106 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. VIII. No. 186. 



year 1896, aud exploration work carried on vin- 

 der direction of tlie government in 1897 shows 

 that the Corundum-bearing lands have an ag- 

 gregate area of about 50,000 acres, lying in the 

 townships of Carlow, Bangor, Eaglan, Rad- 

 cliflFe, Brudenel, Lyndoch and Sebastopol, in 

 the counties of Hastings aud Renfrew. The 

 mineral rights over nearly the whole of this 

 ■tract are held by the crown, and they have been 

 withdrawn from sale and lease pending a report 

 on the occurrence of the mineral and the meth- 

 ods of treating it, undertaken by the professors 

 of the Kingston School of Mining. This report 

 and a map of the Corundum region has been 

 published, and copies of it may be had on ap- 

 plication to the Bureau of Mines, Toronto. 

 The attention of prospectors, miners and cap- 

 italists is invited to the district, and, with a 

 view to its development and the establishment 

 of industries in the Province for treating and 

 utilizing the Corundum ore, proposals will be 

 received until the first day of September next. 

 Preference in the selection of mineral lands 

 will be given to parties who will undertake to 

 conduct mining and treating operations on the 

 largest and completest scale, and who can fur- 

 nish satisfactory assurances that they possess 

 the requisite capital for the proposed opera- 

 tions, including separation of the ore from its 

 gangue, milling for abrasive uses, manufacture 

 of abrasive goods, and the production of alu- 

 minium if the ore is suitable therefor. Water- 

 power of large capacity is available in the lo- 

 cality for electrical and other works ; and during 

 the summer season the lands are easily acces- 

 sible by steamboat from Barry' Bay station, on 

 the line of the Ottawa, Arnprior and Parry 

 Sound Railway. The lands will be disposed of 

 under the leasehold system, renewable for fixed 

 periods indefinitely at a low rental, subject to 

 the performance of working conditions as pro- 

 vided in the regulations governing the same. 



We learn from Natural Science that the 

 Trustees of the British Museum have recently 

 purchased the large collection of marine ani- 

 mals formed by Canon A. M. Norman, and 

 containing type-specimens of many species 

 which he has established. Part of the collec- 

 tion is already in the Museum ; the rest will go 

 there eventually. The Edinburgh Museum of 



Science and Art has recently acquired the val- 

 uable collection of fossils from the Upper Silu- 

 rian rocks of the Pentland Hills, made by the 

 late David Hardie, of Bavelaw. It is especially 

 rich in specimens from the Eurypterid beds of 

 Gutterford Burn, near Carlops, Peeblesshire ; 

 there are also specimens, chiefly sponges, from 

 North Esk. 



In view of the importance of photography for 

 scientific expeditions Mr. W. J. Stillman writes 

 to the London Times ou experiments made by 

 him, demonstrating the advantage, of using 

 ' cut-films' of celluloid as a substitute for glass. 

 These films are shavings, about the fourth of a 

 millimeter in thickness, from a solid block of 

 celluloid, practically not breakable, and lying 

 flat in the holder like glass. Mr. Stillman 

 writes as follows : "Considering the extreme 

 portability and infrangibility of these films and 

 their inestimable superiority in these respects 

 over glass, and in other respects over paper, I 

 think that these experiments have a high value 

 for scientific voyagers, to whom photographic 

 illustration is so important and the difficulties 

 of photographic operation en voyage are so 

 great. A priori, as the celluloid is produced 

 under the action of strong acids, and has a cer- 

 tain tendency to liberate the acids with time, 

 their action tending to cause insensibility in the 

 haloid which holds the photographic image, I 

 believed that in so long a time as is covered by 

 my experiment they would have become quite 

 insensible, but I did not see that in this respect 

 there was much falling off. A little there 

 probably is, for in the case of films of the high- 

 est sensibility I have found that impressibility 

 for all practical purposes had disappeared after 

 a year, those of lower sensibility losing less in 

 proportion ; but this is of absolutely no moment, 

 exposure in the camera for a second more or 

 less being a matter of no importance. The 

 fact that a traveller may with this portable and 

 unbreakable material spend years in the most 

 difiicult explorations with photographic record 

 possible at all stages, and develop it on his 

 return home, ought to be of scientific import." 



Technical inventions naturally lead to the 

 invention of new names, but rarely in such 

 variety as the following synonyms, for all of 

 which we cannot, however, vouch, collected by 



