134 
WAYSIDE NOTES. 
27th, 56'0° at Binley Vicarage. In the rays of the sun, 121-2° at 
Hodsock, on the 12th; 109.3° at Loughborough and 104-5° at South- 
well, on the 27tli. The lowest readings were 16-3° at Coston, 20‘0° at 
Binley Vicarage, on the 13th ; 18-8° at Hodsock, 20’7° at Southwell, on 
the 20th ; 21-0° at Henley-in-Arden, on the 13th, 14th, and 19th ; and 
21-5° at Loughborough, on the 21st. On the grass, 11-3° at Hodsock, 
on the 18th ; 16'3° at Southwell and 16-6° at Loughborough, on the 
17th. Rainfall was about half an inch below the average, the amounts 
measured being 1-61 inches at Coston Rectory, 1*59 inches at Binley 
Vicarage, 1-54 inches at Henley-in-Arden, 1-44 inches at Southwell, 
1*30 inches at Loughborough, and 1-29 inches at Hodsock. The values 
in twenty-four hours in no case exceeded half an inch. The number 
of “ rainy days ” varied from sixteen to twelve. Snow fell at Lough¬ 
borough on seven days. The customary March gales were rather 
“ conspicuous by their absence ” till the end of the month. Sunshine 
about the average. Wm. Berridge, F. R. Met. Soc. 
12, Victoria Street, Loughborough. 
Visitors to the British Association Meeting last year will 
remember the excitement over Mr. E. B. Poulton’s five-toed cats, 
while his far more interesting communication on the gilding of 
chrysalids did not attract nearly so much attention. This latter 
series of investigations he has since been continuing, broadening out 
into experiments on the protective value of colour and markings in 
insects, especially in Lepidopterous larvae, in their relations to verte- 
brata. He has found that conspicuous insects are nearly always 
refused by birds and lizards, but that they are eaten in extreme hunger ; 
hence the unpleasant taste which conspicuously-coloured insects 
possess failed as a protection under the circumstances. Further, 
conspicuous and unpalatable insects, although widely separated, tended 
to converge in colour and pattern, being thus more easily seen and 
remembered by their enemies. In the insects protected by resembling 
their surroundings it was observed that mere size might prevent the 
attacks of small enemies. Some such insects were unpalatable, but 
could not be distinguished from the others. In tracing the inedibility 
through the stages, he found that no inedible imago was edible in the 
larval stage ; the unpleasant taste arises therefore in this latter stage. 
At a recent meeting of the Physiological Society of Berlin 
(March 25) Prof. Falk gave an account of some recent investigations 
into the influence of extremes of temperature upon the colour of the 
blood. In persons either burnt or frozen to death the post mortem 
patches present a strikingly bright red colour. He has found that 
temperatures of 0° C. (freezing point) and below lead to the colour of 
the blood becoming bright red by causing the oxygen of the air to be more 
readily fixed and more stably retained by the blood corpuscles than is 
the case at ordinary temperatures. If, however, the blood has stood 
exposed to the air until putrefactive changes have set in, in this case 
the action of cold no longer makes the blood brighter in colour. Other 
experiments have shown that in animals killed by low temperatures 
the blood is bright red, not only in the peripheral parts but also in 
the heart and great vessels. Also in human beings frozen to death the 
blood even in the heart is sometimes observed to be bright red, 
although in most cases only the blood in the peripheral parts presents 
this appearance ; probably death has ensued from freezing only in 
