OcroBER 13, 1899.] 
the public from time immemorial. There are 
several roads and footpaths in close proximity 
to the monument, and the council were unani- 
mous in their opinion that the right of the pub- 
lic to the use of those roads should be main- 
tained. Stonehenge is a source of considerable 
revenue to Salisbury and district, and the pre- 
vailing opinion is that the monument should be 
acquired by the State. 
In ‘Memoires et Compte Rendus des Trav- 
aux de la Société des Ingenieurs Civils de 
France’ an extended account is given by M. 
Chalon of the progress made in that country by 
‘Metal déployé,’ since its introduction from 
the United States in 1898. The first machine 
producing Golding’s new product was installed 
in June, 1898, and six are now unequal to the 
requirements of that country. The process 
and manufacture are very fully described. The 
metal used is a steel containing very little C., 
less than 0.7 per cent Mn., a trace of S. and of 
Si., and 0.1 per cent. O. 
Mr. Girrorp PincHort, Forester of the U.S. 
Department of Agriculture, in the last number 
of the National Geographic Magazine, gives an 
interesting explanation of the method by which 
longleaf pine seedlings protect themselves 
against forest fires. In addition to bark which 
is not uncommonly as thick as the wood (the 
whole diameter being thus two-thirds bark and 
one third wood), the young trees add a device 
‘specially adapted for their safety when growing 
amid long grass, with which they are almost 
always associated. ‘‘ During the first four or 
five years the long leaf seedling reaches a 
height of but four or five inches above the 
ground; but while the stem during these early 
years makes little progress, the long needles 
shoot up and bend over in a green cascade 
which falls to the ground ina circle about the 
seedling. Not only does this barrier of green 
needles itself burn only with difficulty, but it 
shades out the grass around the young stem, 
and so prepares a double fire-resisting shield 
about the vitals of the young tree.’ Such facts 
explain why the fire which has restricted the 
growth of evergreen oaks in parts of Florida, 
for example, has made a pure forest of pines in 
a region where the reproduction of the oaks is 
“SCIENCE. 
545 
phenomenally rapid wherever the annual fires 
cannot run.”’ 
A PRIZE of 100,000f. has been founded by the 
heirs of the late Mr. Anthony Pollok, of Wash- 
ington, to be awarded during the Universal Ex- 
hibition which is to be held in Paris in 1900, to 
the inventor of the best apparatus for the sav- 
ing of life in case of maritime disaster. The 
prize is open to universal competition This 
sum is now in deposit with the American Se- 
curity and Trust Company of Washington, 
D. C., and will be paid over to the successful 
competitor when a decision shall have been 
rendered by an appointed jury, and formally 
communicated to the Secretary of State of the 
United States ,through the Commissioner-Gen- 
eral of the United States to the International 
Exhibition of 1900. The juror selected on be- 
half of the United States is Lieutenant William 
S. Sims, U.S. N., Naval Attaché of the Embassy 
of the United States at Paris. In considering 
the award the jury will be governed by the fol- 
lowing conditions: (1) The total amount of the 
prize may be awarded to a single individual on 
condition that the invention is of sufficient 
practical value and importance to justify the 
proposed award; (2) should several persons 
enter inventions of equal value, the jury, as it 
shall consider right and just, may award a por- 
tion of the prize to each; (8) should none of 
the inventions entered be of sufficient value to 
entitle it ‘to the prize, the jury may reject any 
and all of them, but at the same time shall be 
empowered to indemnify competing inventors 
in such amounts as may be deemed advisable. 
The instructions to competitors will be issued in 
due course by the jury, with the sanction and 
approval of the authorities of the French Exhi- 
bition. These will be distributed upon applica- 
tion. Correspondence, however, may be ad- 
dressed to the members of the jury at Paris, or 
to Mr. Charles J. Bell, President of the Amer- 
ican Security and Trust Company, No. 1405 G 
Street, Washington, D. C. 
UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS. 
THE will of Dr. Calvin Ellis, formerly Dean 
of the Harvard Medical School, has only re- 
cently been probated, though his death occurred 
some years ago. It leaves about $140,000 to 
