0. MISCELLANEOUS. 617 



of the council, to the two vacant places in the list of foreign 

 members. The number is limited to fifty. 



APPOINTMENT OF ASSISTANT-KEEPER OF THE BRITISH 



MUSEUM. 



The position of assistant-keeper in the Zoological Depart- 

 ment of the British Museum, rendered vacant by the death of 

 Mr. George R. Gray, has been filled by the appointment of 

 Dr. Alfred Gunther, the well-known herpetologist and ichthy- 

 ologist of the museum. The vacancy caused by Dr. Giinther's 

 promotion will be occupied by Mr. R. B. Sharpe, at present 

 librarian of the Zoological Society. This gentleman is an 

 accomplished ornithologist, and will doubtless discharge the 

 duties of his position with entire satisfaction. Of his abili- 

 ties we have ample testimony in the great work upon the 

 birds of Europe, upon which he is engaged in connection with 

 Mr. Dresser, and in his monograph of the Alcedinidce, etc. 

 12 A, August 15, 1872, 304. 



HONORS CONFERRED ON DR. GROSS AND PROFESSOR AIRY. 



At the meeting of the Convocation of the University of 

 Oxford, in the middle of June, the honorary degree of D.C.L. 

 was conferred on Dr. Samuel David Gross, Professor of Sur- 

 gery in the Jefferson Medical College of Philadelphia. 



AVe also learn that Professor G. B. Airy, the eminent head 

 of the Greenwich Observatory, has been gazetted as K.C.B. 

 \2 A,June 20,1872,149. 



EXCELLENCE OF AMERICAN MEDICAL BOOKS. 



A gratifying tribute to the excellence of the American 

 medical faculty is paid in a recent number of the Medical 

 Times and Gazette, in which it is stated, as an illustration of 

 the thoroughness of the inquiries prosecuted in this country, 

 that half of the best text-books available for use in the En- 

 glish language are American in their origin. 20 A, January 

 6,1872,9. 



GOLD MEDAL TO PROFESSOR DANA. 



No person in the United States, perhaps, occupies a higher 

 position in the esteem of his colleagues as a man of science 

 than Professor Dana, of New Haven, while to those who en- 



