862 
and are published in the Comptes Rendus. Polo- 
nium, already found by Curie, seems akin to 
bismuth and radium to barium. DeBierne has 
worked upon that portion of the solution of 
pitch-blende which is not precipitated by hydro- 
gen sulfid in acid solution, but is by ammonia 
or ammonium sulfid. In this portion were 
present with iron and aluminum small quantities 
of many other metals, as zinc, manganese, 
chromium, vanadium, etc., and rare earths. A 
new radiant substance was found closely akin 
analytically to titanium, whose power is 5000 
times as great as that of uranium, but is not 
spontaneously luminous as in the case with 
radium. 
In the Zeitung fiir Biologie H. Harms has 
gone over again the question of the quantity of 
fluorin in bones, and his conclusion is that the 
amount varies from 0.005% to 0.022%, and that 
the quantity is so small and variable that it 
must be considered, not as belonging to the con- 
stitution of the bones and teeth, but as merely 
accessory. 
Ir has long been believed that the step from 
the inorganic carbon dioxid and water to organic 
plant substance, that is to thecarbo-hydrates, was 
by way of formaldehyde, but the actual existence 
of the intermediate product could not be proven. 
By macerating fresh leaves with pure water and 
immediately distilling, it has been possible for 
Gino Pollacci to detect formaldehyde in the dis- 
tillate. The test used for formaldehyde is the 
violet color given with codein and concentrated 
sulfuric acid. 
A NOTABLE contribution to the stereo-chem- 
istry of nitrogen by W. J. Pope and 8. J. 
Peachey appears in the last Proceedings of the 
Chemical Society (London). When ¢-benzyl- 
phenyl-allyl-ethyl ammonium iodid is heated 
with silver dextro-camphorsulfonate, it is re- 
solved into optical isomers, respectively dextro- 
and leyo-rotary. Here the optical activity ap- 
pears to be clearly due to the asymmetry of the 
quinquevalent nitrogen atom, linked to five dif- 
ferent groups (or atoms). When the paper was 
read, Dr. Armstrong characterized it as being the 
most valuable contribution to stereochemistry 
since the introduction of geometrical consider- 
ations by Le Bel and van’t Hoff. J. L. H. 
SCIENCE. 
[N. S. Vou. X. No. 258. 
SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS. 
MrMortiAt exercises in honor of the late Ed- 
ward Orton were held at the Ohio State Univer- 
sity on November 26th. Addresses were made 
by President T. C. Mendenhall, Dr. G. K. Gil- 
bert, Hon. T. J. Godfrey, Professor W. H. 
Scott and Professor 8. C. Derby. 
THE bacteriologists of America are planning 
to organize a society to meet during Christmas 
week in affiliation with the American Society 
of Naturalists. The first meeting for organiza- 
tion will be held at New Haven during the 
coming holidays. A program of papers has, 
however, been provided, and all interested in 
bacteriological topics are invited to attend. 
Information in regard to the Society may be 
obtained by addressing Professor H. W. Conn, 
Middletown, Ct. 
Dr. WILLIAM R. Brooks, director of Smith 
Observatory, has just been awarded by the Paris 
Academy of Sciences ‘the Grand Lalande’ 
prize for his numerous and brilliant astronom- 
ical discoveries. 
PROFESSOR CHARLES R. Cross of the Massa- 
chusetts Institute of Technology will give a se- 
ries of Lowell lectures on ‘The Telephone,’ 
beginning on December 19th. 
A DINNER given by the Physical Society, 
London, was held at the Hotel Cecil on No- 
vember 17th. The president of the Society, 
Professor O. J. Lodge, took the chair, and 
the guests included Right Hon. A. J. Bal- 
four, Mr. G. Wyndham, M.P., Sir W. H. 
Preece, Major-General E. R. Festing, Dr. J. H. 
Gladstone, Professor A. W. Rucker, and Pro- 
fessors G. F, Fitzgerald, A. W. Reinhold, A. 
W. Ayrton, S. P. Thompson, G. C. Foster, and 
W. Ramsey. 
A TOTEMIC column from southern Alaska has 
been presented to the museum of the University 
of Michigan by Leon J. Cole, assistant in zool- 
ogy, who visited Alaska last summer as a mem- 
ber of the Harriman Alaska Expedition. The 
column is about ten feet high and three feet 
wide and is made from a tree trunk split length- 
wise. It was taken by Mr. Cole from the in- 
terior of a house in a deserted village of the 
Tlingit Indians near Cape Fox. 
