Dec. 9, 1 836] 



NA TURE 



133 



Mr. William Fawcett, one of the assistants in the De- 

 partment of Botany in the British Museum, has been appointed 

 by the Secretary of State for the Colonies to the post of Direc- 

 tor of the Public Gardens and Plantations in Jamaica. 



The Uralian Society of Natural Sciences is arranging to hold 

 a Scientific and Industri.1l Exhibition of Siberia and the Ural 

 Mountains in 1S87, at Ekaterinburg. The Exhibition pro- 

 mises to be of great scientific interest, including sections of 

 geology, botany, zoology, anthropology, and archeology. The 

 anthropology especially will be of the most comprehensive 

 character. It will include a certain number of families of 

 Bashkirs, Kirghizes, Vogones, Ostiaks, Samoiedes, and other 

 *^ half-civilised peoples of Siberia, with their dwellings, and ap- 

 pliances for hunting and fishing, besides models, figures, cos- 

 tumes, &c. There will also be a large collection of prehistoric 

 objects. The grounds around the Exhibition building will be 

 utilised to give a fairly accurate idea of the arborescent vegeta- 

 tion of the countries represented. Delegates from foreign 

 Societies intending to visit the E.xhibition will be accorded 

 special travelling privileges, and be received with the greatest 

 hospitality. The Exhibition will be open from May 27 to Sep- 

 tember 27. The President of the Society is General Ivanoff, 

 and the President of the Exhibition Committee M. A. 

 Miclowsky. 



Mr. Arthur Grote died on the 4th inst. at his residence in 

 Ovington Square. He was born in 1814. He was a Fellow of 

 the Royal Society and also of the Linnean Society. Mr. 

 Grote wrote a number of papers on subjects connected with 

 botany and natural history, and contributed an introduction to 

 Hewitson's " Descriptions of New Indian Lepidopterous Insects 

 in the Atkinson Collection." He was engaged for many years 

 in Her Majesty's Indian Civil Service. 



Mr. W. Galloway writes with reference to the recent ex- 

 plosion at Elemore Pit : — " Elemore Pit is one of the Heeltan 

 group of collieries near Newcastle-on-Tyne, which are accounted 

 to be amongst the best and most carefully managed mines in this 

 or any other country. It is under the direct supervision of Mr. 

 Lindsay Wood — a member of the late Royal Commission on 

 Accidents in Mines. The workings are dry and dusty ; no 

 accumulation of gas was known to exist anywhere ; a shot is 

 supposed to have been fired at the moment the explosion took 

 place, for shot-firing was going on. The explosion appears to 

 have been confined to the in-take air-ways, and to have shot up 

 the downcast shaft, or, in other words, to have traversed a 

 region filled with fresh air without any admixture of fire-damp. 

 These features of this and other similar explosions of late appear 

 to militate somewhat against the views expressed in the Report 

 of the Royal Commission on Accidents in Mines, to the effect 

 that coal-dust alone was a comparatively harmless agent in the 

 absence of fire-damp." 



The following are the arrangements for the lectures before 

 Easter at the Royal Institution : — Prof. Dewar, six lectures 

 (adapted to a juvenile auditory) on " The Chemistry of Light 

 and Photography"; Prof. Gamgee, eleven lectures on "The 

 Function of Respiration " ; Prof. Riicker, five lectures on 

 "Molecular Forces"; Prof. Max Mtiller, three lectures on 

 " The .Science of Thought " ; Mi. Carl Armbruster, five lectures 

 on " Modern Composers of Classical Song"; and Lord Ray- 

 leigh, six lectures on "Sound." The following are the probable 

 arrangements for the Friday evening meetings before Easter : — 

 Sir William Thomson, on "The Probable Origin, the Total 

 Amount, and the Possible Duration of the Sun's Heat " ; Mr. 

