February 9, 1899] 



NA TURE 



347 



whole; the number that perished were 35 per cent., and 

 those saved were 65 per cent. Various systems of inoculation 

 were used, as that of Dr. Koch, the improved method elaborated 

 by Dr. Edington, and the process of Drs. Turner and Kolle. 

 In some districts all three were in operation. In twenty-three 

 districts, as shown by the printed returns, 393,777 head of cattle 

 were inoculated under Dr. Edington's system, the resultant 

 mortality being 32,464, or only %\ per cent. Thus more than 

 360,000 cattle were saved, or over two millions sterling in value, 

 by the application of the glycerinated bile process. 



We are glad to notice, from a short report by Mr. Alex. 

 Meek, that the Northumberland Sea Fisheries Committee has 

 established some connection with the Durham College of Science, 

 and that a certain amount of scientific work is now being carried 

 on in the marine laboratory at CuUercoats. The report is chiefly 

 occupied with the results of the trawling expeditions carried on 

 in the summer of 189S by Mr. John Dent in the steamer Living- 

 stone. The hauls seem to have been comparatively few in 

 number — probably too few as yet in each year to justify any 

 conclusions drawn from the curves given. The report ends 

 with an interesting account of the mussel cultivation carried on 

 by Major Browne at Budle Bay, on the Northumberland coast. 

 As the fishing boats of the neighbourhood require about 1500 

 tons annually for bait, and as all of this, with the exception of 

 200 tons supplied by the Budle Bay farm, has to be imported 

 from a distance, it seems as if mussel culture on the North- 

 umberland coast ought to be an industry with a future 

 before it. 



Investigations carried on by the New York State Museum 

 and the U.S. Fish Commission, lead Mr. T. H. Bean to con- 

 clude that marine fishes now certainly known in the New York 

 fauna represent 200 species. The fresh waters contain 1 16 species, 

 and there are, besides, thirteen anadromous forms. The list 

 might be further increased by the addition of nineteen, including 

 forms doubtfully assigned to the fauna, which would bring the 

 total up to 348 species. Mr. Bean remarks that no systematic 

 account of the fishes has been published since 1842, and many 

 large regions of the State are almost, or altogether, unknown to 

 the ichthyologist. 



Commenting upon photographs of ribbon lightning obtained 

 by the Rev. J. Stewart-Smith, in the U.S. Monthly Weather 

 Kevieiu, Prof. Cleveland Abbe remarks that they are not taken 

 by moving the camera during exposure. He points out that a 

 discharge of lightning is too fleeting to be influenced by the 

 motion of the camera. With artificial oscillatory discharges one 

 may so control the time of the discharges and the motion of the 

 sensitive film as to produce the appearance of a ribbon ; but no 

 motion of the camera seems likely to explain the many details 

 in these ribbon photographs of natural lightning. On the con- 

 trary. Prof. Abbe thinks there is one flash on Mr. Stewart- 

 Smith's plate that has every indication of being certainly an 

 oscillatory discharge, showing lines of flow identical with those 

 photographed by Prof. Trowbridge at Cambridge, Massachu- 

 setts, and fully maintaining his conclusion, which was also that of 

 Prof. Joseph Henry and J. Ogden Rood, that the lightning flash 

 is an oscillatory discharge, repeated frequently to and fro within 

 the crack in the air that is opened by the first discharge. The 

 whole process requires but a few millionths of a second, and 

 the motion of the camera within that short time is insignificant. 



We have received from the Government Astronomer of New 

 South Wales a copy of the " Results of Rain, River and Evapor- 

 ation Observations" made in that Colony during 1897, contain- 

 ing monthly and annual totals of rainfall at 1518 stations, and 

 the annual rainfall at all stations with three and up to fourteen 

 years' records, with much other useful information, and .accom- 

 NO. 1528, VOL. 59] 



panied by maps showing the tabular results very clearly at a 

 glance. This system, under the careful superintendence of Mr. 

 Russell, has become one of the most perfect that exists, and it is 

 satisfactory to find that the author is able to state that the im- 

 portance of the work is being recognised every yeir by a wider 

 circle ; no less than 1450 of the observers being volunteers. The 

 average rainfall for the whole Colony during 1897 was 18*89 

 inches, being 25 per cent, less than the average for th= previous 

 twenty-four years. In the catchment of the river Darling the 

 average was 1975 inches, and in that of the Murray I7'7; inches. 

 In parts of the Colony, there has been an abundance of rain ; in 

 others, the intensity of drought. 



Dr. Paul Bergholz has sent us a translation into the 

 German language of the late Father B. Vines' paper entitled 

 "Investigation of the cyclonic circulation and the translatory 

 movement of West Indian hurricanes." The original work 

 was in Spanish, and was translated into English by Dr. C. 

 Finley, of Havana, for presentation to the Meteorological Con- 

 gress held at Chicago in August 1893. It was recently pub- 

 lished by the U.S. Weather Bureau, and briefly noticed in our 

 columns. The investigation is held in such high esteem, as 

 probably the most satisfactory statement of the laws and phe- 

 nomena of these storms which has yet been made, that Dr. 

 Bergholz has rendered good service to the science of meteorology 

 in preparing an independent translation for the use of German 

 readers. He has also carefully revised it, and rendered it more 

 useful by the publication of several charts showing the zones of- 

 the tracks of the storms in the various months. The translation 

 appears in the Marine- Rundschau; 1898. 



The Italian Central Meteorological Office is apparently re- 

 ducing the extent of its publications — ^not that the number of 

 observing stations is decreasing, for in the last published 

 Aniiali, for 1S96, Part ii., they reach 392 ; but that only ten- 

 day, monthly and annual means are given for temperature and 

 rainfall, together with summaries of the general state of the 

 weather. These results are arranged according to provinces, 

 and in the alphabetical order of the stations. A separate volume 

 of the Annali (Part i. ) contains, in the same way as in the 

 French Service, some valuable discussions of the detailed 

 observations, including earthquake phenomena. The last pub- 

 lished part of this series (for 1895) contains a discussion of the 

 observations of the meteorological observatory on Mount Etna, 

 situated at 2942 metres above sea-level. 



The Geological Survey of Western Australia has issued a 

 Bulletin (No. 2) containing two reports by Mr. R. Neil Smith. 

 The first relates to the state of mining in the Kimberley 

 district, and in it the author points out that very little work has 

 been done, except in a few mines, since 1891. The gold-field Is 

 evidently not suitable for large companies, but simply for the 

 gaining of a precarious living by working miners. Patches of 

 alluvial gold, and small veins of uncertain continuance, are 

 found at rare intervals, and these may pay well for a few months. 

 The second report deals with the question of obtaining artesian 

 water between the Pilbarra gold-fields and the Great Desert, and 

 the author concludes that the comparatively small superficial, 

 extent of the impervious ranges, and the thinness and probable 

 want of continuity of the water-bearing strata, are unfavourable 

 to any system of artesian wells. 



Quartz mining in Victoria, Australia, is now being carried 

 on in a very economical manner. The methods of mining the 

 stone underground and bringing it to the surface have been 

 reduced to a science, and it is probably nowhere more 

 economically done than in Victoria. There is much room 

 for improvement, though, in the method of milling the ore. 

 The half-yearly statements of several of the public companies. 



