884 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIII. No. 597. 



herent rights would entail disastrous conse- 

 quences? Vei-y possibly it would, and evils 

 of this sort might have to be faced, but they 

 would be in their nature temporary, and not 

 nearly as disheartening as the lasting and 

 deepening evils involved in the perpetuation 

 of an administrative policy which is an affront 

 to every professional instinct. Professor 

 Joseph Jastrow, in a remarkably forceful 

 and enlightened discussion of this subject in 

 its bearings upon university administration 

 (Science, April 13), puts the whole matter in 

 a nutshell when he declares for the substitu- 

 tion of ' government by cooperation ' for ' gov- 

 ernment by imposition.' This is surely the 

 ideal toward which everyone having at heart 

 the interests of education as a professional 

 matter should strive, in fields both high and 

 low, and we have observed numerous recent 

 indications of a reaction in this sense from 

 the military or corporate ideal which has 

 hitherto had things its own way. But the 

 enemy is still strongly intrenched, and his 

 position will not easily be forced. — The Dial. 



THE GEOLOGICAL SURVEY. 



The National Geological Survey has prop- 

 erly taken alarm at the radical cut which 

 Mr. Tawney, the new chairman of the House 

 committee, has made in the appropriation for 

 its work. He proposes to reduce the annual 

 charge from $1,400,000 to $1,050,000, a cut 

 which falls with especial severity upon certain 

 of the survey's operations. The allowance for 

 the measurement of streams for water-power 

 purposes and to aid in settling other questions 

 of municipal and domestic importance, in 

 which New England is so vitally interested, 

 has been cut from $200,000 to half that smn. 

 The coal-testing plant at St. Louis, recently 

 described in the Transcript, will be asked to 

 get along on half rations. The division of 

 mineral resources, and the TopogTaphical Sur- 

 vey, have also felt the committee's pruning 

 knife. 



While it has long been evident that the 

 Geological Survey was expanding far too 

 rapidly, in common with various other func- 

 tions of government, so radical a cut as this 

 is neither necessary nor desirable. The sur- 



vey has trained its own scientists for their 

 various lines of work, and such a reduction 

 as Mr. Tawney proposes would break up a 

 corps that could not in years be reassembled. 

 In view of the expenditures for war, like the 

 $100,000,000 a year in time of profound peace, 

 for the navy, it seems little short of ridiculous 

 to be disturbed over a great civil establish- 

 ment, whose work is counting for civilization 

 and progress in a score of directions, at an 

 annual cost which equals that of the navy 

 for only four days. So long as the govern- 

 ment can spend freely for some things, it 

 seems unreasonable to hold other agencies 

 down to the strict rules of economy. The 

 survey is now moving vigorously to get the 

 House or, if not that body, certainly the Sen- 

 ate, to restore its appropriation, in part, at 

 least. Every new chairman of the appropria- 

 tions committee makes a similar attempt. 

 Mr. Cannon did, when he went into that serv- 

 ice, and so did Mr. Hemenway, and now comes 

 Mr. Tawney. 



The national irrigation enterprise which is 

 conducted by the Geological Survey, though 

 not carried in its appropriations, is now at 

 full tide. More ditch digging is probably in 

 progress under its direction than at Panama, 

 for the records show that the reclamation 

 service is employing four thousand persons 

 directly, and that the contractors working 

 under it employ seven thousand more. Irri- 

 gation expenses have now reached one million 

 dollars a month, paid for by the sales of public 

 land, and at this rate expenditure will go on, 

 it is safe to predict, for some years. These 

 enterprises bring differing problems, and al- 

 though no one of them is so difficult as that 

 at Panama, they present in the aggregate 

 questions to be solved, engineering, mechan- 

 ical and financial, probably not less serious 

 than at the Isthmus. — The Boston Transcript. 



A8TR0V0MIGAL NOTES. 



SUGGESTIONS FOR A THEORY OF THE MILKY WAY 



AND THE CLOUDS OP MAGELLAN. 



Mr. Arthur E. Hinks, of Cambridge, Eng- 

 land, has published an interesting pamphlet 

 on ' Suggestion for a Theory of the Milky 



