Junk 4, i 896] 



NA TURE 



107 



with a knife, and give a clinking sound when shaken to- 

 gether in the hand. They are not affected by soaking in 

 sea-water. 



-V MONOGR.\PH of the Crambidit (or grass moths) of North 

 America, by Dr. C. H. Fernald, was issued by the Massa- 

 chusetts Agricultural College in January of the present year. 

 Much care seems to have been bestowed upon this essay, which 

 extenils to ninety-three pages, and is illustrated by three plates 

 of details, and five coloured plates of quite unusual excellence, 

 as well as occasional woodcuts. 



TnK interesting address on Meteorological Observatories, de- 

 livered by Mr. Richard Inwards before the Royal Meteoro- 

 logical Society, early in this year, is published in the April 

 /oiiriial o( the Society, with illustrations of the Temple of the 

 Winds, Athens, Greenwich Observatory, and Kew Observatory. 

 Mr. Inwards has brought together a large amount of general . 

 information on meteorological observatories in various parts of 

 the world. 



The report of the Marlborough College Natural History 

 .Society for 1S95 ^^^ j"st been issued, and contains numerous 

 articles, not only on local ornithology, entomology, botany and 

 meteorology, but also on archa;ology, astronomy and chemistry. 

 There are also illustrations of Wayland Smith's Cave, and of 

 High Street, Marlborough, after the great storm of June 26, 

 1S95. Times seem to have changed since classics and mathe- 

 matics were regarded as the only subjects worth thinking about 

 at a i^ublic school. 



By order of the Government of Madras, that Observatory has 

 published a valuable series of daily, monthly, and yearly meteoro- 

 logical means, as a supplement to the volumes already issued 

 giving the meteorological observations from 1796 to 1890. 

 They are not intended as a discussion of those observations, but 

 have been prepared specially for use in various offices which issue 

 daily weather charts of Indian regions. The rainfall values 

 e.\tend over eighty years, and the barometrical means over fifty 

 years. 



We have received the nineteenth report of the State Ento- 

 mologist on the noxious and beneficial insects of the State 

 of Illinois. It is the eighth report of S. A. Forbes, for the years 

 1893 ^f' 1894 (1896) ; with a separately issued appendi.x on the 

 Mediterranean Flour Moth (Ephestia ktiehniella, Zell. ) in Europe 

 and America, by W. G. Johnson, Assistant Entomologist. 

 These reports are drawn up in the usual elaborate American 

 manner, and the main report is chiefly devoted to the Chinch 

 Bug (Blissus teucoplertts. Say) and to White Ants, and is 

 illustrated w'ith thirteen plates of a very miscellaneous character 

 in connection with the ravages of these and other insects. Much 

 attention is given in this report to experiments on the dissemina- 

 tion of vegetable parasites among insects. 



The latest number of the Journal of the Asiatic Society of 

 Bengal (vol. Ixiv. part ii. No. 3), contains articles of unusual 

 interest and variety. Neatly three-quarters of the part are taken 

 up with a list of the Butterflies of Sumatra, by Mr. De Niceville 

 and Dr. Martin ; while Messrs. King, Prain and Pantling write 

 on Papaveracea , new orchids from Sikkim, and on anew species 

 oi Kcnanthera. But in addition to these more technical entomo- 

 logical and botanical papers. Surgeon Lieut. -Colonel Ranking 

 writes on artificial immunity to snake venom by inoculation or 

 internal application, in ancient and modern times (compare Prof. 

 Fraser's articles in recent numbers of Nature) ; and Mr. Frank 

 Finn commences a series of contributions to the theory of 

 warning colours and mimicry, by recording his experiments in 

 feeding a Babbler (Craleropus canorus) on protectively-coloured 

 butterflies and other insects. 



NO. 1388, VOL. 54] 



We note the appearance of three new volumes in the extensive 

 series which constitutes the F.ncyclopedie Scientifique des Aide- 

 Memoire, published by MM. Gauthier-Villars and G. Masson^ 

 One is the third volume on " Geometric Descriptive," and it 

 deals with changes of planes of projection, rotations, trihedrons, 

 and polyhedrons. In " Calcul de Temps de Pose en Photo- 

 graphic," by M. H. Boursault, the complex problem of the 

 conditions which affect calculations of the time of exposure is 

 treated in a very satisfactory manner. Scientific photographers 

 will find much exact and serviceable information in M. Bour- 

 sault's little volume. A volume on " Les Tramways," by M. 

 R. Seguela, is an account of methods and materials employed in 

 the construction of tram-lines in France, the United States, 

 Great Britain, and other countries. 



The volumes in Stanford's Compendium of Geography and 

 Travel, now in course of reissue, have been subjected to such, 

 thorough revision and considerably enlargement, that they are 

 practically new books. The work on Asia, for instance, first 

 published in 1882 in one volume of 750 pages, has been expanded 

 into two volumes of about 550 pages each, and the first, dealing 

 with northern and eastern Asia, has just been published by Mr. 

 Stanford. Mr. A. H. Keane is responsible for this volume, and 

 he may be complimented upon the thoroughness with which he 

 has performed his task of revision. If the forthcoming volume 

 on southern and western Asia is as satisfactorily done as the one 

 now published, the whole will form an admirable account of 

 the geography of the Asiatic continent, and one which ac- 

 curately records the results of the important expeditions mad& 

 during the past few years. 



Recent events in the Transvaal have had the eftect of in- 

 creasing the number of visitors to the South African Museum, 

 according to the annual rejxirt of the Trustees ; and this con- 

 nection is borne out by the fact that during January of the 

 present year the number of visitors was 5574, three-fourths of 

 which consisted of country people, while the other fourth con- 

 sisted chiefly of new arrivals and inhabitants of the Cape- 

 Peninsula. Visits from the inhabitants of Cape Town are said 

 to be comparatively rare. Several attempts were made during 

 last year to procure some of the large South African mammals, 

 but the Trustees have not yet been successful in obtaining, 

 specimens of the elephant, giraffe, hippopotamous, &c., to re- 

 place the defective ones in the Museum collection. A number 

 of fossil remains procured by Mr. E. H. L. Schwarz from the 

 Prince Albert district of the colony are being developed by 

 him. Fragments of one of the fossil reptiles have been sent to- 

 Prof. Seeley for development and identification, and the animal 

 has been provisionally named by him Tetracynodon. Reference- 

 is made in the report to the resignation of the Curator, Mr. 

 R. Trimen, and the appointment of Mr. W. L. Sclater as his 

 successor. We notice that on account of the increased require- 

 ments of the new Museum, the buildings of which were takea 

 over by the Trustees at the end of last year, the annual subsidy 

 has been raised from ;^i6oo to £2000. 



We have received the meteorological results of the observa- 

 tions taken at the Bangalore, Mysore, Hassan and Chitaldroog 

 observatories for the years 1S93 and 1S94. The stations were 

 established by the Mysore Government, in accordance with the 

 desire of the Government of India. In addition to the usual 

 tables, the work contains diagrams giving the mean daily and 

 monthly values of the various elements, and a map of the 

 Mysore Province, showing the average annual rainfall for the- 

 twenty-five years (1870-1894). These diagrams exhibit at a 

 glance the nature of the weather changes, much more easily than, 

 could be gathered from a mere collection of figures. They show 

 clearly that the rise of temperature from the cold of January to- 

 the heat of March and April is much more rapid in Mysore than. 



