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NATURE 



\7nly 4, 1872 



Tennant. Monday, July 22, and five following days, excursion 

 to Ludlow and the Longmynds ; directors, Prof. Morris, Mr. 

 Robert Lightbody, and Rev. J. D La Touche. This excursion 

 is intended to afford members an opportunity of studying Sihirian 

 and Cambrian Strata, and will be of great value to students of 

 the Palajozoic Rocks. On Monday, after arrival at Ludlow, 

 the party will examine the exposures of the Ludlow group of 

 rocks in the immediate vicinity of the town. On Tuesday tire 

 objects of attraction will be the outcrop of the Upper Ludlow 

 on the road to Wigmore, the Aymestry Limestone, and the 

 Lower Ludlow. After passing Elton Hall, examine fine and 

 Fossiliferous .Section of the Lower [Ludlow, at Evenhays (Vinal 

 Ridge). Proceed then to Burrington (Wenlock Shale), B.ank of 

 the Teme (good section of Wenlock Shale), and Church Hill 

 Quarry, Leintwardiiie, famed for Echinoderm remains. On 

 Wednesday, leave Ludlow for Hayton's Bent, where the Old 

 Red sandstone is exposed, and may be examined with advantage. 

 On Thursday, proceed by Bishop's Castle Railway for the south 

 end of the Ijongmynds, where the Wenlock Shales will be 

 examined, and the physiography of the district formed by the 

 Llandeilo Rocks observed. Walk back through the Valley of 

 the Onney, observing on the way sections of Silurian Rocks 

 from the Lower Caradoc to the Wenlock. On Friday, proceed 

 by rail to Lydham Heath, thence to Shelve (Lower Llandeilo). 

 Walk over the Stijjcrstone and Longmynd Ranges to Church 

 Stretton, and examine junction of Cambrian and Silurians. On 

 Saturday, from Craven Arms walk to Norton Camp, observing 

 by the way Wenlock and Ludlow Sections, and at Norton in- 

 fspect a good exposure of the "Bone Bed." Should time 

 permit, proceed to Onibury, and inspect junction of Silurians 

 and Devonians, and a fossiliferous section of Lower Ludlow 

 Shale. 



A NEW work on Electrostatics by Sir William Thomson will 

 be published by Messrs. Macmillan and Co. early in August. It 

 will consist chiefly of articles which originally appeared at dif- 

 ferent times during the last thirty years, in the Cambridge Mathc- 

 mdlical yournal, the Cambiidge and Dublin Mathematical 

 yoHynal, Liouville's 'Journal de Mathhnatiques, the I'hiloscphical 

 Magazine, Nichol's Cyclopcedia, the Reports of the British Asso- 

 ciation, the Proceedings of the Royal Societies of London and 

 Edinburgh, of the Roy.al Institution of Great Britain, and of the 

 Philosophical Societies of Manchester and Glasgow ; and which 

 will now be first collected and published together. The rest, 

 constituting about a quarter of the whole, will be printed from 

 manuscript, which, except a small part about twenty years old, 

 entitled " Electromagnets," has been written for the present pub- 

 lication, to fill up roughly gaps in the collection. 



The two modes of photographic printing known as the Albert 

 and Woodbury processes have both been employed by Prof. 

 Agassiz in the illustration of his forthcoming " Revision of the 

 Echini." Prof Agassiz has kindly permitted us to see specimens 

 of both modes of illustration. They are simply exquisite, por- 

 traying every marking on the surface of the shells with the accu- 

 racy of nature printing, and with the beauty of a lithograph. 

 The practical working of these new modes of photographic 

 printing must speedily work a complete revolution in the illustra- 

 tion of works on Natural History. 



