June ?4, 1880] 



NA TURE 



i«i 



to fresh water. In still weaker mixtures (i in 8, or i in 10) 

 spontaneity persists for a long time ; but the animal 

 gradually becomes less and less energetic, till at last it 

 will only move in a bout of feeble pulsations when irri- 

 tated. In still weaker solutions (i in 12 or i in 15) 

 spontaneity continues for hours, and in solutions of from 

 I in 15 to I in 18 the Medusa will swim about for days. 



It will be seen from this account that the freshwater 

 Medusa is even more intolerant of sea water than are the 

 marine species of fresh water. Moreover the freshwater 

 Medusa is beyond all comparison more intolerant of sea 

 water than are the marine species of brine. For I have 

 previously found that the marine species will survive 

 many hours' immersion in a saturated solution of salt. 

 While in such a solution they are motionless, with manu- 

 brium and tentacles relaxed, so resembling the freshwater 

 Medusa shortly after being immersed in a mixture of 

 I part sea water to 5 of fresh ; but there is the great 

 difference that while this small amount of salt is very 

 quickly fatal to the fresh-water species, the large addi- 

 tion of salt exerts no permanently deleterious influence on 

 the marine species. 



We have thus altogether a curious set of cross relations. 

 It would appear that a much less profound physiological 

 change would be required to transmute a sea-water jelly- 

 fish into a jelly-fish adapted to inhabit brine, than would 

 be required to enable it to inhabit fresh water. Yet the 

 latter is the direction in which the modification has taken 

 place, and taken place so completely that sea water is 

 now more poisonous to the modified species than is fresh 

 water to the unmodified. There can be no doubt that 

 the modification was gradual — probably brought about by 

 the ancestors of the freshwater Medusa penetrating 

 higher and higher through the brackish waters of estuaries 

 into the fresh water of riv-ers — and it would, I think, be 

 hard to point to a more remarkable case of profound 

 physiological modification in adaptation to changed con- 

 ditions of life. If an animal so exceedingly intolerant of 

 fresh water as is a marine jelly-fish may yet have all its 

 tissues changed so as to adapt them to] thrive in fresh 

 water, and even die after an exposure of one minute to 

 their ancestral element, assuredly we can see no reason 

 why any animal in earth or sea or anywhere else may not 

 in time become fitted to change its element. 



George J. Romanes 



NOTES 

 The Fiftieth Annual Meeting of the British Association will 

 commence on Wednesday, August 25, 18S0, at Swansea. The 

 President Elect is Andrew Ciombie Ramsay, LL.D., F.R.S., 

 Director-General of the Geological Survey of the United 

 Kingdom and of the Museum of Practical Geology. The Vice- 

 presidents Elect are : The Right Hon. the Earl of Jersey, the 

 Mayor of Swansea, the Hon. Sir W. R. Grove, D.C.L., F.R.S., 

 H. Hussey Vivian, M.P., F.G.S., L. LI. Dillwyn, M.P., F.L.S., 

 J. Gwyn Jeffreys, LL.D., F. R.S. ; and the General Secretaries : 

 Capt. Douglas Gallon, C.B., D.C.L., F.R.S., 12, Chester 

 Street, Grosvenor Place, London, S.W., Philip Lutley Sclater, 

 Ph.D., F.R.S., II, Hanover Square, Loudon, W. ; Assistant- 

 Secretary : J. E. H. Gordon, 22, Albemarle Street, London, 

 W. ; General Treasurer : Prof. A. W. Williamson, Ph.D. , 

 LL.D., F.R.S., University College, London, W.C. ; Local 

 Secretaries: W. Morgan, Ph.D., F.C.S., and James Strick, 

 Swansea ; and Local Treasurer ; R. J. Letcher, Swansea. 

 The Sections are the following : — A. ^Mathematical and Physi- 

 cal Science.— President : Prof. W. Grylls Adams, F.R.S. Vice- 

 Presidents : C W.Merrifield, F.R.S. ; C.W.Siemens, D.C.L., 

 F.R.S. Secretaries: W. E. Ayrton ; J. W. L. Glaisher, 

 F.R.S.; Oliver J. Lodge, D.Sc. ; Donald McAlister, B.Sc. 

 (Recorder). B. — Chemical Science. — President : John Henry 



Gilbert, Ph.D., F.R.S. Vice-Presidents: I. Lowthian Bell, 

 F.R.S. ; William Crookes, F.R.S. ; W. Chandler Roberts, 

 F.R.S. Secretaries : Harold B. Dixon, F.C.S. : Dr. W. R. 

 Eaton-Hodgkinson ; P. Phillips-Bedson, D.Sc, F.C.S. ; J. M. 

