April 20, 1883.] 



SCIENCE. 



321 



— Circulars liave been issued by the German-Aus- 

 trian alpine union, calling for contributions in aid of 

 tbe sufferers from the floods in Tyrol and Carinthia 

 last year. In answer to the first, nearly 40,000 florins 

 were received. Details of the damage caused by the 

 floods are reported by the several sections of the soci- 

 ety. 



— The highest meteorological observatory in the 

 British Empire has just been organized on the gov- 

 ei'nment cinchona plantations in Jamaica. The 

 mean annual rainfall at this particular spot and ele- 

 vation (4,900 feet) is given as 136 inches, and the 

 mean annual temperature as 60° F. The record of 

 observations mil be published in the Jamaica gazette. 



— Buffalo supports a second scientific society in the 

 Naturalist's field-club, the first (double) number of 

 whose Bulletin is recently issued. Sis numbers a 

 year are promised ; and if this youthful company of 

 fifty persons, half of either sex, succeeds in filling 

 them with as good material in local natural history 

 as is furnished here, we would wish them all success, 



— J. Thomson arrived at Zanzibar Jan. 29, and 

 hopes to complete his preparations for a two-years' 

 trip inland by March 2. He found difficulty in secur- 

 ing porters, as Fischer had taken the best men ; but 

 he secured Many a Sera, who had charge of Stanley's 

 party. 



— M. Thouar, a French explorer, reports his arrival 

 at Medellin (Antioquia, Colombia) in December last. 

 He goes to Bogota and Quito, and, after a short rest 

 in these cities, will follow the Andes along to Chu- 

 quizaca (Sucre), at the head of the Pilcomayo. 



— Dillon, French consul at Tientsin, undertook a 

 journey into Mantchuria last Januaiy. 



— The first two miles of railroad on the upper Sen- 

 egal, constructed by the French, were opened Dec. 19, 

 1882, the natives running and shouting after the train 

 as long as they could follow it. Col. Berguis-Des- 

 bordes has gone on to Bamaku, on the Niger, where he 

 arrived Feb. 1. On Jan. 16, he burned Daba, whose 

 chief offered the only resistance he met on the way. 



— A new Italian expedition, under Bianchi, will go 

 into the interior of Abyssinia with presents to the 

 king, in hopes of obtaining the papers and collections 

 left there by the deceased traveller, Antinori. An at- 

 tempt will also be made to open a road from Assab to 

 the mountains. 



— The section of the Meuse of the Soci6t6 de g6o- 

 graphie de Test (France) will open a geographic and 

 ethnographic exhibition at Bar-le-Duc, Aug. 20 to 

 Sept. 20, 1883. Besides maps and collections from 

 foreign coimtries, the exhibit is to contain special 

 studies of the geography of the Meuse ; and prizes are 

 bfiered for the best monographic descriptions of the 

 several communes. 



— The Michigan mutual life-insurance company 

 has published a report on the mortuary experience of 

 the company from its organization to Jan. 1, 1882. 



The methods employed in making their experience- 

 tables is described in detail by the actuary, Mr. M. 

 W. Harrington. It should be noticed, however, that 

 the results make a very favorable showing for the 

 company, possibly due to its comparative youth. 



— A. Penck's ' Vergletscherung der deutschen al- 

 pen' is carefully reviewed by F. v. Richthofen ( Verh. 

 erdk. Bert, 1882, .56.5-577). 



— J. E. Sherrill of the Normal publishing house, 

 Danville, Ind., has in press, for immediate issue, 

 ' Scientific orthography and orthoepy,' by Professor 

 Isaac W. Clinger, Normal school, Charleston, W. Va. 



— The Russian department of public works will 

 this year begin the construction of a canal between 

 branches of the Obi and Tenissei, which will, when 

 completed, give water communication from Tumen, 

 near the Ural Mountains, to Kiakta, beyond Baikal, 

 on the Chinese frontier, a distance of more than 

 1,500 miles in a direct line. Navigation on part of 

 this route lasts only four months. 



— The Societa geografica italiana has lately issued 

 a volume of notices and proceedings {notizie e rendi- 

 conti) of the third international geographical congress, 

 held at Venice in September, 1881. A considerable 

 number of pages is occupied with formal addresses, 

 lists of members, awards, and other statistical mat- 

 ters. The reports on certain questions presented to the 

 congress include material of more permanent interest. 

 Among these may be mentioned that of A. Ferrero, 

 recommending the measurement of southern merid- 

 ian arcs in Australia and the Argentine Republic ; 

 Schiaparelli's report on local deflections of gravity, 

 causing differences between astronomical and geo- 

 detic latitudes, in one case, near the Alps, between 

 Andrate and Mondovi, amounting to 47", or one per 

 cent of the total amplitude (singularly enough, the 

 Apennines, in some cases, cause the geodetic to 

 exceed the astronomical latitude); the successful 

 application of photography to toijographic work, by 

 Pagauini; Magnaghi's hydrographic report, recog- 

 nizing the superiority of wire-sounding apparatus, 

 and including a classified list of coasts sufficiently or 

 imperfectly surveyed; Uzielli's recommendation of 

 careful measurements to determine horizontal or ver- 

 tical changes in the relative position of certain points 

 on the land, the causes of such change being found in 

 variations of internal and external pressures in the 

 earth, in contraction of the globe from cooling, in the 

 daily and yearly oscillations from solar heat, shown 

 by Plantamour and Hirsch, in change of composition 

 and density of rocks, and in the underground effects 

 of water. Polar meteorology, ethnography, commer- 

 cial and historic geography, are also considered. In 

 the geographic exhibition, Italy naturally filled the 

 greatest space ; France, Russia, and Germany follow- 

 ing it. The objects exhibited numbered 7,042, exceed- 

 ing those of the Paris geographic exhibition of 1875 

 by 40 per cent. 



