In a stout volume[G]of nearly a thousand pages Mr.Jackson, the leader of the Jackson-Harmsworth Polar Expedition of 1894-'97, puts into permanent form the record of three years' observations made in Franz-Josef Land, a region beyond the eightieth parallel of latitude, which was accidentally made known to the world twenty years before by the drift of the Tegethoff, the ill-fated vessel of the Austrian expedition of Payer and Weyprecht. As such it is a substantial contribution to arctic literature, and from it much important detail will be obtained by those seeking further adventure in the quest for the pole, and a mass of material, geographic and otherwise, pertaining to the region which forms the subject of the work before us. The meteorological data, covering as they do a longer continuous period of observation in the extreme North than has heretofore been possible, and fittingly supplementing those recorded by Nansen for an almost equal period, will be specially prized by the scientist, even if the facts of the air are not considered to be the main object of arcticresearch. It is interesting to note, from the observations on temperature, that the lowest record was only -46° F., the extreme rigor, consequently, being only that of Dakota or Manitoba, and marking nearly fifty degrees above what has been observed a thousand miles farther to the south at Verkhoyansk, in Siberia. Nothing approaching the extreme cold (-72°) noted by Kane and by the Nares British Expedition of 1875-'76 has thus been recorded by Nansen, Peary, or Jackson.
Mr. Jackson's claims to discovery lie mainly in the field of geography; for, while the observations on zoölogy, botany, and geology are by no means meager or lacking in originality, the results obtained have been largely anticipated by other investigators—notably Payer, Leigh Smith, and Nansen. In the domain of geography, however, there is a distinct contribution, and the author has missed no opportunity to add to the catalogue of geographical names by "rounding up," as it were, the numerous points which appeared new to him or were thought worthy of designation. This diligence in applying names, at times to points or places which are wholly insignificant and which could be followed with equal advantage or disadvantage on most of the known coast lines of either Europe or North America, can hardly be said to detract from the value of the discoveries actually made, although their publication, from advance letters received by Mr. Harmsworth's representative in London, has caused hostile comment and bitter controversy, even on the part of British geographers and scientists. Much of Mr. Jackson's work, it was contended, was directed to demolishing the work of Lieutenant Payer in the same region, and toward substituting names for those given, whether with a correct placing or not, by the Austrian commander—in itself a legitimate undertaking, but heralded out, it was claimed, to mask Mr. Jackson's own failure to accomplish the real task of his expedition—the finding of the north pole. Mr. Jackson has certainly very largely remodeled Payer's map of the archipelago, but the new map in no way discredits the attainments of his predecessor, even though showing up many and even glaring inaccuracies in the cartographical details published by him, for allowance must be made for the limitations under which the Austrian commander made his work. The vital points which have to be eliminated from the geography of Payer are: That Franz-Josef Land is a congeries of no very large islands, without continental extent northward, and that much that has been represented to be land is, in fact, water or ice, the appearance of land in the frozen North being frequently suggested by the vast gray and ill-defined ice masses which loom up in fog and mist, both as flat sheets and mountain buttresses.
It was the failure to find a northward continental extension to Franz-Josef Land, such as had been thought to possibly exist by Payer, which led Jackson to abandon all effort to advance upon the pole—a condition which appears, at this time, the more surprising seeing that two expeditions, those of Walter Wellmann and the Duke of Abruzzi, with all of Mr. Jackson's facts before them, have elected this same route as the one most calculated to bring about a successful issue, and certainly much can be said in favor of it. While the Franz-Josef Land route may not commend itself as the one best to be followed—and surely the open highway which from time to time appears north of Spitzbergen offers marked advantages for one without a land following—it still has its advantages in the point of high northern departure, and arctic authorities will fail to be impressed by the negative conditions which were obtained from it by the Harmsworth Expedition. Manifestly, Mr. Jackson had prepared himself for oneform of journey only—that of following the land, a singularly blind limitation, considered in the light of the little that was positively known of such land extension as the expedition had counted upon, and one that is disagreeably emphasized by the lavish expenditure of money that had been put to the expedition, and the personal confidence that had in some quarters been expressed in its success. Without wishing in any way to disparage or minimize the importance of Mr. Jackson's work, or to underestimate the hardships of any form of arctic exploration, one can not but feel surprised and in a measure disappointed that an expedition designed primarily for an advance upon the pole, which passed the better part of three years beyond the eightieth parallel of latitude, and whose members during this time did not know a single day of sickness—an almost unprecedented performance in arctic methods—should have found itself in a condition unable even to make an effort upon the "open." The recollection of Parry's performance in the frozen sea north of Spitzbergen in 1827, of Markham's advance in 1876, and of Peary's "treck" across the north of Greenland in 1892, emphasizes only more deeply this feeling of disappointment.
Mr. Jackson has made a very careful study of Franz-Josef Land, and has brought that region into a condition of knowledge similar to that which the different Peary expeditions have brought to the north of Greenland. His narrative is simple and direct, virtually a transcript of notebook and diary, without embellishment of any kind, and with a statement of facts and conditions such as they appeared almost at the instant of time of their occurrence. While indisputably impressing a truthfulness and reality, it can not be said that this method adds to the readableness of the book, which is overburdened with repetitions, frequently in identical words and sentences, to a useless and, one is tempted to say, most distressing extent. It is to be regretted that an explorer of the marked energy, routine, and persistence which are Mr. Jackson's qualities should have faltered in what by some travelers has been considered the most arduous part of their task—the proper preparation of a report—for surely it can not be conceived that a good purpose was subserved, either in a popular or scientific aspect, in the publication of wholly unimportant matter, over and over repeated, merely because it formed part of an official diary. The work is abundantly illustrated throughout with half-tone reproductions from photographs, taken by Jackson and his companions, that give a vivid reality to the journey which no amount of word-painting, even when so skillfully handled as by the present author, could prove a substitute for. Scientists will be gratified to know that supplemental reports, prepared by specialists in different departments, may be expected before long to fill out the full scientific aspects of the exploration.
