624 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. II. No. 45 



the hitherto unknown portion of Sonora 

 county, Mexico, and Tiburon Island, on the 

 coast of Mexico, inhabited by the Seri In- 

 dians, noted for their treacherous blood- 

 thirstiness. 



AccoEDiNG to Nature the Catalogue of the 

 Library of the Royal Geographical Society, 

 compiled by Dr. H. R. Mill, and lately pub- 

 lished, is a verj' full and valuable index to 

 the literature of geography. The Catalogue 

 contains the titles of all works in the pos- 

 session of the Royal Geographical Society 

 published up to the close of 1893. The 

 entries (amounting to as many as 18,000) 

 are arranged in four divisions. The first 

 division, which runs into 521 of the 833 

 pages, is a general alphabetical author's 

 catalogue; the second comprises collections 

 of voyages and travels, arranged in alpha- 

 betical order under authors' names, and 

 containing a brief analysis of the contents 

 of each volume; in the third division, gov- 

 ernment, anonymous and other miscellan. 

 eous publications are arranged geographi- 

 cally ; whUe the fourth consists of a list of 

 transactions and periodical publications, ar- 

 ranged in a similar manner according to 

 the place of publication. With such a 

 comprehensive classification, it is easy to 

 find the works of each author and to refer 

 to the literature concerning different divi- 

 sions of the earth. A valuable supplement 

 to the Catalogue will be the subject index 

 now being prepared and in which the princi- 

 pal contents of all the geographical books 

 and periodicals belonging to the Society 

 will be classified. 



A MONTTMENT to Ducheuue by M. M. Des- 

 vergnes and Debrie will shortly be erected 

 in the Salpetriere. It is also proposed to 

 erect a memorial to Duchenne in his native 

 city of Boulogne. 



It is said that Pi'ofessor Wollny, of 

 Munich, has made some experiments which 

 prove the utility of angle-worms for agri- 



cultural purposes. He raised peas, beans, 

 potatoes and other vegetables in wooden 

 boxes, some with and some without worms, 

 and in each case the presence of worms led 

 to an increase in the crop, varying from 

 twenty-five per cent, in the peas to ninety- 

 four per cent, in the rye. 



The Canadian Medical Association will 

 hold its annual meeting for 1896 iu Montreal 

 under the presidency of Dr. James Thor- 

 burn. 



The total number of new students who 

 have entered the twelve London medical 

 schools is 581, as compared with 552 in 1894. 



Mr. C. H. Cochrane states in Lippin- 

 cott's Magazine that the National Rapid 

 Transit Company is asking the United 

 States Senate for privileges looking to the 

 establishment of a line between New York 

 and Washington, and specifying in the pro- 

 posed bill that the schedule time shall not 

 be less than one hundred miles an hour, 

 which necessitates a speed of a hundred 

 and twenty miles per hour to cover loss 

 from stops. Further, the General Electric 

 Company of New York is willing to guar- 

 antee motors, generators and other electric 

 mechanism for such a road, warranting 

 them to maintain a speed of one hundred 

 and fifty miles an hour when deUvering a 

 hundred horse-power per motor with two 

 motors per car. 



The Neiu York Evening Post states that 

 the documents of the Arctic explorer Jack- 

 son, brought back fi-om Franz Joseph Land 

 by the Windward, have been opened in 

 London. They record that the expedition 

 landed on September 7, 1894, at Cape Flora, 

 where log houses were erected and a tem- 

 pestuous winter was spent. Jackson and 

 two othei'S started north March 10, 1895, 

 with two ponies and two sledges. The 

 temperature was sometimes 45 degrees be- 

 low zero. The countrj^ generally was 2,500 

 feet above sea level and was covered with 



