160 
age. A law of July 10, 1894, allowed five years 
for this operation, and it has been punctually 
accomplished with two days to spare. The 
great, collector at Clichy has been closed, and 
henceforth half a million cubic meters of sewage 
daily will, instead of being discharged into the 
Seine, find an outlet at Achéres, Méry and 
Gennevilliers, to be spread over 3,500 hectares 
of land. 
UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS. 
THE Ahearn bill, passed by the recent New 
York Legislature, allows $96,000 to be spent on 
free lectures next year in New York City, be- 
ing an increase of $36,000 over last year. The 
lectures are largely on scientific topics and are 
doing much for the education of the people. 
WE learn from Natural Science that the colo- 
nies of the west coast of Africa have adopted a 
scheme whereby picked boys shall be sent for 
training in horticulture and economic agricul- 
ture, first to Jamaica and afterwards to Kew 
Gardens. This scheme is due to the success 
that attended the experiment initiated by the 
then Governor, Sir A. Maloney, of sending in 
1890 two native lads from Lagos to be trained 
as gardeners at the Jamaica and Kew Gardens. 
After spending two years and a half in Jamaica 
they were attached to Kew Gardens for some 
months, and are now in charge of branch botanic 
stations in Lagos, growing and preparing agri- 
cultural products and giving instruction. 
Dr. W. WACE CARLIER, in the University of 
Edinburgh, has been appointed professor of 
physiology in Mason University College, Bir- 
mingham. 
Dr. ADELBERT VON WALDENHOFEN, profes- 
sor of applied electricity at the Vienna School 
of Technology, has retired, after more than 
fifty years of service. 
ProFEssoR A. WILMER DUFF, now of Pur- 
due University, Lafayette, Ind., has accepted 
the professorship of physics in the Polytechnic 
Institute, Worcester. Professor Duff received 
his B. A. degree in 1884 in New Brunswick, 
after which he went to Europe for advanced 
study in the University of Edinburgh. Here 
he studied with the distinguished physicist, 
SCIENCE. 
[N. S. Vou. X. No. 240. 
Professor Tait, and in 1888 received the mas- 
ter’s degree, with first-class honors, in mathe- 
matics and mathematical physics, receiving also 
a fellowship in physics. In 1888 and 1892 Pro- 
fessor Duff studied in Berlin, having, in 1889 
and 1890 filled temporarily the professorship 
of physics in Madras, India. Since 1893 he 
has filled the chair in physics at Purdue Uni- 
versity with great success. He is a fellow o 
the American Association for the Advancement 
of Science, and has made a number of im- 
portant investigations in physics which have 
been published in the Philosophical Magazine, 
the Physical Review and other leading scientific 
journals. At present he is engaged on some 
researches on sound, of great scientific and 
practical importance. 
PrRoFessor A. W. FRENCH, formerly of the 
Thayer School of Civil Engineering, Dartmouth 
College, has been appointed professor of civil 
engineering in the Worcester Polytechnic In- 
stitute. Professor French was educated at 
Dartmouth College and at the Thayer School of 
Civil Engineering, from which he received the 
degree of C.E. in 1892. The Thayer School is 
well known to be of the first rank in the United 
States as a graduate school of civil engineering. 
Its courses are probably more exacting and ex- 
tensive than those of any other institution. 
After his graduation Professor French spent 
two or three years in practice, serving as as- 
sistant engineer to Tower Brothers, of Holyoke, 
and as engineer in charge of the Platte River 
Paper Mills. Subsequently he was engineer in 
charge of the Denver and Platte Pumping Sta- 
tion, and this was followed by an appointment 
as assistant engineer on the Denver and Gulf 
Railway, especially in bridge designing. In 
July, 1895, he was called to an associate pro- 
fessorship in the Thayer School, from which he 
was graduated. He filled this chair most ac- 
ceptably to the Director, Dr. Robert Fletcher, 
until 1897, when he resigned for the purpose of 
again taking up the practice of his profession 
with the object of obtaining a more varied ex- 
perience in actual field and construction work. 
During the past two years he has been the 
principal engineer of the Niagara Engineering 
Works, Niagara Falls, New York, which posi- 
tion he leaves to come to Worcester. 
