April 17, 1902] 



NATURE 



571 



national council at Copenhagen, at which Great Britain will be 

 represented, but the date of which has not yet been fixed. The 

 Board of Trade has also appointed a committee under a minute 

 dated August 13, 1901, to inquire and report as to the best 

 means by which the State or local authorities can assist scientific 

 research as applied to problems affecting the fisheries of Great 

 Britain and Ireland, and, in particular, whether the object in 

 view would best be attained by the creation of one central body 

 or department acting for England, Scotland and Ireland, or by 

 means of separate departments or agencies in each of the three 

 countries. Quite apart from this important question of scientific 

 research, the Board of Trade has, with the assistance of another 

 committee, considered how the present system of collecting 

 fishery statistics in England and Wales could be improved 

 and extended. The chief recommendations of this committee 

 are referred to below. 



The Times has published the recommendations of the inter- 

 departmental committee appointed "to inquire into the system 

 of collecting fishery statistics in England and Wales, and to 

 report how it could be improved and extended, and what ad- 

 ditional cost (if any) would be entailed thereby, having special 

 regard to the opinion expressed by the Select Committee of the 

 House of Commons on Sea Fisheries, 1893, and the proposals 

 of the Stockholm Conference, 1S99." Among the suggestions 

 are : — the extension and improvement of the present system of 

 employing collectors at the fishing ports with the view of obtain- 

 ing fuller details relating to fishery statistics ; the preparation of 

 separate returns as to the amount of fish caught in Icelandic and 

 Faroese waters and in the Bay of Biscay and on such other new 

 fishing grounds as it may from time to time be found desirable 

 and practicable to distinguish ; and that conger eels, dabs, 

 gurnards, lemon soles, skate and rays, and whiting should be 

 separately distinguished. The present report does not extend 

 to statistics of salmon or fresh-water fish. The adoption of 

 the recommendations would involve an annual expenditure on 

 the collection of fishery statistics of 2135/., or 1435/. beyond 

 what is provided at the present time, and a further annual ex- 

 penditure of at least 1000/. for the supervision of collectors and 

 for obtaining the additional information already described. 



News has come to hand that Dr. Elliot Smith, professor of 

 Anatomy in the Medical School at Cairo, has been given two 

 months' leave of absence to investigate at once some human 

 remains discovered at Girga, in Upper Egypt. The graves 

 containing the remains are said to consist of a continuous series 

 extending over an interval of at least Sooo years, which repre- 

 sent the most archaic of prehistoric periods. The bodies are 

 so well preserved, owing doubtless to the dryness of the atmo- 

 sphere where they were interred and to the perfection of 

 interment, that not only can the hair, nails and ligaments be 

 made out, but the muscles and nerves. In almost every case 

 the brain is said to be preserved, and the climax has been 

 reached in two examples where the eyes with lens in good con- 

 dition are present, and in others in which Dr. Elliot Smith has 

 already observed the limb plexures and great splanchnic nerve. 

 There are also now unearthed a series of later prehistoric graves, 

 ranging throughout the first fifteen dynasties, others of the 

 eighteenth, and yet others of the Ptolemaic and early and recent 

 Coptic periods. This vast "cemetery " has been excavated by 

 Dr. Reisner for the University of California, and we can but 

 congratulate him and the Egyptian Government on having 

 secured the services of so competent an anthropotomist as Dr. 

 Elliot Smith, whose full report will be eagerly awaited. 



A MEMORIAL to the late Dr. John Anderson, F.R.S., the 



first superintendent of the Indian Museum at Calcutta, has 



recently been erected in the upper eastern verandah of the main 



Chowringhi building. The memorial is in the form of a fuU- 



NO. 1694, VOL. 65J 



face medallion portrait in bronze, and is the work of the eminent 

 Scottish academician, D. W. Stevenson. It is completed by a 

 brass tablet, upon which the following words are inscribed : — ■ 

 "John Anderson, M.D., F.R.S., First Superintendent of the 

 Indian Museum, 1865-1886. Besides organising and arranging 

 the zoological and archreological sections of this Museum, he 

 made large collections and many discoveries in Yunnan and 

 Mergui, and achieved enduring distinction by his original con- 

 tributions to vertebrate zoology. (Presented to the Museum 

 by his widow and friends, 1901.)" Referring to the memorial, 

 the Englishman remarks: — "As the gift of Dr. Anderson's 

 friends, the location of the memorial is happily chosen ; but 

 from a wider point of view the museum itself — at least in its 

 zoological and arch^ological sections — is viomtmentimi aerc 

 pereiudtis of Dr. Anderson's work in India, for although the 

 institution has considerably developed since his time, it has 

 done so strictly along the lines — well in advance of their day — 

 that he laid down and fashioned. Dr. Anderson will also be 

 remembered as one of the earliest advocates of a zoological 

 garden for Calcutta, and as having greatly helped to shape thi' 

 institution also when it was started." Every naturalist will be 

 glad to know that Dr. Anderson's valuable work has been 

 commemorated in this way. His labours could not easily be 

 forgotten even if no memorial had been erected, but students 

 unfamiliar with his career should be reminded of the great work 

 he accomplished. In connection with this subject it is worth 

 mention that the volume on "The Mammals of Egypt," on 

 which Dr. Anderson was busily engaged when a brief illness 

 unexpectedly terminated his useful life, will be published during 

 the present year. This will be the second volume of Dr. 

 Anderson's important work on the zoology of Egypt, and it will 

 be similar in every respect to the first volume, on the reptiles of 

 Egypt. 



In a discussion on West Africa at the monthly dinner of the 

 London Chamber of Commerce on .^pril 9, Sir Harry Johnston 

 remarked that we were much behind Germany and France in 

 respect of the scientific examination of the territories under our 

 control. Writing to the Times \x^an the subject, he defends the 

 Foreign and Colonial Ofiices from charges of want of sympathy 

 with purely scientific work (examination of rainfall, fauna, flora, 

 geology, minerals, &c.) in our African possessions by pointing 

 out that they were often prevented from carrying out such work 

 by the reluctance' of the Treasury to expend national moneys in 

 that direction. Referring to the Uganda Railway he says, "if 

 in past decades we had been allowed to spend, say, 20,000/. in the 

 scientific examination of East Africa, the knowledge thus acquired 

 might have enabled us from omniscience to make the Uganda 

 Railway for some half a million less money. Lacking this prior 

 knowledge, those engaged in the construction of this remarkable 

 line have done their very best to avoid mistakes and unnecessary 

 expenditure, and the result is wholly creditable to the Office 

 which employed them. The Treasury is sometimes unsym- 

 pathetic towards scientific research, but the Treasury, after all, 

 is only an exponent of the national will. It is the nation — the 

 Empire — at large which is so indifferent to the value of scientific 

 research, more especially in the domains of anthropology, 

 zoology, botany, geology, and meteorology, that it cares litile for 

 the scientific examination of its territories, new and old. Some 

 of this work can be done by private enterprise and generosity. 

 But much might be accomplished by the Government if the 

 Treasury would but agree. I am not asking for an expenditure 

 of a million sterling per annum, or of even one of those uncon- 

 sidered hundred thousand pounds cheerfully spent without 

 blinking on an armed and punitive expedition. Twenty thousand 

 pounds wisely expended on three scientific expeditions in West 

 Africa, East Africa, and British Central Africa would probably 

 give us all the information we require as to the products, soils, 



