FEBRUARY 22, 1901. ] 
the full moon. He dealt particularly with the 
interest that attached to further photography 
of the region of the sun independently of the co- 
rona, and pointed out that with a wider shadow 
track, such as might be expected in Sumatra in 
next May, there was reason to expect that stars 
as small as the ninth magnitude might be se- 
cured; and he showed that on a reasonable 
supposition as to brilliancy the diameter of 
such a body might be supposed to be something 
like the one one-hundredth part of that of 
Mercury, or in a rough way, one-tenth of a 
second on the solar disk. The observers were 
aided of course by irradiation in seeing this as 
a star, while on the surface of the sun he could 
say from a good deal of experience that such a 
body would be invisible. 
The argument against the existence of a zone 
of such small bodies, from their never having 
been seen on the sun’s face, was therefore in- 
conclusive. He did not himself look forward 
with confidence to any new discovery being 
made in this direction, but he was encouraged 
by the opinion of a very competent adviser to 
think that the observation was worth repeating 
under better conditions. It was also desirable 
to repeat and extend the observations on the 
heat of the inner corona made at the late 
eclipse, and he had decided to send out a very 
small expedition to Sumatra in the immediate 
charge of Mr. C. G. Abbot, of the Smithsonian 
Astrophysical Observatory. The ultimate sta- 
tion in the interior of the island has not yet 
been determined. 
Professor 8. J. Brown, of the Naval Obsery- 
atory, showed slides from some of the photo- 
graphs taken by his party in North Carolina, 
those of the flash spectrumibeing specially inter- 
esting, and other slides from Mr. Burekhalter’s 
photographs in which the outer portions of the 
corona had a progressively longer exposure 
than the inner parts. 
Dr. L. A. Bauer reported on ‘The Coast and 
Geodetic Survey, Magnetic Observations Dur- 
ing the Late Eclipse.’ Records from several 
stations within and without the belt of totality 
showed that at all of them the regular morning 
change of declination was interrupted very 
nearly at the time of totality and reversed in 
direction for half an hour to an hour, the aver- 
SCIENCE. 307 
age magnitude of the reversed movement being 
about 30 seconds, while the probable error of 
a reading is not over 3 seconds. At one sta- 
tion the intensity was observed, and here a 
similar reversal of the regular change was noted, 
amounting to three times the probable error of 
a reading, the intensity being diminished. No 
satisfactory explanation has yet been given of 
these reversals. 
CHARLES K. WEAD, 
Secretary. 
BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. 
THE 333d meeting was held on Saturday even 
ing, January 26th, and was devoted toa dis- 
cussion of the question of ‘Former Land Con- 
nections between Asia and North America.’ 
In introducing the subject F. A. Lucas said the 
questions to be considered were the existence 
and probable geologic time of such connections 
and their place, whether by way of the Aleu- 
tian Islands or across Bering Strait. The dis- 
tribution of the North American sheep and 
brown bears, the presence of abundant and 
comparatively fresh remains of the northern 
mammoth, Hlephas primigenius in the north- 
' west, and the fact that the remains of a bison, 
,B. crassicernis, were found in Alaska only 
pointed to a rather recent and brief land con- 
nection. Hints of a much earlier land connec- 
tion were shown by the existence of a fossil 
Nemorhedus in Colorado and by the occurrence 
of the southern mammoth, Elephas columbi, from 
Oregon southwards and eastwards. 
Theo. Gill said that the fossils and recent 
mammals pointed to a recent brief connection 
between the continents, but that a more ancient 
one was indicated by the distribution of certain 
fresh-water fishes. The pike, Lucius lucius, 
was common to Europe, Asia and America and 
the nearest allies of the American Polyodon and 
Scaphirhynchus were Psephurus and several rela- 
tives of Scaphirhynchus found in Asia. These 
fishes were of old types, while the existing 
Cyprinoid fishes so characteristic of the streams 
of North America did not occur in Asia. 
W. H. Dall discussed the geology of the 
contiguous portions of Asia and North America, 
and described the hydrographic and climatic 
conditions existing in Bering Sea, saying that 
