DR. OSCAR BAUMANN is about to undertake a series of explorations in the interest of the German East Africa Company. In the German Masai territory there are, he says, in a letter to Globus, many regions about which little is known; and about these he hopes to bring back much fresh light. He proposes to study the conditions which must be taken into account by projectors of railways, and, if possible, to open a direct caravan route to Lake Victoria.

IN the course of his interesting presidential address at the meeting of the Institution of Civil Engineers last week, Mr. Berkley referred to the production of iron in the United States. The most conspicuous difference between American and English practice, he said, was the output from one blast furnace. The largest production in Great Britain did not seem to exceed 750 tons in the week, while in America it had reached 20co tons. It might be questioned whether this large output from a single furnace was not obtained at some sacrifice of economy of fuel used and of wear and tear of furnace. The production of pig-iron in the United States now amounted to 10,000,000 tons, or 2,000,000 tons more than that of the United Kingdom. This amount was wholly used within the country, showing a larger quantity of iron used per head of the population (300 pounds) than in any other part of the world. In Great Britain, after deducting from its production of iron the quantity exported, the consumption only equalled 250 pounds per head of the population.

THE lecture season at the London Institution, Finsbury Circus, was opened on Monday evening with a lecture by Sir M. E. Grant Duff on "Some of our Debts to the East."

THE barometric depression on November 11, according to Mr. G. J. Symons, has been exceeded only five times in the 34 years during which he has been making meteorological observa. tions. In a letter to the Times Mr. Symons says that as he anticipated some such depression, he started the Richard brontometer at 6.30 a.m., and kept it running for 10 hoursi.e. through the chief part of the depression. This, at the cost of a little trouble and a roll of paper, gave him a record of the motion of the barometer such as had never before been obtained -somewhere about 60 feet long-and with every little pulsation shown in detail, even if it lasted only two seconds.

We have received the meteorological year-book published by the Madgeburg Zeitung for 1890, being the tenth year for which the observations have been made on a uniform plan. In addition to observations taken three times daily, the volume contains hourly values of pressure and wind, and continuous records of sunshine; also, curves of pressure and temperature for those periods of exceptional weather during which the ordinary hourly values would fail to represent the details of the oscillations-a plan which seems highly commendable. whole work is very complete and compact.

The

THE Deutsche Seewarte has published a catalogue of its valuable library, containing entries of 10,660 works and excerpt papers in various subjects, about a quarter of which refer to meteorology. The library has been enriched by the acquisition of the books which formerly belonged to Prof. Dove and other eminent men. This laborious undertaking has been carried out with great care, and is classified under subjects and authors. Some difficulty has been experienced in dealing with a few English authors; e.g., on p. 67, Balfour Stewart is entered under the Christian name, and on p. 160, Powell is entered as the Christian name of Baden-Powell. And the works issued by institutions are not always sufficiently distinguished from those which are due to individual writers; e.g., on p. 5, Sir Thomas Farrer is credited with a work on "Telegraphic Weather Information "-of which, probably, he would have no recollection, it being merely a circular signed in his capacity as Secretary of the Board of Trade. But these are mere trifles, and in no way detract from the value of the work as a whole, for which the scientific world will be grateful.

MR. ALBERT KOEBELE, the American entomologist, is travelling in the Australasian colonies for the purpose of studying the enemies of insect pests. In introducing him to the Wellington Philosophical Society at a meeting on September 23, Sir James Hector recalled the circumstances connected with a memorable service which Mr. Koebele lately rendered to California. In 1888, when on a visit to South Australia in search of a small fly (Testophonus), a parasite on that dreadful pest Icerya purchasi, Mr. Koebele discovered a single ladybird (Vedalia) preying on the pest. He found a second specimen in New South Wales, and then on his arrival in New Zealand he found that the Icerya about Auckland was also being destroyed by something, and this, too, turned out to be Vedalia. He at once saw that here was the thing he sought, and he was fortunate enough to be able to collect several thousands of Vedalias, which he afterwards liberated in California. Up to that time California had been so eaten up by Icerya that the damage was estimated at twenty millions of dollars annually. Yet, in twelve or fifteen months after the liberation of Vedalia in April 1889, the State was practically free from the dreaded pest. Sir James Hector rightly characterized this work of Mr. Koebele as one of the grandest things in the interest of fruit and treegrowers that have been effected in modern times.

