1877.] Scientific News. 635 
begin the publication of a work on the Game Birds of India, with colored 
illustrations of all the known species. The work is to be issued in three 
volumes, and will comprise not only the grouse, bustards, pheasants, 
jungle fowls, partridges, ètc., but also the rails, cranes, swans, geese, 
ducks, suipes, woodcock, godwits, etc. Price per volume, twenty-one 
shillings six pence. 
—Professor E. S. Morse, of Salem, Mass., is now busy with dredge 
and microscope in Japan, having fixed his headquarters at Inoshima, 
seventeen miles south of Yokohama. Recently he ascended one of the 
highest of the Japanese mountains, about one hundred miles from the 
coast, and found opportunity there for dredging Lake Chiusenji, a body 
of water 4000 feet above sea level. Its fauna was ascertained to be 
quite peculiar. Professor Morse will return to the United States in 
time for his usual courses of lectures during the coming autumn and win- 
ter; but afterwards, in 1878, he expects to go back to Japan, having ac- 
cepted an engagement in the Imperial University of Tokio, as professor 
of biology. He has also projected a summer school of natural history, 
to be conducted on the coast near the university. His text-book for be- 
gipners in zodlogy is to be translated into the language of Japan, and 
animals native to that country are to be substituted for the American 
ones referred to throughout the volume. 
_ — During the eruption of Cotopaxi, on the 26th of last June, the vol- 
cano, according to a writer in the Nation of September 6th, poured out a 
cataract “ ten times the bulk of Niagara,” which swept away everything 
before it in its course and submerged a large extent of the surrounding 
country. The torrent divided and descended in several directions, one 
branch flowing southerly toward the city of Latacunga, twelve miles dis- 
tant, but before reaching the city met the beds of three rivers, which 
carried away the waters and saved it from threatened destruction. The 
torrent, however, submerged the plain of Callo, and destroyed crops, 
factories, cattle, and bridges, and it is thought the ruins of the palace of 
the Incas, described by Humboldt, have not escaped its ravages. Another 
branch devastated the fertile valley of Chillo, destroying property valued 
at over two millions of dollars, while the loss of property in other sec- 
Hons is said to be equally great. It is also estimated that. the loss of life 
will exceed one thousand souls. Although the surroundings of Quito 
Were laid waste, the city itself suffered only from a storm of ashes, which 
fell first in the form of coarse, heavy sand, and later as a fine, impalpable 
dust, which penetrated everywhere. The darkness was intense for many 
ours and a reign of terror pervaded the city. It is said that ten 
years of peace and prosperity, of which there is now in Ecuador faint 
Prospect, will not suffice to repair the evils wrought in a few hours during 
this memorable eruption, 
s — News to July 12th received by recent mails fully establishes the con- 
‘Rection between the tidal phenomena observed on the northern coast o 
