502 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIV. No. 616. 



a mild form of the American phenomenon of 

 the same name. It occurred, at North Sydney, 

 March 27 last, in the region of northeast 

 cyclonic winds, and moved southeast. This 

 is the region which corresponds to the usual 

 part of a cyclonic area in which our tornadoes 

 occur. 



BORNSTEIN's ' LEITFADEN DER WETTERKUNDE.' 



One of the most useful text-books of recent 

 years is Bornstein's ' Leitf aden der Wetter- 

 kunde,' the first edition of which was pub- 

 lished in 1901, This excellent little volume 

 has now come to a second edition (Berlin, 

 1906), and has been brought thoroughly up to 

 date. It in no way trespasses on the ground 

 covered by any other of the newer text-books, 

 and is unique in presenting an extraordinary 

 richness of material, in a clear, compact form, 

 with an admirable list of references to publi- 

 cations where further details may be sought. 

 In the new edition special attention is paid 

 to the temperature conditions and movements 

 of the upper air, and to other subjects upon 

 which recent studies have thrown much light. 

 We note an interesting view (Fig. 14) of the 

 upper surface of a sea of clouds, in which the 

 course of underlying rivers is indicated by 

 breaks; the inclusion of Berson's excellent 

 classification of the different atmospheric 

 strata in relation to vertical temperature 

 gradients (p. 35) ; and the beautiful colored 

 cloud views. Pis. V.-XV. 



THE OYOLONIO THEORY. 



W. H. Dines, who has been active in the 

 prosecution of kite meteorology, says (Nature, 

 1906, 35-36) that the results of some two 

 hundred kite ascents which he has carried out 

 in England and Scotland, with an average 

 height of about one mile, seem to give no 

 evidence either for or against the convectional 

 or ' driven ' theory of cyclones. Dines believes 

 that an error has been made in working out 

 the results of free-air observations in cyclones 

 and anticyclones. In a gas in equilibrium, 

 he says, under a conservative system of forces, 

 the isothermal and isobaric surfaces must be 

 identical. The temperatures in cyclones and 

 anticyclones should, therefore, not be com- 



pared at the same height, but on the same iso- 

 baric surfaces. In temperate latitudes these 

 surfaces may differ from surfaces of equal 

 height above sea level by a thousand or more 

 feet. 



* SOME FACTS ABOUT THE WEATHER.' 



Under the above title, Mr. William Mar- 

 riott, assistant secretary of the Royal Meteoro- 

 logical Society (London), has published a 

 little handbook of thirty-two octavo pag-es, at 

 the price of sixpence (London, Stanford, 

 1906). The text covers about the ground of a 

 ' popular ' lecture on meteorology, but is espe- 

 cially adapted for use in the British Isles. 



R. DeC. Ward. 



YALE UNIYERSITY."^ 



Our constant growth in numbers and our 

 recent increase in endowment ought to enable 

 us to do better work in the future than we 

 have done in the past. A progressive univer- 

 sity should make the maintenance and im- 

 provement of its standards its chief concern. 

 It must be recognized as a place where truth 

 is discovered and taught. I propose to dis- 

 cuss some of the means by which we can reach 

 this end. 



In dealing with the question of university 

 organization, we can divide our members into 

 three groups : (1) heads of departments ; (2) 

 other instructors and graduate students; (3) 

 undergraduates in the various courses, liberal 

 or professional. This is not the conventional 

 line of division, but it is the one which best 

 serves our present purpose. 



Heads of departments ought to be fewer in 

 number, and better paid. This is probably 

 true of American universities as a class; it 

 is certainly true of Yale. We have too many 

 full professors, and, partly as a consequence 

 of this, we pay them too small salaries. If 

 we see a store or factory where there are a 

 large number of more or less separate depart- 

 ments whose heads receive low salaries, we be- 

 lieve that the business is being wrongly ad- 

 ministered. It is not always safe to draw too 

 close analogies between industrial work and 



^ From the report of President Hadley. 



