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NATURE 247 
nette had been only three days. The water in bird fountains 
and in water bottles, if not looked after and frequently changed, 
would be sure to contain /y/isorta. The rest of the evening was 
spent in examining the different forms of /zfusoria brought for 
exhibition. Before separating it was announced that the subject 
for the next meeting in July, would be the ‘‘ eggs of Articudata,” 
é.e, of insects, &c. 
PARIS 
Academy of Sciences, July 4.—M. Serret presented a 
report upon a memoir by M. Bouquet, on the theory of ultra- 
elliptical integrals.—M. FE. Catalan presented some remarks 
upon M, Darboux’s note on the surface of the centres of curva- 
ture of an algebraic surface.—M. Janin read a reply to the 
observations of M. H. Sainte-Claire Deville, upon the variation 
of temperature produced by the mixing of two liquids, in which 
he discussed the theory proposed by M. Deville, and maintained 
the correctness of his own theory, according to which, he stated, 
the elevation of temperature of mixtures of liquids may be ex- 
plained and calculated.—M. H. Sainte-Claire Deville made a 
few remarks upon M. Janin’s paper, and also presented a third 
memoir on the action of water upon iron and of hydrogen upon 
oxide of iron, the results of which he sums up as follows :—The 
increase of tension of the hydrogen formed by the contact of 
iron and aqueous vapour is a continuous phenomenon when 
' the tension of the aqueous vapour is caused to vary progressively 
without any change in the temperature of the iron ; the tension of 
‘the hydrogen corresponding to an invariable tension of the 
aqueous vapour decreases continuously when the temperature is 
gradually increased; and the same laws are followed in the 
inverse phenomenon of the reduction of oxide of iron by hydro- 
gen.—A note on a property of Volta’s condenser, by M. P. 
Volpicelli, was read.—Some magnetic observations made at 
Makerstown, and at Trevandrum, near Cape Comorin, by M. 
Broun, were communicated.—An extract from a letter from M. 
Legrand to M. Jamin, on Deluc’s thermometers, was read, in 
which the author stated that the difference between the tem- 
perature of the blood given by Deluc, and that now admitted, 
was due to the difference of atmospheric pressure at which 
the thermometers were graduated.—A note by M. Amagat, 
on the compressibility and dilatation of gases, was com- 
municated by M. Balard.—M. Delaunay presented a note 
by MM. Wolf and Rayet on the light of Winnecke’s Comet 
(Comet J. 1870) in which the authors describe their observations 
on the very feeble spectrum of that comet.—M. Delaunay also 
presented a note on the pyramids of Villejuif and Juvisy, the 
extremities of the geodetic base of Picard and Cassini.—M. 
Chapelas commpnicated a note on the spring of 1870, in which 
he noticed the phenomena of temperature, the direction of the 
winds, and the amount of rain observed at Paris during the 
months of April, May, and June of the present year.—M. Dau- 
din communicated a memoir relating chiefly to the drought of 
the present year, which he ascribed to the prevalence of north- 
west and north-east winds, caused by some phenomena occurring 
in the Arctic regions. —M. Janin presented, in the name of M. 
Fonvielle, a notice of solar halos; and M. C. Sainte-Claire 
Deville a note by M. Grad on the climate of Alsace and the 
Vosges.—M. A. W. Hofmann presented a note on the isomers 
of the cyanuricethers in reply to M, S. Cloéz.—A paper on the 
phosphoplatinic compounds, by M. P. Schiitzenberger was read, 
in which the author announced that he had separated the radi- 
cals from the chlorine compounds described by him in his former 
paper.—M, A. Béchamp communicated a paper on the carbonic 
and alcoholic fermentation of acetate of soda and oxalate of 
ammonia, in which he described the growth of microscopic 
vegetation in solutions of those salts, and the production of 
alcohol thereby, from which he inferred that the synthesis of 
alcohol is effected by the vegetation, although the constituents 
of alcohol may not be present in solution. He went further, 
and stated that the same yegetation produced the same effect 
eyen in distilled water !—M, Elie de Beaumont presented a note 
on the rocks traversed in forming the tunnel between Modane 
and Bardonnéche in the Western Alps, a distance of 12,220 
metres (or nearly 8 miles). The paper includes a long catalogue 
of the rocks observed, with their depths, which will prove of great 
yalue to the geologist.—M. Descloizeaux presented a note by M. 
