808 EXPERIMENT STATION" RECORD. IVoI. 41 



Department, IT. S. Army, K. G. Fat.k {Jour. Indus, and Engin. Chem., 11 

 (1919), Ko. 11, pp. 1062, 1063). — A brief statement is given of the lines of in- 

 vestigation which have been carried on at the Harriman Researcli Laboratory 

 in a study of the protein decomposition of meat. These have included the 

 chemical study of meat spoilage, the published results of which have been 

 noted from various sources (E. S. R., 40, pp. 712, 713) ; a study, by I. Green- 

 wald, of the factors upon which the toxic action of spoiled meat depend 

 (E. S. R., 41, p. 668) ; and a study of the methods for preventing spoilage which 

 resulted in the new process of dehydration noted above. 



METEOROLOGY. 



Smithsonian meteorological tables {Smithsn. Misc. Collect., 69 (1918), No. 1, 

 pp. LXXII-\-261, fig. 1), — This is the fourth revised edition of these tables, the 

 original edition of which was issued in 1893. The revision was "prepared 

 under the direction of Prof. Charles F. Marvin, Chief of the U. S, Weather 

 Bureau, assisted by Prof. Herbert H. Kimball. . . . 



"All errata thus far detected in the earlier editions have here been cor- 

 rected. New vapor pressure tables, derived from the latest experimental 

 values by means of a modification of Van der Waals' interpolation formula 

 devised by Professor Marvin, have been introduced. The table of relative^ 

 acceleration of gravity at different latitudes has been recomputed from a new 

 equation based upon the latest investigations of the U. S. Coast and Geodetic 

 Survey. These values have been employed in reducing barometric readings to 

 the standard value of gravity adopted by the International Bureau of Weights 

 and Measures, supplementing a table that has been introduced for directly re- 

 ducing barometer readings from the value of gravity at the place of observa- 

 tion to its standard value. The new values of vapor pressure and of gravity 

 acceleration thus obtained, together with a recent and more accurate deter- 

 mination of the density of mercury, have called for an extensive revision of 

 numerous other tables, and especially of those for the reduction of psychro- 

 metric observations, and the barometrical tables. Among the new tables added 

 are those for converting barometric inches and barometric millimeters into 

 millibars, for determining heights from pressures expressed in dynamic units, 

 tables of gradient winds, and tables giving the duration of astronomical ana 

 civil twilight, and the transmission percentages of radiation through moist air. 

 The tables of international meteorological symbols, of clouil classification, of 

 the Beaufort scale of winds, of the Beaufort weather notation, and the list of 

 metorological stations, are among those extensively revised. Tables for re- 

 ducing barometric readings to sea level, and tables of logarithms of numbers, 

 of natural sines and cosines, of tangents and cotangents, and for dividing by 

 28, 29, and 31, with a few others, have been omitted from this edition." 



The volume includes thermometrical tables, conversions involving linear 

 measures, conversion of measures of time and angle, conversion of measures 

 of weight, wind tables, reduction of temperature to sea level, barometrical 

 tables, hygi-ometrical tables, geodetical tables, and miscellaneous tables. 



Climatological data for the United States by sections (U. S. Dept. Agr.. 

 Weather Bur. Climat. Data, 6 (1919), Nos. 5, pp. [203], pU. Ji, figs. 2: 6. pp. 

 [201], pis. Jf, figs. 2). — ^These volumes contain brief summaries and detailed 

 tabular statements of climatological data for each State for INIay and .Tune, 

 1019, respectively. 



Meteorological observations at the Massachusetts Agricultural Experi- 

 ment Station, J. E. Ostrander and G. A. Smith (Massachusetts Sta. Met. Buls. 

 369-370 (1919), pp. 4 eac7i).— Summaries of observations at Amherst, Mass., on 



