October 24, 1912] 



NATURE 



latter dealt with mysteries, and membership was 

 generally attained by virtue of a dream vision. The 

 Omaha were a thoughtful and practical people. The 

 idea of personality is dominant in the language and 

 in the religious beliefs and practices. The force 

 within this personality was recognised as that of the 

 will, and "the Sacred Legend, which preserved the 

 experiences of the years, emphasised the vital fact 

 that better conditions are always attained by the 

 exercise of thought, not by magical interferences." 

 Enough has been said to show that Miss Fletcher has 

 given us a monograph that deserves the careful study 

 of all ethnologists, and will still further increase 

 their indebtedness to "the Bureau of American 

 Ethnology. A. C. Haddon. 



THE RGYAI. MICROSCOPICAL SOCIETY. 



OX Wednesday, October i6, a conversazione was 

 held in the Great Hall of King's College, about 

 four hundred fellows and guests being received by 

 the president, Mr. H. G. Plimmer, F.R.S., and Mrs. 

 Plimmer. The object in view was, so far as prac- 

 ticable, to gather together a series of exhibits which 

 would indicate the many uses, both in science and 

 commerce, to which the microscope is put at the 

 present time. In addition, the conversazione afforded 

 a.T opportunity for those engaged in microscopic work 

 to show objects of interest or to demonstrate the use 

 of apparatus or appliances for special purposes. 



The centre of the hall was occupied with pond life 

 exhibits, about forty microscopes having been arranged 

 on the tables under the direction of D. J. Scourfield, 

 and these were a centre of interest to a considerable 

 number of observers throughout the evening. Other 

 interesting exhibits were some very beautiful botanical 

 slides showing mitosis, by H. F. .Angus and E. J. 

 Sheppard ; a Siedentopf ultra-microscope and cardioid 

 condenser system for the observation of ultra-micro- 

 scopic particles, by J. E. B^irnard; an .Abbe diffrac- 

 tion microscope illuminated by means of a quartz 

 mercury-vapour lamp, by J. E. Barnard and Powell 

 Swift; an instantaneous reflex photomicrographic 

 camera, by F. W. Watson Baker; some preparations 

 exhibiting Brownian movement, by G. P. Bate ; a 

 complete optical bench and an apparatus for polishing 

 metal surfaces, by Conrad Beck ; an e.xtensive series 

 of saccharoniycetes, by .\. Chaston Chapman ; a very 

 interesting old microscope and accessory apparatus, by 

 Prof. k. Dendy, F.R.S. ; some diffraction experiments, 

 by J. W. Gordon; a series of foraminifera, by E. 

 Htron-.Allen and A. Earland ; microchemical reactions 

 of a very striking character, by Prof. Herbert Jackson ; 

 an extremely beautiful series of photomicrographs in 

 colour, by J. W. Ogilvy, and another series of stereo- 

 photomicrographs of water mites, also in colour, by 

 H. Taverner. The possibility of applying his micro- 

 spectra camera to the production of photomicrographs 

 in colour was demonstrated by J. Rheinberg, and this 

 exhibit attracted a great deal of attention. 



Prof. Minchin, F.R.S., exhibited a series of trypano- 

 somes which were of great interest. In the adjoining 

 theatre, three lectures were delivered during the even- 

 ing, Dr. E. J. Spitta giving a kinematographic ex- 

 hibition of pond life, Prof. Hewlett lecturing on in- 

 sects as carriers of disease, and Mr. Max Poser show- 

 ing a beautjful series of liquid crystals by means of 

 a projection micropolariscope, each of the lectures 

 attracting a large audience. .Apart from the social 

 advantages of such a gathering, the exhibits were in 

 all cases of real scientific interest, and demonstrated 

 that the Royal Microscopical .Society may look forward 

 to doing an even greater work in the future than it 

 lias done in the past in bringing before scientific 

 NO. 2243, VOL. 90] 



workers the possibilities of the use ot the microscope. 

 That the instrument is now a necessity in nearly all 

 branches of science is, of course, well known, but it 

 is often used merely as a tool and not as an appliance 

 which demands considerable skill in its use for the 

 best results to be obtained. If the council of the 

 society should decide that this conversazione is to be 

 but the first of a series of annual gatherings to be 

 held with a similar object, then the success which has 

 attended this function may be regarded as an indica- 

 tion that its usefulness in the future may be consider- 

 ably increased. 



THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION AT DUNDEE. 



SECTION M. 



agriculture. 



From the Opening Address by T. H. Middleton, 



M..A., President of the Section. 

 Interest in the practice of improved husbandry was 

 first aroused in England by the books of Fitzherbert. 

 The extent to which this author stimulated agriculture 

 may be inferred from the appreciation with which his 

 works were received in his own day, and copied bv 

 others for a century. He himself does not appear to 

 have been acquainted with the classical writers. He 

 describes the English practice with which he was 

 familiar ; he quotes frequently from the Scriptures and 

 refers to earlv religious works, but only in writing of 

 animal diseases, when he cites the " Sayinge of the 

 I'Venche man," is there any indication that he was 

 influenced by foreign authors. Fitzherbert's " Boke 

 of Husbandr)' " and " Surueyenge. " while they are 

 free from the direct influence of Roman writers, show 

 us, nevertheless, that the English agriculture of his 

 day owed much to Roman traditions. The careful 

 business methods and accounting of the farm bailiffs 

 of the Middle -Ages, with which Thorold Rogers has 

 acquainted us, weie the methods which Fitzherbert 

 learned and counselled, as they were the methods which 

 Columella taught. 



It was between 1523, when Fitzherbert's " Boke of 

 Husbandry " was first printed, and 1557, when Tusser 

 published his "Points of Good Husbandry," that the 

 classical writers began to exert a direct influence on 

 English farming. In 1532 there appeared Xenophon's 

 "Treatise of Householde," "ryht counnyngly trans- 

 lated out of the Greke tonge into Englyshe by Gentian 

 Hervet," which at once became popular and ran 

 through a number of editions. .At least as early as 1542 

 editions of the works on agriculture and gardening 

 of Cato, Varro, Columella, and Palladius 1 were pub- 

 lished in England, and they must certainly have been 

 known to Tusser, for in his " Five Hundred Points 

 of Good Husbandry," composed some years later, there 

 is clear evidence of the influence of the writings of 

 Xenophon and Columella. From the latter author 

 Tusser adopts the method of a calendar, and he appears 

 now and again to adapt Roman maxims to modern 

 conditions. Thus in his calendar Columella says of 

 March that it " is the proper time to cleanse meadows, 

 and to defend and secure them from cattle ; in warm 

 and dry places indeed that ought to be done even from 

 the month of January," and Tusser in his calendar 

 for March rhymes : — 



" Sp.ire meadow .it Gregorie Marshes at Pask 

 for feare of drle Sommer no longer time ask 

 Then hedge them and ditch them, bestow thereon pence, 

 corne, meadow, and pasture aske alway good fence." 



It might be, of course, that in discussing the same 

 subject, a subject moreover which does not admit of 

 much difference of opinion, the similarity of the above- 



1 A translation of Palladius into English was made about 1420, but it was 

 not discovered and published until within recent times. 



