354 



NATURE 



[June 



19 i 3 



amount for a laboratory test being 200 lb. of mineral, 

 and for a working test not less than 5 tons. It is 

 true that something of the same kind has been done 

 previously in Australasia, but never upon the same 

 liberal scale, and the intelligent enterprise of the 

 Canadian Government in thus facilitating the develop- 

 ment of mining- and metallurgical industries in the 

 Dominion cannot be too highlv appreciated. It is 

 sincerely to be hoped that the example may be fol- 

 lowed elsewhere. 



The summer meeting of the Institution of Naval 

 Architects is to be held in Glasgow on June 23-27. 

 The premises of the Institution of Engineers and 

 Shipbuilders in Scotland have been placed at the dis- 

 posal of the visitors to Glasgow. Among the papers 

 included in the programme of proceedings may be 

 mentioned : — Dr. S. J. P. Thearle, note on some cases 

 of fatigue in the steel material of steamers ; Messrs. 

 G. S. Baker and J. L. Kent, effect of form and size 

 on the resistance of ships: Prof. A. H. Gibson and 

 J. Hannay Thompson, experiments on "suction" or 

 interaction between passing vessels; Mr. A. Cannon, 

 experimental determination of the effect of internal 

 loose water upon the rolling of a ship amongst a 

 regular series of waves ; Mr. Lloyd \V oollard, effect 

 of water chambers on the rolling of ships ; Prof. L. 

 Giimbel, on the criterion for the occurrence of cavita- 

 tion. The programme also includes a variety of 

 functions, visits to works, and excursions, in addition 

 to the more serious business of the meeting. 



Mr. A. Radclyffe Digmore, the pioneer photo- 

 grapher of big game in their native haunts, and the 

 author of "Camera Adventures in the African Wilds" 

 and other works on kindred subjects, delivered, at the 

 yEolian Hall on May 30, the first of two lectures 

 entitled "Stalking Big Game with a Camera." This 

 lecture dealt solely with his experiences in British 

 East Africa, where he succeeded in getting some 

 splendid flashlight photographs of lions creeping up 

 to a " kill " at night, and of hartebeests drinking at 

 a water-hole. He was very fortunate also in secur- 

 ing pictures of rhinoceroses, giraffes, zebras, 

 gazelles, and buffaloes in the open, two of 

 them, showing a large black rhinoceros in the 

 act of charging- the photographer, being par- 

 ticularly impressive. So close was the beast at 

 the final click of the shutter that he had to be turned 

 with a rifle bullet; but to Mr. Dugmore's credit be it 

 said that he claims never to have used firearms unless 

 his own life was in danger or unless meat was re- 

 quired for feeding the members of the expedition. 

 Many of the photographs show beautiful spots in the 

 scenery of East Africa, one with a group of Grant's 

 gazelles in the foreground and the snow-clad summit 

 of Kilimanjaro breaking through the clouds in the 

 distance being especially charming. Mr. Dugmore is 

 a clever and practised lecturer, and those who are 

 interested in living animals could not spend a 

 pleasanter hour and a half than by visiting the ^Eolian 

 Hall this evening, June 5, when the second of the 

 two lectures will be given. 



Mr. R. E. Dennett, Deputy Conservator of 

 Forests, Nigeria, a well-known authority on the 

 negroes of West Africa, has reprinted from the 

 NO. 2275, VOL. 91] 



Journal of the African Society a paper entitled "A 

 Common Basis of Religion." In our existing know- 

 ledge of Bantu culture, derived from writers like 

 Miss Mary Kingsley and Sir A. Ellis, it is startling 

 to find the negro credited with a system of philosophv, 

 including no fewer than 201 parts, each representing 

 an Orisha, or departed spirit. It is said to be based 

 on on elaborate scheme of symbolism, and the order 

 of these symbols represents " to the psychologist what 

 the periodic classification is to the chemist, or per- 

 haps another form of Newland's law of octaves." The 

 exposition, as it stands, is most ingenious, and the 

 writer concludes by stating that by "superimposing 

 the kinetic parts upon the potential in the moral 

 and intellectual categories we note that the soul 

 becomes the home of faith, the mind of idealism, the 

 body of the senses, the will of life." At the same 

 time, it must be remembered that the interpretation 

 largely rests on the verbal analysis of native terms, 

 and it may possibly be held that while our knowledge 

 of Bantu philology scarcely warrants the conclusions, 

 Mr. Dennett may have read between the lines of his 

 authorities more than they may be reasonably 

 admitted to bear. 



A recent number of the Annals of Tropical Medi- 

 cine and Parasitology (vol. vii., No. 1) contains a 

 detailed study, by Major Christophers, I. M.S., upon 

 the colour-markings and other variable characters of 

 Anophelinae, with special reference to the systematic 

 and phylogenetic grouping of the species. The pub- 

 lication of this memoir in a medical journal may 

 cause it to be overlooked by naturalists, to whom it 

 should be of special interest. The author concludes 

 that colour-markings can be utilised, equallv with 

 structural characters, in a natural classification of 

 the anophelines and for placing species in groups to 

 which they have affinities. A classification based on 

 colour-marking approximates very closely to one 

 based on scale-structure, but show-s the affinities and 

 relation between the groups much more clearlv. The 

 tendency of the phylogenetic evolution of the group 

 is towards elaboration of ornament and development 

 of scales ; the more scaly an anopheline, the more 

 advanced phylogenetically it would appear to be. 

 Three main subdivisions are recognised; the Proto- 

 anopheles, occuring both in the Old and New Worlds ; 

 the Deuteranopheles, chiefly African, South Asian, 

 and Malayan ; and the Neoanopheles, a peculiar Aus- 

 tralasian type. 



The report of the Philadelphia Zoological Society 

 for 1912-13 records a large increase in receipts over 

 the previous year, this increase being distributed over 

 every month of the year. 



The Naturwissenschaftliche Wochenschrift of May 



11 (No. 19, Bd. xii.) contains an excellent summary, 

 with bibliography, by Dr. Oberstein, of the fungoid 

 diseases of animals and the bacterial diseases of plants. 



We have to acknowledge the receipt of a copv of 

 the third part of vol. i. of the Saraivak Museum 

 Journal, the contents of which include an article by 

 Mr. C. Aurivillius on Bornean longicorn beetles, and 

 a second, by Air. C. J. Gahan, on those remarkable 

 Indo-Malay coleopterous larvae commonly termed 



