Jan. 17, 1884] 



NA TURE 



279 



Table 1. — Measures of Length. 



The yard = 9I4"4 millimetres. 

 The foot = 304-8 ,, 



The inch = 25'4 ,, 



Table W.— Weights. 

 The ponnd = 453'6 grammes. 



The half-pound = 226S „ 



The quarter pound = II3'4 „ 



The ounce = 2S'35 ,, 



The grain = '0648 ,, 



[This last Ogives the gramme = 15 '43210 grains, a number 

 Mhich it is singularly easy to recollect.] 



Table III. — Measures of Capacity 



The gallon = 4544 cubic centimetres. 



The quart = 1136 ,, 



The pint = J68 „ 



The half pint =284 



The noggin = 142 ,, 



'The fluid ounce = 28-4 ,, 



If any person using these tables -.vishes to carry refinement 

 farther, he may do so by subtracting one in every hundred 

 thousand after using Table I., Iiy subtracting one in sixty 

 thousand after using Table II., and by subtracting one in ten 

 thousand after using Table III. These corrections will carry 

 accuracy to the limit of Prof. Miller's and Capt. Clarke's 

 determinations. — R. J. Moss, F.C.S., showed an experiment 

 illustrating the use of Rohrbach's heavy liquid — a solution of 

 baric and mercuric iodides. Minute garnets occm-ring in Dublin 

 granite were separated from the roughly pulverised rock in a 

 state of purity, and in quantity quite sufficient for an exhaustive 

 analysis. 



Sydney 

 Linnean Society of New South Wales, October 31, 1883. 

 —The President, C. S. Wilkinson, F.G.S., in the chair.— The 

 following papers were read : — Occasional notes on phnts indi- 

 genous in the immediate neighbourhood of Sydney, No. 5, by 

 Kdward Haviland.^Notes on the temperature of the body of 

 the Echidna hystrix, by N. de Miklouho Maclay. This is a 

 detailed account of some experiments made by the writer at 

 Brisbane in July, 1S79. He found, after observations carefully 

 made on two occasions, that the average temperature of the 

 body of the Echidna is 25^ C, equal to 78° F., or very little 

 more than that of fish, and about 25° under that of mam- 

 mals generally. — On the Plagiostomata of the Pacific, part ii., by 

 N. de Miklouho Maclay and William Macleay, F. L.S. The 

 continuation of a paper by the same authors, written some years 

 back, on the genus Heterodontus. The present paper gives de- 

 .'criptions and illustrations of a new species from Japan, named 

 Heterodontus japonicHs. — Notes on some reptiles from the Her- 

 bert River, Queensland, by William Macleay, F.L.S. In this 

 paper, after enumerating all the Reptilia contained in the collec- 

 tion sent to him by Mr. Boyd from the Herbert River, Mr. 

 Macleay descrities as new a lizard, Tiaris lioydii, and three 

 snakes, Tropidonotiis angusticeps, Dendtophis hilorealis, and 

 Herberlophis pluinbeHS, the latter a new genus allied to Coronella. 

 — Notes on some customs of the aboriginal tribes of the Albert 

 District, New South Wales, by C. S. Wilkinson, F.G.S., presi- 

 dent. The President read some notes furnished him by Mr. W. 

 H. J. Slee, the Government Inspector of Mines, regarding a 

 singular ceremony which the aboriginal tribes of the Mount 

 Poole district perform, when, as is often the case in that arid 

 region, they netd rain. Occasionally pieces of the fibrous 

 variety of gypsum. Satin-spar, are found by the natives, who 

 highly value them and call them "rain-stoues," for they believe 

 that the Great Spirit uses them in producing rain. The Presi- 

 dent exhibited one of the " rain-stones " which had been secured 

 by Mr. Slee, who witnessed the ceremony when performed two 

 years ago by the Mount Poole and Mokley tribes. — On the brain 

 of Grey's whale {Kogia greyi), by William A. Haswell, M.A. 

 — On a new genus of fishes from Port Jackson, by \Vm. Macleay, 

 F.L.S. This paper consists of the description of a large fi>h 

 taken a few days ago in a seine net at Watson's Bay. It is of 

 the family Cirrhitid,r, and somewhat allied to the genus Chilo- 

 dactyhis. The generic name given to it is Psilocraiiium, from 

 its naked head, and ihe specific name Coxii, in honour of the 

 President of the Commissioners for Fisheries of New South 

 Wales. This fish was exhibited by Mr. Morton, Assistant 

 Cuntor, Australian Museum. 



