July 16, 1886.1 



SCIENCE. 



57 



or in the form of spray, directly to the mucous 

 membrane of the throat and the larynx. 



— Some of the friends of M. Chevreul propose 

 to present him a medal on his hundredth bu-th- 

 day, which comes the 31st of August. This medal 

 will bear in relief a portrait of Chevreul engraved 

 by M. Roty. Subscriptions should be addressed 

 to M. Louis Passy, secretaire perpfetuel de la 

 Societe nationale d'agriculture de France, 18, rue 

 de Bellechasse, Paris, France. 



— The Athenaeum states tliat Mr. Blanford, the 

 meteorological reporter to the government of 

 India, has drawn up a memorandum to accom- 

 pany the charts of temperature and rainfall. 

 The temperature being reduced to its equivalent 

 at sea-level, the hottest tract in India is a portion 

 of the Deccan plateau between Bellary and Shola- 

 pore. The hottest region of the peninsvila is really 

 the eastern coast from Vizagapatam southwards 

 and the plains of the Carnatic and northern Cey- 

 lon. In intra-tropical India, except as modified 

 by the elevation of the country, the temperature 

 mcreases from the coast inland, the west coast 

 being cooler than the east coast. Sind and Raj- 

 putana are the driest portion of India. In the 

 greater part of India. May is the hottest month in 

 the year, except in the Punjab and Smd, where, 

 owing to the lateness of the rains, June is hottest. 

 Of those stations, the temperature of which has 

 been pretty accurately determined, the hottest in 

 May is Jhansi : the coolest region is Assam, where 

 the May rains are very coiDious. The mean an- 

 nual rainfall of the whole of India is about forty- 

 two inches, varying from nearly five hundred 

 inches at Clierra Poonjee, to about three inches at 

 Jacobabad. The provinces most subject to famine 

 are the north-western provinces, Behar, Rajpu- 

 tana, the Carnatic, the North Deccan, Hyderabad, 

 Mysore, Orissa, and the northern Circars. 



— M, E. Grimaux exhibited to the French acad- 

 emy of sciences, at the seance of June 15, some 

 unijublished prmted documents showing the action 

 taken by the commission on behalf of Lavoisier, 

 at that time (1792-93) under arrest as a farmer- 

 general. From one of these documents it appears, 

 that, in consequence of the said action, the illus- 

 trious names of Laplace, Delambre, Borda, and 

 others, were themselves removed from the com- 

 mission on the 3d Nivose of the second year of 

 the republic (Dec. 26, 1793). 



— A few years ago Dr. J. B. de Lacerda of 

 Rio de Janeiro made extensive experiments upon 

 antidotes for snake-bites, and finally settled upon 

 the hyiDodermic injection of a solution of per- 

 manganate of potash as being the most efficacious. 

 This remedy has also been used lately in Brazil 



against hydrophobia. One planter reports having 

 used it over a year ago in two cases of j)ersons 

 bitten by rabid dogs. So far, these persons have 

 shown no symptoms of hydrophobia. A colleague 

 of Dr. Lacerda, however, treated by this method 

 two patients who had been bitten by a rabid cat. 

 One of them received the hypodermic injection 

 fifteen minutes after having been bitten. As yet 

 he shows no iU effects from the wound. The 

 second, a child, was treated twelve hours after 

 having been bitten, and died seven weeks later 

 with all the symptoms of hydrophobia. 



— The Brazilian government has du-ected Prof. 

 Emil Goldi to investigate the disease of the coffee- 

 plants. This disease was investigated by Capane- 

 ma about four years ago, but no satisfactory 

 conclusion was reached as to its character or the 

 remedy for it. In the mean while it has been 

 spreading. 



— The sundry civil bill, as considered in the 

 senate, restores the pay of the coast survey oflS- 

 cials (changed by the house) to the figures now 

 existing ; it also appropriates $10,000 for salaries 

 and expenses of the National board of health. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 

 A most extraordinary structure. 



Aside from the publicity which your tlieosoph- 

 ical correspondent has given the error which un- 

 fortunately crept into one of the plates in a recent 

 contribution of mine to the Proceedings of the 

 Zoological society of London {Science, vii. No. 177), 

 the subject, I understand, has created no little com- 

 ment in other quarters. Indeed, so thoroughly has 

 it been discussed that I should have entirelj' disre- 

 garded this additional notice of it, had it not been 

 that the attention thus called to it by this theosophist 

 of the Smithsonian institution, placed it before your 

 readers as ' a most extraordinary structure.' Sure- 

 ly it must be a structure most extraordinary to have 

 excited any wonder in the eyes of a Smithsonian 

 theosophist, when, in view of the fact that the pub- 

 lished researches of Prof. Elliott Cones, another 

 theosophist of the Smithsonian, called for no com- 

 ment whatever. The succinct account of the re- 

 searches I refer to, were published by Professor 

 Coues in the New York Nation (Dec. 25, 1884), 

 wherein this author in referring to bis examination 

 of ghosts, says " I myself, personally, have repeated- 

 ly by physical, chemical, and microscopical examina- 

 tion studied detached portions of them [ghosts], as 

 hair, nails, or pieces of any substance which may 

 envelop them more or less completely." 



The fact of the matter is this, in both the figure 

 and text I described the right humerus of a hum- 

 ming bird for the left. Mr. F. A. Lucas the osteolo- 

 gist of the Smithsonian discovered the error and 

 courteously pointed it out for me. But Mr. Lucas did 

 not write the letter in Science signed 'a theosophist,' 

 and notwithstanding the fact that I am personally 

 acquainted with the members of the staff of that 

 institution, I know of no theosophist there who has 



