Maech 13, 1903.] 



SCIENCE. 



439 



are looking forward to an astronomical career. 



The College of Physicians of Philadelphia 

 has secured pledges of $50,000 which makes 

 available the $50,000 offered by Mr. Carnegie 

 for a library building. The question has now 

 arisen whether it would be better to enlarge 

 the present building or to erect a new build- 

 ing on a different site. 



As we have already stated the Congress of 

 American Physicians and Surgeons will hold 

 its sixth triennial session at Washington on 

 May 12, 13 and 14. Sixteen national so- 

 cieties devoted to the medical sciences, in- 

 cluding the American Physiological Society, 

 the Association of American Anatomists and 

 the American Association of Pathologists and 

 Bacteriologists, join in the congress. The 

 president is Dr. William W. Keen, of Phil- 

 adelphia, who will deliver an address on the 

 evening of May 12. The general sessions of 

 the congress will be held on the afternoon of 

 May 12 and 13. 



The Boston Transcript says a plan has been 

 definitely approved for the holding of an In- 

 ternational Congress of Arts and Sciences at 

 the St. Louis Exposition. The congress is 

 to convene on Monday, September 19, 1904, 

 and continue until Friday, September 30. The 

 congress will have before it the definite task 

 of bringing out the unity of human knowl- 

 edge, with a view to correlating the scattered 

 theoretical and practical scientific work of our 

 time. The addresses are to be prepared by 

 the greatest authorities in each branch of 

 knowledge. In each of the various subdivis- 

 ions two papers will be presented — one on the 

 history of that particular department of 

 knowledge during the past one hundred years, 

 and the other on the problems that now pre- 

 sent themselves for solution in that field. It 

 ' is planned to publish the proceedings, which, 

 it is hoped, will be a permanent contribution 

 to the cause of scholarship. An executive 

 committee of representative scholars. Pro- 

 fessors Simon Newcomb, of Washington, Hugo 

 Miinsterberg, of Harvard University, and Al- 

 bion W. Small, of the University of Chicago, 

 has been intrusted with the task of elabora- 

 ting the details of this plan. It is expected 

 that the three members of this committee will 



spend several months in Europe in the near 

 future, conferring with the leading European 

 scholars with a view to interesting them in 

 the plan and securing their full cooperation. 



A COMMITTEE has been organized for the 

 International Botanical Congress which will 

 meet in Vienna from June 12 to 18 in 1905. 

 The honorary presidents are Professor 

 Edouard Suess, president of the Imperial 

 Academy of Sciences and the Austrian min- 

 isters of public instruction and of agriculture. 

 The presidents, elected at the Paris congress of 

 1900, are Professors de Wettstein and Wiesner, 

 of the University of Vienna. Correspondence 

 in regard to the congress should be addressed 

 to the secretary. Dr. A. Zahlbruekner, Berg- 

 ring 7, Vienna. 



The National Dairy Association of Belgium 

 has decided to hold an international congress 

 at Brussels during the month of September, 

 1903, immediately after the eleventh Con- 

 gress of Hygiene and Demography. 



The Indiana legislature has passed a bill 

 which has been signed by the governor, the 

 effect of which is to set aside under the con- 

 trol of Indiana University a tract of land 

 of over 200 acres for an experimental farm. 

 The land is covered by primitive forest and 

 lies at the edge of the great cave region of 

 the Ohio valley in which Wyandotte and 

 Mammoth caves are situated. On this land 

 are the only entrances to an extensive under- 

 ground ' well ' or brook which pours out its 

 water into a narrow valley also on this farm. 

 A large room 40 x 230 feet, easily accessible, 

 is within 100 feet of the exit of the river. 

 The farm is said to be ideally adapted for 

 experimental work with cave animals. The 

 land belonged to an alien without naturalized 

 heirs, and on his death escheated to the state 

 of Indiana. His heirs brought suit to recover 

 it and the lower court confirmed the title to 

 the state; an appeal is now pending in the 

 supreme court. 



The University of California has leased for 

 two years two square miles in Shasta county, 

 California, where Professor John C. Merriam 

 last summer secured valuable collections of 

 fossils. 



The Sharon Biological Observatory, a sum- 



