956 
Survey Commission a bibliographical and histor- 
ical sketch of all the work that has been done 
for the study of geology, biology and the re- 
sources of West Virginia by public and private 
effort. 
AT a meeting of the Board of Managers of 
- the New York Zoological Society, on December 
14th, it was announced by Professor Henry F. 
Osborn, Chairman of the Executive Committee, 
that subscriptions amounting to $65,000 had so 
far been received for the zoological gardens in 
Bronx Park. New subscriptions to the fund 
include $5,000 subscribed by J. Pierpont Mor- 
gan, $2,500 by Tiffany & Co., $2,500 by F. 
Augustus Schermerhorn, $2,500 by Philip 
Schuyler, $1,000 by George Crocker, $1,000 by 
Jacob H. Schiff, and $500 by Eugene G. Black- 
ford. The Society now has 540 members. 
A ZooLocicat Society has been established in 
West Australia with a view of founding a 
zoological garden at South Perth. 
Money has been appropriated by the trustees 
of Amherst College for the purchase of a new 
telescope to replace the old instrument in use 
at present, and the bequest of $18,000 for the 
purchase of a site for a new observatory will 
be expended as soon as the various plans for a 
new location have been carefully considered. 
THE Iron and Steel Institute of Great Britain 
will hold its annual meeting at Stockholm in 
August of next year. 
Dr. ANnNiINGSON, Dr. Donald MacAlister and 
Professor Kanthack will represent Cambridge 
University at the Madrid International Con- 
gress of Hygiene and Demography in April, 
1898. 
AT the 284th regular meeting of the Biolog- 
ical Society of Washington, on Saturday, Decem- 
ber 18th, officers for 1898 were elected, as fol- 
lows: President, L. O. Howard ; Vice-Presidents, 
B. E, Fernow, Richard Rathbun, F. V. Coville, 
Chas. D. Walcott; Recording Secretary, Charles 
Louis Pollard; Corresponding Secretary, F. A. 
Lucas ; Treasurer, F. H. Knowlton ; Councillors, 
W. H. Ashmead, C. W. Stiles, BE. L. Greene, 
F. W. True, M. B. Waite. 
ArT the statutory annual meeting of the Royal 
Society of Edinburgh, held on November 22d, 
SCIENCE. 
[N. S. Vou. VI. No. 156. 
the following office-bearers were elected for the 
ensuing session: President, The Right Hon. 
Lord Kelvin, F.R.S.; Vice-Presidents, The 
Hon. Lord McLaren, F.R.S., the Rev Professor 
Flint, Professor MeKendrick, M.D., F.R.S., 
Professor Chrystal, Sir Arthur Mitchell, K.C.B., 
Sir William Turner, F.R.S.; General Secretary, 
Professor P. E. Tait; Secretaries to Ordinary 
Meetings, Professor Crum Brown, F.R.S.; Mr. 
John Murray, LL.D.; Treasurer, Mr. Philip R. 
D. Maclagan, F.F.A.; Curator of Library and 
Museum, Mr. Alexander Buchan, M.A., LL.D. 
AN International Congress of Balneology will 
be held in Vienna in March, 1898. Further 
information regarding the Congress may be ob- 
tained from the General Secretary, Dr. Brock, 
of Berlin. 
Mr. WRAGGE, the meteorologist, who estab- 
lished and worked the first observatory on Ben 
Nevis, and who is now Meteorological Observer 
of Queensland, has arrived on the summit of 
Mount Kosciuszko, the highest mountain in 
Australia, for the purpose of establishing an 
observatory there. 
THE bequest of the late Sir William McKin- 
non to the Royal Society for the purpose of 
furthering natural and physical science, includ- 
ing geology and astronomy, and for the further- 
ance of original research and investigation in 
pathology by prizes and scholarships, which we 
announced last week, will, it appears, amount 
to more than $80,000, 
The Kansas University Quarterly for October 
contains two important articles by Professor 
Williston, one on the ‘Range and Distribution 
of the Mosasaurs, with Remarks on Synonomy,’ 
and the other on a Labyrinthodont from the 
Kansas Carboniferous. This, as Professor Wil- 
liston remarks, is of particular interest, for 
while Professor Marsh had described the foot- 
prints of Labyrinthodonts from the Upper Car- 
boniferous the tooth noted came from the 
Lower Carboniferous, or from an earlier hori- 
zon than noted elsewhere. 
Appleton’s Popular Scientific Monthly for Jan- 
uary will contain a translation of the important 
address given by Professor His, of Leipzig, in 
memory of his friends Ludwig and Thiersch. 
