134 CARNEGIE INSTITUTION OF WASHINGTON. 



regarding solutions and the laws of physical chemistry apply broadly 

 to silicate solutions as well as elsewhere; that the multiplicity of par- 

 ticipating substances is not a prohibitive difficulty when these are 

 appropriately grouped for study; and now, finally, that the fact that 

 some of the substances which participated in the formation process 

 were volatile and disappeared in part from the system in the process 

 of its development is no longer an absolute bar to the competent study 

 of such systems. All this was necessary, and with appropriate detailed 

 development may- be expected to prove sufficient for the competent 

 study of rock formation with its allied problems and applications, 

 which was the purpose of the founders of the Geophysical Laboratory. 



The second direction in which the interests of this laboratory have 

 advanced materially during the year is in the progress of volcano 

 study. Perhaps for the first time in the history of volcano observa- 

 tion, laboratory-trained men have stood upon the brink of an active 

 volcano basin, fully equipped to measure the temperature distribution 

 prevailing deep down in the boiling lava at their feet and to collect 

 appropriate samples both of the liquid and gaseous ingTedients which 

 through their interreaction so largely determine the character of 

 volcanic phenomena. The materials so collected still remain to be 

 studied and no inference at this time can properly forecast the con- 

 clusions which will be reached as a result of these studies, but the 

 opportunity presented this year was a rare one and the fact that 

 trained men and appropriate facilities were on the ground to take 

 advantage of it forms one of the bright pages in the history of this 

 elusive science. It will be recalled that volcanoes offer the only oppor- 

 tunity now remaining to science to study the phenomena accompanying 

 the formation of igneous rocks in nature, and by far the greater portion 

 of these must remain entirely inaccessible to man because of the 

 violence of their activity. 



During the present season an opportunity was also afforded to this 

 laboratory, through the courtesy of the National Geographic Society, 

 to be represented upon the advisory committee in charge of its explor- 

 ing expedition to Mount Katmai, the great Alaskan volcano which 

 exploded with extreme violence in 1912, and to provide equipment for 

 the collection of samples from the gaseous emanations and the salts 

 deposited thereby. These were collected with great care and con- 

 siderable hardship by Professor Robert F. Griggs, leader of the expedi- 

 tion, and Professor J. W. Shipley, its chemist, and are on their way to 

 Washington at the time of writing. 



Volcano studies in Italy, which are in charge of Mr, Frank A. Perret, 

 have suffered somewhat from limitations placed upon the movements 

 of foreigners and the use of instruments because of the state of war. 

 Notwithstanding these, Mr. Perret has been able to make occasional 

 observations of Vesuvius and has twice spent a night at the bottom 