On one point in connection with Mr. Jackson's discoveries the geographer, not less than the lay public, has the right to break straws with the author—that is, the method of naming the new points of land, water, and ice. Zoölogists and botanists have long been guilty of an absurd levity in the discharge of their obligations as namers of new species, and have burdened the vocabulary of animal and vegetable names with thousands ofpersonaliawhich in no way called for perpetuation, and many of which were suggested only by way of ridicule or jest. So long, however, as these were dressed in Latin or Greek form and remained merely the possession of the scientific world there was little to complain of, and even the objections of the extreme sentimentalists might have been met by anappeal to the difficulty of obtaining or coining judicious or otherwise appropriate names. The case is different with the naming of places on the earth's surface, which at this day can be done with direct reference to euphony, to a certain appropriateness of dedication or appeal, and the intelligence of the student. A map of the world is intended for everybody, and not for a class of specialists, and its symbols are devised for readers of all classes. Maps of America have particularly suffered from irrelevant and commonplace designations, and only during recent years has the money value of names suggested radical changes, as in the case of many of the seaside resorts of the middle Atlantic coast. But, with all our indifferences and extravagances of even a half century ago—the period of Hog Hollows and Yuba Dams—a no cruder infraction of the logic of nomenclature can be found than in the coining of such names as "Cape Mary Harmsworth," "Cape Cecil Harmsworth," "Alfred Harmsworth Island," "Harold Harmsworth Straits," "Cape William Bruce," "Bruce Island," "Mabel [Bruce] Islands," "Mabel Bruce Fjord," "Albert Armitage Island," "Cape Alice Armitage," "Ceceil Rhodes Straits," "H. M. S. Worcester Glacier," etc. These have not even the advantage of an old-time arctic "ring" about them. Courting popularity by the bestowal of all manner of personal names, irrespective of direct relation to the expedition or to geographical exploration, is hardly commendable, and is only less objectionable than the plan suggested a few years ago by an American would-be arctic explorer to "sell" the names of places to be discovered to the highest bidder—i. e., according to a graded schedule of contributions to the expedition funds.
On the South African Frontier[H]is a narrative of the experiences and observations of the author, Mr.William Harvey Brown, partly as naturalist of the United States Government Eclipse-observing Expedition of 1889 to the west coast of Africa, and partly as a resident in various occupations for seven years in Rhodesia. The principal object in composing it was to give American readers a clearer idea of English operations in conquest and colonization on the South African frontier than it is possible to glean from current fragmentary accounts. The author served his apprenticeship at natural history collecting under Prof. L. L. Dyche, of the University of Kansas, and Mr. W. T. Hornady, of the New York Zoölogical Gardens, and was recommended by Mr. Hornady to the Government for the Eclipse Expedition. He sailed first to Freetown, then to St. Paul de Loanda, where he spent a few weeks collecting, establishing his headquarters at Bishop Taylor's American Methodist Self-supporting Mission. Thence, after a short attack of African fever, he proceeded to Cape Town, where he was attacked by the other sort of African fever—"an irresistible longing to penetrate the Dark Continent for purposes of exploration and of observing both man and Nature." He made the journey overland to Mafeting and to the Mashona country, in the region of which he spent seven years as "game-hunter, gold-seeker, landowner, citizen, and soldier," observing and participating in the settlement and early development of the new state of Rhodesia. The larger part of the book is devoted to his adventures and observations, "travel, collecting, hunting, prospecting, farming, scouting, fighting," and seeing pioneer life. Two chapters are devoted to ethnology. The race problems which arise during the stage of transition from barbarism, the agricultural and mineral resources of Rhodesia, and its prospects and possibilities, are discussed.
A very handsome book, in what to many are the most graceful and interesting forms of vegetable life, is Mrs.Parsons'sHow to Know the Ferns.[I]The name of the author is new, but the author herself is a familiar friend to all lovers of American field and wild-wood life, for she is none other than Mrs. William Starr Dana, who had already given us How to Know the Wild Flowers and According to Season. In this book she does as she did with regard to the wild flowers—takes her readers to the haunts of the ferns and into their company, introduces us to them, and before she is done makes us well acquainted with them. "It seems strange," she says, "that the abundance of ferns everywhere has not aroused more curiosity as to their names, haunts, and habits." Possibly it is because they are so common that we are not at pains to seek greater intimacy with them. Then, they depend on the beauty of graceful proportion, which is less obvious to careless eyes than that of color. First, Mrs. Parsons discourses of Ferns as a Hobby, and the pleasure we may derive from them; then she tells when and where to find them, defines the terms used in speaking of them, explains their fertilization, development, and fructification, gives a list of notable fern families and descriptions of the American ferns classified into eight groups according to the arrangement of their spores, and completes the work with indexes of Latin and of English names and of technical terms.
The Microscopy of Drinking Water[J]is intended by Mr.Whippleprimarily to serve as a guide to the water analyst and the water-works engineer by describing the methods of microscopic examination, assisting in the identification of the common microscopic organisms found in drinking water, and interpreting the results in the light of environmental studies. A second purpose is to stimulate a greater interest in the study of microscopic aquatic life and general limnology (the lessons of lakes and ponds) from the practical and economic point of view. The work is elementary in character. Principles are stated and illustrated, but the last ten years' accumulations of data are not otherwise attacked. The illustrations have been largely drawn from Massachusetts cases, from which there may be differences elsewhere, but not very great as to microscopic organisms. The latter half of the book is devoted to descriptions of a limited number of organisms, chosen for the most part from those commonest to the water supplies of New England, and those that have best illustrated the more important groups of microscopic animals and plants. Most of the illustrations have been drawn from living specimens or photomicrographs of such, but some are reproduced from other sources.
It is evidence of appreciation of Dr.Wetterstrand's Hypnotism and its Application to Medicine[K]that, written in Swedish, it has been translated into German and Russian, and now into English. The German work, from which the present translation is made, was enlarged from the original, and embodied the results of additional experience. The author disavows the intention of writing a manual or text-book, and modestly assumes only to have given "unpretentious notes by a physician who, under the pressure of a fatiguing and engrossing practice, has not been able to develop his rich material into a more complete form." The book is characterized by the translator as more practical than theoretical, and as offering the results of conscientious and able observation. Hypnosis is defined by Dr. Wetterstrand as embracing a number of various conditions of the nervous system, which can be produced in different ways. "We recognize phases of the greatest variety, from a slight heaviness in the limbs, the most superficial somnolence enabling the hypnotized subject to hear and perceive the least noise, to the deepest sleep, from which the greatest disturbance can not awake him, and wherein every sensation disappears and permits the most serious surgical operation without pain." The author believes that the majority of people can be brought into any of theseconditions, but the methods and degrees of difficulty of the process are various. "Liébeault distinguishes five degrees in hypnotic sleep, Bernheim nine; but Wetterstrand thinks they may all be grouped under three. Suggestive therapeutics is regarded as by no means a panacea, but it succeeds in cases where other methods have failed," and, as Bernheim says, "often it produces miracles." After an outline of the general principles of the subject the author passes on to describe some diseases and morbid conditions in which he has employed hypnotism with the greatest results, culling from his notes, as impartially as possible, both successful attempts and failures. The cases include insomnia, the list of nervous diseases, drug diseases, consumption, rheumatic, heart, and other organic diseases, and functional affections; with the use of suggestive therapeutics in operations, obstetrics, and on some other occasions. Dr. Petersen's medical letters on hypno-suggestion, etc., added to Dr. Wetterstrand's work, are intended to give a succinct idea of the present status of practical psychic therapeutics, as based on the observation of clinical facts. They relate to suggestive treatment in reform work, post-hypnotic responsibility, and music in hospitals.
