JULY TI, 1912] 
Observatory at Cérdoba. It is expected to erect this 
telescope in the mountains to the west of and close 
to Cérdoba, where preliminary investigations have 
already been made and the meteorological conditions 
found to be good. 
As was announced in the issue of Nature for 
January 4 last, the Congress of the Royal Sanitary 
Institute will be held this year at York on July 
29-August 3. The names of the presidents of the 
various sections into which the work of the congress 
is divided have already been given. It is now known 
that the lecture to the congress will be delivered by 
Prof. Karl Pearson, F.R:S., his subject being 
‘“Eugenics and the “Public Health.” Prof. H. R. 
Kenwood will give the popular lecture on ‘The 
Healthy Home.’ More than 250 authorities, includ- 
ing foreign and colonial Governments, Government 
departments, county councils, universities; and socie- 
ties have already appointed delegates to the con- 
gress, and a large attendance is expected. A health 
exhibition of apparatus and appliances relating 
to health and domestic use will be held in  illus- 
tration of the principles and methods discussed at the 
meetings. Excursions to places of interest in connec- 
tion with sanitation, a conversazione, garden-parties, 
and other entertainments have been arranged. 
Tue International Radio-telegraphic Conference, 
which has been sitting in London since June 4, has 
concluded its meetings, and an official statement has 
been issued showing the main points of the resolu- 
tions considered and new regulations proposed. 
Special consideration was given to the question of 
the use of wireless telegraphy for the prevention of 
disasters at sea, and after full discussion the confer- 
ence passed unanimously a resolution in favour of the 
principle of compulsory equipment of ships with wire- 
less telegraphy. The new regulations contain several 
provisions intended to render more effective the 
service of wireless telegraphy in cases of distress at 
sea. Ships will in future be required to provide an 
auxiliary source of power able to work the wireless 
apparatus for at least six hours. Rules have also 
been made for both ship and shore stations to suspend 
work and to listen at the end of each quarter of an 
hour in cases where it is likely that distress calls 
might otherwise not be heard. Provision has been 
made for giving priority of transmission to weather 
reports from ships and for keeping coast stations sup- 
plied with weather forecasts for communication to 
ships on demand. It is now agreed that all ships 
should be under the obligation to intercommunicate 
with one another, irrespective of the system of radio- 
telegraphy employed. An invitation to hold the next 
conference in Washington was unanimously accepted, 
and 1917 was fixed as the date at which the confer- 
ence will be held. 
In Man for June, Mr. C. M. Barreau contributes 
a paper on the bearing of the heraldry of the Indians 
of the north-west coast of America upon their social 
organisation. The intricate system of clans with 
their phratries is clearly explained, and it is shown 
that two modes of social grouping prevail in the Kwa- 
kiutl tribe. In summer they are arranged in clans, 
NO. 2228, voi. 89| 
NATURE 
483 
but this organisation is broken up in winter, when 
they arrange themselves in two large fraternities. 
This is due to the fact that while the child may belong 
either to the clan of the mother or father, his right 
to admission into a fraternity may not only be in- 
herited from his parents, but is often secured by pay- 
ment or by other means. These fraternities are con- 
cerned with ritual dances, dramatic performances and 
potlatches or feasts, while others initiate members in 
order to cure disease or practise sorcery. Each clan 
bears a representation of the animal or object after 
which it is named, and through which the members 
are connected by ties of special affinity. 
In L’Anthropologie for March-April, Dr. G. 
Lalanne, under the title of ‘‘ Bas-reliefs A figuration 
humaine de labri sous roche de Laussel (Dordogne),”’ 
describes two remarkable rock carvings, one of a 
male, the other of a female. The block on which 
the female carving appears now lies outside the 
excavation. It represents a woman in profile, holding 
the horn of a wild ox in her hand, but nothing re- 
mains to indicate the expression or the mode of 
arrangement of the hair. It is apparently of the 
Paleolithic type which has already been discovered 
at Brassempouy in the Landes, Menton, and 
Willendorf in Austria. These discoveries appear to 
indicate that in the Aurignacian period Central 
Europe, and possibly the Mediterranean area, were 
occupied by a negroid race, characterised in the female 
by well-marked steatopygy, such as that which appears 
among the modern Bushmen. The male image, on 
the other hand, displays a delicacy of form which is 
in direct contrast to that of the female. 
In the June number of The Zoologist, Col. Shep- 
herd continues his account of the pharyngeal teeth of 
fishes, dealing in this instance with those of the carp 
group (Cyprininz), in which the lower pharyngeal 
teeth bite against a callous pad. 
WE are glad to see that public interest is being 
aroused in the potential dangers connected with the 
house-fly. The case against the insect is stated in 
a striking article in the July number of Pearson’s 
Magazine, which contains the views of several 
authorities upon public health as to the dangers of 
its presence. House-flies play no inconsiderable part 
in the dissemination of certain diseases, and every 
encouragement should be given to a campaign which 
aims at reducing their numbers. 
To the Revue générale des Sciences of June 15 Mr. 
Louis Gain, naturalist to the second French. Antarctic 
expedition, contributes a very fully illustrated account 
of the distribution and habits of the Adélie penguin 
(Pygoscelis adeliae). This bird, which was first met 
with by Dumont d’Urville in 1841, may be considered 
the most characteristic inhabitant of the Antarctic 
continent and islands, never ranging to the northward 
of 60° S. lat., and communicating, even when not 
seen, a sign of life to these dreary regions by its 
oft-repeated; although harsh, cry of kaah, kaah. 
ReEcENT observations seem to show that certain 
yeasts and yeast-like forms may undergo a process 
of conjugation in some part of their life-cycle. The 
