Atcg. 29, 1872] 



NA TURE 



357 



THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION 



Brighton, Thursday, Aug. 22 



THIS year's Congress of the British Association 

 was formally brought to a close yesterday after- 

 noon by a largely attended general meeting held in 

 the Dome, the mam purpose ot which was to allot votes 

 of thanks to those who had officially done their best to 

 make the meeting successful. One of the best-deserved 

 votes was that to the Mayor and Corporation of the town, 

 ■who had done all that lay in their power to promote in 

 every respect the comfort and convenience of visitors. If 

 the meeting has not been in all respects a success, it has 

 certainly been from no want of hospitality and courtesy 

 on the part of the Brightonians. Prof. Fawcett proposed 

 the vote of thanks to the distinguished president, Dr. 

 Carpenter. The professor's praise of the president was 

 hearty and well-deserved. In returning thanks Dr. Car- 

 penter paid a well-merited compliment to Mr. Griffiths 

 and Mr. Galton, " his right and left hands, the fomier his 

 Jidus Acita/es." 



The following are the grants agreed tO'this year, with 

 the names of the members entitled to them :— 



M.^THEMATICS AND PHYSICS 

 *Cayley, Prof. — Mathematical Tables .... .^100 

 'Thomson, SirW. — Tidal Observations . . . 400 



*Brooke, Mr. — British Rainfall 100 



"Everett, Prof — Underground Temperature (100/. re- 

 newed) 150 



*Griftith, Mr. G. — Gaussian Constants (renewed) . . 10 



*Glaisher, Jlr. J. — Luminous Meteors .... 30 



Glaisher, Mr. J. — Efiicacy of Lightning Conducto s . 50 



'Williamson, Prof A. W. — Testing Siemens' New Pjro- 



meter (renewed) ....... 30 



*Huggins, Dr. W. — Table of Inverse Wave-Lengths . 150 

 *Tait, Prof. — Thermal Conductivity of Metals . . 50 



Chemistry 

 'Williamson, Prof. A. W. — Records of the Progress of 



Chemistry (100/. renewed) 200 



'Gladstone, Ur. — Chemical Constitution and Optical 



Properties of Essential Oils 30 



Brown, Prof. Crum. — Temperature of Incandescent 



Bodies 50 



Browni, prof Crum. — Electric Tensions of Batteries . 25 



Geology 

 *Ramsay, Prof — Mapping Positions of Erratic Blocks 



and Boulders (renewed) ..... 10 



*Lyell, Sir C, Birt. — Kent's-Cavern Exploration . . 150 



Lubbock, Sir J. — Exploration of Settle Cave . . 50 



'Busk, Mr. — Fossil Elephants of Malta ... 25 



'ILirkness, Prof — Investigation of Fossil Corals . . 25 



Carrathers, Mr.— Fossil Flora of Ireland ... 20 



'Harkness, Prof — Collection of Fossils in the North- 

 west of Scotland ....... 10 



*Bryce, Dr. — Earthquakes in Scotland ... 20 



WiUett, Mr. H.— The Sub-Wealden Exploration . 25 



Biology 

 Lane Fox, Col. A. — Forms of Instructions for Travellers 25 



'Stainton, Mr. — Record of the Progress of Zoology . 100 



'Christison, Sir R. — Antagonism of the Action of Poisons 20 



'Balfour, Prof — Effect of the Denudation of Timlier on 



the Rainfall in North Britain (renewed) ... 20 



Mechanics 

 'Grantham, Mr. R. B. —Treatment and Utilisation of 



Sewage ........ 100 



'Froude, Mr. W. — Experiments on Instruments for 

 Jfeasuring the Speed of Ships and Currents (30/. 

 renewed) ........ 5° 



Total ;^2,025 



Some of the grants, as the president remarked, were for 

 large sums, but it is gratifying to learn that the sum 



* Reappointed. 



rsalised by the sale of tickets this year will more than 

 cover the whole amount. The total number of tickets 

 sold has been 2,533, representing 2,649/. 



