another beach will have a constant supply, and for no obvious

reason.

The causes which affect the movement of sand and silt are so numerous, and their resultant effects so well balanced, that if one of the former be increased or diminished the combined result may be completely reversed. I have just come across an interesting instance. For more than twenty years I kept a 6-ton boat in the tidal harbour here, where, when at her moorings, she took the ground in all weathers twice a day without any damage whatever. Since the erection of the new harbour arm, the silt has been cleared out of the harbour, leaving a hard bottom, and the coxswain of the lifeboat informs me that a boat moored in my old berth sprung a leak in a few days and had to be removed. The mode of accumulation of sand on the Torre Abbey beach is also changed in character. I cannot but think that it is a pity experiments are viewed with disfavour. The Torquay inlet and harbour works were eminently The then adapted for reproduction in an experimental tank. local surveyor, who had practically planned the new works, was anxious to carry the experiments out. We had begun to consider the details of the tank, when my intended colleague told me that superior authority" did not favour" the idea, and it was useless to proceed further.

I am now informed by practical seafaring men that the present plan must ultimately be amended, and clearly at considerable cost. Whether this be so or not, the question could have been decided in a tank in a few minutes, at the cost of, say, £15. The experimental tank for waves playing upon beaches was the suggestion of the late Mr. W. Froude, C. E., F. R.S.; so it is no mere fad of an unprofessional outsider. Southwood, Torquay, February 19.

Torpid Cuckoo.

A. R. HUNT.

IN the last volume of NATURE (vol. xliv. p. 223) an account is given by "E. W. P." of a cuckoo which was brought up in a house, and which disappeared one day in November, and was found in the following March on a shelf in the back kitchen, "still alive, and asleep, with all its feathers off, and clothed only in down, the feathers lying in a heap round the body."

It is rather interesting to note that Aristotle, who firmly believed that some birds hybernate, seems to have come across cases of birds in a similar condition. In his " History of Animals" (Book viii., chap. xviii.), he says, "Many kinds of birds also conceal themselves, and they do not all, as some suppose, migrate to warmer climates; but those which are near the places of which they are permanent inhabitants, as the kite and swallow, migrate thither; but those that are farther off from such places do not migrate, but conceal themselves; and many swallows have been seen in hollow places almost stripped of feathers; for the stork, blackbird, turtledove, and lark hide themselves, and by general agreement the turtledove most of all, for no one is ever said to have seen one during the winter. At the commencement of hybernation it is very fat, and during that season it loses its feathers, though they remain thick for a long while." I have adopted the translation in Bohn's edition. The italics are mine. A. HOLTE MACPHERSON. 51 Gloucester Place, Hyde Park, W., February 22.

A Swan's Secret.

Now that the breeding-season for birds is coming near, it would be interesting to note if the following sight I saw last spring is common to swans. A pair of swans built on an island on the River Wey, which runs through our grounds, and I stood on the bank opposite their nest, and watched for a view The male bird of the cygnets, which were just hatched out. presently picked up an empty half egg-shell lying beside the nest, and carefully carried it to the edge of the water, some 20 feet from where the nest was built, and proceeded to fill it with mud, and then pushed it into the river, where it sank to the bottom. He then fetched the only other remaining piece of shell, and did the same. On returning to his nest the last time, he placed a few sticks across the small track he had made, as if to conceal his actions. Evidently this process had been done to each piece of shell, as no other pieces were to be seen, although five cygnets were hatched out.

JESSIE GODWIN-AUSTEN. Shalford House, Guildford, February 22.

A Simple Heat Engine.

