il6 



NA TURE 



[yuneS, 1882 



solstice, when the southern manifestations generally are of rare 

 occurrence, their greatest frequency coinciding with the 

 equinoxes. 



The tide of travel, with insects, as with men, seems naturally 

 to be from east to west. With the noted exception of the grape 

 phylloxera and the Colorado potato beetle (as Miss Murthly 

 points out in a paper to the St. Louis Academy), Europe has not 

 received from America any considerable pest, while innumerable 

 noxious species have crossed the Atlantic from Europe. There 

 is a comparative scarcity, too, of Asiatic insect species on the 

 western seaboard of America, notwithstanding frequent ocean 

 traffic. Spite of great arid plains and lofty mountains, nearly 

 all the insects of Eastern American States, including those from 

 Europe, have found their way to the fields, orchards, and vine- 

 yards of the Pacific States. One of the latest insect-invaders 

 from Europe is the cabbage or rape-butterfly {Pieris rapa, 

 Schrank). It appeared about twelve years ago in some northern 

 seaports, and its range now extends from far north in Canada to 

 the south of Georgia. It attacks every cruciferous garden vege- 

 table, but in the flower garden curiously rejects plants of that 

 family in favour of mignonette. Miss Murthly has noted a large 

 amount of premature emergence from the chrysalis, and conse- 

 quent death ; indicating imperfect adjustment of the insect to the 

 climate of its new habitat. In Europe the insect is mainly kept 

 in check by numerous parasites. For several years in America 

 none such came to the aid of the disheartened gardener, but 

 some have now appeared, the most important being a small, 

 metallic green fly, which, though identical with the most de- 

 structive European parasite, is proved to be indigenous on 

 both sides of the Atlantic. It lays its eggs in or upon the skin 

 of the mature caterpillar, and from these come small maggots, 

 which live on the fatty tissues of their victim, but do not touch 

 its vital organs till the chrysalis state is reached. 



The mines opened a short time since in Chiua in the province 

 of Chihli, with the special support and patronage of Li Hung 

 Chang, have recently become the subject of much adventitious 

 interest in Europe. The working of these mines was wholly a 

 native enterprise ; foreign machinery was imported in large 

 quantities, and up to a month or two ago all seemed going on 

 well. A canal between the mines and Tientsin was nearly com- 

 pleted, and it was calculated that 250 tons of fine coal could be 

 forwarded daily to the latter port. Five thousand tons were, it 

 was said, ready at the pit's mouth for conveyance as soon as the 

 canal was opened. It was believed that, with sufficient transport, 

 one thousand tons a day could be raised for many years from the 

 present pits, while it was said that fifty collieries of an equal size 

 to the present one could be opened in or near Kaiping. The 

 information, therefore, telegraphed by Reuter's agent in Shanghai 

 that the further working of the mines had been peremptorily 

 stopped by the Government, came with a shock to many in- 

 terested in progress in China. It was stated that a censor in a 

 memorial to the throne complained that the long galleries in the 

 mines, and the smoke of the foreign machinery, disturbed the 

 earth dragon, who in his turn disturbed the spirit of the Empress 

 who died some months ago, and who was buried about a hundred 

 miles off. The irate spirit of the departed lady promptly took 

 vengeance by afflicting the denizens of the palace in Peking with 

 measles. The latter were, the censor is reported to have said, 

 distinctly traceable to the Kaiping mines, which interfered with 

 Qsiffng-shui. The conclusion was obvious : the mines must be 

 stopped. Such was the story told by the Tientsin correspondent 

 of a Shanghai newspaper. The process by which a suggestion 

 that the mines should be stopped grew in the excited minds of 

 the residents of Shanghai into the certainty that they were 

 actually stopped — and thus to Reuter's telegram— is not an 

 unfamiliar one. The latest information from the East enables 

 us to say that the mines are still working as usual, and there is 



not the slightest evidence that there is or has been any intention 

 of interfering with them. It is even denied that such a memorial 

 as that mentioned above has had any existence except in the 

 imagination of a gobemouche at Tientsin. However this may be, 

 it must be confessed that the petition has a Chinese ring about 

 it, and that the method of argument is one sufficiently familiar 

 to readers of the Peking Gazette. The mines are fortunately 

 within Li Hung Chang's jurisdiction, and while they enjoy his 

 encouragement it is unlikely that feng-shui or other superstition 

 will be allowed to interfere with them. 