The original object of Mr.Henry Rutgers Marshall'sessay onInstinct and Reason[L]was to present a conception of religion. In attempting to make his argument convincing he found it necessary to deal with questions which did not at first appear to relate to this subject, whereby the study of religion, though still the most important and interesting matter considered, is made to appear subsidiary to the treatment of instinct and reason. Believing that activities so universal in man as those which express his religious life must be significant in relation to his biological development, the author has attempted to outline a theory that will account for their existence and explain their biological import. In order to present this clearly he has made a special study of instinct and the relation of its activities with religious activities in general. This has naturally led to the study of impulse, and thus to a consideration of moral standards. The study of reason, too, has been found appropriate in connection with the consideration of the nature of religion. The genesis of religious customs and beliefs is touched upon only so far as seems necessary for the elucidation of other parts of the treatise. Concerning the relation of religion and morals, the author finds that religion teaches us to listen to the past, and gives enthusiasm to do the work commended by the "voice" of that past; it gives us the basis for the perfection of our moral code, but it does not give us this perfect moral code itself. When reason and the religious instinct are opposed we should, after reverent and full consideration, act in accord with reason, but should be cautious in guiding others that way, for the chances are decidedly that we are wrong, and "the rule of action which will best satisfy conscience, which will produce the closest correspondence between our action as viewed in retrospect and our most permanently efficient impulse series, is one which is based upon the religious instinct, and which involves the presence in mind of the sense of duty."
Mr.Arthur Berryhas undertaken, in hisShort History of Astronomy,[M]to give an outline of the history of the science from the earliest times in a form intelligible to readers who have no special knowledge of astronomy or mathematics. Some compression having been necessary, it has been found possible to omit a considerable number of details which might receive treatment, and indeed would often require it in a treatise on the science. The author has deliberately abstained from giving any connected account of the astronomy of the Egyptians, Chaldeans, Chinese, and other peoples who are usually supposed to have had a share in the early development of star-lore. Accounts of scientific instruments, except in a few simple and important cases, are omitted. But little is said of scientific discoveries that have to be described in technical mathematical language, and of speculative theories that have not been established orrefuted. On the other hand, whatever pertains to the real history of astronomy has been given with sufficient fullness to make it plain; the principles which are illustrated by enormous masses of observations that there is no room to record; short biographical sketches of leading astronomers other than living ones; a considerable number of dates, such as those of the births and deaths of astronomers; and even descriptions of such obsolete theories as appear to form an integral part of astronomical progress. Among the illustrations are portraits of a few of the eminent astronomers of the past.
The special articles in theBulletin of the Department of Labor, Nos. 18 and 19, are Wages in the United States and Europe, 1870 to 1898, in the September number, and Mr. Dunham's paper on The Alaskan Gold Fields and the Opportunities they offer for Capital and Labor, and Mutual Relief and Benefit Associations in the Printing Trade, by W. S. Wandly, in the number for November.
The Rev. Dr.Adam Milleris a retired minister who has devoted his leisure hours to the study of sunshine, in which he has included all that properly belongs to the sun. He has read the standard works on astronomy, and some, but apparently not all, the later results for comparison, it seems, rather than information, and he has performed some original and ingenious experiments with the sunlight. His views, therefore, as expressed inThe Sun an Electric Light(Chicago), are his own. He has come to the conclusion that the material theories of the origin of the sun's light and heat do not account for the facts, and are therefore insufficient if not wrong; postulates a theory that the phenomena are matters of electric action made perceptible to us by refraction through the atmosphere, and makes an unnecessary and inconsequent attack on the theory of the conservation of forces. When Dr. Miller assumes that his views of the insufficiency of present theories and of the electrical nature of the sun's action are new, he shows that he is not fully read up in the current literature on the subject. The insufficiency of present views is confessed, and the discussions of the subject with the various suppositions which he criticises are efforts to find better explanations. The causal identity of electricity, heat, and certain other forces is accepted. But, given that electrical action is the basis of it all, what then? Philosophers know of no way of maintaining electric action except through material processes, and the way they are replenished to keep it up is as hard to find out as would be the way fuel is supplied to keep up a solar fire.
A pamphlet entitledThe Story of the Rise of the Oral Method in America(of Instructing the Deaf and Dumb)as told in the Writings of the late Hon. Gardner G. Hubbard, compiled by Mrs.M. Gardner Bell, reveals a seeming indolence in the early instructors of the old method that is hardly creditable to their energy in investigation. When deaf-mute instruction was first projected here, a teacher was sent over to Europe to learn the best methods. Denied access to schools in London and Edinburgh, where articulation systems were taught, he went to Paris, found the Abbé de l'Epée's sign language there and brought it over. This and the finger language held sway in our schools for many years, while the possibility of teaching articulation to the deaf was denied. It required long-persistent effort on the part of a few men who refused to have their deaf children taught these systems and consequently isolated from their fellow-men to secure a recognized place for oral schools. The story of the struggle is told in Mrs. Bell's pamphlet.
The widespread ignorance and superstition with which even to-day the practicing physician has to contend are hardly conceivable by an outsider. The conditions under which a doctor knows his patients are just those calculated to bring out the weak spots in their mental organization, and the absurd notions which still have a foothold in many minds are a constant source of wonder to the speculative doctor. These superstitions are so widespread and so frequently dangerous to the whole community, as well as the individual himself, that anything which is calculated to improve matters, however so little, should be welcomed with open arms.Dr. Therne, byH. Rider Haggard, is aimed at the antivaccinators, and by means of a not uninteresting story points out the serious consequences which a general beliefin this absurd crusade brought to an English city. The author labels his story as an attempt to forecast the "almost certain issue of the recent surrender of the English Government leaders to the clamor of the antivaccinationists."
The annual number of theCumulative Indexfor 1898, constituting the third annual volume, is a book of seven hundred and ninety-two pages, and includes one hundred periodicals. It indexes—by authors, titles, and subjects, including reviews and portraits—what is important in the monthly and part of that in the weekly publications of the year. Special attention is given to portraits, reviews, and necrology. The Index is a very useful publication to writers and students of every sort, recording the articles as they appear month by month in a form that makes the knowledge of them easily accessible to one who seeks it. The numbers succeeding the first number of the volume include, besides their own fresh matter, that which has appeared in two or three previous numbers, saving the necessity of hunting up scattered editions. The annual volume contains all for the year. The Index is edited in the Public Library of Cleveland, Ohio, and is published by the Holman-Taylor Company in the same city.
