January 23, 1902] 



NA TURE 



281 



by Mr. Herring, both of vvhoTi hwa attained results in advance 

 of those previously achieved, by the use of machines provided 

 with movable wing^. Still more recently, i.e. from October 

 igoD onwards, two other workers have attacked the problem, 

 namely, Mr. Wilbur Wright and Mr. Orville Wright, of Dayton, 

 Ohio. Mr. Wilbur Wright adopts a two-surfaced machine and 

 assumes a horizontal position when gliding, with the view of 

 diminishing head resistance. He has successfully worked with 

 a surface area of double that u^ad by previous experimenters, 

 and has on several occasions extricated himself from the 

 dangerous position in which Lilienthal and other observers have 

 found themselves when suddenly brought to rest in a high wind. 



Prof. V. Monti has forwarded us three papers dealing with 

 the question of prevention of hailstorm?, which is now exciting so 

 much interest in Italy. One of these, published by the Italian 

 Meteorological Office, deals generally with the distribution of 

 hailstorms in Italy at different seasons. Prof. Monti divides 

 Italy roughly into three different regions, the " Padan " region, 

 including the valley of the Po and certain Alpine stations, where 

 hailstorms commence between the end of February and M ly and 

 cease about November; the "Peninsular" region, where no 

 month is altogether exempt from hail; and the "Cilabro- 

 Sicilian" region, which is characterised by an almost complete 

 absence of hailstorms during the summer month;. A second 

 paper deals with the question of whether hailstorms are affected 

 by the detonations accompanying volcanic eruption?. In it 

 Prof. Monti discusses an account of a hailstorm on Stromboli, 

 by M. Brun,of Geneva, and other writers, and he infers that 

 (l) the fall of hail is not prevented by volcanic detona- 

 tions ; (2) hail may even be formed in storms of volcanic 

 origin, contrary to Faye's theory. In the third piper 

 Prof. Monti discusses the effect of thunder on the production 

 of hail, and quotes letters on the subject. He finds that two- 

 thirds of the heavy hailstorms that have been carefully studied 

 are accompanied with loud thunder (" tuoni forti o fortissimi "), 

 and that the frequency of the thunder, both before and during 

 the hail, does not prevent the formation of large hailstones. 

 In one storm at Campofreddo, near Genoa, where the hail was 

 large and abundant, the thunder was so violent as to break 

 windows. The theory according to which hail is dispersed by 

 cannonades, as the result of the atmospheric waves produced, 

 derives no support from the observed results in connection with 

 either volcanic explosions or thunder. 



The latest issue of the Zeilschrift fiir wissemchaftlic he 

 Zoologic (vol. Ixx. part iv. ) contains four papers, as usual, of a 

 highly technical nature. The first, by Dr. E. Botezat, treats of 

 the terminations of nerves in the taste-corpuscles. In the 

 second, Herr P. Morgenstern describe; the development of the 

 hydroid zoophyte Cordylofihora lacnslris. Certain reproductive 

 organs of sharks form the subject of a long article by Herr O. 

 Huber ; while Dr. E. BiUowitz treats of the gastrulation of 

 the ovum of the common grass-snake. All the articles are 

 illustrated by plates. 



In a pamphlet published at Frankfurt-am-Maine and bearing 

 the title " Der Zoologische Garten des Museu Goeldi in Para 

 (Brasilien)," Dr. G. Hagmann, an assistant on the staff, gives 

 an excellent and well-illustrated account of the rise and progress 

 of the menagerie which has been formed under the direction of 

 Dr. E. Goeldi, the able chief of the museum. It was in 1893 

 that Dr. Goeldi, then attached to the museum at Rio, was 

 appointed to take charge of and reorganise the museum at Para ; 

 but, owing to the military revolution which then disorganised 

 the greater part of Brazil, it was not till late in the following 

 year that he was able to assume the duties of his new post. It 

 was not long before his attention was directed to the formation 

 of a zoological garden to illustrate the local fauna, and by 1895 

 NO. 1682, VOL. 65] 



