1882.] 
Notes. 
693 
Mr. W. Stokes, in an Address delivered at the Jubilee Meeting 
of the British Medical Association, says, speaking of the Bestia- 
rians, “ Their wrath is reserved not for the sportsman, the 
gourmet, or the military tyrant, but for the physiologist, who is 
outlawed if he does not fulfil all the vexatious conditions of an 
extraordinary Adi, the passing of which was simply an insult to 
our profession.” 
It is not generally known that the autumnal tints of foliage 
are not produced in regions where the air is polluted with 
sulphur-fumes. The leaves shrivel up and blacken without pre- 
viously turning red or yellow. 
A healthy young man, of our acquaintance, has been in some 
danger from the sting of a single bee, received on the side of the 
nose near the eye. The roof of the mouth swelled, the oesopha- 
gus was for some time entirely closed, and breathing became 
exceedingly difficult. 
The Abbe Moigno says that the ancient cubit, the ten-millionth 
part of the polar axis of the earth, is preferable, as a standard 
unity of measurement, to the metre. 
Dr. Johnston, of New York, maintains that chloroform cannot 
be given to sleepers without waking them, save by an expert. 
The “ Annales de Chimie et de Physique ” calls attention to a 
paper on the “ Re-concentration of the Mechanical Energy of 
the Universe,” read by the late Prof. W. J. Macquorn Rankine 
at the meeting of the British Association in 1852. 
A statue in honour of the late A. C. Becquerel was inaugurated 
on September 24th, at Chatillon-sur-Loing, amidst much speech- 
making. Prof. Dumas availed himself of the opportunity to 
glorify beet-root sugar, and to pronounce invention a “ quality 
essentially French.” 
M. Fremy, “ following on the same side,” asserted that 
Daniell’s constant-current battery ought to be, and would be, 
called Becquerel’s battery. 
Mr. St. Croix Rose (“ Zoologist ”) ' gives, as an eye-witness, 
a case of a viper swallowing her young. On cutting her open 
the young were found in the stomach. 
Dr. Tholozan (“ Comptes Rendus ”) in a memoir on the occa- 
sional outbursts of plague in Kurdistan, expresses the opinion 
that the received views on the origin and spread of epidemics, 
will, in the very near future, have to be submitted to a complete 
revision. 
Every new idea or system, whilst still sub judice, is apt to 
afford shelter and pabulum to a double crop of charlatans ; on 
the one side promoters, on the other side “ exposers.” 