Two papers bearing upon instruction of the deaf, published by the Volta Bureau, Washington, are statistics, by Alexander G. Bell, of the relative use in the United States of the several methods, and a collection ofInternational Reports of Schools for the Deaf. The latter paper contains reports from sixteen countries.
Armour Institute of Technology. Year-Book, 1898-'99. Pp. 89.
Association of American Anatomists. Report of the Majority of the Committee on Anatomical Nomenclature. Pp. 10.
Baillairge, Charles. Biographie. By E. La Selve. With Addenda by Léon Sortie. Pp. 15, and papers.—In French: On Communism. Pp. 45; Report on Engineering Works In Quebec. Pp. 90; Etymological Utility of Greek and Latin. Pp. 48; The Club of Twenty-one in 1879, Biography for Twenty Years. Pp. 12; Life, Evolution, and Materialism. Pp. 37; Antiquity of the Earth and Man. Pp. 23; Bibliography. Pp. xv.—In English: Technical Education of the People In Untechnical Language. Pp. 42; Educational Word Lessons. Pp. 19; How best to Learn or Teach a Language. Pp. 9; Address. P. 1.
Baker, Major-General, Royal (Bombay) Engineers. Visions of Antichrist and his Times. St.-Leonards-on-Sea, England. Pp. 28.
Binet, Alfred, Beaunis, H., and Ribot, Th. L'Année Psychologique. (The Psychological Year.) Fifth year. Paris, France. Libraire C. Reinwald. Schleicher Frères. Pp. 902. 15 francs.
Bulletins, Reports, Transactions, etc. American Microscopical Society: Twenty-first Annual Meeting, Syracuse, N. Y., August 31 and September 1, 1899. Transactions. Pp. 370.—Astronomical Observatory of Harvard University: Vol. XXIII, Part II. Discussion of Observations made with the Meridian Photometer during the Years 1882-'88. By E. C. Pickering and O. C. Wendell. Pp. 100.—Johns Hopkins University: Circulars. July, 1899. Pp. 10. 10 cents.—Michigan Monthly Bulletin of Vital Statistics. April, 1899. Pp. 20.—Michigan Ornithological Club: Bulletin. April, 1899. Pp. 12.—Minnesota: Fourth Annual Report of the Chief Fire Warden. Pp. 148.—New York State Commission in Lunacy: Rules and Suggestions as to Plumbing Work, Drainage, etc. Pp. 93.—United States Department of Labor. July, 1899. Pp. 124.—United States Coast and Geodetic Survey: Notice to Mariners. No. 246. Pp. 14.—University of Tennessee: Record. Announcements for 1899, 1900. Pp. 96.
Clayton, The, Air Compressors. Clayton Air-Compressor Works. New York. Pp. 70.
Coulter, John M. Plant Relations. A First Book of Botany. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 264. $1.10.
Crook, James K. The Mineral Waters of the United States and their Therapeutic Uses. New York and Philadelphia: Lea Brothers & Co. Pp. 588. $3.50.
Dalton, Captain Davis. How to Swim. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 133. $1.
Gerhard, W. P. Sanitary Engineering of Buildings. Vol. I. New York: W. P. Comstock. Pp. 454. $5.—A Half Century of Sanitation, 1850-'99. Pp. 30.
Gildemeister, E., and Hoffmann, Fr. Die Aetherischen Oele. (The Etherial Oils.) Prepared in behalf of the firm of Schimmel & Co. Leipzig and Berlin: Julius Springer. Pp. 919.
Gould, the late Benjamin Apthorp. Cordoba Photographs. Photographic Observations of Star Clusters. Lynn, Mass.: the Nichols Press. Pp. 533, with 37 plates. Text in Spanish and English.
Iowa Geological Survey. Annual Report. 1898, with accompanying Papers. Samuel Calvin, State Geologist; H. F. Bain, Assistant State Geologist. Pp. 572, with maps.
Kellerman, W. A. The Fourth State Catalogue of Ohio Plants. Systematic Check-list of the Pteridophytes and Spermatophytes. Columbus, Ohio. Pp. 65. 20 cents.
Leonard, John W. Who's Who in America. A Biographical Dictionary of Living Men and Women in the United States, 1899, 1900. Chicago: A. N. Marquis & Co. Pp. 822.
Long Island Hospital. Polhemus Memorial Clinic and Hoagland Laboratory. Forty-first Annual Announcement, 1899.
Meunier, Stanislas. La Géologie Expérimentale. (Experimental Geology.) Paris: Félix Alcan. Pp. 311.
Reprints. Adler, Cyrus. The International Catalogue of Scientific Literature. Second Conference. Pp. 43.—Chamberlin, T. C. A Systematic Source of Evolution of Provincial Faunas, and the Influence of Great Epochs of Limestone Formation upon the Constitution of the Atmosphere. Pp. 24; The Ulterior Basis of Time Divisions and the Classifications of Geologic History. Pp. 161; Lord Kelvin's Address on the Age of the Earth as an Abode fitted for Life. Pp. 20.—Croke, W. J. Architecture, Painting, and Printing at Subiaco. Pp. 21.—Daly, Reginald A. Three Days in the Caucasus. Pp. 15.—Harkness, H. W. Californian Hypogæous Fungi. Pp. 56, with plates.—Hobbs, W. H. The Diamond Fields of the Great Lakes. Pp. 16.—Lucas, Frederick A. The Fossil Bison of North America. Pp. 12, with plates.—Manson, Marsden. Observations on the Denudation of Vegetation. Pp. 18, with plates.—Mason, Otis T. The Latimer Collection of Antiquities from Puerto Rico, and the Guerde Collection of Antiquities from Pointe à Pitre, Guadeloupe. Pp. 837.—Pammel, Louis H. Anatomical Characters of Seeds of Leguminosæ. Pp. 262, with tables and plates.—Ravenel, Mazyck P. The Resistance of Bacteria to Cold. Pp. 5.—Veeder, M. A. Questions in regard to the Diphtheria Bacillus. Pp. 6.—West, Max. The Public Domain of the United States. Pp. 32.—Wilder, Burt C. Some Misapprehensions as to the Simplified Nomenclature of Anatomy. Pp. 24.
Ripley, William Z. The Races of Europe. Accompanied by a Supplementary Bibliography of the Anthropology and Ethnology of Europe. Published by the Public Library of the City of Boston. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 624, with plates and Supplement, Pp. 160. $6.
Stearns, Frederick, and Pilsby, Henry A. Catalogue of the Marine Mollusks of Japan. Detroit: Frederick Stearns. Pp. 196, with plates.
Tilden, William A. A Short History of the Progress of Scientific Chemistry within our own Times. New York: Longmans, Green & Co. Pp. 276.
