Mar. 19, 1 8 74 J 



NATURE 



395 



of Dumont, the district referred to contains scarcely half that 

 number. — Several mathematical notes are given, and there is a 

 description of three additions to the synopsis of Calopterygines, 

 by M. Longchamps. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES 



London 



Royal Society, March 12. — " Contributions to the Develop- 

 mental History of the MoUusca, Sections I., II., III., IV." 

 By E. Ray Lankester, M. A., Fellow of Exeter College, Oxford. 

 Communicated by G. RoUeston, F.R.S., Linacre Professor of 

 Anatomy and Physiology in the University of Oxford. 



The points of greatest interest to which the author draws atten- 

 tion in tlie present memoir are : — 



1. The explanation of the basket-work structure of the surface 

 of the ovarian egg, by the plication of the inner egg-capsule. 



2. The increase of the yelk by the inception of cells pro- 

 liferated from the inner egg-capsule. 



3. The homogeneous condition of the egg at fertilisation. 



4. The limitation of yelk-cleavage to the cleavage-patch. 



5. The occurrence of independently-formed corpuscles (the 

 autoplasts) which take part in the formation of the blastoderm. 



6. The primitive eye-chamber formed by the rising up of an 

 oval wall, and its growing together so as to form a roof to the 

 chamber. 



7. The origin of the otocysts by invagination. 



8. The rythmic contractility of a part of the wall of the yelk- 

 sac. 



g. The disappearance of the primitive mouth, and the develop- 

 ment of a secondary mouth. 



10. The development of a pair of ilarge nerve-ganglia by in- 

 vagination of the epiblast immediately below the primitive eye- 

 chambers. 



"The Localisation of Function in the Brain," by David 

 Ferrier, M.A., M.R.C.P., Professor of Forensic Medicine, 

 King's College, London. Communicated by J. Burdon Sander- 

 son, F.R.S., Professor of Practical Physiology in University 

 College. 



The chief contents of this paper are the results of an experi- 

 mental investigation tending to prove that there is a localisation 

 of function ni special regions of the cerebral hemispheres. 



Anthropological Institute, March 10. — Prof. George Busk, 

 F.R.S., president, in the chair. A paper, by Dr. A. P. Reid, 

 was read, " On the mixed or half-breed Races of North-Western 

 Canada." The mixed races were nine in number, viz. the 

 progeny of (i) the Anglo-Saxon father and Indian mother, (2) 

 the French and French-Canadian father and Indian mother, 

 (3) the Anglo-Saxon father and mixed Anglo-Saxon and Inijian 

 mother, (4) the French father and mixed French and Indian 

 mother, (5) the "half-breed " Anglo-Saxon and Indian as father 

 and mother, (6) the " half-breed " French and Indian as father 

 and mother, (7) the descendants proceeding from intermarriage 

 of 5th class, (8) the descendants proceeding from intermarriage 

 of 6th class, (9) the mixed or "half-breed" father and Indian 

 mother. Those nine divisions included the principal mass of tlie 

 mixed peoples of Manitoba. The French and Anglo-Saxons and 

 their descendants rarely intermarried. The author pointed out 

 the marked change in physique, which was common to all the 

 classes he had enumerated, that quickly followed the removal of 

 Europeans to American soil. The complexion becomes swarthier 

 and more nearly resembling the type of native Americans than 

 one would suppose. That change was due to climatic influences, 

 to different food, and to altered customs. On the whole, there 

 was a tendency, in all the mixed races, to the Indian rather than 

 to the European type. They could not be said to possess any 

 objectionable peculiarities ; they were not more inclined to the 

 abuse of alcohol or to other irregularities than the pure whites ; 

 and it would be difficult to find a people who have fe\\er faults. 

 Some of the families of the pure while and pure Indian were 

 often very numerous, sometimes reaching the number ol fifteen ; 

 but four to six was the average. — A paper, by the Rev. George 

 Taplln was read, "On the mixed races of Australia and their 

 migrations." The author's deductions were made chiefly from 

 linguistic data. He however recorded the fact of having met 

 with some individuals ol the Narrinyeri tribe who had liL'ht com- 

 plexions and straight hair. He found also that among the 

 Narrinyeri there were superstitions and customs identical, even 

 in name, with those obtaining among the Samoans. — Commander 

 Teller, R.N., communicated notes on the discovery of burial 



grounds near Tiflis in Georgia. In one of the graves were found 

 parts of a body that had undoubtedly been interred in a sitting 

 posture. The skud of an adult was remarkably distorted, and 

 bore a striking resemblance to the longest form of the Titicacan 

 skulls of South America. — A paper by Miss A. W. Buckland " On 

 the Serpent, in connection with primitive metallurgy," was also 

 read. 



