594 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. III. No. 68. 



economy it is urged that salt water will keep the 

 roads and sewers much cleaner and more Avhole- 

 some. 



The French Admiralty and a large number 

 of railways and other corporations have adopted 

 the metric system of screw threads recom- 

 mended by La Societe d? Encouragement pour 

 V Industrie Nationale, of Paris. It is proposed 

 to consider the subject at an international con- 

 ference at Berne, where it is probable that the 

 new system will be adopted, and in this case 

 the Whitworth system would soon be super- 

 seded. 



The British Medical Journal states that a water 

 famine is threatened in London. In 1895 the 

 total amovint of rain measured at the Royal 

 Observatory, Greenwich, was only 19.73 inches, 

 against an average of 25.06 inches. This de- 

 ficiency is still in progress in the present year. 

 In February the total rainfall at Greenwich 

 was only 23 per cent, of the average for the 

 month, and at Paris only 16 per cent. During 

 January and February together the value was 

 as low as 65 per cent, short of the mean at 

 Paris, while in London the deficiency was 68 

 per cent. The rainfall of 1896 in London has 

 so far, in fact, amounted to less than one-third 

 of the average. 



In a paper presented before the Paris Acad- 

 emy on March 23d, MM. le Prince Galitzine 

 and A. le Carnojitzky claim that they have been 

 able to polarize the X-rays by means of tourma- 

 lines. Lord Blythswood reported to the Royal 

 Society on March 19th that he had been able 

 to reflect the rays. The most perfect photo- 

 graphs hitherto taken by means of the Routgeu 

 rays are produced in recent issues of the £i-it- 

 ish Medical Journal and the Lancet, one of a 

 monkey and one of an infant three months old; 

 not only is the skeleton of a child shown with 

 great distinctness, but some of the soft parts 

 are clearly outlined. 



Prof. J. C. Ewabt, of the University of 

 Edinburgh, has undertaken an extended series 

 of experiments upon telegony. He has a mare 

 in foal by a zebra and a zebra mare in foal by a 

 zebra stallion, and has arranged a number of 

 other crosses in which the paternal and maternal 

 characteristics are strong but less easily recog- 



nizable than in the above cases. Breeders 

 thoroughly believe in telegony, or the transmis- 

 sion of the influence of a previous sire. A num- 

 ber of apparently authentic cases have been 

 cited besides the famous one of Lord Morton's 

 mare, but none that fully satisfy the most cri- 

 tical. The matter of transmission of character- 

 istics from a previous sire in such an impor- 

 tant one that it requires fresh verification, and 

 Prof. Ewart's experiments will be watched with 

 interest. 



In an editorial comment entitled ' The Tam- 

 ing of the Shrews ' on the recent monographs 

 by Dr. Merriam and Mr. Miller, Natural Science 

 remarks: "In looking through these publica- 

 tions the conviction is forced upon one that 

 ' they know how to do things in America,' and 

 one wonders what work will be left for the poor 

 fellows of the next generation. So far as North 

 America is concerned, at any rate, there will 

 be no new species to discover nor any work to 

 be done in unravelling synonymy, for this is all 

 done so thoroughly by the writei's of these 

 monographs. They know, too, how to print 

 books in America; in this, as in their other 

 government publications, both the paper and 

 type are all that can be desired, and might well 

 be commended to the notice of the ' Printers to 

 the Queen's most excellent Majesty.' " 



Appleton's Popular Science Monthly for April 

 contains the Presidential address by Sur- 

 geon-General George M. Sternberg before 

 the Biological Society of Washington on the 

 ' Practical Results of Bacteriological Research- 

 es,' an article on the X-raj^'s by Prof. Trow- 

 bridge, a continuation of the articles by Mr. 

 Herbert Spencer, Prof. Ripley and Prof. New- 

 bold, and other articles of interest, including a 

 sketch of Benjamin Smith Barton, with a por- 

 trait. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS. 

 The Calendar of the University of INIichigan 

 for 1896-97 shows the following attendance : 

 Department of Literature, Science and the Arts 1204 



" of Engineering 331 



' ' of Jledicine and Surgery 452 



" of Law 675 



School of Pharmacy 83 



