in the field, investigating the flora of the White Mountain region of New Mexico, which has already yielded him so many interesting novelties. Professor C. H. T. Townsend and Mr. C. M. Barber are collecting in the region of the Sierra Madre Mountains, in northern Mexico.

PROFESSOR W. A. SETCHELL, of the University of California, and other botanists of the University, are about to leave on an expedition to study the flora of the Aleutian Islands.

Two French explorers have returned to Paris, Dr. Maclaud, who had been in French Guinea, and M. Peroy, who has been for three years in Gen-Thé and Caï- Binh.

MR. CHARLES H. SENFF has given $5,000 to the zoological department of Columbia University for purposes of exploration and publication. Mr. Harrington and Mr. Sumner expect, with the assistance of this fund, to make a second expedition to the Nile in search of Polypterus, if the unsettled political conditions make this possible. The fund will also be used for the publication of a memoir on the anatomy of Polypterus, to be undertaken conjointly by Messrs. Dean, Harrington, McGregor, Strong, Herrick and Professor Wheeler, of the University of Chicago. Professor E. B. Wilson, after ascertaining last spring that the trip to Khartoum was impracticable, established a temporary laboratory at Mansourah, upon the lower Nile, the point visited by Messrs. Harrington and Hunt last summer. The fishermen assured him that Polypterus would return in quantity, and raised his hopes greatly; but, when after a long period, the fish began to appear it was ascertained that all the females had spawned, so that further efforts to obtain the eggs would be futile during the remainder of the season. Professor Wilson is now occupying the Columbia University table at Naples and is engaged in the revision for the third edition of his volume, 'The Cell,' which is to be translated into Italian and French.

THE Peabody Museum, of Harvard University, has received from the heirs of the late Moses D. Kimball a valuable collection of archæological and ethnological specimens.

AT a meeting of the British Astronomical Association on May 31st Mr. E. Walter Maun

der announced that the report of the eclipse expeditions of last year were now far advanced and were expected to be issued before the next meeting. With regard to the arrangements of the expeditions for next year, they had not yet entered into a contract with any steamship company, but they were carrying on negotiations in that direction. They expected to arrange without difficulty for a steamship to take a party out from England, leaving approximately a fortnight before the eclipse, and reaching England again about a week after it. It would probably call at some port in Portugaleither Oporto or Lisbon-then, perhaps, at Cadiz and Alicante, finally going to Algiers, where the steamer could be used as a hotel by those members of the party who went the full journey. They had received 109 names so far for the European and Algerian expedition, and additions to that number were expected.

THE University of the State of New York has just issued a museum bulletin by the State Entomologist, Dr. Felt, on Shade Tree Pests.. Those likely to prove most destructive this season are described and depicted in various stages, and directions for the most effective means of exterminating them are given. This bulletin, No. 27, will be sent to any address for five cents. State Paleontologist Dr. John M. Clarke has prepared a Guide to excursions in the fossiliferous rocks of New York (University Hand-book 15), which will be of special interest to teachers and students wishing to acquaint themselves more intimately with the classic rocks of this State. Itineraries of 32 trips are given, covering nearly the entire series of paleozoic rocks, with careful details as to typical localities, how to get to them without loss of time and comfort, what strata and fossils to look for and where to find them. It is hoped to send this hand-book to all the schools in the University before the end of the school year.

AMONG important American scientific books announced for early publication are the 'Races of Europe,' by Professor W. Z. Ripley (Appletons) based on the series of articles published in the Popular Science Monthly; and 'Statistical Methods with Special Reference to Biological Variation,' by Dr. C. B. Davenport (Wiley), de

scribing the statistical methods elaborated by Galton and Pearson and their application in the natural sciences.

ACCORDING to the Boston Transcript the University of Chicago has set aside $5,000 to defray the expenses of explorations which are about to be conducted under its auspices in Yucatan. A collection of hitherto-unknown ruins has been discovered lately some distance southeast of the city of Merida, on the north coast, and a representative of the institution paid a visit to the spot this winter. He found the remains of what seemed to be an enormous tribal dwelling, with buildings scattered around it over an area of nearly a mile. The main edifice was built massively of stone, and the façades were liter. ally covered with the most intricate and beautiful carving. The top is covered with earth and vegetation, and from a distance looks like a square wooded hill, so there is fairly good reason for supposing that the interior rooms are in a state of good preservation, at least that they have not been opened and ransacked by prowling Indians. There are many tombs also that have every appearance of being intact, and, if so, they may contain much matter to shed light on one of the most mysterious pages of the history of humanity. The exploring expedition will start some time within the next month, and New Orleans will be the point of departure.

