Feuudauy 20, 1913] 



NATVRE 



683 



for transport purposes. Copies of the report may be 

 obtained from the assistant secretary, British Fire 

 Prevention Committee, 8 Waterloo Place, S.W. 



We have received a copy of an address delivered by 

 Prof. C. Neuberg: before the members of the German 

 Zentralstelle fiir Balneologie, at Schwerin, in Sep- 

 tember last, entitled " Beziehungen des Lebens zum 

 Licht" (Berlin, Allgemeinc Medizinische Verlags- 

 anstalt, pp. 63, price 1.50 marks). This address con- 

 tains a valuable summary of recent worlc on the in- 

 fluence of light on living organisms, both from the 

 chemical and biological aspects ; in this field Prof. 

 Neuberg has himself been an active worker, and some 

 of the views he develops, regarding the influence of 

 sunlight on health and disease, will be read with 

 considerable interest. 



An illustrated article in Engineering for February 

 14 gives an account of the largo Humphrey gas pumps 

 installed at Chingford. There are five sets in all ; 

 the first two were started on January 18 and 19, and 

 the third a week ago; the remaining sets will no 

 doubt be at work before the official opening of the 

 Chingford Reservoir by his Majesty the King on 

 March 15 next. No accurate tests have been made as 

 yet, but it is already sufficiently obvious that the 

 guaranteed output is being very substantially ex- 

 ceeded. So carefully have the designs of the pumps 

 been worked out that the only detail altered, as the 

 result of seeing them at work, has been the substitu- 

 tion on certain valve-spindles of a solid nut instead 

 of the split one originally provided. It has required 

 considerable courage to accept a contract, under very 

 stringent penalties, for pumps of this type, 7 ft. in 

 diameter, and developing each between 200 and 300 

 h.p., on the basis of the experience gained of an 

 experimental pump having an output equivalent to 

 about 35 h.p only. The results so far have entirely 

 justified Mr. Humphrey's confidence in the capabilities 

 I if his remarkable contribution to the progress of 

 mechanical engineering. 



OUR ASTRONOMICAL COLUMN. 



Variation of Latitude : the Kimlra Term. — After 

 applying all known corrections to the results obtained 

 bv the International Latitude Service, there remains 

 a periodic term, known as the Kimura term, for 

 which many explanations have been suggested. Dr. 

 F. E. Ross now suggests that this term is not real, 

 but is due to our lack of knowledge concerning the 

 method of treating the results. He points out that 

 any one of the suggested explanations is efficient, but 

 argues that there is no need for them, for any periodic 

 error in the system of mean declinations adopted 

 would produce a so-called Kimura term. {Astro- 

 iw)}iische Nachrichten, No. 4630.) 



Westphal's Comet. — Having investigated, by 

 Pontecoulant's method, the perturbations of West- 

 phal's comet (i852iv) for the period 1852-1914, Herr 

 M. Viljev publishes a set of elements and a number 

 of search-ephemerides in No. 4621 of the Astro- 

 nomische Nachrichten. As the time of perihelion 

 passage is still uncertain, he gives a number of 



NO. 2260, VOL. go] 



ephemerides, extending to March 12, which cover the 

 period ±240 days on either side of the computed 

 epoch; the period of the comet is 61-5554 years, and 

 it last passed perihelion on October 12, 1852. 



The Op.iciTV of the At.mosfhere in 1912. — An 

 article in No. 63 of the Gazette astronomiqtie directs 

 attention to the general opacity presented by the sky 

 on cloudless nights during the late spring, the 

 summer, and the autumn of 1912. M. de Roy found 

 sixth-magnitude stars invisible to the naked eye, even 

 on moonless nights and at the zenith, while other 

 observers in many parts of the world found a lack 

 of transparency, noticeable in observations of the sun 

 and stars and in the unusual paleness of the blue of 

 the sky. A suggested explanation of the phenomenon 

 is that volcanic eruptions, more especially the one 

 which took place in the Alaskan peninsula and Aleu- 

 tian archipelago in June, polluted the atmosphere with 

 fine dust, and so reduced its transparency. 



.4 ZOOLOGICAL GARDEN FOR 



EDINBURGH. 



'PHE council of the Zoological Society of Scotland, 



*■ in pursuance of its project of raising the neces- 

 sary funds for the purchase and laying out of the estate 

 of "Corstorphine Hill House as a zoological garden 

 and park, as announced in Nature of January 30, 

 has issued a prospectus giving a brief account of the 

 development of the modern zoological garden of the 

 type the society wishes to establish, together with 

 some suggestions regarding the benefits of such an 

 institution to education, science, and art, and a full 

 description of the site selected for the purpose. The 

 prospectus is illustrated with scenes depicting enclo- 

 sures and ranges in the New York Zoological Park 

 and in Carl Hagenbeck's menagerie at Stellingen, 

 which, with modifications, will serve as models for 

 the kind of accommodation it is proposed to adopt 

 for the animals in Edinburgh. Finally, there are 

 many beautiful views of the grotmds of the above- 

 mentioned estate, which not only testify to the wisdom 

 of the council in its choice of a situation, but suggest 

 that, given the necessary funds for the purchase of 

 stock and the upkeep of the collection, Scotland will 

 be able to claim that it has at least the most pictur- 

 esque zoological garden in Europe. 



The scheme for the establishment of the garden was 

 in some danger, at the time of our recent note on 

 the subject, owing to the approaching expiry of the 

 society's option for the purchase of this fine site, and 

 the doubt whether a sufficiently large amount would 

 be subscribed within the brief period remaining. This 

 danger has been averted by the action of the Edin- 

 burgh Town Council, which has agreed to purchase 

 the site, of which the society will have the entire 

 use and control in return for an annual payment of 

 4 per cent, on the price, the society having the right 

 to redeem the site from the corporation within fifteen 

 voars. The society is already assured, by gift and 

 loan, of a large and representative collection of 

 animals, and it is the intention of the council to have 

 a number of them installed and the garden open to the 

 public bv the beginning of July, 1913, though opera- 

 tions involving much disturbance of the groimd will 

 be deferred until the winter months. Funds arc 

 urgently needed, both for the future development of 

 the garden and for the redemption of the site, and 

 donations should be intimated to the honorary 

 treasurer, Mr. T. B. Whitson, C.A., 21 Rutland 

 Street, Edinburgh. 



