APRIL 14, 1923] 
NATURE 
515 

spoken. But whereas in Norway the entrance of 
foreign words is not resented, in Iceland they in- 
variably undergo translation before acceptance. The 
writer was given to understand that the language is 
written and spoken in almost exactly the same manner 


“THE report by Col. Ryder, the present Surveyor- 
General of India, referred to below,! shows 
that in the year 1919-20 the Indian Survey Depart- 
‘ment had fully recovered from the dislocation due 
to the War. 
_ During this period there were no less than 19 
survey parties in the field, of which 12 were topo- 
graphical. On the normal scale of one inch per mile 
(much of which was revision) and smaller geographical 
scales, about 2800 square miles was turned out, 
while on the larger scales, ranging from 1} inches to 
4 inches and even 64 inches (city and town surveys), 
the output, detailed partly in miles and partly in 
eres, was reckoned to be satisfactory. Every class 
of country was included in the field of work, from 
the sands of Rajputana to the dense forest-covered 
hill tracts of Burma, and we read of the time-old 
ifficulties, heavy and continuous rain, malaria, and 
en of the clearance of villages by man-eating tigers. 
it is interesting to observe that the sources of the 
Irawadi (so long a geographical problem) were finally 


































Enough the costs of the different classes and 
scales of survey are set out in considerable detail, 
it is difficult to frame any conclusion as to whether 
costs have risen since the War. The normal 
me-inch scale of original survey apparently varied 
yetween 20 Rs. per square mile in Bengal and 70 Rs. 
n Lower Burma. This does not indicate any great 
ease on pre-war costs, but in itself scarcely justifies 
ny general estimate. 
. oh the geodesic and scientific branch of the depart- 
nt there is a curtailment of activity. No first- 
ss triangulation was carried out, and both the 
rnose 
1 Records of the Survey of India: Annual report of Parties and Offices 
for 1919-20, vol. 15. 
4 
N ICOLAUS COPERNICUS was born on February 
i 19, 1473, in Torun (Thorn), a town situated on 
the Vistula, in the north-west of Poland; the 450th 
nniversary of the birthday of the great astronomer 
tred thus on Monday, February 19, and was 
celebrated in many parts of Poland with much 
solemnity. Impressive ceremonies were held in 
Warsaw, Wilno, Poznan, L6édZ, Wloclawek, and 
Kieke; in the Jagellonian University of Cracow 
(where for four years, 1491-1495, Copernicus was an 
undergraduate) the celebrations in commemoration 
_of the anniversary will be held at a later date, probably 
in May. 
» In Seaexion with the Cracow proceedings a 
work, ‘ Stromata Copernicana,” will be published 
under the auspices of the Polish Academy of Sciences 
and Letters in Cracow; its author is Prof. L. 
 Birkenmajer, the well-known biographer of Copernicus. 
‘We have not the space to enter into an account of 
Prof. Birkenmajer’s investigations, but the following 
interesting fact may be mentioned: On the October 
page for the year 1505 of the book ‘ Calendarium, 
Magistri Joannis de Monte Regio,” preserved in the 
Uppsala University Library (sign. ‘ Incunab.”’ 840), 
Prof. Birkenmajer discovered, in Copernicus’s well- 
known handwriting, the Polish inscription (twice 
NO. 2789, VOL. 111] 
OC 

as it was a thousand years ago, and that the ancient 
sagas can be read with the same ease as the modern 
newspaper. Probably there is no other country in 
Europe where this strange perpetuation of ancient 
forms of speech prevails. 
The Survey of India. 
pendulum and latitude observations were suspended, 
but the registrations of tidal curves by means of 
self-registering tide-gauges were continued at Aden 
and at the principal ports of India. Levelling 
operations were also continued, and a new geodesic 
level net of India has been inaugurated on which 
levelling of high precision on the ‘‘ fore and back ” 
system will be the method employed. Like the exact 
determination of the height of the principal peaks 
of the Himalaya, it might be open to question 
whether the practical results of extreme precision 
are worth the expense of determination. The 
magnetic survey was also carried on during this 
season. The report closes with the usual returns of 
the computing- and drawing-offices. 
The chief point of interest in the volume is found 
in Appendix II.—the report on the expedition to 
Kamet by Major Morshead, who afterwards took 
such an active part in the Everest expedition. 
Kamet (25,445 feet high) is the culminating peak of 
the Zaskar range, and afforded Major Morshead and 
that distinguished mountaineer, Dr. Kellas, an ex- 
cellent opportunity for scientific observation on the 
effect of high altitudes on the human body. Appendix 
III. is also interesting, recording a note on the topo- 
graphy of the Nun Kun massif in Ladakh by Major 
Kenneth Mason. He has a good deal to say in criti- 
cism of Mrs. Bullock Workman’s claim to have 
established the height and position of certain peaks 
of that group, in which she disagrees with Indian 
Survey results. It is always dangerous for the 
amateur to claim greater accuracy than that main- 
tained by the Trigonometrical Survey of India. 
Mrs. Bullock Workman, in publishing her account 
of her extraordinary feats of climbing, pits herself 
against the G.T.S. and suffers accordingly. 
pi REE le 
Polish Celebrations of the 450th Anniversary of the Birth of Copernicus. 
repeated) “‘ Bok pomagay”’ (Our Lord, help us). 
Writing on this interesting detail, Prof. Jan Los, the 
well-known philologist (and professor of the history 
of Polish language in the Jagellonian University of 
Cracow), says: “ In the year 1505 every Pole would 
have written the words given above exactly in the 
form in which Copernicus has written them ”’ (Jezyk 
Polski, vol. viii., No. 1). Prof. Birkenmajer adds 
that in 1505, or perhaps in 1506, Copernicus had al- 
ready in his mind the ideas which eventually took form 
in the well-known revolutionary ‘‘ Commentariolus.”’ 
The Copernicus commemoration at Toruri extended 
over the two days—February 18 and 19; delegates 
from all the universities, high schools, scientific 
societies, etc., of Poland, and other guestswere cordially 
received by the municipality and citizens of Torut. 
The proceedings included the inauguration of the first 
general meeting of the Polish Astronomical Society. 
This meeting resolved unanimously to ask the Polish 
nation to establish a National Astronomical Institute 
in Poland ; an attempt with this object in view was 
made by Prof. Banachiewicz, of the Jagellonian 
University of Cracow, and exists in the form of an 
astronomical station in the Carpathian Mountains. 
A memorial tablet on the house where Copernicus was 
born was also unveiled. 
