452 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. n., No. 34. 



beds in the vicinity is complete, and that botanical 

 material is on hand in great abundance for consulta- 

 tion. There will be three laboratories provided with 

 every needed appliance, — one for general botanical 

 work, the second for zoological work, the third for 

 special work with compound microscopes. The last 

 laboratory, in particular, is to be devoted exclusively 

 to original research. 



— Frederick A. Fernald, in criticising, in the Sep- 

 tember Century, Mr. A. Melville Bell's paper in 

 Science for June 1, objects to the forms of the visi- 

 ble-speech letters which Mr. Bell would employ as 

 symbols for the six consonant sounds in our lan- 

 guage which have no proper letters to represent 

 them, and suggests the discarding from their pres- 

 ent use in our alphabet of the duplicated symbols q, 

 X, and c, and using them instead for tiie sounds 

 represented by nij, zh, and ch. "Perhaps it will be 

 decided to replace w and y by vowels, as in Franklin's 

 scheme; if so, these, with one Anglo-Saxon letter, 

 alredy lookt upon with favor, would make up the 

 six lacking consonants." To this suggestion it may 

 be objected, that the use of familiar letters in an un- 

 familiar sense would be a source of constant confu- 

 sion. For example, we should have to read cat and 

 coke as chat and choke, pleaxure as pleasure, roux as 

 rouge, sig as sing, etc. The alterations of spelling, 

 too, would be seriously numerous ; as in siks for six, 

 egzist for exist, kueen for queen, kuite for quite, 

 etc. The use of the Anglo-Saxon p and ^ for the 

 two sounds of th would certainly be an improvement 

 on present practice; but the writing of w (in way) 

 and y (in yea) as vowels would be altogether wrong, 

 as these sounds are demonstrably not vowels, but 

 consonants. Wh, also, is a true consonant, — the 

 non-vocal correspondent of w, — and has not, as al- 

 leged, the sound of hoo. If wh had this sound, the 

 sentence, " I saw the man whet the knife," would 

 not be — as it is — unmistakably distinct from "I 

 saw the man who ate the knife." Ch (in chair) is 

 not, as alleged, a simple consonant, but a compound 

 consisting of a shut position of the tongue (i), fol- 

 lowed by a hiss (sft) ; and either the silent position 

 or the hiss may be prolonged ad libitum. 



" Even such a man, so woe-begone," etc. 



Give due lingering emphasis to the word ' such,' in 

 the above quotation, and the compound character of 

 the ch — misunderstood by many writers — will be 

 apparent. The letter c should consistently stand for 

 sh, not eh, in Mr. Fernald' s proposition; but, if a 

 better method of completing our alphabet cannot be 

 adopted, by all means rather let the ABC remain 

 as it is. 



— Le Temps has published the following direc- 

 tions by Pasteur to those exposed to the contagion of 

 cholera. 



The precautions to be taken, indicated to the mem- 

 bers of the French cholera commission, all relate to 

 the case when it is necessary to guard against the 

 excessive causes of contagion. 



1°. Do not use the potable water of the locality, 

 when the commission enters on its investigations, 



without having first boiled the water, and, after it 

 has cooled, shaken it for some minutes (two or 

 three minutes are auflScient) in a bottle half full and 

 corked. 



One may use the waters of the locality, provided 

 one draws them at a spring, in vessels which have 

 been purified by exposing them to a temperature of 

 150° C, or, belter, to a higher heat. One can advan- 

 tageously employ natural mineral waters. 



2°. Use wine which has been heated in bottles 

 some 50° to 60°, and drink from glasses likewise 

 purified. 



3°. Only make use of food thoroughly boiled, or of 

 fruits well washed with water which has been boiled, 

 and which has been kept in the same vessels in 

 which it was boiled, or which has been transferred 

 from these vessels to others disinfected by heat. 



4°. The bread used should be cut in thin slices, and 

 kept at a temperature of 150° C. for twenty minutes 

 or more. 



5°. All vessels used for food should be exposed to 

 a temperature of 150° C. or more. 



6°. Bed linen and towels should be plunged in boil- 

 ing water, and dried. 



7°. Water for washing should be boiled, and have 

 added to it, after cooling, one five-himdredth part 

 of thymic acid (one litre of dilute alcohol for two 

 grams of acid) and one-fiftieth part of phenic acid 

 (one litre of water for twenty grams of acid). 



8°. Wash the hands and body often during the day 

 with the boiled water to which the thymic or phenic 

 acid has been added. 



9°. It is only in case one has to handle the bodies 

 of those who have died from cholera, or the clothes 

 and linen soiled with their discharges, that it is neces- 

 sary to cover the mouth and nostrils with a mask, 

 formed of two pieces of fine wire gauze, with wad- 

 ding between, one centimetre thick. The mask should 

 be exposed to a temperature of 150° each time before 

 it is used. 



— The Wisconsin agricultural experiment-station 

 was organized by the board of regents of the Univer- 

 sity of Wisconsin, in June, 1883. The work of the 

 station is. in charge of W. A. Henry, agriculture ; 

 William Trelease, botany and horticulture; H. P. 

 Armsby, agricultural chemistry. The bulletins of 

 the station will be sent to all interested. The first 

 number contains an account of experiments at the 

 station In feeding skim-milk to calves and pigs. 



— Mr. C. F. Mabery has resigned his position at 

 Harvard college, and accepted the chair of chemistry 

 at the recently organized Case school of applied 

 science at Cleveland, O. 



— The British association for the advancement of 

 science will meet next year in Montreal, on Aug. 27. 



— Next year's meeting of the Swiss naturalists 

 will be held at Lucerne. 



— The jury which will examine the electric light- 

 ing machinery offered for competition at the Cincin- 

 nati industrial exposition has begun its work. It is 

 hoped that the comparative tests will be the most 

 satisfactory yet obtained. Awards of five hundred 

 and three hundred dollars will be made for the best 



