290 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. IX., No 216 



experienced a terrible motion for three or four 

 minutes, as though the propeller had droi)ped off 

 and the engines were racing terribly. Several 

 fishermen, having noticed on the jarevious night 

 unusual movements of the water on the shore-line, 

 were afraid to go on shore to sleep. 



The Lords' committee of council on education 

 have just taken a new departure in the use of the 

 South Kensington museum, library, and schools. 

 Arrangements have been made for the study there, 

 without any fees, for periods of from two to nine 

 months, of persons engaged ia those industries in 

 which art is more or less concerned, the sole con- 

 dition being that the proprietors of works in 

 whose employ such students are, shall undertake 

 to maintain them while thej' are thus engaged in 

 studying. We trust that this is only a prekide to 

 the employment of the science schools of the de- 

 partment in a similar way. 



An active discussion is going on in the Univer- 

 sity of Cambridge as to the arrangement of speci- 

 mens to be adopted in the new geological museum, 

 which has yet to be built, and the site of which 

 is still undecided. Professor Hughes heads the 

 party which desires the stratigraphical arrange- 

 ment, so as to present the earth's development at 

 different epochs. The other party, led by Profes- 

 sor Newton, advocates the zoological arrangement, 

 so as to display the development of particular 

 orders of plants and animals ; and, with this view, 

 it desires that the new museum should be placed 

 as close as possible to the Museum of comparative 

 anatomy, so as to facilitate a comparison of ex- 

 isting types. 



A year ago, Professor Langley, the distinguished 

 American astronomer, performed an experiment 

 in the theatre of the Royal institution to explain 

 his theory that the true color of the sun was blue. 

 A few nights ago, in a lecture upon ' Sunlight 

 colors,' Captain Abney repeated this experiment, 

 adopting Professor Langley's figures, but dispens- 

 ing with his paper disks, which, he held, vitiated 

 the result. As the result of this, he maintained 

 that the color of the sun was very nearly that of 

 white light seen at high elevations in a clear, dust- 

 free atmosphere. When the spectra of sunlight 

 on the Alps and the specti-a as imagined by Pro- 

 fessor Langley were compared, they were almost 

 identical. In support of some of his views, Cap- 

 tain Abney showed a novel and beautiful experi- 

 ment, called an 'artificial sunset.' Through a 

 solution of sodium hyposulphite, a clear circle of 

 electric light was thrown on a screen : a few drops 

 of hydrochloric acid added to the solution pre- 

 cipitated the sulphur in fine particles, and first 

 the violet, and then the blue, green, and yellow 

 rays were successively cut off, until finally there 



was the dull red of the sun setting in a wintry or 

 a smoky sky. The effects of clearness of atmos- 

 phere on photographs were strikingly shown in 

 Alpine and Egyptian pictures. 



A serious outbreak of anthrax, or splenic-fever, 

 recently occurred near Chelmsford, Essex, and 

 it has communicated itself to several human 

 subjects. Anthrax has long been known to be. 

 synonymous with that fatal human ailment ' wool- 

 sorters ' disease.' In one of the present cases a 

 veterinary surgeon bled one of the animals, and 

 some of the blood fell upon his shirt-sleeve. A 

 pimple upon his arm was rubbed or scratched, and, 

 the tiny raw spot touching the blood-stained sleeve, 

 an unhappily successful inoculation was effected. 

 Various possible causes of the outbreak are specu- 

 latively assigned, one being the feeding with pol- 

 lard made from foreign corn. 



The board of trade have appointed a committee 

 to inquire into and report upon the desirability of 

 electrical communication between lightships and 

 the shore, with the special object of facilitating 

 the saving of life at sea. 



Sir Fred. Abel, the organizing secretary to the 

 •' imperial institute,' designed to commemorate the 

 jubilee of the reign of Queen Victoria, has ad- 

 dressed letters to the presidents and councils of 

 several of the scientific societies, with a view of 

 obtaining subscriptions to the scheme through 

 those channels. Invitations to members to sub- 

 scribe thereto have accordingly been issued by 

 most of these bodies. Besides the institute fund, 

 the Society of telegraph engineers appeals for 

 separate subscriptions towards a telegraph jubilee 

 fund, to be devoted to an entirely distinct pur- 

 pose. 



It is stated on excellent authority that a new 

 and cheap insulating material and system of lay- 

 ing underground telegraph-wires has just been de- 

 vised by Messrs. Callender & Co. of London and 

 New York, by which a hitherto unapproachable 

 speed of signalling can be obtained on under- 

 ground lines. If what is stated be correct 

 (and there seems no reason to doubt it), the 

 problem which has occupied some of our best 

 electricians for some years has been successfully 

 solved. 



A movement is on foot to obtain government 

 aid for the various 'university colleges 'in the 

 larger English towns. Similar colleges in Ireland 

 and Scotland have long received such aid, and very 

 recently three Welsh colleges have obtained grants 

 of twenty thousand dollars per year each. The 

 English colleges (in Manchester, Newcastle, Bris- 

 tol, Birmingham, Liverpool, Leeds, etc.) are en- 

 tirely without such help, and in some cases, nota- 

 bly in Bristol, they are in serious pecuniary 



