September 28, 1900.] 



SCIENCE. 



459 



some cases at least come to with much mis- 

 giving. 



It must be remembered that though some 

 of the schedules in question have been 

 tested (and corrected) by being actually 

 applied to a considerable mass of literature, 

 they will all be severely tested by the actual 

 experience even of the first year. 



Speaking now entirely for myself and 

 giving only my own opinion, I cannot ex- 

 pect otherwise than that the experience of 

 the first year (or possibly even a shorter 

 experience) will compel the International 

 Council to authorize changes in the sched- 

 ules. This, if done, will have the disad- 

 vantage of making the second year's Cata- 

 logue not wholly homogeneous with the 

 first year's; but this I venture to think 

 will be more than balanced by the better 

 character of the second year's issue. Sim- 

 ilarly with the third and fourth years. 

 When the fifth year is reached, the Cata- 

 logue if it is to answer the expectations 

 which it has raised may be expected to 

 have passed through at least its main met- 

 amorphoses and to have assumed its adult 

 form. If at the end of the fifth year, the 

 office will be able, and it is hoped it will be 

 able, to issue not only the Catalogue for the 

 fifth year, but also a combined catalogue of 

 all the five years taken together, then if 

 that five year Catalogue and the fifth year 

 Catalogue are not fully worth, both to 

 workers and to libraries, the money asked 

 for them, the whole enterprise had better be 

 abandoned. And I would venture to urge 

 very earnestly that the worth of the Cata- 

 logue should not be judged by its first is- 

 sues ; they must necessarily be most imper- 

 fect ; they can only present not the achieve- 

 ment but the promise of what is intended. 

 5. As a substitute for cards, it was sug- 

 gested that a bimonthly issue might be 

 adopted, or an issue on an accumulative 

 plan ; but the Conference decided in the 

 first instance to be content with the simple 



annual book issue. There seems, however, 

 to be no reason why special arrangements 

 should not be made by which a subscriber 

 should receive the Catalogue printed on one 

 side only of the paper. Scissors and paste 

 would soon convert this into a card cata- 

 logue. 



6. The subscriptions asked for by the 

 Smithsonian Institution, namely for com- 

 plete sets of the 17 volumes a year, for five 

 years, represent part of the financial basis of 

 the enterprise. The calculations made show 

 that an annual sale of about 300 sets of 17 

 volumes representing 17 branches of science 

 at an average cost per volume of £1, i. e., 

 £17 or $85 for a complete set will put the 

 whole undertaking on a sound financial 

 basis. The price of each volume will of 

 course not be the same, some volumes 

 (e. g., Zoology) will be much larger than 

 others (e.g., Mineralogy). The exact price 

 of each volume cannot be determined until 

 the size, i. e., the number of entries in that 

 volume, is approximately known. Hence 

 at present subscriptions for individual vol- 

 umes at a stated price cannot be invited. 

 Ultimately of course not only each volume, 

 but in certain cases at least, parts of a vol- 

 ume, i. e., indices of subdivisions of a 

 branch of science will be offered for sale. 

 The prices and conditions of sale will be de- 

 termined hereafter. 



M. FOSTEE. 



Gaeeison-on-Hudson, N. Y., 

 September 21, 1900. 



ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE BO- 

 TANICAL SECTION OF THE BRITISH 

 ASSOCIATION. 

 There has been considerable difference 

 of opinion as to whether the present year 

 marks the close of the nineteenth or the 

 beginning of the twentieth century. But 

 whatever may be the right or the wrong 

 of this vexed question, the fact that the 

 year-date now begins with ' 19 ' instead of 

 with ' 18 ' suggests the appropriateness of 



