Dr. Stejneger in No. 1471 describes a new tree-frog (Hyla) from Costa Rica; East African birds, by Mr. H. C. Oberholser, form the subject of No. 1469; while in No. 1472 Mr. E. S. Miller discusses mammals from Engano Island, off Sumatra. Certain American moths are described in Nos. 1463 and 1465 by Mr. A. Busck.

IN a paper contributed to part iii. of vol. xxv. of Gegenbaur's Morphologisches Jahrbuch, Mr. J. E. V. Boas makes the startling announcement that a pleural cavity is absent in the Indian elephant. The author believes the feature to be constant, and that it will be found to hold good also for the African elephant, in which case we shall have a feature distinguishing the group from all other mammals. This paper is followed by one by Prof. G. Ruge on the shape of the thoracic cavity in the Indian elephant, and the relations thereto of the lungs. In a third paper Mr. A. Rauber contrasts the skull of Immanuel Kant with that of a member of the Neanderthal race. A striking difference between the two crania is to be found in the extreme brachycephalism of the one and the equally marked dolichocephalism of the other. If it be suggested that the shortness of the savant's skull was due to inheritance-from his ancestors in Scotland and Nürnberg-this is merely evading the main question, namely, When did the first brachycephalic man appear? It is noteworthy that if Kant's skull be plotted on the dolichocephalic lines of that of the Neanderthaler, and the Neanderthaler's cranium drawn on the brachycephalic proportions of that of Kant, the normals from a line connecting the " ophrion" with the "basion" will be very nearly the same in both cases.

THE Bio-Chemical Journal for June (i., Nos. 6 and 7) contains several interesting papers. Prof. Moore and Messrs. Alexander, Kelly, and Roaf show that the secretion of gastric hydrochloric acid is very sensitive to any variation in general health of the body, any enfeeblement leading to decreased percentage of the acid. This reduction in acid-secreting power is much more marked in cancer than in any other condition. Prof. Moore and Mr. Wilson contribute a paper on a clinical method of hæmalkalimetry which seems to be a distinct advance on previous ones.

THE longevity of Bacillus typhosus in natural waters and in sewage forms the subject of an important paper by Messrs. H. L. Russell and C. A. Fuller (Journ. of Infectious Diseases, Supp. No. 2, February, p. 40). Permeable sacs of celloidin, parchment, and agar were employed to imprison the typhoid organisms while exposed to the influence of water and sewage bacteria. When B. typhosus was exposed to the action of flowing lake water (Mendota), the longevity of the organism ranged from eight to ten days; when exposed directly to the action of sewage bacteria, its longevity was reduced to three to five days.

IN Bulletin No. 104 of the Agricultural Experiment Station, Morgantown, West Virginia, Mr. J. L. Sheldon writes on the ripe rot or mummy disease of guavas, ascribed to the fungus Glomerella psidii. Brown spots appear on the ripening fruits causing them to shrivel, whence the term mummy disease; if not identical with the bitter rot of apples it is very similar, and it was found possible to inoculate apples with the fungus. Delacroix assigned the fungus to the genus Glæoosperium, but on account of the ascigerous stage observed by Mr. Sheldon he refers it to the genus Glomerella.

EXPERIMENTS on the tapping and preparation of rubber from Castilloa trees are in a less advanced stage than experiments with Hevea latex. As Castilloa promises to

be more suitable for cultivation than Hevea in parts of the West Indies, considerable interest attaches to the preliminary results outlined in the West Indian Bulletin (vol. vii., part i.) by Mr. J. C. Moore for St. Lucia and Mr. J. Jones for Dominica. A variation in the semi-circumferential method of tapping is described, where, instead of a continuous cut, a series of incisions are made with a chisel. Castilloa is found to thrive on land suited to cacao. and may be grown on a shade tree for cacao; it possesses the further advantage of being able to withstand severe

storms.

