Notes. 
[May, 
308 
“ Science ” gives an instance of a prolonged drought in Vir- 
ginia having been broken by the ascent of a column of hot air 
from the conflagration of about 40 acres of scrub pines. Rain 
began in little more than an hour from the origin of the fire, and 
continued till sunset. During the rest of the season showers 
occurred with ordinary frequency. 
Mr. G. P. Sanderson, in a paper read before the Society of 
Arts, rates the intelligence of the elephant very much lower than 
is ordinarily done. He has only met with one instance of an 
Indian elephant which exceeded 10 feet in height, being 10 feet 
7^- inches. 
Prof. R. W. Raymond (“ Kansas Rev. of Science ”) says, 
concerning the divining-rod, that in one department after another 
it has been found useless. If it be worthy the attention of sci- 
entific students, it is the students of Psychology and Biology, 
not of Geology and Hydroscopy, who can profitably consider it. 
At the recent Hertford sewage trial the learned judge made 
the mistake of saying that the “ Phosphate Sewage Company ” 
had worked the “ABC process ” there unsatisfactorily. We 
are authorised to say that the “ABC” sewage-process has 
never been worked at Hertford at all. 
Dr. S. W. Burnett (“Science”) refutes Mr. Lawson Tait’s 
assertion that “ no other animals than cats are affected with 
congenital deafness.” He gives two instances of dogs, deaf 
from puppyhood, — one of them, moreover, not white, but yellow. 
The average cloudiness in Kansas (“ Kansas Rev. of Science ”) 
is 44 per cent, as against 31 in California, 47 in the Southern 
States, 53 in New England, and 71 in Great Britain. 
Mr. E. F. Hardman, Government Geologist in Western Aus- 
tralia, reports what he regards as an instance of suicide by black 
snakes. A half-killed snake was attacked by black ants in the 
wounded parts, when “ it instantly turned round and bit itself 
twice in the neck, with seeming determination.” In less than 
one minute it was dead, poisoned, Mr. Hardman believes, by its 
own venom. His men reported this to be a common occurrence. 
According to the researches of M. Certes (“ Comptes Rendus”) 
there appear to exist at the bottom of the sea aerobic microbia, 
but no anaerobic forms. 
Sir Richard Owen has described a mammalian species from 
the trias of South Africa. This animal, which has received the 
name Tritylodon, approaches nearer to the Stereognathus of the 
oolite than to any other form, but is still so distinct from all 
known animals as to throw no light on the ancestry of the Mam- 
malia. 
M. Ch. Richet shows that the hydrochloric acid of the gastric 
juice exists chiefly in combination with pepsine, 
