302 
NATURE 
[Aug. 11, 1870 
Prussia will probably suffer—she will certainly suffer if the 
war be prolonged—from her native animals being stricken by 
contagion ; and England, that has hoped so long and so much 
from the resources of the East, will be left to seek for plenty in 
her own evergreen fields, and trust that some day her pre- 
eminence over the seas may render. her: independent of the 
transportation of a few hundred bullocks and sheep weekly 
from shores nearest her, by securing the produce—dead, not 
alive—of healthier, though more distant lands.” 
THE Pharmaceutical Gournal (which now appears weekly) 
states that the plans for the erection of a Pharmaceutical Institute 
in connection with the University of Marburg have been 
approved, and the work was to have been commenced at once, 
but will now probably be delayed by reason of the war. 
A COMMITTEE, appointed by the Royal Medical and Chirur- 
gical Society to investigate the hypodermal method of adminis- 
tering injections, has just presented its report, on which the 
Medical Times and Gazette remarks :—‘‘ We may safely take, as 
a broad guide in practice, the rule that the physiological activity 
of nearly every substance which can thus be used, is three, if not 
four times greater when it is given by the skin than when it is 
swallowed.” The proper commencing dose of strychnine is 
xn grain of the sulphate. The doseof atropine is also 74, grain 
at first. The dose of morphia is 4; grain to } grain. 
A TRANSLATION of Professor Huxley’s Elementary Lessons 
in Physiology has just been brought out in Paris, edited by Dr. 
Dally, who introduces it as ‘‘ Za Science sans Phrases.” 
THE following parliamentary papers have been recently 
issued :—Second Report of the Rivers Pollution Commission 
(discussing the A B C process of treating sewage) ; report 
of the Meteorological Committee of the Royal Society for 
the past year, an important document to which we shall re- 
turn; and Volume VII. of the Irish Primary Education Com- 
missioners’ report. 
Some standard photographs and directions for measurement 
have been received by the Colonial Office from the Ethnological 
Society, through Prof. Huxley, the president. These are in- 
tended for the measurement and descriptions of aborigines in 
our Colonies. 
THE Statistical Society has under consideration the means of 
promoting the study of political economy and of the numerical 
and statistical mode of investigation by granting prizes in our 
public schools. The first step will be to obtain the opinions of 
the head masters. The success of the Royal Geographical Society’s 
examinations is an encouragement for this new effort. 
O1t seeds having proved such a valuable branch of commerce 
in India, the Government is trying to promote the gum trade. 
The plants of the Australian gum tree, the Axcalyptus, intro- 
duced into the Punjaub, are taking well. It is hoped the gum 
will be of equal quality to the fossil, Damara Australis, or New 
Zealand Kauri pine. 
COAL containing 68 per cent. of carbon is reported to have 
been discovered near the town of Darjeeling, in the hill district 
of the Himalayas. Valuable copper and iron have also been 
discovered, so that important English settlement has the chance 
of other resources beyond tea and cinchona. The development 
of the minerals promises in time to give further employment for 
English settlers. At present in the hill regions the only metal 
working is in the iron mines of Kumaon. The hills can supply 
fuel for working charcoal iron. Our newly-annexed Bhootan 
territory is supposed to contain iron, 
NOTWITHSTANDING the financial raid, the Lieutenant- 
Governor of Bengal has directed that nothing shall be done in 
the way of disbanding the establishment assigned for the survey 
of the Khasi, Naza, and Garrow hills, but, on the contrary, that 
the survey operations shall be taken up whenever the reduced 
strength of the staff will admit of it. The Government of India 
has confirmed this decision. 
THE last scientific curiosity is a “Statement of a recently 
claimed discovery in Natural Science, incentive to mining enter- 
prise,” compiled by ‘‘ Research,” who endeavours to prove that 
geologists are entirely wrong in teaching that the changes in the 
ocean-line are due to continuous slow elevation or subsidence of 
theland. It appears that these changes are really due to shiftings 
of the mass of water in the ocean resulting from ‘‘a change of 
the centre of gravity of the earth’s volume ;” though how a 
knowledge that we are at any time liable to a sudden overflow 
of the waters of the ocean can be ‘‘an incentive to mining 
enterprise” is not clearly shown. 
AmonG the novelties in the Exhibition at Paris in 1867 was 
the American Gatling gun, which, it was asserted, was to reyo- 
lutionise the art of war. Like the mitrailleuse, the Gatling has 
as many locks as it has barrels. But whereas in the mitrailleuse 
the barrels are fixed and the locks have only a horizontal motion, 
in the Gatling both locks and barrels revolve. The locks have 
also, when the gun is at work, a reciprocating motion. The 
cartridges are kept in ‘‘feed-cases” side by side, and transferred 
to a ‘“‘hopper,” or shoot, when they are to be used. A handle © 
is turned, and a process goes on analogous to that of the bullet- 
making machines, well known to visitors of the Royal Arsenal at 
Woolwich. When a ten-barrel Gatling is being fired, five of 
the cartridges are in process of loading and firing, five in process 
of extraction after discharging their bullets. The locks play 
backwards and forwards in the cavities where they work, and if 
one becomes disordered the action of the others is not stopped, 
provided that everything acts as it ought. Three sizes of Gatlings 
are generally made, the largest throwing a projectile of about 
half a pound weight. Case shot are made for the large-sized 
Gatling as well as solid bullets. It is, however, too heavy, and 
requires four horses. The chief defect of the Gatling, of all sizes, 
is that it cannot, like the mitrailleuse, fire volleys, but only single 
shots, always in the same line. 
Two experiments have recently been tried with a gunpowder 
invented by M. Pertuiset—the first by the Austrians against iron 
plates at Pola ; the second recently in London. ‘The former were 
made last September, in continuation of a series commenced some 
time before. The target was intended to represent the side of a 
first-class ironclad ship. There were two plates, one of 4°5 inches 
thick, the other 4°75 inches, English measure. The backing was 
10 inches of hard wood, then an iron skin 1°5 inches thick, and 
behind it 12 inches of oak. The gun was of 8 inches calibre ; 
the charge was 12 kilogrammes of common powder. The pro- 
jectiles were of cast iron, made in Austria. They weighed go 
kilogrammes, and those intended to explode contained 1,500 
grammes of Pertuiset powder. Two solid shot were first fired 
at the target, and only indented the face of it. The first of M. 
Pertuiset’s shells not only broke the front plate and damaged 
the backing, but dislodged a mass of iron 22 inches by 15. The 
second round struck ona sound plate, and not only destroyed 
the iron, but so smashed the backing as to render the target 
unfit for further experiments. The opening in the front plates 
was this time far more considerable than after the first round. 
The experiments in London were made on horses. The skull 
was split, and on handling it large pieces of bone came away 
easily. The surface bones were removed, and the brain beneath 
was found to be utterly destroyed—a mass of gray and white 
matter devoid of consistency. When the loose material was 
lifted out there was a hole like the crater of a mine, 7 inches long 
by 6 broad. Part of the bullet had been driven up to the back 
of the head. And this work was done by a weapon that a man 
can carry in his pocket ! : 