IT is interesting to note how the trade of each of the West Indian Islands possesses its own special features. Dr. F. Watts reviews the changes that have occurred in the agricultural industries of Montserrat in the West Indian Bulletin, vol. vii., No. 1, of which the most prominent facts are the decadence of the sugar industry and the marked fluctations in the production of lime and lime-juice. The raising of cattle and stock for export shows a steady increase, and a papain industry has been developed, which, however, is threatened by competitive production in the East. Cotton is regarded by Dr. Watts as the most hopeful industry for the future, but the peasant population has not, so far, taken to the cultivation. In the course of another article, Dr. Watts outlines the development of the cotton industry in the Leeward Islands since 1900, the greatest changes having been effected thereby in Nevis and Anguilla.

THE Completion of the Simplon Tunnel, 12 miles in length, at a cost of 3,100,000l., and at an average rate of two miles a year, has induced Mr. Lewis M. Haupt to publish in the Journal of the Franklin Institute (vol. clxi.. No. 6) some comparative notes on other great tunnels. The Hoosac Tunnel, Massachusetts, five miles in length, was begun in 1854 and completed in 1876, with an average progress of 5.5 feet per day. The Mont Cenis Tunnel, eight miles in length, was begun in 1857 and completed in 1871, with an average progress of 8 feet per day. The Sutro Tunnel, Nevada, four miles in length, was begun in 1869 and completed in 1878, with an average progress of 10-24 feet per day. The St. Gothard Tunnel (18721881), 9 miles in length, was driven at the rate of 14.6 feet per day. The Arlberg Tunnel (1880-1884), 6-38 miles in length, was driven at the rate of 27.8 feet per day.

THE third number of Concrete and Constructional Engineering (July) shows a marked improvement on the previous issues. The principal articles deal with reinforced concrete in France, reinforced concrete bridges, steel and concrete buildings in Scotland, reinforced concrete water mains, the theory of reinforced concrete, and hollow concrete blocks. The illustrations are excellent, and the articles are written by recognised authorities. An editorial note deals with the need for international standards in respect to reinforced concrete, and suggests that the International Association for Testing Materials should form a committee to collect international data. There is also a portrait and obituary notice of the octogenarian Joseph Monier, who died in Paris on March 13 last, almost unknown, almost forgotten, and in unfortunate circumstances, yet credit will always be due to him as the inventor of reinforced concrete.

THE blackening of rocks in rivers has of late received some attention from geologists. Mr. A. Lucas, chief chemist to the Geological Survey in Cairo, sends us a paper on the blackened rocks of the Nile Cataract (National

Printing Department, Cairo, 1905; for the Ministry of Finance). The dark outer film is similar to that well recognised as a characteristic of stones in deserts. The desert-film has been examined separately, and Mr. Lucas agrees with Walther that "the colour is much the darker the more the silica content of the rock." The depth of colour is dependent upon the amount of black oxide of manganese in the film, and this is conditioned first by the manganese content of the rock, and secondly by the opportunities presented for the manganese salts to be brought to the surface and oxidised." "A hot climate and a small rainfall are necessary to the formation and preservation of the film." In regard to the river-film, it is noted that certain incised stones at the First Cataract are equally black on their surface and in the hollows of the inscriptions. Silica is one of the minor constituents of the riverfilm, but is absent from the desert-film. Mr. Lucas, after discussing previous literature and his own analyses, concludes that the river-film arises from material in the rocks themselves, as in the case of the analogous desert-film. Dr. W. F. Hume contributes a description of the microscopic characters of the rocks examined, with the general

result that no connection can be established between the surface-film and any special decomposition in the outer layers.

THE June number of the National Geographic Magazine contains an account of a visit to Vesuvius after the eruption of April 8. The account is illustrated by a number

pewter was used by goldsmiths to take castings of certain articles. Benvenuto Cellini is said to have used it for this purpose in connection with his work. It appears from Mr. Cooke's article that dealers nowadays, to enhance the value of their wares, often point to the small marks in shields of a lion rampant or a leopard's head crowned, and describe articles bearing these as silver pewter." But such marks indicate no special value in the metal, and except for the infinitesimal quantity that there may be in the lead employed, it is safe to assume that old pewter contains no silver.

