yipri/ 7, 1887J 



NA TURE 



535 



Indeed, judging from the small amount of damage done to build- 

 ings in which flat or square stones and flat floors have been u;;d, 

 I should doubt wliether the shock was much more severe than 

 that which not lonj ago damaged the brick buildings in East 

 Anglia. 



At both Oiieglia and Diano Marina the building material is 

 usually rounded stones from the beach, or rubble with stones of 

 all sha[)cs and si^es. The stucco is apparently expected to 

 make goo 1 any deficiencies. Besides this the floors are nearly 

 always lirick arches abutting agai 1st the vertical wall-;, without 

 any reference to other literal support. Most of these houses are 

 three or four stories high. Of course any vibration afl'ecting 

 buildings of this construction will split the walls in all directions, 

 for besides the lateral thrust of the arches the walls are full of 

 wedge-shaped stones ready to slip into any fissures which may 

 form. 



The complication caused by these arched floors makes it very 

 iliflicult to trace the direction or angle of emergence of the 

 ~'iock. Clement Reid 



Oncglia, March 13 



Scorpion Virus 



Allow me to state that the results of my experiments on Cape 

 scorpions are in full accord with Prof. ISaurne's conclusion that 

 the poison of the scorpion has no fatal elifect on the same indi- 

 vidual or another individual of the same or even of another 

 species. Speaking bafore the South African Philosophical 

 Society in Kebniary 1SS3, I said : — " Members of the Society 

 will see on the table a scorpion of the larger (Cape) species. 

 That scorpion I caught at 1 1 o'clock this morning. I at once 

 jiierced him in three places with his own sting, on which in 

 each case there was a drop of poison. In the last inoculation I 

 lield the stin^ in the wound, and squeezing the ' bulb of the 

 sting' with the pincers forcibly injected poison. The creature 

 is alive and active" (Proceedings for 1883). These and subse- 

 quent experiments, however, led me to believe that the poison 

 has sonic effect, causing sluggishness and torpor for a while. I 

 quite agree with Prof, liourne that it is physically possible for a 

 scorpion to .^ting itself in a vulnerable place ; and though I never 

 was abli to observe the infliction of a wound on itself by any 

 scorpion, 1 can well believe that this is possible, bat, I am 

 convinced, wholly accidental. 



I found also that the poison of the ringhals snake (Naja 

 liiLinacliatcs) was not fatal when inoculated in the same individual 

 or another individual of the same species. 



Univer-ity College, Bristol C. Lloyd Morgan 



The Supposed Myzostoma-cysts in Antcdon rosacea 



Some eighteen months ago I called attention in these columns 

 (vol. xxxii. p. 391, and vol. xxxiii. p. 8) to certain malforma- 

 tions which 1 had discovered on the pinnules of AnIcJon rosacea 

 fiom various British localities. They often take the form of 

 small cysts which are very like those produced by encysting 

 Myzostomila on the arm; and pinnules of various Crinoids from 

 the Pacific ; and as no other cyst-builders but Myzosloim were 

 then known to infest the Crinoids, the inference seemed a natural 

 one that the cysts on the pinnules of Anledoti rosacea had been 

 produced by a small member of this genus. I subsequently 

 fiiund several more cysts on some examples of Antcdon rosace i 

 which were dredged at Gibraltar by the Italian corvette Vcltor 

 Pismi, and the whole cnllection was sent to my friend Prof. 

 L. von Graff for examination. 



To our great surprise, however, he has not found a single 

 Myzostomi in any one of the fourteen malformations of the pin- 

 nules, whether cysts or otherwise, which he has opened ; and 

 " the new British Myzostoma " must therefore be dis- 

 established. 



But what, then, ha; been the cause of these malformations? 

 Prof, von Grafl' has found them to be always associated with the 

 presence of a minute globular body, which has the appearance 

 of an egg that has undergone superficial cleavage, but yet exhibits 

 no trace of nuclei when stained. It is impossible to decide at 

 present what this structure may be. Prof, von Graff has de- 

 scribed it more fully in a " Supplementary Report on the Myzo- 

 st imida of the Cka'len^er Expedition " which he has just com- 

 pleted. But its nature see ns to be as problematical as that of the 

 s.icculi ; and fresh material, not spirit specimens, must be examined 



before we can expect to learn much more about it. In any case, 

 however, it would seem that we have to deal with a hitherto un- 

 known parasite of the Crinoids, w-hich is capable of producing 

 modifications in the calcareous tissues of the arms and pinnules, 

 of essentially the same character as those caused by Myzostoma, 

 though of smaller size. 