A VALUABLE report, prepared by Mr. R. D. Cutts, of the 

 United States Coast Survey, upon commerce in the products of the 

 sea, has just been published by the Senate, and is considered a valu- 

 able contribution to the statistics of the fisheries of America 

 and of the rest of the world. In this the different marketable pro- 

 ducts arc described in detail, and the relative rank which they 

 occupy in commerce indicated. In addition to this, there is 

 given the area, population, most important ports, and commer- 



cial tonnage of the principal nations of the world ; the imports 

 and exports of the products of the sea ; showing the capacity of 

 the markets and the countries supplied ; and niso the catch, con- 

 sumption, and balance of trade, from official statistics. This 

 Report was prepared in 1869 by request of the Secretary of State, 

 and transmitted in February of that year, but the order to print 

 was not made till receetly. 



The Report of the Government Cinchona Plantations at 

 Ootacamund in India for 1S70-71 states that the growth of the 

 plants has been very .satisfactory. The older shrubs have grown 

 into trees 22ft. to 23ft. high, and iSin. to 21 in. in girth. Of the 

 Cinchona succirubra the finest samples reach a height of 30ft., 

 with a girth of 3ft. Among the new species of plants lately 

 introduced is the Pitayo bark, which appears hirdy and well 

 suited to the climate. During the year 5i,353lbs. of fresh bark 

 were supplied to Mr. Broughton, the Government quinologist, 1 

 for the manufacture of amorphous quinine. From 1,000 eight- I 

 year-old plants of the Cinchona succirubra, as much as 2,56olbs. ' 

 may be expected to be extracted this year. This aver.age of 

 more than 2?,lbs. to each tree will yield at the present rate of 

 2 J. 8(/. to 3.S. per lb. , a clear profit of at least 2s, per lb . 



Prof. Lf.idy, at a meeting of the Philadelphia Academy of 

 Seciences, on February 6, exhibited specimens of corundum from 

 Macon County, North Carolina, which, he said, were especially 

 interesting, as they consisted of fragments of large crystals of 

 gray corundum, containing in the interior dark blue sapphire, 

 and coated on the exterior with bright red ruliy. One pyramid 

 of a large crystal from the same locality recently brought to that 

 city weighs 300 pounds. 



At the meeting of the American Fish-Culturists' Association, 

 held at Albany, it was voted to present to Congress a memorial 

 for aid from Government in stocking the rivers of the United 

 States with useful food fishes. Mr. George Page Shepherd, of 

 New Jersey, was appointed to present the memorial, and had 

 an opportunity not long since of expressing his views before the 

 House Committee on Appropriations. 



According to Dr. Uhler, of Baltimore, the European cab- 

 bage butterfly (Fontia Brassicc), the pest of the agriculturist, 

 has reached Baltimore in its invasion of the United States. It 

 lias been known for some years more to the eastward, and has 

 been slowly but surely creeping along, until it bids fair to involve 

 the whole country in its ravages. 



We reprint the following interesting note from Harper s 

 Weekly: — "As is well known, grouse, pheasants, ptarmigans, 

 and some other gallinacea have a red patch or wattle above the 

 eye, this being so conspicuous in some species as to resemble a 

 piece of red llannel. This has been lately subjected to a careful 

 analysis by Dr. Wurm, wlio ascertains that it contains a new 

 organic colouring material, which he calls Tctronerylhrin, or 

 grouse red. It seems to lie in the deeper strata of the epider- 

 mis, like the colouring matter of the human skin, and to be 

 partly dissolved in the deep layers of the cells, and p.artly to 

 common with the colouring matter of the blood. The fact has 

 baen well known to hunters that if a white cloth be rubbed over 

 this red process the colour will come off." J 



The AiTt' York Journal of Commerce ^w&t, circulation to a 

 story of an extraordinary fall of fish-bones (?) in Louisiana, cover- 

 ing the ground over a considerable area. 



Late Chilian papers announce the discovery of important 

 mines of coal in that country, especially along the Gulf of Aranco, 

 near the mouth of the Carampangue River. According to an 

 official report, one of these veins is five feet thick, and is esti- 

 mated to contain four million tons of coal. 



