SCIENCE 



Friday, June 24, 1921 



The Coral Beefs of Tutuila, Samoa: Profes- 

 sor W. M. Davis 559 



A Novel Magneto-optical Effect: Dr. Elihu 

 Thomson 565 



Edward Bennett Sosa: Dr. S. W. Stratton. 569 



Scientific Events: — 



TJw Sarpswell Laboratory ; Presentation to 

 Dr. Frederick Belding Power; Medallion of 

 the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences 569 



Scientific Notes and News 571 



University and Edticational News 573 



Discission and Correspondence: — 

 Newton's Corpuscular Theory of Light: 

 Dr. J. M. ScHAEBERLE. German Surtaxes 

 on Sdentifio Publications: Dr. C. Stuart 

 Gager 574 



Quotations : — 

 Centenary of the French Academy of Medi- 

 cine 575 



Special Articles: — 

 Resistance to Stem Bust in Kanred Wheat: 

 Ruth F. Allen 575 



The Bochester Meeting of the American Chem- 

 ical Society : Dr. Charles L. Parsons . . . 576 



MSS. intended for "publication and books, etc., intended for 

 review should be sent to The Editor of Science, Garrison-on- 

 Hudson, N. Y. 



THE CORAL REEFS OF TUTUILA, 

 SAMOA 



The preparation of a detailed chart — not 

 yet published — of Tutuila, Samoa, by the U. 

 S. Hydrographic Office, and the studies made 

 by various scientific specialists invited to the 

 island by Dr. A. G. Mayor, director of the 

 department of marine biology of the Carnegie 

 Institution of Washington, have added greatly 

 to the knowledge of that remote possession of 

 ours in recent years. The chart, on a scale 

 of about 1 : 50,000, shows the mountainous 

 volcanic island to be surrounded by an ex- 

 tensive submarine bank, from one to three 

 miles wide, somewhat shallower near its inner 

 and outer margins than along an intermediate 

 belt, where soundings of 60 fathoms occur. 

 The shallower parts of the bank are interpreted 

 as submerged fringing and barrier reefs, 

 which are supposed to rest on a wave-cut plat- 

 form now lying between 60 and YO fathoms be- 

 low sea level by reason of island subsidence. 

 The present shores of the island are embayed 

 and are bordered by well developed fringing 

 reefs. 



Dr. Mayor's latest Carnegie report contains 

 a condensed statement by E. T. Chamberlin, 

 entitled " The geological interpretation of the 

 coral reefs of Tutuila, Samoa," the result of 

 three weeks' observation there in July, 1920, 

 from which the following extracts are taken: 



The island of Tutuila is a volcanic pile whose 

 slopes have been attacked by the sea until a broad 

 wave-cut platform, 2 miles in width, has come to 

 surround the island. This broad shelf of plana- 

 tion, originally cut iu the volcanic rocks not far 

 below the sea level, now lies at least (though prob- 

 ably not much more than) 400 feet below sea- 

 level. . . . On the outer margia of the wave-cut 

 platform, corals commenced to build a barrier 

 reef, while a fringing reef grew outward from 

 the shore. . . . Subsequently the island became 

 progressively submerged. . . . Tutuila, therefore. 



