238 



SCIENCE 



N. S. Vol. XXX. No. 764 



A Bristol County Academy of Sciences, 

 situated at Taunton, lias been organized and 

 incorporated under the laws of Massachusetts. 

 It is proposed to establish a museum with col- 

 lections selected especially to illustrate the 

 local fauna and flora, to establish a library 

 and reading room, to conduct a laboratory if 

 possible, to maintain a bureau of information, 

 to provide lectures and to issue publications. 

 The president is Mr. Henry F. Bassett, the 

 secretary Mr. A. Cleveland Bent and the cura- 

 tor Mr. Frederic H. Carpenter. 



The attendance at the New York Aquarium 

 during July was 528,266, an average of 17,040 

 per day. The total attendance for 1909 to Au- 

 gust 2 has been 2,006,919. 



The University of Utah archeological ex- 

 pedition that is making excavations and stud- 

 ies in the San Juan country reports that it has 

 secured a large quantity of material and has 

 been successful in its investigations. Byron 

 Cummings, dean of the school of arts and 

 sciences, is in charge of the expedition. Dur- 

 ing the coming year he will pursue archeolog- 

 ical studies in New York and in Europe. 



The junior class in mining engineering of 

 the Case School of Applied Science spent the 

 month of June studying the mines, mills and 

 geology of the Black Hills, near Deadwood, 

 Lead and Terry. The students were accom- 

 panied by Dr. A. W. Smith, professor of 

 metallurgy. Dr. Frank E. Van Horn, professor 

 of geology and mineralogy, and Mr. E. E. 

 Abbott, instructor in mining engineering. 

 During July, Professor Van Horn, with a few 

 of the party, spent over two weeks in the 

 Yellowstone National Park, entering by way 

 of the Cody, Wyoming, road over the Sylvan 

 Pass, and returning through Gardiner, Mon- 

 tana. 



We learn from the London Times that the 

 collection of fossil Brachiopod shells made by 

 the late Mr. John Francis Wall^er, F.G.S., of 

 York, has lately been presented to the British 

 Museum (Natural History) by his executors. 

 It represents the life-work of Mr. Walker, 

 who formed it with the special intention of 

 illustrating the nature of animal species and 



the laws governing the change of one species 

 into another. He chose Brachiopods for his 

 purpose on account of their abundance in the 

 rocks of all geological ages, and arranged 

 them in groups to exhibit their variations 

 round certain apparently central forms. The 

 collection consists of several thousand speci- 

 mens chiefly from the English Jurassic and 

 Cretaceous formations, and will be kept for 

 the most part in the original cabinets in the 

 Department of Geology, near the well-known 

 Davidson collection. Some of the more im- 

 portant specimens, especially those described 

 by Davidson, will shortly be exhibited in the 

 public gallery. The case containing the okapis 

 has been enriched by the addition of the skele- 

 ton of the animal whose mounted skin, pre- 

 sented by Major Powell-Cotton, is also shown. 

 The two other specimens are the original fe- 

 male, presented some years ago by Sir Harry 

 Johnston, and a male presented by Captain 

 Boyd Alexander. In the upper gallery a very 

 fine specimen of the Tibetan langur (Bhino- 

 pithecus roxellanw) has just been put out. 

 This curious monkey, distinguished at once by 

 its " tip-tilted " nose, was discovered by Pere 

 David and described by Milne-Edwards. Near 

 the entrance to this gallery is a young flying 

 lemur {Galeopiihecus volans) mounted on a 

 tree stem to show its protective coloration. 

 To the fish and reptile gallery the leathery 

 turtle (Dermochelys coriacea), taken at Pwll- 

 heli last summer, has been added. It was im- 

 possible to preserve the animal, so that only 

 the carapace and skeleton are shown. 



On July 21 Lord Monk Bretton, as reported 

 in Nature, asked in the House of Lords- what 

 steps had been taken to define the spheres of 

 the Boards of Agriculture and Education, re- 

 spectively, in the matter of agricultural edu- 

 cation. At the same time he referred to the 

 memorandum recently issued by the Board of 

 Education, which implied that a sum of £21,- 

 000, in part at any rate, is available for agri- 

 cultural education. He stated that he has 

 been in communication with the university 

 authorities and others, and can find no evi- 

 dence that the money is used for this purpose. 

 Similarly, the Treasury grants and the block- 



