ing it up is saved many times over by the facility with which reference is made.

CHARLES S. CRANDALL. THE STATE AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE, Fort Collins, Colorado.

ZONE TEMPERATURES.

My attention has been recently called by Dr. Walter H. Evans, of the United States Department of Agriculture, to an error in the temperature tables accompanying my paper on the 'Laws of Temperature Control of the Geographic Distribution of Animals and Plants,' an abstract of which was printed in my recent bulletin on 'Life Zones and Crop Zones.' The error in question relates to the effective temperature or 'sum of normal mean daily temperature above 6° C.' In the tables bearing the above heading the quantities actually given are the sums of normal mean daily temperatures (without deducting the 6° C. each day) for the period during which the mean daily temperature exceeds 6°C.

The temperature data, as stated on the first page of my original paper, were furnished by the Weather Bureau. Not being of a mathematical turn of mind, I did not detect the error until my attention was called to it by Dr. Evans. Corrected tables will be given in the next edition of 'Life Zones and Crop Zones.' C. HART MERRIAM.

PHYSICAL NOTES.

DR. OLIVER LODGE, in a recent paper before the Institution of Electrical Engineers, speaks of the probable importance of leakage currents in the usual methods of telegraphing by magnetic inductance through space. This form of wireless telegraphy has usually been accomplished with long parallel wires on poles and ground returns. In some experiments made by Stephenson near Edinburgh horizontal coils of wire were used and signals transmitted half a mile with a morse key in one coil and a telephone receiver in the other. Mr. Lodge used similar coils covering areas of about 4,500 square yards and transmitted signals about two miles. The characteristics of his method are the use of an alternating current of a rather high frequency, about 380, and the tuning of the line to this frequency by the use of con

densers, that is, the balancing of the inductance so that the current becomes equal to the induced E. M. F. divided by the ohmic resistance. As a result, he gets much greater effects than where the current is principally determined by the inductance of the circuits. This he shows by mathematical determination will be the case, the value of 2 x the frequency, coming in one instance in the denominator, while in the other it comes in the numerator of the expression giving the ratio between the secondary current and the impressed primary E. M. F.

F. C. C.

CURRENT NOTES ON METEOROLOGY. THE WINDWARD ISLANDS HURRICANE OF SEPTEMBER, 1898.

THE practical advantages gained by the establishment of the new West Indian Service of our Weather Bureau are forcibly illustrated in the account of the hurricane of September 10th and 11th last, published in the September number of the Monthly Weather Review. The Weather Bureau Observer at Bridgetown, Barbados, sent a special cable to Washington at 12:40 p. m., September 10th, announcing the approach of a hurricane. Warnings were immediately cabled to Weather Bureau stations in the Lesser Antilles, and the officials in charge were directed to give the widest possible distribution to the warnings. Advisory messages were sent to other islands, as far west as Jamaica and eastern Cuba, to points on the South American coast of the Caribbean Sea, and to Admiral Watson's fleet, lying in the harbor of Caimanera, Cuba. The careful reports of the Weather Bureau Observers at Kingston, Jamaica, at St. Kitts and other stations also made possible an early and complete record of the hurricane.

In this connection another paper, in the same number of the Review, is of interest. It concerns the telegraph service of the Weather Bureau with the West Indies, aud is illustrated by a chart showing the routes of the submarine cables over which reports are transmitted and the points at which the cables connect with the land lines.

At the December meeting of the Royal Meteorological Society (London) Captain A. Carpenter, R. N., gave an account of this disastrous hurricane.

Its diameter was 80 miles as it approached Barbados, and 170 miles after leaving St. Vincent. The actual storm center, in which the force of the wind greatly increased, was only 35 miles in diameter until St. Vincent was passed, but after that the strength of the wind extended to 170 miles from the center. The diameter of the calm vortex was not less than four miles. The storm was accompanied by very heavy rainfall, the amount at St. Vincent being about 14 inches in 24 hours. In Barbados 11,400 houses were swept away or blown down and 115 lives were lost, and in St. Vincent 6,000 houses were blown down or damaged beyond repair, and 200 lives were lost.

PROBABLE STATE OF SKY ALONG THE PATH OF

THE ECLIPSE, MAY 28, 1900.

PROFESSOR F. H. BIGELOW, in the Monthly Weather Review for September, considers the probable state of the sky along the path of the total eclipse of the sun, May 28, 1900. His conclusion is as follows: "It would be much safer for the eclipse expeditions to locate their stations in the northern portions of Georgia and Alabama, upon the southern end of the Appalachian Mountains, where the track crosses elevated areas, than nearer the coast line in either direction northeastward toward the Atlantic coast, or southwestward toward the Gulf coast; on the coast itself the weather is more unfavorable than in any other portion of the track." Professor Bigelow's paper is illustrated by means of a chart.

