January 31, 1896.] 



SCIENCE. 



147 



sheds near the building of the Institution, 

 which, being inflammable, are a constant 

 menace to its safety. 



The Bureau of Ethnology is continuing 

 its important work in the study of linguis- 

 tics, habits and customs of the Amei-ican 

 aborigines, and important explorations have 

 been made during the year under the di- 

 rection of Mr. McGee among the Seri and 

 Papago Indians, of the far Southwest, and 

 by Dr. J. Walter Fewkes in the ruins of a 

 town near Moqui, which was destroyed by 

 hostile Indians before the first visit of the 

 Spaniards. The latter exploration was the 

 first ever made of a thoroughly pre-Colum- 

 bian town site, and resulted in the gather- 

 ing of a collection of pottery and other ob- 

 jects of unequalled beauty and value. 



Referring to the Zoological Park, Secre- 

 tary Langley directed attention to the 

 alarming reports which are eoiuing from 

 the Yellowstone National Park, which 

 seem to make it certain that the herd of 

 several hundred buffalo reported last year 

 has been reduced to fifty or less, and indi- 

 cating that it will soon be destroyed unless 

 steps are taken for its preservation. Since 

 the means at the disposal of the custodians 

 of the Yellowstone National Park seem 

 quite inadequate to protect them, the de- 

 sirability is suggested of transferring most 

 of the remnant of the herd to Washington, 

 to be placed in the Zoological Park, which 

 has amply sufficient space for all that are 

 left. 



The work of the Astro-Physical Obser- 

 vatory was referred to, and the researches 

 there being carried on, which are giving us 

 a knowledge of nearly thrice the amount of 

 details of solar energy that were known to 

 Sir Isaac Newton, and in a region which 

 was left almost untouched until our own 

 day when these researches took it up. The 

 number of known lines in this portion of 

 the spectrum has increased from less than 

 twenty to over a thousand owing to the 



work which has been carried on in this lit- 

 tle observatory during the last four years. 

 The location is a very unfortunate one, 

 however, since the traffic of the street in- 

 terferes with the proper use of the instru- 

 ments, and reference was made by the Sec- 

 retary to a plan for constructing a modest 

 building for this work in some portion of 

 the suburbs where the necessary quiet can 

 be obtained. 



The Secretary's report was accepted, as 

 was also that of the Executive Committee. 



Letters of acknowledgment were read 

 from the Eoyal Institute of Great Britain 

 for a portrait of Mr. Hodgkins sent by the 

 Institution, and from the master of Pem- 

 broke College in Oxford, where Smithson 

 received his degree in 1786, acknowledging 

 the gift of a complete series of the publica- 

 tions of the Institution. 



3IEM0EIAL TRIBUTE TO PROFESSOR THOMAS 

 H. HUXLEY* 



All the members of this Academy, in fact 

 all men of science in America, are in different 

 waj's indebted to the late Professor Huxley. 

 We should be ungrateful, indeed, especially 

 in this section of the Academy, if we failed 

 to join in the tributes which are being paid 

 to him in different parts of the world. 



In his niemory I do not offer a formal ad- 

 dress this evening, but, as one of his students, 

 would present some personal reminiscences 

 of his characteristics as a teacher, and some 

 of the striking features of his life and work. 



Huxley was born in 1825. Like Goethe, 

 he inherited from his mother his brilliantly 

 alert powers of thought, and from his father 

 his courage and tenacity of purpose, a com- 

 bination of qualities which especially fitted 

 him for the period in which he was to live. 

 There is nothing striking recorded about his 

 boyhood as a naturalist. He preferred en- 

 gineering, but was led into medicine. 



* Eead before the Biological Section of the New 

 York Academy of Sciences, November :j.l, 1895. 



