Notes and Memoranda. 305 



with every faculty for' producing the utmost amount of variation of 

 which a species is susceptible, a period at length arrives when the 

 species dies out, although the climate, soil, and other external con- 

 ditions, continue as far as we can conceive propitious. , 



Dr. T. Spencer Cobbold read a paper on Meat as a Source of 

 Tape- worms in Man, in which he alluded to the difficulty of detect- 

 ing these parasites in their early condition in the flesh of the 

 animals used as food, and stated that all danger arising from them 

 might be obviated by the employment of meat in a properly cooked 

 condition. He assigned a considerable proportion of the deaths 

 usually attributed to epilepsy, to the development in the human 

 brain of a living embryo taken into the system in half-cooked pork. 



The General Committee of the Association decided that the next 

 meeting should be held at Birmingham, under the Presidentship of 

 Professor Phillips. 



NOTES AND MEMOEANDA. 



The Eighty-first Planet. — We learn from the Astronomische NaehricMen 

 that M. Tempel of Marseilles discovered what appeared to be a new planet on 

 the 30th September. He referred the matter to Dr. E. Luther, who confirmed 

 his belief, and estimated it at from 10 to 11 magnitude. Dr. Peters has assigned 

 to the new body the name of Terpsichore. Mean position 1864, = 5° 4' 8"'8 

 + 2° 47' 38"-3. 



Duration oe Twilight. — Herr Julius Schmidt, of the Athens Observatory, 

 communicates to Astronomische Nachrichten a series of observations to determine 

 the duration of twilight, and the height of the atmosphere. He arrives at the 

 conclusion that the minimum height of the atmosphere ranges from 7'5 to 105 

 geographical miles (15 to an equatorial degree ?), and that it varies with the time 

 of year, being highest in November, December, January, and lowest in May, June, 

 July. The depression of the sun necessary for the close of twilight is not constant, 

 the ordinary reckoning of — 18" being correct only in extreme cases. 



Treatment of the Insane. — The Conseil General of Vosges believing that 

 it is disadvantageous for insane patients of the idiotic type (fous) to be constantly 

 associated with other mad people, has determined to make an allowance to enable 

 their parents to keep them at home, or at farm houses, where they will have the 

 benefit of sane companionship and fresh air. This system appears restricted to 

 cases in which the patients can be safely left at liberty, and so far as it has been 

 tried it has succeeded. 



New Sources of Silk. — M. G-uerin Meneville describes to the French 

 Academy cocoons which he has received from Uruguay.' They are produced in 

 abundance by a silkworm found on a species of mimosa. The trees are covered 

 with the silk to the height of more than six feet from the ground. The cater- 

 pillars are orange with black spots, and the fresh cocoons are orange, but lose their 

 colour by exposure to the sun and rain. The cocoons are deposited on the sunny 

 side of the bark ; they are oval, slightly pointed, and open at the side. The silk 

 is of fine quality. M. Meneville calls the moth Bombyx Fauvetii, in honour of 

 the discoverer. In the same communication, he writes that a Bombyx Atlas has 

 emerged from a cocoon at the Imperial farm at Versailles. This moth is the 

 largest of the Lepidoptera, and its cocoon is four and a-half times as heavy as that 

 of the ordinary silkworm. M. Meneville hopes that other cocoons in the same 

 establishment will keep their chrysalides alive through the winter, and that they 

 will be transformed next year at a_jfavourable part of the season for effecting 

 their acclimatization. 



