716 
be present, having been detained at Geneva by 
illness. 
Mr. HERBERT SPENCER celebrated his eighty- 
first birthday on April 27th. Mr. Spencer lives 
quietly at Brighton. His health is fair, but he 
is not able to undertake much literary work. 
THE Manchester Literary and Philosophical 
Society has awarded the Wilde gold medal to 
Dr. Metchnikoff, of the Pasteur Institute in 
Paris. The presentation was made at a meet- 
ing of the Society on April 22d, when Pro- 
fessor Metchnikoff delivered an address on the 
‘Bacterial Flora of the Intestine.’ 
THE King of Sweden has conferred on Pro- 
fessor J. H. Gore, of Columbian University, 
Knighthood of the Order of Wasa, in view of 
his services as a member of the Superior Jury 
and Committee of Five at the Paris Exposition. 
PROFESSOR CHARLES HowARpD HINTON, of 
the University of Minnesota, has recently been 
appointed a computer at the U.S. Naval Ob- 
servatory in Washington. 
THE U.S. Department of Agriculture is about 
to establish an agricultural experiment station 
in Porto Rico, which will be under the direction 
of Mr, Frank D. Gardner, now of the Division 
of Soils. 
Dr. HARLOW Brooks, instructor in the Uni- 
versity and Bellevue Hospital Medical College, 
has been appointed pathologist to the New 
York Zoological Park. 
THE corporation of Hull (Yorkshire, England) 
has recently taken over the Museum of the 
Literary and Philosophical Society in that town, 
and has appointed Mr. T. Sheppard as curator. 
Mr. O. P. Austin, chief of the Bureau of 
Statistics of the Treasury Department, has gone 
abroad to study the statistical work of other 
nations. 
Dr. CoRNELIA L. CLAPP, professor of zoology 
at Mt. Holyoke College, has been given a year’s 
leave of absence which she will spend in study 
at Naples. 
Dr. B. T. GALLOWAY, director of the Bureau 
of Plant Industry, has been placed in charge of 
the seed distribution from the Department of 
Agriculture. 
SCLENCE. 
(N.S. Von. XIII. No. 331. 
Dr. TARLETON H. BEAN, who was superin- 
tendent of the New York Aquarium prior to 
April 1, 1898, was deprived of this position by 
the abolition of the office. A new position, 
entitled ‘Superintendent of Small Parks,’ was 
shortly afterwards created, and its incumbent 
was given charge of the Aquarium. Dr. Bean 
brought suit against the City for re-instatement, 
as he could not be legally discharged, and the 
office being abolished appeared to be a subter- 
fuge. The Court has, however, now decided 
this suit in favor of the City authorities. 
THE erection of a memorial to the late Right 
Hon. Professor T. H. Huxley in Ealing, near 
London, where he was born and received his 
early education, iscontemplated. On the initia- 
tive of the Council of the Ealing Natural Science 
Society, a committee of those connected with 
the district who are interested in the project 
has been formed. The first meeting of this 
Committee was held on 29th of March last, 
when an executive committee was appointed 
(whose chairman is the Rev. Professor G. Hens- 
low, Pres. Ealing Nat. Sci. Soc.). A bronze 
medallion portrait has been advocated for the 
central feature of the design, which may take 
the form of a simple mural tablet or of a more 
worthy monument as funds are obtainable, 
while should that support be forthcoming for 
which its projectors hope an annual grant or 
medal might also be founded. Subscription to 
the fund is not confined to the neighborhood or 
land of Huxley’s birth, and those who may be 
desirous of assisting in the endeavor to keep 
green the memory of the great scientist in his 
natal town should communicate with the secre- 
tary to the fund, Mr. B. B. Woodward (120: 
The Grove, Ealing, London, W.). 
PROFESSOR F. M. RAOULT, the eminent chem- 
ist, known for his important researches on the 
lowering of the freezing point and lowering the: 
vapor tension of solvents by dissolved sub- 
stances, has died at Grenoble at the age of 
seventy-one years. 
Dr. WILLIAM H. DRAPER, emeritus professor 
of clinical medicine in the College of Physicians 
and Surgeons, Columbia University, and one of 
the trustees of the University, died on April 
26th, at the age of seventy years. 