I would commend the question to the attention of those 

 naturalists who may meet with Anicdon rosacea in the dredgings 

 of the ensuing season ; and in order that they may know how to 

 catch their hare, I shall be most happy to forward specimens of 

 the cysts to anyone who desires to become acquainted with their 

 external apjiearance. I may add that the largest cysts I have 

 seen are on Comatula; from the Cumbrae, Milford Haven, and 

 Gibraltar ; while I have no knowledge of their occurrence either 

 at Naples or anywhere else in the Mediterranean. 



Kton College P. Herdert Carpenter 



On some Observations on Palaeobotany in Gosbjl's 

 "Outlines of Classification and Special Morphology 

 of Plants" 



The few modern authors of botanical text-boo'.^s who have 

 ventured to summarise recent pala;obotinical researches have 

 achieved but moderate success. These authors have too little 

 knowledge of the rapid progress of the study of fossil plants 

 during the last few years to make success possible ; hence, their 

 summaries, if not absolutely inaccurate, are usually misleading. 

 So long as these errors are confined to works published in Con- 

 tinental languages, British jialKobotanists need not take the 

 trouble to correct them. Bui the case is altered wdien English 

 translations of these books appear amongst us. Pah-eobotany 

 has nowhere made greater progress during the last few years than 

 with ourselves. Many errors have been corrected, and new 

 truths, results of careful and prolonged investigations, have taken 

 their place. With the more important of these new discoveries 

 many of our younger students of geology are now familiar. It 

 is desirable that what they have been taught should not be con- 

 tradicted fpy the utterances of authors ignorant of the subjects 

 upon which they venture to express an opinion. 



Some little time ago Dr. Goebel, of Rostock, published a 

 volume which was virtually a new edition of Book II. of Sachs's 

 " Lehrbuch der Botanik," and an English translation of this 

 volume, made by Mr. H. E. F. Garnsey, and revised by Prof. 

 I. B. Balfour, has just ajipeared. Dr. Goeliel's volume contains 

 some references to the Pala:ozoic flora which are seriously behind 

 the times. To allow these statements to reach our students 

 uncorrected will do harm, because they must suggest to those 

 students that certain ques'ions are still open and debatable 

 which cannot now be regarded as such. 



Had I not unfortunately misunderstood a wish expressed by 

 my friend Prof. Balfour, some explanatory footnotes would have 

 been introduced into the above volume, w'.iich would have 

 rendered this communication unnecessary. 



On p. 193 of the translation we find the following statement : — 

 "Other groups are the Sphenophylleae, Lepidodendrese, and 

 Sigillariea;, the first of which are only heterosporous Lyco- 

 podiacea;." We have no reasons for concluding that Spheno- 

 phyllum is Lycopodiaceous, still less that it is heterosporous. 

 This latter statement rests upon M. Renault's interpretation of a 

 minute multicellular fragment which he observed in a spor- 

 angium, and which he believed to be a macrospore ; it could 

 not be this, since the exosporium of a macrospore is a ««;'- 

 (•(■//k/o/- organism. On the other hand, the I.epidodendra were 

 both homosporous and heterosporous. As to the Sigillarije, even 

 M. Renault now admits that all the vertically-fluted forms are 

 Lycopodiaceous. The assertion th.at the Lepidodendra were all 

 heterosporous is repeated on p. 196. On p. 272 we have a brief 

 paragraph of eight lines remarkable for the number of the in- 

 accurate statements which it contains. I have indicated these 

 inaccuracies by reprolucing them in italics. 



"The Calamites are Equisetacese whi;h appear in the older 

 geological formations, l>ejhtning in the Cayhni/ercna Lime- 

 stone (I), culminating in the Coal-measures, and disappearing 

 in the Permian formation. The spikes of sporangia are either 

 not known, or so badly preserved {Calamostacliys) (2), tkat their 

 structure cannot be determined ; it remains doubtful, threfore, 

 ■.i'hether they were homosp rous or heterjsporous forms (3). 

 The stems had neither leaves nor leaf-sheaths, or else these were 

 transi'ory formatius and soon fell off {i^. In other respects 

 the structure of the stems resembles that of the Equisetaeece (5). 