A conversazione in connection with the meeting of the Institution of Civil Engineers, London, was given on August 9th, the guests being received by the President, Sir W. H. Preece. The London Times states that Sir W. Martin Conway showed a series of photographs taken during his recent expedition to the Andes, and Mr. Mansergh exhibited views in the Elan valley, illustrating the progress of the works, of which he is the engineer, for giving Birmingham a new supply of water from Wales. those who desired still lighter amusement a number of electrophones were fitted up in connection with the theatres. Of engineering models and scientific apparatus there was a very interesting display. Among the former, which were particularly numerous, were representations of the Powerful, Latona

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and Fearless, lent by Messrs. Vickers, Sons & Maxim; of the Turbinia and a torpedo-boat destroyer with a guaranteed speed of 35 knots, from the Hon. Charles A. Parsons; of the steel ice-breaking steamer Ermak, from Messrs. Armstrong, Whitworth & Co.; of the proposed new bridge at Kew, from Sir John Wolfe Barry; of the new highlevel bridge at Newcastle, from Mr. Charles Harrison; of the new P. and O. steamer Isis, from Sir Thomas Sutherland; and of dredgers of various descriptions, from Messrs. J. C. Coode and William Matthews. The Royal Ordinance Factories had an interesting exhibit showing the component parts of a 303 Lee-Enfield magazine rifle and the stages in the manufacture of a solid-drawn 6-inch cartridge case. The Cambridge Scientific Instrument Company showed some specimens of Professor Callendar's beautiful electrical recording instruments. One was arranged as a pyrometer recording the variations in the radiation from an ordinary incandescent lamp, and it was very curious to see the constant alterations in the readings with minute fluctuations in the current when the eye could perceive no change whatever in the lamp. The same firm also showed the seismograph, designed by Professor Ewing, and Mr. W. Duddell's oscillograph for tracing alternatecurrent wave forms. Another model in action that attracted considerable notice was Professor Dunkerley's machine to illustrate the whirling and vibration of shafts in rapid rotation. Among the railway exhibits may be mentioned examples of Mr. James Holden's liquid fuel burner for locomotives, as successfully used on the Great Eastern Railway; an interesting series of rail sections from Mr. W. Dean, illustrating the development of the permanent way on the Great Western; and a working model of a magnetic system of train signalling from Mr. W. S. Boult.

UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS. THE gift of Mr. B. N. Duke, of the American Tobacco Company, to Trinity College, which we announced last week, makes his gifts to the College during the year $183,000; $6,000 of which is to improve the scientific laboratories.

The gifts of Mr. B. N. Duke and his father, Mr. W. Duke, to Trinity College have aggregated over half a million dollars in the last six years.

THE sum of twenty-five thousand dollars has been offered by an anonymous friend to Vassar College for a biological laboratory on condition another $25,000 be collected for the purpose.

By the death of Mrs. Jeremiah Halsey the Norwich Free Academy will receive a bequest of nearly $100,000, and Trinity College, Hartford, $20,000, according to the provisions made by Mr. Halsey in his will.

THE REV. H. Latham, Master of Trinity Hall, Cambridge University, has given £2,000 for the proposed Sedgwick Memorial Museum.

MISS SUSAN DYCKMANN has given $300 for a scholarship in zoology in Columbia University for the year 1899.

THE class of 1899 of the University of Pennsylvania has given the University $5,000 toward a scholarship in memory of the late Professor E. Otis Kendall, for many years professor of mathematics.

THE Thirty-seventh University Convocation of the State of New York will be held at Al

bany, beginning June 26th. President Harper, of the University of Chicago, will make the annual address, his subject being Waste in Education.'

(

'Beta-Phenyl-Meta-Nitroglutaric Acid and Derivatives,' by Mariel C. Gere.

'Studies on the Genus Cittotania,' R. A. Lyman. 'A volumetric Method for the quantitative Estimation of Sulphuric Acid,' by Y. Nikaido.

'A Contribution to the Chemistry of Aromatic Glutaric Acids,' by H. C. Parmelee.

