Maech 11, 1904.] 



SCIENCE. 



429 



Mr. Winston spoke briefly on the plans of a 

 committee of delegates at Paris appointed in 

 the interest of an international ausiliary 

 language intended to serve as a medium of 

 communication especially between scientific 

 men. 



Mr. R. A. Harris, of the Coast and Geodetic 

 Survey, in a paper entitled ' On the Feasi- 

 bility of Measuring Tides and Cui-rents at 

 Sea,' suggested the use of a piano-wire sound- 

 ing apparatus for such measurements, and 

 ascertained the magnitudes of errors which 

 might be involved when the weight of the 

 wire, impulse of the current and inaccurate 

 estimates of verticality at the surface are in- 

 volved. The sounding ' lead,' which is not to 

 be recovered in deep water, consists of some 

 weight, a box of stones for example, sufii- 

 ciently heavy for permitting a suitable tension 

 to be obtained. The measurements of the 

 rise and fall of the tide, as here suggested, 

 necessitate much greater care than do those 

 of the tidal streams and other currents. 



Mr. F. J. Bates, of the Bureau of Stand- 

 ards, then spoke on ' The Effect of a Magnetic 

 Field on Plane-polarized Light.' Commencing 

 with Faraday's discovery in 1849, the histor- 

 ical development of the subject was followed 

 and ended with the speaker's work on the 

 rotary dispersion of anomalous dispersing 

 substances. Solutions of fuchsin, cyanin, 

 lackmus and analine-blue were studied with a 

 sensitive-strip spectral polariscope and a mag- 

 net which gave 18,000 lines per sq. cm. The 

 differences between 1 cm. cells of solvent and 

 solution were noted. In no instance was it 

 possible to observe an anomaly in the rota- 

 tion, even though the sensibility of the ap- 

 paratus was ten times that of preceding in- 

 vestigators. The anomalous effects observed 

 by Schmauss were shown to be due to the 

 effect of the selective absorption of the solu- 

 tions studied. For a detailed account of the 

 work see Bates, Wied. Ann., No. 13, 1903. 

 Charles K. Wead, 



Secretary. 



CHEMICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. 



The 148th regular meeting of the Chemical 

 Society of Washington was held Thursday 



evening, February 11, in the Assembly Hall 

 of the Cosmos Club. The program for the 

 evening consisted of an address by Professor 

 Wilder D. Bancroft, of Cornell University, 

 upon the subject 'Inorganic Chemistry and 

 the Phase Rule.' 



The speaker discussed the subject under the 

 two general heads — the phase rule as an in- 

 strument for research and secondly the phase 

 rule as a rational basis for the classification of 

 inorganic chemistry. Under the first of these 

 topics he cited a large number of illustra- 

 tions of cases to which the phase rule has been 

 successfully applied. Among these was men- 

 tioned the work of van't Hoff and his asso- 

 ciates upon the Stassfort salt deposits. Also 

 the work which is now being carried on at 

 Cornell University on the bronzes. The ap- 

 plication of the phase rule to the separation 

 of mixtures of salts by crystallization was 

 illustrated briefly by referring to the case of 

 a mixture of sodium and potassium chlorides. 

 A. Seidell, 

 Secretary. 



the ELISHA MITCHELL SCIENTIFIC SOCIETY. 



The 152d meeting was held in Person Hall 

 in the Chemical Lecture Room on February 

 9, at 7:30 p.m. The following papers were 

 given: 



Dr. W. C. Cokee: 'Mendel's Law of Heredity.' 

 Dk. H. V. Wilson : ' Incomplete Division in 

 Vertebrate Animals.' 



Professor Collier Cobb : ' Composition of 

 Coastal Plain Sands in Relation to Distance from 

 E.xisting Shore Lines.' 



Alvin S. Wheeler, 

 Recording Secretary. 



DI8GOSSI0N A'ND OORRESPONUENGE. 



convocation week. 

 To the Editor op Science: The first thing 

 to be done in connection with the convocation 

 week meetings of the scientific societies is to 

 secure a more perfect organization. Some 

 man or committee must take up the matter 

 of arranging a complete program so as to 

 avoid the present go-as-you-please condition 

 in which meetings are set at almost any time 

 in the week. This is one of the causes of the 