66

IN a paper on the rapid measurement of geodesical bases published in part i. of the Bulletin of the French Physical Society, Dr. C. E. Guillaume gives details of the construction and use of the standards and measuring wires referred to in his article on invar (NATURE, vol. lxxi., p. 138). An account is given, in particular, of the rapid, direct measurement of base lines by means of stretched wires of invariable length. This process is extremely rapid as compared with older methods; in good country, ten or twelve men can bimetallic scale fifty men are required, and the distance measure up 5 to 6 kilometres per day, whereas with a covered per day does not exceed 400 metres. Formerly the number of bases directly measured was kept as small as possible, nearly all the values being obtained by triangulation. The use of these measuring wires of invariable length affords a means of controlling the older data, and will change the character of future surveys by increasing

of reproductions from photographs, of which we reproduce one showing the aspect of the cone after the eruption. The scoring of the slope of the cone is due to slipping of the loose ashes, not to stream action.

THE current number of the Home Counties Magazine contains an interesting article on old pewter by Mr. H. M. Cooke. In a broad sense pewter is composed of tin alloyed in varying quantities with antimony and copper; lead, bismuth, and zinc are sometimes also employed. The variety and constant change of colour are due to the difference of alloys and to atmospheric influence. The colour is in some measure dependent on the surface being good. As a domestic article, pewter succeeded wood, and was used almost universally until earthenware became cheap. It did not come into general domestic use until the seventeenth century. On account of its fusibility

the number of direct data at the expense of those obtained by triangulation.

THE third volume of the contributions from the Jefferson Physical Laboratory of Harvard University for the year 1905 has been received. The previous volumes were described at some length in NATURE for March 1 last (vol. lxxiii., p. 427). The results of the investigations published in the present volume were obtained largely by the aid of the Thomas Jefferson Coolidge fund for original research. Nine of the twelve papers have already appeared in the Proceedings of the American Academy, and most of the contributions have been dealt with already in notes published in these columns.

THE Electrician Printing and Publishing Company, Ltd., is issuing a new series of Electrician primers at 3d. each, post free. A complete list of the primers will be sent on application. From an examination of specimens dealing with thermopiles, Röntgen rays and radiography, influence machines, the induction coil, the magnetic properties of iron and electrical units, it is clear that the series will prove of service to technical students.

THE édition de luxe of the Great Eastern Railway Company's handbook, "Summer Holidays," by Mr. Percy Lindley, is provided with an excellent series of facsimiles of water-colour drawings of places of interest in the eastern counties. In addition to the illustrations in colour, the pen and ink drawings, the letterpress, the list of golf links, and other information provided, combine to make the publ cation a useful holiday guide.

A comparison of the observed and computed places on July 16 will give an approximate value for the corrections to be applied to the ephemeris positions. When rediscovered, the comet was about one degree north of Aquarii; at present (July 19) it is presumably about five degrees north of 2 Ceti, and is travelling in a northeasterly direction, so that it now rises above the southeast horizon at about 11.30 p.m.

THE ORBIT OF CASTOR.-An interesting paper on the quadruple system of Castor, by Dr. H. D. Curtis, appears in No. 5, vol. xxiii., of the Astrophysical Journal.

The discussion is based on the results obtained from a number of spectrograms, of each of the two double systems, taken with the Mills spectrograph at the Lick Observatory. For the fainter component, a,, of the visual system, the final elements deduced give the period as 2.928285 days, the eccentricity as 0.01 0.0066, and the velocity of the system as -0.98 0.15 km. The comparison of these elements with the observational results shows a satisfactory agreement. Reducing the observational results for the brighter component, a,, Dr. Curtis obtained a final set of elements which give the period as 9.218826 days, the eccentricity as 0-5033±0.0112, and the velocity of the system as +6.2010.17 km.

