June 10, 1898.] 



SCIENCE. 



801 



The managers of the Pennsylvania Hospital 

 in Philadelphia have taken steps to add to the 

 institution a clinical laboratory, the funds being 

 provided by a bequest of $50,000 by the late 

 Josephine M. Ayer, of Philadelphia, supple- 

 mented by a gift of $25,000 from her son, Fred. 

 F. Ayer. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS. 



The New York University Medical College 

 and the Bellevue Medical College will be con- 

 solidated under the name ' The University and 

 the Bellevue Hospital Medical College. ' It will 

 be remembered that the negotiations for this 

 union failed a year ago at the last moment, but 

 the resignation of a portion of the faculty of the 

 New York University Medical College to form 

 a new school under the auspices of Cornell Uni- 

 versity has now led to the consolidation. 



The Trustees of Colby University have made 

 a contract for the construction of a chemical 

 laboratory to be built of stone and brick and to 

 cost $30,000. 



The will of the late Felix R. Bonnet, of Pitts- 

 burg, Pa., provides that, upon the death of his 

 widow, $300,000 shall go to the Western Penn- 

 sylvania University for the endowment of 

 scholarships. 



President F. P. Graves, of the University 

 of Wyoming, has been elected President of the 

 University of Washington. 



The following promotions and appointments 

 have been made by the corporation of Yale 

 University : Assistant Professor Sneath was pro- 

 moted to a full professorship of philosophy in 

 the College; Dr. Philip E. Browning, promoted 

 from an instructorship to an assistant professor- 

 ship in chemistry; Dr. E. W. Scripture was 

 given the title of director of the psychological 

 laboratory; E. M. Weier, B.A., 1895, was ap- 

 pointed assistant in the same laboratory; George 

 Grant McCurdy, B.A., Harvard, 1893, was ap- 

 pointed to a new instructorship in prehistoric 

 anthropology in the Graduate School ; H. E. 

 Gregory, B.A., 1896, instructor in physical 



Paine Johnston, who is said to be an American 

 citizen. 



Mr. H. Yale Oldham has been appointed 

 reader in geography in Cambridge University. 



The University of Dublin has elected to the 

 chair of mental and moral philosophy Mr. Swift 



discussion and correspondence. 



'a precise criterion op species.' 



To THE Editor of Science : In the issue of 

 this Journal for May 20, 1898 (N. S. vii.. No. 

 177) is a joint contribution, under the above 

 title, by Messrs. C. B. Davenport and J. W. 

 Blankinship, in which Mr. Davenport, under 

 the subheading '■A. The General Method,' 

 says : ' ' What is needed is a method of pre- 

 cisely defining the degree of isolation and the 

 degi'ee of divergence necessary for distinct spe- 

 cies." To establish such a method, and to de- 

 fine ' the degree of isolation and the degree of 

 divergence necessary for distinct species,' is the 

 grand task here undertaken — and accomplished , 

 to the satisfaction apparently of, at least, the 

 author of the paper ; and his diagrams of 

 curves and his mathematical formulae are very 

 interesting and very suggestive, so far as they 

 go. But the conclusions based thereon, and 

 the methods by which they are reached, dis- 

 play an extraordinary lack of practical ex- 

 perience with the actual conditions of the 

 problem in hand. No one duly appreciating 

 the conditions to be met would ever under- 

 take to formulate a 'method' on such im- 

 perfect data as he has employed for the ' De- 

 termination of the Line between Species and 

 Varieties,' since their utter insufficiency is ob- 

 viovis, one would suppose, to any one at all ex- 

 perienced in this field of research. 



"The question arises," says Mr. Davenport, 

 ' ' -whether it would not be necessary to draw 

 curves for many characters." He answers: 

 ' ' Practically it will not be necessary, for con- 

 fluent species are usually separated chiefly by 

 one most distinctive character." Unfortu- 

 nately, this is not the case, but by a combina- 

 tion of slight difierences along a number of 

 distinct lines. But suppose it were as Mr. Da- 

 venport assumes, and the most distinctive char- 

 acter was one of color, involving not only the 

 prevailing tint, but coincidently variations in 