PROF. G. L. GOODALE, of Harvard University, has recently paid a visit to the Museums and Botanical Gardens in the tropics and in the southern hemisphere, and has contributed an interesting description of them to the American Journal of Science. In the number for October we find an account of the Technological Museum at Sydney, which contains a very complete collection of the economic vegetable products of Australia, and which is largely visited by the working classes; of the two Botanic Gardens at Brisbane, one of them under the management of the Society of Acclimatization; the Botanic Gardens at Geelong, Dunedin, Christchurch, and Wellington; the Museums at Dunedin, Christchurch, Wellington, and Auckland; and the small but excellent local Museum and Garden at Hobart. Prof. Goodale notices, with commendation, the tenacity with which all the Australian Museums cling to rare specimens of archæological and ethnographical interest, instead of utilizing them for exchange.

MESSRS. MACMILLAN AND CO. have published the first number of the Record of Technical and Secondary Education, a bi-monthly journal of the progress made by County Councils and other local authorities in the administration of the Technical Instruction Acts. The periodical is issued on behalf of the National Association for the Promotion of Technical and

| Secondary Education. Lord Hartington contributes an intro

ductory statement, in which he sets forth briefly the objects of the Record. It will, he says, be of a strictly practical character, and will not interfere with any educational journal now in circulation. It will " 'give the latest information, not only with respect to what is being done in this Kingdom, but also in regard to such educational work on the Continent and in America as may be of service to those who are engaged in carrying out schemes of technical instruction." The Record may become a journal of great value, and we trust there will be a cordial response to Lord Hartington's appeal to the members of the County Councils, their organizing secretaries, and others interested in the work, to supply the Committee with early and regular information as to what is being done in their several centres. The present number contains, besides Lord Hartington's statement, County Council schemes and reports relating to Oxfordshire, Surrey, Bedfordshire, Lancashire, Birmingham, and Aberdeen; details regarding Scholarship schemes in the West Riding and Somerset ; notes on the work of the counties and county boroughs; miscellanea; and reviews.

THERE are not many remains of the ancient Mexican featherwork which excited the surprise of the Spanish conquerors of the New World. The most famous surviving specimen is the standard, described by Hochstetter, which is now in the Vienna Ethnographical Museum. Another specimen has lately been discovered by Mrs. Zelia Nuttall in the Schloss Ambras, near Innsbruck. It is mentioned in an inventory, drawn up in 1596, of the treasures of the castle. This very valuable relic is the decorative part of a round shield made of interlaced reeds, and consists of feather-mosaics representing a monster, the contours of which are fastened by strips of gold. Formerly the shield was adorned with costly quetzal feathers, only small fragments of which survive. Globus, which has an interesting note on the subject, speaks of similar old Mexican shields in the Stuttgar Museum, and refers to a statement of Stoll to the effect that beautiful feather-ornaments are still made by the Indians of Guatemala.

IN the Report of the U. S. National Museum for 1884, Prof. O. T. Mason published a short paper on the throwing-sticks of the Eskimo. The use of a like device for the throwing of spears and harpoons was formerly well known in Mexico; and Prof. Mason has written to Science to say that he lately received from Lake Patzcuaro, in Mexico, "a modern altatl, well worn and old-looking, accompanied with a gig for killing ducks." The apparatus, which was bought from the hunter by Captain J. G Bourke, U.S. A., has been placed in the National Museum. The thrower is 2 feet 3 inches long, and has two finger-holes, projecting, one from the right, one from the left side. The gig consists of three iron barbs, exactly like the Eskimo trident for water-fowl. "The problem now is," says Prof. Mason, "to connect Alaska with Patzcuaro."

