51 
black smoke having been emitted. Travellers from Alaska report 
that great volumes of steam are rising from the volcanoes 
Redoubt and Iliamna in the Augustine Mountains, while the 
Redoubt is also throwing up immense clouds of smoke. 
According to advices from Honolulu dated September 3, Mount 
Kaluaha is active and is ejecting streams of fire. M. Lacroix, 
of the French Natural History Museum, left on Tuesday last to 
begin his work at Martinique. 
- 
“ 
ACCORDING toa Reuter telegram from Rome, the Italian 
postal authorities have examined a scheme submitted by an 
engineer, named Piscicelli, for the establishment of an electric 
postal service. It is proposed, by means of this system, to 
transmit letters in aluminium boxes, travelling along overhead 
wires at the rate of 400 kilometres an hour. A letter could thus 
be sent from Rome to Naples in twenty-five minutes and from 
Rome to Paris in five hours. A technical commission has been 
appointed to report on the system before instituting a series of 
experiments between Rome and Naples. 
Ir is stated in the Brztish Medical Journal that a somewhat 
new departure is about to be made by the North-Western 
Railway (U.S.), the headquarters of which arein Chicago. The 
plan is to equip every freight and passenger train with emer- 
gency chests containing splints, cotton bandages, antiseptics, 
restoratives, &c.,and to open aschool of instruction in first aid 
to the injured. The employés on all trains are to be required to 
attend the same and demonstrate that they comprehend the 
purpose of the teaching. The great purpose of the plan is to 
save lives, in the case of injuries, by the prompt and intelligent 
use of modern principles of treatment such as could be reason- 
ably applied by an ordinary train crew, the contention being 
that an injured person in such circumstances will be able to 
reach the nearest hospital in a far better condition, and that his 
chances in all respects will be correspondingly heightened. 
THE Lvectricéan states that a patent has just been issued in 
America for a coin-controlled X-ray machine for public use. 
The external appearance of the apparatus is similar to that of 
the automatic kinematograph machines so commonly seen on 
railway platforms and other places. The observer places a coin 
in the slot, moves a lever, puts his hand, or whatever he wishes 
to examine, into a box without any sides, and looks down at it 
through a fluorescent screen which forms the top of the box. 
The coin, on being inserted, closes the primary circuit of an in- 
duction coil worked by a few dry cells, and the vacuum tube is 
in a position immediately below the object to be observed. 
SOME four years ago, the Belgian Government offered a prize 
of 50,000 francs for a paste for matches which should not con- 
tain white sulphur. The commission appointed to judge the 
results of the competition has now reported that after. careful 
. . . | 
experiment and analysis it finds that none of the products so 
far submitted fulfil the required conditions, being defective in 
inflammability, ignite on any surface, or in igniting eject in- 
flammable matter containing some poisonous substance. 
THE sum of 5000 dollars has, according to Sczence, been 
bequeathed to the Astronomical Society of the Pacific by Mr. 
John Dolbeer, of San Francisco. The money will be invested, 
and the interest devoted to the diffusion of astronomical know- 
ledge. 
A GOTHENBURG physician has, it is stated in the Journal of 
the Society of Arts, invented an apparatus by which milk can 
be brought into the form of powder similar in appearance to | 
flour, and possessing all the qualities of milk in concentrated 
form, moisture excepted. It is maintained that the flour is 
perfectly soluble in water, and can be used for all purposes for 
which ordinary milk is employed. It is also claimed for it that 
NO. 1716, VOL. 66] 
NATURE 
[SEPTEMBER 18, 1902 
it does not get sour, or ferment, and in its dry state is not 
sensitive to changes in the weather. The cost of its production 
is estimated at Is. Id. per 106 quarts, 
THE zoological station of Arcachon, under the direction of 
M. le Dr, F. Jolyet, professor of medicine in the University of 
Bordeaux, is now in full work, but we are sorry to learn that the 
laboratories are not fully occupied. Arcachon, with its grand 
“basin” always accessible, and large fishing fleet, is such a 
favourable spot for the marine zoologist that we are surprised 
that such should be the case. The report of the station for 
1900-1 contains the results of several pieces of scientific work 
of much interest. Arcachon is a good place for the student of 
animal electricity, Torpedo being of common occurrence there. 
A new subsidiary station has recently been opened at Guethary, 
a small bathing-place near St. Jean de Luz, which is stated to 
have an excellent beach for dredging operations. 
THERE are now three examples of the Grevy’s zebra (Equus 
grevyt) in the Regent’s Park Gardens, placed under the Zoo- 
logical Society's care by the order of the King. Two of these 
were presented to His Majesty by the Emperor Menelik, and 
the third is the survivor cf a pair presented by the same 
Emperor to Queen Victoria. Unfortunately, they are all three 
of the female sex. But Colonel Harrington, the British repre- 
sentative in Abyssinia, has most kindly presented to the 
Zoological Society a pair of this zebra now living in his com- 
pound at Abis Abeba, and it has been arranged to send out one 
of the keepers to bring them home next month, so that there is 
a good chance of this magnificent animal, by far the largest and 
finest of all the wild Equidz now in existence on the earth’s 
surface, being permanently established in England. 
THE weekly weather reports issued by the Meteorological 
Council up to August 30 show that in the principal wheat-pro- 
ducing districts, which include the eastern portions of Great 
Britain and the south of England, the only part where the rain- 
fall had reached the average amount was the east of England ; 
in the east of Scotland the deficit was 3 inches. Inthe principal 
grazing districts, which include the western portions of Great 
Britain, the south-west of England and the whole of Ireland, 
the only part where the rainfall had reached the normal amount 
was the north of Ireland; in the south-west of England the 
deficit was 5 inches. These figures will be somewhat modified 
by the heavy fall that accompanied the severe storm which 
passed along St. George’s Channel and the Irish Sea on the 
night of September 2-3, when the amount exceeded an inch 
both in the north and south of Ireland; and in the counties 
of Wicklow and Dublin, which lay in the direct path of the 
centre of the storm, the fall in twenty-four hours amounted to 
nearly 3 inches. Nearly 2 inches fell on parts of the south 
coast of England during the same night. 
METEOROLOGISTS are much indebted to Mr. R. C. Moss- 
man for the publication of part iii, of his valuable papers on 
the meteorology of Idinburgh, which appears in a recent 
number of the 77azsacéions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. 
The present paper deals more particularly with new monthly and 
annual averages for the ten years 1891-1900 and the fifty years 
1851-1900, and includes, 7z/er a/za, means of temperature and 
pressure, and rainfall values. for periods varying from 124 to 
137 years. An appendix continues the very interesting account, 
commenced in part ii., of remarkable atmospheric and celestial 
| phenomena that have occurred in past years, and contains 
references to two events as far back as the twelfth century. The 
complete work undoubtedly forms the most useful and compre- 
| hensive discussion of the climatology of Edinburgh that exists. 
A PAPER by Mr. Walter Wesché in the Journa/ of the Royal 
Microscopical Society for August bids fair to throw light on the 