this was in full working order. In the present pamphlet we 

 have a list of the vertebrates — all natives of Brazil — which have 

 been exhibited in the garden between July, 1S95, and July, 

 1901. These comprise sixty-five species or races of mammals, 

 one hundred and twenty-seven of birds, thirty-five of reptiles 

 and amphibians, and nine of fishes. Many of the species 

 exhibited are very rare, and much new information has been 

 acquired in regard to the habits of several. Judging from the 

 photographs with which the pamphlet is illustrated, the appear- 

 ance of the garden must be highly attractive, and the idea of 

 devoting it entirely to the local fauna is most excellent. 



Noticing that the tang of the head of some Eskimo arrows 

 are provided with a screw, Herr Krause asks whether the screw 

 is an Eskimo invention {Globus, Ixxix. 1901, p. 8), for it would 

 be strange if a people still in their stone age had in a mechanical 

 contrivance progressed beyond highly cultured, superfine Romans 

 of the Empire. Dr. Karl von den Steinen {Globus, Ixxix. 

 p. 125) answers this question in the negative, and points to 

 the considerable trade there has been between the natives and 

 numerous European sailors during the last century, and any 

 extensive collection of Eskimo objects will also demonstrate 

 that borrowing has taken place. Mr. H. Newell Wardle 

 replies to Dr. von den Steinen {Globus, Ixxx. 1901, p. 226) 

 and points out that the Eskimo sometimes made their harpoon 

 heads of the tooth of the narwhal, and as this has a spiral 

 twist there is no need to seek elsewhere for a screw ; he there- 

 fore thinks it will probably always remain an open question. 

 The relation of the sickle to the saw, on the one hand, and to 

 the dagger on the other is the subject of a learned philological 

 and ethnographical treatise by Herr Hugo Schuchardt in Globus 

 (Ixxx. pp. 181 and 204). 



A SECOND edition of the second volume of Prof. J. R. Green's 

 " Manual of Botany" has been published by Messrs. J. and A. 

 Churchill. The volume is concerned with plant classification 

 and physiology, and several additions have been made with the 

 view of increasing its usefulness and rendering it more readable. 

 Prof. Green provides students with a valuable course of training 

 in systematic botany and plant physiology. 



We have received the following botanical reprints from the 

 United States, the first three being from the Botanical Gazelle : — 

 "A Study of the Sporangia and Gametophytes of 5«/aj!««//a apus 

 and S. rupestris," by Florence M. Lyon, a very careful study, 

 illustrated by five plates; " Development of the Pollen in the 

 Asclepiadacece," by T. C. Frye, from which it would appear 

 that the connection of the pollen-grains into poUinia in this 

 order is not associated with any speciality in the mode of 

 development of the sporange ; " Further Notes on the Physiology 

 of Polymorphism in Green Algoe," by B. E, Livingston, relating 

 chiefly to the effect on Algte of cultivation in various nutrient 

 solutions ; " The Seed-coats of certain Species of the Genus 

 Brassica," by A. J. Pieters and Vera K. Charles, being Bullelin 

 No. 29 of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Division of 

 Botany ; "The Progress made in Botany during the Nineteenth 

 Century," by Wm. Trelease, from the Transactions of the 

 Academy of Sciences of St. Louis. 



The fact that the atomic weights of some of the most im- 

 portant elements have not as yet been determined with a 

 sufficient degree of precision is clearly illustrated by a new 

 determination of the atomic weight of calcium by F. W. 

 Hinrichsen, the results of which are published in the last 

 number of the Zcitschrift fiir pitysikalische Cheinie. In spite 

 of the importance of this element and numerous investigations 

 carried out to determine its atomic weight, the latter cannot be 

 said to be known with certainty. The value generally accepted 

 asbeingmost trustworthy is the result of a determination by Erd- 

 mann and Marchand in 1850, in which they obtained Ca = 4O"0O. 