A PAMPHLET on "The Dwarfs of Mount Atlas," by Mr. R. G. Haliburton, has been published by Mr. David Nutt. Along with it are printed portions of the paper on the subject read by Mr. Haliburton before the recent Oriental Congress. His views are accepted by Sir J. Drummond-Hay, who represented Great Britain in Morocco for over forty years, and by Mr. Hunnot, our Consul at Saffi. There is, of course, no inherent improbability in the statement that there are tribes of dwarfs to the

south of Mount Atlas. Such tribes are known to exist elsewhere in Africa, and they may exist in the regions where Mr. Haliburton thinks he has discovered them. The question is one of evidence. Even if dwarfs have many settlements there, it does not follow that there is any solid foundation for Mr. Haliburton's theories as to the part their race has played in the evolution of mythology. Still the suggestion is an interesting one.

IN the report on "Oysters and Oyster-Fisheries of Queensland," to which we referred last week, Mr. Saville-Kent presents quite an idyllic picture of the circumstances of those who devote themselves in Queensland to the culture of "bank oysters "— that is, oysters which spread over extensive level banks that are more or less uncovered at low water. He says that "probably in no other country in the world is so healthy, congenial, and unlaborious a means of earning a substantial competency open to, and turned to practical account by, all classes as that of bank oyster culture in the Queensland oyster-producing districts of Moreton or Wide Bays. With a nominal rental payable for the ground cultivated and occupied for a homestead, a climate that permits of dispensing with all but the most necessary form of raiment, and fish procurable in such abundance as to substantially minimize the butcher's bill, no more perfect terrestrial Elysium is probably at the disposal of small capitalists having sufficient means for the supply of their most immediate necessities during that first year or two that must elapse before their oyster-crops have increased to a remunerative extent."

MR. CHARLES CHILTON contributes to the new number of the Records of the Australian Museum (vol. i. No. 8) an excellent paper on a new and peculiar fresh-water "Isopod" from Mount Kosciusko. Towards the end of 1889, Mr. Chilton received from the trustees of the Australian Museum, Sydney, a small collection of Australian Crustacea, containing, among others, some terrestrial and fresh-water species collected by Mr. R. Helms while on an expedition to Mount Kosciusko on behalf of the Museum. Among these Mr. Chilton at once saw that one was quite different from any of the terrestrial and freshwater Crustacea previously described from Australia, and that it belonged to a genus Phreatoicus established by himself in 1882, for a peculiar blind subterranean Isopod found in wells in Canterbury, New Zealand. This genus was of special interest, both because of the situation in which the original species was found, and because it combined characters belonging to several different families, and was also, to some extent, intermediate between the Isopoda and the Amphipoda. The discovery of a species belonging to the same genus in such a widely remote situation as Mount Kosciusko, and living under such different conditions, was therefore of peculiar interest; and Mr. Chilton thinks that it will probably have an important hearing on the difficult question of the origin of the blind subterranean forms. In the paper in the Records he does not enter upon this question, but he hopes to do so on a future occasion, when describing more fully the subterranean forms from New Zealand.

MESSRS. MACMILLAN AND CO. have issued the fifth edition, revised, of Part IV. of Prof. M. Foster's "Text-book of Physiology." This completes the work, with the exception of the appendix, which differs so widely in character from the rest of the book that it seemed desirable to issue it separately. It will be published very shortly.

SOME time ago the Department of Agriculture in New South Wales included in its list of economic plants suitable for cultivation in the north-eastern portion of the colony the "Avocado" or Alligator pear" (Persea gratissima, Gærtn.). Several inquiries about it having since been made, Mr. F. Turner provides an account of the plant, with an illustration, in the August number of the Agricultural Gazette of New South Wales. Unless it is grown in very sheltered situations, the climate of Sydney is too cold for its successful cultivation as a commercial crop; but Mr. Turner thinks that on the northern rivers of New South Wales it should bear fruit as prolifically as it does in Southern Queensland. Some years ago, in the Brisbane Botanic Gardens, a fine Alligator pear-tree bore annual crops of very fine fruit, and it may do so still. When Sir W. W. Cairns was Governor of Queensland, he often asked Mr. Turner for some of the fruit when it was in

season, and Mr. Turner kept him well supplied, for at that time no one seemed to care much for it. His Excellency told Mr. Turner he was very fond of the fruit for breakfast, and he used to eat it spread on bread and butter, with pepper and salt added Mr. Turner did not to give it zest, and in various other ways. care for the fruit at first, but afterwards became as fond of it as his tutor. So we are not unlikely to hear of the Alligator pear by-and-by as a popular Australian product.

