990 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIII. No. 600. 



Professor Daniel Georg Lindhagen, tlie 

 Swedish astronomer, died on May 5, at tlie 

 age of eiglity-seven years. 



Dr. Theodor Polleck, formerly professor 

 of pharmacology at Breslau, died on June 1 

 at the age of eighty-four years. 



Dr. F. Hegelmaier, honorary professor of 

 botany at Tiibingen, has died at the age of 

 seventy-two years. 



The death is announced of M. BischofEs- 

 lieim, founder of the observatory near Nice. 



The German Botanical Society offers a 

 prize of 1,000 Marks for a monograph on 

 ' Polymorphism in the Algae.' 



At the meeting of the council of the Royal 

 Astronomical Society, held on June 1, the 

 following resolution was unanimously agreed 

 to : " That the council learn with deep concern 

 of the danger threatened to the Eoyal Ob- 

 servatory, Greenwich, from the erection of a 

 large electric generating station near the ob- 

 servatory and desire to represent to the ad- 

 miralty at the earliest opportunity their con- 

 viction of the paramount importance of main- 

 taining the integrity and efficiency of Green- 

 wich Observatory, which has been adopted as 

 the reference point for the whole world." 



The spring series of hallons-sondes ascen- 

 sions at St. Louis, conducted by Mr. Eotch, 

 director of the Blue Hill Observatory, proved 

 very successful, since twenty of the twenty-one 

 instruments despatched have been recovered, 

 most of them with good records of barometric 

 pressure and temperature. The experiments 

 were in charge of Mr. S. P. Fergusson, mech- 

 anician of the observatory, and were witnessed 

 by Professor 0. L. Fassig, who will undertake 

 similar investigations for the United States 

 Weather Bureau. 



At the instance of the late Professor I. C. 

 Russell, of Michigan, the Geological Society 

 of America recently invited the cooperation 

 of the government surveys of the United 

 States, Canada and Mexico in the preparation 

 of a geologic map of North America. The 

 immediate object was to make such a map 

 available at the approaching international 

 geological congress in the City of Mexico. 



The map is being prepared in the office of the 

 United States Geological Survey under the 

 direction of Mr. Bailey Willis, and will be 

 published in connection with a professional 

 paper. The map will be about six feet by 

 four and a half feet in size, and may be used 

 as a wall map or as a pocket reference. 



There has just been published, by act of 

 congress, a report on the geology of the Owl 

 Creek Mountains in central Wyoming, which 

 contains a description of a but little-known 

 portion of the Rocky Mountain region. It is 

 the result of an exploration made during the 

 past summer, by 'N. H. Darton, of the U. S. 

 Geological Survey, partly for the purpose of 

 ascertaining the mineral resources of the por- 

 tion of the Shoshone Indian Reservation to 

 be opened to settlement on August 15 this 

 year. The report is Senate Document No. 

 219, 59th Congress, First Session, and may be 

 obtained by application to senators and repre- 

 sentatives; the Geological Survey will not 

 have the report for distribution. 



Professor H. H. Turner, of Oxford Uni- 

 versity, addressed a letter on June 2 to the 

 editor of the London Times, in which he says : 

 " The board of visitors of the Royal Observa- 

 tory at Greenwich found themselves con- 

 fronted, at their annual meeting yesterday, 

 by a grave anxiety. The London County 

 Council have established in the Greenwich 

 meridian and within half a mile of the ob- 

 servatory a large station for generating elec- 

 tricity. There are already two chimneys, 

 250 feet high, which rise from the river bed 

 above the domes of the observatory, in spite 

 of the 150 feet of hill on which the latter is 

 placed; as well as two other chimneys some- 

 what smaller. The disturbance caused by the 

 hot air and smoke from all these chimneys 

 can not fail to be serious, though it is at 

 present impossible to estimate it quantita- 

 tively. But there is another source of dis- 

 turbance of an alarming kind of which direct 

 evidence has already been obtained. In spite 

 of various precautions taken, the engines of 

 the generating station are so powerful that 

 they shake the observatory. The delicate ob- 

 servations for nadir, which furnish the refer- 



