SCIENCE 



Friday, July 23, 1915 



CONTENTS 



Forty Years' Fluctuations in Mathematical 

 Sesearch: Professor H. S. White 105 



Nieholai Alexeyevich Oumov: Leo Pasvolse;t 113 



Classification of Technical Literature 115 



TAe Nineteenth International Congress of 

 Americanists 116 



Scientific Notes and News 116 



University and Educational News 121 



Discussion and Correspondence: — 



The Meridional Deviation of a Falling Body : 

 Professor Wm. H. Eoever. Vegetative Me- 

 generation of Alfalfa: Orville T. Wilson. 122 



The Organization of Science in Great 

 Britain 127 



Scientific BooTcs: — 



Sorsburgh's Modern Instruments and Meth- 

 ods of Calculation: Professor David 

 Eugene Smith. Hertwig's Die Elemente 

 der EntwicTclungslehre des Menschen und der 

 Wirieltiere : Professor Feederic T. Lewis. 128 



Special Articles: — 



Electrical Density and Absorption of p-rays: 

 Professor Fernando Sanfobd. The Belly 

 Biver Beds of Alberta and the Judith Biver 

 Beds of Montana: Charles H. Sternberg. 

 The Travertine Becord of Blalce Sea: Dr. 

 D. T. MacDougal and Godfrey Sykes... 130 



Societies and Academies : — 



The Anthropological Society of Washing- 

 ton : Dr. Daniel Polkmar 134 



MSS. intended for publication and books, etc., intended for 

 reTiew should be sent to Professor J. McKeen Cattell, Garrison- 

 on-Hudson. N. Y. 



FOBTY YEABS' FLUCTUATIONS IN MATHE- 

 MATICAL BESEABCH1 



In the year 1870 was published the first 

 volume of the Jahrbuch iiber die Fort- 

 schritte der Mathematik, a new venture in 

 the mathematical world. It was intended 

 to relieve students and investigators from 

 the necessity of searching through all avail- 

 able recent books and serials in the quest of 

 any particular topic, or in the effort to keep 

 posted on the discoveries of current inter- 

 est. Similar attempts have been made, both 

 before and since 1870, in other fields of 

 science ; and their effect and influence have 

 been so marked that even the general reader 

 has now Poole's Index and its successors, 

 attempting in a less minute way the same 

 service for general periodical literature. 

 Under each title of book or article the Jahr- 

 buch gives a brief analysis, sometimes a 

 criticism, so that the reader follows up only 

 those articles whose actual content proves 

 important for him. 



At the outset the expectation was confi- 

 dently expressed that the Jahrbuch would 

 appear within six months after the close of 

 its year. But serials were slow in reaching 

 the oifice, there were from twenty to forty 

 referees, and once a printer's strike inter- 

 posed for half a year; so that three years 

 often elapsed instead of six months. Twice 

 a double volume was issued in the hope of 

 lessening the delay; but it soon fell back, 

 and now our most recent volume covers the 

 year 1909. These voluminous handbooks, 

 now covering forty-two years and oc- 

 cupying eight feet of shelf-room, offer op- 



1 Bead before the Vassar Faculty Club, and the 

 Columbia Mathematical Colloquium, February, 

 1914. 



