NATURE 
581 

 Aprit 28, 1923] 
Research Items. 















EXCAVATIONS AT ANCIENT CARTHAGE.—A corre- 
spondent writing in the Times of April 9 describes 
e result of excavations on the site of ancient 
Carthage conducted by a party of Americans working 
in co-operation with French archeologists. Their 
work is timely, as the site of this city is in danger of 
becoming a modern suburb of Tunis. Within the 
city itself the remains of two sanctuaries and the 
potters’ quarter have yielded some sculptured stones 
and numerous specimens of pottery. But the most 
important discovery is an underground corridor 
through which a supply of water passed, and some 
rock-cut tombs, containing statues, two on recumbent 
stone coffins of Greek work, and others showing that 
the Carthaginians were dependent for their art on 
Greece and Egypt. It is hoped that further explora- 
tion will throw light on the Roman buildings and 
North African architecture during the Christian 
period. 
CLASH oF IDEALS IN MopDERN INpIA.—The Earl of 
Ronaldshay, Governor of Bengal, 1917-22, delivered 
an interesting address before the Indian Section of 
the Royal Society of Arts, which is printed in the 
Society’s Journal (vol. Ixxi., No. 3, 665), on the 
situation in India. The motive force of the native 
movement is ‘‘ fear lest before the triumphant assert- 
iveness of Western civilisation all that is essentially 
and distinctively Indian is doomed to perish and 
utterly to disappear.’’ As regards education, there is 
dissatisfaction with the present system, but it is not 
easy to discover what it is that Indians desire to see 
taking its place. There is an emphatic demand for 
vocational or practical instruction—they object to the 
present courses as displaying a Western bias; the 
demand in Bengal for medical training is clamorous 
and widespread, ‘‘and many Indians who are far 
from being hostile to the British connexio1 desire to 
see a more distinctly Indian orientation given to the 
education imparted to their people.’’ The address, 
which deserves attention, takes, on the whole, an 
optimistic view of the present situation. 
PsYCHOLOGY AND CRIMINAL RESPONSIBILITY.—In 
Psyche (vol. iii., No. 2) Dr. W. Brown discusses the 
attitude of modern psychology to responsibility. He 
shows that there is a tendency for those who under- 
stand incompletely the aims of modern psychology, 
to believe that a general spread of its doctrines will 
result in a weakening of the sense of moral respon- 
sibility. He discusses the legal definition of re- 
sponsibility and describes cases where a crime of 
violence may be committed for which the person 
cannot beheld responsible. The peppolbetst, as such, 
is concerned with the problem of studying the causes 
in the history of the person which have led to the act, 
and the contribution of recent work is in the direction 
of tracing the influence of the acts and phantasies of 
infancy and childhood ; it appears not infrequently 
that the people answerable for the victim’s upbringing 
were really responsible. Modern psychology does not 
contest the reality of moral responsibility. While it 
holds the view that criminals suffering from certain 
forms of mental disease are less fully responsible than 
are normal people, it does not countenance the view 
that all criminals suffer from mental illness, nor that 
mental illness is an invariably sufficient excuse for 
crime. 
THE ALPHABET USED IN WRITING MALAy.—There 
is no record of the Malay language having been written 
until the Arabs reached Indonesia, the oldest existing 
documents being written in the Arabic character, 
NO. 2791, VOL. 111] 
which is still largely used. After the Arabs came the 
Portuguese, Dutch, and English, and each nation 
adopted its own system. It has been felt for a long 
time that it would be a convenience if a uniform 
system of spelling were adopted. Hitherto the choice 
has lain between Arabic characters and the Dutch or 
English spelling, none of which are quite satisfactory. 
Mr. C. H. Pownall in a pamphlet entitled ‘‘ The 
Writing of Malay ’’ (Cambridge, W. Haffer and Sons, 
Ltd.) suggests that the system known as “‘ Peetickay,’” 
advocated by Dr. W. Perrett in a book issued by the 
same publishers in 1920, should be adopted. It pos- 
sesses the special advantage that those who suffer 
from writer’s cramp find it a great relief, as the pen 
is more frequently raised from the paper than in 
ordinary writing. Mr. Pownall regards this system 
as preferable to the symbols used by the International 
Phonetic Association : but it does not seem probable 
that a conservative oriental race will be inclined to 
adopt a new system instead of the systems to which 
they are accustomed. In the end, in spite of certain 
difficulties, English will hold the field. 
THE LAws OF VISION AND THE TECHNIQUE OF ART, 
—In his treatise on landscape painting, Birge Harrison 
shows that a picture is most artistic when it repro- 
duces our retinal impressions, and his theme has been 
taken up and developed by Messrs. A. Ames and C. A. 
Proctor and Miss Blanche Ames in an interesting 
paper published under the auspices of the Rumford 
Fund in the February issue of the Proceedings of the 
American Academy. The retinal picture is less dis- 
tinct at the edges than at the centre and is distorted 
in the “ barrel’’ manner, while the retina itself is 
more sensitive to blue near the edge than at the 
centre. When a photograph of a landscape or build- 
ing taken with a camera having a lens with the same 
properties as the eye is compared with one taken 
with a corrected lens, that taken with the artificial 
eye produces the more artistic effect. On examining 
a number of pictures by distinguished artists, the 
authors have found evidence of the use—conscious or 
unconscious—of the technique suggested by these laws 
of vision by da Vinci, Rembrandt, Israels, Millet, 
Turner, Whistler, De Hoogh, and others, but only by 
one living artist—Orpen. The authors urge that the 
retinal picture should be made. the basis of the 
technique of art. 
CLASSIFICATION OF CiRRUS CLouDs.—In Geografiska 
annaley, 1922, 3-4, Mr. H. H. Hildebrandsson has a 
short paper in which he discusses an international 
terminology for the various kinds of cirrus clouds. 
After full consideration of the forms of cirrus de- 
scribed by L. Besson, C. J. R. Cave, A. W. Clayden, 
C. Ley, J. Loisel, Abbé Maze, H. Osthoff, and 
J. Vincent, all the classifications of whom are sum- 
marised, Mr. Hildebrandsson proposes seven main 
types. Some of these are rare and none is common 
in its typical form, but they serve as a basis of a 
classification to which all cirrus can be referred.. The 
seven types, each of which is briefly described and 
in many cases illustrated, are uncinus or caudatus, 
vertebratus, pennatus, filosus, confertus, floccosus, 
and nebulus. The names have the merit of being 
indicative of each type, and are easily remembered. 
The classification certainly seems to be sounder than 
some former ones which recognised a dozen or more 
main types. 
CLIMATOLOGICAL NORMALS FOR EGYPT AND THE 
Supan.—The Physical Department of the Ministry 
of Public Works, Egypt, has issued a book of normals 