A

This

I

ON A RECENT DISCOVERY OF THE REMAINS OF EXTINCT BIRDS IN NEW ZEALAND. DEPOSIT of moa bones, larger than has been found for many years, has just been discovered near the town of Oamaru, in the province of Otago, in the South Island of this colony. Their presence was indicated by the disinterring of a bone during the ploughing of a field, by the proprietor of which the circumstance was communicated to Dr. H. de Lautour, of Oamaru. gentleman, who is well known through his papers on the diatomaceous deposits discovered by him in his district, at once inspected the spot. Finding that the deposit was large, he first secured, through the kindness of the proprietor, the inviolability of the ground, and then telegraphed the information to the Canterbury Museum. lost no time in proceeding to Oamaru with one of my assistants, and superintended the digging out of the bones in a systematic manner. The site of the deposit was at Enfield, some ten miles to the north-west of the town, on ground elevated several hundred feet above the level of the sea, in a shallow bayleted hollow, into which the unbroken surface of the expansive slope gently descending from the Kurow hills to the open vale of the Waireka (a stream that rises further to the west) has sunk here for some 7 to 8 feet below the general level, and which, proceeding with a gentle gradient valleywards, becomes a ditch-like conduit for a tributary of the Waireka. In the centre of this depression, which does not exceed 10 to 12 yards in width, the ground was of a dark brown colour, damp and peaty. On removing the upper layer of soil for a depth of 3 to 4 inches round where the bones had first been brought to the surface, and whereon was strewn abundance of small' crop-stones, a bed of very solid peat was reached, and firmly embedded in it were seen the extremities of numerous Dinornis bones, most of them in excellent preFurther digging servation, though dyed almost black. showed that certainly many of the skeletons were complete, and had been but slightly, if at all, disturbed since the birds had decayed. Owing, however, to the close manner in which they were packed together, and especially in which the limbs were intertwined, it was rarely possible to extricate the bones in the order of their relations, or to identify with certainty the various bones of the same skeleton, each bone having to be extracted as

the circumstances of the moment directed. In many cases, again, only the pelvis and femora could be traced in situ, the vertebræ and remaining leg-bones being indistinguishable in the general agglomeration. It seemed evident that the birds had not died in an erect posture, but more probably with their limbs bent under them or in the same plane with the body. In some instances, beneath the sternum were found, lying quite undisturbed, the contents of the stomach, consisting of more or less triturated grass mingled with crop-stones. The quantity of these smoothed, rounded (chiefly white quartz) pebbles— in size from about that of a bean to that of a plummingled with the bones was enormous, and would, if collected, bave formed more than a cart-load. Except where the bones were, there were no pebbles of any sort, no small stones nor even sand, anywhere around. The nearest place where pebbles of the same composition are to be found is. I was informed, several miles distant. Four trenches, or pits, in all, were sunk. The dimensions of the first, which was excavated entirely in peat, did not exceed 3 feet square and 3 to 4 feet in depth. When it was exhausted of its treasure, a second search was made about 20 to 25 feet higher up the hollow. The dimensions of this pit extended to about 7 feet square and to the same depth as the first. Two more trenches, a few feet apart, were dug at about 30 yards still further up the depression. They were not so large as the other two, but they extended down to about the same depth, 3 to 4 feet, the bottom of both being (as it was in the second) a bluish clay, with which, in the pit furthest up, was sparingly mingled a small deposit of the finest silt. In the first pit portions of both Chemiornis and Hapagornis bones were found in abundance, and remains of several hundreds of moas of all ages. It was from the second pit, however, that the largest deposit of moa bones was obtained, and the most perfect specimen of food remains from beneath a sternum. Here, also, numerous bones of the giant buzzard and of the great extinct goose were exhumed, and a cranium as large as, if not slightly larger than, that of Cnemiornis, but of a species with complete bony orbits, as in the Cape Barren goose, and indistinguishable from Cercopsis. Bones from other parts of New Zealand, now in my possession, which I hope shortly to describe, indicate with certainty that several species of Cnemiornis formerly existed in this colony. Some of these bones are remarkable for their slender elegance, and indicate species less in size and lighter in build than Cnemiornis calcitrans. Among the bones so far examined, I have observed no remains of Aptornis, of Ocydromus, or of Notornis, but I possess an adult tibia of a rail smaller than Porphyrio melanotus, yet larger than any other existing New Zealand species. The tarso-metatarsus of a species of Anas, about the size of Anas finschi, the metatarsus and sternum of Apteryx Oweni, and crania of A. australis, are among the bones recovered at Enfield, in addition to the metatarsus of a Biziura, somewhat larger than Biziura lobata, the musk duck of Australia, an interesting species for which I have proposed the name of Biziura de Lautouri, after the gentleman to whom I am indebted for the acquisition of these bones. There are still other bones which I have not yet been able to identify. The Dinornis remains belong chiefly to the species elephantopus (of unusually large proportions), to ingens, and to rheides. Very fine specimens of pelves and sterna have been obtained, with numerous crania more or less perfect. In this second trench the excavation penetrated through the peat into a bluish clay charged with water (which was, indeed, reached in all the diggings at about 4 feet below the surface), and into this clay the bones just protruded, but no more. The osseous remains dug from the last two holes belonged to the same species as those from the others. Digging and probing the ground beyond the boundaries of the trenches showed us that we had exhausted their contents; while the probing of

