June 29, 1905] 



NA TURE 



in the seventy-third year of his age. He was laid to 

 rest on Tuesday last in Highgate Cemetery, every 

 society with which he was associated sending re- 

 presentatives to his funeral, while among the 

 mourners were some of his old colleagues in India. 



A. G. 



WOTE5. 



The Civil List Pensions granted during the year ended 

 March 31 show more generous recognition of the claims 

 of science than has usually been the case. The list in- 

 cludes the following pensions : — 1904, August 8. — Mr. 

 W. F. Denning, in consideration of his services to tlif 

 science of astronomy, 150/. August 8. — Miss Elizabeth 

 Parker, in recognition of the services rendered to science 

 as an investigator by her late father, Mr. W. Kitchen 

 Parker, F.R.S., 100!. August 8. — Lady Le Neve Foster, in 

 consideration of the services rendered to mining science 

 by her late husband. Sir Clement Lo Neve Foster, F.R.S., 

 and of the fact that his death was due to the effects of 

 poisoning by carbonic o.xide gas while carrying out his 

 official duties, 100/. 1905, January 17. — Dr. J. G. Frazer, 

 in recognition of his literary merits and of his anthropo- 

 logical studies, 200/. March 22. — The Rev. Lorimer Fison, 

 in recognition of the originality and importance of his re- 

 searches in Australian and Fijian ethnology, 150/. 

 March 22. — Dr. \V. Cramond, in consideration of his 

 antiquarian researches, more particularly in connection 

 with the ecclesiastical and burghal history of -Scotland, 80/. 

 March 22.— Miss L. C. Watts and Miss E. S. Watts, in 

 recognition of the services of their late father, Mr. Henry 

 Watts, to chemistry, 75/. It is satisfactory to record these 

 tributes of national regard for lives devoted to the advance- 

 ment of knowledge ; and we congratulate the Government 

 upon the great improvement which this year's list shows as 

 regards the acknowledgment of the services rendered to 

 the State by scientific workers. 



We regret to learn that Prof, von Tomek, president of 

 the Imperial Bohemian .\cademy of Sciences at Prague, 

 died on June 12 in the eighty-eighth year of his age. 



Sir John Wolfe Barry, K.C.B., F.R.S., has been 

 elected to succeed the late Mr. James Mansergh, F.R.S., 

 as chairman of the Engineering Standards Committee. 



The annual conversazione of the Society of Arts will 

 be held in the gardens of the Royal Botanic Society, 

 Regent's Park, on Tuesday next, July 4. 



The International Institute of Sociology has accepted 

 the invitation of the Sociological Society to hold its next 

 congress in London in the summer of 1906. A general 

 committee has been appointed to promote the success of 

 the congress. Lord Avebury is the chairman of the com- 

 mittee, and Mr. David Mair the secretary for the time 

 being. 



The Guy medal in silver has been awarded by the Roval 

 Statistical Society to Mr. R. Henry Rew for his work in 

 connection with the preparation of the reports of the 

 special committee appointed by the society to investigate 

 the production and consumption of meat and milk in the 

 United Kingdom, and for his paper entitled " Observations 

 on the Production of Meat and Dairy Products." 



Among those who lost their lives in the railway disaster 

 at Mentor, Ohio, on June 21 was Mr. Archibald P. Head, 

 a brilliant young engineer and senior partner in the firm 

 of Messrs. Jeremiah Head and Sons, of Westminster. 



NO. 1 86 1, VOL. 72] 



Mr. Head was the author of several valuable papers on 

 mining and metallurgy contributed to the Institution of 

 Civil Engineers, the Iron and Steel Institute, and the 

 Society of Arts. 



It is announced In the Times that the Board of Trade 

 and the Trinity House have concluded a contract with 

 Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company (Limited) providing 

 for the equipment of lightships with Marconi wireless 

 telegraph installations. This arrangement will enable the 

 lightships to communicate with the shore and with one 

 another by wireless telegraphy for the ordinary purposes 

 of the lightship service, and also to report ships in distress. 



A Reuter telegram from Paris reports that an Inter- 

 national Congress on Colonial Agriculture was opened 

 there on June 22, Great Britain, Holland, Germany, Italy, 

 Portugal, the United States, Mexico, and Brazil being 

 represented. The members of the congress decided to form 

 an international committee for the study of all questions 

 relating to agricultural science and colonial industries. 

 An organising committee, with headquarters in Paris, under 

 the chairmanship of M. de Lanessan, has been formed. 



Toward the close of the fourth International Ornitho- 

 logical Congress, an account of which appeared in our 

 issue of last week (p. 177), a party of members paid a visit 

 on June 20 to Cambridge. They were received by Prof. 

 Newton, who had arranged several exhibits for the benefit 

 of the visitors. These included a case of , great auks' 

 eggs and a selection of letters, papers, and books from 

 Prof. Newton's library. A cataloitue of these documents 

 and books, some of them belonging to the fifteenth century, 

 was distributed among the visitors, as w.is a leaflet on 

 Legaut's giant bird by Prof. Newton explaining its 

 origin and species. A pamphlet by Dr. Gadow on the 

 effects of insularity, Illustrated by birds of (a) Madagascar 

 and Mascarene Islands, and (b) the Sandwich Islands, was 

 also circulated to explain the exhibits arranged in the 

 lecture room of comparative anatomy. A visit to the 

 museums having been concluded, a dinner was given to 

 Prof. Newton In the hall of Magdalene, after which Dr. 

 Fatio in a cordial speech referred to Prof. Newton as 

 " the father of ornithology." The congress concluded on 

 June 21 with a visit to Flamborough Head. 



Dr. J. Charcot gave an account of his expedition to 

 Antarctic regions before the Royal Geographical Society 

 on Monday. The general programme of the expedition was 

 to survey the north-west coast of the Palmer Archipelago 

 (Hoseason, Liege, Brabant, and the Antwerp Islands) : to 

 study the south-west entrance to the Gerlache Strait, 

 wintering as far south as was practicable, to make ex- 

 cursions in spring, and in summer to continue the explor- 

 ation of Graham Land, with the view of elucidating the 

 Bismarck Strait, and follow the coast as far as Alexander I. 

 Land ; in a word, to continue the labours of the Gerlache 

 and Nordenskjold expeditions. The expedition left Buenos 

 Ayres in the Fran(ais (245 tons) on December 23, 1903, 

 reached Smith Island (South Shetlands) on February i, 

 1904, and after coasting for a few weeks was compelled 

 by ice to return to Wandel Island, where it wintered. The 

 temperature varied much and suddenly ; the lowest was 

 -3o°-4 F., but a rise from -22° F. to +26°-6 F. in a 

 few hours was not uncommon, and was always followed 

 by violent gales from the north-east, which broke up the 

 ice between Wandel and Hovgaard Islands, and so pre- 

 vented any move being made, in spite of many efforts. 

 In December, 1904, a channel was made, and the Franfais 

 returned to Wincke Island, which had been visited before 



