ignorance may now elicit a smile of pity, what can be said of the knowledge of natural history at the present time, when the Mark Lane Express for September 4th has the following paragraph in answer to a correspondent who inquires how he can rid his fields of charlock. They are unable to give him the required information, but propound a theory that botanists will be surprised to hear :

"We do not think they come from seed, but is (sic) the result of some electrical action producing them spontaneously. The charlock is an unwelcome visitor, but its removal in corn crops is often worse than the evil itself. Let both grow together until the time of harvest. The seed has more value than some suppose, and when crushed will be found a good tonic. Nothing is given to us in vain."

One scarcely knows which to admire most, his bold contempt of Lindley Murray or his botanical knowledge. You will also observe that in the commencement of the precious paragraph he does not think they come from seed, and then a few lines further on he says "the crushed seeds are a valuable tonic." If such a lamentable amount of ignorance is displayed by those whose province it is to educate, who is to teach the teachers ?

The above extracts are taken from one of the volumes published by the Historical Society of Science. The Anglo-Saxon treatise occupies about twelve, the treatises of Philip de Thaun above a hundred pages of royal octavo.

AN AURORA BY DAYLIGHT.

A SHORT time since, in a contemporary,"

a

discussion took place on daylight aurora, a few observers stating that they had seen such a phenomenon, while at least one correspondent tried to prove such a display was an impossibility. Since then I have anxiously watched for an opportunity of judging for myself, and now can state that aurora displays may be apparent in the daylight. The facts observed will be given in detail, the hours mentioned being Dublin time, taken from the watch of the mail guard.

On October 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th there were slight frosts, the nights being clear and bright, with brilliant displays of stars, and a rather sharp wind from the north. On the morning of the 8th we travelled from Galway to Clifden, our route lying for more than half the way through the hills of Varconnaught. When leaving the town of Galway, at two o'clock A.M., there was a red glow over most of the sky, being rather more intense to the northward, while toward the southward it was imperceptible, this glow appearing and disappearing at intervals of from fifteen to twenty minutes. These intermit

Nature.

tent lights continued till four o'clock, when a bright, brilliant crimson band suddenly darted up from the northern horizon through the North Star, extending southward more than halfway across the heavens. This band lasted only for a few moments, however. Subsequently it graduated into space, and was succeeded by a display of needle-shaped rays of red light, that seemed to be falling every way from the zenith, but especially towards the N.W., N., and N.E. This shower of rays, if it may be so called, might be likened to a shower of red rain or blood, the rays drifting away and gradually disappearing in space, similarly to a passing shower, as any one who is accustomed to a mountainous country must often have observed. Subsequently very similar displays, but of greater or less intensity, succeeded one another at intervals of from about five to ten minutes, till seven minutes to five o'clock, when the first streak of daylight was apparent on the castern horizon. After the dawn of day, and from that to six o'clock, the aurora was still visible. The colour, however, of the rays changed, first to purple, and afterwards, as the daylight grew stronger, to a neutral tint; but the play of the rays was similar to those of a red colour, except that the intervals of time between each appearance became longer and longer. Furthermore, the rays, instead of brightening up the sky, as they did during the night, now cast a shadow over it. When the daylight had become strong, and all the stars but a few of the larger ones had disappeared, all defined colour seemed to have departed from the aurora rays, they then being more like a fleeting, dusky, thin cloud, or a distant passing shower of rain. Nevertheless, that such appearances were due to the aurora was evident, as they radiated from the northern horizon, besides coming and going similarly to the previously described red lights.

At six o'clock the day had well dawned; scarcely a star could be detected, while the distant mountains, hills, fields, cattle, and houses, were distinctly visible, and the aurora seemed to have disappeared for good. Not so, however, for at seventeen minutes past six there was a grand display; eight double pencils of bright but pale yellow light suddenly appearing, radiating from the edge of a dark cloud that floated due north close to the horizon, having an appearance similar to the rays from a setting sun. These lasted for about three minutes, and disappeared as suddenly as they had come up. The daylight at this time apparently was quite perfect; however, it was not till eleven minutes afterwards (twenty-eight minutes past six) that the edge of the rising sun appeared above the eastern horizon.

