OCTOUER 4, 1906] 



NA TURE 



577 



attempt to inoculate papilionaceous plants with the root- 

 nodule organisms belonging to non-papilionaceous Legu- 

 minos;e and to plants of quite different families, those of 

 Acacia (Mimoses) and of Ela;agnus and Alnus being 

 chosen. In another paper Prof. Bottomley showed that the 

 long-known effect of sprinkling urine on the floors of green- 

 houses in order to cause a more lu.\uriant growth of 

 orchids is due to the presence of both nitrite and nitrate 

 bacteria in the cells of the velamen, which are thus able 

 to utilise the ammonia arising by decomposition of the 

 urine and absorbed along with the water vapour normally 

 condensed by the velamen. 



Miss C. B. Sanders, of Oxford, described some experi- 

 ments carried out in Prof. Gotch's laboratory on the local 

 production of heat connected with the disappearance of 

 starch in the spadices of various Aracea;. Remarks on 

 this paper were made by Dr. F. F. Blackman. 



Dr. Ellis, of Glasgow, described experiments to show 

 that ciliation cannot be used as a taxonomic character 

 among bacteria — as has recently been done by Migula — 

 because under appropriate conditions all the members of 

 such groups as Coccacese, Bacteriaces, and Splrillace;E, in 

 which this character has been used, can be made to acquire 

 cilia. 



The semi-popular lecture was delivered by Prof. Yapp, 

 who took his hearers for a most pleasant excursion 

 through some of the principal regions of South Africa, in- 

 troducing them to the various types of vegetation met with 

 by means of a series of beautiful lantern-slides from his 

 own photographs. 



The section met on Thursday afternoon, August 2, and 

 for a short time on Monday afternoon, August 6. The 

 other afternoons were left free for excursions, of which 

 several were arranged by the local secretary. Dr. Burtt. 

 of the British Botanical Association, and by other local 

 botanists. Those to Askham Bog and to Skipwith Common 

 may be specially mentioned as of great botanical interest. 



THE ARCH.-EOLOGICAL CONGRESS AT 

 VANNES. 

 "T^HE second congress of the Prehistoric Society of France 

 was held from August 21-26 in the capital of the 

 department of Morbihan, the classic land of Megalithic 

 monuments, at any rate so far as France is concerned. 

 The attendance exceeded that of the very successful first 

 congress held at Perigueux last year. 



The inaugural meeting at 10 a.m. on Tuesday, August 21, 

 was graced by the presence of prominent citizens. Speeches 

 were made by the Mayor of Vannes, Senator Riou, Prof, 

 .^drien de Mortillet, president of the congress, and by Dr. 

 Marcel Baudouin, the secretary, who insisted on the need 

 of providing a special building to house the rich collections 

 of the Soci^t^ polvmathique, and on the desirability of 

 creating a national Megalithic park comparable to the 

 Yellowstone National Park of the United States. 



The president of the local committee, M. Morio, 

 welcomed the congress in the name of the Soci^t^ poly- 

 mathique, the museum of which was much admired by 

 the parties which visited it in the afternoon. It includes 

 collections from the principal tumuli of the neighbourhood, 

 excavated by the society during its many years of exist- 

 ence ; there are, for example, the splendid necklaces of 

 callais beads, a fine series of fibrolite axes, curious stone 

 discs, scarcely found outside this area, and huge polished 

 celts. In the evening M. Riou gave a reception at the 

 Mairie, and various toasts were proposed. 



The numerous papers and the lively discussions attest 

 the success of the congress. M. Rutot, the curator of the 

 Royal Museum of Brussels, led off with a consideration 

 of the question of the Palaeolithic bed of Havre ; he main- 

 tained that there was no question of displacement ; what 

 had taken place was a falling in of the superincumbent 

 earth and erosion of the cliff. Dr. Joussel then described 

 a new prehistoric bed discovered at La Long^re, near 

 Xogent-le-Notrou (Eure-et-Loire), where objects of varying 

 appearance and discutable age have been found, assigned 

 by the author to the Fl^nusien age of Rutot. M. Hue 

 brought forward a new method of measuring the skulls of 

 Canida>, which M. Baudouin urged all archaeologists to 



NO. 1927, VOL. 74I 



apply to the measurement of other animals. Dr. Gu^bhard 

 appealed to the archajologists of the world to bring into 

 existence a map of prehistoric monuments, the preliminary 

 sieps towards which have been made by the Soci^t^ fti- 

 liistorique de Paris. 



