656 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXIX. No. 747 



manent endowment of six existing schools in 

 the university, and these schools are to be 

 given the names as follows: The James Mad- 

 ison School of Law, the James Monroe School 

 of International Law, the James "Wilson 

 School of Political Science and Political 

 Economy, the Edgar AUan Poe School of 

 English, the Andrew Carnegie School of Engi- 

 neering, the Walter Eeed School of Pathol- 

 ogy- 



Gifts to Princeton University for the quar- 

 ter ending with the spring recess aggregated 

 $145,939. $100,000 was presented by Cleve- 

 land H. Dodge, '79, of New York, for part of 

 the endowment of Guyot Hall, the new nat- 

 ural science laboratory now under construc- 

 tion on the eastern side of the campus. A 

 fund of $400,000 was presented some time ago 

 for the construction of the building, which is 

 now nearing completion. The next largest 

 gift came from the committee of fifty alumni 

 who are raising funds by subscription for the 

 immediate needs and future development of 

 the university. This committee turned in a 

 total of $38,039 for the quarter, $28,039 of 

 which goes to current expenses and $10,000 

 for endowment. 



Exercises appropriate to the opening of the 

 new engineering building of Eutgers College, 

 erected at a cost of $100,000, were held on 

 April 14. The building contains seven class- 

 rooms, five laboratories, six professors' offices, 

 and three draughting rooms. It is used by 

 the departments of civil, electrical and me- 

 chanical engineering. 



The University of Pennsylvania corre- 

 spondent of the New York Evening Post 

 states that the cosmopolitan character of the 

 student body at the university was empha- 

 sized at the recent formation of the Cosmo- 

 politan Club, the object of which is to hold 

 occasional meetings, when an opportimity 

 will be afforded to men of all nationalities to 

 become acquainted with each other, and to 

 discuss matters of common interest. It is 

 planned to hold, next year, a series of "na- 

 tional nights," where the customs of each 

 country will be presented by its representa- 

 tives. It was found that there are 120 stu- 



dents in the university from the Latin-Amer- 

 ican countries, 50 students who are British 

 subjects, and 31 who are Chinese. There are 

 32 other countries- represented in the student 

 body. 



De. a. a. Murpheee, president of the State 

 College for Women at Tallahassee, has been 

 elected president of the University of Elorida. 



De. R C. Hughes has resigned the presi- 

 dency of Kipon College. 



J. F. Messenger, A.B. (Kansas), A.M. 

 (Harvard), Ph.D. (Columbia), professor in 

 the department of psychology and education 

 of the State Normal School at Farmville, 

 Va., has been called to the University of Ver- 

 mont. 



M. Dangeaed, editor of the Botaniste, pro- 

 fessor in the faculty of Poitiers, has been 

 called to a chair in the faculty of sciences 

 at Paris. 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE 



THE FUNDAMENTAL LAWS OP MATTEE AND 

 ENEEGY 



To THE Editor of Science: In a recent 

 number of The Technology Quarterly (June, 

 1908) appears an article by Professor Lewis 

 entitled "A Eevision of the Fundamental 

 Laws of Matter and Energy." It closes with 

 the following summary: 



It is postulated that the energy and momentum 

 of a beam of radiation are due to a mass moving 

 with the velocity of light. 



From the postulate alone it is shown that the 

 mass of a body depends upon its energy content. 

 It is, therefore, necessary to replace that axiom 

 of the Newtonian mechanics according to which 

 the mass of a body is independent of its velocity 

 by one which makes the mass increase with the 

 kinetic energy. 



Retaining all the other axioms of the Newtonian 

 mechanics and assuming the conservation of mass, 

 energy and momentum, a new system of mechanics 

 is constructed. 



In this system momentuti is mv, kinetic energy 

 varies between imv' at low velocities and mv" at 

 the velocity of light, while the mass of a body is 

 a function of the velocity and becomes infinite at 

 the velocity of light. The equation obtained agrees 

 with the experiments of Kaufmann on the relation 



