58 



NATURE 



[September 12, 1912 



Italy, which has been recently presented. It is the 

 work of Mr. De Cou, who was killed by Arabs while 

 conducting excavations at Cyrene in north Africa in 

 March, 191 1. Mr. Tarbell, professor of classical 

 nrchEeology at Chicago, has now edited the work of 

 his friend, with some additions. Nearlv the whole 

 collection comes from a villa at the foot of Mount 

 Vesuvius which shared the fate of Pompeii in the 

 eruption of 79 a.d. It contains some curious frescoes 

 and a number of bronze articles, of which the most 

 remarkable is a fine bronze table, the legs shaped in 

 the form of a lion's feet. This was found in a room 

 with the skeletons of two men and a woman, who had 

 apparently perished in the attempt to remove to safety 

 the more valuable property of the house. Two bronze 

 bathing-tubs, which have counterparts in the Naples 

 Museum from Pompeii, are interesting on account of 

 their comparative rarity. 



The movement in favour of the protection and con- 

 servation of scenery, antiquities, and the native flora 

 and fauna has made considerable progress in 

 Germany and Switzerland, as well as in other parts 

 of the Continent, during the last few years. A recent 

 number of the NaturwissenschaftUche Wochenschrift 

 (No. 27, 1912) is occupied by a series of four articles 

 dealing with the scenic, geological, botanical, and 

 zoological aspects of the question, and contributed by 

 Profs. W. Bock, F. Wahnschaffe, P. Graebner, and 

 M. Braess respectively. In each case the writer 

 describes, with numerous concrete examples, the 

 melancholy results of various acts of vandalism and 

 destruction — the spoiling of otherwise beautiful 

 scenery by huge advertisement hoardings, the erec- 

 tion of painfully conspicuous buildings on hillsides 

 and on the shores of lakes, the conversion of fine 

 lakes into unsightly marshes owing to the construc- 

 tion of waterworks in the neighbourhood, the build- 

 ing over of interesting or even unique geological out- 

 crops, the rooting-up of rare plants, the threatened 

 extinction of rare animals, &c. Righteous indigna- 

 tion is expressed at the wanton or careless mischief 

 done by those responsible for such acts ; but it is 

 gratifying to note that vigorous steps are being taken 

 by the State and by private organisations to protect 

 beautiful and interesting natural objects, animate and 

 inanimate, from continued vandalism, and to undo 

 wherever possible the harm already done. 



An article in The Scientific American of August 10 

 discusses the proposal of Prof. Etchegoyen to flood 

 a portion of the Sahara with sea-water b)' means of 

 a channel from the Mediterranean and thereby to 

 create an inland sea, which, as he claims, would 

 favourably affect the climate, make for conditions of 

 fertility, and for possibilities of colonisation, and pro- 

 vide a channel of communication. Quite apart from 

 the possibility or desirability of the scheme itself, a 

 considerable number of crimes seem to have been 

 committed in the name of physical geography by 

 opponents of the scheme, who have foreseen that the 

 new subtropical area thus created would so far affect 

 the climate of more northern lands as to bring the 

 arctic belt southward to Denmark, and thev even 

 seriously discuss the probability of the upsetting of 



NO. 2237, VOL. go] 



the earth's equilibrium by the displacement of so 

 great a bod\- of sea-water. The writer of the article 

 is at pains to calm these fears, shows that the total 

 area of the Sahara capable of flooding from the sea 

 is no large proportion of the whole, and appears to 

 welcome the idea as much for its own romantic sake 

 as for any benefits which it might confer. He is not 

 concerned to remark upon the ultimate condition of 

 a practically stagnant pond of sea-water, with only a 

 long narrow channel connecting it with the general 

 marine circulation. 



The second volume of Dr. G. Linck's " Fortschritte 

 der Mineralogie, Kristallographie und Petrographie " 

 is now issued (Jena : G. Fischer, 1912. Price 10.50 

 marks). This annual of the German Mineralogical 

 Society contains original memoirs, and also useful 

 reviews of current work, in which a number of papers 

 are brought together and compared. J. H. L. Vogt 

 (p. 24) summarises his views on the production of ore- 

 deposits by magmatic differentiation ; A. Ritzel (p. 62) 

 treats of plasticity in crystals ; and both these papers 

 have considerable geological interest. H. Stremme 

 (p. 87) discusses what is known as to the chemistry of 

 kaolin, and papers follow on petrographv and on 

 meteorites. The aim of the publication, like that of 

 the Geologische Rundschau, is to correlate recent 

 work in the interests of those engaged in teaching and 

 research. The individuality imparted by the authors 

 to their reviews makes an annual of this type far more 

 interesting than a collection of ordinary abstracts. 



Diseases of the respiratory and digestive organs 

 among apes and monkeys in confinement are discussed 

 by Mr. W. R. Blair in vol. i.. No. 9, of Zoologica. 

 .\mong other items in the report, it may be noted that 

 orang-utans and chimpanzees in the New York 

 Gardens were infected in 1901 by an outbreak of 

 ulcerating dysentery due to the presence of Balantidium 

 coli. The source of the infection was traced to Galapagos 

 giant tortoises in an adjacent enclosure, the colons of 

 which swarmed with the parasite, although the health 

 of the reptiles was unaffected. 



Dr. Annandale has sent us a copy of the report of 

 a lecture on recent advances in our knowledge of the 

 fresh-water fauna of India, published in vol. viii. of the 

 Journal and Proceedings of the Asiatic .Society of 

 Bengal. During the last five years Dr. Annandale has 

 devoted great attention to this fauna, with special 

 regard to the biological relations between different 

 groups of fresh-water organisms, seasonal changes in 

 the life-cycles of the lower invertebrates, and the effect 

 of environment on sponges and other plastic groups. 

 The geographical distribution of the fresh-water fauna 

 as a whole is reserved for future investigation. 



Self-fertilis.wion in the fresh-water snail Limnaea 

 columella forms the subject of an article by Mr. H. S. 

 Colton in the May issue of the Proceedings of the 

 Philadelphia Academy. As the result of investigation, 

 it appears that the eggs, when isolated, are self- 

 fertilised, and that the generation-period lasts only two 

 or three months. When more than one species of 

 pond-snail inhabit the same area, hybridisation may 

 occur. L. columella seems to present some of the 

 factors necessary for the investigation of a "pure- 