From the above facts it seems apparent that an aurora display during daylight may occur, but that such a phenomenon is easily overlooked, as the

I

THE STORY OF A GRAVEL-PIT.

BY J. E. TAYLOR, F.G.S., ETC.

AM the last of my race. My brother storytellers have had their day, and ceased to be. Had you questioned me a few years ago, I should have been like Canning's Knife-grinder, and had nothing to tell. Even now my story is not complete. New editions are constantly coming out, although their general truth remains unaltered.

Who among my listeners has not played, when a child, in a sand- or gravel-pit? You have them in abundance, scattered over the surface of the country. But there are gravel-pits and gravel-pits-a difference without a popular distinction.

Those I particularly represent are always situated on the banks of some river-valley. Hence their other geological nanies of "Valley-gravels" and "Rivergravels." Frequently they form terraces flanking the present course of the rivers, and you may identify two of these terraces,-a low-lying one and a higher. If you could strip off these banks of gravel, you would find the bare rock beneath, or else some thick sheet of boulder clay, which had been scooped

out to make the present river-valley. Banked up against these old denuded surfaces are the gravels, whose excavations are so well known as pits. I am one of them, and I propose to tell you my story, as well as I can recollect it. Although I can hardly define the difference between the gravels to which I belong and those which belong to the Glacial series, generally the Middle Drift, yet the practised eye readily learns to detect that there is a difference. The pebbles composing our beds are well rounded, showing they have undergone a tremendous deal of wear-and-tear. They are composed of different kinds of rock, just as you would expect when you know they have been washed out of the boulder clays, or brought down by the river in its passage over the outcrops of successive beds. The flint pebbles have generally an oily look about them, and all the pebbles are red and ochreous. Their position along the river-valley, however, is always the best test. Some of these valley-gravels are very thick, whilst others extend as mere banks of local distribution. All of them, however, indicate some degree of antiquity, inasmuch as you will find ancient trees growing on the most recent of these terraces, and, here and there, old ruins which stand upon them. In fact, the gravel-pits indicate a gradual risc in the land for them to occupy their present heights above the river-level. The gravels were originally brought down by the ancestor of the present river. when it was broader and perhaps more turbulent, at the close of the Glacial epoch, when the climature was more severe than it now is, and the quantity of rain and snow which annually fell much greater, so that the river-valley was subjected to great floods, which brought down the materials of which we are composed.

As the land gradually rose, and the climate became more genial, and toned down to its present mildness, the waters of the river shrank in volume, until only the present channel was occupied. But the heights to which we river-gravels rise above the water not only indicate how old we are, but, in some cases, go back as far as the commencement of the original scooping-out of the valley itself.

All this would be very interesting in itself, as geological action connecting the most recent of the great physical changes with those we see in operation around us. But the interest of these valleygravels is still more enhanced when my listeners understand that it is in them that the first evidences of Man's appearance on the earth are met with! All my brother story-tellers have had their say, and many of them have described the commonest of the animals and plants of their day; but not one of them mentioned that mankind was living at the time. It was reserved for so humble and commonplace an object as a Gravel-pit to unfold the most important of all geological discoveries. Men have speculated as to their original ancestors living as far back as the Miocene period, but they have adduced no facts in support. On the contrary, I yield nothing but facts, and those in great abundance. In the gravel-pits you meet with the chipped flint implements, of which you have doubtless already heard. They are imbedded, as stones, along with the other material, having been brought down by the ancient river in the same way as pebbles.

