878 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XV. No. 387. 



Mr. C. Henry Wernle, a maker of matlie- 

 matieal instruments at the U. S. Arsenal at 

 Frankfort, died on May 20, aged seventy-one 

 years. 



Mr. George Griffith, the assistant general 

 secretary of the British Association for the 

 Advancement of Science, and formerly science 

 master of Harrow School, died on May 7, at 

 the age of sixty-eight. Mr. Griffith had been 

 connected with the British Association for over 

 forty years, having first acted as local secre- 

 tary in 1859 for the Oxford meeting. An Eng- 

 lish correspondent writes : " Mr. Griffith's death 

 will be keenly regretted by the members of the 

 Association, with whom his relations were 

 most courteous, he being, as is needful in that 

 position, one of those who 'suffer fools gladly.' 

 His death was unexpected. He died in har- 

 ness." 



Dr. G. Monro Grant, since 1887 principal 

 of Queen's College, Kingston, a well-known 

 Canadian educator and author, died on May 

 11, at the age of sixty-seven years. 



The fourteenth annual meeting of the Asso- 

 ciation of Economic Entomologists will be 

 held in Pittsburgh, Pa., on Friday and Satur- 

 day, June 27 and 28. Sessions will be held in 

 the west room of Carnegie Lecture Hall, Car- 

 negie Institute, Schenley Park. The opening 

 session will convene on Friday at 10 :00 o'clock 

 A.M. Members are requested to send titles of 

 communications, which they may desire to 

 present, as soon as possible to the secretary. 

 Professor A. L. Quaintance, College Park, Md. 



The Royal Society of Canada is this week 

 holding its annual meeting at Toronto, the 

 exercises being on May 27, 28 and 29. They 

 include the address by the president. Dr. 

 James Loudon, president of the University 

 of Toronto and professor of physics, whose 

 subject is 'Universities in Relation to Re- 

 search,' and a popular science lecture by 

 Dr. Jeffrey, of the University of Toronto, on 

 'The Forest Trees of Canada.' The Society 

 meets in four sections, one devoted to French 

 literature, one to English literature, one to 

 the mathematical, physical and chemical sci- 

 ences and one to the geological and biological 

 sciences. 



In connection with the proposal to enlarge 

 the Royal Society so as to include representa- 

 tives of the historical, philological and moral 

 sciences, or to establish a new academy for 

 these sciences, Mr. Charles Waldstein, of 

 King's College, Cambridge, has proposed the 

 establishment of an Imperial British Acad- 

 emy of Arts and Sciences, which would in- 

 clude four sections as follows : The Royal So- 

 ciety for the natural and mathematical sci- 

 ences, a new Royal Society of Humanities for 

 the historical, philological and moral sciences, 

 the present Royal Academy for painting, 

 sculpture, architecture and the decorative 

 arts, and a new Royal Academy, of literature 

 and music. 



We have noted that a commission is consid- 

 ering the question as to whether a state elec- 

 trical laboratory should be established in New 

 York state, to provide means for testing elec- 

 tric measuring instruments. Of this proposal 

 the Electrical World and Engineer says: "We 

 sincerely hope that no such state laboratory 

 will be established, as it would be worse than 

 useless expense. The Bureau of Standards 

 at Washington is a national body, charged 

 with doing this precise work among other 

 duties. There is no immediate likelihood of 

 this bureau being so far overwhelmed with 

 electrical work as to be incapable of supplying 

 the demand. No sub-standardizing bureaus 

 should be called into official existence without 

 being annexed to the National Bureau at 

 Washington. A number of state electric 

 standardizing bureaus are likely to lead to 

 just as many different values of the volt, ampere 

 and watt, besides involving much reduplicated 

 labor and expense. Were the states generally 

 to indulge in the practice, the situation might 

 become particularly unbearable to the manu- 

 facturing companies doing business all over 

 the country." 



The botanical laboratories, presented to 

 University College, Liverpool, by Mr. W. P. 

 Hartley, were opened by Sir William Thisel- 

 ton-Dyer, F.R.S., on May 10 last. 



Before the Zoological Society of London on 

 May 6 Mr. Oldfield Thomas, F.R.S., read a 

 paper on the 'Mammals obtained during the 



