February 6, 1902] 



NATURE 



^ -3 -» 

 060 



At Carlton College, Northfield, Minn., it was estimated that 

 four observers might have counted about 1600 meteors per 

 hour. There was a marked falling off in numbers on the 

 morning of November 16. Vet at two stations, according to 

 newspaper reports, the shower was quite striking on the latter 

 morning, for at Los Angeles one observer is said to have 

 counted 3S5 meteors in the hour between 4h. and 5h. a. m. , while 

 at Phcenix 200 were seen in half an hour. It is highly 

 probable, however, judging from the character of the shower as 

 recorded at other stations, that in the two latter cases the obser- 

 vations were really made on the morning of the 15th and not 

 on the l6th as stated in the newspaper accounts, which are 

 often erroneous in such matters. 



The maximum of the display must have occurred at about 

 I ih. 30m. a.m. G.M.T. November 15, according to some of the 

 best American descriptions. Possibly it may have been 

 attained even later than this, for the morning twilight must 

 have affected the observations to some extent. If the time of 

 greatest frequency was after that stated, the phenomenon at its 

 best could only have been observed from the Pacific Ocean, 

 and it is not probable that we shall get any satisfactory reports 

 from this region. 



Though the shower was pretty active, it does not appear that 

 photography has afforded any material assistance in recording 

 its features. Plates were exposed at many observatories, but 

 trails were absent upon them except in one or two isolated 

 instances. 



In England a number of meteors were doubly observed during 

 the Leonid epoch, and their real paths have been calculated. 

 In the following table are given the heights, &c. , of 8 Leonids, 

 of I Leo Minorid, of i 5 Leonid, and of a remarkably slow- 

 moving meteor from Cetus : — 



Date. G.M.T. 



13 37i 



Mag. 



Nov. ,5 



13 8 



The mean height of 8 true Leonids was 8l to 56 miles and 

 the mean radiant-position i5i°'2 + 23°7. 



The place of the radiant found by Mr. Winslow Upton at the 

 Ladd Observatory, ProWdence, was on November 15 a.m. 

 l5o}° + 2ii°, and on November 16 a.m. 151^4-21^°. 



The next return of the Leonids will be regarded in an inter- 

 esting light, for 1932 will afford the loooth anniversary of the 

 first record of the shower (902). The moon will be full at the 

 middle of November, but as the meteors of this swarm are 

 often brilliant, some of them are likely to be distinguished in 

 spite of the illuminated sky. There were showers of Leonids 

 in 902, 1002, 1202 and 1602, and the revival of the display in 

 1901 encourages the hope that something may be seen of it in 

 1902, though the parent comet will be about three and a half 

 years past its perihelion. W. F. Denning. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE. 



Oxford. — The 231st meeting of the Junior Scientific Club 

 was held on January 31. Two papers were read, one by Prof. 

 H. A. Miers, F. R S. , Magdalen, on gold-mining in Klondike, 

 and the other, by Mr. H. L. Tidy, New College, on some 

 curious sounds. The officers of the Club for this term are : — 

 President, Mr. H. H. Cooke, New College ; biologicil secre- 

 tary, Mr. E. Burstal, Trinity ; chemical secretary, Mr. S. P. 

 Grundy, Billiol; treasurer, Mr. E. L. Kennaway, New 

 College ; editor, Mr. H. D. Davis, Balliol. 



In reply to a question in the House of Commons on Monday 

 as to the approximate date of the introduction of the Education 

 Bill promised in the King's Speech, Mr. Balfour said he was 

 unable to give a date, but he hoped the Bill would be introduced 

 before Whitsuntide. 



NO. 1684, VOL. 65] 



Correspondence classes in various branches of engineering 

 have been successfully carried on in the United States for several 

 years. Prof. Andrew Jamieson, late professor of electrical 

 engineering at the Glasgow Technical College, has now 

 established similar classes in Glasgow for students of electrical 

 and machanical engineering. We are glad to notice that all 

 students are advised to take a course of practical mathematics 

 before devoting themselves to other subjects. 



The annual general meeting of the Association oi Technical 

 Institutions was held on Friday last in London. Lord Avebury, 

 the president for the ensuing year, delivered an address in which 

 he showed that the system of technical and higher education in 

 Germany had been to the industrial advantage of the nation. If 

 Britannia is to rule the waves she must be able to rule the 

 steam engine and dynamo as well. Resolutions were adopted 

 to the following effect : — (a) That this Association strongly 

 approves the general principles on which the Government 

 Education Bill of 1901 was based, and trusts that the Govern- 

 ment will carry a Bill embodying these principles, with such 

 amendments as may prove necessary, in the next session of 

 Parliament. (/') That the Bill should prescribe that the residue 

 under section i of the Local Taxation Account (Customs and 

 Excise) Act, 1890, including any balance thereof which may 

 remain unexpended at the end of the financial year, shall be 

 applied for the purposes of education, and shall be administered 

 by the education authority, (c) That an extension of the rating 

 power by only id. in the pound, as was proposed in the Bill of 

 1901, would be wholly inadequate — especially in the case of 

 the county boroughs — to defray the necessary additional charges 

 in respect of secondary education which would fall upon the 

 local authorities, {d) That it should be made a condition of the 

 application of the residue under section i of the Local Taxation 

 (Customs and Excise) Act, 1890, to the purposes of secondary 

 education in general, that adequate provision shall first have 

 been made for technical instruction, as was done in clauses one 

 (i) and two (i) of the Duke of Devonshire's Education Bill of 

 1900. (e) That the Government should at once introduce and 

 pass a Bill placing primary, secondary and technological educa- 

 tion under the supervision of one local authority appointed as a 

 rule for an area not less than that of a county or a county 

 borough. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 



Royal Society, January 23.— "On the Causation of the 

 so-called ' Peripheral Reflex Secretion' of the Pancreas. (Pre- 

 liminary Communication.)" By W. M. Bayliss, D.Sc. and 

 Ernest H. Starling, M D., F.R.S. 



Inlroductton. — It has long been known that the introduction 

 of acid into the duodenum causes a flow of pancreatic juice, 

 and it has been shown recently by Popielski, and by Wertheimer 

 and Le Page, that this flow still occurs after nervous isolation 

 of duodenum and pancreas. Wertheimer also mentions that 

 the flow can be excited by injection of acid into the jejunum,- 

 but not by introduction of acid into the lower part of the ileum. 

 These authors conclude that the secretion is a local reflex, 

 the centres being situated in the scattered ganglia of the pan- 

 creas, or, in the case of the jejunum, in the ganglia of the solar 

 plexus (Wertheimer). 



Results. — The secretion excited by introduction of acid into 

 the jejunum cannot be reflex, since it occurs after extirpation of 

 the solar plexus and destruction of all the nervous filaments 

 passing to the isolated loop of jejunum. It also occurs after 

 intravenous injection of o-oi gramme atropin sulphate. It must 

 therefore be due to direct excitation of the gland cells be a sub- 

 stance or substances conveyed to the gland from the bowel by 

 the blood stream. 



The exciting substance is not acid. Wertheimer has shown 

 that injection of 0-4 per cent. HCI into the blood stream has no 

 excitatory influence on the pancreas. 



The secretion must therefore be due to some substance pro- 

 duced in the intestinal mucous membrane under the influence of 

 the acid, and carried thence by the blood stream to the gland. 

 This conclusion was at once confirmed by experiment. 



When the mucous membrane of the jejunum or duodenum is 

 exposed to the action of 0'4 per cent. HCI a body is produced 

 which, when injected in minimal doses into the blood stream. 



