JUNE 7, 1912] 
ganization of the American Association for 
Promoting Hygiene and Public Baths. Dr. 
Simon Branch, professor in the medical de- 
partment of Columbia University, who has 
for nearly twenty years led the movement for 
free public baths, was elected president, and 
Dr. William H. Hale, permanent secretary. 
The annual meeting will be held on the second 
Tuesday of May, the next meeting being at 
Baltimore, May 18, 1913. The membership 
fee is one dollar a year and all persons of 
good character are eligible for membership. 
A CABLEGRAM received at the Harvard Col- 
lege Observatory from Kiel states that a spec- 
trogram of Enebos Nova obtained by Kuestner 
at Bonn shows “dark lines uranium radium 
emanation.” 
We learn from the London Times that 
Messrs. Sotheby sold, on May 17, the scientific 
books of the late Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker, 
among which were several presentation copies, 
whilst many were with valuable MS. notes by 
the late owner. A set of Hooker’s Icones 
Plantarum, 1837-1911, 30 volumes—£67 (Wes- 
ley); Edwards’s Botanical Register, 1815-47, 
33 volumes—£26 (Muller) ; and a collection of 
books on the “Flora” of the Antarctic re- 
gions, New Zealand, etc., in nine volumes— 
£123 (Wesley). The late Dr. Joseph F. 
Payne’s property included a slightly defective 
eopy of Apuleius Platonicus, ‘“ Herbarium,” 
Rome, 1488, the earliest printed book with 
figures of plants—£55 (Leighton); J. Milton, 
“ Areopagitica,” 1644, the very rare first edi- 
tion, one page slightly cut into—£21 (Bar- 
nard); and Joannem de Cuba, “ Tractatus de 
Herbis,” etc., 1491, with numerous woodcuts 
of plants and animals, slightly defective—£35 
(Quaritch). The two days’ sale of books 
realized £1,488 14s. 
AccorDING to the Journal of the American 
Medical Association the births for 1910 were 
35,119 and for 1911, 69,098 below the average 
for the decade 1901 to 1910, while the number 
of marriages in the first year was 10,154 and 
in the latter 20,897 above the average in that 
period. It is therefore evident that the fer- 
tility of married women has shown a consid- 
erable decrease. For each 1,000 of the pop- 
SCIENCE 
891 
ulation there occurred in 1911 30.2 births as 
compared with 31.5 in 1910, 32.7 in 1909, 33.7 
in 1908 and 37.4 in 1901, so that in ten years 
the birth rate has dropped by 7.2 per thousand. 
The number of deaths in 1911 was 18.1 per 
thousand, as contrasted with 16.9, 17.9, 18.9 
and 21.7 in the four preceding years. Accord- 
ing to these figures, the excess of births for 
1911 was 12.1, as compared with 14.6 in 1910, 
14.8 in 1909 and 1908 and 15.7 in 1901. 
UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS 
Nearty $1,000,000 was appropriated by 
the General Education Board at its meet- 
ing on May 24. $250,000 is given to the 
George Peabody College for Teachers at Nash- 
ville, Tenn., for the establishment of the Sea- 
man A. Knapp School of Country Life. The 
other colleges awarded conditional appropria- 
tions are: Beloit College, Beloit, Wis., $100,- 
000; Coe College, Cedar Rapids, La., $100,- 
000; McAlester College, St. Paul, Minn., 
$50,000; University of Rochester, Rochester, 
N. Y., $200,000. The sum of $210,000 was set 
aside for demonstration work in agriculture 
in the southern states, for professors of secon- 
dary education in state universities of the 
south, and to aid the work of Negro education 
in the south. 
Proressor Oris F. Ranpaut, who holds the 
chair of mechanics and mechanical drawing 
at Brown University, has been appointed 
dean of the university to succeed Professor 
Alexander Meiklejohn, who is to become pres- 
ident of Amherst College. 
Dr. Grorce Dock has resigned the deanship 
of the medical department of Washington 
University, St. Louis. Dr. Dock will continue 
as professor of medicine. 
Dr. Davin Rizrsman and Dr. Joseph Sailer 
have been elected professors of clinical medi- 
cine in the medical department of the Uni- 
versity of Pennsylvania, in succession to the 
late Dr. John H. Musser. Dr. Richard M. 
Pearce occupies the John Herr Musser pro- 
fessorship of medical research. 
Victor C. Myers, Ph.D. (Yale, 709), has 
been appointed professor of pathological chem- 
istry, and has taken charge of the new labora- 