Two long sittings were held on the morning and even- 

 ing of the second day. The first subject was the Palaeo- 

 lithic age of Brittany, introduced by M. Sageret, of Carnac, 

 who was followed by MM. de Mortillet, Rutot, and 

 Baudouin, who showed why beds of this epoch are rare : 

 the Neolithic period has attracted more attention in 

 Brittany (Mortillet) ; Brittany is only the central area of 

 Quaternary Briltany, which was united to the British Isles 

 until the Magdalenian period (Rutot), and to a south- 

 western continent which survives in Belle-Ile, Ouiberon, 

 Houat, &c. (Baudouin). Some stones of this period were 

 exhibited by M. Landren, of St. Nazaire, under the name 

 of eoliths ; the Rennes flints of M. Pavot were not regarded 

 as of prehistoric character. Dordogne, the scene of the last 

 congress, next claimed the attention of the meeting. M. 

 I'Abb^ Chastaing otTered some remarks on the hammers for 

 use with bones discovered in the cave of Le Moustier, and 

 M. de Ricard directed attention to the new Magdalenian 

 station of Rocheyral, Drome Valley. Finally, M. de 

 Mortillet brought into prominence the Placard cave 

 (Charente), and the various industries there practised ; in 

 this connection there arose a discussion on the pre- 

 Solutrian age of M. I'.Abb^ Breuil, for which M. Rutot 

 and M. I'Abb^ Chastaing took up the cudgels. 



M. Rutot spoke on the question of the Micoque beds, on 

 the V^zfere, after dealing with the Str^pyien of France. 

 He showed that the Chelles-Moust(5rien of Micoque was in 

 reality Str^pyien, and that this stage fell between the 

 ChelMen and the Mesvinien, and not between the ChelMen 

 and the Moust^rien. M. Feuvrier (of D61e) directed atten- 

 tion to a Magdalenian cave in the Jura, and M. J. Dharvent 

 exhibited a sculptured flint of the Moustirien age. 



On Wednesday evening Neolithic problems were 

 approached ; among the papers were those of Dr. Martin, 

 on the false tumulus of La Motte Beudron (Deux-S^vres) ; 

 M. Goby, on the tumuli of the districts of St. Vallier de 

 Thiay, St. C^zaire, and Grasse (Alpes Maritimes) ; and M. 

 Roerich, of St. Petersburg, on sculptured Neolithic flints. 

 M. Rutot then turned to the Fl^nusien, or lower Neolithic, 

 in France, and showed that traces could be found from 

 one end of France to the other. Dr. Montelius then gave 

 a summary exposition of the Stockholm collections from 

 the Robenhausen and other periods. 



On the morning of Thursday the pottery of the dolmens 

 came up for discussion ; M. Fourdrignier, of Paris, showed 

 that the study of finger-prints might be of value, but it 

 was pointed out that the information could throw little 

 light on questions of race. Other papers were those of 

 M. Goby, on the dolmen pottery of the Grasse district, and 

 the micaceous pottery of Camp du Bois-du-Rouret (Alpes 

 Maritimes), 



After a remarkable paper by Dr. Stjerna on the Scan- 

 dinavian origin of the Burgundians came papers on Mega- 

 lithic monuments, among them those of Dr. Jousset, on 

 the Carnacean age of Perche ; Dr. Coutil, on Megalithic 

 monuments in Normandy : M. Jos(? Fortes, on Megalithic 

 sculptures in Portugal ; M. Tavar^s de Proenca, on the 

 classification of Portuguese dolmens ; M. Coutil, on his 

 exploration and restoration of the tumulus of Fontenay-le- 

 Marmion (Calvados) in 1904 and iqofi. Important com- 

 munications were read by Dr. Waldemar Schmidt, on 

 Megalithic monuments in Denmark ; by Dr. Montelius, on 

 the same in Sweden ; by Dr. Baudouin, on five years' 

 excavations and restorations of the megaliths of Vendue. 

 .\ popular evening lecture on the dolmens of Brittany, 

 illustrated by lantern-slides, had already been given in the 

 theatre on the previous evening. 



On Thursday evening the subject of prehistoric gold in 

 Brittany and Vendue was treated by Count Costa de 

 Beauregard and Dr. Baudouin, and much was said on the 

 significance of menhirs and of the alignments. For M. 

 de Paniagua they are evidence of a phallic cult, for M. 

 Rutot they are sign-posts, for M. Montelius and for 

 Dr. Baudouin tombstones, and the last view finds sup- 

 port in the results of the excavations of Dr. Baudouin 



