July 8, 1880] 



NATURE 



:2g 



ment of our present system of lighting our coasts, which, he 

 maintainerl, is a fruitful source of danger to navigation. A 

 Parliamentary paper has just been issued CDUtaining a corre- 

 spondence between Lloyd's Committee and the Trinity House on 

 these suggestions. Naturally the Elder Brethren of the Trinity 

 House attempt to show that their system is by no means so un- 

 satisfactory as Sir William Thomson maintains it is, though they 

 admit it is by no means perfect. They assured Lloyd's Com- 

 mittee of two things — (i) that the lighthouse system was not in 

 the crude state which Sir William Thomson appeared to imply, 

 and (2) that its present custodians w-ere actuated by a very earnest 

 desire yet further to simplify and improve it. The Committee 

 of Lloyd's remarked, in their reply, dated January 16, 18S0, that 

 they were glad to find that they were at one with the Elder 

 Brethren in thinking that some distinctions more marked than 

 those already existing would be useful. They had no special 

 interest in Sir William Thomson's plan, but they had always 

 understood that his inventions and improvements in electrical 

 apparatus, the mariner's compass, and the sounding machine had 

 been of great service to the community at large. We suspect 

 there is much more in Sir William Thomson's animadversions 

 and suggestions, the result of the practical experience of an 

 eminent man of science, than the Elder Brethren of the Trinity 

 House are willing to admit. 



The engineers of the St. Gothard Tunnel are stated to be in a 

 fair way to overcome the difficulty arising from the falling in of 

 the roof in the part known as the " windy stretch." This stretch, 

 which is 200 metres long, and situated almost directly under the 

 plain of Andermatt, passes through strata composed alternately 

 of gypsum and aluminous and calcareous schists, w hich absorb 

 moisture like a sponge and swell on exposure to the atmosphere. 

 It has given the contractor.s immense trouble, and has fallen in 

 so often that it was seriously proposed a short time ago to allow 

 it to collapse, and make a bend so as to avoid the "windy 

 stretch" altogether. The exjiedient now adopted, which has so 

 far been successful, is the rebuilding of the supporting masonry 

 in rings of solid granite. The rings are each four metres long 

 so that in the event of any one of them giving way the others 

 will not thereby be affected. The building is constructed slowly 

 and with the utmost care ; no imperfect stones are allowed to be 

 used ; the masonry is perfect, and the walls of extraordinary 

 thickness— in the parts most exposed to pressure not less than 

 ten feet. At the beginning of June only 34 metres of the "windy 

 stretch " required to be revaulted. 



M. Tresca, whose name has been connected with the Con- 

 servatoire des Arts et Metiers for about twenty-five years, no 

 longer belongs to that establishment. His office has been sup- 

 pressed by a recent decision of M. Tisard, the Minister of Agri- 

 culture and Commerce. This unexpected resolution has created 

 some sensation in the Paris scientific world. 



We have received the first volume of the Air/itVi'S of the 

 Dattscltc Seewar/e, a neatly -printed quarto volume of above 300 

 pages, w ith numerous plates, containing an account of the first 

 four years' working of the Meteorological Office at Hamburg, 

 1S75-7S, under the able guidance of Dr. G. Neumayer, well 

 known as the former Superintendent of the Flagstaff Observatory 

 at Melbourne. The volume contains some elaborate reports, 

 among which may be specially mentioned an account of the 

 activity of the Office in the departments (i) of Marine Meteoro- 

 logy, (2) of Weather Telegraphy and Storm Warnings, (3) a 

 Report on the Testing of Chronometers, and (4) a paper on the 

 Non-periodical Monthly Variations of the Barometer. Subse- 

 quent annual volumes are promised in regular succession, and 

 we lojk forward with confidence that an addition of much useful 

 knoH ledge on the subject of meteorology generally will be gained 

 by their publication. The Sccuiarte already possesses a library 



of 9,400 volumes, and includes that formerly belonging to Prof. 

 Dove of Berlin, whicli was acquired at a cost of 1,500/. 



A CURIOUS work, impressively illustrative of the "science" 

 of the Dark Ages, has just been published at Berlin, under the 

 title of "Compendium der Naturwissenschaften an der Schule 

 zu Fulda in IX. Jahrhundert." Its purpose is to expound the 

 works of Rhaban, the celebrated Abbe of Fulda (788-856). 

 The Abbe, under the title of De Univirso, published what 

 would now jMobably be classed as an encyclopaedia, and as we 

 have said, its divisions and contents are a curious illustration of 

 the state of systematic knowledge at the time it was written. 

 Book I. treats of the Trinity and Angels ; Book II. Patriarchs 

 and Prophets; Book III. Men and Women spoken of in the 

 Old Testament ; Book VI. Man and the various parts of the 

 Human Body ; Book IX. the World, Atoms, Elements, the 

 Sky, Stars, Meteors; Book X. the Almanack and Feasts; 

 Book XII. the Earth ; Book XIII. the Vertical (?) Parts of the 

 Earth ; Book XV. Philosophers, Poets, Sorcerers, Idols. 

 Pagans ; Book XVIII. Measures, Weights, Numbers, Music, 

 Medicine, and Diseases ; Book XX. War, Horses and Ships, 

 &c. Of course the book is full of curious mythological and other 

 mysteries, a remarkable feature, however, being the important 

 part given to etymology ; indeed it would almost seem as if all 

 science consisted in good etymology. 



De. R. F. Hutchinson of Mussooree, India, writes that on 

 the afternoon of May 25 a hail-storm, remarkable for its fury, 

 extensive area, and size and structure of its stones, enveloped 

 that station, and Deyrab and Rajpore, at the foot of the hill. A 

 discharge of stones as large .as pigeon-eggs opened the attack, 

 and this was followed by a continuous downponr of stones, 

 oblate spheres as large as small marbles. The whole station 

 was penetrated by these, and it presented the appearance of 

 being strewn broadcast with acidulated drops. These stones 

 were of pure, clear ice, and, barring their shape, quite 

 amorphous. Not so the large stones, whose structure and 

 mode of formation were very puzzling. First, an opaque nucle- 

 olus surrounded by a concentric nucleus of clear ice, and this by 

 a radiating periphery. The nucleolus being opaque, was rapidly 

 frozen ; it must then have moved through alternate layers of hot 

 and cold air to have received the concentric accretions of clear 

 ice. The radiating periphery (which was translucent, but not 

 transparent) quite puzzles our correspondent. 



A VALUABLE paper of observations of the aspect of Mars 

 during his recent opposition, of the red spot of Jupiter, and the 

 spots of Venus, by M. Terby, appears in the Belgian Academy's 

 Bulletin (No. 5). The most delicate part of the work is that 

 relating to the spots of Venus, of which he supplies ten carefully 

 executed drawings. 



Captain Douglas Galton gives an address to-day in con- 

 nection with the Sanitary Institute at the Royal Institution. 



The 126th annual meeting of the Society of Arts was held 

 on the 30th ult., when the Report was presented and officers 

 elected. The Society is in a more satisf-actory condition than at 

 any previous period. 



Scientific Practice is the title of a periodical published three 

 times a year for the students of the School of Practical Engineer- 

 ing at the Crystal Palace. No. 7, which we have received, 

 contains several papers likely to interest young engineers. 



Mr. W. Saville Kent's long-promised "Manual of the 

 Infusoria " will be published by Mr. David Bogue. The complete 

 MS. and drawings are in the printer's hands. The work will be 

 issued in six monthly parts, the first of w Inch is to be ready in 

 October. 



