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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXIX. No. 751 



great loss of life and property within the territory 

 of the United States and its possessions, as well 

 aa other countries; and 



Whebeas: It is only through the scientific in- 

 vestigation of the phenomena that there is hope 

 of discovering the laws which govern them, so as 

 to predict their occurrences and to reduce the 

 danger to life and property; and 



Whebeas: Such investigations can be success- 

 fully conducted only with the support of the gen- 

 eral government, be it therefore 



Resolved, That this society urge upon Congress 

 the establishment of a national bureau of seis- 

 mology, and suggest that this bureau be organized 

 under the Smithsonian Institution with the active 

 cooperation of the other scientific departments of 

 the government, and that this bureau be charged 

 with the following duties: (a) the collection of 

 seismological data, (6) the establishment of ob- 

 serving stations, (c) the organization of an ex- 

 peditionary corps for the investigation of special 

 earthquakes and volcanic eruptions in any part of 

 the world, (d) the study and investigation of 

 special earthquake regions within the national 

 domain, and 



Resolved, That copies of these resolutions be 

 transmitted to the president, the speaker of the 

 house of representatives, to the president of the 

 senate and to the secretary of the Smithsonian 

 Institution. 



The Evolution of the City of Rome from its Origin 

 to the Gallic Catastrophe: Professor Jesse B. 

 Cabteb, of Rome, Italy. 



An attempt to sketch in its outlines the devel- 

 opment of the city of Rome from its origin to the 

 Gallic catastrophe. The original people lived in 

 little communities upon the hilltops, each com- 

 munity surrounded by a circular wall or stockade. 

 The geological character of the campagna and its 

 topography produced a number of elevations ad- 

 mirably adapted for such settlements. All of these 

 little hilltop towns must have been very similar 

 in population and customs and no one was prob- 

 ably a leader among them. Their consolidation 

 into a city is assigned to the influence of an 

 invasion by the Etruscans who conquered these 

 hill towns, and enclosed them along with their 

 intervening valleys with one wall. Some villages 

 remained without the wall, as suburbs to be 

 afterwards incorporated in the city; such were the 

 Aventine region and the Campus Martius. The 

 city had then outgrown its original dimensions 

 and was no longer all within walls, which ac- 

 counts for the ease with which it was captured by 



the Gauls in 390 B.C. With the capture of the 

 city by the Gauls Rome enters upon her period 

 of inviolability for almost eight hundred years 

 and the thought suggests itself irresistibly that 

 the reputation for inviolability thus gained may 

 have been a large factor in preserving her invio- 

 late. Even in their early days the city began to 

 be " that so holy spot, this very Rome." 

 On the Extent and Number of the Indo-European 

 Peoples: Professor Maueice Bloomfield, of 

 Baltimore. 

 The Burning Bush and the Origin of Judaism: 

 Professor Paul Haupt, of Baltimore. 

 The Israelites probably never saw Egypt. The 

 so-called Israelites who were in Egypt were the 

 descendants of Esau, the Edomites. The burning 

 bush was explained as the shrubbery on the 

 heights of a volcano, lighted up at night by the 

 glow of the incandescent lava. The story of the 

 pillar of cloud by day and pillar of fire by night 

 was not that it hung over the tabernacle but over 

 Mount Sinai, the cloud of steam from the active 

 volcano was the " pillar of cloud by day and the 

 pillar of fire by night." The myths in regard to 

 the destruction of Jericho and of Sodom and 

 Gomorrah were attributed to the effect of earth- 

 quakes. 



Magic and Religion: Professor Edwabd W. Hop- 

 kins, of New Haven. 

 Milton's Confession of Faith: The Identity of 

 Religious Belief between Milton and George 

 Fox: Alden Sampson, of Haverford, Pa. 

 J. J. Rousseau, a Precursor of Modern Prag- 

 matism: Professor Albeet Schniz, of Bryn 

 Mawr, Pa. 



At the Darwin commemorative meeting, after 

 the presentation of the three addresses attention 

 was called to the fact that there were two mem- 

 bers of the American Philosophical Society still 

 living in England who were friends of Charles 

 Darwin — Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker and Dr. Alfred 

 Russel Wallace — and on motion it was unani- 

 mously resolved that the society should cable to 

 them its greetings and congratulations on the 

 general acceptance of the views in the elaboration 

 and promulgation of which they had taken such 

 an effective part. 



Early in the day a telegram was sent to Vice- 

 president Simon Newcomb conveying to him the 

 society's good wishes and greeting and their regret 

 that he could not be present at the meeting. 



The meeting was largely attended by members 

 from various parts of the country and was re- 

 garded as most successful both from the point of 



