630 



NA TURE 



[OcTOliKK 29, 1S96 



Various communications and exhibitions followed, amongst 

 which was an account of the occurrence in England of a bird 

 new to the British .Avifauna. This was the, greenish Willow- 

 warbler, Phyllosiopus z'iridanits, Blyth, an inhabitant of North 

 India and Western Asia, which has previously occurred as far 

 west as Heligoland. 



Mr. J. H. (Jreai llEAii, the engineer, who wil be chiefly 

 remembered as the pioneer in the system of tunnelling by means 

 of the shield which boars his name, died on Wednesday, 

 October 21. 



We notice with much regret the announccnKiU of the death 

 of Dr. George Ilarley. Dr. Harley was born on February 12, 

 1829, at Haddington. At the end of his sixteenth year he 

 matriculated as a medical student at the University of Edinburgh, 

 graduating there in 1850. He left Edinburgh in the follow- 

 ing year, and went to Paris to pursue his scientific studies. 

 After two years' residence there he proceeded to dermany, 

 where he continued his studies at the Universities of Wiirzburg, 

 Berlin, Vienna, and Heidelberg, f )n his return to England he 

 became Curator of the Anatomical Museum at University 

 ■College, and subsequently he was appointed to its lectureship 

 on practical physiology and histology. In iSsghe was appointed 

 to the professorship of medical jurisprudence at the College, 

 and shortly afterwards was made physician to University College 

 Hospital. In 1861 he won the triennial prize of fifty guineasi 

 offered by the Royal College of Surgeons, for an essay " On the 

 Anatomy and Physiology of the Supra-Renal Bodies." Up to 

 1863 he had contributed no fewer than twenty-one separate 

 memoirs to science, which fact was recognised by his election into 

 the Royal Society in 1865. He was already at that time a cor- 

 responding member of the Academy of Sciences, of Bavaria, and 

 of the Academy of Medicine, of Madrid. It was Dr. George 

 Harley who proposed what is known as the A. C. E. anaesthetic, 

 a mixture of absolute alcohol, chloroform, and sulphuric ether, 

 in the proportion ; 2 : 3. His suggestion was adopted by 



the Chloroform Committee of the Royal Medico-Chirurgical 

 Society, and soon it became widely accepted as being the safest 

 of any of the known amesthetics. He was the author of several 

 valuable works on medical subjects. 



The opening of a new Pathological Institute at Glasgow is 

 ■reported in the Lancet. The Institute is an addition to the 

 Western Infirmary, and every care has been taken to ensure 

 its adequacy for its purpose. It comprises a large lecture- 

 room, post-mortem laboratory, practical class-room, chemical 

 and bacteriological laboratories, photographic room, and private 

 working rooms in which original researches may be conducted, 

 as well as a large and commodious museum. The total ex- 

 penditure has exceeded ^15,000. At the inaugural ceremony 

 Prof. Gairdner delivered an address on the relation of the study 

 of pathology to the art of medicine and the public health. 

 -Speeches were also delivered by Prof. Coats, Prof. Boyce 

 (Liverpool), Dr. Leith (Edinburgh), Mr. J. G. \. Baird, M.P., 

 and Mr. J. Wilson, M.P. 



The new session of the Royal Geographica Society will 

 open on November 10 with a brief introductory address by the 

 President, Sir Clements Markham, and a description, by Mr. 

 \. Montefiore Brice, of last year's work of the Jackson- Harms- 

 worth ,\rctic Expedition. On November 23, Lieut. \'andeleur 

 •will give a paper on Uganda, Unyoro, and the Upper Nile 

 Region, and on December 7, Colonel J. K. Trotter will describe 

 his journey to the sources of the Niger. Dr. Eridtjof Nansen 

 will give an account of the results of his recent expedition across 

 the North Polar area, at a meeting to be held towards the end of 

 January. Other papers, which may be expected after Christmas, 

 are the following : — Exploration in Spitzbergen, by Sir W. 

