476 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. VIII. No. 197. 



De. Eugenio Bettoni, Director of the Fish- 

 eries Station at Brescia, died on August 5th at 

 the age of fifty -three years. 



The sessions of the New York Academy of 

 Sciences will this year be held in the rooms of 

 the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, 

 12 West Thirty-first Street. It should be re- 

 membered by those interested that the Academy 

 meets on Monday evenings at eight o'clock, the 

 first Monday in the month being given to the 

 Section of Astronomy and Physics, the second 

 Monday to the Section of Biology, the third 

 Monday to the Section of Geology and Mineral, 

 ogy, and the fourth Monday to the Section of 

 Anthropology, Psychology and Philology. The 

 annual meeting and presidential address will 

 be on February 27th. 



The other societies forming the Scientific Al- 

 liance of New York, which is so greatly in need 

 of a building of its own, will hold their meetings 

 at the following places : The Torrey Botanical 

 Club, at the College of Pharmacy, 115 West 

 68th Street ; The New York Microscopical So- 

 ciety, at the Motte Memorial Library, 64 Madi- 

 son Avenue; The New York Section of the 

 American Chemical Society, at the College of 

 the City of New York ; The New York Miner- 

 logical Club, at the rooms of the American So- 

 ciety of Mechanical Engineers ; The American 

 Mathematical Society, at Columbia University ; 

 The Linnrean Society of New York and the 

 New York Entomological Society, at the Amer- 

 ican Museum of Natural History. 



A NEW building has been erected for the Ma- 

 ryland Geological Survey in the rear of the one 

 occupied at present by the Survey and the 

 Weather Bureau, on Howard Street, Baltimore. 

 It is of brick, two stories high, 20 feet wide by 

 50 feet long. It will be used for experiments 

 and for depositing large pieces of machinery. 



The government of New Zealand offers a 

 prize of $10,000 for improvements in the process 

 of treating the native fibre {Phormium tenax), 

 known as New Zealand flax. The successful 

 competitor will not be required to surrender 

 title to his invention, or to permit a free use of 

 it in the country which ofiers the reward. 



Consul-Geneeal Lincoln, writing from Ant- 

 werp, notes that 78,220 pounds of African ivory 



and 55 pounds of hippopotamus tusks were 

 offered at the quarterly sale of August 2d, the 

 stock on hand being about 174,628 pounds. One 

 can but wonder how long the elephant will con- 

 tinue to exist. 



The American Public Health Association 

 held its Twenty-sixth annual meeting at the 

 Parliament Building, Ottawa, Canada, on Sep- 

 tember 28th, 29th and 30th, under the presi- 

 dency of Dr. C. A. Lindsay, of New Haven, 

 Conn. The Executive Committee selected the 

 following subjects for consideration : Pollution 

 of Water Supplies ; Disposal of Garbage and 

 Eefuse ; Animal Diseases and Animal Food ; 

 Demography and Statistics in their Sanitary 

 Relation ; Car Sanitation ; Steamship and 

 Steamboat Sanitation ; The Etiology of Yellow 

 Fever ; The Relation of Forestry to Public 

 Health ; The Cause and Prevention of Infec- 

 tious Diseases ; Public Health Legislation ; The 

 Cause and Prevention of Infant Mortality ; 

 Transportation of Diseased Tissues by Mail ; 

 The Period during which each Contagious 

 Disease is Transmissible and the Length of 

 Time for which each Patient is Dangerous to 

 the Community ; Sanitation, with special 

 reference to Drainage, Plumbing and Ventila- 

 tion of Public and Private Buildings ; Interna- 

 tional Arrangement for Protection against the 

 Transmission of Infectious Diseases ; Disin- 

 fectants ; To Examine into the Existing Sani- 

 tary Municipal Organizations of the Countries 

 belonging to the Association, with a view to 

 Report upon those most Successful in Practical 

 Results ; The Duties and Responsibilities of the 

 Healthy Man for his own and others' Health. 



A CONFEEENCE of representatives of the lead- 

 ing underwriting organizations was held in New 

 York for the purpose of adopting a national 

 code of rules governing the use of acetylene 

 gas. It was generally agreed that the use of 

 liquefied gas under pressure should be pro- 

 hibited. There was a difference of opinion as 

 to whether apparatus for the generation of 

 acetylene should be allowed in insured build- 

 ings or whether separate buildings should be 

 required. 



A EEMAEKABLE discovery, as we learn from 

 Literature, has recently been made in Dumbar- 