Not the least successful, and doubtlees to many of the 

 200 guests, rot the least enjoyable of the numerous meet- 

 ings which have within the last few days been held at 

 Brighton, was the dejeuner given yesterday by the hos- 

 pitable mayor in the banqueting-room of the Royal 

 I'avilion. 



The . Press arrangements have received very general 

 commendation. Special praise is due to the Brighton 

 Daily News, whose reports of general and sectional 

 meetings were unremitting until it came to Mr. J. F. 

 Walker's paper, and what the Pall Mall calls the alarm- 

 ing polysyllable "Dinitrobrombenzenc." The M-Tfj- might, 

 however, have got over the word, which we shall not venture 

 to repeat, " but," it says, " since the communication was 

 full of such words as mononitromonobrombenzenc and 

 metamononitromonobrombenzene, wc do not imagine a 

 full report would be interesting to our general readers." 

 Our spirited contemporary is probably right, as the Pall 

 Mall remarks ; half-a-dozen such words might make a 

 handsome day's wage even for the most dihgent com- 

 positor. 



In alluding to Dr. Carpenter's lecture on Chalk to be 

 delivered to-night, the opportunity must be'taken of sup- 

 plying an omission which we unintentionally made last 

 week. We should have mentioned that one of the 

 three general lectures was by Mr. J. M. Duncan, on the 

 " Metamorphoses of Insects." 



SECTION A — M.^THEMATICAL AND PHYSICAL SCIENCE 



On a Periodicity in the Frequency of Cyclones in the Indian 

 Ocean South of the Equator, by Mr. Meldrum. 



One of the objects for which the Meteorological Society of 

 Mauritius was established, in 1S51, was to obtain extracts from 

 the meteorological registers of vessels visiting the harbour of Port 

 Louis, especially of such vessels as had experienced bad weather 

 in the Indian Ocean. 



Accordingly, clerks were employed to copy all the log-books 

 that could be procured. 



In 1S53 the system of registration was remodelled. Instead of 

 having the observations contained in each log-book recorded 

 separately, all the observations in all the log-books for the same 

 day were recorded on the same page. 



As this system has been conducted without interruption to the 

 present time, the Society has now a large collection of observa- 

 tions showing more or less the state of the winds and weather 

 over the frequented parts of the Indian Ocean, in the form of a 

 daily journal, during the last nineteen years; so that a person 

 may lind at once what weather prevailed on any day or in any 

 year during that period. 



Together with the years 1S51-2, therefore, during which the 

 registers were differently kept, we have 21 years' continuous 

 observation, from the meridian of Greenwich to 120° E., and 

 from 23° N. to 45° S. 



Adding to the information obtained by the Society throughout 

 these 21 years numerous ol)servations collected by several persons 

 for the previous four years (1S47-50), we have a more or less 

 complete record of all, or of very nearly all, the cyclones which 

 have taken place in the Southern Indian Ocean during the last 

 25 years ; for Mauritius is so much in the track of these cyclones, 

 and so much visited by vessels in distress and by others trading 

 between the colony and England, India, and Australia, that it is 

 scarcely possible for any violent hurricane to pass without being 

 noticed. 



Taking now, for the present, the area comprised between the 

 equator and the parallel of 25° S., and the meridians of 40" and 

 1 10' E. , and examining a table of the cyclones that have occurred 

 there from 1S47 to 1S72, it is found that some years have been 

 remarkable for a frequency and others for a comparative absence 

 of cyclones. 



The five years, 1847-51, were characterised by cyclone fre- 

 quency; then came a period of comparative calm (1S52-57), 

 which was followed by six years (1858-63) remarkable for 

 cyclones. The next five years (1S64-68) showed a considerable 

 ecrease ; and since 1869 there has been an increas*, until, for 



