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August 20, 1885 | 
NATURE as 
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of the salary of a curator and for the acquisition of new speci- 
mens. This collection, so lib>rally provided for, includes many 
noble examples of rare minerals. ; 
‘The University of Pennsylvania possesses also a mineral 
cabinet which is administered by Dr. Genth, whose private 
collection is probably in some respects unique, especially as 
regards pseudomorphs and minerals which have been derived 
from others by alteration. Here it may be mentioned that in 
Philadelphia there are several important private collections of 
minerals which have been acquired at great expense by their 
owners—among them those of Dr. Lea and Mr. Bemment are 
especially noteworthy. However scientific institutions. may have 
progressed in other parts of the United States of late years, 
Americans cannot but admit the debt which their country owes 
to the Academy of Natural Sciences for the leading part which 
it has taken for so many years in the advancement of know- 
ledge of the natural sciences.”’ ‘ 
Mr. Ball gives a somewhat detailed account of the American 
Museum of Natural History, New York, which, however, we 
need not quote, as we recently referred to it in some detail. 
The well-known Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 
Boston, was founded by charter in 1841, its objects, as sketched 
out by its first President, Prof. Rogers, being threefold, namely, 
the establishment of a Society of Arts, a Museum of Arts, and a 
School of Industrial Science. The Society of Arts was the first 
part of the scheme to be organised. It holds fortnightly meet- 
ings, from October to May, the objects of which are to ‘‘awaken 
and maintain an active interest in the practical sciences, and to 
aid generally in their advancement and development in connec- 
tion with arts, agriculture, manufactures, and commerce.” Dis- 
coveries and inventions are described and discussed at these 
meetings. Judging from the titles and characters of the subjects 
which have been communicated, the results of these meetings 
are often doubtless of such a character as to confer great benefit 
on the community at large. Abstracts of the proceedings are 
published in the annual reports. 
In the new building a spacious and suitable hall has been pro- 
vided for an Industrial Museum; but, although varied and 
valuable collections have been made of material suitable for such 
a Museum, it has been necessary to make use of them in the 
different departments of the school, where they are placed so as 
to be easy of access to teachers and students, which would not 
be the case were they centralised in the main building. The 
most important branch of the institution, Mr. Bull states, which 
has excited the admiration of s> many visitors, is the School of 
Industrial Science. 
This school was founded in 1865, and two subsidiary schools 
have since been organised under the control of the Corporation 
of the Institute. These are, respectively, the Lowell School of 
Practical Design and the School of Mechanic Arts. The studies 
in the school ‘‘are so arranged as to offer a practical and liberal 
education in preparation for active pursuits, as well as a thorough 
training for most of the active professions.” 
The regular courses, each of four years’ duration, are as 
follows :— 
I. Civil and topographical engineering. 
Mechanical engineering. 
. Mining engineering. 
. Geology and mining. 
Architecture. 
. Chemistry. 
. Metallurgy. 
. Natural history. 
Preparatory to the professional study of medicine. 
. Physics. 
. Electrical engineering. 
IX. A.B.C. General courses. 
For proficiency in any one of these courses the degree of 
Bachelor in Science (S.B.), in the course pursued, is conferred. 
The first six of these courses and VIII. B. are distinctly pro- 
fessional, The general courses IX. A.B.C. are for students who, 
though not desiring to enter a distinctly scientific profession, 
desire an education of a pre-eminently scientific character. 
Advanced courses of study may be pursued with or without 
reference to the higher degree of Doctor of Science. Women 
who are properly qualified are admitted to any of the courses of 
the school, and special laboratories in the different branches of 
study have been provided for their use. Schedules of pre- 
scribed studies in the various courses indicate very clearly the 
wei ht which is given to the modern languages and other branches 
of a liberal but strictly non-classical education. 
