APRIL 12, 1901. ] 
ter meeting, which is the annual meeting of 
the Society, is held at some convenient 
point during the last week in December. 
The winter meeting of 1900 was held in 
Chicago last December. The Society will 
hold its next summer meeting in Denver, 
Colorado, August 26 and 27, 1901. 
4. The Journal of the Society appears 
on the first of each month during the 
year. It has been greatly enlarged during 
the past decade, and every effort is put 
forth to make it worthy of the Society 
which it represents. It contains papers 
read before the various sections of the So- 
ciety and in its general meetings, together 
with such abstracts relating to the progress 
of chemical science and industry, as seem 
desirable. The estimate in which the 
Journal is held in other countries is shown 
by the number of articles published in 
the Jowrnal which are fully abstracted or 
copied entire by foreign periodicals. 
The present officers of the Society are: 
President, F. W. Clarke, chief chemist, U. 
S. Geological Survey, Washington, D. C.; 
_ Vice- Presidents, the presiding officers of the 
various sections ; Secretary, Albert G. Hale, 
Brooklyn, N. Y.; Treasurer, Albert P. Hal- 
lock, New York; Editor, Edward Hart, 
Easton, Pa.; Librarian, Edward G. Love, 
New York. The officers of the New York 
local section are: Chairman, Professor C. 
A. Doremus, College of the City of New 
York; Vice-Chairman, Professor M. T. 
Bogert, Columbia University ; Secretary and 
Treasurer, Dr. Durand Woodman. 
The total membership of the Society is 
about 1800, distributed mainly throughout 
the United States and other portions of the 
American continent. Some of its members 
are to be found in Cuba and other islands 
of the West Indies, others in various 
European countries, South America and 
Australia ; in fact nearly every nation of the 
world is represented in its membership. 
It is believed that this celebration, with 
SCIENCE. 
577 
its record of the history and achievements 
of the Society, and its representation of the 
character and strength of the organization 
of American chemists whom it represents, 
will not only mark an epoch in the progress 
of the Society itself, but will point the way 
to higher attainments and greater triumphs 
in all departments of chemical science and 
its applications in the New World. 
SCIENTIFIC BOOKS. 
Sur quelques microorganismes des combustibles 
fossiles. Par B. RENAULT. One vol., roy. 
8vo, pp. 460, with 66 text figs. ; atlas, folio, 
80 plates with explanation sheets. Extrait 
du Bulletin de la Société de 1lIndustrie 
Minérale. Troisiéme série, tome XIII., 4° 
livraison, 1899. Tome XIV., 1° livraison, 
1900. Saint-Etienne. 1900. 
This is a superb work on a very difficult, 
but at the same time very important subject 
both for the geologist and the biologist. It has 
been many years in process of elaboration, and 
more than a dozen preliminary papers, dating 
back as far as 1892, announcing important 
results as fast as they were reached, have ap- 
peared by the same indefatigable investigator, 
mostly unaided, but also occasionally in as- 
sociation with MM. Bertrand and Roche, who 
are working somewhat along the same lines. 
It is fashionable in our day to extol the 
wonders of the microscope, especially so since 
the modern bacteriological investigations began 
with their momentous practical consequences. 
The medieval philosophers had not probably 
any adequate conception of the real meaning 
of their fine alliterative phrase: Deus magnus 
in magnis, maximus in minimis. Spencer’s 
‘soul of truth in things erroneous’ also finds 
exemplification here, for the ‘devils’ of which 
men were once believed to be ‘possessed,’ 
in disease, epilepsy, insanity, etc., and which 
it was sought to ‘cast out’ by exorcism and 
prayer, have been shown by the microscope to 
be real living things—malignant spirits—the 
invisible germs of disease. 
But while it has become clear that these mod- 
ern revelations have not brought anything new 
to light, and that these devils were as numer- 