MESSRS. J. B. BAILLIÈRE ET FILS, Paris, have lately added some good volumes to their well-known Bibliothèque des Connaissances Utiles. In one of them-"La Pêche et les Poissons des Eaux Douces "-M. Arnould Locard presents a clear and interesting summary of the various classes of facts which must be understood by all who desire to become expert in the art of fishing in fresh waters. M. Lacroix-Danliard contributes a volume on "La Plume des Oiseaux," dealing with the birds whose feathers are utilized by man, and with the industrial processes to which the demand for feathers has given rise. A useful volume on "Les Plantes d'Appartement et les Plantes de Fenêtres" is contributed by M. D. Bois.

UNDER the title "Bibliotheca Accipitraria," Mr. J. E. Harting has on the eve of publication a bibliography of falconry, with critical notes. It deals with 378 works in various languages, ancient and modern, and will be illustrated with portraits of famous falconers by Holbein, Titian, Vandyck, The volume conFrans Floris, Gerhardt, and other masters. cludes with an English glossary, and a vocabulary, in seven languages, of the technical terms used by falconers.

AN important treatise on Salt-Range fossils has been issued in the series entitled "Palæontologia Indica," which contains figures and descriptions of the organic remains procured during the progress of the Geological Survey of India. Prof. Waagen, the author of the treatise, in concluding it says he has tried to make it as useful as possible both to Indian geology and to geological science in general.

MR. STUART A. RUSSELL'S new work on electric light cables and the distribution of electricity will be issued shortly in Messrs. Whittaker's "Specialists' Series."

MESSRS. DULAU AND CO. have issued a catalogue of zoological and palæontological books which they offer for sale. It includes the following "parts"-Natural history publications of the British Museum; Protozoa, Bacteria; Cœlenterata.

THE last volume of the Memoirs of the Statistical Section of the Russian Geographical Society contains an interesting work by M. Borkovsky, who has devoted more than twenty-five years of his life to the study of the grain-production of Russia, and the directions in which cereals are transported within Russia both for export and for home consumption. The results totally upset the current theory as to Russia being a granary of Europe, and are grimly confirmed by the famine which now prevails in several provinces of the empire. It appears from M. Borkovsky's figures and maps that Russia may be divided into two parts, strictly dependent on her orographical structure one of them, which corresponds to the south-eastern slope of the broad swelling which stretches across the country from south-west to north-east, has an excess of grain during the years of good crops, which excess sometimes exceeds twice or thrice the wants for local use. But there is also another part-the north-western one-which always has less corn than is wanted for its pɔpulation. Taking the years 1882-85, which were years of average crops, a line traced from Kieff to Nijni-Novgorod and further north-east divides Russia into two almost equal parts, of which the south-eastern exports wheat and rye into the north-western

corn.

part to the amount of no less than 710,000 tons of wheat and 508,000 tons of rye, the exports to foreign countries attaining at the same time the respective figures of 1,780,coo and 1,029,600 tons. Taking into account the respective populations of the two regions, and the amount of corn consumed by the distilleries (which does not exceed 14 English pounds per inhabitant), M. Borkovsky shows that the total consumption of wheat and rye attains only the figure of 437 pounds per inhabitant (109 pounds of wheat) in the exporting region, and the still lower figure of 382 pounds (46 pounds of wheat) in the region which imports The average consumption throughout Russia thus attains only 430 pounds per inhabitant, out of which 14 pounds must be deducted for the use of the distilleries. These figures will certainly seem very low if it is remembered that the great mass of the Russian peasants consume extremely small quantities of meat-bread being their chief and almost exclusive food. It appears, moreover, that if Russia exported no grain at all, and the whole of the crop of cereals were consumed within the country, the average consumption would nearly approach the average consumption in France—that is, 505 English pounds on an average year; while the surplus obtained during years of exceptionally good crops would only cover the deficit during the bad years, which recur in the steppes of South-East Russia with almost the same regularity as in India, i.e. every ten to twelve years.

