January 14, 1909] 



NA TURE 



329 



home worthy of the first school of geography in the British 

 Empire. At Cambridge also the geographical spirit is 

 active, and new developments may be expected. Extension 

 meetings in the summer spread university teaching far and 

 wide, and everywhere there are signs that teachers who 

 take an interest in their subject are multiplying, and that 

 the conception of geography as a study for mental dis- 

 cipline is spreading. No one in touch with education 

 speaks apologetically nowadays of geography. It has won 

 its place, in comparison with physical science and history, 

 as a science full of problems as well as facts, a mental 

 exercise of no mean order. It is not only to the classical 

 student, but to the man of science, the economist, and 

 the statesman, and Mr. Freshfield added, to the elector, that 

 a just knowledge of geographical conditions may prove 

 serviceable. The abysmal ignorance of the British Empire 

 in large classes of our countrymen who are allowed a 

 share in controlling its destinies is not the least of our 

 national dangers. Dr. H. R. Mill delivered a lecture on 

 the rainfall of the British Isles, and Mr. G. W. Palmer, 

 of Clifton College, gave a lantern exhibition of a set of 

 views of the Dora Baltea. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 



Royal Society, November 12, 190S. — "The Natural 

 Mechanism for evoking the Chemical Secretion of the 

 Stomach." By J. S. Edkins and M. Tweedy. Com- 

 municated by Prof. E. H. Starling, F.R.S. 



By a special method, elsewhere described, the authors 

 were able to restrict the introduction of food material to 

 definite portions of the stomach and intestine. It was 

 therefore passible to test how these different regions 

 behaved as channels for absorption, and what the com- 

 parative value of different food substances was in respect 

 of the evoking of the chemical mechanism of secretion of 

 gastric juice. The fundus of the stomach was found to 

 be non-functional in absorption, the pyloric end of con- 

 siderable value, and absorption in the duodenum also 

 stimulated the fundus to secrete. It was observed that 

 acid alone is but a slight stimulus ; dextrin has a marked 

 effect similar to that shown by dextrose and maltose. 

 Commercial peptone and the meat extract devised by 

 Herzen, of Geneva, were found most potent of the sub- 

 stances experimented on. 



No evidence was found of any negative hormone pass- 

 ing into the circulation tending to inhibit gastric secretion. 

 The pyloric end of the stomach and the duodenum are to 

 be regarded as the normal channels of such absorption a? 

 liberates the gastric hormone. The fundus is definitely 

 e.xcluded. 



Royal Microscopical Society, December 16, 1908. — Mr. 

 Conrad Beck, vice-president, in the chair. — (i) A worlc- 

 shop microscope for the examination of opaque objects ; 

 (2) a simple method of illuminating opaque objects : J. E. 

 Stead. — Mounting rotifers and Protista in Canada balsam : 

 Rev. Eustace Tozer. 



Edinburgh. 



Royal Society, Decemhjr 21, 1908.— Prof. Crum Brnwn 

 in the chair. — A photographic apparatus for automatic- 

 ally recording the readings of the scale and vernier of 

 any instrument : Dr. J. R. Milne. The apparatus was a 

 sf>ecialised form of camera. When the observer wished 

 to make a reading he pressed a small lever, which set 

 in motion the automatic mechanism. The shutter was 

 first opened and closed, and then the plate was moved on 

 a step so as to bring a fresh part of its surface into posi- 

 tion. A 5-inch by 4-inch plate could in this way be covered 

 with seventy small photographs of the scale and vernier, 

 and these could be read off at leisure afterwards. Not 

 only was the work of the observer much lightened, but 

 his eyes were spared much fatigue, while a permanent 

 record was obtained in which there could be no error due 

 to bias or a mistake in reading. The author had used 

 this camera for some time in connection with a polari- 

 meter, and had found it of great advantage in recording 

 the readings of the Nicol. — ^The friction at the extremi- 

 ties of a short bar subjected to a crushing load, and its 



NO. 2046, VOL. 79] 



