434 



NA TURE 



[February i i, 1909 



Sir Daniel Morris, K.C.M.G., late Imperial Com- 

 missioner of Agriculture for the West Indies, has been 

 selected for the newly created office of scientific adviser 

 to the Secretary of State for the Colonies on agricultural 

 matters relating to British possessions in the tropics. 



Mr. R. R. Tatlock has been elected president of the 

 Society of Public Analysts for the ensuing year. 



Mr. O. J. R. HowARTH has been appointed assistant 

 secretary of the British Association in succession to Mr. 

 A. Silva White, who recently resigned that office. 



Dr. F. H. Hatch has been appointed by the Govern- 

 ment of Natal to make an examination of the mineral 

 resources of the colony, and will shortly proceed to South 

 Africa for that purpose. 



A Reuter message from Messina states that a strong 

 earthquake shock was felt there on February 7 at 

 9.30 p.m., followed by a slighter one half an hour Inter. 

 Another shock of some violence occurred at q a.m. on 

 February 8. 



On Thursday next, February 18, Dr. Hans Gadow, 

 F.R.S., will begin a course of three lectures at the Royal 

 Institution on " Problems of Geographical Distribution in 

 Mexico." The Friday evening discourse on February 19 

 will be delivered by Sir Henry Cunynghame on " Recent 

 .Advances in Means of Saving Life in Coal Mines." 



The Turin .Academy of Sciences, says ha Nature, will 

 award in 191 1 a prize of 9300 francs, bequeathed by M. 

 Bressa, to the man of science or the inventor of any 

 nationality, who in the period 1907 to igio shall have 

 made, in the judgment of the Turin Academy, the most 

 distinguished and useful discovery, or have produced the 

 most celebrated scientific work in some branch of science. 



The second meeting of the Spanish Association for the 

 Advancement of Science, which was founded on the 

 occasion of the Saragossa Exhibition, will be held at 

 Valence next October. According to the Revue scicn- 

 tifiquc, two meetings will be held in 1910, one in Spain 

 and the other at Toulouse. Particulars of the meetings 

 may be obtained from M. Ricardo Garcia Merat, general 

 secretary of the Royal Spanish Society of Sciences, at 

 Madrid. 



The fifth meeting of the Prehistoric Congress of France 

 will be held at Beauvais on July 26-31 next. The first 

 three days will be devoted to the discussion of papers, and 

 the remaining three to scientific excursions. .An exhibition 

 of prehistoric specimens will be held during the meeting. 

 All information may be obtained from M. L. Giraux, the 

 treasurer to the committee, 9 bis, avenue Victor-Hugo, 

 a Saint-Mand^ (Seine). 



The death is announced in Science of Prof. B. H. 

 Guilbcau, professor of zoology at the Louisiana State Uni- 

 versity. Since 1906 Prof. Guilbeau had been director of 

 the Gulf Biologic Station. In summer work at Cornell 

 he investigated the froth production of the " spittle 

 insects." At the time of his death he had been engaged 

 for several months investigating the parasites of Plusia 

 hrassica, confirming the results of French investigators as 

 to the development of many insects from a single egg. 



The gold medal of the Royal Astronomical Society has 

 this year been awarded to Prof. O. Backlund, director of 

 the observatory, Pulkowa, Russia, for his researches on 

 Encke's comet. The medal will be presented at the annual 

 general meeting of the society on Friday, February 12, 

 NO. 2050, VOL. 79] 



when the president, Mr. H. F. Newall, F.R.S., will give 

 an address, setting forth the grounds upon which the 

 award has been founded. The Jackson-Gwilt (bronze) 

 medal and gift have been awarded to Mr. P. Melotte, for 

 his discovery of the eighth satellite of Jupiter. 



The following have been elected as officers and council 

 of the Royal Microscopical Society for the ensuing year : — 

 President, Sir E. Ray Lankester, K.C.B., F.R.S. ; vicc- 

 presideiils, Mr. F. J. Cheshire, Rev. W. H. Dallinger. 

 F.R.S., Sir Ford North, P.C., F.R.S. , Mr. E. J. Spitta ; 

 treasurer, Mr. W. E. Baxter ; secretaries. Dr. R. G. 

 Hebb, Mr. J. W. Gordon ; ordinary menihers of council, 

 Mr. F. W. Watson Baker, Mr. A. N. Disney, Dr. J. W. H. 

 Eyre, Mr. E. Heron-Allen, Mr. H. G. Plimmcr, Mr. 

 Thomas H. Powell, Mr. C. Price-Jones, Mr. P. E. Radley, 

 Mr. Julius Rheinberg, Mr. C. F. Rousselet, Mr. F. 

 Shillington Scales, and Mr. D. J. Scourfield. 



On Thursday, February 18, there will be a discussion 

 at the Linnean Society on the subject of alternation of 

 generations in plants. The discussion will be opened by 

 Prof. W. H. Lang, who has just published an article, in 

 the New Phytologist for January, on " A Theory of 

 Alternation of Generations in .Archegoniate Plants based 

 upon Ontogeny." It is expected that Prof. F. O. Bower, 

 F.R.S., Prof. J. Bretland Farmer, F.R.S., Prof. F. W. 

 Oliver, F.R.S., Dr. D. H. Scott, F.R.S., and Mr. A. G. 

 Tansley will be among those taking part in the discussion, 

 which is likely to be of considerable interest, as the sub- 

 ject is of fundamental importance to botanical morphology, 

 and is one on which botanists have hitherto taken very 

 divergent views. 



One of the most puzzling features of the reports of the 

 Italian earthquake in the daily papers has been the absence 

 of any news from the interior of .Aspromonte. A corre- 

 spondent to the Hampshire Chronicle fills this gap with an 

 account of the medical expedition which was dispatched 

 from Bologna ; leaving the coast towns, this struck into 

 the interior, and reached Oppido eight days after the 

 earthquake, to find that they were the first, and only, relief 

 expedition to reach the communes of Oppido, Scido, and 

 Delianuova, where it was found that most of the houses 

 had been destroyed and those still standing were un- 

 inhabitable. This district was one of the centres of 

 destructive violence in 1783, and it is interesting to be 

 able to add another to the many analogies between the 

 earthquakes of that year and of 1908. 



In the issue of Nature for April 20, 1905 (vol. Ixxi., 

 P- 595). ^" account was given of the work of Mr. J. B. 

 Millet, of Boston, Massachusetts, on submarine signalling 

 by sound, which he described at the annual spring meet- 

 ing of that year of the Institution of Naval Architects. 

 The recent wreck of the Republic and the subsequent 

 events, in which use was made of the method, has brought 

 submarine signalling prominently before the public, and 

 it is suggested that the Government should supply our 

 principal lightships with bells. It has been found that 

 the bells can be heard usually at a distance of ten miles, 

 and sometimes of twelve or fifteen miles. Ships fitted 

 with a receiving apparatus can, by using the telephone 

 receiver in the chart room in thicl; weather, pick up the 

 .sound from an ordinary bell-buoy which cannot be heard 

 by the ear alone. We learn from an article in the Times 

 that the lightships which already possess bells are the 

 Royal Sovereign, Tongue, East Goodwin, and Outer 

 Dowsing. Bells are about to be installed on the Outer 

 Gubbard, Shambles, Spurn, and Owers lightships. 



