SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS 



A general plan to coordinate the work of the various associations 

 interested in changes in the executive departments of the Federal Gov- 

 ernment was set on foot on October 5, when John T. Pr.\tt, former 

 Secretary of War Stimson, Herbert Hoover, PauIv M. Warburg, 

 M. O. LEighTon and C. T. Chenery met and decided to call a meet- 

 ing of representatives of all interested organizations on October 14. A 

 general plan will be submitted by the National Committee on Gov- 

 ernmental Economy. 



The following educational courses are being given at the Bureau of 

 Standards: H. L. Curtis: Advanced electricity and magnetism, h. B. 

 TuckERMAn: Theory of functions. L. H. Adams: Physical chemistry. 

 I. C. Gardner: Optical instruments and lens design. 



At the regular meeting of the Board of Surveys and Maps on Octo- 

 ber 12, the committees on Coordination, Highway Maps, and Hydro- 

 graphic Charts made complete reports, which are being prepared for 

 distribution. 



The National Academy of Sciences has purchased the block bounded 

 by B, C, Twenty-first, and Twenty-second Streets, N. W., near the 

 Lincoln Memorial. The site will be used for the erection of a home 

 for the Academy and the National Research Council. Funds for the 

 building have been allotted by the Carnegie Corporation of New York. 



The representatives of the various organizations constituting the Fed- 

 erated American Engineering Societies met in Washington on Novem- 

 ber 18-19. 



The Grass Herbarium of the U. S. National Museum has recently 

 received from the Berlin Botanic Garden two consignments of grasses, 

 consisting of 100 specimens from Africa and South America, and 126 

 specimens nearly all of which were types of species described from 

 South America, " chiefly the Andean region, by Dr. Pilger. In pro- 

 portion to its size, the collection is the most valuable ever received by 

 the Herbarium. 



The mounted skeleton of an extinct Pleistocene wolverine from a 

 cave near Cumberland, Maryland, has recently been added to the 

 paleontological exhibits at the National Museum. 



At a meeting at the Chemists' Club in New York City on October 

 15, Dr. C. L. Alsberg, Chief of the Bureau of Chemistry, and Dr. 

 F. G. CoTTRELL, Director of the Bureau of Mines, presented the Gov- 

 ernment's arguments in favor of the bill concerning patents by Federal 

 employees (H. R. 9932 and S. 3223).^ Representatives of the chem- 

 ical industries opposed the bill but offered no substitute to accomplish 



' See this Journal 10: 400, 425. 1920. 



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