304 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXV. No. 634 



ports,' stating that the more rapid movement 

 of the Julius suspensions and similar sup- 

 ports, probably on account of the rapidity, does 

 not perceptibly affect ordinary moving coil 

 galvanometers; hence for such galvanometers 

 placing at the center of gravity, etc., is usu- 

 ally unnecessary, and the supports for such 

 galvanometers may be given great simplicity 

 and wide variety. 



The effectiveness of a suspended support 

 can easily be shown to be less for slower move- 

 ments of the building ; hence for a double rea- 

 son these slower motions constitute the chief 

 difficulty with the moving coil galvanometer. 



By hanging one support from another, each 

 provided with its own damping arrangements, 

 a considerable gain in efficiency can be shown 

 theoretically. This has not yet been thor- 

 oughly tested experimentally. 



E. L. Paris, 

 Secretary 



THE BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON 



The 27th annual and 422d regular meeting 

 was held December 15, 1906. The following 

 officers were elected for the ensuing year: 



President — Leonhard Stejneger. 



Vice-presidents — T. 8. Palmer, W. P. Hay, E. L. 

 Greene, E. W. Nelson. 



Recording Secretary — M. C. Marsh. 



Corresponding Secretary — W. H. Osgood. 



Treasurer — Hugh M. Smith. 



Councilors — ^A. D. Hopkins, J. N. Rose, A. K. 

 Fisher, A. B. Baker, David White. 



President Stejneger was nominated as a 

 vice-president of the Washington Academy of 

 Sciences. 



The 423d regular meeting was held Jan- 

 uary 12, 1907, President Stejneger in the 

 chair and forty persons present. 



Mr. Maxon exhibited a nest made apparent- 

 ly by a mouse chiefly from horse hair. The 

 nest was found upon the ground near Oneida, 

 N. Y. Mr. Bailey said the locality of the 

 specimen made it remarkable. The harvest 

 mouse weaves nests of this type, using similar 

 fine material, but Washington is the northern 

 limit of distribution of the species. Dr. H. 

 M. Smith noted the late autumnal flowering 

 (November 10, 1906) of the bluet, Hoiistonia 



ccerulea, an early spring species. Mr. Morris 

 observed on November 15 a late flowering of 

 Phlox suhulata, and Mr. Clark on January 

 6 saw the early flowers of the skunk cabbage 

 and the latest of the witch hazel. 



Dr. Smith commented on the death on De- 

 cember 16, 1906, of Captain Z. L. Tanner, 

 retired, a naval officer prominent in marine 

 research as commander for many years of the 

 Albatross on both coasts, in which capacity 

 he has rendered great service to science. 



Mr. Van Deman exhibited specimens of the 

 Grimes apple and remarked upon the superior- 

 ity of this variety. Mr. Titcomb showed an 

 interesting anomaly in a frog which had an 

 additional pair of hind legs. A radiograph of 

 the specimen was shown. 



Mr. M. B. Waite presented the first paper 

 of the evening on ' A New Peach Blight from 

 California.' The speaker stated that this 

 peach blight was not entirely new, it having 

 been described by Beijerinck. Pierce, in his 

 bulletin on peach leaf-curl noted the presence 

 of a winter blight on the peach, which, he 

 stated, ' is probably induced by a Coryneum.' 

 He mentioned the gumming habit as similar 

 to that of Coryneum Beyerinchii. 



The disease has evidently been in California 

 for several years, but during the last three or 

 four years it has increased to alarming pro- 

 portions in the great interior valley of Cali- 

 fornia and in the adjacent smaller districts. 

 Especially in the more humid sections has it 

 seriously crippled the peach industry, cutting 

 down the production of some of the most 

 profitable orchards to less than one half, or 

 even a quarter, of a crop. 



While in California investigating pear- 

 blight, the writer was appealed to by peach 

 growers for assistance. When this disease was 

 thus submitted to him, early in February, 1905, 

 it was easy, on microscopic examination, to 

 promptly identify it as produced by the gum- 

 ming fungus of Beijerinck, Coryneum Beyer- 

 inchii Cud., the writer having become familiar 

 with the disease in 1898 through specimens 

 sent in from Clyde, Ohio. It was known to 

 occur occasionally in other eastern peach- 

 growing sections. It had not attracted atten- 

 tion, however, as a serious disease until this 



