536 



NA TURE 



[September 28, 1905 



Oligocene (Tongrian). The youngest beds in the 

 area are gravel terraces, lacustrine clays, deposited on 

 the bed of the ever-diminishing lake, sands blown 

 from the desert, and alluvial deposits. 



JMr. Beadnell adduces evidence in favour of the view 

 that the bodies of the animals the skeletons of which 

 are found entombed in the strata of the Fayum were 

 brought down from the African interior by a great 

 stream which flowed in a north-westerly direction, 

 passing through the ancient lake occupying the site 

 of the Baharia Oasis. At that period the shore-line 

 would be near the Fayum, and the Nile would flow 

 into the sea near the same point. 



In historical times, as is well known, a large part 

 of the Fayum was occupied by the ancient Lake 

 Moeris. By successive reclamations of the alluvial 

 lands, this lake has probably been reduced to less 

 than one-eighth of its original area, and now con- 

 stitutes the comparatively insignificant Birket el 

 Ourun. 



The work before us appears in the same excellent 

 form as the other memoirs of the Geological Survev 

 of Egypt, issued under the direction of Captain 



-Eahr Vusuf at Lahun before entering the Fayum. From " The T< 

 of the Fayum Province of Egypt," by H. J. L. Beadnt 



Lyons. There are sixteen plates reproduced from 

 photographs, which give a good idea of the scenerv 

 of this wonderful district. We give reductions of 

 two of the plates. In addition to these, there are 

 two geological maps and six sheets of longitudinal 

 sections. There are also woodcuts in the letterpress. 

 The printing of the text of the work and the execu- 

 tion of the illustrations are highlv creditable to the 

 Survey Department at Cairo. ' J. W. J. 



THE ROYAL PHOTOGRAPHIC SOCIETY'S 



EXHIBITION. 

 T^HE fiftieth annual exhibition of the Royal Photo- 

 graphic Society is now open. There is a dis- 

 tmct and regrettable falling off in the number of 

 exhibits in the section devoted to scientific and 

 technical photography, but this is in a measure com- 

 pensated for by the presence of the loan collection 

 of British photographs of a similar kind that was 

 sent to the St. Louis Exhibition last year, though 

 NO. 1874, VOL. 72] 



among the latter there are many examples that have 

 been shown in the society's previous exhibitions. 



Of the new work, the natural history section is by 

 far the best represented. Miss Turner's set of photo- 

 graphs of the " great crested grebe," and a series of 

 twenty-two lantern slides of butterflies by Dr. D. H. 

 Hutchinson, have been awarded medals. The lantern 

 slides are bv the .Sanger-Shepherd three-colour 

 process, and illustrate the usefulness of this method 

 for recording rare varieties. In some of the slides 

 the colours are notably excellent, perhaps as perfect 

 as any mechanical colour process will ever produce. 

 Some of the photographs of " nesting swans " by Mr. 

 Douglas English must have been taken at consider- 

 able risk, for in two or three of them the bird is 

 shown flying at the photographer in anger. Another 

 example (No. 237) will be found in the west room 

 among the pictorial photographs, and close by (No. 

 216) is a very fine photograph of sea-gulls, the fore- 

 most of which are in the act of alighting on the 

 water. Of other photographs that record slower 

 movements, the chief are a series of seven by Mr. 

 W. Farren of the " skin moult of the caterpillar of 

 the privet hawk-moth," a series 

 of eight photomicrographs ( x 30) 

 by Mrs. Kate J. Pigg showing the 

 germination of a grass seed, and 

 two photographs of the same oak, 

 the one taken more than fifty 

 years before the other, by Mr. 

 j. B. Hilditch. The earlier photo- 

 graph of the oak was exhibited 

 at the first exhibition of the Royal 

 Photographic Society (then the 

 Photographic Society of London), 

 and is at least as good a piece of 

 work as the later, the main differ- 

 ence from a technical point of 

 view being that the exposure 

 necessary for the first was three 

 thousand times as long as that 

 given for the second. There are 

 many other photographs of living 

 tilings, but the bee photographs 

 of Mr. Oliver G. Pike deserve 

 ^pecial notice. The difficulty was 

 to get light enough without 

 causing the bees to stop their 

 work, and Mr. Pike has suc- 

 ceeded. 



Of other work in the technical 

 section there are photomicrographs 

 showing the structure of various 

 metals and alloys by Mr. E. F. Law, some interest- 

 ing wave photographs by Dr. \"aughan Cornish, and 

 a number of radiographs by Dr. Thurstan Holland 

 which well illustrate the possibilities of modern 

 methods. The only "natural colour" photograph 

 that we discovered, other than the transparencies bv 

 the Sanger-Shepherd method, is a three-carbon print 

 by Mr. Brewerton. We think he has sent as good 

 examples in previous years, but whether or not, what 

 we want to show the capabilities of three-colour work 

 are the finished print, produced without handwork, bv 

 the side of the object or painting that it represents. 

 Some commercial work is excellent, but its measure 

 of perfection is due to retouching. 



The loan collection from the St. Louis Exhibition 

 will doubtless prove more interesting to manv than 

 the new work, because of its greater varietv. Some 

 of these exhibits are of historic interest, such as Sir 

 William .\bney"s photograph of the spectrum in the 

 infra-red, and General Waterhouse's examples of 

 photomechanical work. There are a very great many 



pography and Geology 



