328 
THE MEDITERRANEAN' NATURALIST 
In the course of his researches, from which has 
been prepared a new chart of the currents of the 
North Atlantic, the Prince of Monaco threw into 
the sea nearly 1000 numbered and recorded floats, 
of which 227 were returned with particulars of 
their discovery ou various coasts. A notable result 
is the tracing of a great ocean vortex to the west 
of the Azores. Just as in an atmospheric cyclone, 
there exists in this oceanic vortex a region of calm 
where the waters do not follow any regular direc- 
tion, and when the floats enter this region they 
remain there often for months or years. 
Pomologists have been warned by Prof. C. V. 
Riley against two foreign insects that are likely 
to appear in the United States. The peach ceratitis 
a subtropical insect resembling the apple 
maggot, is extremely destructive to the peach crop 
of Bermuda, and would doubtless prove very 
troublesome in Florida and Georgia. The Japa- 
nese peach fruit-worm is like the codling moth, 
and in some seasons damages ninety percent of 
the peach crop of Japan. 
In an address to the Royal Academy of Medi- 
cine in Ireland, Mr, Edward Hamilton stated 
that the progress of surgery now rests securely 
upon three points — anaesthesia, antisepticism and 
experimental research. In the matter of anaesthe- 
tics, he favored ether for adults and chloroform 
for children. Lest the great work already accom- 
plished should exalt his hearers above measure 
he mentioned that cancer and tubercle are still 
incurable, and that littie advance has been made 
in the cure of syphilis. He urged the importance 
of hygienic treatment, good air, good food, early 
hours, temperance in all things, the Turkish bath 
and the blood-making property of cod-liver oil. 
The failure of the recent attempt to introduce 
a destructive epidemic among the rabbits of 
Australasia has not wholly discouraged the 
advocates of such a method of reducing the 
plague. Mr. Miller Christy calls attention to some 
interesting facts concerning the rabbits of the 
Canadian northwest. These animals become very 
scarce for several successive seasons, then in a few 
years increase to enormous numbers, when they 
suddenly die off until hardly a living rabbit can be 
found. Prof. Hind in 1860 attributed this to 
exhaustion following a severe winter, but later 
writers claim to find evidence of disease. The hope 
is thus revived that a virulent disease peculiar to 
the rabbit may yet be brought to the aid of the 
Australian sheep farmer. 
Attempts are being made, so says Mature, to 
create a silk-producing industry in the district of 
Xicolaieff in South Russia, attempts which it is 
surmised will prove successful. The soil and 
climate of the country are admirably adapted for 
the culture of tho mulberry tree, so that provided 
the matter be taken up with energy and derrni- 
nation there seems to be no reason why a thriving 
and prosperous industry should not be estabished 
for the benefit of the peasants and of the poorer 
classes. 
Herr Nagel has recently been conducting some 
experiments at Naples having for their object the 
localization of the various senses of sea anemones. 
The results of his researches have shown that 
the sense of taste resides in the tentacles: and 
that though the tentacles were apparently unsus- 
cex>tible to pain when cut, yet when touched, or 
when heated substances were placed near them 
they gave evidences of being most sensitive. 
They are therefore the seat of three senses viz. of 
touch, taste, and smell. 
According to the Census of 1892 the Maltese 
Islands have an area d 270,3991 tutnmoli (a tam- 
molo = -fg of an acre) or 117A square miles, and 
of this 1 13,083-1 tummoli are uncultivated or uncul- 
tivable. To put it in other terms 42 per cent of 
the total areage of the islands is little more than 
bare, sterile rock. 
Nature contains a most interesting note on a 
paper which was contributed to the Ivew Bulletin 
by Mr. E.H. Floyer, F. L. S. Inspector General of 
Egyptian Telegraphs in the course of which we 
are told that the country between the Nile and the 
Nile and the Red Ska has not always been so bar- 
ren as it is now. 
There is ample evidence that in former times 
bodies of cavalry from three to five hundred in 
number ranged without commisariat difficulties 
over districts which are now deserts. 
