892 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIII. No. 597. 



whicli contains some 3,500 species of land, 

 fresh water and marine shells. 



The Danish Arctic Biologic Station will be 

 open for investigators for the first time during 

 the summer of 1907. Application for a table 

 should be sent to the Danish ministry of edu- 

 cation (Kultusministerium), through the con- 

 sulate of the United States, Copenhagen, Den- 

 mark. 



The astronomical observatory of La Plata 

 has been affiliated with the new National Uni- 

 versity of La Plata, recently inaugurated by 

 the minister of public instruction of the 

 Argentine Republic. 



It is announced that the issue of the Index 

 Medicus, ' published by the Carnegie Institu- 

 tion, has been unavoidably delayed, owing to 

 the recent printers' strikes. For this reason, 

 the number for March has not as yet been 

 published. On account of the strike the gen- 

 eral index of the Geologist has also been de- 

 layed and will not appear until some time in 

 June. 



The German Zoological Society and the 

 German Botaxiical Society are meeting this 

 year at Marburg, beginning on June 5. 



The Reale Institute Veneto di Science, 

 Letters ed Arti has decided to commence a 

 systematic scientific study of the geophysical 

 phenomena which concern directly and indi- 

 rectly the lagoon of Venice. With this object 

 a special committee has been appointed, and 

 the preliminary investigations, bearing prin- 

 cipally on the tidal waves in the upper Adri- 

 atic and the rivers flowing into it and into 

 the lagoon of Venice, have been intrusted to 

 Dr. Giovanni Piero Magrini, who is to be 

 assisted by Professors Luigi de Marchi and 

 Tullio Gnesotto of the University of Padua. 



The Paris correspondent of the London 

 Times reports that at a meeting of the Acad- 

 emy of Medicine on May 16, Professor 

 Metchnikoff supplemented his previous state- 

 ment as to his prophylactic treatment of 

 syphilis by important observations concerning 

 some objections made against his method by 

 Professor Neisser, of Breslau. Dr. Metchnikoff 



and Dr. Roux discovered by a number of ex- 

 periments that infection by inoculation of the 

 syphilitic virus in monkeys and men was ar- 

 rested and nullified by application of the 

 calomel ointment within an hour of the intro- 

 duction of the virus. Professor Neisser, ex- 

 perimenting with Java monkeys, obtained by 

 the same method results that were less satis- 

 factory. He had only one hundred successful 

 cases out of two hundred. Dr. Metchnikoff 

 gave an explanation of this fact. Professor 

 Neisser, he affirms, makes his scarifications 

 too deep, by which method he completely alters 

 the conditions of the experiment. In the 

 majority of cases of normal syphilitic infec- 

 tion the virus penetrates by purely epidermic 

 — that is to say very superficial — erosion. If 

 it be artificially introduced into the lower tis- 

 sues, the absorption takes place in less than 

 an hour and the prophylactic treatment ar- 

 rives necessarily too late. Dr. Roux and Dr. 

 Metchnikoff, while practising scarifications 

 certainly deeper than those which give rise 

 to syphilitic infection in life, carefully 

 avoided applying the virus too far below the 

 surface. 



We learn from Nature that the Republic of 

 Uruguay has recently established a National 

 Institute for Weather Prediction, with its 

 central observatory at Monte Video; the 

 meteorological observatory at that place was 

 founded by the municipal authorities in 1895. 

 Observations have been made at several sta- 

 tions for some years, and the new institution 

 has commenced its operations by the collation 

 and discussion of the means and extremes 

 already available, and by the investigation of 

 the characteristics of the severe storms which 

 affect the navigation of the estuary of the 

 Rio de La Plata. The most dangerous storms 

 are those from the southeast, as they usually 

 occur with a rising barometer, in connection 

 with anticyclonic conditions over the Atlantic, 

 and are frequently accompanied by thick fog 

 on the coast. The first number of the bulletin 

 of the institute contains an exposition of the 

 hydrography of the estuary, and tables show- 

 ing, inter alia, the effect of the various winds 

 upon the tides of the river. 



