520 
NATURE 
[March 29, 1883 
their weight, which was still considerable, would not be objec- | 
tionable. The secondary battery was not an entirely new con- 
ception. The hydrogen gas battery suggested by Sir Wm. Grove 
in 1841, and which was shown in operation, realised in the 
most jerfect manner the conception of storage, only that the 
power obtained from it was exceedingly slight. The lecturer, in 
working upon Sir William Grove’s conception, had twenty-five 
years ago constructed a battery of considerable power in substi- 
tuting porous carbon for platinum, impregnating the same with 
a precipitate of lead peroxidised by a charging current. At that 
time little practical importance attached, however, to the sub- 
ject, and even when Plante, in 1860, produced his secondary 
battery, composed of lead plates peroxidised by a charging 
current, little more than scientific curiosity was excited. Jt was 
only since the dynamo-machine had become an accomplished 
fact that the importance of this mode of storing energy 
had become of practical importance, and great credit was 
due to Faure, to Sellon, and to Velckmar, for putting this valu- 
able addition to practical science into available forms. A ques- 
tion of great interest in connection with the secondary battery 
had reference to its permanence. A fear had been expressed by 
many that local action would soon destroy the fabric of which it 
was composed, and that the active surfaces would become coated 
with sulphate of lead preventing further action. It had, how- 
ever, lately been proved in a paper read by Dr. Frankland 
before the Royal Society, corroborated by simultaneous investi- 
gations by Dr. Glad-tone and Mr. Tribe, that the action of the 
secondary battery depended essentially upon the alternative 
composition and decomposition of sulphate of lead, which was 
therefore not an enemy, but the best friend to its continued 
action. 
In conclusion, the lecturer referred to electric nomenclature, 
and to tke means for measuring and recording the passage of 
electric energy. When he addressed the British Association at 
Southampton, he had ventured to suggest two electrical units 
additional to those established at the Electrical Congress in 
1881, viz., the Watt and the Joule, in order to complete the 
chain of units connecting electrical with mechanical energy and 
with the unit-quantity of heat. He was glad to find that this 
suggestion had met with favourable reception, especially that of 
the Watt, which was convenient for expressing in an intelligible 
manner the effective power of a dynamo-machine, ard for giving 
a precise idea of the number of lights or effective power to be 
realised by ils current, as well as of the engine power necessary 
to drive it : 746 Watts represented 1 h.p. 
Finally the Watt-meter, an instrument recently developed by 
his firm, was shown in operation. This consisted simply of a 
-coil of thick conductor suspended by a torsion wire, and opposed 
laterally to a fixed coil of wire of high resi-tance. The current 
to be measured flowed through both coils in parallel circuit, the 
one representing its quantity expressible in Ampéres, and the 
other its potential expressible in Volts. Their joint attractive 
action expressed therefore Volt-Amperes or Watts, which were 
read off upon a scale of equal divisions. 
The lecture was illustrated by experiments, and by numerous 
diagrams and tables of results. Measuring instruments by 
Professors Ayrton and Perry, by Mr. Edison and by Mr. Boys 
were also exhibited. 
FAUNA AND FLORA OF THE ALEUTIAN 
ISLANDS 
HE last number of Matwren contains an interesting report 
by Dr. Leonhard Stejneger of the result of his six months’ 
observations of the fauna and flora of the Kamschatkan coast 
and of the so-called Kommandorski Islands, which form the 
western group of the Aleutian archipelago between Behring’s 
Sea and the Pacific, in 50°-55° N. lat. The Kommandorski 
group consists of two islands, one of which is known as Mednoj 
Ostrov, Copper Island, from the large amount of the pure metal 
found there ; while the other, which was the scene of Behring’s 
shipwreck and death, bears his name. Both islands are geolo- 
gically allied to Kamschatka, and excepting at the north of 
Behring’s Island, where the gradual subsidence of the sea has 
left raised beaches, terraces, and tabulated rock-formations, the 
islands consist generally of deep narrow valleys separated by 
rocky barriers, which rive precipitously to a height of from 1000 
to 2000 feet above the level of the sea. The islands, which 
were uninhabited before their annexation by Russia, are now 
occupied by about 700 persons, in the employment of a Russo- 
American fur company, which has been attracted to the spot by 
the enormous numbers of sea-bears (Cal/orhinus ursinus) and 
sea-oiters (Enhydra lutris) which frequent the coasts. ‘The 
climate is foggy, and the vegetation stunted and _ sparse, 
while in the neighbouring Kamschatkan territory the blue 
of the summer sky, the stillness of the sea, and the 
softness of the air, are almost Italian in character. 
