May 29, 1896.] 



SCIENCE. 



805 



Mills. At the country meeting to be held at 

 Manchester prizes are ofiered by the Societj' for 

 self-moving vehicles. 



At a meeting of the Philosophical Society of 

 "Washington on May 23d the following biographi- 

 cal notices of deceased members were expected: 

 Thomas Antisell, by H. W. Seaman ; Stephen 

 Vincent Benet, by Rogers Birnie; J. Mills 

 Browne, by Eobert Fletcher ; Thomas Lincoln 

 Casey, by B. R. Green; Robert Edward Earll, by 

 O. Brown Goode ; William Lee, by D. Webster 

 Prentiss; Walter Lamb Nicholson, by Edward 

 Goodfellow ; Orlando Metcalfe Poe, by O. H. 

 Tittman; Charles Valentine Riley, by L. O. How- 

 ard ; William Bower Taylor, by W. J. Rhees. 



The attention of those who are interested in 

 the history of human progress (it is a pity that 

 we lack the German word Culturgeschichte), in 

 its forward and backward currents, should be 

 called to a book of absorbing interest, Woman 

 Under Monasticism, by Lina Eckenstein (Mac- 

 millan). It gives a vivid picture of the convent 

 life of women during the period between 500 

 and 1500 A. D. , in Germany and England, with 

 special biographies of those nuns and abbesses 

 who exerted an important influence upon the 

 life of their times ; but its chief value is in 

 showing that the present effort of women to 

 obtain a greater share of social responsibility is 

 a return to conditions which were the estab- 

 lished state of things a thousand years ago. 

 The convent afforded a career for those who 

 felt themselves capable of wider activities than 

 were involved in the care of the household, and 

 a career of greater influence and power than 

 has been open to women, of other than royal 

 descent, under any other circumstances. The 

 closing of the monasteries, by compelling all 

 women to marry, acted injuriously upon hu- 

 man development in more ways than one, even 

 though its effect may have been on the whole 

 ■desirable. That there is an historical basis for 

 the present movement toward greater inde- 

 pendence on the part of women is a matter of 

 much importance. 



At a recent meeting of the Anthropological 

 Institute of Great Britain, Professor E. B. 

 Tyler commented upon Mr. Howarth's paper 

 on ' The Asiatic Element of the Tribes of 



Southern Mexico,' drawing attention to the 

 difficulty of defining the meaning of the word 

 ' prehistoric ' in America. He remarked that 

 the picture writings exhibited by Mr. Howarth 

 were wonderful examples of the authentic 

 Aztec, side by side with the imported Spanish 

 element, the exact proportion of which was, how- 

 ever, exceedingly hard to distinguish. In the 

 United States, he continued, many anthropolo- 

 gists, headed by Dr. Brinton, support a kind of 

 'Anthropological Monroe Doctrine,' according 

 to which America admitted no extraneous con- 

 tributions to her culture. The conflict of this 

 theory with the older doctrine gives promise of 

 a good fight in the future, should he still re- 

 main constant to the older theory. He found 

 it very difficult, on the new Monroe doctrine, to 

 account for such things as the astronomical 

 calendar. He, nevertheless, favored dropping, 

 for the present, such questions as Egj^ptian 

 derivation, in favor of the investigation of 

 nearer links in the chain. 



It is stated in the daily papers that Pi'ofs. 

 Cox and Calendar, of the McGill University 

 have reported to the Canadian Royal Society 

 that they have made experiments showing that 

 the X-rays are deflected by magnetic influence. 

 It is also said that Prof Dorn and Dr. Brandes, 

 of the University of Halle, have proved that 

 the X-rays affect the retina, it having been 

 demonstrated in the flrst instance in the case of 

 a patient the lenses of whose eyes had been re- 

 moved. Later it is said that they were them- 

 selves able to see the rays, looking at their 

 source through an aluminum plate. 



A COMPLETE edition of the works of Descartes 

 will be published by the French Ministry of 

 Public Instruction, under the auspices of the 

 'Revue de Metaphysique et de Morale' 5 rue de 

 Mezieres, Paris. Five volumes will be devoted 

 to the correspondence, including letters ad- 

 dressed to Descartes as well as those written by 

 him, and five volumes will be devoted to his 

 published works. The publication will be be- 

 gun this year and will be completed in 1900. 

 A deduction of 40 per cent, in the price will be 

 made to those who send subscriptions in ad- 

 vance to the above address. 



We learn from the American Geologist that the 