Royal Society of New South Wales, October 3, 1883. — 

 Hon. Prof. Smith, C.M.G., president, in the chair. — Two new 

 members were elected and thirty-five donations received. — A 

 paper by H. Ling Roth, F. M.S., on the roots of the .sugar-cane, 

 was read. — Mr. H. C. Rus-ell exhibited a modifioHion r,f 

 Faure's bichromate battery. — Mr. Russell exhibited several new 

 photographs of the sun taken by him at the Sydney Observatory. 



November;, 1883.— H. C. Russell, F.R.A.S., in the chair. 

 — One new member was elected and eighty-eight donations 

 received. — A paper, on irrigation in Upper India, was read by 

 H. G. McKinney, M.E. — Prof. Liversidge exhibited portions of 

 a fossil crocodile from the Flinders River in Queensland, and 

 other fossils. 



November 14, 1883. — Hon. Prof. Smith, C.M.G., president, 

 in the chair. — An adjourned meeting was held, and a i-aper, 

 by Mr. A. Pepys Wood, on tanks and wells of New South 

 Wales water supply and irrigation, was communicated by Mr. 

 Warren, C.E. 



Paris 



Academy of Sciences, January 7. — M. Rolland, president, 

 in the chair. — M. Bouley was elected vice-president, and MM. 

 H. Milne Edwards and Eecquerel added to the Central Com- 

 mittee of Management for the year 18S4. — The President re- 

 ported on the papers, memoirs, and documents of all kinds issued 

 by the Academy and received from various sources during the; 

 year 1883. The changes that took place amongst the members 

 and correspondents during the same year were announced. — Re- 

 port on the hydrographic explorations of the Roinanclie in Tierra 

 del Fuego, by M. F. Martial. The work accomplished com- 

 prised three distinct parts — (l) the regular triangulation of a 

 portion of Beagle Passage and of several islands, besides twenty 

 plans of various roadsteads ; (2) the survey of the north-weslern 

 branch and about half of the south-western branch of Beagle 

 Passage and the Ildefonsus Islands ; (3) exploration of the 

 north-west extremity of Talbot Passage, of the west side of the 

 archipelago from Cook Bay to Black Head Cape, and of the 

 various channels connecting Brecknock Passage with Whaleboat 

 and Darwin Sounds. — Report on the climate of Cape Horn, by 

 M. J. Lephay. Appended to the report are various meteorolo- 

 gical tables showing the temperature, barometric pressure, at- 

 mospheric currents, direction and velocity of the winds observed 

 at the station of Orange Bay from September 26, 1S82, to 

 August 31, 1883. — On the spectrum of the Pons-Brooks comet, 

 by JL Ch. Trepied. — Spectroscopic observations made at Nice 

 on the Pons-Brooks comet, by M. ThoUon. — Observations at 

 Marseilles on the same comet (one illustration), by M. E. L. 

 Trouvelot. — On certain doubly periodical functions of the second 

 species, by M. E. Goursat. — On the application of Vander- 

 monde's notation to the representation of hypergeometrical 

 polynomes in a condensed form, by M. Radau. — Calculus of the 

 contact arc of a flexible, spiral, metallic rod, according to any 

 given conditions, on a circular cylinder, by M. H. Leaute. 

 — Note on the action exercised on polarised light by the 

 cellulose solutions in the Schweizer reagent, by M. A. Levallois. 

 — On the compound heat of the soluble fluorides and the law of 

 substituted thermic constants, by M. D. Tommasi. — Some new 

 sulphuretted salts derived from the trisulphuret of phoshorus, by 

 M.G. Lemoine. — On the law of free surfaces in vegetable anatomy, 

 by M. C. Eg. Bertrand. — On the modifications presented by the 

 muscles after severance of the nerves communicating with them, 

 by M. J. Babinski. — On progressive atrophic myopathy (here- 

 ditary myopathy beginning in infancy with the muscles of the 

 face, without change in the nervous system), by MM. L. 

 Landouzy and J. Dejerine. — Researches on some recent pretended 

 infallible specifics against hydrophobia (second note), by M. P. 

 Gibier. Garlic and pilocarpine (active principlesofjaborandi), tested 

 on rats and cats, were found to be powerless to prevent thedevelop- 

 ment of rabies. — Note accompanying the photographs of natural 

 size of two children delivered by the operation of paratomy in 

 cases of extra-uterine pregnancy by M. Championniere, of the 

 Tenon Hospital, by M. Just Lucas Championniere. — Observa- 

 tions on the remarkable sunsets and dawns observed at Campan 

 during the month of December, 18S3, by M. Soucaze. No solu- 

 tion of the phenomenon is offered ; but to the volcanic theory it 

 is objected that the effects should be permanent if due to the 

 permanent presence of minute igneous particles in the atmo- 

 sphere. 



Berlin 

 Physical Society, December 14, 1883. — Prof. Bornstein 

 described an apparatus for measuring the momentum of 



