J<'ebruaky 18, 1910] 



SCIENCE 



277 



" The Internal Secretion of the Pancreas," by 

 W. G. MacCallum. 



" Our Present Knowledge of Thyroid Function," 

 by S. P. Beebe. 



"Metabolism after Parathyroidectomy," by J. 

 V. Cooke. 



" Physiological Consequences of Total and of 

 Partial Hypophysectomy," by Harvey Gushing. 



Executive Session ( Section K ) . 



The oificers and committee members for tlie 

 coming year will be : 



Chairman — Frederick G. Novy. 



Sectional Committee — Charles Sedgwick Minot, 

 vice-president, 1909-10; George T. Kemp, secre- 

 tary, 1909-13; Graham Lusk (one year) ; Jacques 

 Loeb (two years) ; Elias P. Lyon (three years) ; 

 William G. Gies (four years) ; William H. Howell 

 (five years) . 



Member of the Council — Thomas G. Lee. 



Meniler of General Committee — Clarence M. 

 Jackson. 



G. T. Kemp, 

 Secretary 



SECTION' F 



At the Boston meeting, Professor Jacob Reig- 

 hard was elected vice-president for the next meet- 

 ing; Professor F. I. Landacre, member of the 

 council; Professor H. F. Nachtrieb, member of 

 the sectional committee," and Professor E. L. Rice, 

 member of the general committee. 



Instead of the usual programs for the reading 

 of technical zoological papers, a number of well- 

 known zoologists cooperated in making general 

 interest programs. The following lectures were 

 delivered : Professor C. J. Herrick, " Evolution of 

 Intelligence and its Organs " ; Professor W. E. 

 Ritter, " A Plea for Popular Zoology " ; Professor 

 Jacob Reighard, " The Nest-building Habits of 

 some American Fishes" (illustrated); Dr. A. G. 

 Mayer, " The Study of Natural History at the 

 Tortugas Laboratory" (illustrated) ; Professor F. 

 H. Herriek, " Illustrations of the Life and In- 

 stincts of Wild Birds" (illustrated) ; Dr. Daniel 

 D. Jackson, " The House Fly as a Carrier of Dis- 

 ease " (illustrated by moving pictures furnished 

 by Mr. Edward Hatch, Jr., of the Merchants' 

 Association of New York, and exhibited by the 

 Kleine Optical Co., of Boston) ; President David 

 Starr Jordan, " Conservation of our Fisheries " ; 

 Professor W. E. Castle, " Recent Progress in Study 

 of Heredity" (illustrated). 



Maurice A. Bigelow, 



Secretary 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES 



THE TOREEY BOTANICAX CLUB 



The meeting of December 14, 1909, was called 

 to order at the American Museum of Natural 

 History, with President Rusby in the chair. 



The announced paper of the evening, on " Tlie 

 Reclamation of the Desert of the San Bernardino 

 Valley," was then presented by Dr. Rusby and 

 illustrated by some seventy lantern slides. The 

 following abstract was prepared by the speaker. 



The distinctions between desert and arid re- 

 gions were explained and that under discussion 

 was defined as being arid rather than desert, for 

 the most part, although the production of culti- 

 vated crops without irrigation was impossible. 

 Tlie first settlement established was a Moravian 

 mission near the present western boundary of 

 Redlands. This was afterwards purchased by the 

 Mormons, who instituted local irrigation. The 

 first extensive irrigation operations were em- 

 ployed by the town of San Bernardino, the pres- 

 ent water supply of which is about 1,200,000 gal- 

 lons, obtained by the deflection of Lytle Creek, 

 besides a large amount from deeply driven wells. 

 Tills water supplies not only the requirements 

 of the city, but those of a large cultivated area. 



San Bernardino is near the western mouth of 

 the large, somewhat horseshoe-shaped valley, 

 from the mountains about which all the water of 

 the valley must come, except that which falls 

 during the rainy season, and which varies from 

 six to twelve inches in the different parts of the 

 valley, the larger amounts falling successively 

 nearer the mountains. The moisture brought by 

 the Pacific winds is precipitated in crossing these 

 mountains during the winter season only. At 

 the greater elevations, 10,000 to 12,000 feet, it is 

 deposited as snow; lower, in the form of copious 

 rains, and in the valley itself is a more or less 

 scanty rainfall. During this period, moisture is 

 not carried to the great interior plain of Nevada, 

 Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona, where 

 a dry season then prevails. In the summer, con- 

 ditions are exactly reversed, no rain whatever 

 falling west of the mountains. It thus happens 

 that the San Bernardino valley gets its natural 

 water supply at a time when cultivation can de- 

 rive the least benefit from it and the problem is 

 presented of preserving the winter supply and 

 distributing it during the summer. The highly 

 successful operations in the western part of the 

 valley demonstrated the existence of a most fer- 

 tile soil of great depth, and showed that the sole 

 requirement for a rich agricultural region was an 



