January 30, 19 13] 



NATURE 



59; 



lagus cuniculus would puzzle not a few zoologists. 

 The second treatise is the catalogue of passeri- 

 form bird's eggs, by Mr. Ogilvie-Grant, so well 

 known in the department, and it is the fifth volume 

 of the series. Both in text and plates — of which 

 there are twenty-two, all coloured — it is worthy 

 of the reputation of the author. The value of such 

 a work to all ornithologists is sufficiently obvious, 

 and the trustees have to be congratulated on this 

 addition to the series. The third catalogue, that 

 of the Arenicolidas, by Dr. J. H. Ashworth, is 

 reall}' a monograph of the family, containing as 

 it does the results of years of labour by the author 

 on the structure of the group, and admirably illus- 

 trated by text-figures and fifteen plates. By his 

 devoted and varied researches on this family and 

 its allies, the author is rightly regarded as one 

 of the chief authorities on the subject, and this 

 task for the trustees of the British Museum still 

 further emphasises that view. 



From the narrative of Dr. Giinther, and the three 

 works which form the latest additions to the long 

 roll of important publications, it is clear that 

 the great national zoological collection is one of 

 which the country may justly be proud ; and a 

 tribute may well, in addition, be paid to the staff, 

 whose courteous aid is ever at the disposal of 

 -zoologists of every nation. W. C. M. 



PAUL GORDAN. 



THE death of Paul Gordan, which occurred 

 on December 21, has removed a mathe- 

 matician of pre-eminent rank in his own particular 

 field. When the calculus of invariants and co- 

 variants was started it was taken up with great 

 vigour in Germany, and very important develop- 

 ments were effected by Aronhold, Clebsch, and 

 Gordan respectively. Aronhold invented the 

 symbolical method, Clebsch gave brilliant applica- 

 tions of it to geometry, and Gordan, besides 

 collaborating with Clebsch, wrote numerous 

 papers on the purely algebraic part of the theory. 



Gordan's best-known, and perhaps greatest, 

 achievement is his proof of the existence of a com- 

 plete system of concomitants for any given binary 

 form. In its original shape the proof was very 

 laborious and difficult to grasp ; even in the 

 simpler form to which he and others reduced it, it 

 is still very hard, and is not, perhaps, the proper 

 and natural demonstration. However that may 

 be, to have given the first strict proof of the 

 theorem is an algebraic feat of the highest order. 

 Gordan also worked out in detail the theory of 

 transvection and "folding," ultimately arriving at 

 formulse which provide a sort of engine for 

 establishing the syzygies connected with any 

 particular binary form. 



.\mong Gordan's other work mav be mentioned 

 his papers on finite groups, and in particular on 

 the simple group of order 16S, and its associated 

 curve y%-|-s^.i; + .\^y = 0. His book on binary 

 forms is very valuable, and easier to read than 

 most of his papers. The joint papers of Gordan 

 and Clebsch are admirable : for instance, the 

 NO. 2257, VOL. 90] 



memoir on ternary cubics in Math. Ann., vi., should 

 be read by everyone who has mastered the easier 

 parts of invariant-theory. 



Gordan was born at Breslau in 1837, ultimately 

 became professor at Erlangen, and was a corre- 

 sponding member of the Paris Academy of 

 ."sciences. M. 



NOTES. 

 The President of the Board of .A.griculture and 

 Fisheries has just appointed a departmental com- 

 mittee to advise the Board as to the steps which could 

 be taken with advantage for the preservation and 

 development of the inshore fisheries. The committee 

 consists of Sir E. S. Howard, chairman of the Wye 

 Board of Conservators ; Sir K. S. .\nderson, chair- 

 man of the Orient Steam Navigation Company; Sir 

 S. Fay, manager of the Great Central Railway Com- 

 pany; Sir Norval Helme, M.P., a manufacturer; 

 the Hon. T. H. W. Pelham, of the Harbours Depart- 

 ment of the Board of Trade ; Mr. Norman Craig, 

 M.P. ; Mr. W. Brace, a Labour M.P. ; Mr. J. W. 

 Beaumont Pease, vice-chairman of Lloyds Bank ; Mr. 

 C. Hellyer, a trawl-vessel owner ; Mr. S. Bostock; and 

 Mr. Cecil Harmsworth, M.P. Commerce and finance 

 on the great scale are thus well represented, and no 

 doubt the committee will be able to supplement the 

 knowledge of the inshore fisheries which it may not 

 possess by accepting evidence from those who do 

 possess it. The interests of the inshore fishermen 

 are opposed to those of the steam-trawling industry 

 on one hand, and of the salmon fisheries on the 

 other, and this is, no doubt, the reason why the 

 only two fishery members of the committee are a 

 prominent owner of steam fishing vessels and the 

 chairman of a very important board of salmon 

 fisheries. Those who know the high!)' technical occu- 

 pations of the inshore fishermen will also know that 

 the whole question of the decadence of these industries 

 must by and by involve a scientific knowledge of the 

 natural conditions under which inshore fishing is car- 

 ried on. Yet the committee does not contain a scien- 

 tific man, and it is unlikely that its members can 

 acquire second-hand, from expert evidence, that know- 

 ledge of the "inwardness" of technical marine biology 

 which can alone render their advice to the Board of 

 permanent value. 



Sir William Tilden, F.R.S., has been elected a 

 corresponding member of the Imperial .Academy of 

 Sciences, St. Petersburg. 



The death is announced, at seventy years of age, 

 of Prof. R. Collett, professor of zoology in the Uni- 

 versity of Christiania. 



The subject selected by Dr. .'\. J. Jex-Blake for his 

 Goulstonian lectures, to be delivered before the Royal 

 College of Physicians on February 25 and 27 and 

 March 4, is "Death by Lightning and Electric Cur- 

 rents." 



The Mexican Minister has desired the Secretary of 

 State for Foreign .'\ffairs to announce in this country 

 that the Astronomical Society of Mexico has decided, 

 beginning from 1913, to offer a medal and diploma 



