i895. NEWS OF UNIVERSITIES, ETC. 151 



to date from the 12th dynasty. With it are given ilhistrations of the exquisite gold- 

 smiths' work of the period, one of which bears the cartouch of Usertesen II., 

 another that of Amen-em-hat III , and a third that of Usertesen III. 



Professor Canavari's scheme for a Paleontooyafia Italiana has met with so 

 much success that the first volume will be issued about the end of the year. It will 

 be a quarto, with twenty plates, and will be published at Pisa, price fifty francs. 

 Materials for a second volume are already in hand, and should the first be a 

 financial success, the second will immediately follow. 



We learn from the Scottish Geographical Magazine that Dr. O. Nordenskiold and 

 Dr. Ohlin will shortly proceed to Tierra del Fuego to explore the country. They 

 will remain there till the summer of 1896. Dr. F. A. Cook will start from New York, 

 on September i, on an Antarctic Expedition. He will take two small vessels, 

 provisioned for three years, and hopes to reach Erebus and Terror Gulf about the 

 beginning of December. Professor W. H. Dall and Dr. G. Becker, on behalf of the 

 United States Geological Survey, are conducting a natural history expedition to 

 Alaska. 



A Reuter's telegram says that the steamer " Kite " left St. John's on July 9 for 

 Bowdoin Bay, Greenland, to bring home the Peary Arctic Expedition. It is 

 expected to return on October i. The party on board includes Professor Salisbury, 

 of Chicago, who goes to study the glaciers and geology of the region, and Professor 

 Dyche, of the State University, Kansas, to collect specimens of the fauna and flora, 

 while Mr. Boutillier, of Philadelphia, represents the Geographical Society. Lieut. 

 Peary will probably bring home a great meteoric stone which was found near Cape 

 York. . 



Several cases of specimens have reached the British Museum (Nat. Hist.) 

 from Dr. Forsyth Major in Madagascar, The greater part of the collection comes 

 from the forest and the neighbourhood of Ambositra, and consists of zoological 

 specimens, including a very important consignment of skins of mammals, several of 

 which are believed to be new to science, a very fine series of dried plants, and a 

 valuable assortment of ethnological objects from the Betsileo country, among them 

 being many articles of singular interest illustrating the domestic life of the tribe 

 inhabiting this little known part of Madagascar. If all be well Dr. Forsyth Major 

 should now be fairly at work excavating in the marshes of Sirabe for Pleistocene 

 vertebrate remains, the discovery of which was the primary purpose of the 

 expedition. 



Coal in the Sahara has been reported to the Paris Academy of Sciences by M. 

 Foureau. The field occupies an area contained between lat. 27° and 28' N. and 

 5° and 6° 30' E., and has been traced at nine points within the area. Lepidodendron 

 has been noted, as well as crinoids and Producti. 



In our issue for October, 1894, we quoted a paragraph from the Pittsburgh 

 Despatch on adaptation of cats to cold, which stated that the cold increased the 

 thickness of the fur, and the dim light of the storage warehouses tended to lengthen 

 the " feelers." A letter from the Secretary of the Storage Company, published in 

 the American Naturalist for June, shows that the facts have been exaggerated, and 

 that the " adaptation " is comparable with that which takes place in warm climates 

 on the approach of wintry conditions. 