NOTES.

THE November number of Climate and Crops, Illinois Section, in commenting upon the statistics of losses by lightning in Illinois during 1898, says: "A survey of the reports shows a very marked increase in the loss of stock due to the wire fence, and the urgent need of frequent ground wires in those in use." (See note in this connection in SCIENCE, Dec. 2, 1898, p. 785.) R. DEC. WARD.

HARVARD UNIVERSITY.

CURRENT NOTES ON ANTHROPOLOGY.
THE OLDEST SKULL-FORM IN EUROPE.

IN the Centralblatt für Anthropologie (Heft. 4, 1898) are some abstracts touching the skull

form which is believed to be the oldest in Europe. It is represented most perfectly by the remains found at Spy. The characteristics are uncommon length, moderate width, very limited height, retreating forehead, prominent but depressed supra-orbital ridges and narrowed post-orbital diameter. Dr. Fraipont argues sharply for the genuine ancient character of the Neanderthall skull, and Dr. Schwalbe does not regard that found at Egisheim as a good type. As for modern examples simulating the Neanderthal skull the latter asserts that, while they may resemble it in one or another point, they never present the group of inferior criteria which characterize its measurements.

THE SUPPOSED OTTER TRAP.'

DR. ROBERT MUNRO in his excellent work, Prehistoric Problems, has a chapter on a curious object found in the peat bogs of Europe, from Italy to Scotland and North Germany. He has recently supplemented that chapter by an article describing further examples. (Jour. Roy. Soc. Antiquaries of Ireland, September, 1898.)

The object is a thick board or plank, two to three feet long, in the center of which is an oblong aperture four to six inches wide, closed by one or two valvular doors. The purpose of this arrangement is obscure Dr. Munro argues that it is an otter or beaver trap, while others have explained it as a boat-model, a sluice-box, a float for lines, etc.

The suggestion which I would offer for its use differs from any I have seen. It is doubtful that the valves could hold firmly an otter or any such animal. The purpose for which it would be entirely suited would be that of the inlet to a fish-weir. The valves, opening inward, would allow the fish to enter and would prevent their exit. Similar, though not identical, devices are in common use.

ANTHROPOLOGICAL STUDY OF FEEBLE-MINDED CHILDREN.

IN a supplement of the 48th annual report of the managers of the Syracuse State Institution for feeble-minded Children, Dr. Alex. Hrdlicka presents an anthropological study of a long series of these unfortunates. It includes their family conditions, the supposed etiolog

ical factors of the deficiency, and the physical examination of the subjects.

While the report is very instructive on many individual features, it admits of few general conclusions other than that we need much more extended investigations than have heretofore been prosecuted, in order to reach positive opinions as to the causation and the status of the feeble-minded; and this is Dr. Hrdlicka's own decision (p. 95).

D. G. BRINTON.

UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA.

SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS.

M. VAN TIEGHEM, the eminent botanist, succeeds M. Wolf as President of the Paris Academy of Science, while M. Lévy has been elected Vice-President.

AT its meeting on January 11th the American Academy of Arts and Sciences elected Charles Doolittle Walcott, of Washington, an Associate Fellow in place of the late Professor James Hall, and Oliver Heaviside, of Newton Abbot, England, a Foreign Honorary Member.

It is proposed to erect a monument in memory of Fèlix Tisserand, Member of the Institute of France, and of the Bureau of Longitude, and Director of the Observatory of Paris, at Nuits Saint-Georges (Côte-d'Or), his native place. Subscriptions will be received at Nuits SaintGeorges, by M. Desmazures, Receveur Municipal; at the Observatory of Paris, by M. Fraissinet, and at Dijon, by M. Ragot (rue Colson).

SURGEON-GENERAL STERNBERG is at present in Cuba inspecting the hospitals and arranging for a new yellow fever hospital and a depot for medical supplies in Havana.

THE Permanent Secretary of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Dr. L. O. Howard, would be glad to learn of the address of José de Riviera, who was elected a life member of the Association at the Boston meeting of 1880.

THE Chemical Society of Washington, at the annual meeting held on Thursday, January 12, 1899, elected the following officers for the ensuing year: President, Dr. H. N. Stokes; Vice-Presidents, Dr. P. Fireman, Dr. H. C. Bolton; Secretary, Mr. William H. Krug;

Treasurer, Mr. W. P. Cutter; Executive Committee, the above officers and Dr. C. E. Munroe, Dr. E. A. de Schweinitz, Mr. Wirt Tassin and Dr. F. W. Hillebrand, ex-officio.