AN important paper is contributed by M. Moissan to the current number of the Comptes rendus describing two interesting new compounds containing boron, phosphorus, and iodine. A few months ago M. Moissan succeeded in preparing the iodide of boron (comp. NATURE, vol. xliii. p. 565), a beautiful substance of the composition BI3, crystallizing from solution in carbon bisulphide in pearly tables, which melt at 43° to a liquid which boils undecomposed at 210°. When this substance is brought in contact with fused phosphorus an intense action occurs, the whole mass inflames with evolution of violet vapour of iodine. Red phosphorus also reacts with incandescence when heated in the vapour of boron iodide. The reaction may, however, be moderated by employing solutions of phosphorus and boron iodide in dry carbon bisulphide. The two solutions are mixed in a tube closed at one end, a little phosphorus being in excess, and the tube is then sealed. No external application of

heat is necessary.

At first the liquid is quite clear, but in a few minutes a brown solid substance commences to separate, and in three hours the reaction is complete. The substance is freed from carbon bisulphide in a current of carbon dioxide, the last traces being removed by means of the Sprengel pump. The compound thus obtained is a deep-red amorphous powder, readily capable of volatilization. It melts between 190 and 200°. When heated in vacuo it commences to volatilize about 170°, and the vapour condenses in the cooler portion of the tube in beautiful red crystals. Analyses of these crystals agree perfectly with the formula BPI,. Boron phospho-di-iodide is a very hygroscopic substance, moisture rapidly decomposing it. In contact with a large excess of water, yellow phosphorus is deposited, and hydriodic, boric, and phosphorous acids formed in the solution. A small quantity of phosphoretted hydrogen also escapes. If a small quantity of water is used a larger deposit of yellow phosphorus is formed, together with a considerable quantity of phosphonium iodide. Strong nitric acid oxidizes boron phosphodi iodide with incandescence. Dilute nitric acid oxidizes it to

phosphoric and boric acids. It burns spontaneously in chlorine, forming boron chloride, chloride of iodine, and pentachloride of phosphorus. When slightly warmed in oxygen it inflames, the combustion being rendered very beautiful by the fumes of boric and phosphoric anhydrides and the violet vapours of iodine. Heated in contact with sulphuretted hydrogen, it forms sulphides of boron and phosphorus and hydriodic acid, without liberation

of iodine. Metallic magnesium when slightly warmed reacts with it with incandescence. When thrown into vapour of mercury, boron phospho-di-iodide instantly takes fire.

THE second phospho-iodide of boron obtained by M. Moissan is represented by the formula BPI. It is formed when sodium or magnesium in a fine state of division is allowed to act upon a solution of the di-iodide just described in carbon bisulphide; or when boron phospho-di-iodide is heated to 160° in a current of hydrogen. It is obtained in the form of a bright-red powder, somewhat hygroscopic. It volatilizes in vacuo without fusion at a temperature about 210°, and the vapour condenses in the cooler portion of the tube in beautiful orange coloured crystals. When heated to low redness it decomposes into free iodine and phosphide of boron, BP. Nitric acid reacts energetically with it, but without incandescence, and a certain amount of iodine is liberated. Sulphuric acid decomposes it upon warming, with formation of sulphurous and boric acids and free iodine. By the continued action of dry hydrogen upon the heated compound the iodine and a portion of the phosphorus are removed, and a new phosphide of boron, of the composition B5P3, is obtained.

