Page:1902 Encyclopædia Britannica - Volume 25 - A-AUS.pdf/553

 APULIA—AQUARIA indicate the distribution of a benefit {e.g., salvage), or the incidence of a duty {e.g., obligations as to the maintenance of highways); (ii.) In its strict legal interpretation it falls into two classes, “apportionment in respect of estate ” and “ apportionment in respect of time.” Where a lessee is evicted from, or surrenders, or forfeits possession of part of the property leased to him, he becomes liable at common law to pay only a rent apportioned to the value of the interest which he still retains. So where the person entitled to the reversion of an estate assigns part of it, the right to an apportioned part of the rent incident to the whple reversion passes to his assignee. In each of these cases there is said to be “apportionment in respect of estate.” Apportionment of this description may be brought about not only, as in the cases above noted, by the act of the parties, but also by operation of law, or by the “ act of God ” (as, for instance, where part of an estate is submerged by the encroachments of the sea); and to the same category belongs the apportionment which takes place under various statutes {e.g., the Lands Clauses Act, 1845), when land is required for public purposes. Under the Apportionment Act, 1870, rents, annuities, dividends, and other payments at fixed periods, are to be considered as accruing from day to day, and to be apportionable accordingly. This is “apportionment in respect of time.” The cases to which it applies are mainly cases of either (a) apportionment of rent due under leases where at a time between the dates fixed for payment the lessor or lessee dies, or some other alteration in the position of parties occurs ; or (6) apportionment of income between the representatives of a limited owner and the remainder-man when the limited interest determines at a time between the date when such income became due. (a. w. e.) Apulia, Italian Puglia, a territorial division of Italy, stretching from Monte Gargano to the extremity of the “ heel,” and embracing the provinces of Bari, Foggia, and Lecce, with an area of 7376 sq. miles and a population of 1,589,064 (1881), and 1,929,723 (1899). It is a treeless plain, growing corn and feeding sheep, the principal wealth of the inhabitants. The products next in importance are oats, barley, olives, wine, lemons, oranges, tobacco, and figs. Salt, limestone, and other building stone are extracted. Wool is a source of wealth. Distilleries (66 in 1899, producing 146,775 gallons of pure spirit), olive-oil mills, the manufacture of casks and porcelain, iron-works and foundries are the most important of the industries. The principal ports are Brindisi, Gallipoli, Taranto, Bari, Barletta, Molfetta, Manfredonia, Trani, Bisceglie, Mola di Bari, and Monopoli. Apart from these, the more important towns are Lecce, Foggia, Bitonto, San Severe, Cerignola, Andria, and Terlizzi. Apure.

See Okinoco.

Apurimac, an interior department of southern Peru, with an area of 8187 square miles and a population officially estimated at 177,387 in 1896. It embraces five provinces, Andahuaylas, Abancay, Cotabambas, Aymaraes, and Antabamba. The principal towns are Andahuaylas and Abancay. Aq uaria for a marine flora and fauna, which in 1875 (the date of the article on this subject in the ninth edition of this Encyclopaedia) were little more than domestic toys, or show-places of a popular character, have of late years not only assumed a profound scientific importance for the convenient study of anatomical and physiological problems in marine botany and zoology, but have also attained an economic value, o,s offering the best opportunities for that study of the habits and environment

505

of marketable food-fish without which no steps for the improvement of sea-fisheries can be safely taken. The numerous “zoological stations” which have sprung up, chiefly in Europe and the United States, but also in the British colonies and Japan, often endeavour to unite these two aims, and have in many cases become centres of experimental work in problems relating to fisheries, as well as in less directly practical subjects. Of these stations, the oldest and the most important is that at Naples, which, though designed for purely scientific objects, also encourages popular study by means of a public aquarium. The following account of this station from the pen of Dr Giesbrecht, a member of the staff, will serve to show the methods and aims, and the complex and expensive equipment of a modern aquarium :— The zoological station at Naples is an institution for the advancement of biological science—that is, of comparative anatomy, zoology, botany, physiology. It serves this end by providing the biologist with the various objects of his study and the necessary appliances ; it is not a teaching institution. The station was founded by Dr Anton Dohrn, and opened in the spring of 1874 ; it is the oldest and largest of all biological stations, of which there are now about thirty in existence. Its two buildings are situated near the seashore in the western town park (Villa Nazionale) of Naples. The older and larger one, 33 metres long, 24 m. deep, 16 m. high, contains on the ground floor the aquarium, which is open to the public. On the first floor there is, facing south, the principal library, ornamented with fresco paintings, and, facing north, a large hall containing twelve working tables, several smaller rooms, and the secretarial offices. On the second floor is the physiological laboratory, and on the third floor the small library, a hall with several working tables, and the dark rooms used in developing photographs. The ground floor of the smaller building, which was finished in 1887, contains the rooms in which the animals are delivered, sorted, and preserved, and the fishing tackle kept, together with the workshop of the engineer ; on the first and second floors are work-rooms, amongst others the botanical laboratory ; on the third floor are store-rooms. In the basement of both buildings, which is continued underneath the court, there are sea-water cisterns and filters, engines, and store-rooms. The materials for study which the station offers to the biologist are specimens of marine animals and plants which abound in the western part of the Mediterranean, and especially in the Gulf of Naples. To obtain these, two screw-steamers and several rowing boats are required, which are moored in the harbour of Mergellina, situated close by. The larger steamer, Johannes Muller (15 m. long, 21 m. wide, 1 m. draught), which can steam eight to ten English miles per hour, is provided with a steam dredge working to a depth of eighty fathoms. From the small steamer, Fraiik. Balfour, and the rowing boats, the fishing is done by means of tow-nets. Besides these there are fishermen and others who daily supply living material for study. The plankton (small floating animals) is distributed in the morning, other animals as required. The animals brought in by the fishermen are at once distributed amongst the biologists, whereas the material brought up by the dredges is placed in flat revolving wooden vessels, so as to give the smaller animals time to come out of their hiding - places. The students who work in the station have the first claim on specimens of plants and animals ; but specimens are also supplied to museums, laboratories, and schools, and to individuals engaged in original research elsewhere. Up to the present time about 4000 such parcels have been despatched, and not infrequently live specimens of animals are sent to distant places. This side of the work has been of very great value to science. The principal appliances for study with which the station provides the biologist are work-rooms furnished with the apparatus and chemicals necessary for anatomical research and physiological experiments and tanks. Every student receives a tank for his own special use. The large tanks of the principal aquarium are also at his disposal for purposes of observation and experiment if necessary. The water in the tanks is kept fresh by continual circulation, and is thus charged with the oxygen necessary to the life of the organisms. It is not pumped into the tanks directly from the sea, but from three large cisterns (containing 300 cubic metres), to which it again returns from the tanks. The water wasted or evaporated during this process is replaced by new water pumped into the cisterns directly from the sea. The water flows from the large cisterns into a smaller cistern, from which it is distributed by means of an electric pump through vulcanite or lead pipes to the various tanks. The water with which the tanks on the upper floors are filled is first pumped into large wooden tanks placed beneath the roof, thence it flows, under S. I. — 64