Septembeb 4, 1908] 



SCIENCE 



299 



stitute a committee authorized by this 

 meeting to make such a report on mathe- 

 matics for colleges of engineering as in 

 their opinion will be of service to teachers 

 in such institutions, and to submit this 

 report when completed to the Chicago Sec- 

 tion of the American Mathematical So- 

 ciety. 



TEE mVEBNATIONAL GEOGRAPHICAL 

 CONGRESS ' 



The ninth International Geographical Con- 

 gress, which began with a reception on Sun- 

 day, July 26, ended on August 6 with a ban- 

 quet given by the Council of State of the 

 Canton of Geneva. The congress has been 

 marked by one unique feature — its unpre- 

 cedented length. Hitherto a week has been 

 the limit of the session of these congresses, 

 and why the Geneva congress should have been 

 protracted to the weary length of thirteen 

 days it is difficult to surmise. 



On the social side Geneva has hardly been 

 surpassed by any city in which the congress 

 had previously met. From the president of 

 the republic downwards every one has vied in 

 making the Y50 members of the congress feel 

 that they were welcome. 



The membership was thoroughly representa- 

 tive, and the discussions in the sections, as 

 well as the daily intercourse outside the sec- 

 tions, between geographers of all nationalities, 

 are sure to lead to good results, to a clearer 

 conception as to the field of geography, and 

 as to the best methods of solving the many 

 problems with which it has to deal. As usual, 

 the educational side of the subject gave rise to 

 much discussion, a good deal of it of little 

 value from the practical point of view, but 

 still not without its uses. Perhaps on the 

 whole the discussions on glaciation in the 

 section devoted to that subject were of wider 

 bearing and of more scientific value than those 

 in any other section ; but they had as much to 

 do with geology as geography, as, indeed, was 

 the case with subjects brought before certain 

 other sections. Geography has quite a wide 

 enough field of its own, without having to 



' Abridged from an article in the London Times. 



burden itself and overweigh a congress with 

 matters outside its sphere. Perhaps the lec- 

 ture that attracted most attention and had the 

 widest hearings was that of M. Ch. Lallemand 

 on the " Respiration of the Earth." M. Lal- 

 lemand gave a clear exposition of the re- 

 searches of Professor Eckert, of Potsdam, 

 which seem to show that there is a daily tide 

 on the surface of the earth, of small dimen- 

 sions may be, but absolutely real. Other lec- 

 tures deserving special mention were those of 

 Professor Oberhummer, of Vienna, on Leo- 

 nardo da Vinci and his influence on the geog- 

 raphy of his time, and on the great cities as 

 individuals ; of Dr. Pilchner, on his masterly 

 exploration in Eastern Tibet and the region be- 

 tween the Hoangho and Yang-tsze; and of M. 

 Alexandre Monet, on the Scarab containing 

 the record of the circumnavigation of Africa 

 under King Necho, this last leading to a 

 vigorous discussion. Dr. Otto Nordenskjold's 

 account of the results of his Antarctic expedi- 

 tion, though not altogether new, suggested 

 several interesting problems. An unusual 

 feature was the exhibition, with interesting 

 explanations by Frau Wegener, of a remark- 

 able collection of Chinese paintings collected 

 by herself, and supplementary to some extent 

 to her husband's account of his expedition in 

 central China. 



At the London congress in 1895 a com- 

 mittee was appointed at the suggestion of Pro- 

 fessor Penck, now of Berlin, for the purpose 

 of securing international action for the con- 

 struction of a map of the world on the scale 

 of 1 to 1,000,000, about sixteen miles to the 

 inch. The scale has been adopted as a sort of 

 standard scale, but otherwise little progress 

 has been made. At Geneva those interested 

 in the scheme decided to form a committee 

 for the purpose of agreeing upon lines on 

 which the proposed map should be constructed. 

 After one or two meetings the committee came 

 to definite conclusions, not only as to the 

 scale, but also as to the symbols to be adopted 

 to represent the various features on the map, 

 the lettering to be used, the size of the sheets, 

 the initial meridian (Greenwich), the use of 

 the metric system (along with others if de- 

 sired by individual states), and other points. 



