Abstract
Der Naturforscher, May.—This serial, containing little that is original, furnishes a weekly supply of well-selected and adapted matter froth various sources. In the present number attention may be called to an academical address delivered by Herr Sirengat Giesseh, onthe “circle-course” of substances in nature, treating chiefly of geological phenomena; to an account of Herr Janettas's recent careful researches on the conduction of heat in crystals (some 44 mineral species having been examined); to atlseoretical investigation by Herr Handl (Vienna Academy) of the conditions of saturated and supersaturated solutions, and to several papers of meteorological experimnt: on moisture in forests and in the open, On the temperature of lain, and on the velocity of winds as measured on various heights on Antwerp Cathedral.—Some observations of M. Du Breuil on the partial decortication of horse-chestnuts, are worthy of notice. He found about twenty of these trees in the park at Compiègne, the bark of which had been eaten off twenty-four years previously, by rabbits, to a height of 30 or 4o centimetres. From several experiments he concluded that the chestnuts could live thus long without conmunication with the soil, and that the elements necessary to their growth were obtained partly from the atmosphere, partly through endosmose from the woody tissue formed before decortication.—Among several French Academy papers are those by M. Jamin on the laws of the normal magnet, and M. Faye on circulation of hydrogen in tlse sun.—English and American science is also represented.—A curious fact is stated in the “Kleinere Mitubeilungen”: Herr Eimerhas recently found, on a precipitous rock near the island of Capri, a stew species of lizard. It is blue all over, with dark spots on the back; while the lizards in Capri are of a bright green, with only a little blue at the extremities, Now the rock (which is frequented by birds of prey) has little or no vegetation, and its natural colour is a bluish grey, or dark blue in the shaded parts. The lizard, when at rest, can hardly be detected by sight, its colour is so like that of the rock. Herr Eimer finds indications that the rock was once connected with the land, and supposes green lizards to have gone over and been gradually transformed to blue, through natural selection.
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Scientific Serials . Nature 8, 194 (1873). https://doi.org/10.1038/008194a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/008194a0