April 24, 19 13] 



NATURE 



'93 



A further valuable gift has just been made to tin- 

 Hull Municipal Museums Committee by Mr. C. 

 Pickering, the donor of the new Museum of Fisheries 

 and Shipping at the Pickering Park. It was recently 

 represented to him that the new museum was already 

 crowded with exhibits, and he has kindly presented 

 a strip of land stretching from the Hessle Road to 

 the Pickering Park, and adjoining the presenl 

 museum, for the purpose of extension. 



On Tuesday next, April 29, Prof. W. Stirling will 

 begin a course of three lectures at the Royal Institu- 

 tion on recent physiological inquiries. Owing to the 

 illness of Prof. Bateson, his course of lectures on 

 the heredity of sex and some cognate problems has 

 been postponed. In addition to the Friday evening 

 arrangements already announced, discourse; will 

 probably be given by Mr. F. Balfour Browne, Capt. 

 C. G. Rawling, Prof. Silvanus P. Thompson, Mr. 

 Owen Seaman, and Dr. Francis Ward. 



Under its curator, Mr. A. G. Thacker, the Public 

 Museum at Gloucester is being actively developed. 

 The fine collection of Roman remains is being extended 

 and rearranged. In the archaeological department the 

 museum has received from Sir VV. T. Thiselton-Dyer 

 a collection of the "river-drift" type of pateoliths. 

 The Cotswold district abounds in Neolithic imple- 

 ments, which are here well represented. But in this 

 latter department, by the gift of the fine collection 

 made bv the late Mr. G. B. Witts, the museum at 

 Cheltenham holds, perhaps, a higher place. Between 

 the two the Neolithic culture of the southern midlands 

 is now admirably represented. 



In the transmission of pathogenic trypanosomes of 

 man and domestic animals by tsetse-flies in Africa 

 there has been some difference of opinion amongst 

 investigators as regards the connection between the 

 infectivity of the fly and the invasion of its salivary 

 glands by the trypanosomes. Kleine was of opinion 

 that the development of Trypanosoma gambiense in 

 Glossina palpalis was limited to the intestine of the 

 flv, while the Royal Society's commissioners in 

 Uganda considered that the invasion of the salivary 

 glands was necessary to render the flv infective. In 

 a memoir published in Annals of Tropica] Medicine 

 and Parasitology (vol. vi., No. 4), Kinghorn, Yorke, 

 and Lloyd publish a number of experiments on the 

 transmission of T. rhodesiense by G. morsitans, which 

 prove in the most convincing manner that the fly 

 only becomes infective when its salivary glands are 

 invaded and is non-infective when the trypanosomes 

 are confined to the intestine only, even if swarming 

 in this part. The trypanosomes found in the salivary 

 gland resemble the stumpy form found in mammalian 

 blood, and differ from the predominant type found in 

 the intestine of the fly. The same result has been 

 obtained by Miss Muriel Robertson in her researches 

 on the development of T. gambiense in G. palpalis 

 (Phil. Trans. (B), vol. cciii.). 



The fresh-water fishes of South Africa form the 



subject of an illustrated report by Messrs. Gilchrist 



and Wardlaw Thompson, published as part 5 of 



vol. xi. of the Annals of the South African Museum. 



NO. 2269, VOL. 91] 



It is based on collections in the South African, Bula- 

 wayo, and Transvaal Museums, a large proportion 

 of which was procured by the aid of grants from the 

 British and the South African Associations for the 

 Advancement of Science. A considerable number of 

 species are described as new. 



According to the report for the past year, the 

 Rugby School Natural History Society continues its 

 activity in all branches, the entomological section 

 being particularly remarkable for its energy, as 

 exemplified by a long list of the species of four orders 

 of insects collected in the neighbourhood. We have 

 also received the seventy-ninth report of the Bootham 

 School Natural History, Literarv, and Polytechnic 

 Society, in which it is recorded that two of the mem- 

 bers obtained prizes at a public-school essay competi- 

 tion arranged by the Royal Societv for the Protection 

 of Birds. 



Mr. G. Fischer, Jena, has sent us a reprint from 

 the " Handworterbuch der Naturwissenschaften," en- 

 titled " Leitfaden der Descendenztheorie," by Prof. L. 

 Plate, of Jena (price 1.60 marks). The author attempts 

 in fifty-five pages, of which nearly half the space is 

 occupied by illustrations, to sketch the outlines of the 

 evidence on which the evolution theory is based. 

 When the difficulties of compressing the subject to 

 this extent are remembered, the result must be re- 

 garded as remarkably successful. All the chief lines 

 of argument are mentioned, with the exception of those 

 derived from the study of heredity and experimental 

 morphology, which are dealt with in a separate sec- 

 tion of the Handworterbuch. The style is simple, and 

 the cases chosen in illustration well suited to the 

 purpose, but it is perhaps unfortunate that scarcely 

 anv examples are taken from the vegetable kingdom. 



In the report of the American Museum of Natural 

 History for 1912 attention is directed to the policy 

 of instituting exploring and collecting expeditions, 

 rather than depending on purchase, as the chief 

 means of increasing; the collections. "While speci- 

 mens for exhibition are the chief aim of the explorer, 

 he brings back a large amount of information regard- 

 ing the country visited, as well as photographs, draw- 

 ings, or paintings, which are absolutely essential both 

 for publication and as accessories to exhibition. . . . 

 In all, thirty-five parties were operating in the field 

 during- the year 1912 ; every continent on the globe 

 except Australia has been visited, and remarkable 

 success has crowned the efforts of the leaders." Illus- 

 tions of several of the new exhibits, including one of 

 a fine pair of African forest-hogs, render the report 

 highly attractive. 



The report of the Dove Marine Laboratory, Culler- 

 coats, for the year ending; June 30, 1912, deals with 

 a considerable number of subject-- bearing more or 

 less directly on practical fishery questions. In most 

 cases these are dealt with very briefly, and it might 

 perhaps be suggested that conclusions of more per- 

 manent value would be reached if fewer subjects were 

 investigated, and those that were attempted were 

 more thoroughly and exhaustively done. The paper 

 bv B. Storrow on Neplnop-- norvegicus i> the most 