United States Department of Agriculture: Bulletin No. 19. The Structure of the Caryopsis of Grasses with Reference to their Morphology and Classification. By P. B. Kennedy. Pp. 44, with plates.—No. 26. Lightning and the Electricity of the Air. By A. G. McAdie and A. J. Henry. Pp. 74, with plates.—No. 56. History and Present Status of Instruction in Cooking in the Public Schools of New York City. By Mrs. L. E. Hogan. Pp. 70.
Vincenti, Giuseppi. La Fonografia Universale Michela, o La Fono-Telegrafia Universale Vincenti. (The Michela Universal Phonography, or the Vincenti Universal Phono-Telegraphy.) In Italian, French, and English. Pp. 40, with plates.—Short Course in Michela's Universal Hand-Phonographic System. (In Italian.) Pp. 24; New and Partial Applications of Michela's Phonographic Table for the Use of the Universal Alphabet. Pp. 6. (All published at Ivrea, Italy.)
Warder, George W. The New Cosmogony. New York: J. S. Ogilvie Publishing Company. Pp. 293.
Warman, Cy. Snow on the Headlight. A Story of the Great Burlington Strike. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 249. $1.25.
Weber, Adna F. The Growth of Cities in the Nineteenth Century. A Study in Statistics. (Columbia University Studies.) New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 495. $3.50.
Yale University, Observatory of. Report for 1898-'99. Pp. 21.
Death of Dr. Brinton.—By the death of Dr. Daniel G. Brinton, at Atlantic City, N. J., July 31st, America loses one of the most industrious and intelligent students of its ethnology, languages, and antiquities. We think we may safely say of him that he did as much as any other single man among us to organize and systematize these studies and put them on a stable foundation and a broad basis. To them he devoted his time, his heart, and his fortune. Dr. Brinton was born in West Chester, Pa., in 1837; was a graduate of Yale College and of Jefferson Medical College; served in medical departments in the United States Volunteer Army during the civil war; was for several years editor of the Medical and Surgical Reporter and of the Quarterly Compendium of Medical Science; and was finally drawn predominantly to the study of American ethnology and languages, to which he contributed a long list of books, special articles, and paragraphs, a large proportion of them fruits of his own investigations. For his work in this department he received, in 1866, the medal of the Société Américaine de France. He was Professor of Ethnology and Archæology in the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, and of American Linguistics and Archæology in the University of Pennsylvania, and was President of the Antiquarian and Numismatic Society of Philadelphia. He was President of the American Association for the Advancementof Science in 1894. He established a library and publishing house of aboriginal American literature, and one of his most noteworthy works was the publication in this library of a series of original texts in the languages of North and South American tribes, with commentaries and translations, in the preparation of which he called in other Americanists to assist him. In this way he contributed much to save a literature and a history that were fast disappearing. A few months ago, as was mentioned in the Monthly at the time, he presented his entire collection of books, pamphlets, and manuscripts, many original and some unique, relating to the aboriginal languages of North and South America, to the University of Pennsylvania.
Nebraska as a Home for Birds.—Mr. Lawrence Bruner introduces his Notes on Nebraska Birds with the expression of a belief, founded on his own observations for twenty-five years, together with those of about fifty other persons to whose notes he has had access, that Nebraska, although a prairie State, has an unusually large bird fauna. The notes show 415 species and subspecies as visiting the State, while there are records of 227 species breeding within its borders, and of more than 700 winter residents. "When we learn that only about 780 species are recorded for the whole of North America north of the Mexican boundary, it certainly seems astonishing that from among them we should receive so large a percentage. If, however, we take into consideration the variations in altitude above sea level, the differences in surface configuration, climate, etc., that pertain to our State, its location, and the relation which it bears to the country at large, perhaps the wonderment will become less." The southeastern corner of Nebraska is only eight hundred feet, the western border almost six thousand feet, above tide water. The State is divided into timber, prairie, and plain regions. It lies in the middle of the United States, with a high mountain chain to the west and a giant water way along its eastern boundary. In fact, eastern, western, northern, and southern fauna meet in Nebraska, and it also has a fauna of its own. Forms are found there that belong to low and high altitudes, to wet and dry climates, to prairie and timbered countries, and to semi-desert and alkali regions.
The Power of the Imagination.—The following interesting experiment is described in the Psychological Review for July by E. E. Slosson, of the University of Wyoming: "I had prepared a bottle, filled with distilled water, carefully wrapped in cotton and packed in a box. After some other experiments in the course of a popular lecture I stated that I wished to see how rapidly an odor would be diffused through the air, and requested that as soon as any one perceived the odor he should raise his hand. I then unpacked the bottle in the front of the hall, poured the water over the cotton, holding my head away during the operation, and started a stop-watch while awaiting results. I explained that I was quite sure no one in the audience had ever smelled the chemical compound which I had poured out, and expressed the hope that while they might find the odor strong and peculiar it would not be disagreeable to any one. In fifteen seconds most of those in the front row had raised their hands, and in forty seconds the 'odor' had spread to the back of the hall, keeping a pretty regular 'wave front' as it passed on. About three quarters of the audience claimed to perceive the smell, the obstinate minority including more men than the average of the whole. More would probably have succumbed to the suggestion, but at the end of a minute I was obliged to stop the experiment, for some on the front seats were being unpleasantly affected, and were about to leave the room."
Government Scientific Work.—Mr. Charles W. Dabney, Jr., of Knoxville, Tenn., while having a very high opinion of the scientific work of the Government, finds it greatly scattered and confused, and often multiplied, among the departments. There are three distinct and separate agencies for measuring the land of the country, four hydrographic offices in as many departments, and five separate and distinct Government chemical laboratories. The Coast Survey, the Naval Observatory, and the Weather Bureau are all engaged in studying the magnetism of the earth. Three distinct branchesof the Interior Department are engaged in irrigation work, and the census has published a report on the subject, while the report of a board appointed to examine into the matter shows that eight bureaus of the Interior and Agriculture Departments must co-operate in order to accomplish any thorough work on the great problem of irrigation. The statistics of the natural resources and the products of the country, of exports and imports, of populations, schools, etc., are collected and compiled by eight or ten different agencies in five or six different departments. Mr. Dabney's remedy for this condition is the consolidation of all the scientific work under a single department, to constitute a National Department of Science. This seems hardly necessary. The scientific work of the departments has grown under the pressure of their necessities, relating chiefly to the examination of an unsettled and unexplored country. So long and so far as such work is essential to the legitimate work of the department it will have to be done within it. All work beyond this can be left to the Smithsonian Institution, the universities and scientific academies, and individual effort. The Government of the United States is not a scientific body.
