242 Scientific Intelligence. 



light. The possible significance of individual peculiarities in 

 morphological structure is also considered in this connection. 



Professor Hofmeister concludes by pointing out that the con- 

 sideration of the cell as a machine equipped with chemical and 

 physico-chemical accessories does away with the necessity of 

 calling upon other than well known forces for an explanation of 

 the work done. There is to-day no occasion to set up the doctrine 

 of " Ignorabimus," or to assume the existence of some additional, 

 indefinite, vital force. l. b. m. 



9. Beitraege zur Ghemischen Physiologic und Pathologie, her- 

 ausgegeben von Franz Hofmeister. I. Band, 7/9 Heft. Braun- 

 schweig, 1901 (F. Vieweg und Sohn). — This number of the 

 Beitraege includes the results of an elaborate chemical study of 

 the active constituents of " immune " sera, by Dr. E. P. Pick of 

 Prag ; and five investigations of physiological-chemical interest, 

 from the laboratory of Professor Hofmeister in Strassburg. 

 Among the latter are contained demonstrations of the existence 

 of phenyl-analin as a constituent complex in the proteid molecule, 

 as indicated by the preparation of cinnamic acid from the decom- 

 position products (by Ducceschi and Spiro); a study of the trans- 

 formations of albumoses by the gastric mucosa (Glaessner); and 

 an investigation suggesting the preeminent importance of the 

 liver for the synthesis of aromatic ethereal sulphates in the 

 animal body (Embden and Glaessner). In the same number 

 Wroblewski and his co-workers have brought new evidence of 

 the destructive action of certain enzymes upon one another. 



Heft 10/12. The ten contributions in this number cover too 

 many departments of chemical physiology to receive detailed 

 mention here. Attention may be called, however, to the dis- 

 covery of oxyphenylethyl-amine as a product of pancreatic diges- 

 tion (Emerson) and to two papers on the proteid chemistry of 

 plants. (Iwanoff ; Czapek.) Nine laboratories are represented. 

 A survey of the table of contents of the first volume of the Bei- 

 traege, just completed, will, in our opinion, justify the promise 

 previously expressed by the reviewer, that the new journal has a 

 future of usefulness. l. b. m. 



II. Geology and Natural History. 



1 . On the occurrence of Chrompicotite in Canada / by G. Chr. 

 Hoffmann, of the Geological Survey of Canada. (Communi- 

 cated by permission of the Director.) — This variety of chromite — 

 a mineral hitherto found in but one locality, namely, at Dun 

 Mountain, in New Zealand — has been somewhat recently met 

 with, in considerable quantity, in veins or dikes in the volcanic 

 series of the Miocene Tertiary, on Scottie Creek — a stream flow- 

 ing into the Bonaparte — about nine hundred feet west of its first 

 tributary on the south side and some seven miles east of Mun- 

 dorff, in the district of Lillooet, province of British Columbia. 



The mineral, which is massive, with a fine to somewhat coarse 

 granular structure, is associated with a pale yellow serpentine, 