PROFESSORS VON KUPFER, of Munich; F. Klein, of Göttingen, and E. Fischer, of Berlin, have been made members of the Bavarian Maximilian Order of Science and Art.

PROFESSOR M. E. COOLEY, of the engineering department of the University of Michigan, who has been Chief Engineer on the United States auxiliary steamer Yosemite since the outbreak of the Spanish-American war, will return to the University in time to begin work with the second semester. He was detached from the Yosemite December 23d, since which date he has been doing temporary work at the League Island Navy Yard. He expects to be relieved from duty by the first of next month.

MR. Wм. T. HORNADAY, Director of the New York Zoological Park, has been elected a corresponding member of the London Zoological Society.

Nature states that Mr. Frederick G. Jackson, the leader of the Jackson-Harmsworth expedition, has been presented with a first class of the Royal Order of St. Olaf by King Oscar of Sweden and Norway.

THE Paris Academy of Sciences has nominated for the chair of chemistry in the Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers as first choice M. Florent, and as second choice M. Joannis.

MR. JOHN BARROW, F.R.S., the author of works on travel and physiography, has died at the advanced age of 91 years.

PROFESSOR JOSEPH BALDWIN, who held the chair of pedagogy in the University of Texas, died on January 14th, aged 70 years.

AT the annual meeting of the Indiana Academy of Science held at Indianapolis during Christmas week, Mr. W. W. Woollen announced that he had set aside forty-four acres of land situated nine miles from the center of Indianapolis, for a garden of birds and botany. He proposes to develop the garden and present it to the city of Indianapolis, to be placed under the control of the Superintendent of Schools, the President of Butler College, and the President

of the Academy of Science, for the use of the bodies represented by them.

THE Association for maintaining the American women's table at the zoological station at Naples announces that it is prepared to receive applications for use of the table, which should be addressed to the Secretary, Miss Ida H. Hyde, 1 Berkeley St., Cambridge. The Executive Board has at its disposal a small fund for the aid of scholars of the Association who may need assistance to meet the expenses of travel and of residence in Naples. The first two scholars of the Association were Professor Mary Alice Wilcox, of Wellesley College, and Miss Florence Peebles, European Fellow of Bryn Mawr College.

THE late Baron Ferdinand Rothschild has bequeathed to the British Museum art collections valued at $1,500,000.

THE French Society for the encouragement of national industry has been presented with a sum of 20,000 fr. by M. Gilbert.

JUDGE JOHN HANDLEY, of Scranton, Pa., left $250,000 for a public library at Winchester, Va., and made the city his residuary legatee. It has been decided in the Courts that the latter bequest is valid, and the city will receive about $250,000 additional to the public library.

MR. ANDREW CARNEGIE has offered to give $250,000 for the construction of a building for the Washington Public Library if Congress will furnish a suitable site and provide for the maintenance of the library.

THE Imperial Academy of Military Medicine, St. Petersburg, celebrated on December 30th the centenary of its foundation, in the presence of official delegates from Germany, France and other nations. The Director of the Academy, Professor Ponchatine, made an address, giving a brief history of the institution and an account of the work that it had accomplished.

THE Proceedings of the second annual meeting of the Association of Experiment Station Veterinarians, held at Omaha, Neb., September 8, 1898, have recently been published by the U. S. Department of Agriculture (Bureau of Animal Industry, Bul. No. 22). Among the papers are those on 'Growing Tubercle Bacilli for Tuberculin,' by C. A. Cary; 'Feeding Wild

Plants to Sheep,' by S. B. Nelson, and 'Laboratory Records for Veterinarians,' by A. W. Bitting.

THE meeting of teachers of chemistry held at the University of Michigan on December 27 and 28, 1898, proved to be of great interest. A considerable number of high schools in Michigan were represented in the meeting. Among the institutions sending teachers were the University of Wisconsin; Lake Forest University ; Chicago University; Notre Dame, Ind.; Ohio State University; Kenyon College, Ohio; Otterbein University, Ohio; Olivet College, and Lewis Institute, Chicago. There were also reports and papers from the University of Chicago. The discussions were limited to the subjects and methods of teaching chemistry in high schools and colleges.

AN International Conference on Child Study will be held in Buda-Pesth next September.