American Indians and Mongolians.—In answer to Major Powell's theory, recently expressed anew, that while there may be a unity of species in the ancient physical man, the civilization, arts, industries, institutions, languages, and opinions of the American tribes were autochthonous, and owed nothing to Old-World influences; Mr. James Wickersham, of Tacoma, Washington, maintains that our Indians are connected in blood with the Mongolian stock of East Asia and none other, and that their arts, etc., were derived thence in comparatively recent times. In the comparison he makes, for argument, between the two races he finds a considerable number of features that were common and peculiar to both. Of both, the Chino-Japanese and the Americans, he says: "The most civilized tribes spoke a monosyllabic language, others spoke an agglutinative tongue; their writing was ideographic and written from right to left, from top to bottom; their systems of numeration were based upon the digital count, and their old numerals up to nineteen were practically identical; their calendar systems were alike in principle, and nearly so in details; both divided time into cycles and quarters thereof; the solar year in both regions began at the winter solstice, and the solstices were celebrated in both lands on the same day by the same national festivals; both prepared almanacs on paper of national manufacture; the good or evil power of every day was fixed by the priest-astronomer, and each almanac also contained medical receipts and astrological formulæ and a table of religious festivals; the same elements, colors, viscera, birds, seasons, and planets were assigned in the same general scheme to the cardinal points." Like similarities are traced in constitutions, laws, ecclesiastical institutions, monastic orders, and physical aspects.
The Teaching of Bows and Arrows.—What the study of so simple a subject as bows and arrows may reveal is illustrated by Mr. Herman Meyer's paper in the Smithsonian Report for 1896 on Bows and Arrows in Central Brazil; an introduction giving a general outline of a contemplated larger work which intended to set forth for the circumscribed region of the Matto-Grosso, how, through the harmonizing of different tribal groups, ethnographic types arise; what share the several associated tribes have had in this creation of groups; and, on the other hand, what ethnographic development within the group each tribe has undergone. While the South American Indian tribes have different special methods of capturing wild animals, they all have as the chief weapon the bow and arrow, which even the gun can not supplant. The tribes that are now sedentary, which practice hunting along with agriculture only for amusement, exercise still the greatest care upon the preparation of this weapon, and know how to use it with skill. In their sagas the bow and arrow still play an important part. They are regarded almost as sacred, and are frequently used as cult objects. When bows and arrows are exchanged for other weapons the children keep up the old reminiscences, and hold on to the bow and arrow as playthings. The South American Indian is accustomed to recognize the tribe by its arrow. Agrouping by these weapons, a separation of forms according to specific marks of structure, is possible for the study of the tribes. The feathering, which seems to be capable of unlimited variation, is of great importance. A great deal of care may be bestowed on the fastening of the feather, on the wrapping of the shaft with thread, or upon the manner of fitting the feather. The wrapping of the feathered end or shaftment offers excellent opportunity to preserve certain textile patterns, perhaps the one remaining survival of the old tribal peculiarity. The fastening of the point to the shaft or to the foreshaft also affords a safe datum for discriminating, and the shape of the point furnishes a guide for differentiations.
An Aztec Pictorial Record.—The forty-four paintings of theMapa de Cuauhtlantzincowere executed in oil colors on European paper by an artist named Tepozetecatl, and are of high importance in the history of the conquest of Mexico. The Pueblo of San Juan de Cuauhtlantzinco, to which they belong, is situated between the cities of Pueblo and Cholula, and is inhabited by about fifteen hundred people, who still speak the Aztec language. The pictures, each about sixteen by twelve inches in size, were discovered about thirty years ago by Padre D. José Vicente Campos, who, to save them from decay, had them pasted on cotton sheeting and mounted in two frames. They contain scenes from the conquest—not badly executed—and portraits of aborigines. Each bears a text in Nahuatl, which Padre Campos translated into Spanish and appended the translation to the original. Another series of ancient paintings somewhat like these was preserved for a long time at Tlaxcala, but, according to Prof. Frederick Starr, they were less personal and less local. They are called theLienzo de Tlaxcala, and picture all the important events of conquest from the time when Cortes came into contact with the Tlascalans till the city of Mexico was captured. The Mapa de Cuauhtlantzinco deals with but little space; perhaps Texculco and Chalco and Quimistlan describe its limits. The pictures and the texts in Spanish and English have been copied by Professor Starr, who publishes them for their ethnological interest, in that they illustrate a practice, common at the time of the conquest, of painting representations of important matters; that they in many cases present successful portraits; that they are, in conception and execution, truly native works of art; that they give considerable information relative to daily life and customs; and that they are psychically interesting in showing the feelings of the natives shortly after the conquest toward their conquerors and toward the newly introduced religion. The town of Cuauhtlantzinco appears to have been settled between 1519 and 1528 by refugees from Cholula, who were driven away because they had gone to Tlaxcala to visit Cortes and invite him to come to their pueblo.
Permanence of the Fish Supply.—A Scottish fish commission has been for fifteen years conducting an experimental research on the capacity of the sea to bear the drain upon its resources made by the growing industry of trawl fishing along shore. Some first-class fishing grounds along the coast were closed for several years, in the anticipation that the fish, freed from molestation, would breed and multiply in them. The conclusion reached from examination of the results has been that fishing or no fishing makes no difference whatever. "On the preserved grounds there are no more fish, and no less, than when the trawls were daily dragged across the bottoms of the bays. For the rest of the areas frequented by trawlers beyond the three-mile limit the happy conclusion is that there are as many fish in the sea as ever, and that the supply does not diminish, in spite of the increased and increasing number of ships engaged in the fisheries and their fine equipment." The equipment of steam trawlers for the North Sea and the open ocean has become an immense industry in the east of England. Never have so much capital and labor been spent in harrying the fish since the fishing began. "Yet the take steadily increases as the boats increase. 'The great labor and expenditure of the last ten years prove that the balance of Nature in the neighboring seas is steadily maintained, and that there is no need for anxiety concerning the continuance of every species of good fish.' ... It is now clear that life in the sea is notdependent on what takes place near the shore. In other words, it is difficult to destroy marine life, so far as fish are concerned, by mischief done near the coast. Their area of propagation and reproduction is too large for land creatures like us, who can only invade the sea in boats, seriously to injure it." Yet the experiments and experience of the United States Fish Commission show that we are able to increase the supply immensely.
