1885 .] 
Notes. 
631 
Mr. J. T. Campbell (“American Naturalist”) refutes by ob- 
servation the common notion that the rings of trees register 
fruitful and unfruitful years. 
A notion prevails in Brazil that the gitiranaboia ( Fulgora 
lanternaria), a perfectly harmless insert, has the power of killing 
large animals, and even trees, with the touch of its beak. 
Taking a ramble along the banks of the Lea, just below the 
Tottenham Sewage Works, we were saluted by two rough-looking 
youths with the questions — “ Come down to smell at it?” 
“ Aint it strong ? ” 
The teeth of recent animals contain very little fluorine, whilst 
it is largely present in fossil teeth. 
To test the now prevalent opinion concerning the origin of 
cholera, M. Rochefontaine took a certain quantity of the Rejec- 
tions of a cholera patient containing the celebrated comma- 
bacillus, and made them into a bolus, which he swallowed. He 
was not seized with cholera. 
A revival of Astrology seems in contemplation. Would it not 
be possible, as experimentum crucis, to find in London two 
children born at the same time and within a distance of a few 
yards only, and to compare their destinies in life ? 
Luiz de Andrade Corvo, in a communication to the Academy 
of Sciences, contends that the destruction of vines ascribed to 
the Phylloxera is really due to a tubercular disease occasioned 
by a special bacillus. This disease can be communicated to other 
plants by inoculation in the entire absence of the Phylloxera. 
This insert merely spreads the evil of inoculation. 
Mr. K. A. Chipman (“ Science ”) mentions a case of three 
children who associated colours with the names of persons, Kate 
seeming to them red, Mary white, Alice violet, Dick deep Van- 
dyke brown, William a watery blue. 
At the September meeting of the Entomological Society, Mr. 
Waterhouse, of the British Museum, exhibited some aquatic 
Curculios which swim with the same artion and the same ease 
as a Dytiscus, though their legs display no structural adaptation 
for the purpose. 
A certain writer asks— Supposing it asserted that the Moon is 
made of green cheese, could our savants furnish any absolute 
refutation of the assertion ? 
A curious poisoning case has come under our notice : a cat 
which had obtained possession of a sole, and eaten it, became 
almost immediately very sick, and died before night. The fish 
had just been bought for human consumption, and the cat as 
it may be fairly inferred from her good appetite— was in average 
health. 6 