the ground in the neighbourhood for a considerable radius around, and in other peaty spots not far off, failed to afford indications of other deposits. The number of perfect femora of Dinornis brought away exceeded 600; a large number were so decomposed as to fall to pieces in the handling; while a great many others disintegrated, after removal from the ground, on exposure to the atmosphere. I believe I do not over-estimate, therefore, in saying that from 800 to 900 moas at least were entombed in this shallow hollow. So many moas (leaving out of the reckoning the other species of birds) could not by any possibility have found standing-room, however crowded together, in the entire area of the depression. It would appear evident, therefore, that they did not perish all at one time. To account for their burial in such numbers in areas so circumscribed seems to me at present impossible. That their bodies were entire when they were deposited is clear, from the presence in such abundance of the crop-stones, from the position of the bones, and from the finding of the intact contents of the gizzard. No stream of any size could find origin in the immediate neighbourhood, and no stream which could have transported the entire carcasses of birds of such huge proportions as Dinornis ingens or D. elephantopus could ever have occupied this ravine-head without leaving traces of its action on the surface which would be visible to-day, or without washing away the very fine silt mixed with the clay on which the bones lie, in the bottom of the most upland of our excavations. None of the bones are waterworn. This little hollow was, in the early days of its present proprietor, very wet and boggy, and several springs have origin in it. If the moas made this a highway from one part of the country to another, it seems difficult to believe that birds so powerful of limb, and standing at least 10 to 12 feet in height, could stick fast in so shallow a bog; and to conjecture why eagles of powerful flight, slender rails, small ducks, and comparatively light-footed kiwis also should become ensnared. Driven by fire in the surrounding bush-which may have covered the country then, for the plough has, I am informed, brought to light the stools of many large trees at no great distance, while logs of wood were found among the bones-did they, in a struggle for life in a narrow space, trample each other to death? The presence of the strong-winged Harpagornis in considerable numbers seems to militate against this explanation, and no calcined bones have been discovered. An explanation offered some years ago, to account for the presence of a great number of moa and other bird bones in a somewhat similar situation in the Hamilton swampthat during severe winters these birds congregated at the springs rising warmer from below, and were overtaken by a severe and fatal frost as they stood in the waterappears unsatisfactory in the present case, as there are numerous springs and equally boggy ground near at hand, round which no remains can be found, and so close to the sea such excessive frosts are now unknown. That these were individuals who, during an excessive drought, arrived at the springs too far exhausted to revive an occurrence common enough in Australiaand that the water there was charged with poison, have also been offered as explanations. But the permanence of glacier rivers, highest in the hottest seasons, precludes the idea of animals dying of thirst in this island, or at all events in this locality so near to the great snow river Waitaki. Poisoned water-holes or exhalations of carbonic acid might be a sufficient reason, yet in those springs elsewhere where bones have been found chemical analysis has failed to detect any substance harmful to life in their waters at the present day. Not a single indication of human intervention was observed. No bones were discovered which had been broken in their recent state; neither kitchen-middens, nor remains of ovens or of native encampments, occur anywhere near the deposit.

One piece of egg-shell dug out of the highest trench is not sufficient evidence on which to base the supposition that the spot was frequented as a nesting-place.

At Glenmark, in the north of this province, the historic spot where the original (somewhat larger than the present) find of Dinornis reliquiæ was dug out by my predecessor, the late Sir Julius von Haast, the bones of numerous species of birds besides moas were found. Their occurrence in the situations where they were discovered, and the way in which they were lying-entire bodies with their sterna covering crop-stones in situ-have been explained by the supposition that the moas were overtaken by a fierce and sudden storm, and their entire carcasses piled by wind and flood into vast heaps, an explanation against which the presence here also of the same powerful buzzard and other flying birds rises as an objection. Yet there is nothing either in the situation or the disposition of the bones to make it impossible; still I cannot help feeling that that cannot be the true explanation which satisfies only one instance out of so many assemblages of dead birds of nearly always the same species in situations almost similar. I hope, however, that when I have made a thorough examination of all the localities where, and the conditions under which, moa remains have been found, in the light of the personal experience gained in the exhumation of the present deposit, and when I have completed the identification (on which I am now engaged) of the smaller bird bones associated in them with the moa bones, some light may have been gained on this at present mysterious episode in the history of the ancient Avians of New Zealand. HENRY O. FORBES.