Relative Power of Fungicides.—Mr. F. L. Stevens has published, in the Botanical Gazette, an account of experiments made for the purpose of establishing with some degree of accuracy the strengths of various solutions which are necessary to prevent the growth of fungous spores. The bearing of this question upon the relation of a fungicide to its efficiency is apparent. As among the general results the author finds that mercuric chloride is the strongest chemical used in its toxic effect upon the fungi, while potassium cyanide is remarkably weak considering its great toxic action on animals. Alcohol and sodium chloride have a stimulating effect. Various fungi offer different resistance to poisons, and the limits of resistance will vary in the same species. The spores of fungi are less susceptible than the roots of seedlings. A chemical may be twice as powerful as another against one fungus, while in acting upon another fungus an entirely different ratio may be sustained. An occasional spore may germinate and grow quite normally in a solution that prevents hundreds of normal spores around it from germinating. Penicillium as a nutrient medium offered greater resistance to poisons than did any of the other fungi worked upon. Uromyces did not diminish in vigor of growth with the increased strength of the poison, but the percentage of spores that germinated was diminished. In general, the results of the action of the chemicals were in accord with the theory of hydrolytic association. Incidentally new evidence bearing upon the theory of the hydrolytic dissociation of the molecule was adduced, together with facts that may throw some light upon the structure of the cell wall.
National Forest Reserves.—The report of the Secretary of the Interior for the year ending June 30, 1898, mentions thirty forest reservations (exclusive of the Afognac Forest and Fish-Culture Reserve in Alaska) as existing by presidential proclamation under the act of March 3, 1891, embracing an estimated area of 40,719,474 acres. The patrolling of the reserves has shown that fire is the paramount danger to which they are exposed. Next to fire, sheep-raising is the most serious difficulty to be considered in administering the reserves. Yet, as it is not considered expedient to prohibit so important an industry throughout the reserves, special efforts have been directed toward ascertaining the particular regions in which the conditions demand the exclusion of sheep, and toward learning what restrictions may be necessary in other regions. The institution of a national system of timber cutting to be economical in all directions is under consideration, but it is acknowledged that the work will require a certain degree of experience and training on the part of forest officers. A forest system inaugurated by the department in August, 1898, in which the reserves are placed under the control of a graded force of officers, has already shown good results; the reports received from the forest officers indicate that the patrolling has limited both the number and extent of fires. During the eighteen months previous to the preparation of the report in November, 1898, a great advance was made toward a comprehensive administration of the public forests. A marked change in public sentiment toward forest policy is noticed, with a subsidence of the opposition to the reserves and a tendency among the people in the localities directly interested to take a deep and approving interest in the matter.
Sloyd as an Educational Factor.—Mr. Gustaf Larsson, of the Sloyd Training School, Boston, represents, in his Bulletin, that Sloyd is steadily gaining ground, and has been introduced, during the past year, into city schools, colleges, and charitable institutions, and that many clubs and social organizations are becoming interested in it as an educational factor. The Sloyd principles seem to meet a cordial welcome wherever they are adequately presented. Mr. Larsson insists that in Sloyd instruction the teacher should enter into the child'spoint of view, and must never forget, he says, that it is the real work which appeals to him, and not the particular exercise or the typical use of the tool. As Dr. Henderson says, it is not necessary to be forever suggesting to him that he is being educated. "We must see, feel, and think with the worker, and so introduce our disciplinary exercises that he practices them correctly while still carrying out his own dearest desire. In this way only can he get the greatest benefit from any exercise. We must constantly bear in mind that we are aiming at a well-developed producer rather than a perfect product.... Whenever a piece of work, however poor in itself, stands for a child's best effort, it is a highly satisfactory production from the true teacher's point of view. He must remember also to keep constantly before us the fact that independence and self-reliance are to be cultivated from the outset." Sloyd claims to be peculiar in aiming at ethical rather than technical results, and at general organic development rather than special skill; in employing only pedagogically trained teachers; in using rationally progressive courses of exercises applied on objects of good form which are also of special use to the worker; in striving after gymnastically correct working positions in encouraging the use of both the left and right sides of the body; and in giving to each individual opportunity to progress according to his peculiar ability. These points have been emphasized in Sloyd from its beginning in Sweden more than twenty-five years ago.
Hawaiian Reptiles.—It is shown, in a paper on the subject by Dr. Leonhard Stejneger, published by the United States National Museum, that there are no true land reptiles in the Hawaiian archipelago other than a few species of lizards, all belonging to the cosmopolitan families—the geckoes (four species) and the skinks (three species). All of these, except one of the geckoes, belong to species widely distributed over the Indo-Polynesian island world, while the gecko excepted has close relatives in New Caledonia, Java, Sumatra, and Ceylon. This distribution is regarded by the author as not sustaining the theory of a once continuous land connection between the various island groups, but rather, by the limited number of species, as indicating that at the time of the immigration of the lizards the islands were separated from other lands. Yet these land creatures could not have been distributed over thousands of miles of ocean by ordinary means, and the agency of man has to be invoked. From various considerations it is permissible to conclude that they came to the islands with the ancestors of the Hawaiians. No records are known of any of the marine snakes having been taken at the Sandwich Islands. Marine turtles live in the seas surrounding the archipelago and breed upon some of its outlying islands, but little is known of them. There are no indigenous batrachians in the group, but frogs and toads are said to have been brought, intentionally, from China, Japan, and America to assist in the fight against mosquitoes.
Miss Kingsley defines one of the fundamental doctrines of African fetich as being that the connection of a certain spirit with a certain mass of matter, a material object, is not permanent. "The African will point out to you a lightning-stricken tree and tell you that its spirit has been killed; he will tell you when the cooking pot has gone to bits that it has lost its spirit; if his weapon fails, it is because some one has stolen or made sick its spirit by means of witchcraft. In every action of his daily life he shows you how he lives with a great, powerful spirit world around him. You will see him, before starting out to hunt or fight, rubbing medicine into his weapons to strengthen the spirit within them, talking the while, telling them what care he has taken of them, reminding them of the gifts he has given them, though those gifts were hard to give, and begging them in the hour of his dire necessity not to fail him. You will see him bending over the face of a river, talking to its spirit with proper incantations, asking it when it meets a man who is an enemy of his to upset his canoe or drown him, or asking it to carry down with it some curse to the village below which has angered him, and in a thousand other ways he shows you what he believes if youwill watch him patiently. It is a very important point in the study of pure fetich to gain a clear conception of this arrangement of things in grades. As far as I have gone I think I may say fourteen classes of spirits exist in fetich. Dr. Nassau, of Gaboon, thinks that the spirits affecting human affairs can be classified completely into six classes."
