OCTOBEE 12, 1906.] 



SCIENCE. 



471 



The paper of Professor Norton, published in 

 this issue of The Journal, puts forth the eco- 

 nomic side of the question as fully and fairly 

 as any publication of its compass that has 

 lately appeared. Coming from a non-medical 

 man, it is an encouraging sign. Professor 

 Norton shows how great a waste exists at the 

 present time from preventable deaths, sickness 

 and conditions of physical and mental ineffi- 

 ciency, due largely to the lack of a wise gen- 

 eral governmental supervision. We have our 

 pure food laws and our quarantine laws which 

 go a certain way toward checking these evils, 

 but they are, after all, only a beginning of 

 what is needful. We have a great deal of 

 government in regard to health matters, but it 

 is local, unsystematized and often conflicting 

 in different sections of the country and is dis- 

 tributed also, so far as it relates to national 

 affairs, under different departments of the gov- 

 ernment, thus preventing the best results. 

 The plea for a national department of health 

 could be, to a certain extent, met by the con- 

 solidation under a single head of already ex- 

 isting bureaus without a great additional ex- 

 pense, but completeness and full efficiency 

 would demand more than this. 



The plan laid out by Professor Norton 

 covers a much broader field, and, while it may 

 not be absolutely realizable at once, the con- 

 solidation of the existing bureaus would be a 

 great step in advance and could be enlarged 

 on as wisdom and experience would dictate. 

 The work done on less than a million and a 

 half by the Public Health and Marine-Hos- 

 pital Service is itself an indication of what a 

 wise expenditure of only a moderate amount 

 of public funds can accomplish. The protec- 

 tion of our southern coast from yellow fever, 

 which it has practically accomplished, is worth 

 annually many times the whole cost of that 

 department, but this is a local service which 

 principally benefits a section and not the whole 

 country. An intelligent direction of health 

 matters, including far more than that bureau 

 at present has under its control, would be of 

 still more widespread and general advantage. 

 A considerable amount of the work done under 

 the Agricultural Department, which is of the 



utmost value, including, for example, the ad- 

 mirable work of Dr. Wiley and that now as- 

 signed it under the pure food law, should 

 properly be consolidated with the sanitary 

 functions of other departments. Then a cabi- 

 net officer with expert knowledge of health 

 matters could administer all these and -other 

 new departments to much better advantage 

 than under the present system. — The Journal 

 of the American Medical Society. 



TECHNOLOGY— HARVARD GEOLOGICAL 

 EXPEDITION. 



During the past summer Professor Douglas 

 Wilson Johnson, of Harvard University and 

 the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 

 conducted a geological expedition through 

 portions of New Mexico, Arizona and Utah. 

 The expedition was supported by appropria- 

 tions from both the Institute and Harvard 

 University, together with contributions by 

 several friends of the two institutions. Dr. 

 H. W. Shimer, of the Institute geological de- 

 partment, and Mr. C. H. Decker, a graduate 

 of the Colunlbia University School of Mines, 

 were members of the party. 



The first field work was done in New 

 Mexico, where a week was spent in studying 

 the geological relations of underground waters 

 from the town of Belen eastward, while a week 

 or more was devoted to a trip into the Mount 

 Taylor volcanic district, where a somewhat 

 extended detailed examination of the splendid 

 volcanic necks was made. 



The party then proceeded by rail to the Big 

 Bug mining district, twenty-five miles south- 

 east of Prescott, Arizona, where an outfit of 

 wagons, horses and all necessary camp supplies 

 was secured and final preparations made for 

 an overland journey of twelve hundred miles, 

 lasting from June 19 to September 10. 

 Leaving Big Bug and crossing eastward to 

 the Verde River, the ascent from the Basin 

 Region to the Plateau Province was made 

 near the head of Oak Creek, over what is 

 known as the Mogollon Rim. Continuing 

 north past Flagstaff, several days were spent 

 in the San Francisco Mountain region, study- 

 ing the glacial features in the main peak, and 



