284 NATURAL SCIENCE. April, 



the larger Mammalia, owing to insufficiency of room. It is to be hoped that the new 

 buildings will be hurried on by the Cape Government, as it is a poor economy to 

 pinch science. A properly equipped local museum can do enough economic work in 

 one year to save a Government much fruitless expenditure in the matter of insect 

 pests and mineral quests. The chief acquisitions seem to be a large number of types 

 of new plants collected by Dr. Schlechter in the Western Province, Clanwilliam, 

 and Namaqualand. 



The following are the presidents of the British Association for the Toronto 

 meeting :— President, Sir John Evans; mathematics and physics, A. R. Forsyth; 

 chemistry, William Ramsay; geology, G. M. Dav/son ; zoology, L. C. Miall ; 

 economic science and statistics, E. C K. Gonner ; anthropology. Sir William 

 Turner; physiology, Michael Foster; botany, H. M. Ward. Evening lectures will 

 be delivered by Professor James Dewar and Mr. John Milne. Special rates have 

 been obtained from the Canadian railway and steamship lines. The sections will all 

 meet in the buildings of the University of Toronto. It is hoped that, besides 

 British, many foreign men of science will attend the meeting. 



A COMMISSION of American botanists has been appointed to consider the 

 establishment and the site of the proposed tropical laboratory. The Botanical 

 Gazette states that the assured co-operation of British botanists through a com- 

 missioner, and through liberal offers of facilities in case the station is established in 

 British possessions, ensures for the laboratory an international character. A report 

 will be presented by the commission to the meetings of the American and British 

 Associations this year. 



C. S. Sherrington, Professor of Physiology in University College, Liverpool, 

 is to deliver the Croonian Lecture of the Royal Society on April i, taking as his 

 subject "The Spinal Cord and Reflex Action." 



The Royal Zoological Society of Ireland has completed a goat-house and 

 rockery, the latter imitating the natural haunts of the goats and ibexes. A large 

 alligator-pond has been formed in the middle of the aquarium-house, while at one 

 end have been erected heated compartments with plate-glass fronts for tropical 

 snakes and lizards, at the other end cages and a tank for diving birds. The Irish 

 Naturalist states that it is intended to erect a new house and paddock for the llamas 

 and camels, two of the latter having died last year in the old house. New quarters 

 for the marsupials are also contemplated. 



There was once in Great Britain an Aeronautical Society, not to be confused 

 with the Balloon Society. This is being resuscitated, with a committee including 

 Colonel Baden-Powell, Colonel Templar, and Mr. H. S. Maxim. Balloons are now 

 becoming important aids in many kinds of scientific research ; thus, on February i8, 

 balloons with observers or self-registering instruments were sent up simultaneously 

 from Berlin, Strasburg, Paris, and St. Petersburg. The Society will have a large 

 field of usefulness. 



Science says that Robert H. Lamborn has bequeathed |2oo,ooo to the Academy 

 of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia. 



Professor Angelo Mosso of Turin has received from the Reale Istitufo 

 Lombardo the Fossati prize of 2,000 lire for his essay on the temperature of the 

 brain. 



Mr. W. Harcourt-Bath left England on March 12 upon an entomological 

 expedition to the Himalayas. 



The Journal of School Geography ior February states that the northern part of 

 Greenland, studied in 1892, by Lieut. R, E. Peary, has been named Peary Land 

 at the suggestion of the Geographical Club of Philadelphia, seconded by many other 

 geographers. 



