290 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XIV. No. 351 



■none of the Indians ; and it is still believed in Peru, among las 

 ^iarbaras in the upper Amazonas, that the descendants of this Inca 

 ■still live. The author has found the Lost Inca : the Last Inca is 

 '.not yet. 



Col. H. G. Prout (Baroud Bey), in his article on Emin's prov- 



'ince in the November Scrihier, says, " Emin's uncertain povver in a 

 savage land is all that remains of the late Khedive's Central African 

 Empire. One day, in Khartoum, Gordon asked me what I thought 

 would be the future of the Equatorial Provinces. I said, ' The 

 .power will gradually return to the Arabs, the negroes will kill their 

 friends and tormentors together, and the good old times of war and 

 famine will come back.' I am still of that opinion. Unless the 

 enlightenment of Europe can control the upper Nile country, either 

 through the Soudan or from the south, barbarism will control it. 

 iBy control I mean physical control, and that must be directed by 

 some one better than the Turk, the Arab, or the Circassian." Dr. 

 James E. Pilcher, captain Medical Department, U.S.A., will 

 describe in the same number the organization and appliances of 

 the modern Sanitary Corps, which aims to relieve and care for the 

 ^ick and wounded in the time of battle and in peace. The abun- 

 dant illustrations of this article have been made from photographs 

 -of the corps actually at practice-work, and show very clearly the 

 -methods, which are of equal interest to all those who are members 

 ■of the many societies for First Aid to the Injured, and the National 

 ■-Guard, which has adopted this system. In view of the congress of 

 representatives of maritime nations in Washington, Professor J. 

 Russell Soley's article will be of especial interest. He shows how 

 ■certain principles of international law (>vhich Great Britain has mainly 

 teen instrumental in establishing) will re-act to the disadvantage, 

 -and even great peril, of that nation in the event of another Anglo- 

 continental war. He also discusses the effect which our navigation 

 laws will have in preventing us to profit from the redistribution of 

 •■the carrying trade which would ensue. Goethe's house at Wei- 

 rjnar, from which the public have been excluded rigidly until within 

 .a year, will be fully described by Oscar Browning. The many 

 'illustrations are from the first photographs taken since the house 

 ■was thrown open, and represent the rooms as Goethe left them. 

 tDr. M. Allen Starr will describe the effects of electricity upon 

 'the human body. This subject is of special importance, owing to 

 the frequent reports of accidents due to contact with electric wires, 

 'to the recent adoption of electricity as a means for executing crimi- 

 nals, and to the extravagant claims of the curative powers of elec- 

 tricity in diseases. Dr. Starr will draw the line very sharply be- 

 tween the legitimate use of electricity and quackery. 



— The November issue of The Chautaiiqiian presents the fol- 

 lowing table of contents : " The Burial of Rome," by Rodolfo 

 'Lanciani, LL.D. ; " The Politics which made and unmade Rome," 



by President C. K. Adams, LL.D.; "The Life of the Romans," 



by Principal James Donaldson, LL.D ; " The Story of Sejanus,'' by 

 'Ceorge Parsons Lathrop ; " Map Quiz " on The Chaiitauquan 



Map Series ; " The Cause of Geographic Conditions," by Professor 

 :N. S. Shaler ; " Mental Philosophy," by John Habberton ; " The 



Uses of Mathematics," by Professor A. S. Hardy, Ph.D. ; " Traits 



■ of Human Nature," by the Rev. J. M. Buckley, D.D. ; '.' What shall 

 the State do for me ? " by Thomas B. Preston ; " English Politics 

 and Society," by J. Ranken Towse ; "The Story of No Man's 



;Land," by John R. Spears ; " Maria Mitchell," by Harriet Prescott 



Spofford ; "The French Constitution," by Albert Shaw, Ph.D.; 

 " Electricity at the Paris Exposition," by Eugene-Melchior de- 

 Vogue ; " In Armenian Villages," by Harriet G. Powers ; " The 

 Modern Thermometer," by Ernest IngersoU. 



— D. C. Heath & Co. will publish this month Lessing's " Minne 

 von Barnhelm," a comedy in five acts, edited with notes and an 

 extended introduction by Sylvester Primer. The play is highly in- 

 teresting, since the style is Lessing's best, and the dramatic effects 

 well sustained. The study of Lessing as a dramatist and a critic 

 is essential to a comprehensive knowledge of Germany's great 



■ classic period : hence the importance of this masterpiece to students 

 of German. In the introduction the editor gives the progress of 



•German literature from the time of Opitz to Lessing, the condition 

 ■of the German stage, and something of the intellectual develop- 



t-ment of the .people during this period. A discriminating biogra- 



phy of Lessing and a " critical analysis " of the play give a full 

 analysis of the characters and an account of the historical and other 

 sources, while its national importance as being truly German is 

 well brought out. 



INDUSTRIAL NOTES. 

 The Bower-Barff Rustless Iron Process. 



About eighteen months ago, Mr. Henry M. Howe, the eminent 

 metallurgist whose work on steel is now being published in The 

 Engi7ieermg and Mining Journal, applied to several of the 

 licensees of the Bower-Barff Rustless Iron Company for samples 

 of cast and wrought iron which had been treated by the processes 

 controlled by this company, for the purpose of testing their resist- 

 ance to oxidation. Mr. Howe, who is now in Paris acting as 

 United States iron and steel commissioner at the exposition, writes 

 to the company as follows in relation to these experiments : — 



" I have just summed up the results of my experiments in the 

 matter of protective coatings for iron. I enclose table of results, 

 which you may use if you want, and as you want. The Bower- 

 Barff wins easily, beating even tinned and galvanized badly. The 

 galvanizing was done by the Rhode Island Tool Company, whose 

 work, I understand, is of the very highest ; and they were informed 

 that the work was for a test trial. The conditions were rigidly 



Loss of Weight of Wrought and Cast Iron ■with Different Pro- 

 tective Coatings and under Different Conditions, in Pounds 

 per Square Foot of Surface per Annum. 



Sheet Iron (No. 23 Gauge, Black). 



identical. It is a fair victory. I shall publish the results as an 

 appendix to my " Metallurgy of Steel," and perhaps more fully 

 thereafter. Immersed in Chestnut Hill Reservoir, Boston, for a 

 year, the Bower-Barffed wrought-iron plate was hardly discolored, 

 except where held by the crate. Another immersed in the Bos- 

 ton main-sewer sewage for a year retained its skin, and was 

 only slightly pitted, while most of the tin was removed from a 

 tinned iron sheet beside it. If you publish these, credit R. W. 

 Lodge with doing the work with me. He put in a good deal of 

 hard work and deserves credit." 