Royal Horticultural Society, March 4. — General Meeting. 

 —Lieut. -Gen. Hon. Sir A. H. Gordon, K.C.B., in the chair.— 

 The Rev. M. J. Berkeley commented on some of the plant.' 

 shown. They included Encholirion coiaUmiim, a curious Bro- 

 meliaceous plant from Brazil, a fine species of Medinilla probably 

 new, and the beautiful Iris nikiilata, which, though a native of 

 Persia, proved quite hardy in this country. 



Scientific Committee. — Dr. Hooker, C.B., P.R.S., in the 

 chair.— The Rev. M. J. Berkeley called attention to the follow- 

 ing communication made by Prof. Panceri to the Institut 

 Egyptien .at its meeting on December 13, on Cryptogamic vegeta- 

 tion found within the egg of an ostrich, which was interesting in 

 conneciion with what he had himself brought before the committee 

 on March 5 and 19, 1873. The egg had been given Prof. Panceri 

 at Cairo, and was still fresh, the air space having not even been 

 formed. Hesoon, however, noticed theappearance of dark blotches 

 within the shell, and having broken it open to ascertain the 

 cause, he found that they were produced by the growth of minute 

 fungi. Instances of a similar kind had already been studied by 

 him, and he had communicated the results to the Botanical Con- 

 gress held at Lugano in 1859. The Rev. M. J. Berkeley had 

 found Cladospormm herbaram in the interior of a fowl's egg. — 

 Dr. Masters brought shoots of Picea nobilis, in which the pri- 

 mary shoot was dead and swollen beneath the apex. In many 

 instances he had found similar excrescences to contain the larva 

 of an insect. In other cases the primary cause of injury appeared 

 to be frost or cutting east winds. — Dr. Masters exhibited some 

 peas which had been attacked by a beetle {Bvuchus pisi) which 

 fed on the cotyledonary portion, but left the plumule, so that the 

 seeds still germinated. — Dr. Masters reported on the monstrous 

 Cyclamen which had been reierred to liim at the last meeting. 

 The apparent coroUine wliorl in the Primulacece is now regarded 

 as an outgrowth from the andrcecium. In the present case tliere 

 appeared to be a supplementary staminal whorl alternating with 

 the normal one, and therefore with its members opposite to the 

 sepals. These members, however, had become partially petaloid, 

 and were rolled up, so that the whole flower had a superficial 

 resemblance to a case of lateral prolification. — Mr. Grote stated 

 that Mr. F. Moore, of the Indian Museum, agrees with Prof. 

 Westwood, and refers the Assam Tea-bug to tlie genus Hdopii- 

 tis of the Capsida;. A Ceylon species of this bug is figured by 

 Signoret in the Ann. Soc. Entom, de France, 3rd series, pi. 12, 

 fig. 2. Two other species are known from the Indian Archi- 

 pelago. The Indian species described by Mr. Peal, differs from 

 the Ceylon species in its habit of feeding on the ji.ice of the tea- 

 plant ; and Mr. Moore proposes to call it H. t/:--hora. — Prof. 

 Thiselton Dyer read the following extract from a let. :i from Mr. 

 James Caldwell, Port Louis, Mauritius : — " I would 'pecially 

 call your attention to a case in which the ribbon cane has sorted 

 into a green cane and a red cane from the same head. I . 1 ' at 

 least 200 instances of it in the same plantation, and the faci 1. s 

 completely upset all our preconceived ideas of the dlffereuc^ • 

 colour being permanent. The conversion of a striped cane into 

 a green cane was not uncommon, but the change into a red cane 

 universally disbelieved, and that both events should occur in the 

 same plant incredible. I find, however, in Fleischman's ' Re- 

 port on Sugar Cultivation in Louisiana for 1S48,' published by 

 the American Patent Office, tlie circumstance mentioned, but he 

 says he never saw it himself." — In the report of the meeting for 

 Feb. II (Nature, vol. ix. p. 354) the word "gabsy " in line I2 

 should be omitted. 



Mathematical Society, March 12. — Dr. Hirst, F.R.S., 

 president, in the chair. — The following papers were read ; — On 

 certain constructions for bicircular quantics, and On a geometrical 

 interpretation of the equations obtained by equating to zero the 

 resultant and the discriminant of two binary quantics, by Prof. 

 Cayley. — On the Cartesian equation of the circle which cuts 

 three given circles at given angles, by J. Griffiths. — On another 

 system of porisiic equations, by Prof. Wolstenholme. 



Edinburgh 



Royal Physical Society, Feb. 25. — Dr. John Alex. 



Smith, president, in the chair. — On a New Mode of Esti- 



