SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLI. No. 1067 



ing on the history of the human race, that of 

 the relation of culture to climate. Much as 

 has been done, the author would be the last 

 to say that more than a breaking of the ground 

 has been accomplished. He himself is as busily 

 engaged now as before, deriving evidence 

 from all sources available to him, as witness 

 the recent papers on the relation of climate and 

 civilization, work and weather, in Harper's 

 Magazine, forecast doubtless of more extensive 

 study of the same kind. 



A single matter of book-making should be 

 especially mentioned. In a note to the reader, 

 following the table of contents, a list of segre- 

 gations of chapters is given for the direction 

 of those more especially interested in one field 

 of thought than another. Such schemes are 

 helpful in these days of much publication. 

 Francis E. Lloyd 



McGiLL University 



ISE PSOCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL 



ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 



{NVMBEBS 1-4) 



Pour numbers of the Proceedings of the 

 National Academy of Sciences have now been 

 issued. These contained in 258 pages a total 

 of YO articles, including the report of the au- 

 tumn meeting of the Academy. The average 

 length of the contributions was therefore 3.Y 

 pages, which lies well within the limit of 6 

 pages, or 2,500 words, set by the editors. 



The number of articles in the various 

 branches of science is as follows : 



Mathematics 11 Astronomy 11 



Chemistry 33 Gteology 2 



Paleontology 1 Botany 4 



Zoology 5 Genetics 5 



Bacteriology 2 Physiology 8 



Amthropology 5 Psychology 2 



The inadequate representation of certain 

 sciences, such as physics, geology and pa- 

 thology, is largely accidental, as many authors 

 in these fields have indicated their intention 

 of contributing to the Proceedings. 



The arrangement of the articles according 

 to geographical distribution into Eastern, 

 Middle West, and Pacific also shows a reason- 

 able distribution over the whole United States. 

 The figures are: 



Eastern ...35 Middle west ...21 Pacific ...13 



The Pacific figures show the activities of the 

 great Lick and Mt. Wilson observatories in 

 astronomy; and the Middle West has an ex- 

 ceptional representation in mathematics. 



A number of the papers which have appeared 

 in the Proceedings were read before the 

 Academy at its autumn meeting and have 

 therefore appeared in abstract in Science. 

 Without making exceptions in the case of 

 these papers, the contents of the first four 

 issues of the Proceedings may be outlined as 

 follows : 



Astronomy. — An analysis of the radial 

 velocities of nebulae by W. W. Campbell shows 

 that the planetary nebulse are on the average 

 moving much faster than the helium stars, 

 which are supposed to be nearest to the ne- 

 bular condition; and this leads to the sugges- 

 tion that these nebulse may have arisen by the 

 collision of fast moving stars with resisting 

 media. 



H. D. Curtis, from a study of photographs 

 of nebulse taken at various times throughout 

 a period of thirteen years, concludes that 

 there are upon the plates no evidences of in- 

 ternal motion and little if any of proper mo- 

 tion, indicating great distance and enormous 

 size for these objects. 



The announcement of the discovery of the 

 ninth satellite of Jupiter is made by S. B. 

 Nicholson. 



E. E. Wilson reports abnormally high radial 

 velocities (some 250 km. per sec.) for nebulse 

 in the Magellanic Clouds, and calls attention 

 to the importance of determining the velo- 

 cities of stars in the clouds to ascertain 

 whether the clouds as a whole may have such 

 a velocity. 



Kapteyn's theory that the universe is mainly 

 composed of two great streams of stars is 

 strongly supported by a statistical study of 

 stellar radial velocities by J. C. Kapteyn 

 and W. S. Adams. New observations of faint 

 stars show that the streams extend to the 

 greatest distances for which data are available. 



A. van Maanen's measures of stellar paral- 

 laxes with the sixty-inch reflector are appar- 

 ently of very high precision. 



