604 Notes. [September, 
has actually commenced. Though it was universally admitted 
that there was great lack of room in the old building, the situ- 
ation of the new Museum, save in stridlly official circles, is not 
admired. The respective keepers of the mineralogical and geo- 
logical departments, Prof. N. S. Maskelyne, F.R.S., and G. R. 
Waterhouse, have resigned, and have been succeeded by Mr. 
Lazarus Fletcher, F.G.S.. and Dr. H. Woodward, F.R.S. 
Mr. Searles V. Wood, in a letter to the “ Geological Maga- 
zine,” contends, in opposition to Dr. Croll’s “eccentricity theory,” 
that the climate of the Glacial period must have been an uniform 
diminution of mean temperatures as they now exist, and that 
the period hence resulted from a cosmical cause, wholly uncon- 
nected with geographical conditions and ocean currents, — that 
is to say, to a decrease in the heat-emitting power of the sun. 
Dr. Croll, in the “ Geological Magazine,” considers that the 
perpetual snow of high mountains is due to the want of aqueous 
vapour in the upper regions of the atmosphere, where the heat 
received from the sun is radiated off into space. 
According to Dr. Bogomelow and Dr. Koehler, Blatta oriental 
Us, the Orthopterous insecT absurdly called the “ black-beetle J ’ 
in England, is likely to play an important part in the treatment 
of dropsy and albuminuria. The insects are stupefied with 
chloroform, dried and ground to powder, and taken in doses of 
3 decigrammes. 
Dr. Kebler, of Cincinnati, has studied the physiological adtion 
of platinum. In frogs the chief symptoms observed were in- 
creasing paralysis of the voluntary movements, convulsive 
spasms of the extremities, loss of muscular irritability, and 
death. In Mammalia the direcft adlion upon the muscles is not 
perceptible, but death ensues in consequence of paralysis of the 
abdominal vessels. For dogs five- to six-thousandths of their 
own weight is a fatal dose. 
According to MM. Van Tieghem and Bonnier (“ Bulletin de la 
Soc. Botan. de France,” xxvii., p. 83) the seeds of Acer pseudo- 
platanus form an exception to the rule that seeds are not injured 
by cold. 
The editor of “ Science,” a new and ably-condudted American 
contemporary, states that during the fifteen minutes he remained 
in company with the well-known Dr. Tanner, two opportunities 
were presented when he might have taken food unobserved by 
his watchers, who were not always in the same room. 
In the brain of an adult chimpanzee, described by Dr. Spitzka, 
the right side presented a well-developed first transition gyrus, 
evident and exposed to view as in the human subjedt, whilst on 
the left side it was concealed as in the ordinary chimpanzee type. 
