1012 General Notes. 
According to statistics brought together by M. Turquan, an 
average number of seventy-eight centenarians, twenty-seven men, 
and forty-six women, die annually in France. This average is 
based on 1,474 observations. The northern slope of the Pyrenees 
seems to be a favored region for longevity, since 38.8 per 100,000 
in the Hautes Pyrénées and 38.4 in the Basses Pyrénées attain 190 
years. The percentage diminishes northwards, but increases some- 
what in the basin of the Seine. 
The Bulletin of the Alpine Club states that immense caverns 
containing a subterranean lake and water-courses which seem to be 
connected with the river Yonte, have been discovered by M. Fabié 
in the Casse Mejean, an isolated mountain 900 to 1,300 metres In 
height. 
Asts.—Disguised as a Mussulman, Dr. Hurgronji, of Leyden, 
has resided six months at Mecca. The city has not sensibly 
changed since it was visited by Burkhardt, in the beginning of 
the century. This traveller denies that the black stone of the 
Kaaba is a meteorite, since a similar stone occurs in the sacred 
mountain of Abu Giibez. 
The old State of Harar, once governed by an independent emir, 
and afterwards annexed to Egypt, has, since March, 1887, been m 
the possession of Menelik, king of Shoa. het 
England took possession of the island of Socotra on Novem 
30, 1886. 
The English have abandoned their claims to the southern 5 
of the Bay of Tadjura, in the gulf of Aden, and a sel 
portion of the western shore of that gulf is now under the pro 
tion of France. : f the 
As the Baptist Mission of Victoria was within the bounds ben 
Cameron country, which by the Anglo-German convention of edb 
belonged to Germany, it has been given up, and is now occup! y 
missionaries from Basle. s ii 
Great advances have been made in the knowledge of a a 
raphy of Madagascar since the treaty concluded between the #re 
and the Hovas, in December, 1887. - oa of the 
The new republic founded by the Boers, on the frontiers 0 ie 
Transvaal and of Natal, in the territory of the Amazulu, 1s 
annexed to the Transvaal repuplic. 
