790 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXIX. No. 750 



■with instructions to classes or individuals. 

 The appointee shall preferably be a woman if 

 equally competent with other applicants, and 

 the fellowship shall be awarded by a com- 

 mittee of six, composed of the president of 

 the association, the chairman of the observa- 

 tory committee and four others to be named 

 by the president. The committee appointed 

 for this service is Chairman, Professor Mary 

 W. Whitney, Vassar College; Miss Annie J. 

 Cannon, Harvard Observatory; Miss Caroline 

 E. Furness, Ph.D., Vassar College; Mrs. 

 Thomas W. Sidwell, Washington, D. C; Dr. 

 Emma B. Culbertson, Boston, and Mrs. 

 Charles S. Hinchman, secretary, 3635 Chest- 

 nut street, Philadelphia, Pa. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS 



The recent Minnesota legislature appropri- 

 ated to the State University $2,150,000 for 

 the biennial period. This is in addition to 

 the mill tax amounting to $235,000 annually. 

 Of the appropriation made by the legislature, 

 $190,000 is for support in 1909-10 and $200,- 

 000 support for 1910-11. The sum of $350,- 

 000 is appropriated for campus extension, and 

 nearly $1,000,000 for new buildings. The 

 latter are to include a general medical build- 

 ing and an anatomical building, each to cost 

 $200,000. 



The trustees of Columbia University an- 

 nounce that $500,000 had been secured for the 

 erection of Kent Hall and work on the new 

 law school building will soon begin. Other 

 gifts announced were $30,000 for general uni- 

 versity purposes and $5,000 for the depart- 

 ment of pathology, both being anonymous. 



A FUND of $100,000 has been collected for 

 Middlebury College, of which $25,000 has been 

 given by Dr. D. E. Pearson. 



Mr. John E. Lindgren has given $25,000 to 

 the Northwestern University to establish a 

 fund for the promotion of peace. 



The new hall of engineering of Northwest- 

 em University was dedicated on May 7, when 

 addresses were made by Professor John F. 

 Hayford, director of the College of Engineer- 

 ing and Mr. C. W. Baker, editor of The Engi- 

 neering News. 



The inauguration of Dr. Abjjott Lawrence 

 Lowell, as president of Harvard University, 

 and the attendant ceremonies will be held on 

 October 6 and 7, 1909. 



At Columbia University Dr. A. P. Wills, 

 adjunct professor of mechanics, has been ap- 

 pointed professor of mathematical physics, to 

 succeed Professor Richard T. Maclaurin, who 

 will become head of the Massachusetts Insti- 

 tute of Technology. Dr. Bergen Davis has 

 been appointed adjunct professor of physics 

 to fill the vacancy arisen through the death 

 of Professor Tufts. Dr. Geo. B. Pegram has 

 been promoted to an adjunct professorship in 

 the same department. Dr. Hugh Angus 

 Stewart, of Edinburgh and recently of the 

 Johns Hopkins University, has been called to 

 an adjunct professorship of pathology in the 

 College of Physicians and Surgeons. 



The new professorship in the department of 

 teaching of the University of Vermont has 

 been filled by the appointment of Dr. J. F. 

 Messenger, A.B. (Kansas), A.M. (Harvard), 

 Ph.D. (Columbia), now professor of pedagogy 

 in the Virginia State Normal School at Farm- 

 ville. 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE 



OCCUREENCE of the killer whale (ORCINUS 



oeca) on the new jersey coast 

 To THE Editor of Science: Neither of the 

 two zoologists, Messrs. Rhoads and Stone, 

 who have recently published extensive cata- 

 logues of the vertebrate fauna of New Jersey, 

 records any instances of the stranding of 

 killer whales on the coast of that state. Mr. 

 Ehoads remarks of them (1903) : 



While often found off the New Jersey coast, 

 there seem to be no records of its stranding, or 

 being captured. 



In view of this circumstance, it may be of 

 some interest to note that the National Mu- 

 seum has obtained the skull and other parts 

 of the skeleton of a killer whale which 

 stranded at Barnegat, N. J., in January, 

 1909. The animal was at first reported to be 

 a strange creature, of a most extraordinary 

 kind, with hair, claws, a long neck, etc., but 

 upon receipt of the skull it was at once seen 

 that these characters were imaginary. The 

 specimen was reported to be about thirty feet 



