April 18, 1919] 



SCIENCE 



377 



hours, and in biology it was decided that six 

 semester hours of college work were acceptable 

 for students who had completed a year of 

 biology in high school. 



Dr. W. W. Rowlee, of Cornell University, 

 gave an illustrated lecture on " Balsa Wood, 

 its production and uses," at the New York 

 State College of Forestry at Syracuse, on 

 April 2. The lecture included scientific data 

 and experiences gleaned from au eight month's 

 absence in Central America in the employ of 

 the American Balsa Company. 



Dr. John C. McVail delivered the ililroy 

 Lectures before the Royal College of Physi- 

 cians of London on March 13, 18 and 20; his 

 subject being half a century of smallpox and 

 vaccination. The Goulstonian Lectures, on 

 the spread of bacterial infection was delivered 

 on March 25, 27 and April 1, by Dr. W. W. 

 C. Topley, lecturer on bacteriology Charing 

 Cross Medical School and the Lumleian Lec- 

 tures, by Sir Hujnphry D. Rolleston, on cere- 

 bro-spinal fever, were planned for April -3, 8 

 and 10. 



John E. Johnson, Jr., a director of the 

 American Listitute of Mining and Metallurg- 

 ical Engineers, died on April 4 in Scarsdale, 

 N. Y., of injuries received when he was struck 

 by an automobile earlier in the day. Mr. 

 Johnson was fifty-nine years old. He was the 

 author of books on mining and metallurgical 

 subjects. 



Dr. Mary Sophie Young, for the past eight 

 years instructor in botany and curator of the 

 herbarium in the University of Texas, died on 

 March 5 after an illness of a few week's dura- 

 tion. 



The executive committee of the American 

 Federation of Biological Societies has called 

 the annual meeting for April 24, 25 and 26, 

 119, at Johns Hopkins Medical School, Balti- 

 more, Md. 



It is announced that the German govern- 

 ment has decided to return to China the 

 astronomical instrvmients which were trans- 

 ported from Pekin to Germany in 1900. Ne- 

 gotiations have been opened for the shipping 

 of the instruments to China. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 NEWS 



The legislature of Nebraska has recently 

 appropriated for the College of Medicine at 

 Omaha for the ensuing biennium a total of 

 $380,000. This amount includes the mainte- 

 nance of the University Hospital. 



A GIFT of $5,000 for a scholarship in the 

 Sheffield Scientific School of Yale University 

 has been made by Mrs. Arthur A. Stilwell, of 

 New York City, in memory of her son, Thomas 

 Vincent Stilwell, who lost his life in the war. 



Funds have been provided for a scholarship 

 in the department of chemistry of the Univer- 

 city of Chicago, to be called " The Joseph 

 Triner Scholarship in Chemistry." It is to be 

 assigned to a Czecho-Slovak graduate of the 

 Harrison Technical School, Chicago. 



Mr. ExMIL Mond has offered to the Univer- 

 sity of Cambridge £20,000 to be used for the 

 establishment of a chair of aeronautical engi- 

 neering. The chair is to be designated the 

 Francis Mond professorship of aeronautical 

 engineering after Lieutenant Francis Mond, 

 the son of the donor. 



Professor Edwin J. B.U{TLETT, senior pro- 

 fessor at Dartmouth College and son of a 

 former president of the college, has resigned 

 from the chair of chemistry which he has held 

 since 1883, his resignation to take effect in 

 1920. Leave of absence for the second semester 

 has been granted to him. 



It is report-ed that Sir Arthur Newsholme, 

 the distinguished British physician and author 

 of works on the prevention of disease, has been 

 offered the chair of public health at The Johns 

 Hopkins University. 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE 



ON SOME PROBOSCIDEANS OF THE STATE OF 

 NEW YORK 



At a meeting of the Geological Society of 

 America in Washington, at the close of the 

 year 1902,^ the question arose as to the former 

 presence of the mammoth in New York. It 

 was said that, when Theodore Roosevelt, as 



1 Science, Vol. XVII., p. 297. 