But they are undoubtedly of human workmanship. This cannot be gainsaid. You see this at once by the flints having been carefully, and in many cases artistically, chipped down to a cutting edge all round. They are generally spearhead-shaped, and about six to nine inches long. Had they not been connected with the question of the antiquity of Man, you would never have heard a word said about their not being of human manufacture. As it is, in order to steer clear of this disagreeable truth, many have invented all kinds of ingenious hypotheses to account for the flints getting chipped in this regular fashion. But it requires far more faith to believe in these theories than it does in the other common-sense inference.

The most damaging fact to them is the identity in pattern of these cut and chipped flints, wherever they may be met with. Another important incident is this the chipped flints are only found in the valley-gravels, or in deposits of the same age. If they have been chipped by accident, there is no reason in the world why they should not be found in gravel-pits of much older date.

From the time when primitive Man used these flint weapons for almost every purpose, slaying wild animals with them, cutting down trees and scooping them out for canoes, making holes in the ice with

them for fishing purposes-since then you can trace the whole history of offensive and defensive weapons. Antiquaries and geologists call these most ancient of implements Paleolithic,-meaning, in Greek, that they are the oldest known; and the age in which they were produced consequently is known by the same name. When Man first appeared, if we are to reason by the remains with which we find these implements associated, the Woolly-haired Elephant, or Mammoth, and the Woolly-haired Rhinoceros, were both natives of Great Britain. It is frequently objected that you do not find the bones of man associated with these tools; but the reason is not difficult to find.

Remember how few of the bones, &c. of the ancient Romans and Saxons are met with, in proportion to the number of more enduring ornaments, coins, &c. they left behind them. Then consider that the valley-gravels lie in the line of greatest drainage toward the river, and, as they are porous, the surface water percolates through them on its way to the lowest level. Any particle of carbonate of lime, whether in the form of bone or not, which was deposited in these gravels, would thus be dissolved away. Hence it is that, although the huge bones of elephants, &c., were undoubtedly buried up in the same gravels, we find few or no traces of them. The commonest of their remains are teeth and tusks, whose dentine and ivory structure saved them from the gradual destruction to which the frailer parts of the skeleton were liable.

Fortunately, there were other agencies at work during the same period, which were conservative rather than destructive. In the fissures of limestone rocks, where water is percolating, that water is usually charged with carbonate of lime. Every drop of water that evaporates on the surface of the walls of a chasm or natural hollow leaves its contained particle of lime behind. This process is always going on, until there has been left on the walls a great fold or layer of what is called stalactite. The water drips on the floor, and there a portion is evaporated, the lime being left behind.

As you may guess, the process is marvellously slow, but the layer thus formed on the floor is called stalagmite. It is not difficult to see that anything lying on such a cavern-floor would be incrusted over, and eventually covered up. This is what I call a conservative process. Now at the time the valleygravels were forming, savage man was glad to avail himself of any shelter, and the natural caves and hollows of the earth were anxiously sought after, as they are now by the lowest tribes of mankind elsewhere. To such places as Kent's Cavern, Brixham Cavern, &c., savages resorted, bringing with them the fruits of the chase. Here you may find the bones of animals which had been split open in order to extract the marrow, as well as the flint knives and implements, of exactly the same kind as those

You see, therefore, that the two most accessible groups of facts both point to the same great fact of the antiquity of Man. Succeeding the Paleolithic age is that provisionally known as the "Rein-deer period," on account of the large number of the remains of that northern animal which have been found in the bone-caves of the south of France. England and the Continent were then subjected to the periodical migrations of Arctic animals, among which were the Kein-deer, Lemming, Glutton, Elk, &c. The fliut implements found associated with the remains of these animals in the south of France exhibit a superior skill, indicating that man's nature was to progress, even at that early stage.

