506 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



Distribution of the Geneva Award. By 

 Hon. Elijah Ward Pp. 10. Washington, 

 187G. 



Terre Haute Public Schools. Pp. 92. 

 Terre Haute, Ind. : Globe Printing-Office. 



Report on Dermatology. By L. P. Yan- 

 dell, Jr., M. D. Pp. 1. Indianapolis Jour- 

 nal print. 



The Missouri Dental Journal. Monthly. 

 Pp. 1G. 



The Glacial Epoch and the Distribution 

 of Insects in North America. Pp. 5. Are 

 Potato-Bugs poisonous ? Pp. 3. By A. R. 

 Grote. From Proceedings of American As- 

 sociation for the Advancement of Science. 



Nothing. By W. H. Boughton. Pp. 8. 

 Brooklyn : E. S. Dodge print. 



Chemistry of Three Dimensions. By F. 

 W. Clarke. Pp. 9. From Proceedings 

 of American Association for the Advance- 

 ment of Science. 



Experimental Proof of the Law of In- 

 verse Squares for Sound. By W. W. 

 Jacques. Pp. 8. 



MISCELLANY. 



The Academy of Natural Sciences of Pliil- 



adelpliia* The Academy of Natural Sciences 

 of Philadelphia having, at the beginning of 

 the present year, taken possession of its 

 commodious new building, Prof. E. D. Cope 

 avails himself of the occasion to suggest 

 in the Penn Monthly some needed changes 

 and improvements in its organization. 

 The objects of the Academy, as stated by 

 its founder, are, the promotion of origi- 

 nal investigation, the imparting of instruc- 

 tion, and the diffusion of knowledge. The 

 Academy possesses a moderate fund for 

 promoting the last-named object, and pub- 

 lishes its " Transactions " regularly. But 

 the .other two objects do not receive the 

 sunie attention. Original research is not 

 materially encouraged by the Academy, and 

 in one instance funds, supposed to be de- 

 voted to research, were hoarded and after- 

 ward turned over to the building-fund. Less 

 than five hundred dollars per annum is de- 

 voted to " instruction." The chief fault 

 found by Prof. Cope in the organization of 



the Academy is that, while it secures good 

 financial management, it minimizes the sci- 

 entific features of the body. " Its officers 

 are the usual president, vice-president, sec- 

 retary, etc., constituting a manageiuent as 

 appropriate to an historical society, library 

 company, or, I might add, church vestry, as 

 to an academy of natural sciences. It has 

 no position designed for its distinctive and 

 essential feature, its scientific experts." 



Prof. Cope's remedy is simply to adopt 

 the organization which is possessed by all 

 similar institutions the world over. " Let 

 it create as many positions as there is rea- 

 sonable probability of receiving endowments 

 in future years, and attach to them privi- 

 leges which will render them desirable to 

 incumbents, and duties such as are neces- 

 sary to the Academy." 



VFyville Thomson on Oceanic Circulation. 



Prof. Wyville Thomson, in a report to 

 the hydrographer to the British Admiralty, 

 discusses the problem of oceanic circula- 

 tion, and gives reasons for believing that 

 the bottom water of the two great oceans 

 is an extremely slow indraught from the 

 Southern Sea. This indraught he refers to 

 the simplest and most obvious of all causes, 

 viz., the excess of evaporation over precipi- 

 tation in the northern portion of the hind 

 hemisphere, and the excess of precipitation 

 over evaporation in the middle and south- 

 ern part of the water hemisphere. In con- 

 cluding the report, Prof. Thomson further 

 says, " I need scarcely add that I have 

 never seen, whether in the Atlantic, the 

 Southern Sea, or the Pacific, the slightest 

 ground for supposing that such a thing ex- 

 ists as a general vertical circulation of the 

 water of the ocean depending upon differ- 

 ences of specific gravity." 



The Discovery of Ansestuesia. Dr. H. P. 



Steams, of Hartford, at the close of an able 

 " Critique on the History of Modern Anaes- 

 thesia," which appears in the Medical Rec- 

 ord, sums up in the following terms the re- 

 sults obtained by sundry prominent claim- 

 ants of the honors of discovery : 1. In De- 

 cember, 1841, Wells made the suggestion 

 and applied the test in his own person, by 

 inhaling a large dose of nitrous oxide, and 

 having a tooth extracted without pain. 2. 