PROFESSOR BENJAMIN IDE WHEELER, who holds the chair of Greek and comparative philology in Cornell University, has been elected President of the University of California.

AT a recent meeting of the Board of Control of the Michigan College of Mines, Professor Fred W. McNair was unanimously elected President of the institution. Professor McNair has been for some years in charge of the department of mathematics and physics, and so closely identified with the work and growth of the College that its history, aims and methods are entirely familiar to him.

DR. F. STRONG, of Yale University, has been elected President of the University of Oregon.

MR. ULYSSES S. GRANT, of the Minnesota State Geological Survey, has been appointed professor of geology in the Northwestern University.

MR. FRANK R. LILLIE, instructor in zoology in the University of Michigan, has been appointed professor of biology at Vassar College. At the same College Miss Winnifred J. Robinson has been made instructor in biology and Miss Caroline E. Furness, Ph.D., assistant in the observatory.

AT Syracuse University, Mr. S. M. Taylor has been made associate professor of physics; Dr. Henry M. Smith, instructor in chemistry, and John G. Coulter, instructor in botany.

CARL A. BESSEY, A.B., and B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering, of the University of Nebraska, has been appointed assistant professor in the department of mechanic arts in the Agricultural and Mechanical College, Stillwater, Oklahoma.

FELLOWSHIPS at Bryn Mawr College have been given to Miss Elizabeth Towle in biology, and to Miss Anna L. Wilkinson in mathematics. The fellowship in physics has not yet been awarded.

limitations of time. But in the earlier part of the century geological attention was absorbed in the great phenomena that testify to the vastness of the earth's history. The time for the study of limitations had not come. Nevertheless, however inevitab le must have been the ultimate recognition of limitations, it remains to be frankly and gratefully acknowledged that the contributions of Lord Kelvin, based on physical data, have been most powerful influences in hastening and guiding the reaction against the extravagant time-postulates of some of the earlier geologists. With little doubt, these contributions have been the most potent agency of the last three decades in restraining reckless drafts on the bank of time. Geology owes immeasurable obligation to this eminent physicist for the deep interest he has taken in its problems and for the profound impulse which his masterly computations and his trenchant criticisms have given to broader and sounder modes of inquiry.

At the same time, it must be recognized that any one line of reasoning, however logically and rigorously followed, is quite sure to lead astray if it starts from limited and uncertain premises. It is an easy error to press the implications of any single phase of the complex phenomena of geology until they shall become scarcely less misleading than the looser speculations which they seek to replace. A physical deduction which postulates an excessively short geological history may as easily lead to false views as did the reckless license of earlier times. Interpretations of geological and biological phenomena made under the duress of physical deductions, unless the duress be certainly known to be imperative, may delay the final attainment of the real truth scarcely less effectually than interpretations made on independent grounds in complete negligence of the testimony of physics. It is in the last degree important

that physical deductions and speculations should be regarded as positive limitations only so far as they are strictly demonstrative. Falling short of demonstration, they are worthy to be regarded as moral limitations only so far as they approach moral certainty. In so far as they are drawn from doubtful assumptions, they are as obviously to be placed in the common category of speculations as are those tentative conceptions which are confessedly but the possible foreshadowings of truth. The fascinating impressiveness of rigorous mathematical analysis, with its atmosphere of precision and elegance, should not blind us to the defects of the premises that condition the whole process. There is, perhaps, no beguilement more insidious and dangerous than an elaborate and elegant mathematical process built upon unfortified premises.

Lord Kelvin's address is permeated with an air of retrospective triumph and a tone of prophetic assurance. The former is fairly warranted to the extent that his attack was directed against the ultra wing of the uniformitarian school of the earlier decades. It might be wholesome, however, to remember that there were other camps in Israel even then. There were ultraconservatives in chronology as well as ultra-radicals. There were ultra-catastrophists as well as ultra-uniformitarians. Lord Kelvin's contributions have as signally failed to sustain the former as they have signally succeeded in overthrowing the latter. The great body of serious geologists have moved forward neither by the right flank nor by the left, but on median lines. These lines have lain, I think, rather in the field of a qualified uniformitarianism than in the field of catastrophism. Even the doctrine of special acceleration in early times, or at other times, has made only qualified progress toward universal acceptance. The body of competent geologists to-day are probably more nearly dis