590 



SCIENCE. 



fN. S. Vol. VIII. No. 200. 



the plan of an international catalogue of scien- 

 tific literature, and it is to be hoped that an 

 opportunity will be given for full discussion and 

 careful consideration before the final arrange- 

 ments are made. We regret to state that no 

 such opportunity has been hitherto offered. 

 Science, as other scientific journals, was unable 

 to secure satisfactory information regarding the 

 first Conference at the time, though we were 

 fortunate in being able to publish (Vol. VI., 

 pp. 184-201) a year later an admirable account 

 of the Proceedings, based upon official docu- 

 ments, by Dr. Cyrus Adler, the delegate from 

 the United States to the present Conference. 

 No similar accounts, so far as we are aware, 

 have been given in other scientific journals, nor 

 is this surprising, as the Proceedings of the 

 last Conference were not distributed, only two 

 copies, it is said, having been sent to America. 

 Scarcely any mention has been made of the 

 schedules of classification which have recently 

 been drawn up, and which will doubtless be 

 discussed by the present Conference. These 

 schedules have apparently not been sent to 

 scientific journals nor to men of science. The 

 schedule on anthropology has, however, been 

 severely criticised by Dr. Brinton (Science, p. 

 375). At the last Conference a decimal system 

 of classification was practically rejected, but it 

 appears that the Committee on Organization 

 have adopted a new system of decimal classifi- 

 cation, and it is by no means certain that this 

 system is better than Dewey's. We find in the 

 English press full accounts of the reception 

 and dinner, but as yet nothing regarding the 

 scientific proceedings of the Conference. 



GENERAL. 



Peofessor Bowditch, President of the 

 American Society of Naturalists, called a meet- 

 ing in Boston and gave a dinner to the Execu- 

 tive Committee on the 22d ult. Professor Dean 

 was appointed a delegate to represent the New 

 York Local Committee. The American Society 

 of Naturalists and aflSliated societies will, it 

 will be remembered, meet in New York during 

 the last week of the present year. We hope to 

 be able to give full announcements regarding 

 the meetings at an early date. 



The class of 1893 of Williams College has es- 



tablished a prize of $25 in memory of the late 

 Franklin Story Conant, who, it will be remem- 

 bered, sacrificed his life to scientific work in 

 Jamaica. The money is to be used for a 

 scholarship at the Woods Holl Marine Bio- 

 logical Laboratory. 



The Civil Service Commission announces that 

 on December 6, 1898, the examination may be 

 taken at any city in the United States where 

 the Commission has a board of examiners, for 

 the position of Chief of the Bureau of Statistics, 

 Treasury Department, at a salary of $3,000 

 per annum. The examination will consist of 

 the subjects mentioned below, which will be 

 weighted as follows : 

 Science of Statistics — 



(a) Topical 10 



(6) Textual, ' 5 



Mathematics, 5 



Literature of statistics, 10 



Practical statisticism — 



{a) Tabulating, 5 



(J) Analysis and graphics, 5 



(c) Commercial statistics, 10 



General and technical education, 20 



Administration — • 



(a) Positions held and experience,.. . . 15 

 (6) Essay, 15 



Total, 100 



The Commission also invites attention to the 

 fact that no applications were filed for the ex- 

 amination scheduled to be held in New York 

 September 21, 1898, for Assistant Engineer, 

 first-class, in the custodian service in that city, 

 at a salary of $1,080 per annum, and that an- 

 other examination is scheduled to be held on 

 November 15, 1898. 



We learn from Nature that, by a decree dated 

 August 30th last, the Belgian government has 

 separated the astronomical from the meteoro- 

 logical service, each of these departments being 

 placed under a responsible scientific director ; 

 while administrative duties, care of instru- 

 ments, library, etc., are to be under the control 

 of an inspector. The astronomical service is 

 placed under M. C. Lagrange, and meteorology 

 under M. A. Lancaster, each of whom will sub- 

 mit a report quarterly to the Minister of the In- 

 terior upon the work of his department. 



