Septembek 8, 1911] 



SCIENCE 



309 



at Washington in December, in connection 

 ■with the meeting of the American Association 

 for the Advancement of Science. 



The annual Herter lectures will be deliv- 

 ered at the Johns Hopkins University on 

 October 4, 5 and 6, by Professor Dr. Albrecht 

 Kossel, of the University of Heidelberg, who 

 was awarded the Nobel prize last year for his 

 discoveries in medical chemistry. 



The German emperor has conferred on Sir 

 William Ramsay the order " Pour le Merite." 



De. Jacques Loeb, of the Eoekefeller Insti- 

 tute for Medical Research, has been elected a 

 member of the Academy of Science in Cracow. 

 Dr. Loeb has sailed for Europe to make an 

 address before the Congress of Monists to be 

 held in Hamburg. 



At the July meeting of the Spanish Society 

 of Physics and Chemistry of Madrid, Pro- 

 fessor Alexander Smith, of Columbia Uni- 

 versity, ■ was elected an honorary member of 

 the society. 



At its last commencement, the State Uni- 

 versity of Iowa bestowed the degree of doctor 

 of laws on Professor William H. Norton, pro- 

 fessor of geology, Cornell College, Iowa. 



Professor John B. Ekeley, head of the 

 department of chemistry at the University of 

 Colorado, was recently appointed state chemist 

 by the state board of health. In June the 

 honorary degree of doctor of science was con- 

 ferred on him by his alma mater, Colgate 

 University. 



Mr. D. E. Hutchins, chief conservator of 

 forests, British East Africa, after ten years' 

 forest service in India, twenty-three in South 

 Africa and four in equatorial Africa, has 

 retired on a pension. 



E. H. Baker, Ph.D. (Pittsburgh, 1910), has 

 been appointed director of the Laws Observa- 

 tory, University of Missouri. 



Dr. James E. Weir, Ph.D. (Munich), has 

 been appointed an expert in forest pathology 

 in the Bureau of Plant Industry. 



Me. J. Allan Thomson has been appointed 

 paleontologist to the Geological Survey of 

 New Zealand. 



Dr. N. L. Britton and Mrs. Britton are for 

 a month at the Eoyal Gardens, Kew, England, 

 in continuation of their studies on the flora 

 of the West Indies. 



Mr. S. H. Burbuey, F.E.S., distinguished 

 by his work in mathematical physics, died on 

 August 18, at eighty years of age. 



Next year the American Geographical So- 

 ciety celebrates its jubilee, and in connection 

 with this event a transcontinental excursion 

 for the purpose of geographical study is 

 planned, under the leadership of Professor W. 

 M. Davis. The start from New York, by 

 special train, will take place some time in 

 August, and the excursion will conclude in 

 October, its duration being six or seven weeks. 



The South Australian Cabinet has decided 

 to contribute £5,000 towards the cost of the 

 Mawson Antarctic Expedition. 



Letters have been received from Messrs. 

 Vilhjalmur Stefansson and Eudolph M. An- 

 derson, the Arctic explorers sent out three 

 years ago by the American Museum of Nat- 

 ural History. A letter from Mr. Stefansson 

 tells of the hazardous journey he undertook 

 east from Cape Parry to the Coppermine Eiver 

 region, as far as Coronation Gulf. He dis- 

 covered a tribe of Eskimos with fair com- 

 plexions, white hair and red beards — these 

 may be, he thinks, the descendants of the lost 

 Scandinavians, who disappeared several cen- 

 turies ago. He found also a primitive people, 

 using stone implements, who could not count 

 above five, and wiped from the map the Le 

 Eonciere Eiver. A letter from Mr. Anderson 

 records his observations, chiefly of Arctic 

 birds and animals, on his trip westward to 

 Langton Bay. 



At the 1909 meeting of the International 

 Mathematical Congress, held at Eome, the 

 subject of mathematical teaching was brought 

 forward, as Nature reminds us, and upon the 

 initiative of Professor D. E. Smith, U.S.A., 

 it was decided to form an International Com- 

 mission on the Teaching of Mathematics, this 

 commission to report to the next triennial 

 meeting of the congress, which will be held at 

 Cambridge (England) in 1912. The commis- 



