158 
living animal; nor was there any substantial reason 
given for considering the helobacterium as belonging 
to the same species as the micrococci, or, if they 
happened to be different, which, if either, was able 
to cause the disease. 
The same volume contains my report bearing the 
date of Jan. 27, 1882. In this are details of success- 
ful inoculation experiments with the sixth pure cul- 
tivation of micrococci which had been obtained and 
cultivated with every precaution known to science at 
the present day.! It was the first real evidence of 
the pathogenic action of these organisms. It was 
equally satisfactory with the experiments of MM. 
Pasteur and Thuillier; and the inoculations were 
made Jan. 17, 1881, or fourteen months before the 
discovery of this same organism by these gentlemen. 
The communication of Dr. Detmers, referred to by 
M. Pasteur, appeared in the American naturalist for 
March and April, 1882, and was a résumé of his 
studies for the department of agriculture. In this 
article he still thinks there is just cause to suppose 
that the organism of swine-plague has a helobac- 
terium, or rod form, and a resting spore. ‘There are, 
however, no new observations or experiments referred 
to, there is no additional proof that the micro- 
cocci seen by him were not the result of atmospheric 
contamination, — nothing to show that a pure culti- 
vation of these would produce the disease. On the 
other hand, the organism which he describes pos- 
sesses a flagellum, and a moving stage or period, 
neither of which have I been able to observe with 
the true germ of this disease, nor with the closely 
allied micrococcus which causes fowl-cholera. 
It is a matter of record, therefore, that the organ- 
ism which constitutes the cause of swine-plague was 
first discovered by Klein in 1876, but that he failed 
to connect it in any way with the virus of the dis- 
ease, and afterwards concluded that it depended upon 
a very different schizophyte. It is also a matter 
of record that I was the first to demonstrate by satis- 
factory methods that this micrococcus exists in the 
blood during the life of the animal, that it can be 
cultivated in flasks, and that the sixth successive cul- 
tivation, made in considerable quantities of liquid, 
and which contained no other form than micrococ- 
cus, still produced the disease. Neither Pasteur and 
Thuillier, nor any other investigators that Iam aware 
of, have ‘added one particle of evidence, except by 
way of confirmation, to that previously advanced by 
me. M. Pasteur is usually very particular in giving 
credit, but he does not seem to be keeping up with 
the progress of American science. D. E. SALMON. 
MIGRATION OF BIRDS IN ENGLAND. 
THE general report of the committee of the British 
association, of which this is in fact an abstract, com- 
prises the observations taken at lighthouses and light- 
vessels, and a few special land- seh on the east 
1 Loc. cit., pp. 267-269. 
2 Report of the committee of the British association for the 
advancement of science, appointed for the purpose of obtaining 
observations on the migration of birds at lighthouses and light- 
ships, and of reporting on the same. (From Nature.) 
SCIENCE. 
and west coasts of England and Scotland, the coasts 
of Ireland, Isle of Man, Channel Islands, Orkney, 
and Shetland Isles, the Hebrides, Faroes, Iceland, 
and Heligoland, and one Baltic station (Stevns Eye q 
on Stevns Klint, Zealand), for which the committee ~ 
is indebted to Professor Liutken of Copenhagen. 
Altogether, a hundred and ninety-six stations have 
been supplied with schedules and printed instruc- 
tions for registering observations, and returns have 
been received from about a hundred and twenty- 
three, —a result which is very satisfactory, show- 
ing, as it does, the general interest taken in the 
work, and the ready co-operation given by the light- 
keepers in assisting the committee. 
As in preceding years, the line of autumn migra- 
tion has been a broad stream from east to west, or 
from points south of east to north of west, and cover- 
ing the whole of the east coast. In 1880, to judge 
from the returned schedules, a large proportion of the 
immigrants came in at the more southern stations; 
in 1881 they covered the whole of the east coast in — 
tolerably equal proportions; but in 1882 the stations 
north of the Humber showed a marked preponderance 
of arrivals. Altogether, a vast migration took place 
this year upon our east coast; the heaviest waves 
breaking upon the mouth of the Humber, Flam- 
borough Head, the Farne Islands, Isle of May at the 
entrance to the Firth of Forth, and again, after miss- 
ing a long extent of the Scotch coast, at the Pent- 
land Skerries. The Bell Rock also came in for a 
share, although apparently a much smaller one than 
the Isle of May. The easterly winds prevailed all 
along our east coasts, generally strong to gales; and 
the succession of south-easterly and easterly gales 
in October, between the 8th and 23d, occurring as 
they did at the usual time of the principal migration, 
brought vast numbers of land-birds to our shores. 
From the Faroes in the north, to the extreme south 
of England, this is found to have been the case. 
Although migration —that is, direct migration — 
on our east coast is shown to have extended over a 
long period, commencing in July, and continuing, 
with but slight intermissions, throughout the autumn 
and into the next year to the end of January, yet the 
main body of migrants appears to haye reached the 
east coast in October, and of these a large proportion 
during the first fortnight in the month. From the 
6th to the Sth inclusive, and again from the 12th to 
the 15th, there was, night and day, an enormous rush, ~ 
under circumstances of wind and weather, which, 
observations have shown, are most unfavorable to a 
good passage.- During these periods, birds arrived in 
an exhausted condition; and we have reasons for con- 
cluding, from the many reported as alighting on fish- — 
ing-smacks and vessels in the North Sea, that the © 
loss of life must have been very considerable. Large — 
flights, also, are recorded as having appeared round 
the lanterns of lighthouses and lightvessels during 
the night migration. From the 6th to the 9th inclu-— 
sive, strong east winds blew over the North Sea, with 
fog and drizzling rain; and from the night of the 12th 
to “7th very similar wean prevailed. Mr. W. Little- 
wood, of the Galloper lightship, forty miles south-east 
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