Aprit 19, 1901.] 
ton last week, with all the members in attend- 
ance. Professor Young, of Princeton Univer- 
sity, was elected Chairman and Professor Stone, 
of the University of Virginia, Secretary. The 
members of the Board were received by Presi- 
dent McKinley. They visited the observatory, 
and held a number of sessions, but the proceed- 
ings have not been made public. 
AT the last meeting of the Rumford Com- 
mittee of the American Academy of Arts and 
Sciences a grant of $300 was awarded to Pro- 
fessor Arthur A. Noyes in aid of a research 
on the effect of high temperatures upon the 
relative conductivity of aqueous salt solutions. 
Dr. W. KARAWAIEW has been appointed 
director of the zoological station at Sebastapol. 
THE Washington Academy of Sciences has 
announced for Wednesday, April 17th, at 8:15 
P. M., a lecture in honor of the National Acad- 
emy of Sciences by Professor Alpheus Hyatt on 
“A New Law of Evolution.’ 
« THE spring lectures before the Royal Insti- 
tute, London, include: Dr. Allen Macfadyen, 
six lectures on ‘Cellular Physiology,’ with 
special ‘reference to the enzymes and fer- 
ments; Professor Dewar, three lectures on the 
‘Chemistry of Carbon’; Professor J. B. 
Farmer, two lectures on the ‘ Biological Char- 
acters of Epiphytic Plants,’ and Mr. J. Y. 
Buchanan, three lectures on ‘Climate, its 
Causes and Effects.’ The Friday evening meet- 
ings will be resumed on April 19th, when a dis- 
course will be delivered by Professor J. J. 
Thomson, on the ‘ Existence of Bodies Smaller 
than Atoms.’ 
As we have already announced, Mr. J. H. H. 
Teall has succeeded Sir Archibald Geikie as 
director-general of the British Geological Sur- 
vey. Nature now announces the following 
further changes in the staff: Mr. H. B. Wood- 
ward to be assistant director (for England and 
Wales), and Mr. John Horne to be assistant 
director (for Scotland); Mr. C. Fox Strangways, 
Mr. Clement Reid and Mr. Aubrey Strahan to 
be district geologists for England and Wales; 
Mr. B. N. Peach and Mr. W. Gunn to be dis- 
trict geologists for Scotland, and Mr. G. W. 
Lamplugh to be district geologist for Ireland, 
SCIENCE. 
635 
PROFESSOR RUDOLPH VIRCHOW will be eighty 
years old on the 13th of October. When he 
celebrated his seventieth birthday, a fund was 
collected in his honor for the endowment of 
scientific research, and a committee has now 
been appointed to increase this fund as a fur- 
ther testimonial to Germany’s greatest living 
man of science. It js intended that the testi- 
monial shall be international, and a committee 
has been appointed in America consisting of 
Charles A. L. Reed, President of the American 
Medical Association; Henry P. Bowditch, 
President of the Congress of American Physi- 
cians and Surgeons ; William H. Welch, Johns 
Hopkins University ; Robert F. Weir, Presi- 
dent of the New York Academy of Medicine ; 
A. Jacobi, 110 West 34th Street. To Dr. Jacobi, 
who issecretary of the committee, subscriptions 
may be sent, 
THE Geographical Society of Leipzig has 
made the first award of its Edward Vogel gold 
medal to Professor Schweinfurth, of Berlin. 
The Society has elected as honorary members: 
Professor Penck, of Vienna; Professor von den 
Steiner, of Berlin, and Dr. Alph-Stuebel, of 
Dresden. 
Kine EpwArpD has consented to become 
patron of the Royal Institution, London. 
PROFESSOR BRANNER, of the University of 
California, has sent us an extract from the 
Southern Cross, a newspaper published at Buenos 
Ayres, which gives a description of the unveil- 
ing of a monument in honor of the geologist, 
Burmeister, lately director of the National 
Museum in Calle, Peru. The monument is the 
work of the German sculptor, Aigner, and was 
erected by public subscription at a cost of $12,- 
000. The statue, which is of marble on a large 
pedestal, represents Burmeister seated, hold- 
ing a mineralogical specimen in his right hand. 
Commemorative addresses were made by the 
minister of public instruction and others. 
WE record with much regret the death of 
Dr. William Jay Youmans, which occurred on 
April 10th, at Mt. Vernon, at the age of sixty- 
two years. Dr. Youmans, after a thorough 
education in science and medicine, joined his 
brother in the establishment of the Popular 
Science Monthly in 1872, and was editor-in-chief 
