July 19, 1906J 



NA TURE 



79 



Communication by wireloss telegraphy has just been 

 established between the Australian contineni anil Tasmania 

 by the Marconi system. 



The foundation stone of the German Museuin " fiir 

 M'isterwerke der Technik " is to be laid in Munich about 

 the middle of November, in the presence of the Emperor 

 of (iermany. 



TiiF. Magdeburg civic authorities have decided to pay 

 for the erection of a laboratory for the examination of 

 food materials in connection with the new State bacterio- 

 logical laboratory which is shortly to be built. 



Tin; income of the jubilee fund founded in Heidelberg in 

 1SS6, and to be awarded to teachers in the university in 

 recognition of their scientific work, has been divided be- 

 tween Prof. Fr. Pockels, professor of physics, and Prof. A. 

 Klages, professor of chemistry, to enable the latter to 

 continue his investigations on optically active benzoyl dii 

 vatives. 



1'roi-. K. .Siaiii'RT has retired from the International 

 .Atomic Weights Subcominittee on account of over-pressure 

 of work. His place will be taken by Prof. \V. Ostwald, 

 so that the subcommittee will now consist of Profs. T. E. 

 Thorpe, II. Moissan, \V. Ostw.ild, and F. \V. Clarke, 

 president. 



A ST.ANDING e.-chibition committee is to be formed in 

 Berlin by the Zentralverband dcutscher Industrieller, act- 

 ing in conjunction with the Zentralstelle fiir Vorbereitung 

 von Handelsvertragen and with the Bund der Industrieller. 

 The duties of this committee will be to collect information 

 with regard to all exhibitions of importance and to deal 

 with questions affecting the interests of German exhibitors, 

 both at home and abroad. 



.\ LEGACY of 360,000 francs has been left to the F^rench 

 Academy of Sciences and a few other institutes under 

 the w-ill of the late Baron de Rey. To the Academy 

 itself is bequtathed the sum of 150,000 francs, from the 

 interest on which there is to be offered quinquennially a 

 prize of 20,000 francs to the French investigators who, in 

 the opinion of the .\cademy, have best contributed to the 

 progress of physical science. 



Pupils :md friends of the late Prof. August Kekule, who 

 died in 1896, have handed over to the University of Bonn 

 a sum of 31,500 marks, the yearly interest on which is 

 to be given to a young investigator of the exact sciences, 

 more especially chemistry and physics, on July 13 of eac'i 

 year, the anniversary of KekuM's death. The first pay- 

 ment is to be made after the relatives of the deceased 

 chemist have no further claim on the income of the fund 

 as arranged. 



The Deulscher Verein fiir offentliche Gesundheitspflege 

 will hold the annual general meeting this year on Sep- 

 tember 12 to 15 in .Augsburg immediately before the 

 beginning of the meeting of the Deutsche Naturforscher 

 und Aerzte in Stuttgart which begins on September 16. 

 The subjects to be proposed for discussion include : — (i) Pre- 

 cautions against iiydrophobia, (2) the milk supplies of 

 towns, with special reference to the milk supplic: f 

 young children, (3) invalid homes, (4) the dust plague in 

 the house and on the streets, (5) the hygiene of small 

 houses. 



In No. 55 of the Cliemihcr Zeitiiiig will be found some 

 interesting details of the imports and exports of Germany 

 for the year 1905 ; the estimated total value of the former 

 NO. 1 916, VOL. 74] 



is given as nearly 7500 million marks, and that of the 

 latter as nearly 6000 million marks. Of these, 430 million 

 inarks are imported chemicals, including both raw and 

 manufactured substances, and 473 million exported raw 

 and manufactured chemicals; it is noteworthy that the 

 imported raw stuffs for the chemical industries is put 

 down .-11 nearly 301) million marks in value, and the ex- 

 ported at 57 million. 



With the view of cultivating an intelligent interest in 

 meteorological science, the council of the Royal Meteor- 

 ological Society appointed the assistant-secretary of the 

 society, Mr. VV. Marriott, last year to act in cooperation 

 with scientific societies, in.stitutions, and schools as a 

 lecturer on meteorological subjects. The experiment has 

 proved so successful that it is being continued, and a list 

 of lectures for the coming lecture season has just been 

 issued. Particulars can be obtained from the society, 

 70 Victoria Street, S.W. 



An article on hyl)ridisation and plant breeding in the 

 July number of the Monthly licvic^o. written by Mr. A. J. 

 Bliss, affords a timely introduction to the subject that will 

 shortly attract public notice when in the course of the 

 monlK the third triennial conference on plant breeding will 

 be held in London under the auspices of the Royal Horti- 

 cultural Society. Premising that there are continuous 

 variations and discontinuous variations, the writer proceeds 

 to show how variations have been produced by cultivation 

 and selection alone, as in the case of Shirley poppies, or 

 more easily and rapidly by cross-fertilisation. To fix the 

 type, thanks to Mendel, certain principles are being evolved 

 for the guidance of the breeder. The elucidation of these 

 principles and other problems will be discussed at the con- 

 ference. The article concludes with some interesting 

 details of results already obtained and future possibilities. 



In their thirty-fourth annual report (for 1905) the 

 directors of the Philadelphia Zoological Society state that 

 they are considering a plan for lectures on animals to be 

 given in the gardens at such times as they are most 

 frequented by children. Special attention is directed to the 

 valuable results attained by the introduction of a patho- 

 logical laboratory. " No • monkey is now placed upon 

 exhibition unless it has successfully passed the tuberculin 

 test, and it is hoped that by the employment of every 

 practicable measure of prevention within the building, in- 

 cluding prohibition of feeding by visitors, the occurrence 

 of tuberculosis in these susceptible animals may be brought 

 under control. A temporary result of the rigid system 

 which has been put in practice is that the collection in 

 the Monkey House is less complete than is usually the 

 case. ... Of those procured a considerable number failed 

 to pass the tests and have not got beyond the quarantine- 

 room." 



In a paper on additions to the exhibited series of fossil 

 vertebrates in the U.S. National Museum, published in the 

 Proceedings (No. 1460) of that institution, Mr. C. W. 

 Gilmore figures another specimen of a pterodactyle from 

 Eichstatt showing the impressions of the wing-membranes, 

 and also the skull of a new horned dinosaur of the genus 

 Triceratops. Japanese fishes form the subject of a paper 

 in the same serial (No. 1462) by Messrs. Jordan and 

 Starks, while in No. 1464 the former writer reviews the 

 sand-lances (Ammodytidse) of Japan, and in No. 1470 he 

 describes, in conjunction with Mr. R. C. McGregor, a 

 new threadfin-fish of the genus Polydactylus from Japan. 



