Jan. 20, 1 881] 



NATURE 



283 



lakes and Teocalli Mountain, Central Colorado, with remarks on 

 the glacial phenomena of that region. — C. E. iiessey, sketch of 

 the progress of botany in the United States in the year 1879. — 

 C. S. Minot, sketch of comparative embryology, No. 5 ; on the 

 general principle of development. — The Editor's Table. — Per- 

 manent e.\hibition of Philadelphia. — Recent literature. — A nevv 

 edition of Packard's "Zoology" is announced. — General Notes. 

 Scientific news. Proceedings of scientific societies. 



RiTJue dfs Sciences Naturelles, December, iSSo, contains : 

 Herborisations of Strobelberger about Montpellier in 1620, 

 translated, with notes, by M. Kieffer (a complete expose of the 

 extraordinary plagiarism of Strobelberger, who copied his work 

 on the plants of Montpellier almost verbatim from the work of 

 Lobel).— M. Doumet-Adan^on, on an immense Calamary taken 

 near Cette, January, iSSo \Ommastrephes sagittata). This 

 specimen was nearly six feet in length, from the end of the body 

 to the tops of the arm-^. — M. S. Jcrardain, on the late develop- 

 ment of scales in the eels. — E. Dubrueil, catalot;ue of testaceous 

 moUusca collected from the French shores of tlie Mediterranean. 

 — M. Reitsch, an analysis of Falkenberg's researches on the 

 fecondation and alternation of generation in Cutleria. — F. Fon- 

 tannes, on the stratigraphical position of the Pliocene group of 

 Saint Aries, in the Western Bas-Dauphine, and particularly in 

 the environs of Hauterives (Droaie). — Scientific Reports and 

 Bulletin. 



Cegeiibaur's morphologisches fahrbuch, Band 6, Heft 4. — Dr. 

 M. V. Davidoff, contribution to the comparative anatomy of the 

 posterior limb masses in fishes, 2nd part (Plates 21, 23) ; Dr. 

 W. Pfitzner, on the epidermis in the amphibia (Plates 24, 25) ; 

 I.E. V. Boas, on the conns arteriosus in Butirinus albula and 

 in other Teleostei (Plate 26); Dr. H. Rabl-Kiickhard, on the 

 mutual relations between the chorda, hypophysis and the middle 

 ridge of the skull in the embryos of the sharks', &c., brains (with 

 Plates 27, 28) ; Carl Kabl, on the " pedicle of invagination," 

 &c., in Planorbis (Plate 29) ; Prof. R. Wieder.sheim, on the 

 duplication of the os centrale in the carpus and tarsus of 

 Axolotl (Plate 30) ; Prof. C. Gegenbaur, critical remarks on 

 polydactylism as atavism ; short notices ; W. Leche, on the 

 morpology of the pelvic region in the Insectivora. 



Archives des Sciences Physiques et Naturelles, December 15, 

 18S0. — Tertiary man in Portugal, by M. Choffat, — Monograph 

 of the ancient glaciers and the erratic formation of the middle 

 p.art of the Rhone valley, by MM. Falsan and Chantre. — Organic 

 dust of the atmosphere, by Dr. Yung. — On the question of 

 lowering of the high waters of the Lake of Constance, by M. 

 Achard. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES 

 London 



Royal Society, January 6. — Observations on the Structure 

 of the Immature Ovarian Ovum in the Bird and Kabbit, and on 

 the Mode of Formation of the Discus Proligerus in the Rabbit 

 and of the "Egg-Tubes" in the Dog. By E. A. Schafer, 

 F.R.S. 



The first part of the paper is devoted to a minute description 

 of the young ovarian ova of the bird as seen in sections of the 

 ovary of a laying hen. The germinal spot is described as com- 

 posed of two distinct substances, namely, a homogeneous matrix 

 staining but slightly with logwood and a number of coarse 

 granules imbedded in it, which become darkly stained. The 

 germinal spot may often be seen to be connected vith the wall 

 of the germinal vesicle by a network of fine filaments (intra- 

 nuclear network). Appearances are also descrilied which indi- 

 cate that two germinal vesicles may be originally present in one 

 ovum (? formed by the fusion of two primitive ova), and that 

 one of the two may afterwards disappear, 



A network of filaments is also described as existing in the 

 yolk, which in some ova shows peculiar conden ati. ins of vitel- 

 line substance, which simulate nuclei ; hut the origin and 

 meaning of these are left in doubt. Other appearance-^, as of 

 systems of strice, are al?o mentioned as occurring in larger 

 ovarian ova. With regard to the membranes of the ovum the 

 author difiers from Waldeyer and agrees with Balfour in 

 regarding the zona radiata as a product of the prot'iplasm of the 

 ovum, and not as derived from the cells of the follicular 

 epithelium. 



