August 11, 1916] 



SCIENCE 



205 



But I do not attach much, weight to the 

 pedagogical principle, succinctly stated by 

 Dooley that " It doesn't matter what you teach 

 a boy, so long as he doesn't like it." To give 

 point to my attitude, I have frequently asked 

 the question " Why should a girl be required 

 to ' pass ' in mathematics as a condition of 

 entering an American college and (usually) 

 of graduating from an American high school ? " 

 Is algebra, as usually taught, a subject of 

 such unique educational excellence in general 

 education, and does it in so exceptional a 

 measure train the mind or give rise to the 

 appreciations and insights which we call cul- 

 ture, that it should have the monopolistic 

 position in our secondary schools which we 

 now give it? To me this is an important 

 question; and in asking it, I have no intention 

 of depreciating the values, demonstrable or 

 assumed, which that subject may still possess 

 for a large proportion of the one million three 

 hundred thousand pupils now found in our 

 public high schools. 



David Snedden 



Columbia University, 

 July 18, 1916 



THE SOUTHERN BULLFROG, RANA GRYLIO 

 STEJNEGER 



The southern bullfrog was first pronounced 

 a distinct species by Dr. Leonhard Stejneger 

 of the U. S. National Museum in 1902. 1 Miss 

 Dickerson in "The Frog Book" (1906) de- 

 scribes and gives photographs of this southern 

 frog. It has been reported only from Pensa- 

 cola, Kissimmee and Ozona, in Florida, and 

 from Bay St. Louis, in Mississippi. It is evi- 

 dent that little is known concerning the limits 

 of the range of this frog. 



Although the frog was first obtained at Bay 

 St. Louis, Mississippi, it appears to have been 

 known to some of the older naturalists more 

 than a century ago. It is interesting to note 

 that William Bartram appears to have been 

 well acquainted with this frog and considered 

 it distinct from the common bullfrog, Rana 

 catesbiana. This excellent naturalist, on page 



1 "A New Species of Bullfrog from Florida 

 and the Gulf Coast," Proc. Nat. Museum U. S., 

 Vol. 24, pp. 211-215, 1902. 



272 of his book, " Travels through North and 

 South Carolina, Georgia, East and West 

 Florida" (1792), says: 



The largest frog known in Florida and on the 

 seaeoast of Carolina is about eight or nine inches 

 in length from the nose to the extremity of the 

 toes; they are of a dusky brown or black color on 

 the upper side, and their belly or underside is 

 white, spotted and clouded with dusky spots of 

 various size and figure; their legs and thighs also 

 are variegated with dark brown or black; and 

 they are yellow and green about their mouth and 

 lips. They live in wet swamps, on the shores of 

 large rivers and lakes; their voice is loud and 

 hideous, greatly resembling the grunting of swine; 

 but not near as loud as the voice of the bullfrog 

 from Virginia and Pennsylvania: neither do they 

 arrive to half the size, the bullfrog being fre- 

 quently 18 inches in length and their roaring as 

 loud as that of a bull. 



From Bartram's description of the color and 

 markings, one can not say with certainty that 

 he did not confuse the southern bullfrog to 

 some extent with the common bullfrog, which 

 is also known to extend its range into Florida. 

 However, his description of the voice makes it 

 certain that he had heard the frog Rana Grylio 

 as named by Stejneger. H. A. Allard 



Washington, D. C, 

 April, 1916. 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS 



Outlines of Industrial Chemistry. By Frank 

 Hall Thorp, Ph.D., with assistance in re- 

 vision from Warren K. Lewis, Ph.D., pro- 

 fessor of chemical engineering in the Massa- 

 chusetts Institute of Technology. Third 

 revised and enlarged edition. Published by 

 the Macmillan Co., New York. Cloth. 8vo. 

 Pp. 665. Price $3.75. 



As the second edition of this well-known 

 text-book appeared in 1905, a material revision 

 of its pages was found necessary and many 

 sections have in consequence been altogether 

 rewritten with elimination of obsolete matter 

 and introduction of new material. 



One of the problems which must necessarily 

 present itself to the writer of a one-volume 

 text-book on so extensive a subject as indus- 

 trial chemistry is to know how to choose the 