The staff of professors and assistants is a large and highly 
competent one, and the practical part of the instraction appears 
to be carried on in a very earnest and sound manner. Tae fee 
for regular students is 400 dollars per annum, to which in esti- 
mating the total cost must be added board and lodzing in the 
town, books, instruments, and personal expenditure. There are 
at present about 440 students on the roll. From the records of 
the School it would appear that numbers of its graduates occupy 
important positions all over the country, for which their special 
training has qualified them. 
The School of Mechanic Arts is for the benefit of those who, 
from want of time or means, are unable to go through one of the 
regular courses of the School of Industrial Science. ‘‘ The 
object is to develope the bodily and mental powers in harmony 
with each other.” Its exact and systematic method affords the 
direct advantage of training the hand and the eye for accurate 
and efficient service with the greatest economy of time. The 
instruction in the mechanic arts given to each regular student at 
present embraces :—I. Carpentry and joinery ; II. Wood turn- 
ing; III. Pattern making; IV. Foundry work; V. Iron 
forging; VI. Vice work; WII. Machine tool work. The 
regular course includes two years of study in English, French, 
and elementary mathematics and physics. The general plan of 
the School is found2d upon the systens followed in the Imperial 
Technical School of Moscow, the Royal Mechanical Art School 
of Komotan in Bohemia, the Ecole Municipale d’Apprentis of 
Paris, and the Ambachts Schoole of the principal cities of 
Holland, modified, however, to suit local conditions. Ap- 
plicants for entrance must be at least fifteen years old, and must 
pass an examination in arithmetic, geography, and composition. 
Fifty-six students have been on the roll during the current year. 
The Lowell School of Practical Design was established by 
the trustees of the Lowell Institute for the purpose of promoting 
industrial art in the United States, but it is under the admini- 
stration of the Corporation of the Institute of Technology. 
Tuition is free to all pupils. A considerable degree of skill in 
freehand drawing from nature and in the use of the brush is 
positively required for entrance to the school, which does not 
undertake to teach drawing 
* Course of Study.—Students are taught the art of making 
patterns for prints, ginghams, delaines, silks, laces, paperhang- 
ings, carpets, oil-cloths, &c. The course is of three years’ 
duration, and embraces (1) technical manipulations ; (2) copying 
and variations of designs ; (3) original designs or composition 
of patterns ; (4) the making of working drawings and finishing 
of designs,” 
The school is provided with looms for different fabrics, and 
the pupils have the opportunity of working their designs in 
various materials. A constant supply of samples of novelties in 
textile fabrics of all kinds is received from Paris. Those students 
who, at the close of the half-year, do not show evidence of pro- 
gress are permitted to withdraw. Some sixty students have 
received certificates from this school, and the majority of them 
have found employment in various factories and other places of 
business. 
Among other institutions referred to in this Report are the 
Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology, the Meteorological 
Museum, Harvard, the Peabody Museum, Connecticut, the 
Peter Redpath Museum, Montreal, and the Geological Museum, 
Ottawa. The Report is illustrated by numerous views and 
plans. 
SCIENTIFIC SERIALS 
Konigliche Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften, Gottingen, January 
to March, 1885.—Memoir on Jacob Grimm, by F. Frensdorff.— 
On the optical properties of very thin metal plates, by W. Voigt. 
—Seventh annual report on the treatment of ear complaints in 
University Hospital, Gottingen, by Dr. K. Biirkner.—A contri- 
bution to the history of the Papacy during the tenth century, by 
Ludwig Weiland.—On the electric conductivity of liquid solu- 
tions in a state of extreme dilution, by Friedrich Kohlrausch.— 
On the Eris of Greek mythology, her outward appearance and 
representation in plastic art and literature, by Friedrich Wieseler. 
—On the theory of complex magnitudes formed of % units, by 
R. Dedekind.—The organic Aryan inflection of the locative 
case singular of the zw declension, by A. Bezzenberger.—On 
Euler’s integral in connection with Cauchy’s ‘‘ Mémoire sur les 
Intégrales définies,” by A. Enneper.—A demonstration of the 
multiplication theorem for the determinants, by M. Falk.—A 
