490 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. LII. No. 1351 



the Belgian national conference, and of the 

 International Association of Agricultural Mis- 

 sions of 1920; a memorandum presented to the 

 Peace Conference on World Agricultural Prin- 

 ciples hy President K. L. Butterfield, of the 

 Massachusetts Agricultural College; a tribute 

 to the late David Lubin; Some Impressions of 

 French Agriculture by Captain E. N. Went- 

 worth, assistant director of the college of agri- 

 culture, American E. F. University; the State 

 Society of Agricultural Teaching in France, 

 by G. "Wery, director of the ^National Institute 

 of Agronomy; several shorter articles relative 

 to the reconstruction of French agriculture; 

 and other topics. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 NEWS 



Offers of support and financial assistance 

 tovs^ards the establishment of an agricultural 

 college of university rank in the West Indies 

 have been received from Trinidad, Barbados, 

 Grenada, St. Lucia, St. Vincent, and the Lee- 

 ward Islands, while Bermuda, although not in 

 the West Indies, has offered an annual grant. 

 On the recommendation of the West Indian 

 Agricultural College Committee, Lord Milner 

 has decided that the promises and prospects 

 of support are sufficient to justify him in pro- 

 ceeding with the necessary arrangements for 

 the establishment of the college. It will be 

 situated in Trinidad, and plans for the build- 

 ings will shortly be prepared. 



Part of the $5,000,000 expected to be realized 

 from a campaign for McGill University, Mon- 

 treal, will be devoted to a building to house the 

 departments of pathology, medical jurispru- 

 dence, hygiene and psychiatry. It is estimated 

 that such a building would cost at least $460,- 

 000, and its maintenance would require an 

 endowment of $150,000. 



At the college of engineering of the Univer- 

 sity of Wisconsin, A. A. INeff, graduate of the 

 University of Nebraska, has been appointed 

 associate professor of machine designing, and 

 A. H. Anderson, of the Armour Institute of 

 Technology, Chicago, associate professor of 

 steam and gas engineering. 



< Dr. B. J. Spence, professor of physics at the 

 University of North Dakota, has resigned to 

 accept a position in the department of physics 

 of Northwestern University. 



J. H. GouRLEY, professor of horticulture in 

 the New Hampshire College, has become head 

 of the horticultural department of the Uni- 

 versity of West Virginia. 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE 



AN UNFAVORABLE SPAWNING SEASON FOR 

 MULLET 



The mullet, Mugil cephalus Linnssus, knovm 

 as ama-ama in the native language, is one of 

 the most extensively used food fishes of the 

 Hawaiian Islands. The custom of taking very 

 young mullet from the sea and stocking ponds 

 with them has been practised for a long time. 

 These ponds, usually walled-off arms of bays, 

 are frequently of several acres in area and from 

 them are taken annually thousands of mullet 

 which have developed to marketable size within 

 these enclosures. 



Although a well-known fish, aside from the 

 fact that the fishermen have learned to know 

 the approximate time of the year when the fry 

 are abundant in the sea, no definite informa- 

 tion is at hand relative to the spawning sea- 

 son of the mullet or the conditions favorable 

 to this process or to its later growth and de- 

 velopment in these waters. 



With a view of tmdertaking artificial propaga- 

 tion of the mullet the Board of Fish and Game 

 Commissioners of the Territory delegated Mr. 

 H. L. Kelley, executive officer, assisted by Mr. 

 Irwin H. Wilson, fish culturist, to establish a 

 small fish hatchery at Kalahuipuaa, Hawaii, 

 which was completed early in January of the 

 present year. From observations during previ- 

 ous years it was believed that the mullet 

 spawned during January. In the pond on 

 which the hatchery was located it was esti- 

 mated that there were approximately 1,000 

 mature females approaching the period of 

 spawning and nearly as many mature males. 

 Careful observations were kept upon the con- 

 dition of the mullet throughout January and 

 February but no indications of spawning were 

 to be seen. Attempts were made to force the 



