634 
NATURE 
[April 21, 1870 
between a piston and the train wanted, and the pressure 
of the air over the large sectional area of the tube required 
for propulsion is but a small fraction of that formerly 
employed ; there is, consequently, no heating, no inor- 
dinate wear and tear, and no loss of power. Equally 
ingenious is the construction of the proposed air pumps. 
Very large volumes of air are wanted to accompany and 
press forward the train—several hundred thousand cubic 
feet per minute. And what is the nature of the pumps to 
supply these? Are they to be blast engines? No ; they 
are to be air pumps, in the shape of gasometers. We are 
all familiar enough with the sight of gasometers, but their 
application for such a purpose is certainly new. 
We find throughout the work the same invincible spirit 
which seems to seek a difficulty for its immediate destruc- 
tion. That a permanent railway across the English 
Channel will be built, we doubt not ; we are equally con- 
fident that Messrs. Bateman and Révy’s scheme is a 
practicable solution of the problem. No less an authority 
than the Emperor Napoleon III., after mature considera- 
tion of the scheme, wrote to say:—“ Cest le seul realisable,” 
and as the design is one that belongs essentially to 
England, His Majesty’s opinion acquires enhanced value 
and importance. Letus, then, hope that the engineering 
and enterprising powers of this eminently engineering 
country will heartily support, advance, and improve the 
plan, which seems to ensure inestimable advantages to 
England and France. 
NOTES 
THE Secretaries of the Royal Astronomical Society have 
circulated the following notification. ‘‘We are instructed to 
communicate to you the following Resolution, which was passed 
at a Committee of the Council held yesterday, April 8th :— 
Resolved—‘ That the Fellows be informed that there is a 
possibility of the Government providing means of transit to and 
from stations on the Mediterranean for about sixty observers, 
who may be willing to take part in the Observation of the Total 
Eclipse of December 22, 1870; and that persons willing to 
undertake a portion of the Observations on a plan to be arranged 
by the Council, be invited to send their names to the Secretaries, 
and also to state the branch of observation which they would be 
prepared, or prefer, to undertake, and the instruments they 
would be willing to contribute.’ It is desirable that the names 
of those who are willing to take part in the observation of the 
Eclipse should be sent in, if possible, before the next meeting of 
Council, May 13.” 
WE are informed that M. Fahnehjelm, the Swedish Commis. 
sioner for the forthcoming series of Annual International Exhibi- 
tions, has applied for permission to exhibit a full-sized model of 
a school-room, just as it exists in the country parishes in Sweden, 
with all the books, maps, apparatus, forms, desks, &c., in order 
to give acomplete idea of the Swedish system of elementary 
instruction. Her Majesty’s Commissioners will, there can be no 
doubt, gladly place a sufficient space at the disposal of the 
Swedish Commissioner for so interesting an exhibit. It is to be 
hoped that encouragement will be given to other countries to 
follow this excellent example. An easy comparison of interna- 
tional appliances for educational purposes would be most useful 
to visitors to the Exhibition, and would be beneficial and stimu- 
lating to the countries exhibiting. 
YET another contribution to Mr. De Morgan’s ‘‘ Budget of 
Paradoxes.” A pamphlet reaches us under the title of ‘‘The 
New System of Astronomy” by ‘‘ Incognito” (Spon, Charing 
Cross), reviving, as ‘* more in accordance with ascertained 
observations, and more capable of exact proof than any yet 
propounded,” the old idea that the earth is the centre of our 
system, the sun revolving round it in an orbit intermediate 
between those of the Moon and Mars, with Mercury and Venus 
as his satellites. 
PrRoFEssoOR H. J. CLARK, of Lexington University, 
Kentucky, sends us a paper entitled ‘* Polarity and 
Polycephalism, an essay on Individuality.” He applies the 
term ‘‘ polarity” to the tendency of the vertebrate individual to 
arrange its organs in two opposing sets, cephalic and caudal, 
and again dorsal and ventral. An individual is generally under- 
stood to be a monocephalic being. In the case of so-called 
“alternation of generation” among the Acalephic, since the 
sexual and sexless are necessary to make up a distinct organism, 
7.é., vegetative and reproductive, the one a completement of 
the other, neither alone can represent the individual unit or 
whole cycle of life ; and cephalism is therefore, Professor Clark 
contends, a better term to indicate the potentiality of these sub- 
divisions to live apart. 
Mr. T. PAYNTER ALLEN reprints from the “Journal of the 
Society of Arts” an Inquiry into the existing state of education 
in Richmond, Twickenham, and Mortlake. He finds that of the 
whole number of children in the district, one-third are absolutely 
uninstructed, scarcely one half are in average attendance at 
school, one-fifth alternate attendance at school with fluctuating 
labour injuriously to themselves and to the school; one-sixth 
are of the maximum school age without having reached the 
maximum of proficiency, and above one-half are children of eight 
years, and therefore in training in infant or mixed schools, the 
classification, methods, and teaching power of which are very 
imperfect and inferior. 
PROFESSOR PrAzzI SMyTH publishes ‘* A Poor Man’s 
Photography at the Great Pyramid in the year 1865.” The 
“‘ poor man ” is Professor Smyth himself, who details the 
difficulties encountered in pursuit of his undertaking in the face 
of a *‘coalition of rich ones against him.” Whatever may be 
thought of Professor Smyth’s theory of the object for which 
the Great Pyramid was built, there can be no question that he has 
brought to the subject an immense amount of patient self- 
denying research which demands acknowledgment, and some of 
his meteorological observations may. yet lead to important 
results. 
Messrs. LONGMAN’s latest list of forthcoming works includes 
the following, in different departments of science:—The Origin 
of Civilisation, and the Primitive Condition of Man, by Sir John 
Lubbock; Other Worlds than Ours, by R. A. Proctor; The 
Historical Geography of Europe, by E. A. Freeman; Le Maout 
and Decaisne’s General System of Descriptive and Analytical 
Botany, translated by Mrs. J. D. Hooker; Researches on Dia- 
magnetism and Magnecrystallic Action, by Professor Tyndall; 
Lectures on Surgical Pathology, by James Paget ; A Course of 
Elementary Problems in Practical Plane Geometry, by John 
Lowres; Principles of Mechanism, by Professor Willis; Smoking 
Fires—their Cause and Cure, by Rev. A. C. Ainslie; On the 
Manufacture of Beet-root Sugar in England, by W. Crookes ; 
and A Handbook of Dyeing and Calico-printing, by the same 
author, 
THE continental subscription list on behalf of the late Pro- 
fessor Sars now exceeds 10,000fr. A young naturalist, Mr. C. 
Jobert, called a public meeting at Havre in its support, which 
was a great success, the mayor granting free use of a room in 
the Hotel de Ville, and the printer refusing to be paid for print- 
ing the circulars: a worthy example for imitation. 
Apropos of Professor Tyndall’s ‘‘Dust and Disease,” we 
extract the following from the Sczertific American:—‘ The 
dust obtained from the places of amusement in New York 
has recently been analysed by the scientific officers of the 
Metropolitan Board of Health. Over one hundred speci- 
