432 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



The " Revue Scientifiquc " claims the 

 first thought of the germ theory of disease for 

 a Dr. Goiffon, who died at Lyons more than 

 one hundred and fifty years ago. He be- 

 lieved, in 1721, tliat diseases like the plague 

 could be caused only by minute insects or 

 worms, too small to be seen, perhaps, but 

 nevertheless really existing. lie also be- 

 lieved that the conveyance of infection 

 could be explained by their activity and 

 propagation. 



An observatory is in building at Sonn- 

 blick, in the Tyrolesc Alps, ten thousand 

 feet above the sea, which will be the high- 

 est of the kind in Europe. The mountain 

 is relatively easy of access, with mines half- 

 way up its slopes, and a wire rope-way in 

 operation leading up to them. The observ- 

 atory will be in telephonic communication 

 with the mines, and thence in telegraphic 

 communication with whatever spot it may 

 be desirable to reach. 



Professor Odling has described a pro- 

 cess in which benzoic acid, when heated in 

 sealed tubes at about 260° with an aqueous 

 solution of zinc chloride, i3 decomposed, and 

 yields chiefly benzene, together with a small 

 quantity of diphenylc. 



OBITUARY NOTES. 



Mr. Eli Whitney Blake, the inventor 

 of the Blake stone-crusher, who recently 

 died at his home in New Haven, Connecti- 

 cut, was the founder of the Connecticut 

 Academy of Arts and Sciences, and for 

 several years its president. He communi- 

 cated several papers to the " American 

 Journal of Science " and other scientific 

 publications ; and a number of these were 

 published together in 1882, under the title 

 of " Original Solutions of several Problems 

 in Aerodynamics." His stone-crusher is in 

 nearly universal use. 



Professor II. A. Bayne, Ph.D., of the 

 Royal Military College, Kingston, Ontario, 

 has recently died. He was a student under 

 Liebig, Bunsen, and Dumas. 



Herrmann Amen, an eminent Austrian 

 geologist, died on the 1st of July, nearly 

 seventy years of age. He began his scien- 

 tific career in 1831 by the publication of a 

 memoir on the minerals of the Spinel family. 

 At a later period he devoted special atten- 

 tion to the phenomena of volcanic action ; 

 he published an atlas of views of Vesuvius 

 and Etna in 1837, and a work on volcanic 

 formations in 1841. He investigated the 

 Caucasus region and Southeastern Europe, 

 and was, at the time of his death, superin- 

 tending the publication of the " Geologische 

 Forschungen in den kaukasischen Landem," 

 his greatest work. 



TnE death is reported of M. Ernest Dcs- 

 jardins, professor in the College de Prance, 

 aged eighty-three years. His principal la- 

 bors were upon problems of comparative 

 geography, in which missions executed by 

 him in Egypt, Italy, and the basin of the 

 Danube, led to interesting discoveries. His 

 most important publications were on the 

 topography of Latium, the ancient geogra- 

 phy of Italy, and the geography of ancient 

 Gaul. 



Alessandro Dorna, Director of the As- 

 tronomical Observatory at Turin, died in 

 August last, aged sixty-one years. 



M. Paul Bert, the eminent French 

 physiologist, died in Tonquin, where he oc- 

 cupied the position of French resident in 

 Annam and Cochin-China, on the 11th of 

 November. He had held professorships at 

 Bordeaux and Paris ; was elected to the 

 National Assembly in 1874; was an effi- 

 cient Minister of Public Instruction in 

 Gambctta's Cabinet ; and was a pleasing 

 writer on scientific and educational sub- 

 jects. 



Professor Frederick Settle Barff, in- 

 ventor of the Barff process for preventing 

 the corrosion of iron and of an antiseptic 

 compound, died on the 11th of August, aged 

 sixty-two years. The record of his life is 

 one of useful investigation and invention. 

 He delivered at different times " Cantor 

 Lectures " of the Society of Arts on " Artis- 

 tic Colors and Pigments," " Silicates, Sili- 

 cides, Glass, and Glass-Painting," and " Car- 

 bon, and Certain Compounds of Carbon, 

 treated principally in reference to Heating 

 and Illuminating Purposes " ; also juvenile 

 lectures, for 1878, on "Coal and its Com- 

 pounds." He was awarded the Society's 

 medal for a paper on " Zinc-White as Paint, 

 and the Treatment of Iron for the Preven- 

 tion of Corrosion," and a second medal for 

 his paper on " A New Antiseptic Com- 

 pound." He held the positions of Assist- 

 ant Professor of Chemistry at University 

 College, London, Examiner in Chemistry 

 for the Natural Science Tripos, Cambridge, 

 and Professor of Chemistry at the Catholic 

 University at Kensington, and in the Jesuits' 

 College, Beaumont. 



Dr. John P. Gray, Superintendeni of 

 the New York Lunatic Asylum, died in 

 Utica, November 29th, of Bright's disease, 

 aged sixty-one years. After having been 

 assistant physician at the lunatic asylum 

 for several years, he was appointed its su- 

 perintendent in 1854. He was regarded as 

 one of the foremost experts in insanity in 

 the United States. 



Professor Pan™, the great Danish 

 physiologist, has recently died in Copen- 

 hagen, in the sixty-fifth year of his age. 



