5 °o 



NATURE 



[March 25, 1880 



funds, Mr. Bell was completely successful in his object. 

 Up to nearly the close of his long life he was in the habit 

 of coming to town to attend the anniversary meetings of a 

 society of which he may almost be called the second 

 founder. 



In 1 866 Mr. Bell purchased The Wakes, Selborne, 

 from the grand-nieces of Gilbert White, and the last 

 twenty years were spent by him there in peaceful retire- 

 ment, but not in idleness. Giving up systematic scientific 

 work, as well as professional practice, he devoted the long 

 evening of his life to observation in the field, especially 

 of birds and plants, and to the reverent study of the life 

 and labours of the famous historian of his adopted home. 

 Only three years ago, at the age of eighty-five, he pub- 

 lished an edition of the "Natural History of Selborne," 

 which may safely be said to be by far the best of the 

 numerous issues of that classic work. 



In his Hampshire retreat, as in the heat and bustle of 

 metropolitan life, Mr. Bell retained all the charm of 

 manner and fine qualities both of heart and mind, which 

 endeared him to all who had the privilege of knowing 

 him ; and up till very recently his robust health enabled 

 him to bear the weight of years lightly as an honour 

 rather than a burden. Under Gilbert White's roof-tree 

 he died peacefully on Saturday, the 13th instant. By his 

 death the scientific world seems to have lost one of its 

 last links with a generation of good and faithful workers 

 whose labours are too apt to be overlooked in the stir 

 and struggle of controversies of the day. 



NOTES 



We continue this week, by the courtesy of General Myer, cm- 

 monthly series of Meteorological Charts for the Northern 

 Hemisphere, compiled by the U.S. Signal Office. The present 

 map shows the mean pressure, temperature, force, and direction 

 of wind for June, 1S78. To meteorologists the lessons of the 

 chart will he plain ; the next one which we issue we hope to 

 accompany by an article explanatory of the purposes and utility 

 of the whole series. 



After Easter the Royal Society is to meet at half-past four in 

 the afternoon instead of half-past eight in the evening. 



The keepership of the mineralogical department of the 

 British Museum has become vacant by the resignation of Prof. 

 Story-Maskelyne, F.R.S., who is a candidate for the represen- 

 tation of Cricklade in the new Parliament. 



The work of casting the lenses of the great refracting telescope 

 of the Paris Observatory has already begun at Feil's establish- 

 ment. The founding of the flint disc has taken five days, and 

 the annealing a full month. A like operation will soon take 

 place for the Bishofsheim Observatory instrument. 



The Melbourne Argus says :— " The Count de Castelnau, 

 for many years French Consul at Melbourne, died yesterday 

 (February 4) at his residence, Apslcy-place, East Melbourne. 

 The deceased gentleman was an ardent student of natural 

 history, and had pursued his studies in the various parts of the 

 v. rid whither his official duties led him. He was director of the 

 Scientific Expedition sent by Louis Philippe, the King of the 

 French, to South America, and was afterwards French Consul 

 in divers parts of the southern hemisphere. While at the Cape 

 of Good Hope he wrote a " Memoire sur les Poissons de l'Afrique 

 Australe." When he returned to Europe and began to put his 

 voluminous notes in order, he made the disheartening discovery 

 that while he had been temporarily disabled his servant had been 

 for more than a month in the habit of using the sheets of paper 

 on which he had bestowed so much time and labour to light the 

 fires. He disposed of the remainder of his notes and drawings 

 to Prof. Lacordaire, and about 1862 arrived in Melbourne, where 



he has since resided. Count Castelnau was an active member 

 of the Zoological and Acclimatisation Society of Victoria. He 

 contributed several valuable papers on the fishes of Australia, 

 which have been published by the Society, and are recognised by 

 naturalists as woiks of authority on the subject." 



The American Philosophical Society of Philadelphia, the 

 oldest scientific society in America, celebrated the one hundredth 

 anniversary of its incorporation by a public dinner at the St. 

 George Hotel, on March 15. The Society was founded May 25, 

 1743, and incorporated March 15, 1780. 



An American correspondent writes that on March 30 and 31 

 the ninth annual meeting of the American Fish Cultural Association 

 takes place. This association is by no means local in its character, 

 but has extended fish culture all over the United States. It was 

 through its exertions that the Government was induced to form the 

 U.S. Fish Commis^on, with the secretary of the Smithsonian at 

 its head. Among the members of the Association are found 

 most of the leading icthyologists in the United States, with all 

 of the Canadian officers who have Her Majesty's Provincial 

 Fisheries under their charge. 



A telephonic line has been formed between the meteoro- 

 logical station on the Pic du Midi and Bagneres-de-Bigorre (30 

 kilometres distance). General de Nansouty writes in hi_,h terms 

 of the Edison telephone, which he is using. 



The Observatory at Mannheim has been removed to 

 Karlsruhe. 



The Vesuvius railway from the observatory to the crater will 

 be opened in April. 



A correspondent of La Nature sends that paper a photo- 

 graph of a curious phenomenon met with in the cold of December 

 last. It shows a bottle which contained a solution of nitrate of 

 silver (1 per cent.). The cork isforced out and imprisoned at the 

 extremity of a long cylinder of ice, due to increase of the volume 

 of the mass in freezing. The bottle was also cracked, and 

 several pieces detached. 



The cold room established by Tellier at the Conservatoire des 

 Arts et Metiers for the fabrication of standard metres and kilo- 

 grammes on behalf of the several foreign governments in the 

 international union, is not to he discontinued when the Inter- 

 national Observatory at St. Cloud is finished. The apparatus 

 will be sold to the French Government and used by it for the 

 fabrication and compari-on of standard kilograms and metres to 

 be used in the several public conservatoires of France and the 

 Colonies. 



The annual meeting of the West London Scientific Associa- 

 tion was held on Tuesday, followed by a soiree and a varied and 

 interesting exhibition. 



There was a shock of earthquake on Monday at Poitiers 

 and Chatellerault. 



A number of pneumatic clocks have been installed by a 

 Viennese speculator on the Paris Boulevards for the distribution 

 of the time, in competition with the electric system advocated 

 by Leverrier and now in course of experimentation. Three 

 systems, Breguet's, Garnier's, and Redier's, which have been 

 successful in a first competition, are to be tested successively. 



It may be noted in confirmation of the theories advocated by 

 Mr. Blandford in our last issue, that the period of north winds, clear 

 skies, and high pressure set in in France in October 1S78, and 

 has continued without any long interruption up to the present 

 moment. The date of the beginning of that remarkable period 

 is almost the same as the end of the high-pressure period noted 

 in India and the great Archipelago of Asia. 



