•56 



NA TURE 



[December 18, 1902 



representative committee was appointed to make the necessary 

 arrangements, the chairman being Prof. George F. Barker, and 

 secretary Mr. I. Minis Hays. 



The commission appointed a year ago by the legislature of 

 New York- to investigate and report upon the advisability of 

 (he State establishing an electrical laboratory will probably 

 report, says the Electrical World, in favour of establishing 

 such an institution, which will also serve as a standardisation 

 bureau. It is reported that the commission has learned that 

 the amount of capital in New York State directly interested in 

 the development and use of electricity is 1,680,590,290 dollars, 

 made up of 217,974,695 dollars, representing the capitalisation 

 of the companies engaged in the manufacture of electrical 

 apparatus, and 1,462,615,595 dollars, the capitalisation of the 

 companies involving the use of electricity. 



A petition to be presented to the council of the Chemical 

 Society is now being circulated among Fellows of that body for 

 signature, in which it is suggested that the council should 

 take the opportunity afforded by the approaching resignation 

 of the senior secretary, Prof. W. R. Dunstan, of limiting the 

 period during which this office may be held, and so afford to 

 the younger Fellows of the Society " an opportunity of gaining 

 experience in this honourable official position." It is pointed 

 out that such a limitation is already in force at the Royal 

 Society. 



A meeting of the Imperial Yaccination League was held on 

 Friday last, under the presidency of the Duke of Northumber- 

 land. The report was read by Mrs. Garrett Anderson, and it 

 stated that the League would supply literature on the subject of 

 vaccination for distribution, and that a body of lecturers would 

 be organised to give addresses on the subject of smallpox and the 

 protection which vaccination affords. In proposing the adoption 

 of the report, the chairman referred to the extremely small fear 

 of complications arising from vaccination now that calf lymph 

 is used. The Bishop of Stepney, in seconding, remarked that 

 educational work by the League was necessary in order to 

 counteract the influence of societies opposed to vaccination. 

 Sir Michael Foster, in moving the election of the executive 

 committee, stated that an important point to consider was 

 whether the sanitary authorities were the right ones to administer 

 the Acts relating to the health of the people. 



At the annual meeting of the Yorkshire Naturalists' Union, 

 held at Hull on December 10, Mr. W. Denison Roebuck was 

 presented with a handsome testimonial in recognition of his past 

 services as secretary of the Union and editor of the Naturalist. 

 The presentaUon took the form of a beautifully illuminated ad- 

 dress, in book form, and a clock and bronzes. References were 

 made by many speakers to the ability with which Mr. Roebuck 

 had worked in the interests of the Union. The presidential 

 address was afterwards delivered by Mr. P. F. Kendall, his sub- 

 ject being "Problems in the Distribution of Animals and 

 Plants." The new secretary is Mr. T. Sheppard, of the 

 Municipal Museum, Hull, and the Naturalist will in future be 

 edited by Mr. Sheppard and Mr. T. W. Woodhead, of Hud- 

 dersfield. The president for 1903 is Mr. Roebuck, and Mr. 

 J. II. Howarth is the treasurer. 



The Zoological Society of New York has acquired the 

 Aquarium, which stands in Battery Park, New York City. It 

 has been transferred to the Society by the City upon terms 

 which provide for the entire control and management of the 

 Aquarium by the Society and for an adequate maintenance of 

 it by the City. The Society has appointed Mr. Charles H. 

 Townshend, late of the United States Fish Commission, as 

 director of the Aquarium. With him will be associated an 



NO. I729, VOL. 67] 



advisory committee of experts, and the Aquarium will be 

 managed by the Society in the same manner as the Zoological 

 Park. 



Dr. J. W. B. Gunning, Director of the Pretoria Museum 

 and Zoological Gardens, sends us a long list of the additions to 

 the menagerie of that institution which have been made during 

 recent months. Amongst them is the celebrated lioness 

 "Beauty," commonly called " Kruger's Lion,'' which was 

 originally presented by the late Mr. Rhodes to the Pretoria 

 Gardens in 1899 and returned to the donor by Mr. Kruger's 

 orders. Mr. Rhodes then gave it to the Zoological Society of 

 London, in whose gardens it remained for two years. At the 

 special request of the authorities at Pretoria, the lioness was 

 sent back there in July last, Mr. Rhodes's executors having 

 signified their approval of this being done. 



By the death of Mr. Henry Stopes, the science of prehistoric 

 archeology has lost an enthusiastic student and an indefatigable 

 collector. By profession Mr. Stopes was an engineer, and he 

 more particularly interested himself in Palaeolithic implements 

 viewed from the standpoint of a practical mechanic. He 

 amassed an enormous collection of Palaeolithic implements of 

 all sorts, rightly judging that long series were all important in 

 scientific study. He held that more could usually be learned 

 from a rude or from an imperfect or unfinished implement than 

 from the typical finished product, and thus he eagerly collected 

 the " wasters " and the ruder and unfinished forms. In a short 

 paper published in the Journal of the Anthropological Institute 

 (vol. xxix., 1S99, p. 302), he announced the discovery of 

 Neritinajluviatilis, with a Pleistocene fauna and worked flints 

 in high terrace gravels of the Thames valley, and in the follow- 

 ing volume of the same Journal (p. 299) he published a paper 

 on " Unclassified Worked Flints," illustrated by numerous 

 specimens. 



The following candidates have been nominated for the 

 Fellowship of the Reale Accademia dei Lincei : — As correspond- 

 ing Fellows, Profs. Baccari, Donati, Lustig, Parona, Pascal 

 and Venturi ; as foreign Fellows, Profs. Lorentz, Thalen, 

 de Yries, Wiesner and Zeuthen. The Academy has been 

 singularly unfortunate in its loss during the summer recess of 

 the four ordinary Fellows General Annibale Ferrero, Prof. 

 AdolfoTargioni-Tozzetti, Prof. Alfonso Cossa and Prof. Riccardo 

 Felici, one corresponding Fellow, Prof. Magnaghi, and, on the 

 list of foreign Fellows, Profs. Faye and Virchow. General 

 Annibale Ferrero took a prominent part from the outset in the 

 work of the International Geodetic Association. He held office 

 in 1872 as head of the geodetic division of the Italian Military 

 Topographical Institution, in 1893 as director of the Military 

 Geographical Institution, from 1873-83 as secretary, and from 

 18S3 as president, of the Royal Geodetic Commission for Italy, 

 from 1891 to 1S97 as vice-president of the Permanent Commis- 

 sion of the International Geodetic Association, and from 1897 

 until his death as president of the Association itself. Prof. 

 Adolfo Targioni-Tozzetti started his career as a botanist, but in 

 1866 was elected to the chair of comparative anatomy and 

 invertebrate zoology at Florence. In 1875, he was appointed 

 director of the newly-formed Department of Agricultural 

 Entomology at Florence. His most important writings are 

 on entomological subjects, and include papers on the 

 luminous organ; of the Italian "lucciole," the classifica- 

 tion of the Orthoptera and the vine diseases oidium and 

 phylloxera. Alfonso Cossa was first assistant leclurer at Pavia 

 in materia medica and botany ; he subsequently held an 

 appointment there as professor of chemistry and director of the 

 Technical Institution; from 1866 to 1871 he was principal 

 of a new technical institution at Udine, and then at Turin he 

 held various posts, culminating in 1S82 in a chair of chemistry 



