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SGIENCK 



[N. S. Vol. VIII. No. 199. 



Professor Alexander Ziwet (mathematics), Pro- 

 fessor George W. Patterson (physics) and Pro- 

 fessor Dean C. Worcester (zoology), of the Uni- 

 versity of Michigan, have been granted leave of 

 absence for the present academic year. 



Professor E. B. Wilson, of Columbia Uni- 

 versity, has recovered from the serious illness 

 from which he suffered during the summer, but 

 will take advantage of the Sabbatical year al- 

 lowed by Columbia University to spend next 

 year in travel and research abroad. 



Dr. P. Morley has resumed the chair of 

 mathematics in Haverford College after a year's 

 leave of absence. While abroad he was given 

 the D. Sc. by Cambridge University. 



Professor Israel C. Eussell, of the depart- 

 ment of geology of the University of Michigan, 

 spent the three months' summer vacation con- 

 ducting a geological survey for the United States 

 government over the northern portion of the 

 Cascade Mountains. The greater part of the 

 work was in Washington State and extended 

 from the Northern Pacific Railroad to the Cana- 

 dian boundary, crossing the mountains several 

 times. Among the places of interest visited 

 was Glacier Peak, the height of which was 

 verified. 



Professor James A. Craig, of the Univer- 

 sity of Michigan, spent the summer vacation in 

 London at work in the British Museum, on the 

 astrological-astronomical tablets of the Kujund- 

 jik (Nineveh) collection known as the Illumi- 

 nation of Bel. This is the most important 

 series of unedited texts in the British Museum 

 and by far the most important in many respects 

 to be found in any of the collections extant. 

 Professor Craig has now completed all the texts 

 of the series, which numbers about 130 tablets. 

 His manuscript is already in the press with Die 

 Hinrichs'sche Buchhandlung, Leipzig. 



Dr. W. p. Wilson, Director of the Phila- 

 delphia Commercial Museums, has arranged to 

 give a course of lectures at the Museums on 

 commercial geography before the Philadelphia 

 Normal and High School students. 



The United States Civil Service Commission 

 announces that on October 25, 1898, examina- 

 tion will be held for the position of assistant, 



editing, abstracting, proof-reading and index- 

 ing, in the Department of Agriculture, at a 

 salary of $1,200 per annum. The scope of this 

 examination may be found in Section 67 of the 

 Manual supplied by the Commission. 



The fifth annual exhibition of the department 

 of entomology of the Brooklyn Institute was 

 opened on October 8th at the museum building, 

 and will continue through the month. It in- 

 cludes rare specimens of moths and butterflies, 

 filling some forty-eight cases, most of which are 

 loaned from the collection of the late Mr. Ber- 

 thold Neumogen. This collection, containing 

 nearly 120,000 specimens made at a cost of $75,- 

 000, is deposited in the Brooklyn Museum. 



There is a serious epidemic of yellow fever 

 in Louisiana and Mississippi, more than 1,000 

 cases having occurred. The usual panic ac- 

 companing epidemics of yellow fever in the 

 South has followed, and it appears that the pa- 

 tients are not properly cared for. Still the mor- 

 tality is low, only 69 deaths having been re- 

 ported. 



At the Boston meeting of the American 

 Chemical Society the Secretary reported the 

 membership to be 1,318, an increase of 162 

 since its annual meeting in December last. 

 Professor Edgar F. Smith was elected a mem- 

 ber of the Committee on Papers and Publica- 

 tion, and a committee was appointed to consider 

 an increase in the membership of this Com- 

 mittee, so that it shall include special repre- 

 sentatives of each of the important departments 

 of chemistry. It was decided to remove the 

 library to Havemeyer Hall, Columbia Univer- 

 sity, and Mr. M. T. Bogert was elected Libra- 

 rian. 



The American Ornithologists' Union will hold 

 its sixteenth annual meeting at Washington, 

 D. C, beginning on November 14th. Titles of 

 papers should be forwarded to the Secretary, 

 Mr. John H. Sage, Portland, Conn., not later 

 than November 6th. 



A convention of Weather Bureau officials 

 was held at Omaha on October 12th and 13th. 

 A number of interesting papers were presented, 

 including one on the ' West Indian Hurricane 

 Service,' by Professor Willis L. Moore, Chief of 

 the U. S. Weather Bureau. 



