590 



NA TURE 



\_April 2 2, t8S6 



expected that this ceremony will have an unusual interest, M. 

 Goblet having sent a circular to the various learned Societies, 

 announcing his intention of altering the date of the Convocation 

 of French savants in Paris. 



Although the Association Fran^aise and the Societe Scien- 

 tifique de France have passed a vote for their fusion into one 

 compact body, the resolution has not been carried into effect, 

 owing to some legal difficulties resulting from the very peculiar 

 state of French law relating to Societies of public interest, which 

 are con^-idered as so many infants, whose properties are always 

 in the hands of a lord chancellor for protection. 



The Report of the Committee of the Mitchell Library at 

 Glasgow (where the Public Libraries Act was rejected by a 

 moderate majority during the past year), while showing a 

 largely-increased usefulness of that institution, forces attention 

 to the very great cost of working even a reference library only. 

 Out of an expenditure of 2770/., only the odd 770/. can be em- 

 ployed in the combined purchase and cost of binding of both 

 books and periodicals. Of this, 450/. is all that was spent in 

 the purchase of 4500 publications j which does not suggest 

 costly works for a reference library from which fiction is 

 excluded. Nevertheless, the crowded state of the present 

 rooms has led to an earnest effort to expend nearly fifty times 

 that amount in a new site and "inexpensive" buildings, 

 although the Committee are well aware that "a new and large 

 building would imply a larger annual expenditure of every 

 kind." The present premises have been much more economic- 

 ally, though not sufliciently, supplemented by the addition of 

 two small houses adjoining, in one of which a reading-room for 

 ladies has been fitted up, while the remaining rooms are well 

 utilised by being shelved and filled with the less-used classes of 

 literature. Complete sets of the 26S periodicals taken would be 

 a valuable part of such a library if indexed in the American way, 

 so that all the most recent information would be found there 

 directly or indirectly. A presentation of 288 volumes from the 

 Lords of Her JVIajesty's Treasury is specially acknowledged, and 

 suggests that a gift from Government Offices of sets of their 

 pitblications to all free libraries up to a certain time, which would 

 be willing to properly house them, would be no very great cost 

 to the nation, while it would be a reward to the enterprise of 

 those towns which have organised free libraries and an en- 

 couragement to others to do so quickly. 



The Fish Commission steamer Albatross, Science states, 

 arrived at Nassau, New Providence, March 19, after a most 

 successful trip. The ship was chiefly engaged in making 

 soundings. Two naturalists were landed at Watling's Island, 

 San Salvador, where much valuable scientific material was 

 gathered during a stay of two weeks. But little dredging has 

 been done, so that few accessions of marine life have been made. 

 At Rum Cay, Conception Island, Cat Island, and Great Exuma 

 Island, the naturalists of the expedition obtained many valuable 

 specimens of fish, lizards, birds' nests, eggs, cave relics, pottery, 

 and about 500 bird-skins. These islands are very small and 

 thinly populated. Vegetation is scarce, and the islands them- 

 selves are formed almost entirely of rock. Cocoa-nut trees and 

 bananas are abundant, but oranges and apples rather scarce. 

 The Albatross is now at Key West, and will spend some time 

 dredging in the Gulf of Mexico and vicinity. 



General Hazen said receutly, in his testimony before a 

 U.S. Congressional Committee, th.at foreign signal stations were 

 a necessity, and the establishment of a station in the West 

 Indies had fully demonstrated thi* fact. It is quite probable that 

 Congress will authorise the establishment of stations at important 

 foreign points. 



An interesting discussion is just now being carried on between 

 Scandinavian and German anthropologists as to priority in the 

 theory of three great prehistoric periods — the ages of Stone, 

 Bronze, and Iron. Dr. Soplius Midler, for the former, claims 

 that the theory was first enunciated in 1837 by the Danish 

 Thomsen, and that it was ridiculed for forty years by the Ger- 

 mans. To this Prof Virchow, in the last Zeitsckriftjitr Ethnolo- 

 gic, replies that Dr. Midler confounds two different things. The 

 priority of the Stone Age to the others was never disputed in 

 Germany ; it certainly was denied that any epoch deserved 

 especially the title of the Bronze Age, and he thinks that this 

 was due to the propensity of the Scandinavians to exaggerate 

 the extent of this epoch. But he contends that two Germans, 

 Lish and Danneil, discovered the three ages simultaneously 

 witlr Thomsen. In support of this he quotes a memoir by the 

 former, published in 1837, but in large part printed in 1836, 

 before Thomsen's work appeared, and when it was wholly un- 

 known to him, expounding a similar theory. In 1835 Lish had 

 actually arranged prehistoric objects in the Museum in Mecklen- 

 burg according to the three ages. Prof. Virchow therefore pro- 

 poses that in future Danneil (whose share in the discovery does 

 not appear so pronounced), Lish, and Thomsen should be re- 

 garded as the earliest propounders of the theory of the three 

 prehistoric ages. 



OxV March 28, at about 9 p.m., a magnificent meteor w.as 

 observed in several places between Trondhjem and Molde, on 

 the north-west coast of Norway.. An observer at the former 

 town states that his attention was first attracted to the pheno- 

 menon by the street in which he was walking becoming suddenly 

 brilliantly illuminated, and on looking up he saw a bright 

 meteor, with a somewhat faint trail, going in a direction S. S.W. 

 toN. N. W. The light from the body itself was an intensely 

 bluish-white, and that of the trail grayish, with a red tint at 

 the end. During its passage the meteor passed behi id some 

 light clouds, and was still visible through them, but not the 

 trail. The meteor disappeared from view behind mountains, 

 but a brightness could still be observed in that direction for 

 some time afterwards. Another observer at Christiansund 

 (about 130 kilometres south-east of Trondhjem in a straight 

 line) states that he saw the meteor at that place at 8.45 p.m., 

 going in a direction S.E. to N. W. It was about 40 centimetres 

 in diameter, with a purple-coloured trail of about ij metre in 

 length, and its passage was accompanied by a whizzing sound 

 like that of a flight of birds. The meteor illuminated the whole 

 town brightly for some seconds, and burst with a report like that 

 of a big gun. The light was so intense that even people in 

 well-lighted rooms were attracted by the sudden brightness 

 without. At Molde (about 60 kilometres further south) the 

 meteor was also seen, and its bursting was so loud that the 

 Romsdal Mountains returned a thundering echo. 



In the twenty-ninth issue of the Medical Reports of the 

 Chinese Customs, published half-yearly, besides the reports of 

 the medical officers at the v.irious Treaty ports, which .ire probably 

 ofmtich professional and local interest, there are two special 

 papers. In one of these the character and uses of the so-called 

 "black-lime" of China are noted by Dr. Peek of Tientsin. 

 This substance is generally stated (Dr. Williams even falls into 

 the error) to be a kind of bitumen ; it really is amorphous 

 graphite, and it is used when mixed with lime to mal^e a very 

 hard and durable plaster, and it is also employed in dyeing cloth. 

 The second special paper is Dr. Macgowan's on the movement 

 cure in China, which has been already noticed in these columns. 



The Norwegian Meteorological Oflice is making an appeal 

 to Norwegian sea-captains with reference to the total eclipse 

 on August 29 ne.xt, viz. that any one who on that day happens 

 to be in the locality wheie the eclipse is total shall make obser- 



