190 



NATURE 



\Junc 22, 1882 



immediately. The President will receive the names of candi- 

 dates and their te>timonials of character on Tuesday, October 

 10 between 8 and 9 p.m. The examination will commence 

 on Wednesday, October II, at 9 a.m. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS 



Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, vol. xix. 

 No. 109, June to December, 1881. — Continuation of notes on 

 an Egyptian element in the names of the Hebrew kings, &c, by 

 S. P. Lesley. — Notes on the geology of West Virginia, by J. C. 

 White. — Bhotodynamic notes, III. and IV., by P. E. Chase. — 

 On Alaskaite, a new member from the series of bismuth sulpho- 

 salts, by G. A. Konig. — The auriferous gravels of North 

 Carolina, by H. M. Chance. — On some mammalia of the lowest 

 eocene beds of New Mexico, by E. D. Cope. — -Notes on the 

 Quinnemout coal grou 1 in Mercer Co. of West Virginia and 

 Tazewell co. of Virginia, by 1. J. Stevenson. — Notes on the 

 coal-field near Canon City, Colorado, by the same. — The brain 

 of the cat (Felis domestical ; I., Preliminary account of the gross 

 anatomy, by B. G. Wilder. — Exploration of the River Bene 

 with the hitherto unexplored regions of Bolivia, by E. R. Heath. 

 —The names of the Gods in the Kiche myths, Central America, 

 by D. G. Brenton. 



The Transactions of the Academy of Sciences of St. Louis, 

 vol. iv. No. 2, 1882. — The hieroglyphic tablet of Pompeium 

 grammatically translated and commented on, by E. Seyffurth. — 

 Notes on North American Microgasters, with descriptions of new 

 species, by C. V. Riley. — Descriptions of some new Tortricidct 

 (leaf-rollers), by the same. — On certain problems in refraction, 

 by F. E. Nipher. — Magnetic determinations in Missouri during 

 the summer of 1880, by the same. — " Reversion of type" in the 

 digastric muscle of the human being, by C. A. Todd. — Ephe- 

 meris of the satellites of Mars for the opposition of 1881, by H. 

 S. Pritchett. — The genus Isoetes in North America, by E. Engel- 

 man. — Auroral phenomenon, September 12, 1881, by E. A. 

 Engler. 



Revue d' 'Anthropologic, Paris. Deuxieme, Fascicule (1882), 

 contains : — A paper by Dr. Paul Broca — left incomplete at his 

 death — on so-called Ectromelian monstrosities, or those in whom 

 there is an abnormality, but not an absence, of certain parts of 

 the body. — Contributions to the study of muscular variations in 

 human races, by Theophile Chudzinski. This paper is one of a 

 series, the earlier parts of which appeared in the Revue for 1873- 

 1874, and which will be continued in subsequent numbers. — On 

 the cephalometric square, and its mode of application, by Dr. 

 Topinard, who also describes the respective merits and de- 

 merits of the methods usually employed by artists to de- 

 termine the facial angle and its relation to other parts of 

 the body. — On the populations of the peninsula of the Balkans, 

 by the late French geographer and traveller, Guillaume 

 Lejean, sometime vice-consul at Khartoum, and at Mas- 

 saouah. This portion of the author's exhaustive history of the 

 origin and settlements of all the various peoples who have 

 occupied the Hemus peninsula since it was held by the ancient 

 Thracians, ends with the complete subjection, in the thirteenth 

 century of the Slaves by Latin princes holding lands under the 

 Greek Empire. — In a paper entitled " Les Griots," Dr. 

 Berenger-Feraud describes those itinerant musicians who are to 

 be met with in every part of Central Africa, from the shores of 

 the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean, and who, notwithstanding the 

 low castes to which they belong, constitute a distinct confedera- 

 tion under the authority of a chief, who exercises great authority 

 over its scattered members, and levies a heavy tax for his own 

 use from their general receipts. These people, whose name of 

 Griots is a French corruption of the Ouolove word " Gwewonal," 

 are regarded with fear and repugnance by the negro natives of 

 the lands which they traverse, and where they are looked upon 

 as members of an impure caste, whose dead are capable of 

 bringing sterility and perpetual drought to the ground in which 

 they are buried . They are skilled in improvising and reciting ; 

 and while some play the violin and guitar, the least gifted among 

 them beat the tam-tam or play on various discordant wind- 

 instruments. The confederation is undoubtedly of long-standing, 

 and while the Griots, who perpetuate many ancient myths and 

 songs, contribute towards the maintenance of some degree of 

 intercommunication among the African races, they are credited 

 with fomenting frequent dissensions, by trafficking with theinfor- 

 mation which they acquire through the extraordinary license 



granted them of going where they will among rich and poor, 

 both in times of war and peace. — A critical review of all that is 

 known of the Chukches, or Yu-its, by M. J. Deniker, gives the 

 substance of what has been learnt of the ethnological and social 

 standing of these Arctic peoples from the narratives of Nordqvist, 

 Nordenskjold, the Russian Argoustinovitch, Krause, Dall, and 

 others. 



