July 9, 1874] 



NATURE 



»95 



by the Rev. Dr. Campion, or the Rev. G. Pirie, Tutors of the 



College. 



The first number of a new journal, which promises to be an 

 important organ on an important subject, appeared on Saturday 

 last. The Sanitary Record, a weekly journal of public health, 

 proposes for its object, to collect and digest information relating 

 to the health of the people, now much scattered, and therefore 

 in a condition much less available for reference and study than 

 it might be. It is also to contain original papers in which sani- 

 tary points are discussed in their scientific, social, and legislative 

 aspects ; together with reviews of the r.ritish and foreign litera- 

 ture of the subject. The staff of contributors includes names of 

 many who hold the highest scientilic position, and who are well 

 known as authorities on hygienic matters. Miss Octavia Hill 

 and several other ladies are also included ; a paper by Miss 

 Beale, Principal of the Cheltenham College for Ladies, appearing 

 in the first number, while others are promised shortly by Miss 

 Stanley, Miss Hill, and Mrs. E. Maurice. We are convinced 

 that this new journal will fill a gap which has existed for some 

 time ; and, from the introductory number before us, we think 

 that no one will have reason to complain of the manner in which 

 it has been organised and started. 



Prof. O. C. Marsh, of Yale College, has directed atten- 

 tion, at a recent meeting of the Connecticut Academy of Arts 

 and Sciences, to the peculiarly diminished capacity of the brain- 

 case in some of the Tertiary mammalia of North America. This 

 is most marked in the Eocene genus Dinoceras, an animal which 

 must have been nearly as bulky as a full-sized elephant, and yet 

 its brain could not have been more than one-eighth the average 

 bulk of that in the Indian rhinoceros. In the Miocene Bronto- 

 therium the brain-case was considerably large proportionately ; 

 and in the Pliocene Mastodon bigger still. These facts have an 

 important bearing on the evolution of mammals, and open an 

 interesting field for further investigation. 



An important addition to ornithological literature has just ap- 

 peared in the form of Mr. Sharpe's " Catalogue of the Birds in 

 the British Museum," of which the first volume, comprising the 

 Accipitres, or Raptorial birds, is before us. 



We believe that at a recent meeting of the Council of the 

 Zoological Society it was' determined that a new building, on a 

 large and much improved scale, should be commenced next 

 spring and completed during the summer, to contain the lions, 

 tigers, and other large feline animals. 



The Senate of the University of London, at a meeting on 

 July I, adopted the following amendment by 17 votes to 10 on 

 a proposal to obtain a new charter enabling the University to 

 confer degrees on women: — " That the Senate is desirous to 

 extend the scope of the educational advantages now offered to 

 women, but it is not prepared to apply for a new charter to admit 

 women to its degrees." 



The welbknown German ethnologist. Dr. A. Bastian, is about 

 to publish a work with maps and illustrations, giving the results 

 o f the German expedition to the coast of Loango. 



M. Leverrier has asked for an authorisation to attend or to 

 send a representative to the Maritime Congress, the programme 

 of which we gave in a recent number. 



The comet is beginning to attract the notice of the general 

 public. Telescopes are let on hire in several parts of Paris 

 to get a view of it. 



The balloon of the Observatory of Paris is undergoing repairs 

 under the superintendence of M. W. de Fonvielle. It will be 

 used by him in making ascents in order to verify the law of 

 barometric pressure calculated by Laplace. Trigonometrical 



measures will be taken of the balloon by the astronomer of the 

 Paris Observatory. The balloon is a silk one worth 1,600/., 

 which was built during the war and was used for making captive 

 ascents by the armk de la Loire. It is to be called the Neptune. 



Scientific ascents are becoming numerous in Paris. Last 

 Friday a balloon was sent up from La Villette gasworks to try 

 an apparatus invented by M. Jules Godard to ascertain whether 

 the balloon is descending or ascending. The motor of the 

 apparatus is a large horizontal disc, which is pushed by air 

 pressure and puts in motion an electrical signal. The contrivance 

 is rather heavy and bulky, and the rate of motion gives no 

 idea of the numerical value of the movement. 



We take the following' from the Academy: — "Some of the 

 American papers state that Prof Huxley is likely to be the suc- 

 cessor of Prof. Agassiz, at Harvard. We hope there is no truth 

 in this. Are the English Universities so rich in really eminent 

 professors, and so poor in money, that they can or must allow 

 Prof. Huxley to go to America in order to find leisure for work ? 

 It would require nothing but the will for either Oxford or Cam- 

 bridge to offer Huxley two or three thousand a year, without 

 anybody suffering for it. There are hundreds of non-resident 

 Fellows, doing no good to the University, doing harm to them- 

 selves in resting on their oars, when they ought to be pulling 

 with all their might. Why not give five or ten such Fellowships 

 to men like Huxley, and make the Universities again what they 

 were in the middle ages, the very centres of intellectual force 

 and light in the country ? The Universities are so rich that they 

 could beggar the whole world. Will they allow themselves to 

 be beggared by Harvard?" 



The first number of the Linguist and Educational Review, a 

 monthly journal devoted to language, antiquities, science, and 

 education, has appeared ; its object is the popular treatment of 

 the various branches of ethnology, folk-lore, and kindred sub- 

 jects. This first number contains an interesting article on practi- 

 cal education, in which the wider use of the natural sciences in 

 schools is advocated and the disproportionate amount of time 

 spent on the study of the classics deprecated. It also con- 

 tains several other interesting articles in ethnology, &c. We 

 gladly note that the editor intends to give a portion of space 

 monthly to the proceedings and papers of local scientific societies. 



At the General Monthly Meeting of the Royal Institution, on 

 Monday, the Secretary reported that Lady Fellows, the widow 

 of Sir Charles Fellows, who was long a member and frequently 

 a manager of the Royal Institution, had bequeathed to the 

 Institution her drawings of Sir Charles's celebrated collection of 

 watches, bequeathed to the British Museum. 



Arrangements have been concluded between the proprietors 

 of the Daily Telegraph and Mr. Bennett, proprietor of the Neiu 

 York Herald, under which an expedition will at once be de- 

 spatched to Africa, with the objects of investigating and reporting 

 upon the haunts of the slave-traders, of pursuing the discoveries 

 of Dr. Livingstone, and of completing if possible the remaining 

 problems of Central African geography. This expedition has 

 been undertaken by and will be under the sole command of 

 Mr. Henry M. Stanley. 



At the fortieth Annual Meeting of the Statistical Society, held 

 on June 30, the report showed an increase of seventy-six Fellows 

 in the year ending December 31, 1873. By consequence, the 

 financial state of the Society is satisfactory, the surplus of assets 

 over liabilities being 2,508/. Dr. Guy was re-elected president. 



Ir was reported last week that the cable steamer Faraday (see 

 Nature, vol. x. p. 64) had struck on an iceberg off Halifax 

 and became a total wreck. Happily this rumour has been 

 proved to be without foundation. 



