DhX-EMBER 31. 1909] 



6GIENGE 



967 



The Experiment Statiou Record states that 

 the legislature has increased the rate of taxa- 

 tion for the support of the University of Cali- 

 fornia from two to three cents for each one 

 hundred dollars of assessed valuation. This 

 is expected to provide an income for the cur- 

 rent year of about $600,000. Appropriations 

 were also made aggregating $130,000 for ad- 

 ditional buildings and equipment at the Uni- 

 versity Farm at Davis, and $88,500 for its 

 maintenance during the ensuing biennium; 

 $20,000 for farmers" institutes; $15,000 for 

 viticultural investigations; $12,000 for cereal 

 investigations, and about $40,000 for the 

 equipment and maintenance of the Southern 

 California Pathological Laboratory. 



Mrs. Piicebe He.\hst has undertaken to 

 build an anthropological museum for the Uni- 

 versity of California to cost about $500,000. 



TuL.^KE UNn'ERSiTY will receive $100,000 by 

 will of Isidore Newman, of New Orleans. 



The old block of six tenements at the north 

 end of the Sheffield Scientific School grounds, 

 held for many years at a prohibitory price, 

 has been bought for less than $35,000. It wiU 

 now be torn down and the chemical laboratory 

 extended over part of the site. 



In order to secure closer cooperation between 

 the regents and the faculties of the University 

 of Minnesota, the board of regents has passed 

 the following resolution: 



Resolved, that the several deans of the univer- 

 sity be requested to report to the board of regents 

 at their next meeting some plan by which matters 

 concerning the general interests of the university 

 may be taken up and considered by some repre- 

 sentative body of those directing the work of the 

 university and the board of regents in closer rela- 

 tion than heretofore. 



The establishment of an agricultural col- 

 lege at Mayaguez, Porto Eico, has been autlior- 

 izcd by the territorial legislature. I. W. Hart, 

 of the School of Agriculture, Sao Paulo, 

 Brazil, has been elected president. 



Mr. p. a. WooDsi chief of the Bureau of 

 Plant Industry of the U. S. Department of 

 Agriculture, has been elected dean of the agri- 

 cultural department of the University of 

 Minnesota. 



ItlSCUStiIO\ AXD CORRESPONDENCE 



•' OFFICIAL " LIST OF ZOOLOGICAL NAMES — AN 



OPEN letter to professional 



ZOOLOGISTS 



A NUMBER of zoologists have expressed the 

 opinion that a list of the most common zo- 

 ological names should be prepared and that 

 the International Congress of Zoology should 

 accept this list in the future as free from any 

 operation of the law of priority. Other zool- 

 ogists view this proposition as theoretically 

 and practically open to very serious objec- 

 tions. In the hope of meeting the wishes of 

 the representatives of both sides of' this ques- 

 tion I take the liberty of proposing an alter- 

 native plan, namely, that a list be made of 

 the most commonly used zoological names, 

 that these names be subjected to rigid study 

 under the present international code, and that 

 the international congress adopt this list as 

 " official," with the provision that no change 

 in any of the names in the list be accepted 

 unless the reason for such change is first sub- 

 mitted to the Intarnational Commission on 

 Zoological Nomenclature for careful study 

 and unless said commission decides that the 

 change is justified and necessary. 



If the zoologists of the world will cooperate 

 with me in this matter, I will endeavor to re- 

 port to the International Commission at the 

 Gratz meeting in 1910 a list of the kind pro- 

 posed. It does not seem advisable to make 

 this official list too large at first, but if the 

 plan is found to be feasible, additional names 

 could be placed on the list year after year, 

 and eventually we would have a catalogue of 

 all of the most common and most important 

 names in zoology. 



I invite the zoologists of the world to co- 

 operate with me in this experiment on the 

 following plan: Let any person interested in 

 zoology send to me within the next three 

 months a list of 100 zoological names which he 

 considers the most important, and the most 

 generally used. Let everj' man who is famil- 

 iar with nomenclatural usages work out the 

 status, under the international code, of 10 of 

 the 100 names which he submits, giving the 



