August 3, 1900.] 



SCIENCE. 



197 



it is not clear where the limit of congestion 

 will be found. 



Between the lines of the article referred to, 

 the imagination is tempted to read a hint of a 

 desire for that rank and dominance in the Asso- 

 ciation which the members of Sigma Xi at- 

 tained in university circles, and it is not un- 

 natural to anticipate that the fraternity might 

 unconsciously play a part in Association poli- 

 tics not unlike that for which Greek-letter so- 

 cieties are famous throughout the university 

 world. To those who pride themselves upon 

 rank and band themselves together because of 

 rank it is not unnatural that official expressions 

 of rank should be sought through the uncon- 

 scious influence of fraternization. 



It is not altogether foreign to the subject of 

 this discussion to note the increasing encroach- 

 ments of formal social functions upon the meet- 

 ings of the Association and not less perhaps 

 upon the meetings of the Geological Society of 

 America. Without doubt a certain measure of 

 formal contact with general society is helpful 

 to the ends sought by the Association. At the 

 same time it must be recognized that formal 

 social functions are largely the province of the 

 leisure class and that from the very nature of 

 the case they remain so, for leisure and the 

 means of leisure are prerequisite to their eifec- 

 tive cultivation. Equally from the nature of 

 the case, the devotees of science do not usually 

 belong to the leisure class because real success 

 in science involves strenuous endeavor and an 

 almost unlimited devotion of time. The diver- 

 sion of time to social functions during the meet- 

 ings of the Association should, therefore, be 

 zealously watched and restrained within limits 

 which are compatible with the efficient conduct 

 of the primary purposes of the Association. 

 Particularly is this true of the Geological So- 

 ciety which has no organic relation to general 

 society. The movement in the direction of 

 social formality has already crowded hard upon 

 the point where the first requisite preparation 

 for a meeting of the Association or of the Geo- 

 logical Society is the packing of a dress suit, 

 and the second is the preparation of an after- 

 dinner speech, preparations that are none too 

 congenial to the great mass of hard workers in 

 science. 



SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS. 



A BUST in bronze of M. de Lacaze-Duthiers 

 was presented to him on July 1st by represent- 

 atives of the University of Barcelona, consisting 

 of the rector M. de Luanco and Professors 

 Lozana, Mundi, Arazona, Lopez-Sancho and 

 de Odan Buen. M. Gr^ard, vice-rector of the 

 university of Paris, M. Frederic of Liege, M. 

 Delage of the university of Paris and M. Ley- 

 gues minister of public instruction, made ad- 

 dresses to which M. de Lacaze-Duthiers re- 

 plied. 



Db. J. Howard Goeb, professor of mathe- 

 matics and geodesy at Columbian University, 

 Washington, has been appointed by President 

 Loubet, juror-in-chief of the Court of Appeal 

 of the Paris Exposition. He is already juror- 

 in chief of the International Congresses for the 

 United States. 



On the occasion of the celebration of its cen- 

 tenary, the University of New Brunswick, at 

 Frederickton, conferred an honorary degree 

 on Dr. J. G. Adami, professor of pathology in 

 McGill University. 



Dr. Benjamin Ide Wheeler, of the Uni- 

 versity of California, has returned from his 

 visit to the East, during which he was given 

 the LL.D. degree by Harvard and Brown uni- 

 versities. 



Mr. John C. Merriam is at present in the 

 fossil fields of eastern Oregon, where he has 

 charge of an expedition making paleontological 

 collections for the University of California. 



Dr. Hermann Triepel has been appointed 

 prosector at the Anatomical Institute at Greifs- 

 wald. 



The death is announced of Mr. Georges 

 Marye, curator of the mviseum at Algiers. 



The Rev. Thomas D. Weems, of Decatur, 

 111., has given his archaeological collection, 

 numbering eleven hundred and forty speci- 

 mens, to the Powell Museum of the Illinois 

 Wesleyan University. The collection contains 

 figures, vases, pictured stones, ceremonial 

 stones, tablets, pipes, arrowpoints, spearpoints, 

 celts, sinkers, knives, saws, hammers, scrapers, 

 plummets, discoidals, mortars, pestles and cop- 

 per, bone and shell implements and ornaments. 