66

Rude attempts at carving and drawing were also indulged in, as examples in your principal museums will attest. Then succeeded the next stage, known as Neolithic, or Newer Stone age," which is distinguished by the greater variety in shape of the flint implements, and, more particularly, by the fact that they are, for the most part, ground smooth and to a sharp, knife-like cutting edge. These weapons, however, are usually found strewn on the surface, or imbedded only in peat bogs and the most recent of river-deposits. Whereas the Paleolithic types are limited to valley-gravels and the most ancient of bone-caves, the Neolithic show, by their universal distribution and superior workmanship, that they belong to an advanced period. All the savage races still using stone weapons are generally islanders, cut off from the great centres, so that they are "outliers" of a system once universal. This later period is that of the "Lake Dwellings," which link on to that known to antiquaries as the "Bronze period." To this succeeds the Iron age, and, if you like, the present, or "Steel" age. The two former are historical, and come within the range, not only of scientific deduction, but also of written history. I have simply mentioned them to show how, from the time when the most ancient and rude of the flint implements were deposited in the river-gravels, there is more or less of an unbroken sequence. Archæology commences where geology leaves off-the past and the present meet on common ground. Standing on this neutral area, you may gaze backward into the illimitable ages which have gone by, and see the gradual ascension in animal life, which began in the dim and distant Laurentian epoch in the animalcule, and has terminated in Man. Looking forward from the same vantage-ground, you may hopefully note the development of society, the growth of civilization, and probability of the unfolding of the social and moral attributes of man as marvellously as the

apex! Throughout, in the buried past, as well as in the yet unfolded future, you never lose sight of the operations of an Almighty Spirit-ever working, never resting!-out of chaos bringing forth order,

out of simple protoplasmic material educing the animal and vegetable kingdoms, in all their multitudinous types and varieties, until a small area like the superficies of this planet has teemed with life sufficient to stock a million existing worlds! One generation has passed away, but, in doing so, has furnished a basis on which the new comer may ascend to a higher physiological platform. Every form, animal and vegetable, has been but the expression of Divine Love, communicating to them the excess of its own joyous life! Every species has been an outwardly crystallized Divine idea. Spirit has clothed itself with matter, until in Man the past and the future have met: the ancient Greek fable has been more than realized, for it has been true spiritual fire from heaven-given, not stolen-which has been instilled into fleshly clay !

My story is now ended, and, with mine, the series, whose purpose has been to give as plain an outline of the biography of our old world as possible. It will have been seen that a story may be properly read off, even from so common and ordinary an object as a Gravel-pit. In geology, more than any other science, he that humbleth himself shall be exalted! All its objects lie at your feet, and are of the lowliest kind. Not a pebble you accidentally kick before you, not a handful of dust blown by the wind into gutters, not a spadeful of soil turned over, but each is fraught with teaching of the utmost value and of the intensest interest. It is by recognizing a Cause that you alone can unlock the secret; setting out with the full belief that everything exists by virtue of a right-has resulted, not from accident, but law,--until you arrive at the highest conception of which man is capable,-that the total of these various laws meet and concentrate into one focus, and find their expression in a personal and Almighty God!

“THE land bird is bound to its home by powerful bonds, which, for the most part, are invisible to our dull vision; with some species these limits may perhaps embrace an area less than the hundredth part of a mile."-" Bird Life," by Dr. Brehm.

"THE South, by destroying its trees, has dried up its springs. It has abandoned the mountains to ruin, and its plains to a couple of scourges-the wind and the flood. The North and Central France bid fair ere long to lose their fuel. Before the Revolution, in 1760, France had thirty millions of hectares in forest-to-day she has less than eight millions."-"Nature," by Madame Michelet.

IT

THE SMALL EGGAR-MOTH.

T seems advisable to say a few words upon a correspondence which has been going on for some time on the larva and pupa states of Eriogaster lanestris (the small Eggar-moth). Several writers complain that they cannot obtain pupæ, and that the larvæ die when full-fed. I think that this must be owing to a want of attention to one or two peculiarities in their habits. One is well known. As soon as they emerge from the egg, they go to work and mutually construct a silken tent round the twig upon which the eggs have been laid. This habitation is added to as the larvæ grow, and into it they retire when not engaged in feeding. A second habit is not so well known,-that of basking in the sunshine upon the outside of this web. Now if, when the larvae are collected, their nest is not also taken and carefully kept in contact with their food, they will hardly ever do well; neither do they like to be deprived of sunshine.

