SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



171 



parietal wall with its folds). The palatal arma- 

 ture is in two series, the anterior one consisting of 

 four elongated horizontal folds, the second and 

 third being separated by a wider space than the 

 others, while the posterior series is composed of 

 thirteen or fourteen minute denticles arranged 

 close together, some a little elongated. The shell 

 figured is in the British Museum. It measures — 

 major diameter, S millimetres ; minor diameter, 

 6-5 millimetres : altitude, 4-5 millimetres. 



I fylis fiddeni (figs. 643-1/), from Prome, in 

 the Pegu district of Burma, was described by Mr. 

 W. T. Blanford in the •' Journal of the Asiatic 

 Society of Bengal." xxx. (1S65), P' 75- The shell 

 was figured in Hanley and Theobald's " Con- 

 chologia Indica " (1S75), t, 131, ft. 1-3, while 

 Lieut. -Colonel Godwin-Austen has illustrated the 

 parietal armature ("Proceedings Zoological Soc- 

 iety " (1S74), t. 74, f. 7), and as I have been unable 

 to obtain a specimen, I have copied these figures. 

 According to Mr. Neville's Hand List, p. 71, the 

 Calcutta Museum possesses specimens from Thyet- 



>v '/ rt t/TJjy pj /, 



Fi«- 64-— I'Uctopyhi jtddcni. (a-c, after Hanley and 

 Theobald; a, after Godwin-Austen.) 



myo. The description and figures referred to 

 show that the shell is sinistral, discoid, very 

 widely umbilicated, thin, whitish, irregularly and 

 obliquely sculptured ; the spire is plane and the 

 suture impressed There are six and a-half to 

 seven narrow whorls, which increase slowly and 

 regularly, and are a little convex above ; the last 

 is much wider, rounded at the periphery and base 

 and abruptly descends in front. The peristome 

 is a little thickened and reflexed, and the margins 

 are united by a raised ftexuous ridge I roill 

 the middle of the ridge a horizontal, entering, 

 interrupted fold is given off The parietal arma- 

 ture consists of three vertical folds, of which 

 the posterior one it longest and free, and giv< 

 posteriorly at Its lower extremity a short ridge . 

 the two anterior ones are c|ual in length and are 

 united by two horizontal Cobb, of which the upper 

 one continues anteriorly to the ridge at thi 

 lure, while the lower one ii very short and pi 

 only a little way beyond the first vertical (old 

 between these tv. tal (old*, and close to 



the anterior side of the first vertical fold, is found 

 a small denticle. Above and below there is a 

 similar free horizontal fold (see fig. 64(f). The 

 palatal armature consists of five folds, which are 

 at first horizontal but become vertical posteriorly ; 

 the first and second are longer than the rest. The 

 measurements are stated to be — major diameter, 

 16 millimetres ; minor diameter, 13 millimetres ; 

 altitude, 45 millimetres. 



{To be continued.) 



SCIENCE IN SOME MAGAZINES. 



Notices by John T. Carrington. 



Harper's Monthly Magazine (New York 

 and London: October, 1S97, IS )- "Kilanea, the 

 Home of Pele," by Professor William Libbey, is a 

 beautifully illustrated popular scientific account of 

 volcanic islands in the Pacific Ocean. Pele is the 

 goddess of fire, fabled and mythical maybe to us 

 now, but very real in times past to the early in- 

 habitants of the Hawaiian group. The professor 

 lands us at once in the midst of volcanic surround- 

 ings, and takes us over the floor of Kilanea, with 

 its deep contraction fissures and rough surface. 

 It is much as we should probably find the floor of 

 the moon at the craters we so plainly see through 

 our big telescopes, excepting that Kilanea is alive 

 and the moon is dead and cold. The article is 

 pleasantly written, and of considerable scientific 

 value. In the same number Dr. Henry Smith 

 Williams describes the " Century's Progress in 

 Chemistry." The article is illustrated byportraits 

 of John Dalton, Johan Jakob Belzelius, Joseph 

 Louis Gay-Lussac, Justus von Liebig, Robert 

 William Bunson, Louis Jacques Mande Daguerre, 

 and others. These portraits are worth all the cost 

 of the magazine to the lover of chemical science. 

 If that be not enough, there is a quaint cartoon of 

 a student of bacteriology who has just discovered a 

 funny microscopical cupid, which he is examining 

 through a large lens. 



The Century Magazine (New York and 

 London: October, 1897, is. 4d.). "What is an 

 Aurora ? " is the first article of a scientific 

 character in this month's "Century." It is by 

 Alexander McAdie. The illustrations are from 

 telescopic photographs and explanatory diagrams. 

 The object of the article is to associate three 

 events of interest to mankind : sunspots, 

 auroras and the price of wheat. It was, as most 

 reading people know, Sir William Herschel 

 who first drew attention to the consequent fluctua- 

 tion of sunspots and the price of wheat. Professor 

 Stanley Jevons long afterwards studied the associ- 

 ation, and by tabulating the spots, auroras and 

 commercial crises, made Herschel's hint bear 

 fruit. It has been further discovered that sunspots 

 do not come by chance — does anything ?— but have 

 a certain periodity. The drift of the article is to 

 teach the reader how our planet responds to solar 

 disturbances and how the auroras are among thi 

 ' .. T Ferris tells us of the " Wild 

 Animals in a New Kngland Game-Park." Mr 

 refers i" the I orbln Game Preserve, a reserve of 



twenty-six thousand acres surrounded by a wire 



i lld-i bings paradisi Is pari meadow, 



part forest and much mountain. In it are some 



lour tho 1 and bead of big wild game, including 