influence upon the apparent compressive strength of the 

 material : G. H. Gulliver. As regards the eftect of the 

 friction of the crushing plates upon the yield point of 

 short compression specimens, it was found that with plates 

 harder than the material under test the end friction caused 

 an increase in the apparent yield-point stress. This in- 

 crease was calculated approximately as 20 per cent, for 

 wrought iron and mild steel, 20 per cent, for cast iron, 

 and from 50 per cent, to 200 per cent, for stones, bricks, 

 and concrete. These figures, except the first, might apply 

 almost equally well to the crushing strength, but they 

 required experimental verification. The corresponding in- 

 clinations of the surfaces of sliding were —37° for wrought 

 iron and steel, 36° for cast iron, and 27° to 18° for stone, 

 &c. The first value was seldom obtained, but the others 

 agreed fairly well with average experimental results. 

 With the crushing plates of softer material than that under 

 test, the lateral flow of the former diminished the apparent 

 strength of the specimen. For stones crushed between lead 

 plates the calculation indicated a strength from 0-35 to 

 015 of that obtained with iron or steel crushing plates. 

 Experiment gave from 0-65 to 0-45 as the value of the 

 ratio, but the specimens did not rupture by shearing in 

 the manner contemplated in the theoretic discussion. The 

 total crushing load of a short specimen of cast iron was 

 increased by diminishing the length of the piece, but the 

 crushing stress per unit area was simultaneously decreased. 

 January 4. — Dr. R. H. Traquair, F.R.S., in the chair. 

 — The fossil Osmundacea;, part iii. : Dr. R. Kidston and 

 D. T. Gwynne-Vaughan. The paper contained a de- 

 tailed description of three osmundacean fossils from the 

 Permian of Russia. In the most important, Thamnoptcris 

 Schlechtrtidalii, the protostele of the stem has a solid 

 centr.al mass of xylem. The most central tracheae are 

 short, vesicular and reticulate, and are regarded as being 

 transitional to a parenchymatous pith. On leaving the 

 stele the xylem of the leaf trace is oval in transverse 

 section with a mesarch protoxylem, and on its way through 

 the cortex it gradually changes into the adiaxially curved 

 C-shaped trace of the Osmundacese. These changes are 

 held to represent the phylogeny of the adiaxially curved 

 C-shaped trace in general. The stem stele of the Zygo- 

 pteride^ is held to be phylogenetically connected with that 

 of the Osmundacese. — Supplementary report on _ the 

 hvdroids of the Scottish National Antarctic Expedition : 

 James Ritchie. Twenty-five species, mostly from the sub- 

 Antarctic and temperate seas, have been added to the list 

 already recorded, bringing the total number of the species 

 and varieties in the Scotia hydroid collection up to sixty- 

 one. Several new forms were described, and the known 

 ranges of distribution of many species have been consider- 

 ably extended. 



Paris. 

 Academy of Sciences, January 4. — M. Bouchard in the 

 chair. — Certain systems of linear differential equations : 

 Gaston Darboux. — The possible danger of turning over in 

 the steering of aeroplanes : L. F. Bertin. From an 

 examination of the aeroplanes in current use the author 

 comes to the conclusion that there is a real danger of 

 the whole machine turning over, either by the action of 

 the wind or by the lateral pressure caused by steering out 

 of the straight line. It is pointed out that further experi- 

 mental data are needed. — Prof. Zirkel was elected a corre- 

 spondant in the section of mineralogy in place of the late 

 Carl Klein. — The multiform integrals of algebraical differ- 

 ential equations of the first order : Pierre Boutroux. — 

 Directed waves in wireless telegraphy : Albert Turpain. 

 A reclamation of priority as regards the work of M. 

 Blondcl. — Polar magnetic storms and the aurora borealis : 

 Kr. Birkeland. Reproductions of eleven photographs are 

 given, in which the phenomena of the aurora are experi- 

 mentally imitated. — Modifications of the difference of con- 

 tact potential of two aqueous solutions of electrolytes under 

 the action of a continuous current : M. Chanoz. The 

 passage of a continuous current through the contact 

 surface of two aqueous solutions of electrolytes, MR, M'R', 

 is capable of modifying the difference of potential between 

 the two liquids. This variation of potential produced 

 depends, both for intensity and sign, not only on the nature 

 of the solutions, but also on the direction of the passage 



