September 10, 1886.1 



SCIEN'CE, 



227 



year, alluding to the Grenoble meeting and the 

 excursions made in the neighborhood, mentioning 

 the names of deceased members : Bouquet, Bonley, 

 Jamin, Robin, Dechambre, Courty, and others. 

 M. A. VoUand, mayor of Nancy, greeted the 

 association with heartfelt words. M. E. Galante 

 spoke on the financial state of the association, 

 which is very satisfactory. The expenses are for 

 the publication of the yearly volume recording the 

 acts of the association and the difiPerent works sub- 

 mitted : many grants for scientific researches are 

 also included. 



Some interesting discussions have been held in 

 the meetings of the different sections. One of the 

 best took place in the agricultural section, and the 

 topic was wheat-production. Many experimenters 

 and able specialists took part in this discussion, 

 such as Frederic Passy, Levasseur, Alglave, Dehe- 

 rain, Grandeau, Raffalovich, etc. M. Deherain 

 spoke on the best manner of getting the most 

 wheat at least cost price, which is, I think, the 

 universal desideratum, applying not only to wheat, 

 but to all that can be manufactured or grown. 

 M. Deherain said that the great objection to the 

 use of a large amount of manure is the ' laying' 

 which usually occurs. But the ' laying ' can very 

 well be avoided if some trouble is taken in select- 

 ing the wheat species. According to M. Deherain's 

 experiments, the Scotch red wheat, the Shirley, 

 and the Browick are not subject to ' laying,' and 

 the crop is a very fine one when manure is liber- 

 ally used ; 35 or 40 qidntaux of wheat, and 60 or 

 80 of straw, sometimes bringing more than 500 

 francs per hectare. M. Porion has even been able, 

 in the Pas-de-Calais, to obtain crops four times 

 more abundant than the mean average of French 

 crops. M. Sagnier spoke of Indian wheat, the 

 hero of the day, but a very unwelcome one. It 

 seems that India is growing wheat very success- 

 fully, and the increased extension of railways 

 helps this production in a marked manner. In 

 1876, ten years ago, India had twelve thousand 

 kilometres of railway, and one and a half million 

 hectares planted with wheat. At present there 

 are thirty thousand kilometres of the former, and 

 twelve million hectares of the latter. In ten years 

 the wheat-crop has increased eightfold : it has 

 doubled in the last three years. But this cannot 

 ■ be all, and the wheat-crop must certainly become 

 greater still. M. Sagnier believes it may certainly 

 become double what it is at present, and four 

 times as large as that of France at this time. M. 

 Alglave agrees with M. Sagnier, because, he says, 

 although the inhabitants of North India have 

 taken to using wheat for their food, those of the 

 south keep eating rice, which does not sell so 

 easily ; and all their wheat they willingly sell, in- 



asmuch as rice-culture does not interfere with 

 wheat. Rice requires a watery soil, which does 

 not suit wheat ; so that they will continue grow- 

 ing rice in the valleys, and wheat on the hillsides. 

 At all events, the enormous extension of wheat- 

 culture in India is a matter of no little anxiety to 

 European agriculturists. 



In the anthropological section, M. Cartailhac 

 read a paper concerning primitive burial rites. In 

 1830 some Danish anthropologists, Bruzelius, Boye, 

 and Hildebrand, believed that in many cases 

 primitive men were accustomed to bury only the 

 bones, after the flesh had disappeared. M. Car- 

 tailhac, following up this idea, remarked that in 

 many savage countries the fact is quite true. In 

 the Andaman Islands, for instance, as E. H. Man 

 has recently noticed, the body is buried for a time 

 only, then unearthed when the flesh has been de- 

 composed ; and a similar custom is met with in 

 many instances. M. Cartailhac proves that this 

 fact is also established in regard to primitive man- 

 kind, and that at the age du Reune — nothing being 

 known of the burial rites of the stone age — the 

 real burial was performed only when the body 

 was deprived of flesh. In the Menton caves, for 

 instance, the bodies were certainly buried in the 

 skeleton state. The same is true of the age de la 

 pierre polie. Upon the whole, M. CartaUliac be- 

 lieves that the custom of letting corpses putrefy 

 before giving them a definitive burial has been a 

 very prevalent one. It is curious enough to 

 notice that in Spain no king is laid in his burial- 

 ground before the death of his successor : the 

 dead king remains in the Putrido, as it is called, 

 till his successor comes to take his place. 



In the medical section I notice no very inter- 

 esting papers yet, that is, none of general interest. 

 There have been no general meetings at this ses- 

 sion, as there usually are, — none save the gen- 

 eral assembly of the first day. Some interesting 

 excursions have been made in the neighborhood. 

 One had been projected to Mount Douon, a moun- 

 tain on the German territory ; but the German 

 authorities, not knowing the nature of the French 

 association, had asked that no excm-sion should 

 be made : so it was deemed better to abandon the 

 project. Only two or three persons went up, and 

 found a small body of troops and some local 

 German authorities. But it was ascertained that 

 the intentions of the association had been en- 

 tirely misunderstood, the German authorities 

 knowing nothing of the association, and believing 

 it to have political objects. The absurdity of the 

 notion was ridiculed, and no more was thought 

 about it. 



The next meeting will take place in Toiilouse, 

 and the following one, for 1888, in Oran (Algeria). 



