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to hold a conversazione, and for Saturday afternoon, June 3, a visit to the National Physical Laboratory is proposed. Further particulars will be announced later, when the programme is more definitely settled. The hon. secretary, Mr. F. J. Selby, Elm Lodge, Teddington, Middlesex, will be glad to hear from those wishing to join the convention.

In an account of a journey to Lake San Martin, Patagonia, published in the Geographical Journal for March, Captain H. L. Crosthwait directs attention to the magnetic and meteorological observatory established by the Argentine Government on New Year Island-a small island situated in lat. 54° 59' S., and about five miles off the north coast of Staten Island. The observatory, which is complete in every respect, is superintended by four Argentine naval officers, and is here illustrated from Captain Crosthwait's paper. The observatory was opened in February, 1902, and during the time which has since elapsed, the temperature conditions recorded there by the officers are:-highest temperature recorded, 55°4 F.;

BEAVER-DAMS on the Slate River, Colorado, form the subject of a paper by Mr. E. R. Warren in the Proceedings of the Washington Academy (vol. vi. p. 429), in the course of which the author shows how largely these rodents have altered the features of the valley.

IN the Biologisches Centralblatt of March 1, Mr. S. J. Wasmann continues the account of his theory of the origin of slavery among ants, Mr. H. Prandt discusses reduction processes and "karyogamy " among infusorians, while Prof. von Hansemann reviews the so-called heterotype cellformation in malignant tumours, more especially in connection with the recent cancer investigations of Messrs. Farmer, Moore, and Walker.

To the Proceedings of the Boston Society of Natural History (vol. xxxii., No. 3) Miss Emerson contributes an account of the anatomy of Typhlomolge rathbuni, the blind salamander first made known by specimens thrown up by an artesian well in Texas in 1894. Despite its external resemblance to the olm (Proteus) of the Carniola caves,

FIG. 1.-Magnetic and Meteorological Observatory, New Year Island.

lowest temperature, 16°4 F.; annual mean temperature, 41° F. The magnetic observatory is kept at an almost constant temperature of 64° F. Many interesting facts about Tierra del Fuego are given by Captain Crosthwait in his paper.

He directs attention to the astonishing number and variety of the glaciers, and to the fact that most of the larger ones show signs of shrinkage. Of San Martin Lake he says it undoubtedly occupies what was once a strait joining the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The level of the water of the lake rises and falls in a peculiar manner. Exact measurements of these "seiches" show that the movements are irregular, but on an average they amount to about five inches, having a period of about four minutes between two successive high waters. The surface of the water to the eye is perfectly smooth.

THE "Fauna of New England," in course of publication by the Boston Society of Natural History, has reached its fourth part, which is devoted to the echinoderms, the author being Mr. H. L. Clark.

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the author is of opinion that the creature is a member of the family Salamandridæ, and most nearly related to the American Spelerpes.

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THREE American publications fishes have reached us this week. In the first Messrs. Jordan and Starks (Proceedings U.S. Nat. Mus., No. 1391) describe a collection from Corea, containing several new generic and specific types, while in the second (loc. cit., No. 1394) Mr. T. Gill discusses the generic characters of Synanccia and its allies. Of more general interest is the much larger memoir by Dr. S. E. Meek on the fresh-water fishes of Mexico north of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, issued in the logical series of the publications of the Field Columbian Museum (vol. v.). In this memoir, which is very fully illustrated, the author discusses the physiography of Mexico in connection with its fish fauna in considerable detail.

ZOO

IN July, 1902, Dr. Merkel, of Wiesloch, was fortunate enough to discover in an overflow of the Leimbach a

large number of the generally rare phyllopod crustacean Limnadia lenticularis. The specimens then collected form the basis of a paper on the anatomy of this species by Mr. M. Nowikoff, which appears, with numerous illustrations, in vol. lxxviii., part iv., of the Zeitschrift für In the same issue Mr. L. wissenschaftliche Zoologie. Cohn describes the subocular tentacle of the remarkable

frog Dactylethra calcarata, the function of which, in the absence of living specimens, cannot yet be definitely determined. The third article in this part forms the completion of the account by Mr. F. Voss of the anatomy of the thorax of the house-cricket, with special reference to the comparative anatomy and mechanism of the organs of flight in insects generally.

IN the second part of an essay on the structure and relationships of the opisthocœlian, or sauropod, dinosaurs, issued in the geological series of the Field Columbian Museum publications (vol. ii., No. 6), Mr. E. S. Riggs dissents from the view that these gigantic creatures were

semi-aquatic, or at least marsh-haunting in their habits. Although the massiveness of their vertebræ recalls cetaceans, yet there is no trace in the latter group of the lightening of this part of the skeleton by means of hollowing and fluting which is so characteristic of these reptiles. More important evidence is afforded by the structure of the limbs, which appears to conform strictly to the terrestrial type. The species described in this paper, Brachiosaurus altithorax, is regarded as the type of a family characterised by the great relative length of the fore-limb, the humerus in this genus being as long as the femur.

