576 



NATURE 



[October ii, 1894 



sixth day. For example, as the little pheasant was 

 bolting with his worm, I seized it with a pair of forceps. 

 This alarm or anger note was at once uttered, and the 

 little fellow bridled up and seemed ready to show fight. 



The birds when fresh run about with little short spurts 

 or dashes, as do also chicks. They have a dislike to 

 being confined. When they were surrounded with wire 

 netting, although the space inside was ample for all their 

 needs, they squeezed through the meshes, and did so 

 very cleverly when four or five days old. At about this 

 age or earlier they preen their down, and the incipient 

 feathers of the wing, often tumbling over from imperfect 

 co-ordination. They also peck persistently at their toes. 

 They scratch the ground much less than chicks. 



More difficulty was found in rearing the pheasants by 

 hand than in the case of chicks. Several died apparently 

 from constipation. None were reared beyond the fifteenth 

 day. The coldness of the season was against them, and 

 unfortunately, through an accident, the incubator drawer 

 in which they slept was allowed to get cold, and this 

 caused the death of the last two, one of which was quite 

 healthy. I hope to repeat the observations, next year, 

 on these and other young birds under more favourable 

 conditions. Such as they are, however, they serve to 

 confirm the conclusions based upon the study of newly- 

 batched chicks and ducklings, which I briefly set forth in 

 Natural Science for March 1894, and which are con- 

 sidered at greater length in my " Introduction to Com- 

 parative Psychology," to be published this autumn in 

 the Contemporary Science Series. 



C. Llovd Morgan. 



SCHOOLS OF METEOROLOGY. 



IN your issue of September 13, p. 4Si,you correctly 

 state that one icason for the small number of 

 meteorologists is the want of a training school. This is 

 a defect in our University curricula that I have frequently 

 pointed out and sought to remedy. You will agree with 

 me that meteorology is worthy of a generous and pro- 

 found treatment. It should be recognised as a possible 

 major course in all large Universities. Laboratories 

 should be provided where all questions bearing on the 

 atmosphere and its motions can be experimentally 

 elucidated. 



1 append a sketch of the four years' course of study 

 and work that I hope to carry out with my own students. 

 The necessary laboratory conveniences have not yet been 

 provided, but we are looking forward hopefully. 



1 shall be glad if your publication of this course con- 

 tribute in any way to the proper study of meteorology by 

 the young physicists of the British Empire. 



Clevel.\nd Abbe. 



Washington, September 24. 



Columbian University. 

 Department of Meteorology. 



The series of courses in the Department of Meteoro- 

 logy is designed to give a complete review of the present 

 condition of that science, and is therefore necessarily 

 extended through four years ; but the series of lectures 

 is so arranged that each of the four divisions is complete 

 within itself; each course presents a view of a branch of 

 the subject such as may be desired by a large number of 

 students who need this information in connection with 

 other branches of knowledge to which they arc specially 

 devoting themselves. 



Students who intend to take the degree of I'h.D. in 

 meteorology, and who therefore make this the major 

 subject in connection with several other minor courses, 

 must pursue the whole four years' course. Those who 

 desire merely to enter the service of the United States 

 Weather llureau will probably find the first year's course 

 sufficient to en.ible them to pass the necessary Civil 



NO. 1302, VOL. 50] 



Service examinations. Those who desire to do work in 

 climatological study should also take the second year. 

 The third year's course is designed for those who wish to 

 perfect themselves in methods of making I0c.1l weather 

 forecasts. Finally, the fourth year's course will serve as 

 an abundant introduction to the present state of our 

 knowledge of the mechanics and physics of the atmo- 

 sphere. In addition to the lectures, the instructor will 

 give one hour a week to a quiz-class, in which, by question 

 and answer, he will seek to remove any difficulties th.at 

 remain. 



(1) Observational Meteorology.— ^Tht methods of 

 observation ; the simpler instruments, their errors, 

 corrections, and reductions ; the use of self-registers ; the 

 forms of record and computation ; personal diary of the 

 weather. 



Time. — .\bout eighty lectures, or two hours a week, as 

 alsoj eighty other hours of personal investigation of 

 instruments, especially self-registers. 



Algebra and trigonometry are necessary preliminaries 

 to this course. Elementary laboratory physics, as illus- 

 trated by Hall and Bergen's text-book, is desirable as a 

 preliminary, but may be pursued as a concomitant study. 

 The German language is earnestly recommended as a 

 concomitant. The differential and integral calculus will 

 be needed as preliminary to the Graduate Course in 

 Meteorology. 



(2) Climatology, both local and general ; empirical 

 meteorology, generalisations, averages, periodicities, 

 irregularities. The relation of climate to geology, to 

 vegetation, to animal life, and to anthropology. 



Ti?>ie. — .About forty lectures and four hours weekly 

 given to the investigation of special problems proposed 

 in each lecture. 



Students should be familiar with the use of logarithms ; 

 the method of least squares ; the laws of chance ; the 

 details of physical geography, orography, geology, and 

 ocean currents ; the physiology of plants and animals ; 

 the distribution of species ; physical astronomy, especi- 

 ally that of the sun, earth, and moon ; terrestrial mag- 

 netism ; the chemistry of the atmosphere ; the biology 

 of atmospheric dust. Physical laboratory work on 

 radiation, conduction, and absorption of heat, and on 

 condensation and evaporation of vapour, and on 

 elementary electricity, is recommended, while German, 

 the calculus and analytic mechanics should be continued 

 as preliminary to the Graduate Course. 



Graduate School of Meteorology. 



The following scheme of studies in meteorology, sub- 

 ject to arrangement between the teacher and his pupils, 

 is offered for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy : — ■ 



(1) Practical meteorology ; the daily weather chart ; 

 the empirical laws of weather changes as depending on 

 meteorological data, and the arrangement of continents, 

 plateaus, mountains, oceans, &c. ; weather types and 

 typical weather charts ; prediction of daily weather and 

 seasonal climates; verification of predictions. 



7>w<'.— About forty lectures and at least five hours a 

 week additional, in verifying old laws and studying new 

 ones, in making and verifying predictions. 



Concomitant Stmlies. — Methods of chart projection ; 

 experimental laboratory work in both steady and discon- 

 tinuous motions of fiuid and gases ; mathematical and 

 experimental electricity ; the laws of refraction and 

 interference of light ; elementary hydrodynamics and 

 thermodynamics ; differential equations and definite 

 integrals ; the German language. 



(2) Theoretical meteorology. Insolation. The ab- 

 sorption, conduction, and radiation of heat by the air 

 and the earth. The thermodynamics of the atmosphere ; 

 the graphic methods of Hertz and liczuld. Convective 

 equilibrium, as applied to the .-rtmosphere of the sun by 

 Lane, and to that of the earth by Sir William Thomson 