The Chinese Customs authorities have, we observed, declined 

 to assist the Chamber of Commerce of Shanghai in making a 

 series of meteorological observations along the coast of China. 

 We have already described the project in these columns. The 

 reason of this refusal is unknown ; but it is generally believed 

 that Sir Robert Hart, the Inspector-General of Chinese Customs, 

 intends establishing a special meteorological bureau in connection 

 with his department. If Sir Robert can obtain the assistance of 

 one of the very few men in the East competent for such a task, 

 he may add one more to the many good services which the 

 organisation over which he presides has done to China. 



A sharp earthquake shock, at first undulatory, then vertical, 

 lasting seven seconds, was felt at Naples on Tuesday Morning at 

 6'47. The instruments on Mount Vesuvius gave warning. The 

 centre of the disturbance proves to have been at Isernia, in the 

 Abruzzi, according to the telegrams received since. 



A conversazione in connection with the Royal Colonial Insti- 

 tute will be held at the South Kensington Museum on the 

 evening of June 23. 



The Scientific Publishing Company announce that they have 

 in the press "Photometry and Gas Analysis," by J. T. Brown, 

 F.C.S., divided into three sections — Standards, in two chapters, 

 Photometers, in eight chapters, and Gas Analysis, in two 

 chapters. The Company also announce the publishing in handy 

 form of the "Minutes of Evidence on Electric Lighting Bill, 

 1S82," with text of the bill and a commentary upon the whole. 



We have received a sensible and interesting lecture on the 

 Relations of Science to Modern Life, by the Rev. Dr. H. C. 

 Potter, delivered before the New York Academy of Sciences ; 

 it is published by Putnam and Sons of New York. 



We have on our table the following books : — British Fresh- 

 water Algae, II., Mr. C. {Cooke (Williams and Norgate) ; 

 Transactions of the Brighton Health Congress (J. Beal and Co., 

 Brighton) ; Capital and Population, Fredk. B. Hawley (Apple- 

 ton, New York) ; Hydrographical Surveying, Capt. W. G. L. 

 Wharton (Murray) ; Logic for Children, A. J. Ellis, F.R.S. 

 (C F. Hodgson) ; First Lessons [in Geology, A. S. Packard 

 (Providence, U.S.) ; Diagrams to First Lessons in Geology, A. 

 S. Packard (Providence, U.S.) ; Anales de la Officina Meteoro- 

 logica, vol. ii., B. A. Gould (Buenos Aires) ; Scientific Trans- 

 actions of the Royal Dublin Society, vol. ii. series ii. ; The 

 Great Diamond Fields of the World, Edw. W. Streeter (Bell 

 and Sons) ; A Flight to Mexico, J. J. Aubertin (Kegan Paul) ; 

 Geological Survey of Canada, Report of Progress for 1879-80 

 (Dawson Brothers, Montreal) ; New Indian Lepidopterons 

 Insects, F. Moore (Asiatic Society) ; Regenwaarkemingen in 

 Nederlandsch Indie, lS8t (Batavia) ; Lohrmann's Mondcharten, 

 J. A. Barth of Leipzig; The Land of the Bey, T. Wemyss Reid 

 (Low and Co.) ; Catalogue of Fossil Foraminifera in the British 

 Museum ; Die Seefischerei an der Westkisten Schwedens, 

 Gerhards. Yhlen (Norsledt und Soner, Stockholm) ; Botanicon 

 Sinictun, E. Bretschneider (M. D. Trubner and Co.) ; Tabular 

 View of the Geological Systems, Dr. Clement (Swan Sonnen- 

 schein) ; Report on Injurious Insects, E. A. Omerod (Swan 

 Sonnenschein) ; Bibliographie Generate de l'Astronomie, vol. ii. 

 (Brussels); Proceedings American Association, 2 parts; Col- 



