Notes. 
[September, 
566 
The National Health Society has recently issued a pamphlet 
on the Vaccination question, bringing forward some very decisive 
cases in favour of this precaution. 
Why is Bestiarianism an apparently capital point in the creed 
of the Positivists ? 
According to the “New York Sun” a pair of orioles in 
Central Park, finding the twig on which they were building 
their nest too weak, secured it to a branch above by means of a 
string. 
M. G. Carlet (“ Comptes Rendus ”) shows that the venom-bag 
in the bee, and the other Mellifera, is not— as in the wasps, &c. 
furnished with muscles for the expulsion of the poison. The 
two rods of the sting play the part of an aspirator and an 
injecftor. 
Dr. Wadsworth, in the “ American Naturalist,” continues his 
demonstration that the interior of the earth is not solid. 
General Butler is very justly rebuked, in “ Science,” for 
saying that “the higher education of the few mainly affetfts 
themselves.” 
It is not generally known that Lord Byron’s daughter Ada, 
afterwards Countess of Lovelace, possessed very high scientific 
attainments. Her translation of General Menabrea’s exposition 
of the analytical engine of C. Babbage, with the accompanying 
critical notes, proves her to have been a mathematician of no 
mean order. 
M. J. Fischer (“Revue Scientifique ”) gives an interesting 
account of observations on monkeys, especially Macacus rhesus. 
This animal, having been frightened at seeing a gun discharged 
at some sparrows, extended his fear to a toy pistol appended to 
his master’s watch-chain, and even to the figure of a revolver 
in an armourer’s illustrated catalogue. Several species of mon- 
keys recognise pictures of animals,— a proof of the superiority 
of their intelligence over that of dogs and elephants. The 
rhesus knew the names of some sixty to seventy animals con- 
fined in cages in the same room. He could fully understand the 
expression°of the human countenance, could estimate weights, 
and had a certain — though not strong— sense of number. 
Dr. Fromont (“ Popular Science Monthly ”) seeks to account 
for swarms of Lepidoptera encountered at sea as having been 
developed from pupse contained among the cargo, — a somewhat 
insufficient explanation. 
Mr. C. M. Hollingsworth discusses, in the “ American Natu- 
ralist ” the theory of sex. His conclusions differ from those of 
Mr. Starkweather noticed in our last number, as he considers 
that the epoch of fecundation is decisive. 
