March 23, 1883.] 



SCIENCE. 



207 



at a stand-still, solely because stock-raising and gen- 

 ei-al farming have proved more profitable as an in- 

 vestment. 



The report of the entomologist of the department, 

 recently issued, confirms all that has been hitherto 

 said as to the adaptability of our country to this in- 

 dustry, and as to the value of the osage orange 

 (Madura aurantiaca) as silk-worm food. But while 

 there can be no question on these points, or as to the 

 desirability of permanently establishing so important 

 an industry, he has felt it necessary to dissuade rather 

 than encourage large enterprise in this direction, for 

 the simple reason, that, under existing conditions, the 

 investors must needs meet with disappointment. He 

 remarks, "Those who have eggs for sale, or who are 

 interested in the propagation and sale of mulberry- 

 cuttings, and those who are influenced by philan- 

 thropic or benevolent motives, can afford, albeit from 

 opposite motives, to stimulate in every possible way 

 the interest naturally felt in the subject; but the dis- 

 appointment, under existing circumstances, is apt to 

 be great in proportion as the interest increases, so 

 that there is danger of a repetition of the many re- 

 actions from similar attempts in the past. This fol- 

 lows necessarily from the fact that the reeled silk is 

 imported free of duty, v.h.ile, there is so very heavy a 

 duty on the woven goods. 



" There is a duty to-day, on wools valued at 32 cents, 

 of 10 to 11 cents per pound, and 10 per cent ad valo- 

 rem. Still, in past years, as in 1846, wool has been 

 imported free of duty. Now, wool is essentially a raw 

 product, having gone through no expensive process 

 of manufacture; yet what would our wool-growers 

 throughout the country say, if it were proposed to do 

 away with the duty, and allow wool to come in, as 

 reeled silk is now allowed to come in, free? They 

 would, no doubt, declare that such action on the part 

 of Congress would give the death-blow to wool-grow- 

 ing in the United States. Silk-culture is in just the 

 condition that wool-growing would be in under such 

 circumstances; and if there is any advantage to the 

 country in the protection of one kind of silk-manu- 

 facture, then, logically, that other branch of silk- 

 manufacture, namely, silk-reeling, which would add 

 value to the cocoon, and give encouragement to its 

 production, should also be protected." 



He remarks that the 'raw silk' now imported, to 

 the value of over twelve million dollars, is a manu- 

 factured article, requiring unusual skill and intricate 

 machinery, and that its introduction free of duty is 

 as much an encouragement to foreign manufacturers 

 as the removal, of the duty would be on the woven 

 goods. 



— The January number of The Virginias, the ex- 

 cellent mining journal edited _by Major Hotchkiss, 

 and devoted to the industrial development of the two 

 Virginias, contains a rough map of the Cabin creek 

 coal company's lands, lying south of the Kanawha 



valley, with sections and borings, in illustration of 

 two reports upon the coal and timber lands of the 

 company by Prof. S. P. Sharpies and Capt. I. A. 

 Welch, which are printed in full. The same number 

 contains a reprint of Hitchcock's paper before the 

 mining-engineers in 1882, on the Crystalline rocks of 

 Virginia compared witli those of New England, and 

 Notes on the geology of the Virginias from the note- 

 books of the Virginia geological survey of 1885-41, by 

 the late Prof. W. B. Rogers, toward whom Major 

 Hotchkiss stands as literary executor so far as his 

 Virginia work is concerned. It also contains, from 

 the same papers, a geological section of the Ohio 

 river hills at Wheeling, now mostly buried under 

 heaps of slag and cinder, and a careful analysis of 

 the same by Prof. I. C. White. We trust the people 

 of Virginia appreciate Major Hotchkiss's work. 



— The oflicers of the Paris anthropological society 

 for the present year are : president, Dr. Proust; vice- 

 presidents. Dr. Hamy and Dr. Dureau; general sec- 

 retary. Dr. Topinard; assistant, M. Girard de Recille; 

 annual secretaries, Dr. Prat and M. Issaurat; com- 

 mittee on publication, M. de Quatrefages and Dr. 

 Parrot; curator of the museum. Dr. Collineau; 

 treasurer, M. Leguay; librarian, M. Vinson. 



The school of anthropology was opened on Nov. 4, 

 1882, with the following courses: — zoological anthro- 

 pology, M. Mathias Duval, on anthropology and 

 embryology compared, Darwinism, cerebral convolu- 

 tions; — general anthropology, Dr. Topinard, on the 

 history of anthropology, observations and measure- 

 ments to be made upon the living by travellers ; — 

 ethnology, M. Dally, description of races, geographical 

 distribution, crossing, degeneration, affiliations, evo- 

 lution; — lorehistoric anthropology, M. de Mortillet, 

 protohistory, religion from an ethnic point of view, 

 development of arts, and the origin of agriculture and 

 industry ; — medical geography, M. Bordier, influ- 

 ence of social environment upon the progress and 

 spread of diseases; — demography, M. Bertillon, sta- 

 tistics of marriage, births, and deaths in the differ- 

 ent countries of Europe. 



— Eev. Henry C. McCoolc of Philadelphia is en- 

 gaged upon an illustrated book on ' American spiders 

 and their spinning work,' and hopes to have a volume 

 on the 'Industry and habits of orbweavers' ready by 

 midsummer. 



— The Manitoba historical and scientific society 

 has published as its ' Transaction No. 3 ' a paper by 

 J. Hoyes Panton, late of the Ontario agricultural 

 college, on the Geology of the Red-river valley, in 

 which the author looks forward to the time when the 

 city of Winnipeg will become dependent, for its 

 water-supply, upon the Lake of the Woods, seventy 

 miles distant. 



— The curator of the Peabody academy of science, 

 of Salem, rejiorts that winter classes in botany, aver 

 aging more than fifteen regular attendants for the 



