666 
NATURE 
[AUGUST 29, 1912 
temperature touched 70°. The radiation temperature 
on the grass fell below the freezing point at several 
places in different parts of Great Britain. The rain- 
fall was above the average in all districts except in 
the west of Scotland, and in the south-west of England 
the measurement was as much as three times the 
average. Bright sunshine was everywhere very 
deficient. In the south-west of England the mean 
daily duration was less than two hours, and in the 
south-east of England, where there was more sun- 
shine, the duration was little more than three hours. 
The summary of the weather for the current week 
will show very similar conditions to prevail, with a 
greater excess of rainfall over nearly the entire king- 
dom. The rainfall of 6 inches in less than twelve 
hours at Norwich on August 26 is one of the heaviest 
falls which have occurred in so short a time in England. 
In Australian papers which have just come to hand 
we regret to see the announcement of the death of 
Mr. Francis James Gillen. Anthropology has thus 
lost a conscientious and devoted worker, whose world- 
wide reputation has been well earned in a fast-vanish- 
ing field of investigation, which, unfortunately, attracts 
far too few men of Mr. Gillen’s type. It is now 
forty-five years since he entered the public service 
of South Australia, and his official work caused him to 
become virtually exiled to the heart of the Australian 
continent; but he devoted his spare time to the study 
of the aboriginal people amongst whom he lived, and 
it is no exaggeration to say that he acquired a much 
more intimate knowledge of the customs and beliefs of 
the most backward race of mankind now in existence 
than all other investigators had been able to collect; 
and this wealth of accurate information was put to 
the best use when Mr. Gillen collaborated with Prof. 
Baldwin Spencer, F.R.S., of Melbourne, and produced 
a series of the most discussed volumes that have ever 
been contributed to ethnological literature. The 
opportunities for such investigations as Mr. Gillen 
carried on are abundant, but with the rapid intrusion 
of European customs into every corner of the world 
they will soon be gone for ever. It is thus with 
especial gratitude that all students of mankind will 
always regard the labours of such men as the late 
Mr. Gillen, who have seized the opportunities presented 
by their daily occupations and rescued for posterity an 
accurate knowledge of the fast vanishing customs and 
beliefs of primitive peoples. 
Dr. Jean Mascarr, of the Paris Observatory, has 
been appointed director of the Lyons Observatory in 
succession to M. André. 
Ir is announced in the Revue Scientifique that M. E. 
Solvay has given 4ool. to the Institute of Physical 
Chemistry of the Berlin University to assist the re- 
searches on which Prof. Nernst is engaged. The gift 
will be renewed for three years. 
Tue collection of foreign Lepidoptera bequeathed 
by the late Mr. H. T. Adams, of Enfield, has been 
received at the Natural History Branch of the British | 
Museum. 
to comprise about 150,000 specimens. 
It is contained in 68 cabinets, and is stated 
The estimated 
Tue death is announced in Science of Prof. E. L. 
Richards, emeritus professor of mathematics of Yale 
University, aged seventy-four years; and of Dr. M. H. 
Richardson, Moseley professor of surgery at Harvard 
University, aged sixty-one years. 
Mr. Cuarrtes Ebr, who was surgeon and naturalist 
to H.M.S. Assistance, which took part in one of the 
expeditions in search of Sir John Franklin’s party in 
the Arctic region, has just died in his ninetieth year. 
Tue death is announced, in his eighty-first year, of 
Mr. Alexander Dean, senior lecturer on horticulture 
to the Surrey County Council, and a well-known 
authority on horticultural matters. Mr. Dean received 
the Victorian Medal for Horticulture. He was a fre- 
quent contributor to periodicals dealing with garden- 
ing subjects, and the author of a useful little book on 
vegetable culture. 
Tue death is announced of Prof. John Craig, one of 
the leading American horticulturists. He was born in 
1864 in the province of Quebec, but received his 
education at the Iowa State College. He returned to 
Canada in 1890 to become horticulturist at the 
Dominion experiment station at Ottawa: In 1899 he 
once more crossed the border to take up an appoint- 
ment as professor of horticulture and forestry at the 
Iowa State College. Since 1903 he had held the chair 
of horticulture at Cornell University. He was the 
editor of The National Nurseryman, and the author of 
a text-book: of practical agriculture. 
WE notice with regret the death, on August 25, 
in his sixtieth year, of Dr. Andrew Wilson, lecturer 
on physiology and health to the George Combe Trust 
and Gilchrist Trust lecturer. In 1876 Dr. Wilson was 
appointed lecturer on zoology and comparative anatomy 
at the Edinburgh Medical School; and he was at one 
time editor of Health. But Dr. Wilson was best 
known as a popular lecturer and writer on scientific 
subjects, in which capacity he did very useful work 
in making clear and interesting to general readers and 
the ordinary public the results of research in various 
departments of natural science specially. He was the 
author of a large number of popular books on scientific 
subjects. 
WE regret to see the announcement of the death on 
August 26, at sixty-one years of age, of Mr. Clinton 
Thomas Dent, vice-president of the Royal College of 
| Surgeons, honorary member of the Philadelphia Patho- 
logical Society, and late Hunterian professor and 
member of the Court of Examiners of the Royal Col- 
lege of Surgeons. Mr. Dent was the author of a 
number of surgical works, and was famous as an 
AJpine climber, and also for a series of explorations in 
the Caucasus. He was secretary of the Alpine Club 
from 1878 to 1880, vice-president in 1884, and presi- 
dent from 1886 to 1889. He took a large part in 
editing the mountaineering volume of the Badminton 
Library, and was also the author of a volume entitled 
“Above the Snow Line,” published in 1885. 
WE notice with regret the announcement of the 
death, at eighty-six years of age, of Mr. A. Brothers, 
of Manchester, one of the oldest photographers 
value of the collection is between 40,0001. and 45,oo0l. | in England, and the author of several important 
NO. 2235, VOL. 89| 
