October 22, 1908] 



NA TURE 



641 



thirteen years. The next steps are to arrange the neces- 

 sary alterations of the bye-laws and to secure the approval 

 by the Privy Council and the Home Secretary of the 

 revised bye-laws. 



The report for the year of the English branch of the 

 League for the Preservation of Swiss Scenery was pre- 

 sented at the general meeting held at the Royal Society 

 of Arts on October 21. The report shows that there has 

 been no slackening of the league's efforts in the direction 

 of securing the preservation of the beauties of the Alps. 

 The society has caused the circulation of a petition against 

 the Matterhorn Railway, and has obtained nearly 70,000 

 signatures to the protest. Steps have been taken to 

 formulate a scheme of protected areas. Opposition is to 

 be offered to the proposed mode of constructing the rail- 

 way through the SchoIIenen Gorge by iron bridges, which 

 would destroy the charm of the Teufelsbriicke. It is 

 proposed, if possible, to prevent the sale abroad of the 

 important collection at St. Moritz, illustrative of Swiss 

 life and culture during four centuries, known as the Enga- 

 diner Museum. The league is keeping itself informed of 

 the concessions applied for, and taking all possible steps 

 to prevent needless and unprofitable interference with the 

 grandeur of Swiss mountain scenery. 



We regret to see the announcement that Dr. Daniel C. 

 Oilman, first president of the Johns Hopkins University, 

 Baltimore, and afterwards head of the Carnegie Institute, 

 Washington, died on October 14 at Norwich, Connecticut, 

 at seventy-seven years of age. Educated first at Yale and 

 then at Cambridge and Berlin, he was in 1856 appointed 

 professor of geography in Yale University. He became 

 president of the University of California in 1872. Five 

 years later he went in the same capacity to the Johns 

 Hopkins University. His work there, which lasted until 

 1901, secured him a place among the foremost American 

 educators. In 1891 Dr. Oilman left Baltimore for Wash- 

 ington, where he spent three years organising the Carnegie 

 Institute. In addition to the work of his various uni- 

 versity appointments, Dr. Oilman was appointed by Presi- 

 dent Cleveland to act as commissioner in the Venezuela 

 and British Guiana boundary dispute. He acted also as 

 executive oflicer of the Geological Survey of Maryland. 

 He was president of the American Oriental Society, and a 

 prominent member of various learned societies and institu- 

 tions. His many publications include a memoir of Dana 

 the geologist, and " Science and Letters in Yale Uni- 

 versity." 



We regret to see the announcement of the death of 

 Lieut. -Colonel Charles Thomas Bingham, late Bengal 

 Staff Corps and Conservator of Forests, Burma, in his 

 sixty-first year. During his long residence in India and 

 Burma, he devoted much of his attention to natural 

 history, and formed large collections, which he distributed 

 liberally among museums and private naturalists, both in 

 India and England, and many recent works on the natural 

 history of India and Burma were largely based on these 

 collections. Colonel Bingham interested himself greatly 

 in all branches of natural history, and his earliest papers 

 on the subject which we find noticed relate to birds, and 

 were published in " Stray Feathers " from 1876-81. In 

 some of these early papers he was assisted by the late 

 Allan Hume. At a later period Colonel Bingham gave 

 most of his time and attention to insects, especially 

 Hymenoptera and Lepidoptera. From 1894 onwards a 

 long series of important papers on Hymenoptera, chiefly 

 those of the Indian region, appeared in various journals, 



NO. 2034, VOL. 78] 



and in 1897 and 1903 two volumes on the Hymenoptera 

 of India, Ceylon, and Burma in the " Fauna of British 

 India." These included the wasps, bees, ants, and 

 cuckoo-wasps. On Colonel Bingham's final retirement 

 from his official work he settled in London, devoting all 

 his time and attention to his two favourite authors. In 

 1905 appeared the first volume on butterflies in the 

 " Fauna of British India," and when, shortly afterwards, 

 Dr. Blanford died, he was succeeded by Colonel Bingham 

 as general editor of the series. In 1907 appeared the 

 second volume on butterflies, and Colonel Bingham was 

 engaged in the preparation of the third and concluding 

 volume at the time of his death. He will be widely re- 

 gretted by all who knew him, not only as a great 

 naturalist, but also as a dear and valued friend. 



The inaugural meeting of the winter session of the 

 London School of Tropical Medicine was held at the Royal 

 Society of Medicine on October 14, under the presidency 

 of Lord Crewe. The secretary reported that 849 students 

 had passed through the school since its opening in 1899. 

 Lord Crewe in his address alluded to the part taken by 

 Mr. Chamberlain in the foundation of the school, to the 

 interest of the Colonial Office in the schools of tropical 

 medicine, and the important work these were doing for 

 the State in fighting the scourge of disease in tropical 

 countries. Sir Clifford ."Mlbutt also addressed the meeting, 

 dealing with variation in disease, the distribution of disease 

 by traffic, and the importance in infection of the reaction 

 of the host towards the parasite. Sir Patrick Manson, in 

 moving a vote of thanks to the chairman and Sir Clifford 

 Allbutt, said that the profession as a whole has had an 

 enormous leavening by the students of tropical medicine. 

 There is great difficulty in imparting even to the post- 

 graduate mind anything like a knowledge of tropical 

 medicine by a three months' course. Nothing is so 

 gratifying as the support of the Government for the school. 

 There is now a scheme on foot to attack one of the gravest 

 medical problems affecting the inhabitants of the tropical 

 world, namely, ankylostomiasis, a disease which, in con- 

 sequence of the enormous number of people affected, is 

 one of prime importance. 



Many naturalists will regret to learn that Mr. W. 

 Saville-Kent died at Bournemouth, on October 11, from 

 heart disease following an operation. Mr. Saville-Kent 

 will perhaps be best remembered by his sumptuous work 

 on the Great Barrier Reef of Australia, published in 1893. 

 The remarkable photographs reproduced in that volume 

 were unique in their beauty, and with the text they pro- 

 vided the scientific world with extensive and accurate in- 

 formation about coral reefs as represented by the largest 

 existing coral structure. Mr. Saville-Kent also devoted 

 great attention to oysters and oyster fisheries of Queens- 

 land, and in his presidential address to the Royal Society 

 of Queensland in 1890 he urged the establishment of a 

 well-appointed biological station on Thursday Island, 

 which is the central depSt of the Torres Straits pearl and 

 pearl-shell, and the b(che-de-mer, fisheries. In 1892 he 

 exhibited at the Royal Society his photographs and colour 

 sketches of coral reefs, coral animals, and the marine 

 fauna generally of the Great Barrier district of Australia. 

 He showed at the same time a pearl of fine quality and 

 considerable size that he had caused the mother-of-pearl 

 shell animal to produce by means of a delicately manipu- 

 lated operation on the living animal. While engaged in 

 1893 as Commissioner of Fisheries to the Government of 

 Western Australia, Mr. Saville-Kent sent to London a 

 large collection of the stony corals peculiar to the 