C. Velain on the position of the Zerebratula janitor limestones in 
the Basses-Alpes ; he referred them to the Neocomian stage, of 
which he regarded them as the lowest portion.—M. Duchartre 
communicated a note by M. E. Prillieux, containing an account 
_ of some experiments upon the withering of plants, also a note by 
M. Cave on the generatory zone of the appendages of plants.— 
M. Chantran presented some interesting observations on the 
natural history of the Cray-fish, in which he described the mode 
of copulation of those crustaceans, their oviposition and their 
changes of skin. The last-mentioned phenomenon takes place 
fifteen times in the course of the three years during which the 
animals grow to their adult state.—A note by M. J. B. Noulet 
contained a statement that in the neighbourhood of Toulouse 
the house martins all build their nests in accordance with what 
M. Pouchet calls the old fashion, that is to say, with a small 
round entrance notched in the upper margin of the nest. The 
swallows (ZZ. xustica), on the contrary, according to the author, 
build nests resembling those described by M. Pouchet, and 
M. Noulet evidently considers that the latter naturalist has mis- 
taken the nests of one bird for those of the other. Two physio- 
logical papers were communicated; one on the vitality of the 
vaccine virus, by M. Melsens ; the other on an unequal produc- 
tion and difference of composition of the milk in the two breasts 
of the same woman. 
PHILADELPHIA 
Academy of Natural Sciences, February 1.—Dr. Ruschen- 
berger, president, in the chair. The following paper was pre- 
sented for publication: ‘* Note on the relations of Synocladia, 
King (1849), to the proposed genus of Septopora, Prout (1858).” 
By F. B. Meek and A. H. Worthen. 
March 1.—Dr. Ruschenberger, president, in the chair. The 
following paper was presented for publication: “ Descriptions 
of new species and genera of fossils from the Palzeozoic Rocks 
of the Western States.” By F. B. Meek and A. H. Worthen. 
Prof. Leidy directed attention to a specimen received from the 
Smithsonian Institution for examination, which he said was the 
upper two-thirds of the right humerus of one of the extinct giant 
sloths, and was obtained in Central America by Capt. J. M. 
Dow. It agrees so nearly in form, proportions, and size, with 
the corresponding portion of the arm-bone of the AZy/odon + obus- 
zus of Buenos Ayres, as described and figured by Prof. Owen, as 
to render it probable it may belong to the same species. The 
specimen is unworn, black, not petrified, has no adherent rock 
matrix, and looks as if it had been obtained from alluvial mud. 
The interior of the shaft presents a long wide cavity, which might 
be viewed as the medullary cavity were it not that all the known 
extinct giant sloths have the limb bones solid. There would 
perhaps have been less hesitation in deciding as to the character 
of the cavity, were it not that comparatively recently a reverse 
condition was observed in a bone where it would not have been 
anticipated. A short time ago Mr. James Orton, of Rochester, 
N.Y., submitted for examination a collection of bones from the 
valley of Quito, Ecuador, S.A. The specimens were obtained 
at an altitude of 10,000 feet, and from Mr. Orton’s account, were 
imbedded in a cliff of unstratified silt 400 feet in height. Among 
the bones, besides those of horses, lamas, &c., there was the 
femur apparently of a Mastodon, but solid or devoid of a medul- 
lary cavity. If the hollow interior be the natural condition of 
the JZy/odor-like humerus under inspection, it would not belong 
to Adylodon robustus. Independently of the cavity indicated, the 
bone is sufficiently different in size and form to indicate a different 
species from the AZylodon Harlani of North America. The 
humerus from Oregon, described by Perkins (Am. Jour. Sci. 
1841, xlii. 136), and referred to the latter by Prof. Owen, is not 
only much larger, but it is of greater breadth in relation with 
its antero-posterior diameter. The fragment of a humerus from 
Big-Bone-Lick, Kentucky, represented in fig. 3, plate xiv. of my 
“ Memoir on the Extinct Sloth Tribe,” is somewhat smaller than 
the corresponding part of the Oregon specimen, and is more 
compressed or wider in comparison with the antero-posterior 
diameter. Prof. Leidy further observed that there appeared to 
be a point of some significance in the anatomy of the mandible of 
Dromatherium sylvestre worthy of attention, though the appear- 
ance may turn out to be a deceptive one. Prof. Emmons had 
discovered three isolated rami of mandibles of this most ancient 
of American mammals in the triassic coal of North Carolina. 
Of the specimens, one is represented in fig. 66 of Emmon’s Ame- 
rican Geology, repeated in outline in fig. 650 of Dana’s Geology. 
Another specimen Prof. Emmons presentea to the Academy, and is 
contained in our museum. The point of interest to which reference 
is made is the apparent absence of a condyle. This process may 
have been lost, but in the two specimens seen by Prof. Leidy— 
that figured by Prof. Emmons, and that preserved in our museum 
—a separation of the process is not obvious, 
