584 
Mr. WILLIAM FARNELL in a short article 
in the American Microscopical Journal denies 
that the Drosera brevifoléa and the Saracenza 
varioloris are insectivorous plants, claiming 
that he has gathered them at all proper sea- 
sons and never found any insect caught in the 
first, and that whenever he found any remains 
of them in the second he invariably found at 
the bottom of the tube a white worm with 
strong black mandibles, which was evidently 
the insectivore. 
THE Scientific American, for Dec. 25, has 
a communication from Andrew Van Bibber, 
combating the popular idea that rain always 
follows heavy cannonading, and giving sever- 
al instances in his own experience, for in- 
stance, at the battles of Shiloh, Corinth, 
Lookout Mountain, and Missionary Ridge, 
where no rain followed the heaviest artillery 
explosions. 
We give a table showing the coldest day of 
December in each year since 1875. 
Tam. |2pm. l0pm 
Ith IDEs, Ws ooo 60 -2 11 9 
1G 8 Ps 5 Bo 9 6 4 4 -3 
eye © Le iice ace nsene as 10 29 24 
STS ns Doo dard: 06 -4 2 3 
Wee) OE eo) ani OL o -7 2 -7 
TSSON ics Ooo G6 0.8 |; 6 -2 -10 
THE subcutaneous injection of sulphuric 
ether in three-drop doses, at intervals of 
twelve hours, is recommended by Dr. Comegys 
for the successful treatment of sciatica; and 
he thinks that the substitution of ether for 
ergotine in dealing with tic-doloreux would 
give good results. 
THE weather for the last few days of De- 
cember was remarkably cold. On the 28th 
at Chicago, the mercury fell to —18°, at St. 
Louis to —10°, at Minneapolis —28°, at Fort 
Garry —-41°, at St. Paul —25°, at La Crosse 
—20°, at Milwaukee —19°, at Leavenworth 
—16°, at Kansas City —10°. 
Mr. Frank Buckland, the well-known natu- 
ralist and pisciculturist, is suffering from a 
severe attack of dropsy, and now lies in a 
very critical condition. 
KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE, 
THE December meeting of the Kansas City 
Academy of Science was held on the 28th 
ultimo, and there was a good attendance not- 
withstanding the extreme coldness of the 
weather. Mr. W. H. Miller read his third 
paper on the Synthetic Philosophy of Herbert 
Spencer, which was well received by the 
Academy, and is published in this number of 
the REVIEW. 
Col. R. T. Van Horn read a paper on “fA 
New Hypothesis of Life,’’ in which he took 
up and treated the radiant form, or fourth 
form of matter, suggesting that possibly this 
form of matter might present the primordial 
environment and conditions of life, of whose 
origin, science so far has made no revelations. 
There is no physical basis of life, material 
forms only giving its conditions and environ- 
ment. The paper was original, fresh and 
cogent, but as it will appear in the February. 
number of the REVIEW in full, we will at- 
tempt no abstract of it now. 
PRor. J. S. Newberry, an unquestioned 
authority on the subject, said in a recent ad- 
dress before the National Academy of Sciences 
that the quantity of iron in Utah is such as 
to throw into the shade all other known de- 
posits in this country. 
OF late the electric light has been employed 
by naturalists to attract insects, which they 
desire to collect for examination or to pre- 
serve as specimens. 
Geological explorations have shown the 
probability that Russia contains beds of phos- 
phate of lime of sufficient extent, to supply 
Europe for an indefinite period. 
Pror. Strasburger, of Jena, holds that the 
attributing of all the functions of life to pro- 
toplasm, is to be looked upon asa great ad- 
vance in science, although it is impossible 
thus far even to form hypotheses with regard 
to the forces which are at work in the proto- 
plasm. 
