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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



tophora pxenes, which inhabits the wild fig 

 trees or caprifigs of the Mediterranean coun- 

 tries, and which the fig-growers procure by 

 bringing down twigs of these trees from the 

 mountains at the fertilizing season. Artifi- 

 cial fertilization of figs has been tried in 

 California with considerable success; but it 

 is thought that if the caprifig and its insect 

 can be naturalized in California, there will 

 be no difficulty in raising figs the equal to 

 those of Smyrna. 



Discussing at the meeting of the Ameri- 

 can Association the position of the trilobites 

 in classification, Prof. A. S. Packard referred 

 to the discovery of Beecher that certain gen- 

 era of them have antenna? together with 

 biramose legs, essentially the same for the 

 head and trunk, and double, so that one por- 

 tion is available for swimming and the other 

 for crawling. He then showed that this uni- 

 formity of appendages does not occur in the 

 Crustacece, to which the trilobites have been 

 referred heretofore. For this reason, and 

 because the young have a different form 

 from crustacean young, zoologists are in- 

 clined to refer the trilobites to a separate 

 class and to regard them as an older, more 

 primitive group. From certain obvious 

 affinities, the Limulus, or king crab, may be 

 regarded as a descendant from the trilobites. 



On Thursday, September 15th, Mr. Stan- 

 ley Spencer and Dr. Berson ascended from 

 the Crystal Palace, near London, in a balloon 

 inflated with pure hydrogen to the remark- 

 able height of twenty-seven thousand five 

 hundred feet, only fifteen hundred feet be- 

 low the highest ascent of Coxwell and 

 Glaisher. Numerous scientific instruments 

 were carried, and also a cylinder of com- 

 pressed oxygen for inhaling at great heights. 

 It was found necessary to use the oxygen at 

 twenty-five thousand feet. 



In the discussion in the British Associa- 

 tion of a communication by Professors E. B. 

 Roser and W. 0. Atwater recording their ex- 

 periments (American) on the amount of energy 

 supplied to and obtainable from the human 

 body — which are found to be equal — Prof. 

 W. E. Ayrton, presiding, pointed out that 

 the energy of muscular action is probably 

 capillary or electrical, the human machine 

 being more analogous to an electric battery 

 or motor than to a steam engine. 



In the list of officers of the American 

 Association for 18y9, published in our last 

 number, the name of L. 0. Howard, of the 

 Department of Agriculture, Washington, 

 should have appeared as permanent secre- 

 tary. 



The hundredth anniversary of the inven- 

 tion of the voltaic or electric pile is to be 

 celebrated in 1899 at Como, the birthplace 

 of Alexander Yolta, bv an international elec- 



trical exhibition. A national exhibition of 

 the manufacture of silk — machinery, prepa- 

 ration, and processes — will be held in con- 

 nection with it. An international congress 

 will also be held for the discussion of the 

 progress and applications of electricity. 



A prize of five hundred guineas is of- 

 fered by the Sulphate of Ammonia Commit- 

 tee, 4 Fenchurch Avenue, London, for the 

 best essay on The Utility of Sulphate of 

 Ammonia in Agriculture ; the committee to 

 have entire disposal of the selected essay, 

 and the refusal of any of the others for not 

 more than fifty guineas each. The essays — in 

 English — should be in the hands of the com- 

 mittee not later than November 15, 1898. 



Recent death lists include the names, 

 among men known to science, of Prof. Park 

 Merrill, chief of the Forecast Division of the 

 Weather Bureau, at Washington, August 

 8th ; Dr. E. V. Aveling, late assistant in 

 physiology at Cambridge and professor of 

 chemistry and physiology at New College, a 

 writer upon scientific topics, in London, 

 August 4th, aged forty-seven years ; M. Paul 

 Sevret, mathematician and member of the 

 French Academy of Sciences, in Pai is, June 

 24th, aged seventy years ; W. F. R. Sur- 

 ringer, professor of botany in the University 

 of Ley den, and director of the Botanical 

 Garden and Herbarium; J. A. R. Newlands, 

 the discoverer of the periodic law of the 

 chemical elements, in Lower Clapton, Lon- 

 don, July 29th, aged sixty-nine years ; the 

 astronomer Romberg, who succeeded Encke 

 at Berlin in 1864, and was called to Pulkova 

 in 1873, author of numerous papers in 

 Monthly Notices on double stars and plan- 

 etary and cometary observations, at Pulkova, 

 July 6th, aged sixty-four years ; John Hop- 

 kinson, an eminent British electrician, presi- 

 dent of the Institute of Electrical Engineers 

 in 1890 and 1896, killed with his three chil- 

 dren in an attempt to ascend the Dent de 

 Visivi, Alps, August 24th ; Dr. H. Trimble, 

 professor of practical chemistry in the 

 Philadelphia College of Pharmacy, and editor 

 of the American Journal of Pharmacy ; M. 

 de Windt, geologist of the Belgian Exploring 

 Expedition to the Congo, drowned in Lake 

 Tanganyika, Africa, August 9th ; Dr. Paul 

 Glan, assistant professor of physics in the 

 Univeisity of Berlin, aged fifty eight years; 

 Dr. E. J. Bonsdorf, formerly professor of 

 anatomy and physiology at Helsingfors, Fin- 

 land, aged eighty-eight years; Dr. Robert 

 Zimmerman, formerly professor of philoso- 

 phy in the University of Vienna, at Salzburg, 

 Austria, aged seventy-seven years ; M. J. M. 

 Moniz, known by his investigations of the 

 natural history of Madeira, at Madeira, July 

 11th, aged sixty-six years ; and M. Pomel, a 

 distinguished French mining engineer, pro- 

 fessor of geology and past director at the 

 Algiers Scientific School, and author of a 

 number of special works, at Oran, Algeria. 