Combining these results with those obtained for the visual system, it should become possible to obtain values for the parallax, masses, and other physical constants of this remarkable quadruple system, but the visual results, as shown in a table given by Dr. Curtis, are as yet so indeterminate that any values so obtained could not be looked upon as being in any way final. The relative velocity of the two components as derived from Dr. Curtis's discussion is 7·14±0.23 km., and, taking Prof. Doberck's period of 347 years for the visual system, this would indicate a parallax of o"-05. On a similar assumption the semi-major axes of the two systems are as follow:

α Geminorum, a = 1,435.000 km.
a = 1,667,000..

Although these results are mere hypotheses, they give some idea of the magnitude of each system, and show that they are probably of about the same dimensions.

THE SANITARY CONGRESS AT BRISTOL

THE twenty-third Congress of the Royal Sanitary Institute was held at Bristol during the week ending July 14. Sir Edward Fry presided. The proceedings of the congress comprised the usual general meetings; meetings in three sections, (1) sanitary science and preventive medicine, (2) engineering and architecture, (3) physics, chemistry, and biology; and meetings of conferences of various classes of persons interested in sanitary science. This year there were conferences of municipal representatives, under the presidency of Councillor Colston Wintle, chairman of the health committee of the City of Bristol, who took a prominent part in the proceedings of the congress; of medical officers of health, under Dr. D. S. Davies, medical officer of health, Bristol; of engineers and surveyors to county and other sanitary authorities, under Mr. H. Percy Boulnois, of the Local Government Board; of veterinary inspectors, under Mr. Frank Leigh; of sanitary inspectors, under Mr. A. E. Hudson, chief sanitary inspector, Cheltenham; of women on hygiene, under Miss Mary Clifford, in the absence of the Duchess of Beaufort; and also a conference on the hygiene of school life, under the presidency of the Bishop of Hereford.

In the presidential address to the congress on Monday, July 9, Sir Edward Fry dealt clearly and concisely with the general history of sanitary works and the regulation of public health. After pointing out the increase of duties and responsibilities which had devolved upon the heads of modern households and upon local authorities in consequence of the recent developments of sanitary science, he referred in turn to the sanitary ordinances of the Greeks, the Jews, and the Romans up to the disappearance of all thought of sanitary science in the ruin of the Western ject in Great Britain since the middle of last century. Empire. Finally, he referred to the legislation on the sub

ment.

Sir W. J. Collins, president of Section I., sanitary science and preventive medicine, was detained in London by urgent Shingleton Smith. It protested against the too exclusive parliamentary duties, and the address was read by Dr. consideration of bacteriology, and appealed for greater attention to be paid to the soil in which bacteria are implanted, and upon which they depend for their developpresident, Mr. Edwin T. Hall, referred to a number of In Section II., engineering and architecture, the points in which the architect could assist the promotion of sanitation by the design of buildings. Dr. W. N. Shaw, president of Section III., physics, chemistry, and biology. took for his subject climate and health. After referring to the work of Sir Arthur Mitchell, Dr. Buchan, and Dr. Longstaff, he indicated the climatological material available for the study of questions upon the relation of health to climate, and discussed the methods of using it. In the course of the address he showed a meteorological section of the British Isles from north to south, Sumburgh Head to Hastings, and another from west to east, Valencia to Margate. He also exhibited some interesting diagrams of the average diurnal variation of relative humidity for certain selected months at four observatories in the United Kingdom, and some autographic records of the same element at Cambridge, showing remarkable fluctuations of humidity within the period of twenty-four hours.

