SCIENCE 



Friday, October 1, 1915 



CONTENTS 

 The Construction of the Heavens: SlE F. W. 

 Dyson 435 



A New Profession: Dr. J. E. Rush 444 



The Second Fan-American Scientific Congress 

 and its Section of Anthropology : Db. Glen 



IiEVIN SWIGGETT 445 



He Notes and News 448 



and Educational News 449 



Discussion and Correspondence: — 

 A Proposed Classification of the Attitude of 

 Geologic Surfaces: Dr. Eoswell H. John- 

 son. The Origin of the "Niter Spots" in 

 Certain Western Soils: Walter G. Sackett 

 AND R. M. IsHAM. Calculation of the 

 Gamma Function: P. P. Everitt. The Posi- 

 tion of References in Journal Articles : Het- 



WAKD SCUDDER 450 



Scientific BooJcs: — 



Campbell Brown's Essays and Addresses: 

 Professor Jas. Lewis Howe 456 



Scientific Journals and Articles 458 



Special Articles: — 



The Theory of Magnetisation iy Potation: 

 S. J. Barnett. The Transmission o-f Potato 

 Mosaic through the Tuber: E. J. Wortlet. 

 The Inheritance of Extra Contractile Vacu- 

 oles in an Unusual Pace of Paramoecium 

 eaudatum: Robert T. Hance. Observations 

 on Asotobacter: Maurice Mulvania 459 



The Poyal Society of Canada: Dr. Henri M. 

 Ami 465 



Societies and Academies: — 



The American Mathematical Society: Pro- 

 fessor F. N. Cole 470 



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

 review should be sent to Professor J. MoKeen Cattell, Garrison- 

 on-Hudson. N. Y. 



THE CONSTSUCTION OF THE HEAVENS'^ 

 Although at the present time our minds 

 are largely absorbed by the war, the meet- 

 ing of the British Association in Manchester 

 indicates that we consider it right to make 

 our annual review of scientific progress. I 

 shall therefore make no apology for choos- 

 ing the same subject for my address as I 

 should have chosen in other circumstances. 

 It is a subject far removed from war, being 

 an account of the manner in which astron- 

 omers have with telescopes and spectro- 

 scopes investigated the skies and the con- 

 clusions they have reached on what Herschel 

 called ' ' The Construction of the Heavens. ' ' 

 Our knowledge of the fixed stars, as they 

 M'ere called by the old astronomers, is of 

 comparatively recent origin, and is derived 

 from two sources: (1) the measurement of 

 small changes in the positions of the stars 

 in the sky, and (2) the analysis of the light 

 received from them and the measurement 

 of its amount. To this end the numerous 

 instruments of a modern observatory have 

 been devised. The desire to examine fainter 

 objects, and still more the necessity of in- 

 creasing the accuracy of observations, has 

 brought about a continuous improvement in 

 the range and accuracy of astronomical in- 

 struments. Methods which had been per- 

 fected for observations of a few stars have 

 been extended so that they can be applied 

 to a large number. For these reasons the 

 progress of sidereal astronomy may seem 

 to have gone on slowly for a time. The 

 more rapid progress of recent years arises 



1 Address of the President of the Section of 

 Mathematics and Astronomy at the Manchester 

 meeting of the British Association for the Ad- ' 

 vancement of Science. 



