568 



POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



likely to deal a severe blow to such prog- 

 ress."' 



La Nature's Second Scientific Ex- 

 cursion.- — A second scientific excursion 

 to an interesting district of France is 

 planned, by M. Henri de Parville, of La 

 Nature, to start from Bayonne August 

 2.")th. It will spend about two weeks, 

 following the chain of the Pyrenees from 

 the ocean to the Mediterranean. Among 

 objects of interest enumerated are the 

 scenery at Biarritz, Pau, Cauterets, and 

 Bigorre; fine architecture at Toulouse, 

 Carcassonne, Elne, etc. ; glacial phenom- 

 ena and thermal waters along the whole 

 mountain chain; manufactories, includ- 

 ing iron works at Bouehain, woolen 

 mills at Bigorre, cigarette factories at 

 Perpignan, and the Arago Maritime 

 Laboratory and the sanitarium at Ban- 

 yuls. The excursion will be " person- 

 ally conducted " by the eminent anthro- 

 pologist and archaeologist, M. E. Car- 

 taillac. The excursion last year, to the 

 Central Plateau and the Tarn, was an 

 eminent success. The programme of the 

 present one seems equally attractive. 

 M. de Parville and his associates deserve 

 great credit for their sagacity and enter- 

 prise in inaugurating these excursions, 

 M'hich now promise to become annual. 

 We can conceive nothing more profitable 

 and conducive to real pleasure in a vaca- 

 tion than the tour in the company of men 

 having a common interest in the pursuit 

 of knowledge of Nature and art, through 

 such magnificent regions as that of the 

 Pyrenees or through a country so full of 

 natural wonders and novelties as that of 

 last j'ear's excursion. And it will be an 

 incalculable advantage to be under the 

 guidance of so eminent a student and 

 one so familiar with the remarkable fea- 

 tures and the antiquities of southern 

 France as M. Cartaillac. 



The American Association Meet- 

 ing. — The forty-eighth annual meeting 

 of the American Association for the Ad- 

 vancement of Science will be held at Co- 

 lumbus, Ohio, August 19th to 2Gth. The 

 association headquarters will be in Uni- 

 versity Hall, of the Ohio State Univer- 

 sity, and the headcjuarters of the coun- 

 cil will be at the Chittenden Hotel. 

 The president of the meeting will be 

 Prof. Edward Orton, of the Ohio State 

 University. The vice-presidents or chair- 



men of sections will be: Mathematics 

 and astronomy, Alexander Macfarlane; 

 physics, Elihu Thomson ; chemistry, F. P, 

 Venable; mechanics and engineering, 

 Storm Bull ; geology and geography, J. 

 F. Whiteaves; zoology, S. H. Gage; bot- 

 any, Charles R. Barnes; anthropology, 

 Thomas Wilson; social and economic 

 science, Marcus Benjamin. The Perma- 

 nent Secretary is L. O. Howard, Cosmos 

 Club, Washington; General Secretary, 

 Frederick Bedell, Cornell University; 

 Secretary of the Council, Charles Bas- 

 kerville. Chapel Hill, N. C. ; Treasurer, 

 R. S. Woodward, Columbia University, 

 New York. The address of retiring 

 President Putnam will be delivered Mon- 

 day evening, August 21st. Saturday, 

 August 26th, will be devoted to excur- 

 sions to Fort Ancient and elsewhere. 

 Receptions and shorter excursions will 

 be provided at hours that will not con- 

 flict with the appointments of the asso- 

 ciation. 



The Desire for Notoriety a Cause 

 of Crime.— Under the title Luccheni 

 Redivivus the London Lancet gives some 

 interesting psychological data which 

 have been obtained since the imprison- 

 ment of Luccheni, the assassin of the 

 Austrian Empress. Twice since his trial 

 and conviction he has attempted suicide. 

 Within the last few days (May 13th) his 

 moral condition has undergone a change 

 confirmatory in a significant degree of 

 the diagnosis which found vanity or me- 

 galomania at the root of his crime. The 

 cantonal juge d'instruction in an at- 

 tempt to ascertain if possible his asso- 

 ciates in the crime, visited him in his 

 cell and approached the subject with 

 what seemed to himself due dexterity 

 and caution. At once the previously 

 downcast and abject creature brightened 

 up, his eyes sparkling with gratified self- 

 importance. "/ glornall riparlano di 

 me? " (So the journals are talking of me 

 again) he exclaimed interrogatively. The 

 judge disclosed the object of his visit. 

 Luccheni thereupon dallied with his in- 

 terlocutor, smiling at his reminiscences 

 of the crime, assuming airs of reticence, 

 even indulging in self-contradiction to 

 tease if not torment his judicial antago- 

 nist. It was learned, however, that in 

 the preliminaries leading up to the as- 

 sassination he really had accomplices; be- 

 yond this nothing new was elicited from 



