484 



NA TURK 



[September 17, 1908 



and steel industries during tlie past quarter of a century, 

 that is, since tlie previous visit of the institute to Middles- 

 brough in 1883. The paper promised by Messrs. J. E. 

 Stead and T. Westgarth is to be held over until the next 

 inceting'. 



Prof, vos Levden, of Berlin, and Prof. Czerny, of 

 Heidelberg, have been elected, respectively, honorary presi- 

 dent and president of the International Association for 

 the Investigation of Cancer, which was founded at Berlin 

 in May last. 



.\ccoRDiXG to the Lancet, Prof. Kramer, senior staff- 

 surgeon in the German Navy, has been appointed to the 

 charge of the scientific expedition now being fitted out 

 for the .Antarctic Ocean. 



The publication of a monthly bulletin intended for the 

 information of 'ocal health authorities and others interested 

 in public-health work, and to keep them in touch with 

 what is going on at headquarters, and in Western 

 Australia as a whole, has been begun by the Department 

 of State Medicine and Public Health of Western .'\ustralia. 

 The body immediately responsible for its publication is 

 the Central Board of Health, the president of which is 

 Dr. T. D. Lovegrove. 



To mark the completion of the fiftieth year of the 

 existence of the Geologists' .Association, it is proposed to 

 issue a volume dealing with the geology of the districts 

 of England and Wales visited by the association since its 

 foundation. The work, which will be edited by Messrs. 

 H. W. Monckton and R. S. Herries, will be illustrated 

 by maps and sections, and be ready for publication, it is 

 hoped, before the end of the present year. Orders for 

 eopies should be sent to the secretary of the association. 



-According to information received from Copenhagen, 

 experiments in high-speed wireless telegraphy have recently 

 been carried out by Mr. Poulsen, the Danish engineer. 

 The experiments, which were conducted between the 

 stations at Lyngby, near Copenhagen, and Esbjerg, on 

 the west coast of Jutland, are declared to have resulted 

 in the transmission of about loo words per minute, and 

 the inventor calculates that he will soon succeed in tele- 

 graphing 150 words a minute. It is added that the trials 

 will, in the immediate future, be continued between 

 Lyngby and Tynemouth, and new stations are being 

 erected on the west coast of Ireland and in Canada, 

 between which the high-speed system is to be employed. 



* The recently issued report of the chief sanitary ofBcer 

 of Cuba regarding the destruction of the mosquito in the 

 isUind is most encouraging. The town of Palmira, where 

 yellow fever occurred as lately as January of this year, 

 has been so thoroughly cleaned that in a recent inspection 

 not a single deposit of larvae was found in 112 houses 

 examined. Similar good results have been secured in 

 other provinces. In zones once noted for the prevalence 

 of yellow fever the Stegomyire have been reduced below 

 the yellow-fever limit. In Havana mosquito breeding is 

 practically at an end, as a breeding place was found in 

 only one house in 450 inspected, and of these considerably 

 less than one-half were found to be Stegomyiae. 



.According to the annual report for 1907, a radical 

 change has been inaugurated in the administration of the 

 Marine Biological Association for the West of Scotland, 

 and financial matters have, it is hof>ed, been placed on a 

 more satisfactory footing. The committee has also ex- 

 pressed its intention of running the institution on strictly 

 scientific lines, the systematic survey of the Clyde area 

 being one of the first subjects for investigation. 

 NO. 2029, VOL. 78] 



The summer of 1908 will, we learn from the September 

 number of the Entomologists' Monthly Magazine, stand 

 as a good year for clouded yellows, this being the first 

 season since 1904 that this erratic butterfly has made its 

 appearance in considerable numbers in the Isle of Sheppey. 

 Most of the specimens taken were males, and all were in 

 fine condition and colour. Pale clouded yellows have not 

 been seen in Sheppey since 1902. 



In the Irish Naturalist for September Prof. G. H. 

 Carpenter records two species of spring-tails (CoUembola) 

 as new to the British fauna. One of these was observed 

 on a crop of tobacco, the cultivation of which has probably 

 led to a great increase in the numbers of these minute 

 insects. In the same issue a small gephyrean worm 

 (Petalostoma minutum), typically from the Normandy 

 coast, has been added to the Irish fauna. In No. 15 of 

 the first volume' of Economic Proceedings of the Royal 

 Dublin Society (may we venture to call this a distinctly 

 Hibernian title?) Prof. Carpenter gives an account of the 

 injurious insects, &c., observed in Ireland during 1907. 

 The fact of the caterpillar of the common rustic moth 

 (Apamea didyina) feeding within the sheath-leaves of oats 

 and barley appears to constitute a new record. A saw-fly 

 (Nematus maculiger), hitherto known as feeding — in the 

 larval state — on willow, has been detected in Ireland on 

 larch, but beyond this there is little in the way of novelty 

 in the year's account. 



The Museums Journal for August contains an editorial 

 article on recent correspondence in connection with the 

 British Museum (Natural History), and the deputation to 

 the Prime Minister on the same subject. The author of 

 the article shares Mr. .Asquith's inability to realise the 

 shortcomings of the Museum referred to by the deputa- 

 tion, and adds that an inquiry into the working of that 

 institution is not likely to be granted so long as criticism 

 is based on purely theoretical considerations. It is sug- 

 gested, however, that the trustees should include more 

 men with a practical knowledge of museum work. 

 " Eminence in certain branches of natural science," it is 

 added, " does not necessarily fit a man to govern a great 

 museum any more than does eminence in law or in 

 tlicology." 



Christopher Merrett (1614-1695) forms the subject of 

 the third part of " Early British Ornithologists," which 

 appears in the September number of British Birds. 

 Merrett, it appears, was the author of a work entitled 

 " Pinax [= a list, or index] Rerum . . . Britannicarum," 

 published in London in 1666, which contains a list of the 

 birds of the country. Although extremely meagre, this 

 list was the first attempt of its kind published. 



In Biologisclies Centralblatt of August 15 Mr. O. 

 Lehmann brings to a conclusion his interesting account 

 of " scheinbar lebende Kristalle,'' in which he claims to 

 have observed representatives of pseudopodia, cilia, and 

 muscles. 



It was reported by the Departmental Committee on 

 Irish Forestry that the amount of land in Ireland avail- 

 able for forestry purposes is much less than is generally 

 supposed. This is explained by Mr. A. C. Forbes in an 

 article communicated to Irish Gardening (September). 

 He advocates the establishment of nurseries by county 

 councils to grow trees suitable for road-side planting, and 

 for supply to farmers, who may be encouraged to help 

 towards increasing the timber area in the country. 



It is more than ten years since the disease known as 

 root disease of sugar-cane was referred to the basidio- 

 mycetous fungus Marasmius sacchari ; the fungus has 



