Dec. 1 8, 1879] 



NATURE 



169 



Gegcnbaars morphologischcs Jahrbuch, 5 Bd., 4 Heft.— Rein- 

 hold Hensel, on the homologies ai.d varieties of the teeth formula: 

 of some mammals. — Carl Rabl, on the development of the 

 embryi in Planorbis, with Plates 32 to 38, and woodcuts. — A. 

 Rauber on the formation of form and the disturbance thereof 

 during the development of the vertebrata, first section, introductory 

 ■Unarks, Plates 39 to 41. 



Cosmos, November. — Prof. O. Caspari, Darwinism and philo- 

 sophy, with respect to the homonymous writings of Gustav 

 Teichmiiller, of Dorpat. — Baron Dellingshausen, the meta- 

 physical foundation for the mechanical theory of warmth. — 

 Dr. Wernich, on dying and on being killed in the lower forms of 

 life. — Dr. Speyer, protective resemblance in some native insects 

 (end) with woodcuts, communicated by Dr. Fritz M tiller. — On 

 Christian Conrad Sprengel ; being sketches by two of his pupils. 

 — Smaller contributions literary and critical. 



Revue Internationale des Sciences, November 15, contains : — 

 M. Yulpian, introduction to the physiological study of poisons. 

 -—Prof. Donders, on science and the art of medicine, being the 

 introductory address to the International Congress of Physicians 

 held this year at Amsterdam ; this admirable address will well 

 repay perusal. — M. Villot, the experimental method and the 

 positive limits of natural history. — F. Lataste and R. Blanchard, 

 on the peritoneum in Seba's python. — M. Hallez, on the classi- 

 fication and on the phytogeny of the turbellarians. — Proceedings 

 of the Anthropological Society of Paris. — Bibliographical 

 Bulletin. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES 

 London 



Royal Society, November 27. — " On the Changes in Pepsin- 

 forming Glands during Secretion," by J. N. Langley, M.A., 

 Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, and H. Sewall, B.Sc, 

 Fellow of the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, U.S.A. 

 Communicated by Prof. Michael Foster, M.D., F.R.S. 



'J he (Esophageal Glands of the Frog. — In a frog three to four 

 days after food, the alveoli of the oesophageal glands are, in the 

 living state, granular throughout. The outlines of the cells are 

 not visible. 



Shortly after food is given, the granules thin away at the 

 peripheries of the alveoli, and thus render the alveolar outlines 

 more obvious. This thinning proceeds so rapidly that in a few 

 hours there is a well-marked clear zone in the outer part of each 

 alveolus, the part nearest the basement membrane. 



Later the clear zone becomes larger, the granular zone be- 

 coming smaller, but as the clear zone enlarges it ceases to form 

 in section a ring, it dips down into the granular zone at intervals. 



Nuclei are not- seen either in the resting or the digesting gland. 



The points mentioned above as observable in the fresh tissue, 

 can also in the main be observed in glands treated with osmic 

 acid ; the border granules, however, stain more deeply and 

 readily than the central granules. The mucous cells are fewer 

 in the active than in the resting glands ; it is only in the fresh 

 state that they appear granular. 



The granules we consider as stored up cell-products, which, 

 on suffering molecular re-arrangement during the secretion, give 

 rise amongst other substances to the proteid ferment. 



We cannot agree with Nussbaum's view that the depth of 

 staining with osmic acid is a trustworthy index of the amount of 

 ferment present in the cells. On his view, it appears to us, the 

 border, rather than the central, granules should be connected 

 with the ferment. 



The Gastric Glands of the Newt (Triton tceniatus). — In the 

 newt, the glands were observed through the muscular coat of the 

 stomach with a rapid capillary circulation still going on. 



Twenty-four hours after feeding, the glands of the fundus are 

 thickly granular throughout ; about three hours after feeding, 

 the maximal change takes place; it corresponds in the main to 

 that already described for the oesophageal glands of the frog. 



The glands recover their granular appearance comparatively 

 quickly ; in six hours after feeding, the granules have usually 

 again crept up to the periphery ; they then increase in number 

 throughout the cells up to about the twenty-fourth hour. Later 

 than thi> they diminish somewhat ; in six days the peripheries of 

 the glands have become more sparsely populated. 



