October 7, 1922 



NA TURE 



1 



an entirely new field for research by botanists, and 

 it is probable that it may have an important bearing 

 on the problem of fruit and vegetable transport and 

 storage. 



An account of the experiments undertaken to 

 illustrate the above will be published in due course. 

 I. B. Pole Evans. 

 Mary Pole Evans. 

 Office of the High Commissioner for the 



Union of South Africa, 

 Trafalgar Square, London, September 22. 



Coral in Medicine. 



In the serious contributions published in recent 

 issues of Nature on the subject of black coral, no 

 one seems to have remembered that in the " Medicin 

 malgre lui " Moliere makes Sganarelle offer a medicinal 

 cheese to Perrin for his mother, thus : 



P. Dii fromage, monsieur ? 



S. Oui ; c'est un fromage prepare, oii il entre de 

 Tor, du corail et des perles, et quantite d'autres choses 

 precieuses. 



And Sganarelle's last words are, " Si elle meurt, ne 

 manquez pas de la faire enterrer du mieux que vous 

 pourrez." F. Jeffrey Bell. 



September 20. 



Biography of Sir Norman Lockyer. 



Miss Lockyer and I are preparing a biography of 

 my husband. Sir Norman Lockyer, in a form which 

 I hope will make it not only of interest to his many 

 friends and admirers, but also a contribution to the 

 scientific literature of the present day. If any 

 readers of Nature happen to possess letters from my 

 husband, I should be greatlv obliged if they would 

 give me the opportunity of seeing them. My object 

 in making this request is that anv matters of general 

 interest which thereby come to light might be incor- 

 porated in the work. 



The letters would not be quoted, except with the 

 permission of their owners, and would be returned as 

 soon as their contents had been noted. 



T. Mary Lockyer. 



Salcombe Regis, Sidmouth, 

 September 22. 



Harpoons under Peat at Holderness, Yorks. 



At the recent meeting of the British Association 

 at Hull there w-as a very lively discussion at Section 

 H about some harpoons said to have been found under 

 peat in Holderness. May I ask you to be so good 

 as to spare a little space, in order that I may say 

 more fullv what time prevented me from saying 

 then ? 



There is a doubt about the authenticity of those 

 harpoons. Mr. T. Sheppard believes them to have 

 been made by the supposed finder ; Mr. A. L. 

 Armstrong, who introduced them to the meeting, 

 believes them to be genuine. I also believe one of 

 them to be genuine, the smaller of the two ; about 

 the other I am not so sure. But I expressed no 

 opinion as to whether, if genuine, they were found 

 locally or not, since I have no means of forming 

 an opinion. It is possible that they — or the smaller 

 of the two — were found in archaeological excavations 

 abroad ; and a fictitious site in Yorkshire given to 

 them later to enhance their interest. 



Mr. Sheppard quite rightly says that the discovery 



of a flint axe of a certain type " in the neighbourhood " 

 proves nothing. But I understood that it was found 

 under a depth of peat. In type it is Campignian, 

 exactly what one would expect to find associated 

 with harpoons of early neolithic type. 



There can be little doubt that in Holderness exist 

 remains of the early neolithic age, remains- which are 

 older than the Long Barrows. Apart from surface- 

 finds, the pile-dwellings or platforms at Ulrome are 

 evidence of the existence of habitations there which 

 seem to be neolithic ; they contained stag's-horn 

 axes of a well-known early neolithic type — though it 

 is true that type survived right through the neolithic 

 period on the continent. There is thus no a priori 

 reason for rejecting the harpoons ; they are just 

 what I have always expected would be found in 

 Holderness. 



However, we cannot use suspect material as 

 evidence, and the best thing to do is to go into the 

 field and test it. If Mr. Armstrong will find a site 

 where flint flakes and implements are to be found 

 under the peat in sufficient numbers to justify 

 digging, I will come and bring a spade with me. 



O. G. S. Crawford. 



Ordnance Survey Office, Southampton, 

 September iS. 



A Curious Luminous Phenomenon. 



I hesitate to trespass on your space in describing 

 an observation which may be more common than 

 I suppose. 



While standing about twenty yards from the sea- 

 shore and looking due south out to sea, the horizon 

 and a region slightly above it (elevation only about 

 1° or 2°) were lit up by a faint white light which 

 extended laterally over a segment subtending an 

 angle of about 30 . 



The conditions under which this light was seen 

 were as follows : Time, 7.15 p.m. ; wind strong from 

 the west, bringing up a good deal of low cloud and 

 very fine rain in the air causing bad visibility ; sea 

 rather rough with four lines of breakers at the shore. 

 The appearances of the light were not the same to 

 my wife as to mvself. Her impression of it was that 

 it was a light which she saw only if her eyes followed 

 it, yet it consisted of a long streak of light parallel to 

 the horizon with a break in it and then another 

 small streak. My impression was that of a light 

 which appeared to flash up over the horizon, sub- 

 tending the angles already noted, the flashes not 

 succeeding each other regularly. I had the feeling 

 that my eyes had to be just right for getting the 

 impression at all. 



As to the cause, I think we can eliminate that of 

 distant lightning ; the weather had not been for 

 many days of a thundery type, and it is unlikely 

 that distant flashes would light up a streak of the 

 distant sky embracing such a wide lateral angle and 

 yet be restricted to an elevation of not more than 2°. 



The sky above the horizon was darkly and uni- 

 formly clouded at the time, so that the horizon was 

 barely visible, but white-capped waves could be 

 seen far out at sea. The brightest objects in the 

 field of view were the lines of breakers at the shore, 

 and it may be that the retinal images of these being 

 very near to that of the horizon were the cause of 

 the phenomenon. Perhaps some readers of Nature 

 are familiar with this sort of observation and will point 

 to the obvious cause. S. R. 



Aldwick, Sussex, 



September 16. 



NO. 2762, VOL. I IO] 



