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SGIENCm 



[N. S. Vol. XXIX. No. 734 



RAILROAD RATES FOR THE BALTIMORE MEETING 



To THE Editor op Science : It has been the 

 custom for many years past to obtain a rail- 

 road rate concession for the meeting of the 

 American Association for the Advancement 

 of Science and the affiliated societies. For- 

 merly this was granted at one and one third— 

 a rate, even at that time, far in excess of 

 what could be obtained by a single professor 

 who wished to conduct a handful of students 

 on a geological excursion. To this rate was 

 later added the twenty-five cents validation 

 fee. Then came the concession of two cents 

 per mile, for the Chicago meeting of 1907-8, 

 a rate practically equivalent to the ordinary 

 charges of the roads, to which must be added 

 the validation fee. This year, the arrange- 

 ments have been exceedingly liberal— one and 

 three fifths plus the validation fee. Taking 

 the rate from Philadelphia to Baltimore as an 

 example: the one fare, $2.40, and the three 

 fifths, $1.44, plus the validation fee, $0.25, 

 amount to $4.09, a sum in excess of the regu- 

 lar round-trip fare of $4.00. 



I am aware that for those attending the 

 meeting from a long distance, the rate 

 granted may mean a slight reduction, but, 

 even the scientific world is not made up of 

 altruists, and members from the nearer locali- 

 ties will not pay more for their tickets than 

 the ordinary round-trip fare, and trouble 

 themselves besides to obtain certificates, de- 

 posit them for validation, call for them, and 

 re-sign for the return trip— four unnecessary 

 wastings of time— for the sake of accommo- 

 dating those from a longer distance, and there 

 is thus a possibility that the certificates pre- 

 sented may fall short of the required number, 

 with the result of adding greatly to the ex- 

 penses of members from a distance who put 

 faith in the certificate plan. 



I do not know, nor care to loiow, who is 

 responsible for this most remarkable rate, but 

 I do know what has been done by private 

 individuals, and I am convinced that, with an 

 organization so numerically strong as the 

 American Association for the Advancement 

 of Science and the affiliated societies at its 

 back, the committee, if it be indued with a 

 real desire and determination to obtain con- 



cessions that are worth while, will never again 

 offer to the most powerful scientific body of 

 the United States, an illusory grant. 



H. Newell Wardle 



QV0TATI0N8 

 harvard's new president 

 It would appear that aU the recognized de- 

 mands, exacting though they are, have met 

 satisfactory compliance in to-day's selection 

 of a president of Harvard. Professor Lowell's 

 attainments as a scholar, although well known 

 for many years to the inner circle, have re- 

 cently received new recognition, both in 

 America and abroad. It is quite beyond 

 question that his recent notable volumes on 

 "The Government of England" have placed 

 him first among contemporary American 

 scholars in the field of political science. To 

 his skill as an administrator the success of 

 the Lowell Institute affords striking testi- 

 mony, while his deep and active interest in 

 educational questions has received proof in 

 his effective service as a trustee of the Insti- 

 tute of Technology and as a member, for nine 

 years past, of the Harvard faculty. He is a 

 Bostonian by inheritance, by nativity, and by 

 tradition. He is a Harvard man by educa- 

 tion, both collegiate and professional; the uni- 

 versity can claim no stancher allegiance than 

 his has been. At fifty-two nature has per- 

 mitted him to retain a nimbleness of mind 

 and body which in the case of most men takes 

 its departure at a much earlier age. Indeed, 

 from every point of view his selection seems 

 obvious, logical and fortunate. 



The hand of the president is potent at Har- 

 vard; more so perhaps than in any sister in- 

 stitution. Harvard government is that of a 

 limited monarchy, but with the right type of 

 monarch the administration can be made to 

 veer pretty close to the status of a benevolent 

 despotism. To say that it has veered in this 

 direction during the last two or three decades 

 is the highest tribute one may pay to the con- 

 summate skill and personal power of Presi- 

 dent Eliot. But this very development, this 

 centralization of power, influence and re- 

 sponsibility which the retiiing Nestor among 



