February 13, 1913] 



NATURE 



657 



discussed in some detail, witli examples drawn from 

 the rapidly growing literature of phytogeograpliv. 

 Thougli it is doubtful whether ecologists will accept 

 this scheme in all its details, it will be welcomed as 

 an important contribution to plant ecology from a 

 broad philosophic point of view'. 



The Meteorological Chart of the North Atlantic and 

 Mediterranean for February (first issue), published by 

 the Meteorological Office, exhibits a cyclonic storm of 

 exceptional intensity over the central portions of the 

 Atlantic in the weekly period commencing with 

 January 9 ; the storm region occupied practically the 

 whole breadth of the ocean, while anticyclones lay 

 over the United States and northern Europe. At 

 7h. a.m. on January 10 the ss. Celtic, in lat. 49° N., 

 long. 29° W., reported a reading of the barometer 

 so low as 2744 in., one of the lowest ever recorded 

 over the North Atlantic ; on February 5, 1870, the 

 R.M.S. Tariia, in lat 51° 3' N., long. 23° 39' W., 

 reported a reading of 27-33 '"• I' ^^''" probably 

 be remembered that at False Point, Orissa (India), 

 the low reading of 2712 in. was recorded in the 

 cyclone of September 22, 1885 ; but such extreme 

 values are very rare. 



Dr. Rudolf Spitalen, in " Die Eiszeiten und 

 Polschwankungen der Erde " (Sitsungsb. d. k. Akad. 

 d. Wiss. i)i Wien, November, 1912), discusses two 

 distinct problems. He gives a negative answer to the 

 question whether the heaping up of ice over the 

 northern continents in the glacial periods would have 

 been accompanied necessarily by large displacements 

 of the axis of rotation in the earth, and he forms 

 his conclusions after a very considerable amount of 

 careful computation based on very reasonable assump- 

 tions. He develops Schiaparelli's discussion of the 

 motion of the earth's axis under the influence of 

 geological changes, and confirms the suggestion that 

 the shifting of the pole may cause displacements of 

 the faulty portions of the earth's crust in a way that 

 would lead to wide wanderings of the pole. The con- 

 clusion that the Ice age is to be associated with a 

 considerable shifting of the earth's axis of rotation 

 is necessarily a speculative one, but Dr. Spitalen 

 brings in numerous facts (or perhaps rather theories) 

 from the writings of geologists and geodesists to 

 support his views. It is scarcely possibfe in the 

 nature of things to prove his case, but he gives a 

 good account of it, which will bear careful study. 



Not the least interesting of the many engineering 

 problems presented by the Panama Canal is that 

 of the stability of the sides of the deep cuts. This 

 question is discussed by Dr. Vaughan Cornish in The 

 Edinburgh Review for January — "The Panama Canal 

 and the Philosophy of Landslides." The earlier land- 

 slides, e.g. the big one at Cucuracha, were caused by 

 the top residual clay sliding into the cut upon a lubri- 

 cated sole ; this was dealt with by the removal of 

 practically the whole deposit where slipping appeared 

 probable. Later, in 1910, and again in 1912, when 

 the deepening of the cut was particularly rapid, the 

 movements took the shape of a sudden uplift of the 

 floor, together with bulging of the lower part of the 

 bank. This movement of the earth — incorrectly de- 

 NO. 2259, VOL. 90] 



scribed as a landslide by Dr. Cornish — is called a 

 " break " by the canal engineers ; it is similar in 

 cause and elTect to the well-known "creep" of miners. 

 The sudden removal of support produced by the rapid 

 deepening of the cut caused certain weak beds of 

 argillaceous sandstone, and in other cases beds of 

 lignite, to fail beneath the vertical pressure on the 

 sides. The weakness of the rocks was no doubt in- 

 creased by the access of rain water. The difficultv is 

 serious, as may be seen by the fact that on account 

 of the " breaks " alone more than i6i million cubic 

 yards of material beyond that in the original estimates 

 have had to be removed. The trouble is being over- 

 come by increasing the batter of the sides and by 

 introducing broad " berms " or benches in them. 



The Verhandlungen of the German Physical 

 Society for December 30 last include an abstract of 

 a memoir on the expansion with rise of temperature 

 of quartz, various steels, including nickel steels, and 

 a number of bronzes and brasses, by Dr. W. Bein. 

 The complete paper appears in vol. viii. of the 

 Abhandlungen of the German Committee of 

 Standards. The method is that of Fizeau, with the 

 improvements introduced by Abb^ and by the author. 

 The material tested is in the form of a cylinder one 

 centimetre high, and is placed between horizontal 

 glass plates, kept apart by a quartz ring, as in 

 Reimerde's experiments. The e.xpansion of the quartz 

 is investigated by the interference bands formed by- 

 light reflected at the bottom surface of the top, and 

 the top surface of the bottom glass plate. Three 

 lines of the mercury spectrum were used. The fol- 

 lowing values of the coefficients of t and /- respec- 

 tively were found to hold between 0° and 100° C. : — 

 Quartz, 7-15 xio-' and oooSi x 10-', steels, 10 to 

 11-5 X 10-" and 00045 to 0-0075x10-'; nickel steels, 

 0-59 to 1-48 X 10- ' and 0-0018 to 00045 x 10-'^; bronzes 

 and brasses, 16-S to 19- 1 x 10- ' and 0-0036 to 

 0-0052 X 10-*. The results for quartz agree with those 

 of Benoit and Scheel. ."Ml the metal specimens showed 

 signs of internal stress when first tested. 



The Transactions of the Concrete Institute (vol. iv., 

 part iii.) contain an interesting lecture on fireproof- 

 ing, delivered bj' Mr. R. L. Humphrey, who is the 

 president of the National .Association of Cement Users, 

 Philadelphia, Pa. The conditions in ."America regard- 

 ing this subject are notoriously bad, and give the 

 unenviable distinction of having the greatest fire losses 

 in the world, and each succeeding year shows no 

 appreciable decrease. Mr. Humphrey deals, among 

 many other matters, with safety appliances and facilities 

 for the escape of the occupants of a building in the case 

 of fire. Much greater regard is had for life in Britain 

 and on the Continent than in .America. Steep iron 

 ladders passing unprotected plain glass windows are 

 common. The .Asch building fire provides an example 

 of such a structure, and the consequent loss of life. 

 It is a significant fact that, standing on the pavement 

 of the ill-fated .Asch building, one can see within a 

 stone's throw many more buildings that are infinitely 

 worse as regards construction and provisions for 

 safety. Public opinion and continual ridicule of such 

 ill-conceived contrivances is having its effect in that 



