels, together with 
appendices containing meteorological observations and 
information on physical geography. 
The work will be published first in Russian, but 
translations in other languages will probably soon follow. 
He intends to do a good deal of the anatomical work 
needed to complete his researches on animals collected 
by him in Australia and New Guinea at the Zoological 
Station at Watson’s Bay, of which he is the founder, 
This Zoological Laboratory at the very first received most 
important support from the Linnean Society of New 
South Wales, and by the influence of this Society a grant 
of land was obtained from the New South Wales 
Government for the erection of the building. Scientific 
men in other colonies, and notably in Victoria, recognising 
the great imporiance of the establishment to the progress 
of biological research, have come forward nobly to sup- 
port the enterprise, and the Australian Biological Associa- 
tion has been formed, a Society including men of science 
of all the Australian colonies and some distinguished 
European naturalists, the object being to support bio- 
logical stations in Australia. It is very gratifying to find 
so enlightened a sympathy with scientific progress deve- 
loped, and that the different colonies are able to work 
together in so excellent a cause. We hope to refer 
shortly again to the constitution and aims of the 
Australian Biological Association. 
NOTES 
We can only for the present express the deep regret with 
which we learn of the death, on the gth inst., of Prof. H. J. S. 
Smith, of the Savilian Chair of Geometry at Oxford, at the 