Some years ago I brought home a large nest of young larvæ, stood the branch in a jar in an unoccupied room, put fresh branches of blackthorn or whitethorn into other water-jars close by, arranging that the bushes should touch each other, and supplied fresh branches every two or three days, as they withered or were stripped. In this way the larvæ fed well and enlarged their nest to an immense extent as they grew, and it was curious to see them when, at a certain hour in the day, the sun shone upon the nest, crowding upon the outside of it, squeezing in between each other like pigs, and lying so close together that a pin could hardly be put between them without touching. I think, however, that they did not get enough sun; for although many spun up in reasonable time, others continued feeding till quite late in the summer, and as, on arriving at full size and assuming their handsome skins, they had become erratic, and required to be kept at home with gauze bags, my patience got exhausted, and having a hundred or two of pupa, I turned the rest out. About this matter of the long duration of the pupa state: it really is nothing new. It was noticed in "Westwood and Humphrey's British Moths" more than thirty years ago, and most likely long before, but I have not books at hand. I did not expect my moths out the next spring; but one specimen appeared, and with proper treatment, I feel sure that many more would have come out. The second spring I thought of the advice of a writer in the Entomologist's Weekly Intelligencer, years ago, and brought down my pupa one mild day in the middle of February, and put them on to the mantelpiece.

They acknowledged the attention at once, and emerged by dozens. The next year I did the same, and some more came out; but since that only a

stray specimen or two have appeared, and I have now been breaking open the sound cocoons, and find that great numbers of the moths have perished in the pupa when fully formed and coloured; and this I have no doubt occurred in the first spring, when they had not sufficient warmth to enable them to burst the pupal envelope.

There is another point-the curious double cocoons, from which nothing ever emerges. These are not divided inside, but are formed by two larvæ uniting their efforts, and producing a broad cocoon the size of the whole material of two single ones. Thus, two sides being saved, it is larger than the two single ones would be.

Could anybody expect anything to emerge from this? In the first place, a larva, when assuming the pupa state, requires the most perfect liberty from interference or annoyance. How, then, could either of two larvæ, wriggling off their skins in the same cocoon, be expected to succeed? The only chance would be by one dying in the larva state. But then the survivor would have too much room, -would have, in fact, no "purchase" anywhere by which to burst open the lid of the cocoon.

Fortunately an example occurred among my lot; and I found, on opening it, that one larva shrivelled up without attempting to cast its skin, that the other changed, and in due time the moth emerged from the pupa skin, but never left the cocoon. I found it crumpled up and dead, of course. To this large cocoon three others were slightly attached : from one the moth emerged, and in the other two they died when ready to emerge from the pupa. C. G. BARRETT.

NEW SPECIES OF ROTATORIA.
BY F. COLLINS, M.D.

PREVIOUS to 1867, while residing in the parish

of Sandhurst, Berkshire, it was my fortune to meet with several undescribed species of Rotifers. Presuming that some of the readers of SCIENCEGOSSIP may be interested in that very attractive group of animalcules, I have forwarded for their perusal the following copy of my rough notes, written five years ago, during the time I was employing some of my leisure hours in studying these very beautiful and interesting creatures.

Melicerta socialis.-Tube irregular in shape, built of large yellowish-brown, granular, egg-shaped pellets, which are heaped up into the form of a tube, without any regard to symmetry. The rotatory disc is divided into two lobes, the anterior division being, as is generally the case, much deeper and more marked than the posterior or dorsal division. The eyes are cervical, two in number, and of a pale rose-colour. The maxillary bulb is placed high up in the neck. The two hooks seen in