204 



NA TURE 



[January 2, ii 



in 1843, and became a Fellow of the Royal College of 

 Physicians in 1S56. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal 

 Society in 1858, and received the honour of knighthood 

 in 1887. 



The Belgian Government is organising an Arctic 

 meteorological expedition which will start next summer. 

 The Kevue scientifique announces that the expedition will 

 be under the command of M. Georges Lecointe, director 

 of the Royal Observatory at Uccle. 



Reuter's representative has received details regarding 

 the Antarctic expedition which is being organised by Dr. 

 Jean Charcot, who hopes to start in July, and expects to 

 be absent for two years. Sufficient provisions to last three 

 years will, however, be taken. The expedition is bent on 

 scientific work. The best route to the Pole is, Dr. Charcot 

 thinks, by way of the Ross Barrier, but this he regards 

 as belonging to English explorers, and does not propose to 

 rravel that way. On reaching the Antarctic it is pro- 

 posed to return to Graham Land, and endeavour to 

 reach Alexander Land, where it is hoped a barrier similar 

 to that of Ross's will be found. The expedition will then 

 endeavour to go as far south as possible, .^n important 

 part of the equipment will be motor-sledges, which are 

 being built by the Marquis de Dion. With these sledges 

 experiments will be made in the Alps during this winter. 

 The ship for the expedition will be specially strong in view 

 of the ice pressure, and will be of barquentine rig, with 

 compound engines of 550 horse-power. She is to be 135 

 feet in length, with a beam of 30 feet, and will carry 230 

 tons of coal and 100 tons of provisions. The crew will 

 consist of twenty-two men, ten of whom were members 

 of Dr. Charcot's last expedition. The scientific staff, in 

 addition to the leader, will number three naval officers, 

 two zoologists, one geologist, and one physicist for mag- 

 netic and photographic work. The French Chambers have 

 voted 12,000/., while another sum of equal amount will 

 also be voted by Parliament. Private subscriptions have 

 vielded 2600!., and Dr. Charcot is endeavouring to get a 

 further 3400!. The Academy of Sciences has prepared the 

 scientific programme, and the Committee of Missions 

 of the Ministry of Public Instruction has drawn up a 

 favourable report on the subject of the proposed journey. 

 The Marine Department is giving the necessary coal and 

 a valuable collection of scientific instruments, while the 

 Oceanographical Institute of Paris, founded by the Prince 

 of Monaco, is also helping. 



In his presidential address to the Royal Society on 

 November 30, 1907, Lord Rayleigh referred to a move- 

 ment to promote the publication of standard scientific 

 works in embossed type suitable for the use of the blind. 

 .Mr. H. M. Taylor, F.R.S.. has written out the whole of 

 Mr. C. Smith's "Elementary Algebra" in Braille type; 

 and the embossed edition of this work, consisting of five 

 large royal quarto volumes, containing in the whole eight 

 hundred pages, has been published by the British and 

 Foreign Blind Association at the price of 16s. 6d. The 

 blind who are interested in subjects of a scientific 

 character are heavily handicapped, because an embossed 

 copy of any book occupies a much larger space than a 

 printed copy of the same book, and is therefore expensive 

 to produce. The result is that though books in embossed 

 type are needed on such subjects as mechanics, physics, 

 astronomy, chemistry, and geology, very few blind persons 

 could afford to purcnase these books if their prices were 

 comparable with that at which the embossed edition of 

 the algebra has been published. Accordingly, a fund has 

 been formed to assist the publication, for the use of the 



NO. 1992, VOL. "/y] 



blind, of embossed books on scientific subjects at prices 

 which would not be so high as to be almost prohibitive. 

 This object would be attained by making grants from the 

 fund to Braille printers towards the cost of embossing 

 the plates from which the books are printed. It is 

 thought that 600/. or 800/. would form a fund large 

 enough to test the usefulness of the scheme, and would 

 be ample for an experiment to last three or four years. 

 The sum of about 300/. has already been subscribed or 

 promised in support of the scheme. Donations may be 

 paid to the secretary, Mr. H. M. Taylor, F.R.S., Trinity 

 College, Cambridge, or direct to the " Embossed Scientific 

 Books Fund " at the Cambridge branch of Messrs. 

 Barclay and Co. 's Bank. 



The weather for 1907 affords several features of interest, 

 and the results obtained for I^ondon from the observations 

 of the Meteorological Office probably differ somewhat from 

 the common expectation. The aggregate rainfall for the 

 year is 19-5 inches, whicli is 4-9 inches less than the 

 average for the past thirty-five years. The only months 

 with an excess of rain were April and December. Rain 

 fell on 162 days, and one of the special features of the 

 year was the great frequency with which rain occurred. 

 In October rain fell on twenty-two days, although the 

 aggregate rainfall for the month showed a deficiency of 

 047 inch on the average. The mean temperature for the 

 year was S0°-2, which is o°.i above the average. The 

 highest mean in any month was 60°. 8, in August, and the 

 mean for each of the three summer months was consider- 

 ably below the normal. The lowest monthly mean was 

 38°.5, in February, and with this exception all the six 

 winter months had a temperature in excess of the average. 

 The total range during the year was 57°, the highest 

 temperature being 80°, in September, and the lowest 23°, 

 in January. There were during the year only thirty-four 

 frosty nights, and of these thirty-three occurred in January 

 to March. The sun shone for 1234 hours, which is ninety 

 hours in excess of the average. The Registrar General's 

 returns show that the death-rate for the year was I5'2 

 per 1000 persons living ; this is probably the lowest on 

 record, so that however unpleasant the weather for the 

 year may have proved, there has been a decided gain on 

 the score of mortality. 



The contents of the first. three numbers of the Records 

 of the Indian Museum include a large number of papers, 

 chiefly devoted to invertebrates, among which attention 

 may be directed to a series, by Dr. .Annandale and others, 

 on the fauna of brackish-water pools at Port Canning. 



In the course of a paper on a collection of fishes from 

 Victoria (Australia), published in the October (1907) issue 

 of the Proceedings of the Philadelphia .-\cademy, Mr. 

 H. VV. Fowler describes two new species of sea-horse, 

 which, together apparently with the New Zealand Hippo- 

 campus abdominalis, are referred to the new subgenus 

 Macleayina, on account of the greater number of long 

 dorsal fin-rays in comparison with the more typical re- 

 presentatives of the group. 



The barnacles in the collection of the U.S. National 

 Museum form the subject of a long paper by Dr. H. A. 

 Pilsbry constituting Bulletin No. 60 of the museum. Only 

 the pedunculate group and the members of the sessile 

 family Verrucidae are, however, dealt with in this com- 

 munication. Hitherto the pedunculate species recorded 

 from American waters number about a dozen, while the 

 Verrucid^ have been unknown ; the author is now enabled 

 to raise the numbers of the former group to fifty-six, and 

 to add five species of the latter. 