 W. Baldwin Spencer, on "The Pineal Eye in Lizards " ; Mr. 

 Edwin Freshfield, on " Some Unpublished Records of the City 

 of London"; Mr. E. B. Poulton. on " Gilded Chrysalides " ; 

 Mr. W. Crookes, on " Genesis of Elements " ; Capt. Abney, 



on "Sunlight Colours"; Mr. V. Horsley, on "Brain Surgery 

 in the Stone Ages" ; Archdeacon Farrar, on " Society in the 

 Fourth Century a.d. " ; Mr. G. J. Romanes, on "Mental Dif- 

 ferences between Men and Women " ; and Lord Rayleigh, on 

 " Colours of Thin Plates." 



An Edinburgh Correspondent write; : — " Mr. Romanes has 

 ju-t delivered his first course of lectures on the Philosophy of 

 Natural History to a large and appreciative audience, including 

 students from all the Faculties in the University of Edinburgh." 



The Minister of French Postal Telegraphy has sent to 

 Brussels a delegate to arrange for establishing a telephonic line 

 between Paris and that city. The price for the use of the tele- 

 phone will be five francs for a period of five minutes. It is the 

 first step on record towards an international telephonic system. 



A remarkable fire-ball was seen at Stonyhurst College, 

 Blackburn, on December 4, at 9.16 p.m. Although the moon 

 was shining brightly, it lit up the sky like a brilliant rocket. Its 

 course was from 27 Lyncis to 9 Gemini, and as it advanced it 

 left a fine streak behind it. Its colour was a bluish-white. At 

 first it moved swiftly, then more slowly, and, before vanishing, 

 burst into several fragments. There was no streak left where 

 the meteor burst, but only in the first part of its course. It was 

 like a horse-tail cirrhus, the bushy [portion surrounding the star 

 27 Lyncis, and thence extending in a narrower streak about 3'. 

 It remained visible for one minute and a half, the part last to 

 fade being that about 27 Lyncis. 



We have received the last number (part 2, vol. iv.) of the 

 Proctcdiiigs of the Liverpool Geological Society. The presi- 

 dential address by Mr. Mellard Reade, " On the North Atlantic 

 as a Geological Magazine," is a continuation of the line of in- 

 vestigation sketched out by him in his previous address, which 

 was entitled "Denudation of the two Americas." The papers 

 deal mainly with the geology of Liverpool and the neighbour- 

 hood, especially North Wales. A paper by the Secretary, Mr. 

 W. Hewitt, "On the Topography of Liverpool," must be 

 specially interesting and instructive to those acquainted with 

 the present geography of that great city. 



The active volcano, Asamayama, appears to be attracting 

 particular attention just now in Japan, probably because it is the 

 loftiest mountain in the country which is in a constant state of 

 activity, and also because it is the nearest to the capital, and is 

 situated in a district long famous for its health resorts. A few 

 weeks since we referred to an anonymous account of the crater, 

 published in the Japan Weekly Mail, but a much more careful 

 sketch of it is given by the Japan Correspondent of the 7"imes in a 

 letter published recently in that journal. The roar of the 

 volcano, on approaching the edge of the crater, he describes as 

 not unlike the noise produced by the passage of a train across a 

 bridge under which one is standing. There was no shakmg, 

 however, but loud hissing and bubbling constantly proceeded 

 from numberless vapour-jets in the inner face of the crater-wall, 

 from its rim downwards. The crater is a rough oval in shape, 

 but the estimates of its size are most conflicting. The Japanese 

 give the circumference as four miles, but this is simply a wild 

 guess. A German explorer set down the diameter at 1 looyardS; 

 and an English mathematical professor put it at only 200 yards, 

 " divergences that will illustrate the mental confusion to which 

 some men are liable when in the presence of dread natural phe- 

 nomena." The writer himself estimated the circumference at 

 1056 yards, by walking round the windward half of it— it was 

 impossible to pass through the vapours on the lee side— which 

 was accomplished in six minutes, at the rate of about three miles 

 an hour. 



On the very interesting question of the depth of the crater— 

 that is, the depth from the mouth to the surface of the molten 



