NOTES. 



431 



the Sinaitic district, and of another chain in 

 the center of the Wady Arabah, not far 

 from the water-shed. The great line of 

 fracture of the Wady Arabah and the Jor- 

 dan Valley has been traced to a distance of 

 more than one hundred miles, and the ma- 

 terials for working out a complete theory of 

 this remarkable depression are now avail- 

 able. The terraces of the Jordan have been 

 examined. The relation of these terraces 

 to the surrounding hills and valleys shows 

 that they had already been formed before 

 the water reached their former level ; sec- 

 tions have been carried east and v.'est 

 across the Akabah and the Jordan Valley, 

 and two traverses of Palestine have been 

 made from the Mediterranean to the Jordan. 



Change as a Recreative Agent. — Sir 



James Paget spoke, in a recent address, at 

 the Workingmen's College, London, on the 

 value of change as a mental restorative, 

 and found it to consist principally in direct- 

 ing the patient to some form of " work " for 

 which he has inherited a special capacity. 

 The effect is produced through the awaken- 

 ing and gratification of some dormant love 

 or propensity which lies deep down in the 

 individual nature and has been inherited. It 

 thus appears that the special pleasures of 

 individual lives are ancestral, or are " sur- 

 vivals in us of instincts that belonged 

 to our distant ancestors, who of necessity 

 had to kill, to fish, to hunt, to clear the 

 forests, and make the roads." The mere 

 recommendation of " change " vaguely is 

 idle ; but recreative change, judiciously rec- 

 ommended and specifically applied, is one of 

 the most powerful agents we possess for the 

 treatment of disease, or of derangements 

 and disturbances of the mental temperament 

 and the mind. 



NOTES. 



The thirteenth series of Professor C. G. 

 Rockwood's " Notes on American Earth- 

 quakes," in the " American Journal of Sci- 

 ence," includes seventy - eight notices of 

 shocks that occurred on the American Con- 

 tinents during 1888. Of these, eight were 

 in Canada, three in New England, two in the 

 Atlantic States, eleven in the Mississippi 

 Valley, and twenty -three on the Pacific 

 coast, while the rest were in Mexico, the 

 West Indies, and Central and South America. 



The more important shocks were recorded 

 —January 11th, Cairo, Illinois; March 8th, 

 Panama ;"May 19th, Ecuador; August, Mex- 

 ico ; and October 6th, Alaska. Most of the 

 shocks were very moderate, and caused little 

 or no damage. 



Dr. Ernst Behm, a German geographer, 

 died March 15th. Be had been for twenty- 

 eight years editorially connected with the 

 " Geographische Mittheilungcn " of Justus 

 Perthes in Gotha. He was joint editor of 

 Behm and Wagner's celebrated statistical 

 publication. 



The Trustees of the University of Penn- 

 sylvania have elected Dr. Joseph Leidy, 

 Director, and Professor of Anatomy and 

 Zoology, of the new Biological Department. 

 Dr. J. t. Both rock has been elected Profess- 

 or of Botany ; Dr. A. J. Parker, Professor 

 of Comparative Anatomy ; Dr. Benjamin 

 Sharpe, Professor of Invertebrate Morphol- 

 ogy ; Dr. Horace Jayne, Professor of Ver- 

 tebrate Morphology ; and Dr. Harrison Al- 

 len, Professor of Physiology. Women are 

 to be admitted as students. 



The whole history of the once famous 

 book, the " Vestiges of Creation," is told by 

 Mr. Alexander Ireland, in the twelfth edi- 

 tion, just published. In agreement with 

 what the world has long understood, the au- 

 thor is at last declared on the title-page to 

 have been Mr. Robert Chambers. Accord- 

 ing to Mr. Ireland's account, Mr. Chambers 

 employed his wife as his amanuensis in 

 writing the book, and Sir. Ireland as the 

 medium of communication with his pubUsh- 

 ers. Only four persons were at first in the 

 secret of the authorship, of whom Mr. Ire- 

 land is the sole survivor. 



Experiments by Messrs. R. Pictet and 

 E. Yung have resulted in showing that some 

 of the microbes at least can sustain a temper- 

 ature Mf-W to -130° C. (-94° to -200" . 

 Fahr.) for periods of several hours, and still 

 live and thrive on the accession of more fa- 

 vorable temperatures. 



It is suggested that papers will be ac- 

 ceptable to be read before the Anthropo- 

 logical Section of the British Association on 

 American subjects, as follow : " The Native 

 Races of America, their Pliysical Characters 

 and Origin" ; " Civilization of America be- 

 fore the Time of Columbus, with Particular 

 Reference to Earlier Intercourse with the 

 Old World " ; " Archneology of North Amer- 

 ica, Ancient Mounds and Earth-Works, Cliff- 

 Dwellings and Village-Houses, Stone Archi- 

 tecture of Mexico and Central America," 

 etc. ; " Native Languages of America " ; and 

 " European Colonization and its Effects on 

 the Native Tribes of America." Papers 

 should be sent in to the office of the Asso- 

 ciation, 22 Albemarle Street, London, W., 

 on or before July 1st. 