The ovarian ovum of (he rabbit is next described, and is 

 found to agree in most essential particulars with that of the 



bird. The zona pcUncida is porous, and allows granules of food- 

 material to pass from the epithelium cells of the Graafian follicle 

 directly into the vitellus. But it is chiefly in this epithelium 

 that the interest centres, for the inner layer of cells of the folli- 

 cular epithelium appears to be formed in the peripheral layer of 

 the vitellus of the ovum itself, making their appearance first of 

 all as mere nuclei (derived in all probability from the nucleus of 

 the ovum), around which part of the protoplasm or vitellus of 

 the ovum becomes segmented off. This description is compared 

 with that which Kuppfer gives of the formation of an inner 

 layer of follicular epithelium from nuclei which make their 

 appearance in the periphery of the vitellus of the ovum of 

 Ascidia canina, and with the observations of Kleinenberg upon 

 the formation of a layer of cells from the periphery of the ovum 

 of Hydra. 



Finally the gland-like nature of the ovarian tubes in the 

 bitch's ovary is insisted upon in agreement with Pfliiger and 

 Waldeyer, and in opposition to the view taken by Foulis. 



Janu.ary 13. — "On the Forty-eight Co-ordinates of a Cubic 

 Curve in Space," by William Spottiswoode, President R. S. 



In a note published in the Report of the British Association 

 for 1878 (Dublin), and in a fuller paper in the Transactions of 

 the London Mathematical Society, 1879 (vol. x. No. 152), I 

 have given the forms of the eighteen, or the twenty-one (as 

 there explained), co-ordinates of a conic in space, corresponding, 

 so far as correspondence sttbsists, with the six co-ordinates of a 

 straight line in 'space. And in the same papers I have esta- 

 blished the identical relations between these co-ordinates, where- 

 by the number of independent quantities is reduced to eight, as 

 it should be. In both crises, viz., the straight line and the 

 'cubic, the co-ordinates are to be obtained by eliminating the 

 variables in turn from the two equations representing the line or 

 the conic, and are, in fact, the coefficients of the equations 

 resulting from the eliminations. 



In the present paper I have followed the same procedure for 

 the case of a cubic curve in space. Such a curve may, as is well 

 known, be regarded as the intersection of two quadric surfaces 

 having a generating line in common ; and the result of the 

 elimination of any one of the variables from two quadric equa- 

 tions satisfying this condition is of the third degree. The 

 number «i coefficients so arising is 4 X 10 =; 40 ; but I have 

 found that these forty quantities may very conveniently be re- 

 placed by forty eight others, which are henceforward considered 

 as the co-ordinates of the cubic curve in space. 



The number of identical relations established in the present 

 paper is thirty-four. But it will be observed that the equations 

 are lineo-linear in each of two groups, say the U-co-ordinates 

 and the U'-co-ordinates ; and as we are concerned with the ratios 

 only of the coefficients, and not with their absolute values, we 

 are, in fact, concerned only with the ratios of the U-co-ordinates 

 inter se, and the U'-co-ordinates inter se, and not with their 

 absolute values. Hence the number of independent co-ordinates 

 will be reduced to 48 - 34 - 2 = 12, as it should be. 



Mathematical Society, January 13. — S. Roberts, F.R.S. , 

 president, in the chair. — Miss C. A. Scott and Messrs. J. Parker 

 Smith, O. H. Mitchell, Fellow of Johns Hopkins University, 

 and T. Craig, U.S. Coast Survey Office, Washington, were 

 elected members. Dr. Hirst, in drawing attention to the loss 

 the Society had sustained by the death of M. Chasles, gave a 

 rapid sketch of that distinguished geometer's career and work ; 

 in lightly touching upon his private life he mentioned how 

 gratifieil M. Chasles had been by the fact that he was not only 

 the first Foreign Member of the Society, but for a long time the 

 only one. The following communications were made : — On an 

 apparently paradoxical relation of the circle, parabola, and 

 hyperbola, by A. J. Ellis, F.R.S. — A proof of the differential 

 equation which is satisfied by the hypergeometric series, by the 

 Rev. T. R. Terry. — On the peiiodicity of hyperelliptic integrals 

 of the first class, by W. R. W. Roberts. — On the tangents 

 drawn from a point to a nodal cubic, by R. A. Roberts. — Sur 

 una propriete du parauietre de la transformee canonique des 

 formes cubiques ternaires, by Signor Brioschi (Milan). — Note on 

 a kinematical theorem connected with the rectilinear courses of 

 two vessels sailing uniformly, by C. W. Merrifield, F.R.S. — A 

 partition-problem connecting the angles of a triangle with the 

 angles of the successive pedal triangles, by J. W. L. Glaisher, 

 F.R.S. 



Paris 



Academy of Sciences, January 10. — M. Wurtz in the 

 chair. — The following papers were read : — On the [conditions 