The flora, moreover, is so exuberant that numerous plants, 
which in Norway never exceed two or three feet, here attain the 
height of a tall man. Next to the birch (Betula ermannt), 
alders, willows, and roans (Soréus Kamschaticus), are the most 
frequent trees, the berries of the last-named, and those of 
Lonice-a cerulea, p ssessing a sweetness which brings them into 
great request among strangers as well as natives. Some flowers 
also, as the wild, indigenous, dark red r se, several rhododen- 
drons, and native lilies, are .:qually remirkable for exceptional 
fragrance. Among wild flowers, some of the geraniuas, poten- 
tillas, taraxacums, &c., are almost identical with those found in 
Norway. Besides a large whale, and a specimen of the walrus 
(Rosmarus obesus), which had been killed near Avatscha Bay, Dr. 
Stejneger could find no trace of any mammal but a small specimen 
of Arvicola economus. Of birds there is, however, an enormous 
variety, some of which, as Calliope Kamschatica, Carpodacus Ery- 
thrinus, and a kind of sedge-warbler, provisionally named by the 
author ‘* Acrocephalus dybowskii,” combine an almost tropical 
brilliancy of colouring with a sweetness of song equal to that 
of our own nightingale or thrush. Besides these melodious 
warblers, Kamschatka harbours large numbers of Locustella 
lanceolata, whose grasshopper-like cry is heard when all else is 
still.  Cuculus canorinus represents our common cuckoo. 
Pipits, chats, and wagtails abound; Larus capistratus is com- 
moner than any other gull, and the osprey is not unfrequent. 
Mosquito- like gnats of vindictive natare swarm in such numbers 
as to make the pursuits of the field naturalist almost impractic- 
able. The fauna, generally, is palzarctic in character, with 
a scarcity of American forms which is very remarkable when we 
consider the vicinity of the western continent. 
PHYSICAL HISTORY OF THE DEAD SEA, 
THE FORDAN VALLEY, AND PALESTINE 
ROF. E. HULL, LL.D., F.R.S., delivered an interesting 
lecture on the above subject on March 2, in the Theatre of 
the Royal Dublin Society’s premises, Kildare Street. Prof. 
Hull said :—‘‘ There is no country which possesses for us an 
interest equal to that which I have to treat of this evening. Its 
religious and historical associations stand alone amongst those of 
all nations, and will ever maintain in the history of the world an 
undying import. But while this is true as regards the religious 
and social aspects of Pale-tine, I hope to show that in its physical 
aspect it possesses points of interest which render it unique 
amongst all countries, and which have attracted to it the atten- 
tion of naturalitts during a lengthened period down to the 
present day. Probably no country has been so often described. 
Its physical features have attracted the attention of observers of 
natural phenomena from Strabo downwards to the recent admir- 
able work of M. Lartet and the Duc de Luynes, to which I am 
largely indebted. In more recent times we have the observations 
of Humboldt, of the late Dr. Hitchcock, of Lieut. Lynch of the 
United States Navy, who carried out a systematic series of 
soundings over the bed of the Dead Sea, and more recently of 
the Rev. Dr. Tristram, of Prof. Roth, Burkhardt, and others, 
including the Survey made by the officers of the Royal Engi- 
neer. It is curious however that the remarkable physical 
phenomenon which renders the Holy Land unique among-t all 
countries (regarded in its physical aspect) was not discovered till 
the year 1836-37, when Lleinrich Von Schubert and Prof. Koth 
determined by barometric observations that the surface of the 
Dead Sea lies no less than 1300 feet below the level of the 
Mediterranean, a fact not suspected by previous observers. It 
is the deep depression of the Jordan Valley, deeper by far 
than any river valley elsewhere, which is the key to the 
physical history of the whole country ; and in endeavouring to 
trace out its origin I shall reproduce in as general a manner as I 
can the successive phases through which the region bordering the 
Medit:rranean, and extending eastwards towards the Euphrates 
and : outhwards to the Dead Sea, has passed. The fundamental 
basis of the geological formation of Palestine is the gneissic 
granite, of Archzean age and metamorphic origin, which rises into 
the wountains of Idumea, and is the rock from which the huge 
