Jan. 20, 1887] 



NA TURE 



271 



that in 1847 England was behind America must surely 

 be wrong. The Electric Telegraph Company in England 

 was then in full swing. 



As this is the jubilee year of the telegraph in 

 England, it is well to be reminded that Cooke and 

 Wheatstone made their first practical and successful 

 trial on July 25, 1S37, between Euston and Camden, 

 while Morse did not file his caveat {i.e. did not apply for 

 his patent) until October 5 of the same year. 



We wish the book every success, and shall be glad to 

 see further instalments. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 

 [ The Editor does not hold himself rcsponsiblifor opinions ex- 

 pressed by his correspottdetits. Neither can he undertake to 

 return, or to correspond with the writers of, rejected manu- 

 scripts. No notice is taken of anonymous communications. 

 [ The Editor urgently requests correspondents to keep their letters 

 as short as possible. The pressure on his space is so great 

 that it is impossible otherwise to insure the appearance even 

 of commiinicatiotis containing interesting and novel facts. ] 



Normal School of Science and Royal School of Mines 



I AM directed to request that you will be so good as to allow 

 me to slate, through the medium of your columns, that the 

 number of applications for admission to the Normal School of 

 Science and Royal School of Mines at South Kensington, at 

 the commencement of the present session, having been consider- 

 ably in excess of the accommodation which the School can 

 afford, it has become necessary to adopt some process of selec- 

 tion for the future. Hereafter, applications for admission should 

 be sent to the Registrar of the School before the end of May, 

 accompanied by a statement of the studies which the applicant 

 has already pursued, the examinations he has passed, and the 

 name of a teacher (or teachers) to whom reference maybe made. 

 Such applications will be considered by the Dean and Council 

 of the School, who will decide on them according to their merits. 

 A knowledge of elementary mathematics, such as is required of 

 all Royal Exhibitioners and national scholars, will be held to 

 be of the first importance for those who desire admission to the 

 course for the Associateship of the School ; while for occasional 

 students, who propose only to take up certain specific branches 

 of science, some preliminary knowledge of them will have 

 weight. J. F. D. Donnelly 



Science and Art Department, January 14 



The Cambridge Cholera Fungus 



The letter published by Dr. Klein in your issue of December 



23 (p. 171) having incidentally referred to my views as to the 



nature of the fungus present in choleraic tissue, I should be glad 



to be allowed to make some further remarks upon the subject. 



At an early stage of his investigation Prof Roy brought for 

 my inspection one of his preparations of intestinal mucous 

 membrane, which clearly demonstrated the presence of certain 

 foreign organisms, and especially drew my attention to a form 

 which he tojk to be the more usual and typical one. Such a 

 structure might perhaps best be described as consisting of a thin 

 and somewhat moniliform filament which at one end exhibited a 

 distinct nodular swelling. Being struck with a certain {and, as 

 I now fear, a somewhat superficial) morphological resemblance 

 to a group of fhe Chytridiaceje, I suggested that the organism 

 might possibly be a Chytridium, and this view was perhaps too 

 confidently adopted by Messrs. Roy and Sherrington in their 

 paper. The appearance of Dr. Klein's letter has naturally led 

 me to carefully reconsider the whole question, and on further 

 consideration I entirely abandin the idea of the organism being 

 a Chytridium. I believe, on the contraiy, that it is a Bacterium, 

 and that the structure described by Prof Roy and seen by myself 

 is that particular phase in the life-history of the Bacterium which 

 is known as an involution form. Such fonns are described, for 

 instance, in Zopfs article " Die Spaltpilze," in Schenk's " Ency- 



clopa;die der Naturwissenschaften," as Bacterium accti and 

 Baclcriumcyanogcnuiu. Indeed, the involution form assumed by 

 the latter Bacterium recalls very vividly to my mind the structure 

 shown to me by Prof Roy. 