THE additions to the Zoological Society's Gardens during the past week include a Macaque Monkey (Macacus cynomolgus 8) from India, presented by Mr. James Hammond; two Pink footed Geese (Anser brachyrhynchus), British, presented by Mr. Cecil Smith, F.Z.S.; two Tuberculated Tortoises (Homopus femoralis) from South Africa, presented by the Rev. G. H. R. Fisk, C.M.Z.S.; two White-tailed Sea-Eagles (Haliaëtus albicilla), European, purchased.

OUR ASTRONOMICAL COLUMN. THEORY OF ASTRONOMICAL ABERRATION. -An interesting point connected with astronomical aberration was raised by M. Mascart in a paper presented to the Paris Academy of Sciences on November 2. It would at first appear that if observations demonstrated that the constant of aberration had precisely the same value for all stars, the velocity of light in space must be uniform. This interpretation, however, seems open to objections. Eclipses of Jupiter's satellites furnish a method for determining the velocity of light in the space contained within the earth's orbit, and, as is well known, the results obtained in this manner agree very well with those deduced from experiments made on the surface of the earth. But astronomical aberration depends only upon the relation of the velocity of the observer to that of the light in the region occupied by the instrument, and is unaffected by any variations in the velocity of propagation of the light-waves between the object observed and the earth. A real difference in the constant of aberration given by different stars would therefore indicate that the velocity of light was not uniform in the parts of space traversed by the earth. From this reasoning, M. Mascart is led to conclude that the values derived from the experiments, direct and astronomical, made to determine the velocity of light, should be limited to the space contained within the terrestrial orbit. The induction is certainly a legitimate one, and it must be admitted that to consider the velocity of light in interstellar space as uniform is to rely entirely on hypothesis.

the complaints of those indolent persons who wish to gain a "general knowledge of the subject with the least possible trouble to themselves are worthy of no more consideration than those of the landsman out yachting, of whom Mr. Hamerton writes :

"You cannot speak of anything on board without employing technical terms which, however necessary, however unavoidable, will seem to him a foolish and useless affectation by which an amateur tries to give himself nautical airs. If you say the main-sheet,' he thinks you might have said more rationally and concisely, the cord by which you pull towards you that long pole which is under the biggest of the sails,' and if you say the starboard quarter,' he thinks you ought to have said, in simple English, that part of the vessel's side that is towards the back end of it and to your right hand when you are standing with your face looking forwards.'

As a modern yacht or ironclad requires a more elaborate terminology than a fishing-boat or a trireme, so it is necessary that the exact morphology of to-day-to speak only of one branch of biology-should be weighted with a more extensive nomenclature than was required for the simpler comparative anatomy of former days. That many are repelled by the bristling outwork of more or less barbarous Greek and Latin compounds is undoubted, and is much to be regretted; but I quite fail to see that it can be avoided as long as we have to deal with a comparatively inflexible language like English. I would recommend anyone who is deeply impressed with the evils of the present system to try and translate a technical description of one of the ordinary students' types-say an earthworm or a crayfish-into "plain English" without loss of conciseness or lucidity.

I think it may be taken as axiomatic that whenever the bounds of knowledge are extended, either by the investigation of new problems or by the re-examination of old ones with the aid of improved methods and extended views, an elaboration of nomenclature is inevitable. Indeed, the introduction of an extended terminology, either because of the discovery of new facts or of the more accurate grouping of old ones, is a distinct gain; it emphasizes an actual advance in knowledge.

There are, however, certain undoubted evils connected with the introduction of new terms which must have troubled all of us at some time or other.

Two workers at a given subject living in different parts of the world invent each a terminology of his own. Each system is adopted by the inventor's own friends or countrymen, and no attempt is made by the general body of biologists to give either scheme official sanction-on grounds of priority or otherwise. In this respect systematists have a great advantage; if a given specific or generic name can be shown to have priority, it takes precedence of every other, however much more suitable the latter may be. Morphological names, on the other hand, always run the risk of being either ignored altogether, or ousted by others which, although no more appropriate, and perhaps considerably later in date, happen to be invented or adopted by some widely-read

author.