The subjects of the addresses at the various conferences and of the papers and discussions were for the most part of a technical character. Questions concerning milk supply and its regulation were raised in Section I. by Dr. J. Fortescue-Brickdale and by Mrs. C. Hamer Jackson, at the conference of medical officers of health by Prof. H. Kenwood, and at the conference of veterinary inspectors by Dr. W. G. Savage and by Mr. J. S. Lloyd. The question of dust, particularly of motor dust, also came up in various forms. In the conference of engineers it was raised by a paper by Mr. A. P. I. Cotterell, and in Section III. the influence of dust on health was a subject of discussion opened by Dr. P. Boobbyer. Of the suggestions made for dealing with the question, some of them could only be

yet employed in this branch of astronomy shows anything beyond what is readily distinguishable in an 8-inch glass.

bacterial treatment of sewage also found a place in several | sections or conferences. The necessity for the extension of

employment of women as health visitors or in other ways in connection with the carrying out of provisions for public health also appeared on more than one occasion.

Subjects to be treated from the more specially scientific standpoint fall, as a rule, to Section I., sanitary science and preventive medicine, or to Section III., physics, chemstry, and biology. In the former, Fleet-Surgeon BassettSmith suggested various ways in which disease might be disseminated in a paper on present knowledge of the etiology of Mediterranean fever, with special reference to the Royal Navy. The other papers were by Dr. R. S. Marsden, on scarlatina and certain other diseases in relation to temperature and rainfall; by Dr. J. Fletcher, on post-scarlatina diphtheria and its prevention; and by Dr. F. T. Bond, on some points of interest in the treatment of outbreaks of diphtheria. In Section III., besides the discussion on the influence of dust, may be mentioned a paper by Prof. M. Travers, F.R.S., on the absorption of gases in solids, which showed how, following the analogy of the absorption of carbonic anhydride by carbon, the absorption water vapour by wool and by cotton varied with the pressure of the vapour up to saturation point, and also how the absorption of water vapour by cotton at the same pressure diminished with increase of temperature.

of

Mr. J. H. Johnston described some experiments upon the determination of the amount of organic colloids in sewage and their partial removal by surface action. Mr. J. W. Lovibond sought for a more precise chemical definition of pure beer,' and indicated the use of his tintometer to identify the quality of beers. Dr. Rideal described the effect of copper sulphate in preventing the growth of algae in water supplies, and proposed the use of electrolytic chlorine for the purpose. The other papers were of a technical character.

In an evening lecture Prof. Lloyd Morgan set forth very clearly the distinction to be drawn between the deterioration of the individuals composing a race and the degeneration of the stock, and dealt with the bearing of the theory of evolution upon the question of degeneration. A popular evening lecture was also given by Baillie Anderson, of Glasgow, on the wastage of human life.

Ample provision was made for the entertainment of those attending the congress by visits to works and institutions in the neighbourhood, as well as by garden-parties or excursions to the numerous places of interest in the district. The excellence of the arrangements and the smoothness of the working were effective testimony to the admirable organisation of the congress as carried out by a local committee with Councillor Colston Wintle as chairman and Mr. T. J. Moss-Flower as secretary, in conjunction with the officers of the Sanitary Institute, of whom Colonel Lane Notter is chairman of council, Mr. W. Whittaker, F.R.S., chairman of the congress committee, and Mr. E. WhiteWallis secretary.

Dravidian" from Sanskrit and applied it to a wellknown family of languages, mostly spoken in southern India, but of which an interesting member, Brâhûî, is found far to the north-west, in Baluchistan. In the hills of Central India, to the north of the main Dravidian group, there is another and totally distinct family of languages which philologists call Mundâ."

