May 1, 1903.] 



SCIENCE. 



717 



are now nearly obliterated, and the parchment 

 shows evidence of decay. The committee 

 appointed consists of Dr. Chandler, of Colum- 

 bia University; President Eemsen, of Johns 

 Hopkins University, and Dr. Billings, Libra- 

 rian of the New York Public Library. 



At the meeting of the American Academy 

 of Arts and Sciences held April 8, 1903, in 

 the Harvard University Museum, the Eum- 

 ford premium, consisting of a gold and a 

 silver medal, was presented to Professor 

 George E. Hale, director of Yerkes Observa- 

 tory, in recognition of his researches in solar 

 and stellar physics and in particular for the 

 invention and perfection of the spectro-helio- 

 graph. The grounds of the award of the 

 premium were explained to the academy by 

 the chairman of the Rvunford committee. Pro- 

 fessor Charles E. Cross ; the medals were pre- 

 sented by the president of the academy. Dr. 

 Alexander Agassiz, and Professor Hale in 

 connection with his acki;LOwledgment of the 

 honor conferred upon him described his work 

 and exhibited a number of lantern slides in 

 illustration. 



The University of Edinburgh has conferred 

 the degree of LL.D. on Dr. Arthur Gamgee, 

 E.E.S., emeritus professor of physiology at 

 Owens College, Manchester, and on B. 'N. 

 Peach, F.E.S., of the Geological Survey Of- 

 fice, Edinburgh. 



Dr. a. Hrduoka has been appointed as- 

 sistant curator of the Division of Physical 

 Anthropology at the U. S. National Museum. 



Mr. Henry E. Williams has been appointed 

 assistant chief of the U. S. Weather Bureau. 

 This position was created by the last agricul- 

 tural appropriation act. 



Sir Archibald Geikie, P.R.S., has been 

 elected an honorary member of the British 

 Institution of Civil Engineers. 



Dr. Simon Flesner, professor of pathology 

 at the University of Pennsylvania, director- 

 elect of the Eockefeller Institute for Medical 

 Eesearch, was given a dinner at the Univer- 

 sity Club, Philadelphia, on April 16, Dr. S. 

 Weir Mitchell presiding. 



The Association for maintaining the Ameri- 

 can Woman's Table at the Zoological Station 

 at Naples and for promoting Scientific Ee- 

 search by Women has awarded its prize of 

 $1,000, offered two years ago, for the best sci- 

 entific research done by a woman, to Dr. 

 Florence E. Sabin, assistant in anatomy at 

 the Johns Hopkins University Medical School. 

 She presented a research on the ' Origin of 

 the Lymphatic System.' Honorable mention 

 was given to a paper entitled ' Contributions 

 to the Life History of Pinus,' by Miss Mar- 

 garet Clay Ferguson, instructor in botany at 

 Wellesley College. The prize will again be 

 awarded in 1905. Miss Grace E. Cooley, 

 associate professor of botany at Wellesley 

 College, has been awarded the table at the 

 Naples Station. 



The British Medical Journal states that the 

 executive committee of the Carnegie Institu- 

 tion, Washington, has made a grant of $5,000 

 and traveling expenses to Professor Arthur 

 Gamgee, emeritus professor of physiology, 

 Owens College, Manchester, to enable him to 

 prepare a report on the physiology of nutrition. 

 The object in view is to secure information 

 which may lead to the organization in the 

 laboratories of various countries of cooperative 

 research in the problems of human nutrition. 



Dr. Albert P. Matthews, assistant pro- 

 fessor of physiological chemistry at the Uni- 

 versity of Chicago, lectured before the Yale 

 Alumni Association on April 22, his subject 

 being ' The Action of Inorganic Salts on 

 Protoplasmic Activities.' 



Dr. Duncan S. Johnson and Mr. Forrest 

 Shreve, of Johns Hopkins University, have 

 gone to Jamaica for special work in botany. 

 They will join Professor L. M. Underwood, 

 of Columbia University. 



The party from the Lick Observatory of 

 the University of California, which is to 

 establish a temporary observatory in Chili, 

 has arrived at Santiago. 



Me. Thomas H. Means, of the Bureau of 

 Soils, Department of Agriculture, has re- 

 turned from an investigation on the methods 

 of reclaiming alkali lands in Egypt, the re- 



