Sbptembeb 18, 1908] 



SCIENCE 



371 



raphy at the Zurich Polytechnic School, has 

 died at the age of fifty-one years, 

 sary to make their stay there warm and com- 

 fortable for the winter. Captain F. P. Evans, 

 R.N.E., by permission of Sir James Mills, 

 chairman of the Union Steamship Company, 

 of New Zealand, will command the Nimrod 

 on her voyage to the Antarctic. It is hoped 

 that news from the Antarctic will be received 

 about March or April, 1909. 



A TELEPHONE line has been installed to pro- 

 vide means of communication between the 

 Queen Margherita Observatory on the GnifFet 

 Peak, on Monte Eosa, and the observatory 

 lower down the mountain. The carrying out 

 of this line entailed many difficulties; the 

 higher observatory is 14,960 feet above the sea. 

 This building is only open for two months 

 each year in the middle of summer. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS 



The regents of the West Virginia TJniver- 

 sity, at their meeting in June, voted an in- 

 crease of 10 per cent, in the salaries of all 

 members of the faculty above the rank of in- 

 structor. 



The Board of Education of New York City 

 asks for $33,031,484.65 for the schools in the 

 coming year, an increase of $6,258,521.06 over 

 1908. The increase of about $5,500,000 for 

 this year is largely due to the proposed in- 

 crease of teachers' salaries, this alone occa- 

 sioning an increase in the budget of $3,273,- 

 163.52. It is estimated that the increase in 

 the number of pupils for 1909, will be nearly 

 25,000. To provide a teaching stafE for the 

 increased registration in the elementary 

 schools alone will require employment of 

 9 men principals, 2 women principals, 3 male 

 assistants to principals, 15 assistants to wo- 

 men principals, 102 men teachers, 636 women 

 teachers, and 82 kindergartners, at a total 

 additional expense of $136,315.47. 



Leipzig Univeesity will celebrate the five 

 hundredth anniversary of its foundation in 

 July of next year. 



The foundations of the new haU of engi- 

 neering of the University of Nebraska have 

 been completed, and work has begun on the 

 superstructure. The sum appropriated for 



this building is approximately $100,000, and 

 it is hoped to have it completed by the open- 

 ing of the fall semester in 1909. 



The newspapers Reich and St. Petersburger 

 Zeiiung, have been fined $1,500 each for pub- 

 lishing articles criticizing the policies of Mr. 

 Schwartz, the new minister of education. He 

 is said to have issued an order that all uni- 

 versity professors and instructors belonging 

 to the constitutional democratic party should 

 either renounce their political principles or 

 give up their positions. 



It is reported that ten members of the fac- 

 ulty of the College of Physicians and Sur- 

 geons, San Francisco, have resigned. 



Professor Arthur Dexter Butterfield, for 

 ten years professor of mathematics in the 

 University of Vermont, has accepted a simi- 

 lar position in the "Worcester (Mass.) Poly- 

 technic Institute, from which he was gradu- 

 ated in 1892 and in which he was formerly 

 instructor. 



Dr. George A. Coe, professor of philosophy 

 at the Northwestern University, has been ap- 

 pointed to a chair in the Union Theological 

 Seminary, New York City. 



Dr. Ernst A. Bessey, pathologist in the 

 United States Department of Agriculture, for 

 the past three years in charge of the United 

 States Subtropical Laboratory of Miami, 

 Florida, has been elected to the professorship 

 of botany in the University of Louisiana, at 

 Baton Rouge. He wiU assume his new duties 

 on October 20. 



LiEUT.-CoLONEL BOURGEOIS, chief of the 

 geodetic section of the French Army Geo- 

 graphical Service, has been appointed to the 

 chair of astronomy and geodesy in the Paris 

 ]&cole polytechnique, vacant by the resignation 

 of M. Poincare. 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE 



SCHAEBERLE AND GEOLOGICAL CLIMATES 



To THE Editor of Science: In Professor 

 Schaeberle's last communication to Science, 

 June 5, p. 894, he makes the statement that 

 " it now rests solely with the scientists to 

 demonstrate, if possible, that some vital flaw 

 exists in my (Schaeberle's) published work 

 (upon the effective surface temperature of 



