172 



HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



dent weeks of summer thunderstorm in England and 

 Europe, and that the carnation glows that came with 

 the yellow leaf were left con amore. I will not send 

 the score, but rather recommend to the notice of the 

 composer the enclosed passage, which presents on the 

 lines of Messrs. Wolf and Ellis the sun-spots and 

 responsive magnetic variation, from the year 1750 

 until the well-remembered London aurora of 1S70 ; 

 a general jotting of a necessarily processional music, 

 with sudden tremulous and devil-may-care shrieks, 

 that, sweetly tinkling in the delicately pillared shades 

 of Winchester at a harvest festival, might startle 

 aghast the ghost of St. Swithin. 



It is at least consoling to suppose our fits of 

 momentary chagrin to be portion of the burden of 

 the spheres ; and once when the skaters were figuring 

 on the crisp ice in the London Parks, I fairly came 

 to believe that a black spot that had come round the 

 sun's edge on the sly had been the signal for the 

 thaw and vapoury breathing of the violet-scented, 

 south-western gale. It is an old carp of the salt sea, 

 for Hakluyt quotes the log of the ship ' Richard' of 

 Arundel], bound in the year 1590 for Guinea, to the 

 effect, "that on the seventh, at the going down of 

 the sun, we saw a great blacke spot in the sunne, 

 and the eighth day both at rising and setting we saw 

 the like, which spot to our seeming was about the 

 bigness of a shilling, being in five degrees of latitude, 

 and still there came a great billow out of the souther- 

 board." The cave of Neptune is no longer known, 

 though some tell us it is in the West Indies, and 

 others say it_ is in the Rocky. Mountains, that these 

 whirlwinds gather that rush forth eastwards to attack 

 our American Liners. Having drawn up what Mr. 

 Capron pronounced to be quite a number of coin- 

 cidences, I ventured to address the managers of the 

 Cunard, Allen, and White Star packets, and sug- 

 gested that their captains might observe the ingress 

 and departure of the macula; on the sun's disk as a 

 weather omen. In reply, I received very courteous 

 and practical answers, and a little subsequently I 

 learnt from a leading nautical publisher at Liverpool, 

 that it was thought the gales could be anticipated by 

 telegram. That a sun-spot is calculated to draw a 

 cold line on our atmosphere, maybe gathered from 

 the circumstance that when an image. of the. sun was 

 thrown upon a screen from a telescope in a darkened 

 room by Professor Henry, a spot that happened to 

 be on it, when brought upon the surface of a thermo- 

 pile, proved to be perceptibly colder than the sur- 

 rounding light surface. But methinks to fully realize 

 what is transpiring in the sun it would be needful to 

 be transported in a waking vision to the planet Mer- 

 cury, where eighty-eight of our days close in a rather 

 short year, to rove over its mountains among chromo- 

 landscapes so full of colour, to stray through its 

 vajleys of golden amyrinths banqueted on by hum- 

 ming-birds ; and dance beneath its dark shadows, or 

 bathe in its misty rivers. As the great dilated sun 



arose shimmering in the east, we should then per- 

 adventure start at the huge black pits crawling over 

 its surface, and commence to prattle about its 

 wrinkles of light and its willow diaper : nay, we 

 might argue from the inverse squares of the distance, 

 whether gravitation were not magnetism, and mag- 

 netism the motive power of the universe.* Sad it is 

 to think that while it is possible to learn, and it may 

 be possible to see, what is passing in the planets, we 

 cannot hope through a telephone to interchange a 

 message of kindly greeting. Perhaps in recognition 

 of our unknown brethren we should keep the jubilee 

 festivals of the sun and strike star decorations. 



A. H. SwiNTON. 



NOTES ON THE INFUSORIA. 



By Bernard Thomas. 



VI. 



HYPOTRICHA have the cilia springing from 

 the under or oral surface of the body. 

 27. Euplotes patella is in size about the two 

 hundred and thirtieth of an inch. Front view it 

 is oval, truncated anteriorly, side view it is narrow ; 

 it thus somewhat resembles a plate. It has already 

 been remarked that some of the Ciliata have the 

 exudation layer of the ectosarc converted into a cell- 

 wall, but in this species, as well as in Aspidiscus, the 

 transformation is only partial, and we have a chitinous 

 layer on one side protecting the protoplasm and 

 forming a shield or carapace, which is grooved, 

 the lines extending longitudinally. . Two of these 

 grooves are very distinct, and are seen just above 

 the cilia which guard the mouth. Around the edge 

 of the carapace there is a row of elevations like 



Fig. 108. — Trklwda lyttceus. 1, Aspidiscus; 2, Oxytricha. 



buttons, seen best under a high power. In the 

 posterior region there are four styles. All the cilia 

 are on the under, ventral or oral surface, and 

 can be seen through the transparent carapace. In 

 the anterior region a portion of protoplasm is pro- 

 truded beyond the dorsal shield, and is covered with 

 cilia. The contractile space is situated in the pos- 



* Professor Huxley, in one of his Darwinian orations, states 

 that the harmony of the stars is gravitation ; but this is cause, 

 not effecr. It will, perchance, explain how the "morning 

 stars sang together/' but possibly not why "all the sons of 

 God shouted tor joy." 