FROM Dr. Florentino Ameghino we have received a copy of a paper published at Buenos Aires entitled "Nuevas Especies de Mamíferos, Cretáceos y Terçiarios, de la República Argentina," and purporting to be a reprint from vols. lvi.-Iviii. of the Anales of the Scientific Society of Argentina. It contains a large number of new generic and specific names, which in the absence of illustrations can scarcely be regarded as of much scientific value; and it may be suggested that, despite their admitted richness, the Argentine extinct faunas can scarcely include such a number of forms as the author would have us believe. Moreover, we feel sure that naturalists will display great reluctance in admitting the occurrence of ancestral forms of Tragulus and Galeopithecus in the Argentine Tertiaries, while they will most certainly refuse to follow the author in regarding the latter genus as a member of the Typotherium group of ungulates.

WE have been favoured with a copy of the Schriften of the Philosophical Society of Danzig for 1904 (new series, vol. xi., parts i. and ii.). To the naturalist the most interesting of its contents is perhaps the long article by Dr. W. Wolterstoff, director of the Magdeburg Museum, assisted by several specialists, on the fauna of the districts of Tuchel and Schwetz, in west Prussia ("Beiträge zur Fauna der Tucheler Heide "). A systematic zoological survey of this well-wooded area appears to have been undertaken in 1900, and the general results of this are summarised in the introductory chapter. Specialists are responsible for the determination of the specimens collected, Captain Barrett-Hamilton having undertaken this duty in the case of the mammals, represented only by three mice and one vole. The amphibians receive special attention, a coloured plate. indicating the distinctive features of Rana esculenta and R. arvalis.

THE nuclear divisions in the embryo sac of Fritillaria imperialis have been studied by Dr. B. Sijpkens, who has published his results in the Recueil des Travaux botaniques neerlandaises, No. 2.

THE Scope of plant morphology, and the nature of the fundamental problems in this subject which await investigation at the present day, could have no better exponent than Prof. Goebel, who has expressed his views in the Biologisches Centralblatt (February). Distinction is drawn between structural morphology, originally based upon systematic study, but later concerned with comparison and phylogeny, and causal morphology, which, inquiring into circumstances and conditions, can only be determined by experiment. The question whether a sporophyll is a modified leaf, or a vegetative leaf a sterilised sporophyte, is not without interest to botanists, but whether it is possible to control development and produce at will a vegetative life or a sporophyll is a problem of much greater significance.

AMONGST American horticulturists engaged in plant breeding with the object of improving certain definite characters of flowers and fruit, Mr. L. Burbank, of Cali

fornia, holds a high position. The improvement of plums by hybridisation and selection is a subject which has received much attention, and by crossing the Japan plum with American species he has produced such fine varieties as the Golden, Climax, and the Wickson. More remarkable are the raspberry-blackberry hybrids, of which the Primus, a cross between the western dewberry and the Siberian raspberry, ripens its fruit several weeks before either of its parents, and is superior in productiveness and size of fruit. The first part of an appreciative article by Mr. W. S. Harwood appears in the Century Magazine for March.

WE have received a copy of the observations made at the Hong Kong Observatory in the year 1903. In addition to the usual tables for the year in question, the report contains a valuable summary of hourly and monthly results of the various elements for the ten-yearly period 18041903. During this period the maximum shade temperature recorded was 77°, in August, and the minimum 37.5, in January, and the highest solar radiation was 160°-1, in September. The greatest daily rainfall was 10 19 inches, and the maximum hourly fall was 2.86 inches. A comparison of the daily weather forecasts with the weather subsequently experienced gave a total and partial success of 92 per cent. The extraction of observations from the logs of ships for the construction of trustworthy pilot charts has been continued; the number of days' observ ations collected during the year was 9428. This useful work is undertaken by Miss Doberck.

THE rainfall of the six months September, 1904, to February, 1905, is summarised in Symons's Meteorological Magazine for March, and forms an interesting supplement to the account we published last week from the official reports of the Meteorological Office. The results obtained from fifty-five representative stations are tabulated, and referred to the average rainfall of the thirty years 18701899, and although, as Dr. Mill points out, the circumstance is not unprecedented, it very rarely happens that the general rainfall of the country remains below the average for each of six consecutive months. The great advantage of graphical representation in dealing with such data is clearly shown by the map which accompanies the discussion; from that it is seen at a glance that while the rainfall for the six months reached, and even slightly exceeded, the average over a narrow strip in the west of Scotland, and amounted to 75 per cent. in the north of that country, in the north-west of Ireland, in the English Lake district, and a small part of the Welsh coast, all the rest of the British Isles had less than three-quarters of the usual fall. In two large areas it fell short of 50 per cent. of the average, viz. in the south-east of Scotland and in the midland counties of England. Taking each country separately, the rainfall of the six months was ::-for England and Wales 60 per cent., Scotland 78 per cent, and Ireland 75 per cent. of the average for the thirty years referred to. The necessity of economising the water supply had already made itself felt in several large towns within the dry area before the end of February.

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