840 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XIX. No. 491. 



reported in the assays from this district. The 

 Roslyn Basin is the most productive coal field 

 in the Pacific coast states and it is included 

 mostly within this quadrangle. The coal is a 

 coking, bituminous coal, well adapted for 

 steam raising and gas making. Its clean char- 

 acter and its high percentage of lump fit it 

 for shipment as well as for local use. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS. 



In the thirtieth general assembly of Iowa, 

 recently adjourned, an attempt was made to 

 remove the departments of engineering from 

 the State University at Iowa City to the State 

 College of Agriculture at Ames. The measure 

 was promptly killed by the vigorous action of 

 the alumni and other friends of the univer- 

 sity and an appropriation of $50,000 was made 

 for erecting either the first of a new series of 

 engineering buildings or the wing of a single 

 large engineering hall. An additional appro- 

 priation was made for constructing a dam in 

 the Iowa River which will yield on the average 

 over three hundred horse power. This power 

 will be used for lighting and ventilating the 

 university buildings, besides supplying power 

 to the various engineering shops and labora- 

 tories. Plans for the proposed structures are 

 being made and work will be commenced at 

 the earliest possible date. An additional 

 $5,000 was appropriated for the better equip- 

 ment of the bacteriological laboratory, which 

 sum will be increased from the general sup- 

 port fund of the university. Ground will at 

 once be broken for a new rauseum building 

 to cost about $225,000. The present natural 

 science building of brick, completed in 1885 

 at a cost of $45,000, will be moved bodily to 

 a new site to make room for the proposed 

 structure, this being in accordance with plans 

 formed several years since for the development 

 of the university buildings and grounds. The 

 new medical buildings are nearing completion 

 and are already partially occupied. All the 

 new buildings are massive fireproof structures, 

 finished in Bedford stone and thoroughly mod- 

 ern in every detail. The total income of the 

 university for the next biennium will exceed 

 $960,000, about one third of which must be 

 used for building. 



According to the New York Evening Post 

 the Association of Class Secretaries of the 

 Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which 

 is active in opposition to the proposed union 

 of the Institute with Harvard University, re- 

 ports that over 2,000 of the alumni have signed 

 the petition on the subject addressed to the 

 corporation. Ninety-five per cent, of the grad- 

 uates approached on the subject sign the ad- 

 verse petition without qualification, or with 

 unimportant modification; three per cent., 

 while advocating the independence of the In- 

 stitute, decline to sign because they rely on 

 the judgment of the corporation, or consider 

 the petition too sweeping; and two per cent, 

 decline to sign because they believe that some 

 combination of effort may be possible, or that 

 a union with Harvard is desirable. 



The Cornell College of Agriculture is to 

 add a school of landscape gardening to its 

 curriculum. 



"VVe learn from the London Times that the 

 president of the board of education has ap- 

 pointed a departmental committee to inquire 

 into the present working of the Royal College 

 of Science, including the School of Mines ; to 

 consider in what manner the staff, together 

 with the buildings and appliances now in 

 occupation or in course of construction, may 

 be utilized to the fullest extent for the pro- 

 motion of higher scientific studies in connec- 

 tion with the work of existing or projected 

 institutions for instruction of the same char- 

 acter in the metropolis or elsewhere; and to 

 report on any changes which may be desirable 

 in order to carry out such recommendations 

 as they may make. Sir Francis Mowatt, 

 G.C.B., is chairman of the committee, and 

 Mr. J. C. G. Sykes, assistant secretary in the 

 branch of the board which deals with evening 

 schools, technology and higher education in 

 science and art, has been appointed secretary 

 to the committee. 



Dr. William Stirling, professor of physiol- 

 ogy in the University of Manchester, lias been 

 appointed dean of the Medical School. 



Dr. R. Brauns, professor of geology and 

 mineralogy at Giessen, has been called to 

 Kiel. 