Mathematische und Natur-aiissenschaftliche Mittheilungen, &c. 

 (Berlin Academy), Heft 1, 1882. — Report of work in connection 

 with the Humboldt foundation for natural research and travel, 

 by E. Du Bois Reymond. — The thermo-dynamics of chemical 

 processes, by H. Helniholtz. — On abnormal forms of pine-cones, 

 by A. W. Eichler. — On the molecular refraction of liquid 

 organic compounds, by H. Landolt. — The embryonal excretory 

 apparatus of the gill-less Hylodes martinicensis, by E. Selenka, 

 — On the differences of phase of electric vibrations, by A. Ober- 

 beck. — On twisted rock- crystals, by E. Reusch. — On geognostic 

 observations by G. Schweinfurth in the desert between Cairo 

 and Suez, by E. Beyrich. — Investigation of volcanic rocks from 

 the region of Abu-Zabel, on the Ismailia Canal, by E. Arzruni. 

 — On the terminal growth of phanerogam roots, by S. Schwen- 

 dener. — On an abundant exhalation of sulphuretted hydrogen in 

 the Bay Jof Mesolungi, by G. Von Rath. — On transformations 

 of amide by action of bromine in presence of alkalies, by A. 

 W. Hofmann. — On the phosphates of thallium and lithium, by 

 C. Rammelsberg. — The present state of science, by E. du Bois- 

 Reymond. — On the production of amides of mono-basic acids 

 of the aliphatic series, by A. W. Hofmann. — On the production 

 of mustard-oils, by the same. — Crystallographic researches on 

 sublimated titanite and amphibole, by A. Arzruni. — Congratu- 

 latory addresses to Von Bischoff and to Henle on attaining their 

 doctor-jubilee. 



The last number of the Journal of the Russian Chemical and 

 Physical Society (vol. xiv. fasc. 5) contains several valuable 

 papers. Prof. Mendeleeff con'ributes an interesting paper "on 

 the heat of combustion of hydrocarbons," and a note on his 

 experiments on the resistancce opposed by water to the motion 

 of solid bodies. — Prof. Butleroff contributes a notice on the im- 

 portant question as to the variability of atomic weights, and 

 another on the oxidation of isodibutylene by permanganate of 

 potassium ; and M. Woeikof discusses the influence of local 

 topographical conditions of meteorological stations on the 

 average temperatures of winter. — Besides, we notice papers on 

 the formation of hypochlorites and chlorates during the decom- 

 position of chlorides by means of a current, by MM. Lyadoff and 

 Tikhomiroff. — On the separation of barium from strontium and 

 calcium by means of chromates, by M. Meschersky. — On the 

 structure of nitrated products of the fat series, by M. Kisel. — On 

 the critical state of bodies, by M. Stoletoff. — On the electrical 

 conductibility of vacuum, by M. Kraewitsch. — On vibratory 

 telephonic signals, by M. Jacoby. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES 

 London 



Royal Society, June 15. — "On a Deep Sea Electrical Ther- 

 mometer." By C. William Siemens, D.C.L., F.R.S. 



In the Bakerian Lecture for 1871, delivered before the Royal 

 Society (Proc. Roy. Soc, vol. 19, p. 443), I showed that the 

 principle of the variation of the electrical resistance of a con- 

 ductor with the temperature might be applied to the construction 

 of a thermometer, which would be of use in cases where a 

 mercurial thermometer is not available. 



The instrument I described has since been largely used as a 

 pyrometer for determining the temperatures of hot blasts and 

 smelting furnaces, and Prof. A. Weinhold (Annalen der Physik 

 und Chemie, 1873, p. 225), using the instrument with a differential 

 voltameter described in my paper referred to, found its indica- 

 tions to agree very closely with those of an air thermometer 

 within the limits of his experiments from 100° to iooo°C. I am 

 not aware, however, that any results have been published of its 

 application to measuring temperatures where a much greater 

 degree of accuracy is required, as in the case of deep sea obser- 

 vations. My friend, Prof. Agassiz, of Cambridge, U.S., 

 ordered last year, for the American Government, an instrument 

 designed by me for this purpose, and during the autumn it was 

 subjected to a series of tests on board the United States Coast 

 and Geodetic Survey steamer Blake, by Commander Bartlett. 



The apparatus consists essentially of a coil of silk-covered iron 