It happens that the speakers of the south-Indian Dravidian languages and the speakers of Mundâ languages possess a common ethnic type--nose thick and broad, low facial angle, thick lips, wide, fleshy face, low stature, figure squat and sturdy, skin dark, and so on. This ethnic type ethnologists have called "Dravidian," an unfortunate piece of nomenclature, for (1) if language can ever be taken as a criterion of race, speakers of Mundâ languages are certainly different in racial origin from the speakers of Dravidian, and (2) some speakers of Dravidian languages, the Brahûis, do not possess the so-called Dravidian ethnic 1 Extension of part of a paper on "The Languages of India and the Linguistic Survey." read before the Society of Arts on March 15 by Dr. G. A. Grierson.

type, but possess that of the Iranians. At any rate, if we put the Brâhûîs out of consideration for the present, it is better to name the ethnic type Mundâ-Dravidian, i.e. the type common to the people known as Mundâs and to the people known as South-Indian Dravidians." The type is almost certainly a mixed one. Judging from the fact that all Mundâs possess it, and that it is not possessed by all Dravidians (witness the Brâhûîs), the probability is that the Mundâ-Dravidian ethnic type belongs mainly to the Mundâs, and has been acquired through intermarriage by Dravidians originally endowed with a less persistent type.

When the Aryans entered India they found it inhabited by people of the Mundâ-Dravidian type. The Aryans were the more highly civilised, but as they migrated further and further into the country they intermarried with the people, and themselves commenced to acquire their physical characteristics while they retained their own language and customs, which they in turn imposed upon the MundâDravidas with whom they came in contact. We see traces of the same interchange occurring even at the present day between the Dravidians and the Mundâs. The Nahâls of the Mahâdêo Hills were once a Mundâ tribe. They came into contact with the relatively more civilised Dravidians, and adopted a mixed speech in which Dravidian predominated. Nowadays this tribe is coming under Aryan influence, and is adopting an Aryan language.

It is impossible to say whether the Mundâs or the Dravidians, or both, were aborigines of India or not. Assuming that the Dravidians were immigrants, the probability is that they entered the country from the south, and not from the north-west, as was maintained by Caldwell and others. Relationship has been alleged, with some appearance of truth, between the Dravidian languages and those of New Guinea and Australia. This subject has not yet been thoroughly gone into, and is at present under examination, but the above seems to be the conclusion which will most probably be reached.

As for the Mundâs, if they were immigrants, they must certainly have entered India proper from the north-east. Pater Schmidt, of Vienna, who attacked the question from without, and the Linguistic Survey of India, which has approached it from within, have arrived at the same result. There was once a race spread widely over Further India of which we find remains amongst the forest tribes of Malacca, in Pegu and Indo-China, and along the Mé-kong and Middle Salwin. The languages which they speak are members of what is known as the Môn-Khmêr family. Forms of speech closely connected with Môn-Khmêr are Nicobarese, Khasi (spoken in the central hills of Assam), and the various Mundâ tongues of India proper. That there is an ultimate connection between these widely separated languages must now be taken as firmly established by the latest researches of comparative philology. The matter admits of no further doubt. But this is not the limit of the discoveries. The languages of the Himalaya are, it is well known, TibetoBurman in character. Nevertheless, there are dialects spoken on the southern slope of these mountains, from Kanawar in the Punjab almost to Darjeeling, which have a basis similar to this old Mundâ-Nicobar-Môn-KhmêrKhasi language, that has been, so to speak, overwhelmed, but not entirely hidden, by a layer of Tibeto-Burman. Then, on the other side, Pater Schmidt has shown an intimate connection between Môn-Khmêr and the languages of the south-eastern Pacific, so that there is evidence to show the existence in very early times of a people and a group of speeches extending from the Punjab right across northern India and Assam down to the extreme south of Further India and Indo-China, and thence across Indonesia, Melanesia, and Polynesia up to Easter Island, which is not so very far from the coast of South America.

In India, Nearer and Further, the fate of these speeches has been the same. In Nearer India the Mundâ languages, which were certainly once spoken in the northern plains, have been driven to the hills by Dravidians or Aryans. In Assam and Burmah the Khasis and Môn-Khmêrs have been either driven to the hills, where they survive as islands in a sea of alien tongues, or else to the coast of Pegu by the Tibeto-Burmans, and in Indo-China the Môn-Khmêrs have again been driven to the sea-board by the Tais.