Christchurch, New Zealand.

THE BLUE HILL METEOROLOGICAL

OBSERVATORY.

ΤΗ HE Annals of this high class Meteorological Observatory for 1890 are of more than usual interest, since we have here presented not only the observations of the year, which are made with remarkable fulness and exactness, but also a well presented and discussed résumé by Mr. Clayton for the lustrum ending with 1890, together with an account of the hourly and other observations made at the Signal Service Station at Boston. The Observatory is situated about ten miles south of Boston, on the summit of a peaked hill 640 feet above the sea, and as the ground falls down from the buildings in every direction for several hundred feet, the Observatory occupies a unique position among Observatories in the investigation of some of the more important phenomena of meteorology.

The hourly means of atmospheric pressure show for all

the months the double tide well marked. The chief maximum steadily recedes from 10 a.m. in winter to 8 a.m. in summer, and the chief minimum advances from 2 p.m. in winter to 5 p.m. in June. The evening maximum

shows a slight tendency towards displacement in the same direction as the afternoon minimum, and the night minimum a similar displacement in the same direction as the morning maximum. A third barometric maximum, which is generally met with in middle latitudes, is par

ticularly well marked at this place.

But the important position of this Observatory appears in the most striking manner on comparing the hourly barometric results of 1890 from the Blue Hill with those from Boston for the same year. The Blue Hill Observatory is situated on a true peak, but the station at Boston is in the mouth of the rather broadish valley which stretches northward from the town. The result is that,

1 "Annals of the Astronomical Observatory of Harvard College," vol. xxx., Part 2, Observations made at the Blue Hill Meteorological Observatory, Mass., U.S., in the Year 1830, under the direction of A. Lawrence Rotch, Esq." With Appendices. (Cambridge: University Press 1891.)

though the places are only about ten miles apart, the diurnal fluctuation at Boston is oo17 inch greater than on the top of Blue Hill. In June, when this feature of the pressure is at the annual maximum, the following are the hourly results, where the plus sign indicates that pressure at Boston rose above its daily average by these amounts, expressed in thousandths of an inch, greater than did pressure on the Blue Hill above its daily average; and the minus sign that it fell lower by these amounts at the former than at the latter place.

This

The explanation is that, during the night, cold aircurrents flow down the sides of a valley and accumulate below, and thus a higher pressure is maintained in valleys during the night; but, on the other hand, during the day the valleys become more highly heated by the sun, and under the strong ascending currents thereby generated, pressure falls lower than in open situations. The amounts increase in proportion to the daily range of temperature, and as the mean velocity of the wind diminishes. diurnal variation is greatest in the deep valleys of Switzerland and other mountainous regions, and, though small in amount is a well-defined and steady fluctuation in the valley of the Thames, as shown by a comparison of the Kew and Greenwich barometers. A weak point in the meteorological publications of the Signal Service of the United States is the all but complete absence of the results of the hourly phenomena of meteorology. In filling up this hiatus, the Blue Hill Observatory will prove of the greatest service, as offering a truly normal Observatory, at which, from its mere position, several disturbing elements affecting diurnal phenomena are eliminated.

During the whole year, the time of occurrence of the minimum temperature is very near sunrise; and it is interesting to note that the maximum occurs at all seasons from 2 to 3 p.m., approaching in this respect the time of the maximum at truly high-level Observatories, or at Observatories situated on peaks. For the five years, the mean monthly temperatures deduced from deduced from the hourly values every month, the smallest the maximum and minimum thermometers exceed those excess being o2 in December, and the largest 12 in August, the mean for the year being o 7.

