210 

sky was serene. Some dark clouds hung on the horizon 
between S.W. and W. I was intensely observing a large 
halo about the sun, of about 20° in semi-diameter. It 
exhibited the prismatic colours, though obscurely, except 
in one quarter, where it coincided with the skirt of a dark 
cloud on the horizon, almost directly west. In that por- 
tion of the halo the colours of the iris were very distinctly 
exhibited. . 
“Whilst I was attending to this appearance, the whole 
visible hemisphere of the heavens became covered with a 
light palish vapour, as I at first imagined it to be. It was 
disposed in longitudinal streaks, extending from the west, 
by the zenith, and all along the sky towards the east. On 
examining this appearance more narrowly, I found it to 
be a true aurora borealis, with all the characters which 
distinguish that meteor when seen by night, excepting 
that it was now entirely pale and colourless. The stream 
of electric matter issued very peceptibly from the cloud 
in the west, on the skirts of which the halo exhibited the 
prismatic colours ; thence diffusing themselves, the rays 
converged towards the zenith,and diverged again towards 
every quarter of the horizon ; and the coruscations were 
equally instantaneous, and as distinctly perceptible as 
they are by night, 
“This appearance continued for more than twenty 
minutes, when it gradually vanished, giving place to thin 
scattered vapours, which, towards sunset, began to over- 
spread the sky. Through the ensuing night, I could not 
discern the smallest trace of these meteors in the sky.’” 


NOTES 
Our readers will learn from another column that an appeal is 
about to be made to Government to aid another Eclipse Expe- 
dition, this time a very small one. Seeing that another so 
favourable opportunity will not occur for some time, it is to be 
hoped that the Government will respond to the call, and deserve 
as hearty thanks from all lovers of scientific progress as it earned 
for its efforts last year. 
THE American Association for the Advancement of Science 
will be opened at Indianopolis, Indiana, on August 17. The 
president for this meeting is Prof, Asa Gray. 
It is with great regret that we have to record the death of Mr. 
Alexander Keith Johnston, LL.D., to whose eminent services in 
the promotion of meteorological and physico-geographical science 
we had occasion to refer but a few weeks since on the occasion 
of the medal awarded him by the Royal Geographical Society. 
Dr. Johnston was president-elect of the geographical section of 
the British Association at its approaching meeting at Edinburgh, 
He died on Sunday last, at Ben Rhydding, in Yorkshire. 
Tue Natural History Society of Montreal, with the aid of the 
Government of Canada, is sending an expedition to dredge in the 
deeper parts of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The Hon, Mr. 
Mitchell, Minister of Marine and Fisheries, has taken much 
interest in the matter, and has placed the government schooner 
La Canadienne at the disposal of the party. The gentlemen 
selected are Mr, Whiteaves, F.G.S., secretary of the Society, 
and Mr. G. F. Kennedy, B.A. Principal Dawson, the presi- 
dent of the Society, sends the latter gentleman on behalf of the 
museum of M‘Gill University. It is hoped that the deepest 
parts of the gulf will be searched, and that much interesting 
information will be obtained, bearing both on zoological and 
geological questions, and also on the prosecution of the fisheries. 
Mr. W. S. Axpis, of Trinity College, Cambridge, Senior 
Wrangler in 1861, has been appointed Professor of Mathematics 
at the College of Physical Science at Nex 

le-on-Tyne. 
We are enabled to state that the scheme proposed for the 
institution of the Sharpey Scholarship at University College, 
London, has been adopted by the Council. Its principal features 
are that the scholarship may be held for three or a greater num- 
NATURE 



the Professor of Practical Physiology, having opportunities 
afforded to him of pursuing original investigations, and having 
the right to use the laboratory and its apparatus for that purpose. — 
Tue Brown Institution which has just been founded by the 
University of London, will comprise, in addition to a hospital 
for the treatment of animals, a laboratory for the study of patho- 
logy on the model of the Pathological Institutes of Germany, 
which have been already described in these columns. In this 
laboratory those who desire to learn the methods of exact research, 
or, after having learnt them, to carry out pathological or thera- 
peutical investigations of their own, will have the opportunity of 
doing so under the guidance of the new Brown Professor, Dr. 
Burdon Sanderson. As we before announced, Dr. E. Klein, of 
Vienna, is expected to have the direction of the microscopical 
work of the laboratory, for which his numerous researches show 
him to be so pre-eminently fitted. 
WeE have to record the death of Mr. George Tate, of Alnwick, 
Hon. Secretary of the Berwickshire Naturalists’ Club, which 
took place on June 7, at the age of 66. His treatises on the 
archeology of his native borough and county entitle him to take 
rank among the best of local historians; and his articles on 
Archeology and Geology, published in the ‘‘ Transactions of 
the Berwickshire Naturalists’ Club,” show powers of observation 
and clear habits of thought of no ordinary kind. 
A Report on the progress and condition of the Royal Gar- 
dens at Kew during the year 1870 has just been issued by the 
director, Dr. J. D. Hooker. The number of visitors was not 
quite so large in 1870 as in 1869. The improvements in the lay- 
ing out of the grounds of the Botanic Gardens, which have been 
in progress for the last five years, are now nearly brought to a 
close. The pleasure grounds have suffered severely from the 
long and severe drought of last summer, acting on the excessively 
poor natural soil ; very large numbers of trees have perished, espe- 
cially the older elms, ashes, beeches, and sycamores. These are 
being replaced, and preparations have been made for the forma- 
tion of the new Pinetum, which will be immediately commenced. 
Notwithstanding the rage for planting Conifers which has pre- 
vailed in England for many years, and which has almost sup- 
planted the growth of hardy deciduous trees, no complete public, 
arranged, and named collection of hardy conifers exists in this 
country, Theinterchange of living plants and seeds with foreign 
and colonial botanic gardens has been vigorously prosecuted, 
especial attention having been paid to the promotion of the 
growth of the cinchona, and the introduction of the ipecacuanha 
into our Indian possessions. The museums, herbarium, and 
library have been enriched by numerous purchases and dona- 
tions. 
AT a recent meeting of the Scientific Committee of the Horti- 
cultural Society, Mr. Andrew Murray read a paper on the blight 
of plants, in which he combated the ordinary theory that the 
lower forms of vegetable organisms, which constitute ordinary 
blight, are developed from germs existing in the plant or floating 
in the air. The extraordinary rapidity of their propagation, fre- 
quently after a few hours’ east wind, when no trace of them 
has been visible for many months, the prodigious numbers in 
which they appear, and the great variety of species developed 
sometimes on the same plant, and other considerations, have 
led him to the conclusion that these lowly organised fungi are 
evolved out of previously-existing organic materials, without the 
intervention of a germ, by the process erroneously called sponta- 
neous generation, 
A VERY interesting collection of paintings is now on view at 
the Langham Hotel, Portland Place, being delineations of Arctic 
scenery, by Mr. William Bradford, of New York, In company 
with Dr, J. D, Hayes, Mr. Bradford spent four months of the 
[Fuly 13, 1871 
ber of years, and that the holder of it shall act as an assistant to 

