Dec. 1 8, 1879] 



NATURE 



163 



he present machinery is transmitting the current. The distance 

 marked on the map of the District Railway between their station 

 at Charing Cross and that at Victoria is 2,383 yards, or i'354 

 mile. The length of wire between the two stations, however, 

 owing to curves and losses necessarily attending the laying, con- 

 necting, and fixing, is about 1 "65 mile. The whole circuit is 

 thus equal to a length of 3 '30 miles. The ten lights are on two 

 circuits, and are maintained by the two spare circuits of the 

 Gramme machine which supplies the ten lights on Waterloo 

 Bridge. The loading wire is similar to that used on the Em- 

 bankment, being a cable of seven strands of No. 19 B. W. G. 

 copper wire, highly insulated. The wires are laid through the 

 tunnel of the railway, being fixed against the walls. There is 

 a switch arrangement at the Victoria Station, so that the lights 

 are started and extinguished on the spot, and are thus locally 

 under control. This new development of electric lighting means 

 something more than that sixty lights are now being successfully 

 maintained from a single engine of twenty horsepower nominal. 

 It means that very considerable distances have been bridged 

 over, and that, other things being equal, the application of elec- 

 tricity for illuminating purposes can be carried to distances from 

 the source of power previously unbelieved in and by some un- 

 thought of. 



Mr. Thomas Fletcher, the well-known maker of scientific 

 apparatus, of Museum Street, Warrington, must be a man of 

 CDnsiderable public spirit, as well as enterprise. From a 

 circular letter he has sent us we learn that a few friends interested 

 iu scientific matters, have decided to meet every Thursday 

 evening for the winter months, at his house, with the object of 

 discussing new or interesting scientific matters. The meetings 

 will be informal, simply a social gathering of those interested in 

 the progress of science. If the movement is appreciated by a 

 larger number than can conveniently be accommodated, the 

 question of forming a scientific club will afterwards be raised. 

 The laboratory will, for the evening, be converted into a smoke 

 room, and any apparatus will be at the service of all. Both 

 these privileges will, we are sure, be largely appreciated. These 

 meetings, Mr. Fletcher is careful to state, will be so arranged as 

 to be little or no cost to himself, ar.d therefore they will, so far 

 as room permits, be open to all interested in matters likely to be 

 brought forward, all being at perfect liberty to come and bring 

 any friends. We heartily wish success to Mr. Fletcher's efforts to 

 foster a love of science in Warrington. 



Various statements have recently been published regarding 

 the probable time of completion of the St. Gothard tunnel ; few of 

 them are correct. OnOct. 31 last, at S. 15 a.m., the boring machine 

 on the northern shle reached the centre of the tunnel at a depth 

 of 7,460 metres. The meeting of the boring machines, however, 

 cannot possibly take place before February next year. At the 

 beginning of November there were still 717 metres of rock to be 

 removed, and 50 metres per week is considered to be a fair 

 average. On October I last the borings were some 261 metres 

 short of the original programme, and on that day only 7,S2I 

 metres (total) of the tunnel were complete (instead of 11,579 

 metre?, as stated in the original programme). A serious obstacle 

 has quite recently been encountered in some soft strata, the 

 enormous pressure of which has up to the present resisted all 

 attempts at successful penetration. The most solid beams are 

 bent like reeds after a little time, and a resistance- wall of 

 I metre thickness was completely crushed. Another of 2 metres' 

 thickness is now being constructed. The boring machine is 

 useless in these strata, and only hand labour can be employed. 



The works for the railway across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec 

 have been commenced. The line will be 150 miles long. 



The director of the zoological station at Trieste, Prof. Claus, 

 of Vienna, has issued a report on the work done at the station 



since its opening in 1S75 up to the end of 1S78. It appears that 

 no less than twenty-two zoologists have worked at the station 

 (including ten Austrians and seven Germans), besides thirty-four 

 students of zoology. Apart from a large number of smaller 

 communications issued by the station, thirty-eight important 

 scientific publications owe their origin to work done at that 

 institution. 



At Magdeburg a grand agricultural exhibition will be held 

 from May 2S to June 6, 1880, in celebration of the fortieth 

 anniversary of the foundation of the Magdeburg Agricultural 

 Society. 



For the International Piscicultural Exhibition which will be 

 opened at Berlin on April 20, 1880, a great number of specimen- 

 collections have been already promised. Complete illustrations 

 of the state of pisciculture in the various countries will be sent 

 from Sweden, Norway, Italy, Holland, China, Japan, Canada, 

 and the Malay Islands. Several crowned heads and the free 

 cities of Hamburg and Bremen will award prizes to the 

 exhibitors. 



The Paris Municipal Council has not yet taken any final 

 decision on the question of gas versus electricity. At all events 

 the Commission will propose to u e Jablochkoff lights for illu- 

 minating the Place de l'Opera, and new experiments will be 

 tried in the green room of the opera for deciding whether the 

 Jablochkoff or Werdermann light will be selected for the interior. 



Details of the Temesvar earthquake of November 21 last 

 are now to hand. It appears that two separate shocks were felt, 

 a violent one at 12.5 a.m., and a weaker one shortly before 

 2 A.M. Numerous chimneys, vaults, cellars, fte., fell in in the 

 town as well as in the surrounding villages. A third shock fol- 

 lowed at 5.45 p.m., and a fourth one a little later. On the 

 following days the shocks continued and were also noticed at 

 Szakalhaza, Vukova, Stamora, Blazsova, Lippa, and other places 

 in the district. 



Two shocks of earthquake are reported from Switzerland : 

 one at Geneva on December 4, at 5.34 P.M., Greenwich mean 

 time ; the other at Berne, Bale, Aarau, and Schaffhausen, on 

 December 5, at 2.32 p.m. 



Many of our readers will be glad to know that Messrs. 

 Macmillan and Co. have published a translation of Pasteur's 

 " Etudes sur la Biere," under the title of "Studies on Fermenta- 

 tion," by Messrs. Frank Faulkner and D. Constable Robb. The 

 original work we noticed at length in Nature, vol. xv. pp. 213, 

 249. 



A dangerous and infectious disease among bees is reported 

 from Italy. It is caused by a microscopical fungus, and spreads 

 with alarniing rapidity. However, winter is not a favourable 

 season for its propagation, and salicylic acid solution is said to 

 be an infallible remedy against the_discase. 



In the course of some excavations now going on in the bed of 

 the Rhone, near Geneva, many interesting objects, assigned by 

 archaeologists to the age of polished stone, have been brought to 

 light, the most curious of which is a scraper of jade, highly 

 finished, and in a condition as perfect as when it left the hands 

 of the workman. The question arises, the Times correspondent 

 states, and is being warmly discussed by the learned in lacustrine 

 lore, how this imtrument, made of a mineral which exists in a 

 natural state only in Asia, can have found its way into the Rhone 

 gravel at Geneva. Was jade ever an article of trade between 

 the West and the East in prehistoric times, or is this scraper a 

 iolitary specimen brought by Aryan wanderers from the cradle of 

 their race on the Hindoo Koosh ? As yet no satisfactory solu- 

 tion of the problem has been suggested. 