The prevailing winds are north-westerly from February to April, southerly in May, and westerly and northwesterly for the other months. These winds are ruled by the different distributions of atmospheric pressure over the Atlantic and America in the respective months; these being in winter the low pressure round Iceland, and the high pressure over the United States and Canada; and in summer the high pressure in mid-Atlantic, together frequency of each wind has been worked out for the lustral with the low pressure over the Middle States. The hourly period, with results that are very suggestive. The period is sufficiently extended to give fairly good averages, from which accidental phenomena may be regarded as eliminated; and the result is more completely attained by the height of the Observatory above the surrounding country all round removing from the observations the hourly frequency of each wind shows a clear tendency of more purely local causes of disturbance. The mean

the wind to veer around the compass each day. Thus, the greatest frequency of southerly winds occurs at 8 p.m., south-westerly at 10 p.m., westerly at 1 a.m., northerly at

5 a.m., north-easterly at noon, easterly at 2 p.m., and south-easterly at 7 p.m., and this occurs winter and summer, and is independent of the sea breeze.

This points plainly to a cause in daily operation, which the unique position and work of the Blue Hill Observatory enable us to deduce from a comparatively few years' observations. This cause is the diurnal barometric tide, with its two maxima and minima, which, as regards the Blue Hill, are more pronounced over the land to westward than over the ocean to eastward, and become still more pronounced on advancing southward into lower latitudes and westward into more inland situations. Thus, at 9 a.m., the time of the morning maximum, pressure at the Blue Hill is 0'023 inch above the daily mean; at New York, o'028 inch; at Philadelphia, 0031 inch; and at Washington, 0035 inch. Now at this physical instant, 9 a.m. local time, this atmospheric tide becomes relatively less and less on advancing eastward across the Atlantic, and at Kew (about 2 p.m. G.M.T.) pressure is o012 inch below its average. From its position with respect to this wide-spread shallow diminution of pressure, northerly and north-easterly winds attain their diurnal maximum frequency at this hour. Again, at the Blue Hill, pressure falls to the daily minimum at 3 p.m. (local time), after which it continues slowly to rise; and, while rising, pressure is relatively lower to the westward. From its position in the north-easterly segment of this wide-spread area of lower pressure, the south-easterly winds at the Blue Hill attain their daily maximum frequency at 3 p.m.

The mean maximum velocity of the wind, about the rate of twenty-two miles an hour, occurs from November to March, and the minimum, nearly fifteen miles an hour, from June to August. As regards the hourly velocity of the wind, the records show the occurrence of the daily maximum at 3 p.m., being the hour of occurrence generally, except at high-level Observatories; but the time of the minimum, 8 a.m., is markedly different. This peculiarity arises from the curious but highly interesting fact that the Blue Hill shows a secondary maximum immediately after midnight, or the time when the daily maximum velocity occurs at high-level Observatories, thus linking the Blue Hill Observatory with both high and low level Observatories.

There are also published valuable results of humidity, cloud, sunshine, rain, gales, thunderstorms, and visibility of distant objects, for which we must refer to the Report itself. As the Meteorological Service of the United States has recently taken a new departure, it is to be hoped that Mr. Rotch, who has generously established this Observatory, and has its admirable work well in hand, will yet see his way to the continuance of the tabulation and publication of the hourly values of the elements, which cannot but prove to be of essential service to the Department in carrying out certain developments of American meteorology which, it is understood, are under consideration.

ON

GUSTAV PLARR.

NE of the older generation of mathematicians has lately passed away in the person of Dr. Gustav Plarr, who died at Tonbridge on January 11, of bronchitis following influenza. He was born on August 27, 1819, at Kupferhammer, a country house near Strasburg. He was educated at the Gymnase and at the University in that city, whence he proceeded to Paris University, where he obtained his diplomas as Licentiate of Sciences and as "Docteur ès Sciences Mathématiques." Among his close friends at school and at the University was M. Wurtz, while M. Gerhardt, another great chemist, was among his Strasburg contemporaries. Dr. Plarr for some time meditated a life of chemical research, but found that his health would not permit of prolonged

laboratory work. After taking his doctorial degree, he was for some time mathematical master at a College at Colmar, and, on the Chair of Mathematics becoming vacant in the University of Strasburg, was one of the candidates for the post. He was strongly supported by the Strasburg academic party, especially by M. Sarrus, the outgoing Professor, but clerical influences were at work against him, and a Parisian was finally imposed on the little Germanizing University.

In 1857, Dr. Plarr married an English lady, and during his honeymoon in Dublin was introduced to Sir William Rowan Hamilton, the originator of the Quaternion method, and became thenceforth a devoted student and exponent of the work of that great genius.

