1898.] MICROSCOPICAL JOURNAL 41 



mental positions, zoologfical and botanical, and throws into 

 the list — " a person named Bowers, from Martinsburg-, 

 W. Va., to be U. S. Fish Commissioner." The work of 

 the U. S. Fish Commission is by law larg-ely practical, 

 statistical and economic. Of course zoologists and ichthy- 

 olog-ists who care little for what is outside of what they 

 call "science," would have preferred to welcome some col- 

 legfe professor to this position. But Professor Baird, the 

 founder of the commission, set the precedent by recom- 

 mending- as his own successor "a person named " Ferg-u- 

 son. President Cleveland appointed "a person named " 

 Brice as commissioner, and the present appointment con- 

 tinues the divorce of fish hatching-fromembryolog-y, classi- 

 fication and museum collecting-. The new commissioner 

 would do well, however, to call to his aid men of science 

 who can work with practical ends in view. Perhaps 

 money has been wasted in the past from too severel}' 

 ig-noring practical men of science and from assuming that 

 men of science must of necessity be unpractical. 



Testing Tuberculous Milk. — At Owen College, London, 

 Prof. S. Delepine takes the milk directly from a single 

 cow into a sterilized vessel and avoids all mixing. In the 

 laboratory 80 c. c, of the milk are centrifugalized in two 

 stout cylindrical test tubes holding 40 c. c. each. The 

 tubes are sterilized by steam. A centrifugal machine 

 giving 3,000 revolutions per minute is used for 15 minutes. 

 The tubes are kept closed with an india rubber cap till the 

 moment they are used. When the centrifugalization is 

 completed the thickness of the layer of cream and the di- 

 ameter of the sediment are measured, the color of the 

 milk and sediment are told, and the reaction and specific 

 gravity of the milk in the bottle are taken. Microscopical 

 preparations are then made with the cream and sediment 

 of the prepared milk. One drop of cream is taken with 

 a sterilized platinum loop, spread on a cover glass and 

 allowed to dry. The cream, together with the milk, is 

 then removed by means of a wide pipetle connected with a 

 vacuum apparatus. This is done with the tube standing 

 vertically and without disturbing the sediment. When 