 NO. 1409, VOL. 54] 



Martin Conway ; a journey through Senegambia, by Harry 

 W. Lake ; an expedition to the Barotse country, by Ca|)tain 

 h.. .S. Gibbons and his companions, Percy C. Reid and Capiun 

 Berlrand ; the cafions of .Southern Italy, by R. S. Giiniln 1 ; 

 journeys in Tripoli, by H. S. Cowijer ; journeys in Central 

 Asia, by Dr. Sven Hedin ; exploration on the .South of Hudson's 

 Bay, by Dr. Robert Bell. Special meetings will be held in con- 

 nection with the 400th anniversary of the discovery of New- 

 foundland by Cabot, and of the Cape route to India by Vasco 

 da Ciama. Under the joint auspices of the Society and the 

 London University Extension, Mr. H. J. Mackinder is giving 

 a course of twenty-five lectures on the geography of Europe, 

 Asia and Northern -Vfrica, in illustration of the methods and 

 principles of modern geography, at Gresham College, Basing- 

 hall Street, E.C. 



.Si) many popular periodicals now consist entirely of snipjiets, 

 that the public taste for more substantial literature has been 

 impaired. It is, therefore, with no small degree of .satisfaction 

 that we note the counteracting influence of the Daily Chronicle. 

 At the beginning of September that journal published a paper 

 by Dr. Nansen on his .Arctic expedition, and also a det.ailed 

 communication from Captain Sverdrup on the voyage of the 

 /•'ram. The enterprise which secured these interesting narratives 

 is again shown by the announcement that the Daily Chronicle 

 of November 2, 3, and 4, will contain a signed description by 

 Nansen himself of his recent expedition, accompanied by a map 

 of the course of the Frani and of his sledge journey. The 

 narrative will be illustrated by sixteen drawings from photo- 

 graphs. The first part will describe the general plan of the 

 expedition, and the drifting of the Frani in the Polar current ; 

 the second will deal with the journey of Nansen and Johansen 

 from March 1S95 until they met Mr. Jackson ; and the third part 

 will be devoted to the voyage of the Fram after they left 

 her. The articles will thus epitomise the whole of the results 

 of the expedition ; and we are glad that a contribution ol 

 this character will appear in a daily paper appealing to such 

 a wide public as th.at commanded by our very active 

 contemporary. 



The Pasteur Institute of India is now within measurable 

 distance of becoming an accomplished fact. From a report in 

 the Allahabad Pioneer Mail of a meeting of the Council, on 

 September 10, we learn that 70,000 rupees has already been 

 collected in subscriptions from the general public, and it is 

 estimated that with 50,000 rupees more the building might be 

 commenced, equipment provided, and work begun at a very 

 early date. In addition to the contrilnitions referred to, annual 

 subscriptions amounting to 2873 rupees have been promised by 

 well-disposed Municipal and District Boards, and from the purses 

 of private individuals in the Punjab, for the maintenance of the 

 institution ; and if this sum be added to 1500 rupees, i.e. 

 the interest at 3 per cent, on a fund of 50,000 rupees now avail- 

 able for investment, there is already at the disposal of the Body 

 of Control a total annual income of 4373 rupees. The question 

 of a site for the Institute has not yet been settled. The scope of 

 the proposed Institute was described in these columns on 

 September 17 (|). 483). 



Mr. GossELlN, of the British Embassy in Berlin, mentions 

 in a recent report (says the Times) that the question of preserv- 

 ing big game in German East -Africa has been under the con- 

 sideration of the local authorities for some time past, and a 

 regulation has been notified at Dar-es-.Salaam which it is hoped 

 will do something towards checking the wanton destruction of 

 elephants and other indigenous animals. Under this regulation 

 every hunter must take out an annual licence, for which the fee 

 varies from fi\e to 500 rupees, the former being the ordinary fee 

 for natives, the latter for elephant and rhinoceros hunting and 