In conclusion, I may assure Dr. Klein that the fungus is 

 certainly neither a Penicillum nor of the nature of a mould, 

 and tliat 1 do not believe it is in any way associated w\?apost- 

 mo'lcm change. Walier Gardiner 



Royal Gardens, Kew, January 11 



Snowstorm of January 7, 1887 

 A MOST extraordinary snowstorm occurred here to-day (January 

 7). In fifty years' experience I have seen nothing like it, nor has 

 anyone else in this neighb jurhood seen any similar phenomenor. 

 It would be impossible to reahse the gigantic size of the snow- 

 flakes without seeing them. I can only compare them to a fall of 

 oranges, though the diameter of an orange would be small in 

 comparison with thousands of these snowflakes ; in this immediate 

 neighbourhood (i.e. within sight of the place of observation) at 50 

 yards off it produced a dense snow-wall. The wind was south, 

 and almost calm, and the largest sn iw came down nearly per- 

 pendicularly. The temperature was 32° '6, and the air completely 

 saturated with moisture. Before the storm the temperature was 

 34°'I. Snow had been falling with a slight thaw from 10 a.m., 

 the snowflakes being small. Suddenly, at I2h. 12m. p.m. they 

 became 24 inches in length ; ' at I2h. 14m. they had increased 

 to 2j inches ; and one flalie that was caught measured 2% inches 

 by 24 inches, and was jV of an inch thick. At I2h. i6m. the 

 flakes had increased in size to 3J inches (and several measured 

 were 4 inches across, and there were several larger ones not 

 near enough to be caught); at I2h. 19m. they were somewhat 

 less, and ■at I2h. 20m. though large, were not gigantic. For- 

 tunately I was measuring and weighing snow at the time, with 

 two assistants, and had a number of flat circular glasses kept 

 cold ready for the purpose of catching crystals, and for measur- 

 ing the snow that fell upon these glasses. As is usual when very 

 large flakes are falling, there were many of smaller size, though 

 when the flakes were from 2| to 3^ inches, the majority of the 

 next size were about 2 inches, and the very large flakes 

 would be within 12 inches of each other. A dozen of these large 

 flakes were caught, each on a separate piece of glass, measured 

 and removed under cover, my two assistants giving valuable aid. 

 Of three of these flakes one ) ielded 14 drops of water, a second 

 15, and a third 16 drops ; and these were not the largest flakes 

 seen.'-' The water from seven flakes weighed a quarter of an ounce 

 within 2 or 3 grains. The weight of ten varied from 13 to l6 

 grains each ; most of the flakes were about a third longer than 

 broad, one flake that was 3J inches long by 2i broad was esti- 

 mated (before it touched the glass) to be ij inch thick, when 

 flattened by the force of its descent it was \ of an inch thick. 



The flakes were not a mass of broken pieces, but were com- 

 posed mainly of perfect crystals, and there must have been 

 hundreds of these crystals in each flake ; they were clinging to- 

 gether at every conceivable angle, though a much larger per- 

 centage were more horizontal than vertical. A terrestrial radia- 

 tion thermometer, buried a fifth of an inch within this snow, 

 marked a temperature of 32°'4. 



The snow which fell during the last six minutes of this ^ great 

 storm was just under one-fifth of an inch in depth, and yielded 

 •030 of an inch of water, falling at the rate of i inch of water 

 in three hours and twenty minutes (yielding i inch of water from 

 6 inches of snow). 



There was a great snowstorm here on December 27, 1886, 

 which varied considerably in places near to each other, i.e. — 



Depth of 



Inches 



7 



5 



0-97 

 071 

 0'42 



Shirenewton Hall ... i'55 



Dennil Hill fo? 



Wirewoods Green ... o'86 



Pieicefield Park ... o'96 ... 4 ... — 



Chepstow (The Mount) 070 ... — .-- — 



The drifts above here are very great, and a large number of 

 men are still engaged in cutting through them. 



The following measurements will show the number of inches 



' The breadth was less than the length, and the thickness less than th 

 breadth ; more or less flattened, and curled over on the edges- 



= Besides these drops, the wetted glass shall count f r two more drops. 



