718 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



bats, and the parson arraigns. If he is only 

 moderately successful, his earnings, though 

 small, are safe, and he may hope that his 

 future will be as happy as his past. His 

 occupation, meanwhile, brings him consid- 

 eration and intelligent surroundings, and his 

 life is fairly and pleasantly varied. These 

 things all contribute to length of life. 



NOTES. 



The seventh annual meeting of the Ameri- 

 can Forestry Congress was held at Atlanta, 

 Ga., December 5, 6, and 7, 1888. Papers 

 and addresses on various subjects pertinent 

 to forestry in America were given. The 

 Congress lias for its object the creation of a 

 public sentiment in favor of a more rational 

 treatment of our forest resources. It is pro- 

 posed to raise a fund of ten thousand dol- 

 lars for carrying on the work of the Con- 

 gress, by creating life-memberships of one 

 hundred dollars each. The management of 

 the principal fund is to be in the hands of 

 the subscribers to it, who will be known as 

 patrons. 



The programme for the second triennial 

 session of the International Congress of Hy- 

 drology and Climatology, which is to be held 

 in Paris in October, 1889, includes questions 

 upon scientific hydrology, medical hydrology, 

 and chmatology. The membership fee is 

 twelve francs. 



According to Mr. Thomas T. P. Bruce 

 Warren, the better descriptions of India-rub- 

 ber, which are obtained from Brazil and Cen- 

 tral America, are now so eagerly sought aft- 

 er for the markets of the United States and 

 Germany that the British no longer have the 

 monopoly of the industry. Yankees are so 

 frequently at Para that they have virtually 

 the run of the market for the raw article 

 there, so that British customers have often 

 to take what would not pass muster for 

 them. 



Dr. Ludwig "Wolf relates that while the 

 natives of Africa usually meet the white man 

 with suspicion and hostility, the Baluba peo- 

 ple at once showed his party a blind, child- 

 like confidence. They greeted them as for- 

 mer deceased chiefs and relatives of their 

 king Kalamba ilukenge, by whose names 

 they always called them. This was in pur- 

 suance of their belief that all distinguished 

 -warriors and chiefs will return to them meta- 

 morphosed after death. 



Mr. Proctor left the manuscript of his 

 "Old and New Astronomy" in a more ad- 

 vanced state than was feared. Its comple- 

 tion has been undertaken by Mr. A. C. Ran- 

 yard, who was for some time Secretary of the 

 Royal Astronomical Society. 



Arsenic having been recommended by 

 Dr. Tommasi Crudelli as a substance that 

 will efficiently augment the mean resistance 

 of the human organism to the malarious 

 ferment, Dr. Ricchi, medical supervisor of 

 Italian railways, has adopted as a tonic food- 

 preparation, to aid the preventive virtue of 

 the arsenic, the impalpable soluble powder, 

 made from the " sterilized " and desiccated 

 blood of calves, which is known in commerce 

 as "trefusia." Dr. Tommasi Crudelli ap- 

 proves the preparation, as being adapted to 

 the condition of systems which are not 

 susceptible of protection by the arsenical 

 treatment alone. The same physician rec- 

 ommends decoction of lemon as a prophy- 

 lactic or remedy in cases in which arsenic 

 and quinine have failed. 



Sudden deaths are most frequent, ac- 

 cording to " The Lancet," when the condi- 

 tions of life change suddenly, or are espe- 

 cially liable to change — and this without 

 necessary reference to whether the change 

 effected be relatively for the better or for 

 the worse ; for the change may be so rap- 

 idly effected, in either direction, as to throw 

 upon the circulatory and respiratory func- 

 tions a strain which the organs are not able 

 to bear. In this way, persons with unsound 

 or weak hearts or weak arteries die suddenly 

 under rapid changes, although, if there were 

 no special strain consequent on the change, 

 it would in itself prove advantageous to them. 

 It may be accepted that sudden deaths are 

 especially likely to occur at periods of sea- 

 sonal change, and at times when rapid va- 

 riations of temperature are taking place. 



Prof. H. J. Mackinder, Reader of Geog- 

 raphy at the University of Oxford, expresses 

 the opinion that the best preliminary train- 

 ing for a geographical specialist is a sound 

 grounding in general science, and, superadded 

 to this, an elementary knowledge of history. 

 He has found by experience that it is ex- 

 ceedingly hard to give the necessary scien- 

 tific knowledge to a historian. 



Prof. Mackinder's courses in geography 

 at Oxford for 1888-'89 will include lectures 

 on " The Physical Geography of the Conti- 

 nents " ; " The Geography of the British 

 Isles, with Especial Reference to History " ; 

 and "The Historical Geography of North 

 America." To these will be added lectures 

 by Prof. Freeman on the " Historical Geog- 

 raphy of Europe," and by the Reader in In- 

 dian History on " The Geography of India." 

 Besides his duties at the university proper, 

 Prof. Mackinder last year gave one hundred 

 and two extension lectures on geography 

 and physiography at ten towns. 



The operation of transplanting a part of 

 a nerve from a rabbit to a man has been 

 successfully performed in Vienna, upon Prof, 

 von Flcischl, of the university. The profess- 

 or had lost his thumb and incurred neurotoma. 