The British Association met at Dublin in the autumn of 1857, and Dr. Plarr was one of the eight foreign men of science who were that year elected " Corresponding Members." Whewell, Hamilton, Vignoles, and Brewster were, we believe, his sponsors on this occasion. The paper then communicated by him to the Mathematical Section of the Association will be found at p. 101 of the Report.

The other seven men of science elected at this meeting were Barth, Bolzani, d'Abbadie, Loomis, Pisani, and the two Schlagintweits. Of these, only Herman Schlagintweit survives. Indeed, at the time of his death, Dr. Plarr was one of the half-dozen oldest living "Corresponding Members" of the British Association.

In the Franco-German war of 1870, Kupferhammer was burnt by the French, in order to dislodge Prussians who had been able thence to command the sluices of the moat round Strasburg. Dr. Plarr accordingly came to reside among his wife's relatives, first at St. Andrews, and then at Tonbridge.

Since 1870, Dr. Plarr's time was almost exclusively devoted to the study of Quaternions. In 1882-84 his French translation of Prof. Tait's Treatise was published by Gauthier-Villars. Several papers by him, on abstruse points connected with the Quaternion method, were communicated to the Royal Society of Edinburgh. Beside these there is a very interesting piece of ordinary analysis connected with Spherical Harmonics.

Modest, unambitious, studious, simple in his habits to the verge of asceticism, Dr. Plarr was of a type rare in these days and in this country. Although a man of wide scientific culture, and of many literary interests, he was content to be a pioneer in a realm of thought for which there is necessarily no popular sympathy at present. Quaternions, indeed, were to him the mathematics of the future, and he was to the last happy in the thought that he had assisted, however obscurely, in their development.

NOTES.

Two international scientific Congresses are to be held at Moscow in August. One will relate to anthropology and archæology, the other to zoology. There will be exhibitions in connection with both Congresses, and appeals have been issued for the loan of objects which are likely to be useful and interesting. Among the things wanted for the Anthropological Congress are phonograms of the language and songs of different races. French will be the official language of the two meetings. The more important papers will be printed before members come together, so that discussion may be facilitated.

THE death, on February 20, of Prof. Hermann Kopp is announced. He died at Heidelberg, after a long and painful illness, in the seventy-fifth year of his age.

THE well-known botanist and philologist Stephan Endlicher was buried in 1849 in a churchyard near Vienna. This churchyard is about to be closed, and it is proposed that Endlicher's remains shall be removed to the new central cemetery

of Vienna, and that a suitable monument to him shall there be erected. At present, his grave is not marked even by an ordinary tombstone. An influential international Committee has been formed for the purpose of giving effect to the scheme. Those who desire to associate themselves with it should send subscriptions as soon as possible to the K.K. zoologischbotanische Gesellschaft, Vienna, I, Herrengasse 13.

MR. W. SAVILLE-KENT, who has been absent from England during the past eight years, acting in the capacity of Inspector and Commissioner of Fisheries to various of the Australian Colonial Governments, and most recently to that of Queensland, is now in London, and will be occupied for the next few months, chiefly at the British Museum, South Kensington, in working out the corals and other natural history materials collected by him on the Great Barrier Reefs. Associated with the materials in question is an extensive series of photographs of coral reefs and coral animals taken from life, some few of the more early acquired of which were exhibited at last year's conversazione of the Royal Society. Selections from the completed series will be shortly published in association with a work, on the fishery and natural history products generally of the Great Barrier district, that Mr. Saville-Kent has in preparation. Mr. Saville-Kent is under engagement with the Government of Western Australia to proceed to that colony towards the end of the current year, to investigate and report upon the pearl and pearl-shell, oyster, and other indigenous fisheries, with a view to their more profitable development. This engagement is likely to occupy him for some two years, when he proposes to return permanently to England.

PROF. HUXLEY AND PROF. RAY LANKESTER have each written to the Times on Lady Blake's proposal that a marine biological station should be established in Jamaica as a memorial to Columbus. Prof. Huxley points out that "animal life is in. describably abundant and varied in the intertropical seas," and hopes that the scheme will meet with cordial support here and in the United States. Prof. Ray Lankester is also of opinion that a good permanent laboratory for the study of marine life should be established in the tropics; and he thinks that "no position is more favourable for this purpose than the coasts of Jamaica." He urges, however, that a definite set of proposals should be made in Jamaica for the realization of the Columbus Laboratory. His opinion is that "the Government of Jamaica should initiate the scheme, and make the proposed laboratory part of a biological and physical survey of the coasts of the island." What is chiefly needed is "an efficient, well-trained naturalist, who must be paid at least £700 a year for his services (less than a lawyer or a sanitary officer), and a Government gunboat with crew, &c., and two or three special fishermen and attendants." A suitable building, Prof. Lankester thinks, could easily be obtained.

