50 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. VIII. No. 184. 



and to issue a report on the results of the work- 

 ing. The exhibition will remain open till 

 August 15th. 



The acetylene exhibition, which was origi- 

 nally planned for Cannstadt, near Stuttgart, 

 took place at Berlin on the Kurfiirstendamm, 

 says the Scientific American, in connection with 

 an acetylene conference. Acetylene generators 

 were exhibited by thirty firms, but most of them 

 were not shown in operation, owing to the strict 

 regulations enforced by the police. The genera- 

 tors in action had each to be shown in a special 

 compartment not accessible to the general pub- 

 lic, behind a strong wall. This was not in itself 

 calculated to inspire the citizens of Berlin with 

 a very happy idea of the safety of the new illu- 

 minant. Progress could be recognized in the 

 exhibits, but as yet there does not appear to be 

 any special type which is the favorite. Acety- 

 lene purifiers proved to be necessary adjuncts. 

 Among the impurities of acetylene less thought 

 of in general is phosphureted hydrogen. In 

 spite of purifying, the hall every evening was 

 foggy with the fine dust of the phosphoric acid. 

 Nest year the meeting will be held at Buda- 

 pest. 



It is, perhaps, not generally known, says the 

 British Medical Journal, that Professor Charles 

 Richet, who delivered an address on The Work 

 of Pasteur and the Modern Conception of Medi- 

 cine at the annual meeting in Montreal, is a 

 novelist and a dramatic author as well as a 

 physiologist of the first rank. Under the 

 pseudonym of ' Charles Epheyre ' he has 

 gained a considerable reputation in contempo- 

 rary French literature. His most successful 

 novel. La Douleur des Autres, was published in 

 1896, having first appeared serially as stfeuille- 

 ton in the Ind&pendance Beige. Among his other 

 works of fiction may be mentioned Soeiir Marihe, 

 the plot of which turns on the love of a phj'sic- 

 ian for a hypnotizable patient ; Amour de Garni- 

 son, Bonne et Mauvaise Etoile, A la Recherche de 

 la Oloire, and Le Microbe et le Mirosaurus. 

 'Charles Epheyre's ' last plaj^, Judith, written 

 in collaboration with M. Octave Houdaille, was 

 produced at the Bodiniere Theatre on March 

 28, 1898. Professor Richet is also the author of 

 L'Somme et V Intelligence and other works on 



psychology, and the Editor of the Revue Scien- 

 tifique. 



At the Royal Geographical Society, on April 

 27th, a paper was read by Dr. Sambon on ' Ac- 

 climatization of the white man in tropical lands.' 

 Within recent times, he said, according to the 

 report in the London Times, sanitation had 

 wrought wonderful changes in the healthiness 

 of all tropical countries. They had been con- 

 sidered unfit for the permanent settlement of 

 white men on account of their climate, or, to 

 be more correct, on account of their heat, be- 

 cause the word climate had been used as synony- 

 mous with heat. Heat was supposed to induce 

 deterioration and diseases, such as anasmia, liver 

 abscess and sunstroke. But an£emia was not 

 due to heat, being in the tropics a symptom 

 common to several parasitic diseases. Liver 

 abscess was likewise of parasitic origin and sun- 

 stroke was a microbic disease, however para- 

 doxical the statement might appear, on account 

 of the mistaken etiology perpetuated by an 

 erroneous nomenclature. As for deterioration, 

 it was far more alarming in the overcrowded 

 cities of the Old World than in tropical colonies. 

 The geographical distribution of tropical dis" 

 eases was of the greatest importance in the 

 study of acclimatization. Diseases being due 

 to living organisms that had their peculiar dis- 

 semination like all other forms of life. This 

 distribution was likewise determined by a va- 

 riety of circumstances, among which meteoro- 

 logical conditions were certainly important, 

 but association and competition more so. Under 

 proper management European children did very 

 well in tropical colonies, in the most unhealthy 

 of which infant mortality was lower than in 

 some districts of Europe. The belief, again, 

 that white men could not labor in the tropics 

 was disproved by facts. That man was capable 

 of adaptation to a new climate was shown by 

 the fact that he had constantly moved from one 

 region to another. If attempts at colonization 

 in the past had often been unsuccessful and al- 

 ways cost immense sacrifice in lives and money, 

 it was because they had been made in complete 

 ignorance of the conditions essential to success. 

 Acclimatization was a mere question of hygiene, 

 and what was needed above all was a complete 



