472 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



exigencies of his important duties at home prevent his attendance, a 

 result which now seems unlikely. Baron d'Estournelles De Constant, 

 the leader of the arbitration group in the French Chamber of Deputies, 

 whose part}' has achieved so splendid a triumph through the completion 

 of an arbitration treaty between France and England, is to deliver the 

 principal address in the section of international law. Signor Attilio 

 Brunialti, councillor of state, at Bome, will be the principal speaker on 

 the subject of constitutional law. The history of the christian church 

 will be treated by Frofessor Jean Seville, of the faculty of protestant 

 theology at the University of Paris, and also by Frofessor Harnack, 

 of the University of Berlin. Other foreign speakers in the division of 

 historical sciences are Professor Ettore Pais, director of the National 

 Museum of Antiquities at Naples, Professor Arminius Vambery, the 

 Asiatic traveler and oriental scholar of the University of Budapest, and 

 Professor Henri Cordier, of Paris. 



The sections of biology and medicine are especially strong. Among 

 the expected foreign speakers are Professors Hugo De Vries, of Amster- 

 dam; Oskar Drude, of Dresden; Alfred Giard and Yves Delage, of the 

 Sorbonne; Sir Bonald Eoss, of Liverpool, and Professor Celli, of 

 Bome, the two last being leaders in discovering the causes of malaria. 

 Sir Lauder Brunton, of London, Professor Kitasato of Japan, the 

 eminent bacteriologist, Sir Felix Semon, physician extraordinary to 

 the King, and Professor Escherich, of Vienna, are among the foreign 

 medical men. Professor Hugo de Vries will treat the subject of the 

 origin of races, while Wiessner, Drude, Giard, Fiirbringer and Waldeyer 

 will represent their several branches. 



Our mathematicians will be afforded an opportunity to meet a 

 brilliant trio from the French Academy of Science, — Darboux, Poincare 

 and Picard. Our astronomers will greet with warmth Dr. Backhand, 

 director of the Pulkowa Observatory and Professors Kapteyn and 

 Turner. Sir "William Bamsay and Professors Moissan and Van't Hoff 

 will be among the speakers on chemistry. Professor Arrhenius is to 

 set forth his new and striking views on the more mysterious phe- 

 nomena of cosmical physics, and Sir John Murray will be the prin- 

 cipal speaker in the section of oceanography. 



That every specialist in research will derive both pleasure and 

 profit by withdrawing his attempts for a brief period from his own 

 province and listening to what his fellow investigators in widely 

 different specialties have to say in regard to the problems and rela- 

 tions of their several fields of study is too obvious to need enforcement. 

 But we should err in confining the benefits thus arising to actual 

 suggestions. We must recognize the historic fact that modern science 

 really began, not with investigations, but witli the ideas which were 

 necessary to the beginnings of investigation. Even to-day an in- 