At a recent meeting of the Institute of Mining Engineers (England), reported by Industries and Iron, Mr. J. A. Longden, who delivered the opening address, discussed the problem presented by the rapid exhaustion of the English coal fields. During the last twenty-five years, he said, the output of coal had increased from 120,000,000 to 200,000,000 tons, the ratio of increase being two and a half per cent per annum. Assuming that the increase for the next twenty-five years will only be one and a half per cent, the coal output in 1925 would reach 280,000,000 tons. At such an increasing annual output the commercially workable coal would be practically used up. Mr. Longden suggested the propriety of putting an export duty of sixpence per ton on all coal exported, and finally said: The evidence before them all pointed to one thing—namely, that in fifty years they would practically be dependent on the United States of America for cheap coal, iron, and steel, and when this came about "we or our sons will find out that an alliance with the United States for coaling our navy was imperative." In conclusion, he insisted upon the necessity of taking measures to avoid waste in the coal industry.
The following note is from Nature of May 11th: "At the last meeting of the Anatomical Society of Great Britain and Ireland Dr. Elliot Smith settled a point in the comparative morphology of the brain which at one time was the subject of a heated controversy between Huxley and Owen. In 1861, it may be remembered, Owen maintained that thecalcar avisand the calcarine fissure which causes it were characters peculiar to the brain of man, a statement which Huxley showed to be untrue, the formation being well marked in all primate brains. Dr. Elliot Smith has reached the further generalization that thecalcar avisis a character shown by all mammalian brains, with the possible exception of the prototherian. He identifies—and the reasons for this identification do not seem capable of refutation—the calcarine fissure of the primate brain with the splenial fissure of the brain of other mammals. This generalization will materially assist in homologizing the primate and unguiculatepallium."
The influence of wind on the speed of steamers is of considerably more importance than is generally believed. In theAnnalen der Hydrographiefor January, 1899, L. E. Dinklage describes some observations recently made on two of the North German Lloyd steamers of about five thousand tons and fifteen or sixteen knots. The results show that when the wind was favorable no difference whatever could be detected in the speed of the vessels during a light breeze or a heavy gale. But with a beam (cross-wind) or head wind a reduction of from three to five knots and a half was produced. The obvious conclusion is that the wind when favorable never helps a fast steamer, but always hinders it when unfavorable. Probably with vessels steaming ten knots or less a favoring gale might increase the speed.
The burden of the president's address of J. B. Johnson before the Society for the Promotion of Engineering Education is the necessity for our future material prosperity for a specific scientific training for the directors of each and every kind of manufacturing and commercial activity. Germany "has worked out this problem to a most fruitful issue," but its imperial and paternal method can not be imitated here, or probably anywhere else. The problem is a very difficult one with us, and it will be of no use to look to municipalities or Legislatures for its solution. There exist a few special high-grade industrial, commercial, mechanical, electrical, and mining schools, but they are entirely inadequate to answer the demands of the occasion. The author looks to organized commercial bodies like the one he is addressing as furnishing the best means for establishing the schools desired.
Prof. F. L. Washburn, of the University of Oregon, describes in the American Naturalist a curious specimen of the toad (Bufo columbiensis), which has an extra arm projecting from the left side just in front of the normal left arm. The extra arm has seven digits, and is without an elbow joint, but is slightlymovable at the proximal joint next to the body. Its radius and ulna are separate bones, not fused as they are normally. The dissection shows other peculiarities of structure, such as might be expected from a consideration of the exterior. The species, normal, is common in parts of Oregon.
It is related of Charcot, the distinguished alienist, late of the Salpêtrière, Paris, that he had marked artistic ability, and when he was seventeen years old his family had some hesitation whether to make him a doctor or a painter. He chose the medical profession. He was fond of drawing sketches of his patients, and of landscapes he saw in his travels, and was not above making an occasional caricature. Several albums are filled with designs of this kind. A study of his work as an artist was prepared by Dr. Henri Meige in connection with the erection of his monument, and is deposited in the Salpêtrière.
The Russian decree nullifying the constitutional privileges of Finland, notwithstanding treaty guarantees, is producing an effect that was probably not intended or anticipated. Realizing the futility of resistance and holding the people true to their reputation of being the most peaceable, enlightened, and orderly of the Czar's subjects, the representatives of the Finns are said to be quietly making inquiries about the prospects of settlement in the Canadian Northwest and other free regions.
Despite the growing use of motor traction, the raising of horses gives no sign of diminishing. Against 212,827 horses in 1888, the Argentine Republic has, by the census of 1895, 4,234,032. That country now ranks third in horse-rearing nations, being excelled only by Russia and the United States.
M. André Broca has found, concerning the use of India-rubber supports for isolating physical apparatus from earth tremors, that when apparatus having movable parts are supported in this way the vibrations, instead of being reduced, may in some cases be increased tenfold. But when the apparatus consists entirely of rigid material there is no better way of insuring steadiness than by resting it on India rubber.
The Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Tuberculosis works for the single end of educating the community in a knowledge of the true nature of consumption and of the means of controlling or conquering it. For this it diffuses literature, seeks the aid of persons in influential positions, and strives to obtain the requisite conditions for restoring those early afflicted and for preventing the communication of infection to others from those far advanced. Its main effort is directed toward the establishment of a municipal hospital for tuberculous patients, and for a sanatorium in the high regions of the State. For the last purpose it is offered a most desirable location in Luzerne County.
The list of recent deaths among men known in science includes the names of W. W. Norman, Professor of Biology in the University of Texas; John Whitehead, who died while on a scientific mission to the island of Hainan, for which he left England in the autumn of 1898; Naval Lieutenant Charles William Baillie, Marine Superintendent of the English Meteorological Office, inventor of the hydra sounding machine, late Director of Nautical Studies at the Imperial Naval College, Tokio, and author of important meteorological investigations, at Broadstairs, June 2th, aged fifty-five years; Henry Wollaston Blake, an original member of the Institution of Civil Engineers, of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, and of the British Association, and a Fellow of the Royal Society, eighty-four years of age; Edward Jannetaz, a French mineralogist, an assistant in the Museum of Paris, and Lecturer on Mineralogy for forty years, Master of Conferences in the Faculty of Sciences, author ofLes Rochesand other books, aged sixty-seven years; Dr. Eugen Ritter von Lommell, of the University of Munich, distinguished in mathematics, physics, and optics, and author of several books on those subjects, including The Nature of Light in the International Scientific Series, June 19th, in his sixty-third year; Sir Alexander Armstrong, arctic navigator and discoverer of the Northwest passage, late Director-General of the Medical Department of the British Museum, and author of a narrative of his great discovery and of a work on Naval Hygiene; Dr. Hugo Weidel, Professor of Chemistry in the University of Vienna; Sir William Henry Flower, late Director of the British Museum of Natural History, Past President of the British Association, at the time of his death President of the Zoölogical Society of London, and author of several excellent books on zoölogy, natural history, museums, and kindred subjects, aged sixty-eight years; and Dr. Daniel G. Brinton, the distinguished American ethnologist and linguist, of whom we give a fuller notice elsewhere.