The Sun.
London, England, 1865-10-11 00:00:00

same :

"Palace, Chichester, Oct. 3, 1865

" Sir,—l beg gratefully to acknowledge the safe receipt
of the interesting and beautiful photograph of One of the
boats of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution going off
to a wreck, presented to me in so complimentary a manner
by the committee of that institution. I value it highly,
and shall endeavour to preserve it as an instructive and
encouraging representation of the way in which your in-
stitution shows our seafaring population that their lands-
men brothers are not insensible or regardless of their diffi-
culties and dangers, but will always assist to provide for
their preservation the most approved appliances that
science and art can suggest. The day of the launch of
your boat, the " Olive Leaf," at Hayling Island, was a
joyous day for your institution, and an augury, I trust, of
many a triumph of life saved by God's merciful owning of
human efforts, amid the threatenings of roaring winds and
angry waves.—l have, &c., "A. J. CIIICHESTEIt.
" To the Secretary of the Royal National

Lifeboat Institution."

DISEASE OF SILKWORMS.—The Minister of Agri-
culture having requested M. Pasteur to turn his
attention to the disease of silkworms, which does not ap-
pear to have abated in any perceptible degree, the learned
physiologist last week presented a paper to the Academy
on the subject. After premising that the question was
entirely new to him, he stated that on the 7th June last he
arrived at Alais, where he selected a Kokh, or silkworm
nursery, for his observations. He had been particularly
struck with a fact mentioned in M. do Quatrefages's work
on the subject, viz., that in the body of the diseased
silkworm the microscope reveals certain particles
considered by most authors as a symptom of the disorder.
Those corpuscles exist in profusion in certain worms that
cannot spin their cocoon, and especially in the adipose
matter situated under the skin, and in the silk-producing
organs. The chrysalides and butterflies offered the same
appearances. The worms afflicted with those black spots
from which the disease has derived the name of pobrino
also contained an immense number of the corpuscles.
M. Pasteur was particularly struck with one circum-
stance, which seems to have escaped the attention of
former observers. In one of the rooms of the Kokh,
Japanese silk worms, received from the Societe d'Acelimata-,
tion, hid been reared with such remarkable success that
the eggs obtained from 35 kilogrammes of the cocoons spun I
had been collected for propagation. In a second room,
on the contrary, there were indeed Japanese silkworms
also, but bought by a private dealer; they were all dis-
eased. And yet, iu examining the chrysalides and butter-
flies of the successful brood, M. Pasteur found every
one of them affected with the corpuscles, while the worms
of the bad lot had scarcely any. Hence our author arrives
at the conclusion that the disease properly affects the
chrysalis and butterfly, and not the worm ; and that con-
sequently the efforts of entomologists and physiologists
should be particularly directed towards finding reme-
dies against the disease, not in the lava, but in the pupa
tsate ; and it is in this sense he proposes to continue his
researches.

PERIODICITY OF STOR3IS.—In a paper recently
addressed to the Academy of Sciences, M. Fournet
gives an account of the results he has arrived at after a
series of meteorological observations continued uninter-
ruptedly for a series of 30 years, in the valley of the Saone.
As a result of 3,300 observations, he finds that the winter
—December, January, and February —is singularly' free
from electrical meteors. It is known that what are called
the blank days (journee nentres) abound in these months ;
but it is not known that the season is apt to open with a
storm, usually on the 2d or 3d of December, and that on
the 15th another storm. recurs. " One might be tempted,"
he says, "to consider these winter explosions as the last
expression of the dying energy of the autumn ; but this
idea is set aside by the observation of the phenomena
which occur in mid-winter. These are manifested espe-
cially on the 15th of January. They accompany the
rainy phase—a phase remarkable by the overflow of the
Saone. At the end of February winter often terminates
with a storm as it began with one." In March the stormy
period of spring is moderately introduced, and it is not
until the 7th that we perceive a well-defined electrical
tendency. This tendency increases rapidly, and about the
22d of May we reach the period of intensest evolution of
storms. Summer opens placidly, and even the sth of
June is as free from electric disturbance as the ordinary
days of winter ; but immediately afterwards the causes
cumulate, and the Bth, 12th, and 18th of June are tole-
rably certain to see storms. The 20th of June is gene-
rally a stormy day. July is a period which contrasts by
its quiet with the turbulence of June and August. Up to
the 12th it preserves something of that placidity, which is
then interrupted by the most electrically disturbed period
of the year. It ceases on the 18th—that is to say, it is
composed of six days divided by a moment of profound
calm. After its rains the temperature diminishes, and the
rest of the season, until winter, presents few changes
of violent disturbances. Nevertheless for autumn
we must note the critical days, September 1,9, 23, 30, fol-
lowed by the crisis of October 7 to 11. We may remark that
the fact of our having had six weeks and upwards of fine
weather up to Saturday the 7th last, inclusively, and of
its having changed to rain this day the 9th, certainly
tends to confirm Dz.FOlllllOV§ observations.