New terms are sometimes proposed without a due sense of responsibility-on inadequate grounds or even from mere love of novelty; and, on the other hand, the conservative tendency leads to the continued employment of unsuitable terms when appro⚫ priate ones have been proposed in their place. New names are often casually introduced in the body of a large and highly technical paper, where they are certain to be seen by few; and, lastly, it frequently happens that such terms are inadequately defined.

Unfortunately this state of things can hardly be re medied by anything corresponding to the British Association's Rules, which have proved so useful in systematic zoology and botany. In these departments the appropriateness of a name is a matter of little importance, but in morphological nomenclature suitability is of far more importance than priority, and the most respectable and time-honoured terminology should never be allowed to stand in the way of one by which homologies, mutual relations,

of living things, or that department which deals with the mode of life of organisms-habits, relation to the environment, &c. ; the former use of the term is almost universal in Englishspeaking countries, but many of the leading German writers give it the other signification. Again, morphology and anatomy are terms of fundamental importance, and zoologists and botanists might surely agree upon a common definition for each. The same applies to other terms common to the two sub-sciences, orary being the most flagrant example of divergence. To take one more example, the word biogenesis was introduced by Prof. Huxley to signify the origin of organisms from pre-existing organisms. Eimer, in his recent work on organic evolution, uses the terin biogenetic law for the law that individual recapitulates ancestral development.

Another matter, which might certainly be settled once for all, is the meaning to be attached to adjectives and prefixes denoting position, such as dorsal and ventral, anterior and posterior, proximal and distal, mesial and lateral, epi-, hypo-, pre-, post-, &c. Such terms of position, although easy enough to apply in most cases, are constantly being misused; epipubis (for pre-pubis) is a modern and widely-used term; the dorsal and ventral roots of the spinal nerves are still frequently called anterior and pos terior, and the great body-veins the superior and inferior venæ cava; and the botanical use of many terms of position (e.g. the dorsal and ventral sutures of a carpel) is absolutely meaningless.

Another step in the right direction would be the publication, under the auspices of the British, American, and Australasian Associations, the Anatomische Gesellschaft, and similar bodies, of a glossary of biological terms, in which the history of the word, its inventor, the precise sense in which he used it, and any subsequent changes of meaning it may have undergone, would be set forth. Such a glossary might, I think, be usefully arranged under somewhat similar headings to those employed in the Zoologischer Jahresbericht, the whole work being of course supplied with an alphabetical index. With a single responsible editor, and a sub-editor for each department, the work would not be one of insuperable difficulty.

An even more practicable suggestion than the last, and one which, although supplementary to, is not dependent upon it, is that in such publications as the Zoological Record, the Journal of the Royal Microscopical Society, and the Zoologischer Fahresbericht, there should be a record of new terms as well as of new species. The recorders who do the work of these publications with such fidelity and success, would hardly find their labours increased by noting down all the new terms used by the authors in their various departments, and placing them in a special list, each being accompanied by name of author, date, and definition. If this were done, we should have fewer instances both of useless synonyms and of identical words being employed for totally distinct things. I do not think, for instance, that the body-cavity of Peripatus would have been called a pseudocale by Mr. Sedgwick, or a metacale by Mr. Hatchett Jackson, if these writers had had the means of knowing that the former term had been previously applied by Dr. Burt Wilder to the so-called fifth ventricle of the mammalian brain, and the latter to the fourth ventricle.

Finally, matters would be very much improved if every author who finds himself obliged to coin a word would notify the fact in a conspicuous part of his paper, accompanying the term with an adequate definition. One has only to point to Allman's monograph on the Gymnoblastic Hydroids, or to Haeckel's Report on the Deep-Sea Medusa, to give a practical instance of the advantage of such a practice.

My proposals for promoting greater uniformity of nomenclature in biology may therefore be summed up under three heads, as follows:

1. The appointment of a strong international committee to define terms of general and fundamental importance, such as the subdivisions of biological science, terms common to zoology and botany, terms denoting position, &c.