THE members of the Geologists' Association will make an excursion to Hornchurch on Saturday, March 5, Mr. T. V. Holmes acting as director. They will visit sections on the new railway between Upminster and Komford. The early date of the excursion has been rendered necessary by the state of the most important section. The first cutting to be visited is that between Upminster Station and the Ingrebourne. It shows London Clay capped by gravel and loam belonging to the highest terrace of the Thames Valley deposits in this district. Crossing the Ingrebourne, the line enters another cutting northeast of Hornchurch. In this cutting boulder clay has been seen for a distance of 300 yards, resting in a slight hollow on the surface of the London Clay, and capped by gravel belonging to the highest terrace of the Thames Valley beds. The greatest thickness of boulder clay seen in this cutting is 15 feet, and it is hoped that the sloping now going on may not have advanced so

far at the date of the excursion as to have destroyed every clear section. At Butts Green there is a good section of London Clay capped by sand and gravel. Nearer Romford the cuttings are not sufficiently advanced to be worth visiting. The total walking distance is three miles.

A WORK of considerable interest to meteorologists has been published in the Memoirs of the Physical Society of Geneva, containing the detailed observations made under the directions of H. B. de Saussure on the Col du Géant, at Geneva, and at Chamounix simultaneously, from July 5 to 18, 1788. The means only, and these only for a part of the observations, were published in his "Voyages dans les Alpes" (Neuchatel, 1779-86). These valuable observations, which have been carefully revised by his grandson, Henri de Saussure, have often been asked for, and we believe have only lately been discovered. They include values taken several times daily of pressure, temperature, humidity, wind, cloud, electricity, magnetism, &c., together with general remarks upon the weather.

(summarized in Science), it appears that the average yield of FROM a recent statistical study of the wheat harvests of Ohio

wheat is increasing in the northern and central sections of the State, while it is at a standstill, and at far too low a point for profit, in the southern and south-eastern counties. Geologically, there are three bands running across the State from north to south-that in the east (nearly a third of the whole), over coal-measures; next to it, a narrower strip of Waverly rocks (sandstones and calcareous shales); then the western half, over limestones. The two latter are covered with a bed of glacial drift, which is, however, a good deal modified by the underlying rocks. In the northern portion, the counties over the Waverly rocks show a larger average yield (in forty-four years) than those over limestones and the coalmeasures, and they also show a higher rate of increase. In the middle and south, the limestone counties show the larger yield; and in the middle (not the south), the larger rate of increase. The counties over the coal-measures are inferior in yield per acre in each belt, the difference increasing as we come south. The hilly character of the ground is supposed to be the chief cause of this lower yield. Some 48 million bushels were harvested in Ohio in 1888. The area devoted to wheat is approaching 3 million acres, and represents 12 per cent. of the area in farms in the State. The average yield is thirteen bushels per acre (in England it is about twenty-eight bushels), but in the northern and middle parts it is steadily growing. The production is keeping far ahead of any possible consumption within the State.

AN important Conference of fruit-growers was held last year in Sydney, the chair being occupied by the Hon. Sydney Smith, Minister of Mines and Agriculture in New South Wales. It lasted several days, and the report of the proceedings, which has now been issued, ought to be of great service to fruit-growers in all parts of the colony. The President, in his concluding speech, said the Government were both proud and anxious to assist the agriculturists of the country. All that was required was the cooperation and assistance of those engaged in the industry, in order that they might know in what direction this assistance would be most useful. He felt sure a great deal of good would come from the discussions during the Conference, and he hoped the members would hold Conferences in their own districts. He was most anxious to see the local Agricultural Societies holding meetings every month, where papers could be read and different important questions discussed, as he was certain this would do good, and he sincerely hoped his suggestion would be acted upon, as they might rely upon the assistance of the Department. The Government, as they knew, had already granted pound for pound to the Agricultural Societies, and they were willing to do