IT is reported from Sydney that the private yacht Lady St. Aubyn has discovered some relics of the French navigator La Pérouse at Vanikoro Islands. The objects found include flint-lock muskets and Spanish and French coins.

THE Russian Imperial Geographical Society announces that neither the expedition of Stradling nor of Brede has been able to find in Siberia traces of Andrée. In the meanwhile an expedition has been organized at Copenhagen, under the direction of Dr. Daniel Brunn, to search for traces of Andrée in eastern Greenland

THE Division of Statistics of the U. S. Department of Agriculture reports that the acreage devoted to cotton in the United States in 1897 was 24,319,584, an increase of 1,046,375 over that for 1896. The number of bales pro duced was in 1897 10,897,857, an increase of 2,365,152 bales. There was an increase in almost every State, being especially noticeable in Arkansas and Indian Territory. The investigation of the amount of cotton purchased by mills. located in the cotton-growing States shows that 1,277,674 bales were taken from the current crop. This is 295,683 bales, or 30.1 per cent. more than was purchased by these mills in 1896-97. Without an exception every State

shows increased purchases, the per cent. of increase ranging from 7.7 in Louisiana to 65.2 in Missouri. In the States of greatest consumption the increase is especially marked, that in Alabama being 41.9, in Georgia 25.2, North Carolina 36.6, and South Carolina 33.8 per cent. During the year there were 425 mills in operation, as compared with 402 in 1896-97.

THE Board of Health of New York City has obtained a conviction in the Courts for violating the law forbidding the burning of soft coal, a fine of $25.00 being imposed.

A CORRESPONDENT writes to the London Times: "As it is just 100 years since Pestalozzi began at Stanz, on the Lake of Lucerne, the work among the orphan children which so deeply influenced the aims and methods of elementary education in German-speaking Europe and indirectly in Great Britain and America, it is intended to celebrate the centenary by a public meeting, which will be held, by permission of the Council, in the large hall of the College of Preceptors, Bloomsbury-square, on Wednesday, January 4th, at 8 p. m. Though many of Pestalozzi's hopes have been unfulfilled and modern psychology is far from confirming some of his attempted generalizations, his labors at Stanz will always form one of the most inspiring chapters in educational history. His work there emphasized the fact that religious influences are essential to all education which aims at strengthening the will and at elevating character, and that no educational instrument is so powerful as the self-devotion of the teacher. Sir Joshua Fitch will preside at the meeting, at which short addresses will be given by Professor Wilhelm Rein, of the University of Jena; Lady Isabel Margesson; Miss Herford (Manchester), and Messrs. A. Sonnenschein, R. L. Morant, E. Cooke and others."

UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS. THE sum of £115,000 has been subscribed towards establishing a university at Birmingham.

THE late Henry Clark Warren, of Boston, an accomplished Oriental scholar, has left to Harvard University a large sum principally for the Sanscrit department, but including $10,000 for the Peabody Museum of American archæology

and ethnology and $10,000 for the Denta" School. The Sanscrit department is to have $15,000 for the endowment of the Harvard Oriental Series, and the balance, which is said to be large, is to be used for the benefit of the department.

HARVARD UNIVERSITY receives $5,000 by the will of the late Susan B. Lyman, Dedham, Mass., and $10,000 by the will of the late Mrs. Mary Ann P. Weld, of Boston, the latter sum being for the purpose of founding a Christopher Minot Weld Scholarship, which is to be awarded each year to some worthy student.

THE Teachers College of Columbia University has received an anonymous gift of $10,000.

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY has established sixtythree benefactors' scholarships and twenty-two faculty scholarships, in order to place the remission of tuition fees hitherto made on a more permanent basis.

THE appropriation of the State for the University of Georgia has this year been reduced by $14,000. The appropriation for the schools has also been greatly reduced.

WE have received the calendar of the Tokyo Imperial University for 1897-98, which is printed in English. There were 2,239 students in the University, distributed as follows: University, 177; the College of Law, 744; College of Medicine, 313; College of Engineering, 386; College of Literature, 279; College of Science, There are 105; College of Agriculture, 235.

90 professors and 41 assistant professors. The library now contains about 223,000 volumes. The Journal of the College of Science, established in 1887 and now in its tenth volume, has published many important contributions, which are written in English or in German.

AT Harvard University, Dr. R. W. Willson has been appointed assistant professor of astronomy, and Dr. C. R. Sanger, assistant professor of chemistry.

MR. L. B. WILSON has been appointed demonstrator in pathology and bacteriology in the University of Minnesota.

DR. WILHELM THIERMANN, of the Technical Institute at Hanover, has been made professor.