694 



SCIENCE. 



[N. P, Vol. IX. No. 228. 



The more important departments of the Rus- 

 sian government liave approved tlie reform of 

 tlie Russian calendar urged by the St. Peters- 

 burg Astronomical Society, and will adopt at an 

 early date the system followed by the rest of the 

 civilized world. 



The International Bureau of Weights and 

 Measures has been holding its sessions at Paris. 

 Among the foreign delegates in attendance were 

 Professors Michelson, from the United States; 

 Cheney, from Great Britain ; Tahlen, from 

 Sweden ; Blazema, from Italy ; Hirsch, from 

 Switzerland ; Hepiter, from Austria ; Foerster, 

 from Germany, and Mendeljev, from Russia. 



The American Society of Mechanical En. 

 gineers is holding its spring meeting at Wash- 

 ington as we go to press. Rear-Admiral George 

 W. Melville presides, and about 600 members 

 have signified their intention of being present. 



The American Climatological Association 

 holds its sixteenth annual meeting at the 

 building of the Academy of Medicine, New 

 York City, on May 9th, 10th and 11th. 



The American Library Association is meet- 

 ing during the present week at Atlanta, Ga. 



Experiments were made recently at the 

 South Foreland to demonstrate the possibilities 

 of communicating between a moving ship and 

 the land. According to the London Times, 

 Signor Marconi joined the French commission 

 on board the despatch vessel Ibis. The receiv- 

 ing and transmitting instruments on board the 

 Ibis were in a cabin, the wire to take the cur- 

 rent being connected with the instrument room 

 from the top of the mast, about 150 feet high. 

 The messages were transmitted to the Ibis from 

 the South Foreland, from Wimereux, and from 

 the East Goodwin lightship, as also from the 

 gunboat to each of these points, and in each in- 

 stance they were recorded with unerring dis- 

 tinctness, the French commissioners expressing 

 the greatest satisfaction with the system. 

 Hitherto one of the chief objections raised to 

 wireless telegraphy has been that it is impossi- 

 ble to concentrate the current — in other words, 

 to ' cut out ' and prevent the message from be- 

 ing received at other stations where installa- 

 tions exist within an equal radius other than 

 the^one for which it was originally intended. 



Signor Marconi has now discovered an ingenious 

 but simple arrangement by which this difficulty 

 can be overcome, and it was tested before the 

 French commission and at the South Foreland. 

 Messages were first sent from the Ibis to the 

 South Foreland, and, as Professor Fleming 

 pointed out on his recent visit, were received 

 simultaneously by the Goodwin lightship. Sig- 

 nor Marconi's new invention was then tried, 

 and the messages sent to the Foreland were 

 concentrated there and received at no other 

 point, the lightship being cut out. A similar 

 experiment was made with the lightship, the 

 ships communicating with each other, while the 

 Foreland was cut out. As a further test of this 

 important invention messages were sent simul- 

 taneously from Boulogne and the lightship to 

 the South Foreland, where only the Boulogne 

 message was taken by the receiver, the other 

 being cut out at will. This experiment was 

 also tried on board the Ibis and from the other 

 points, in each instance with complete suc- 

 cess. 



Reutbe's Agency states that Dr. Sven Hedin 

 will start from Stockholm at the end of June on 

 a new expedition to Central Asia, and will 

 travel direct through Russia and Turkestan to 

 Kashgar, taking a new route over the moun- 

 tains. Dr. Sven Hedin will conduct the expe- 

 dition alone, being accompanied only by his old 

 Asiatic servant, Islam Bai, from Osh. He has 

 received permission from the Czar to take two 

 Cossacks as escort. On reaching Kashgar Dr. 

 Sven Hedin will proceed in an easterly direction 

 for the purpose of making fresh investigations 

 in Chinese Turkestan, where he hopes to find 

 further antiquities. Thence he will visit the 

 unexplored Lob Region, and will cross the great 

 Sand Desert by more than one route. After 

 going to Tibet and exploring that portion of 

 the country to the south of his former route, he 

 will return via India. As in the case of his 

 famous journey across Asia, Dr. Sven Hedin's 

 objects on this expedition are purely scientific. 

 The diflBculties to be expected are of much the 

 same character as those experienced during his 

 former trip. Dr. Hedin is, however, better 

 prepared than he was on that occasion, and 

 hopes to achieve even better results than he did 

 then. The expenses of the expedition, which 