 Thomson, F.C.S. (Recorder). C— Geology.— President H. 

 CUfton Sorby, LL.D., F.R.S. Vice-President: Prof. Archi- 

 bald Geikie, LL.D., F.R.S., L. and E., Warington W. Smyth, 

 F.R.S. Secretaries: W. Topley, F.G.S. (Recorder); W. 

 Whitaker, F.G.S. D.— Biology.— President : A. C. L. G. 

 Giinther, ]M.D., F.R.S. Vice-Presidents : F. M. Balfour, 

 F.R.S.; Prof. Newton, F.R.S.; F. W. Rudler, F.G.S. 

 Secretaries : G. W. Bloxam, F.L.S. (Recorder) ; Prof. M'Nab, 

 M.D. (Recorder); John Priestley; Howard Saunders, F.Z.S. 

 E. — Geography. — President: Lieut. -General Sir John Henry 

 Lefroy, C.B., K.C.M.G., F.R.S. Vice-Presidents :— Sir 

 Henry Barldy, G.C.M.G., K.C.B., F.R.S.; Admiral Sir 

 Erasmus Ommanney, C.B., F.R.S. ; Lient. -General Sir H. E. 

 L. ThuiUier, C.S.L, R.A., F.R.S. Secretaries : H. W. Bates, 

 Assist.-Sec. R.G.S., F.L.S. ; C. E. D. Black; E. C. Rye, 

 Librarian R.G.S., F.Z.S. (Recorder). F. — Economic Science 

 and Statistics. — President ; George Woodyatt Hastings, M.P. 

 Vice-Presidents : James Hey wood, F. R. S. ; WilUam New- 

 march, F.R.S.; Henry Richard, M.P. Secretaries: Noel A. 

 Humphreys, F.S.S. ; Constantine Molloy (Recorder). G. — 

 Mechanical Science. — President : James Abernethy, C.E. 

 Vice-Presidents: Prof. Osborne Reynolds, F.R.S.; Prof. 

 James Stuart. Secretaries : A. T. Atchison (Recorder) ; H. 

 Trueman Wood. The first general meeting will be held on 

 Wednesday, August 25, at 8 p.m, precisely, when Prof. G. J- 

 AUman, M.D., LL.D., F.R.S., L. & E., Pres. L.S., will 

 resign the chair, and A. C. Ramsay, LL.D., F.R.S., V.P.G.S., 

 Director- General of the Geological Survey of the United King- 

 dom, and of the Museum of Practical Geology, President-Elect, 

 will assume the presidency and deliver an address. On Thurs- 

 day evening, August 26, at 8 p.m., a soiree ; on Friday evening, 

 August 27, at 8.30 p.m., a discourse by Prof. W. Boyd Dawkins, 

 F.R.S., on "Primjeval Man" ; on Monday evening, Augnst 30, 

 at 8.30 p.m., a discourse by Francis Galton, M.A., F.R.S., on 

 " Mental Imagery" ; on Tuesday evening, August 31, at 8 p.m., 

 aso;}a; on Wednesday, September i, the concluding general 

 meeting will be held at 2.30 p.m. On Saturday evening, 

 August 28, Henry Seebohm, F.Z.S., will deliver a lecture to 

 the operative classes on "The North-East Passage"; tickets 

 can be purchased of the local secretaries. A room will be pro- 

 vided for tlie reception of apparatus and specimens illustrative 

 of papers communicated to the sections. Excursions to places 

 of interest in the neighbourhood of Swansea will be made on 

 Thursday, September 2, and short excm-sions on the afternoon 

 of Saturday, August 28. 



We regret to announce the death of M. J. M. Gaugain, the 

 eminent French electrician, at the age of seventy years. We shall 

 give some account of his Ufe and work next week. 



The Committee for the erection of a statue to Gauss have just 

 issued a note, from which we learn that on the 27th instant 

 (11.30 A.M.) the statue— modelled, as we have previously an- 

 nounced, by Prof. Schafer of Berlin, and cast by Prof. Howaldt 

 —is to be unveiled. The Committee will be happy to have the 

 names of any English mathematicians or gentlemen who may be 

 willing, or who intend, to take part in the festivities which are 

 to accompany the ceremony of unveiling. Applications shoidd 

 be addressed at once to the Landsyndicus Otto, Gauss Monument 

 Committee, Braunschweig (Brunswick). 



A cORREsroNDENT, J. H. S., scuds us the following notice 

 of Dr. E. L. Moss, who has shared the fate of the Alalanla :— 

 "It seems to have escaped the notice of the scientific world the 

 loss it has sustained in the ill-fated Atalaitta. Dr. Edward L. 



