864 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Dr. Orme Masson, of the University of 

 Melbourne, takes a hopeful view of the 

 prospects of chemistry in Australia. The 

 university expects soon to have well-equipped 

 laboratories for the practical instruction of 

 classes of medical students and for the ac- 

 commodation of specialists. 



The military doctors account for the 

 prevalence of diseases of the heart in the 

 French army as arising from the fatiguing 

 duties imposed on recruits, at an age when, 

 generally, the development of the body is 

 not in harmony with that of the heart, but 

 either in advance of it or behind it. In the 

 latter case, there is hypertrophy of growth ; 

 in the former, insufficiency. 



Mr. Goschen, British Chancellor of the 

 Exchequer, recently assured a deputation of 

 local university colleges that the subject of 

 further developing technical and scientific 

 education would receive the most serious 

 attention of the Government. 



Mr. T. P. White, in a communication to 

 the Chemical Society, gives a decidedly nega- 

 tive answer to the question whether the 

 acids of canned fruits may not form poison- 

 ous salts with the tin. lie reports, as the 

 result of bis experiments, that "tin is en- 

 tirely devoid of danger when taken inter- 

 nally in any form that might arise from 

 being in contact with fruits or vegetables." 

 He believes that the cases of accidental 

 poisoning attributed to tin were due to 

 solder or other impurities arsenic, copper, 

 or lead. Professor W. Mattieu Williams says 

 that there need be no lead in the solder 

 that it is only put in for cheapness' sake, and 

 that tin makes a superior solder to any alloy. 

 Therefore, all danger may be obviated by 

 prohibiting the use of any other solder than 

 pure tin. 



Professor Chetreul, on the 31st of 

 August, which was his one hundred and 

 second birthday, in perfect health, attend- 

 ed a meeting of the Agricultural Society 

 and made a pleasant speech, thanking his 

 colleagues for a bouquet which they had 

 presented to him. 



The President has appointed Professor 

 G. Brown Goode to succeed Professor Baird, 

 deceased, as United States Commissioner of 

 Fish and Fisheries. 



OBITUARY NOTES. 



Alvan Clark, the famous telescope- 

 maker, died in Cambridge, Massachusetts, 

 August 19th, in the eighty-fourth year of 

 his age. He was born in 1804, was taught 

 in the public schools only ; having a taste 

 for painting and engraving, he became a 

 calico-engraver at Lowell and elsewhere ; 

 then worked as a portrait-painter for twen- 



ty years ; took up the making of telescope- 

 lenses in 1846, and, without any other in- 

 struction than his own shop afforded, rose 

 to unquestioned pre-eminence in that pro- 

 fession. He was the maker of some of the 

 largest telescopes in the world, including 

 the McCormick telescope at Chicago, the 

 great instruments at Princeton and Wash- 

 ington, the telescope at Pulkowa, Russia, 

 and the Lick telescope, of California. 



Spencer F. Baird, head of the Smithso- 

 nian Institution and of the United States 

 Fish Commission, died at Wood's IIoll, Mas- 

 sachusetts, August 19th, in the sixty-fourth 

 year of his age. He began making a col- 

 lection of birds when fourteen years old, 

 and contributed papers to the Philadelphia 

 Academy of Sciences while still a youth ; 

 was graduated from Dickinson College when 

 seventeen ; studied medicine, but did not go 

 into practice ; became Professor of Natural 

 History in Dickinson College in 1845 ; pro- 

 jected a work with Agassiz, which was not 

 completed, on the fresh-water fishes of the 

 United States; was elected Assistant Secre- 

 tary of the Smithsonian Institution in 1850 ; 

 was promoted to the head of that institution 

 on the death of Professor Henry ; and was 

 appointed Commissioner of Fish and Fish- 

 eries in 1871. A list of his works and pub- 

 lished contributions in 1882 contained more 

 than one thousand titles. 



M. Alfred Terquem, Professor of Phys- 

 ics at Lille, died in Paris, July 17th, in the 

 fifty-seventh year of his age. He was a 

 son of the eminent geologist, Terqucm, also 

 deceased. 



August Friedrioh Pott, who is asso- 

 ciated by Professor Max Miiller, with Bopp 

 and Grimm, as " the triumvirs who founded 

 the science of comparative philology," died 

 at Halle on the 5th of July, in his eighty- 

 fifth year. He was connected with the Uni- 

 versity of nalle during his entire active life, 

 and was the author of " Etymologische For- 

 schungen" and of works on the gypsies, on 

 personal names, and on numerals, of essays 

 on mythology, African languages, and gen- 

 eral grammar, and of other books and pa- 

 pers. 



Sir Walter Elliot, of the Indian Civil 

 Service, who died recently in the eighty-fifth 

 year of his age, was distinguished for his 

 archaeological and numismatic researches, 

 and also for his contributions to zoology, a 

 large number of which appear in the names 

 of other naturalists, to whom he communi- 

 cated them. His " Catalogue of the Species 

 of Mammalia found in the Southern Mah- 

 ratta Country" was a list of the wild ani- 

 mals of the country, many of which were 

 discovered by him. The habits of the 

 larger animals were described from per- 

 sonal observation. 



