December 24, 1908] 



NA TURE 



■■■"I 



is constituted as . follows : — Sir Henry Cunynghame, 

 K.C.B., chairman, Sir Boverton Redwood, F.R.S., Major 

 Cooper Key, and Mr. James Ollis. The secretary to the 

 coinniittee is Major T. H. Crozier, to whom correspondence 

 may be addressed at the Home Office, Whitehall, S.W. 



The Geological Society of Glasgow, instituted in 1858, 

 has now entered the fifty-first year of its existence. The 

 council has made arrangements to celebrate the event by 

 holding a jubilee meeting in Glasgow University on 

 January 28. Sir Archibald Geikie, K.C.B., F.R.S.', the 

 si.iiiur member of the society, has promised to be present 

 and deliver an address. Sir Donald MacAlister, K.C.B., 

 Dr. Teall, F.R.S. , director-general of the Geological 

 Survey of Great Britain, Dr. Home, F.R.S., Mr. B. N. 

 Peach, F.R.S., and other eminent men of science will talie 

 part in the proceedings. A history of the work of the 

 society, with biographical notices of prominent members, 

 is being prepared under the editorship of the secretaries, 

 Messrs. P. Macnair and F. Mort, who hope to issue the 

 book by the end of the year. 



Harv.ard University has lost the senior niembcr of her 

 faculty by the death, on December 9, of Dr. Wolcott 

 Gibbs, emeritus Rumford professor of the application of 

 sciejice to the useful arts. Dr. Gibbs, who was a son of 

 George Gibbs, the mineralogist, was born at New York 

 in 1S22. After graduating as M.D. at the College of 

 Physicians and Surgeons in that city, he pursued his 

 studies under Hcinrich Rose at Berlin, under Liebig at 

 Giessen, and under Regnault at Paris. From 1849-63 he 

 occupied the chair of physics and chemistry at the College 

 of the City of New York. He held his active professor- 

 ship at Harvard from 1863-87. During this latter period 

 he distinguished himself by his researches in light, heat, 

 and organic chemistry, particularly in reference to complex 

 inorganic bases and acids. His investigations of the 

 platinum metals are also well known. In 1886. Prof. 

 Gibbs was elected foreign secretary of the U.S. National 

 .Academy of Sciences, and in 1895 its president. He 

 rendered conspicuous public service on the executive com- 

 mittee of the Sanitary Commission during the Civil War. 

 and was U.S. commissioner to the Vienna Exposition of 

 1873. He was one of the founders, in 1863, of the Union 

 League Club, which gave valuable help to the Union cause 

 in the struggle with the Confederacy. 



The first number of a very attractive inonthly magazine 

 of Travel and Exploration has just been published under 

 that title by Messrs. Witherby and Co. The fundamental 

 note of the magazine is that of human interest in the 

 places, peoples, and products of the world. Travel in 

 all its aspects — by land, water, or air — will be dealt with 

 for the benefit of the general reader and the inspiration 

 and guidance of the young explorer. Exploration is a 

 comprehensive word, and can be applied to studies of the 

 heavens above as well as the earth beneath, but apparentlv 

 the magazine is to be limited to accounts of geographical 

 exploration. In the first number Sir Clements Markhani 

 appeals to the spirit of adventure, and Lieut. Trolle 

 describes the Danish expedition to north-east Greenland, 

 which led to valuable scientific results gained at the price 

 of the lives of the leader Erichsen and his two companions. 

 .Mr. L. C. Bernacchi predicts that Peru will gradually 

 become one of the richest countries of the world, and Mr. 

 E. S. Bruce describes the progress in the construction and 

 performance of dirigible balloons. There are other con- 

 tributions upon travel in the Balkans, photography for 

 travellers, and New Guinea, and the pages are brightened 

 with excellent illustrations. The magazine should .nppe.il 

 to a wide circle of readers. 



.Anothek remarkable aeroplane tliglit was accomplished 

 by -Mr. Wilbur Wright ai .-Xuvours, near Le Mans, on 

 December 18. The flight lasted ih. S4"^-i ^"^ '^e 

 distance covered is estimated to have been more than ninety 

 miles. The flight took place around a triangular course 

 marked with flags at a measured distance apart, and the 

 official record of the number of revolutions around this 

 course gives the distance traversed as si.xty-two miles, but 

 the actual track of the aeroplane was often far beyond 

 the measured triangle, thus making the distance much 

 greater. By his achievement, Mr. Wright will probably 

 win the Michelin trophy of 8ooi. for travelling the 

 greatest distance in the air before December 31. He has 

 won the prize of 40L offered by the A^ro Club of Sarthe 

 for the first aeroplane flight at an altitude of 100 metres. 

 The subjoined table, from Saturday's Daily Mail, shows 

 the progress made in motor flight with heavier-than-air 

 machines during the past five years : — 



The current issue of the Fortnightly lievic'LV contains 

 an article by Dr. William S. Bruce on the aims and objects 

 of modern Polar exploration. Supposing the object of an 

 expedition to be a detailed investigation of the North Polar 

 basin, Dr. Bruce gives a sketch of the equipment of such 

 .an expedition, the method of procedure, the personnel of 

 the staff, and the relations which should subsist between 

 the leader of the expedition and the master of the ship. 

 This investigation is. Dr. Bruce says, the only piece of 

 work in the North Polar regions that remains to be done 

 on an extensive scale, though there is much ."Arctic work 

 required in other directions. The Beaufort Sea, the 

 islands and channels of the north of the American con- 

 tinent, offer a splendid field for topographical, hydro- 

 graphical, biological, geological, and other research. 

 Turning to South Polar regions, it is remarked that almost 

 everything south of 40° S. requires a thorough investiga- 

 tion and overhauling, and vast stores of information are 

 to be gathered . from both sea and land. It is, in Dr. 

 Bruce's judgment, a study of the sub-.'\ntarctic and the 

 .Antarctic seas that requires investigation in the first place, 

 including an exploration and definition of the southern 



NO. 2043, VOL. 79] 



