POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



423 



Schorlommer, Carl. The Rise and Tevelop- 

 ment of Organic Chemistry. New York : Mac- 

 millan & Co. Pp. 280. $1.00. 



Shiifeldt, Dr. R. W. Lectures on Biology. 

 Pp. 103. On the Osteology of Certain Cranes, 

 Rails, etc. Pp. 14. Notes on the Steganopodes, 

 and on Fossil Birds' Eggs. Pp. a. 



Shufeldt, R. W., and Miss Audiibrn. The Last 

 Portrait of Audubon, together with a Letter to his 

 Son. Pp. 5, with Plate 



Smith, H. Q. Notes ou Eskimo Traditions. 

 Pp.8. 



South Dakota. Report of the State Board of 

 Health for 1892. Pierre. Pp. 57. 



Spencer, Herbert. A Rejoinder to Prof. Weis- 

 mann. New York : D. Appleton & Co. Pp. 37. 

 Weismannism Once More. London. Pp. 24. 



Steiner, B. C. The History of Education in 

 Connecticut. United States Bureau of Education. 

 Pp. 300. 



Strike, Report on the Chicago. Washington : 

 Government Printing Office. Pp. 53. 



Strike, The, at Pullman. Statements of Presi- 

 dent G. T. Pullman and Vice-President T. H. 

 Wicke before the United States Strike Commis- 

 sion. Pp. 38. 



United Stites Geological Survey. Geologic 

 Atlas of the United States. Pike's Peak Polio. 

 Pp. 6, and 5 Maps. Chattanooga Folio, Tennes- 

 see. Pp. 4, and 5 Maps. 



Walker, General F. A. General Hancock. New 

 York: D. Appleton & Co. Pp .3.32. 



Wallihan, Mr. and Mrs. A. G. Hoofs, Claws, and 

 Antlers of the Rocky Mountains with a Camera. 

 Photographic Reproductions of Wild Game from 

 Life. With an Introduction by the Hon. Theo- 

 dore Roosevelt. Denver, Col.: Frank S. Thayer. 



Ward, L. F. Recent Discoveries of Cycadean 

 Trunks in the Potomac Formation of Maryland, 

 Pp. 9. 



Warren, L. Z. Defective Speech and Deafness. 

 New York : G. S. Werner, 108 East Sixteenth 

 Street. Pp. 116. 



White, G. R. An Elementary Chemistry. 

 Boston: Ginn & Co. Pp. 372. 



Wood, Henry. The Only Practical and Pos- 

 sible Bimetallism. Boston: Lee & Shepard. Pp. 

 19. 



Wright, Carroll D., Commissioner. Ninth 

 Annual Report of the Commissioner of Labor, 

 1893. Washington. Pp. 719. 



Zinet, Alexander. An Elementary Treatise on 

 Theoretical Mechanics. Part HI, Kinetics. New 

 York .' Macmillan & Co. Pp. 237. $3.25. 



POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



Decrease of Rassian Rivers. A diminu- 

 tion in the quantity of water in the rivers of 

 eastern Europe, particularly in Russia, has 

 been recognized for a long time. Koeppen 

 began to seek for the cause of it as early as 

 1830, and the Russian Government is giving 

 attention to the subject. Prince Vassiltchi- 

 koff, of the government of Saratov, having 

 observed that the sources of a river on his 

 estate shrunk as the region in which they 

 were situated was dried, planted trees, and 

 succeeded in causing the water to reappear. 

 The experiment seemed to demonstrate in- 

 contestably that the removal of the woods 



was the immediate cause of the disappear- 

 ance of the springs, and indicated that means 

 might still be found for restoring the dried 

 streams of the valley of the Volga. M. Ver- 

 molefP, present Minister of Agriculture of 

 Russia, repeated M. Vassiltchikoff's experi- 

 ments on a vast scale and with all the pre- 

 cautions to assure success which science 

 could suggest. He dispatched a scientific 

 expedition, composed of specialists, to visit 

 the sources of the Volga and its affluents; 

 and upon their recommendation suitable 

 measures were taken to increase the quantity 

 of water of the sources, and especially to 

 make the flow more regular and less rapid. 

 Thus, after having drained the marshes in 

 some of the governments of Russia, the au- 

 thorities are seeking means to give others a 

 sufficiency of water. 



Mr. Maxim's Flight. Mr. Maxim, on the 

 31st of July, achieved a flight through the 

 air, with his flying machine carrying himself 

 and two of his men, of five hundred feet. 

 The machine was held to the earth by a rail- 

 way, on which it was locked by a device per- 

 mitting its rising an inch or two, but pre- 

 venting its soaring to any considerable 

 height. It sailed, lifted from this railway as 

 far as the machinery would permit, at the 

 rate of forty-five miles an hour. The ma- 

 chine, with its four side-sails and aeroplanes 

 set, is more than one hundred feet wide, and 

 is described as looking like a huge white 

 bird with four wings instead of two. It is 

 propelled by two large two-bladed screws, 

 resembling the screw propellers of a ship, 

 driven by two compound engines which are 

 said to be, in proportion to their weight, the 

 most powerful ever made. The whole appa- 

 ratus weighs about eight thousand pounds, 

 and the engines have a lifting power of 

 about ten thousand pounds. 



Progress of Electrical Theory. Lord 

 Kelvin's address at the recent annual meet- 

 ing of the Royal Society was largely devoted 

 to a review of the history of the doctrine of 

 the ether, and of light, heat, and electricity, 

 culminating in Hertz's demonstration of its 

 validity. Duiing the fifty -six years, the 

 speaker said at the conclusion of his ad- 

 dress, since Faraday first offended physical 

 mathematicians with his curved lines of 