2. The issue of an authoritative historic al glossary.
3. The systematic record of new terms.

METEORIC IRON.

THE Annalen des k.k. naturh. Hofmuseums, No. 2 of vol.
vi., contains a further contribution by E. Cohen and E.
Weinschenk to their interesting studies on meteoric irons.
By treating comparatively large masses in the cold with very

dilute hydrochloric acid (1 in 20) so that the process of solution was very slow, in some cases extending to several months, a residue is left from which it is found possible to isolate several more or less definite compounds, distinct from the freely soluble main mass of the meteorite.

It is in the portion insoluble in the highly dilute acid, which in some cases amounts to no more than 5 per cent. of the whole, that the main interest in analytical work on meteoric irons centres. The patience and care involved in the separation of its various constituents often find their reward in some interesting discovery. As a typical example of the constituents into which a meteorite may be separated by this treatment with dilute acid, it will suffice to quote the percentage numbers obtained in the case of a slice of the Magura iron. They are as follows:

Nickel-iron which passed into solution 92'67 per cent.
Cohenite

Tænite jagged fragments
Schreibersite
Tænitecohenite
Non-magnetic residue

4'00 33

In most meteoric irons the soluble portion consists to a large extent of a nickel-iron kamacite, which mainly constitutes the broad layers of the Widmanstätten figures seen on an etched polished surface. The authors are of opinion, from a comparison of various analyses, that this alloy has a constant composition represented by the formula Fe,,Ni.

Cohenite, which occurs in very brittle tin-white crystals, has at present been only found in the Magura iron. It was analyzed and described in a previous paper by Dr. Weinschenk, who found it to consist of a definite carbide of iron, nickel, and cobalt, having the composition represented by the formula (FeNiCo),C. Very similar crystals in the Wichita iron were found to have the composition represented by the formula (FeNiCo),C, analogous to the well-known spiegeleisen, Fe,C. Cohenite corresponds to the carbide Fe,C, which separates out in crystals when cast-iron is slowly cooled between 600 and 700°. Many points of resemblance such as this between meteoric and ordinary cast-iron appear to show that the conditions as regards temperature, &c., during their production must have been very similar in the two

cases.

Tænite, occurring usually in thin silver-white lamella of great toughness between the broader layers of kamacite, is a nickel-iron, of which there appear to be two varieties, containing respectively about 65 and 73 per cent. of iron. Further analyses, however, are necessary in order to determine its true composition. The jagged and angular fragments of iron-black colour were analyzed, and found to consist of a nickel-iron containing about 7 per cent. of nickel, and were thus in all probability identical with kamacite.

The phosphor-nickel-iron schreibersite is generally found in large tabular crystals of tin-white colour. The new analyses show that its composition may be represented by the formula (FeNiCo),P. In some meteorites a phosphor-nickel-iron occurring in needles is found. This is the so-called rhabdite of Rose. Whether it is identical or not with schreibersite has not yet been decided, owing to the difficulty of obtaining pure material. A non-magnetic residue, consisting chiefly of transparent grains, the authors find is common in greater or less amount to most meteoric irons. In such residues a great variety of minerals have been identified with more or less certainty, such as diamond, cliftonite (a graphitic pseudomorph after diamond), quartz, tridymite, chromite, cordierite, garnet, corundum, pyroxenes both rhombic and monoclinic, &c.

The aim of the authors in the present investigation was to answer the following questions:How widely distributed is cohenite? Are schreibersite and rhabdite definite compounds ? Has kamacite a constant composition? Has tænite always the tion of the jagged fragments so generally left undissolved after same physical and chemical properties? What is the compositreatment of meteoric irons with dilute hydrochloric acid? How widely distributed are the transparent grains, as well as the diamond, cliftonite, &c. ?

Unfortunately, owing to the fact that the present joint investigation had to be brought to a somewhat premature conclusion, a definite answer to all of these questions could not be given. We may, however, expect soon to hear more on the points still left undecided, as the promise is made that the gaps in the present investigation shall be filled up as soon as possible. G. T. P.