In Triton cristatus the digestive changes are of the same 

 nature, but much less pronounced. 



The Gastric Glands of Stickleback. — In the gastric glands of 



the hungry fish the granules thin away somewhat from the centre 

 to the periphery ; the lumina are inconspicuous. Three to five 

 hours after feeding, the lumina are much larger, the granules are 

 aggregated about it, leaving a peripheral clear rim, the glands 

 are more unequal in size, some having lost more granules and 

 diminished more in size than others. 



The Gastric Glands of Mammals.— In the glands of the fundus 

 of the stomach of all mammals investigated, viz., dog, cat, rat, 

 and rabbit, the chief cells are, in rest, crowded with conspicuous 

 granules ; the border cells are either without conspicuous granules 

 or are finely granular. 



During digestion the granules in the chief cells diminish. 



The stomach of the rabbit has certain structural peculiarities ; 

 the principal of these is that a large portion of the greater curva- 

 ture contains glands, in which the chief cells are not coarsely 

 granular. The glands of the greater curvature contain scarcely 

 more pepsin than the glands of the smaller curvature and 

 pylorus. But in the smaller curvature and pylorus .there are 

 few if any border cells, whilst there are many in the greater 

 curvature. 



Hence the border cells are not directly connected with the 

 formation of pepsin. 



The glands 1 ■( the fundus contain a very much larger amount 

 of pepsin than the glands of the greater curvature ; that is, 

 where there are coarsely granular chief cells there is a large 

 amount of ferment. 



Further, during digestion the fundus-glands contain less fer- 

 ment than in hunger — a fact observed first by Grutzner — and it 

 is during digestion that the chief cells have fewest granules. 



Hence the conspicuous granules in the chief cells are directly 

 connected with the formation of ferment. 



Since in passing from the fundus to the greater curvature we 

 meet all stages of granularity in the chief cells, and since the 

 chief cells of the greater curvature do not differ in any essential 

 point from the pyloric gland cells, we conclude with Heidenhain 

 that the pyloric gland cells and the chief-cells of the fundus are 

 fundamentally the same. We consider, however, the chief cells 

 of the fundus to be a highly differentiated form of the pyloric 

 gland cells, a form more especially designed for the production 

 of pepsin, and probably other solids of the gastric secretion. 



December n. — "Thermo-Electric Behaviour of Aqueous Solu- 

 tions with Mercurial Electrodes," by G. Gore, LL.D., F.R.S. 



In this research the author has examined, by means of a new 

 form of apparatus, the thermo-electric properties of a number of 

 liquids in relation to mercury. The liquids include those of 

 acid, neutral, and alkaline reaction. The results obtained are 

 arranged in a table or series, with the solution at the top, in 

 which hot mercury was the most positive at 180° F., and that at 

 the bottom, in which it was most negative, the amount of 

 deflection of the galvanometer needle with each solution being 

 stated. 



Another table is also given, in which the solutions are arranged 

 according to the relative degrees of electro-motive force of the 

 currents obtained from them. This series was arrived at by 

 employing two similar apparatus with different solutions in 

 each and ascertaining the difference of strength of their currents 

 by passing the two currents simultaneously in opposite directions 

 through the coils of a differential galvanometer, the amount of 

 difference of deflection produced by each two consecutive pairs 

 being given. 



The results obtained from this research have not revealed any 

 very striking phenomena nor disclosed any relation to chemical 

 action or property, but are reasonably explicable upon the hypo- 

 thesis that the rise of temperature of the liquid is attended by a 

 change of molecular arrangement of the solution, of such a kind 

 as to enable a portion of heat to be converted into an electric 

 current . 



The most peculiar phenomenon observed was, that if a solu- 

 tion of a salt, made with distilled water freed from dissolved air, 

 was divided into two equal parts, one of which had been heated 

 and cooled without loss of water or other constituent, previous 

 to making an experiment, the non-preheated portion gave a 

 stronger current than the other, probably in consequence of a 

 change of molecular arrangement of the solution produced by 

 the heating. The method may therefore be employed for 

 detecting molecular differences in conducting liquids having the 

 same che ical composition. 



In the cla-s of cases in which the differences of molecular 

 arrangement were the least and the currents the most feeble, the 



