( 564 ) 
[September, 
NOTES. 
According to Prof. Du Bois Reymond the electric organs of 
fishes afford a curious instance of organic adaptation to the 
water which they inhabit. The eleCtric ray, or Torpedo , living 
in salt water, requires but a slight electromotive power, and its 
organ consequently resembles a battery of few elements, but of 
large section. The eleCtrical eel ( Gymnotus electricus) and the 
Melapterurus of the Nile require a great electromotive force ; 
hence their organs are batteries of many elements, but of small 
section. A comparison of the conductivity of sea- and river- 
water shows almost the same relation as exists between the 
electromotive force of the organs of the Gymnotus and the 
Torpedo. 
M. Musset (“ Comptes Rendus ”), after prolonged observation, 
has never seen a single inseCt captured by the leaves of Drosera 
rotundifolia. 
Dr. T. W. N. Greene states that he practised for four years in 
a province of Monte Video, where the population, practically 
speaking, subsisted entirely upon meat, and yet scurvy was un- 
known. 
The “ Popular Science News ” says — “ It is the tendency of 
all modern training to take for granted that beasts — and men — 
are all alike ; and, if they be not, to try and force them to behave 
as if they were.” 
S. R. Canestrini (“ Rev. Scient. Indust.”) has been experi- 
menting on the effects of decapitation on insects. Butterflies 
are able to fly eighteen days after being beheaded ; crickets leap 
on the thirteenth day ; and Mantis religiosa was still able to move 
on the fourteenth. The house-fly has even been observed to 
copulate after decapitation. 
M. Robin (“ Les Mondes ”) holds that syphilis, and even the 
venom of serpents, may serve as prophylactics against the ma- 
lignant fevers of hot climates. 
A French writer (“ Les Mondes ”) says — “ The meteor (Dar- 
winism) has cast a momentary lustre ; it will soon disappear in 
the darkness of oblivion.” 
A statue of Le Blanc, inventor of the manufacture of soda, is 
about to be ereCted at lssoudun, his native place. When living 
the world refused this illustrious chemist bread ; now he has been 
long dead she gives him a stone. 
