656 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. 1. No. 24. 



store in the coal less than three parts in a 

 thousand ultimatelj^ become useful. In the 

 last sis years, however, some hint of means 

 to overcome this difficulty has been obtained 

 fi'om the proof by Maxwell and Hertz that 

 light is only an electric radiation. Could 

 we produce electric oscillations of a suffi- 

 cient rapiditj' we might discard the mole- 

 cules of matter and directly manufacture 

 light without their intervention. To effect 

 this we must be able to produce oscillations 

 at the rate of five hundred billions per 

 second. Tesla has produced them in 

 thousands and millions per second, and 

 Crookes has shown how by means of high 

 vacua to raise many bodies to brilliant fluor- 

 escence at a small expense of energj'." Il- 

 lustrations of these processes having been 

 given, the lecturer concluded : " These are 

 hints toward a solution of the problem, but 

 give no solution as yet. Professor Langiey 

 states that the Cuban firefly spends the 

 whole of its energy upon the visual rays 

 without wasting any upon heat, and is some 

 four hundred times more efficient as a light 

 producer than the electric arc, and even ten 

 times more efficient than the sun in this re- 

 spect. Thus while at present we have no 

 solution of these important problems we 

 have reason to hope that in the not distant 

 future one may be obtained, and the human 

 inventor may not be put to shame by his 

 insect rival." 



At the general final meeting on Friday 

 (]7th inst) it was moved by Dr. Sandford 

 Fleming, C. M. C, of Ottawa, and seconded 

 by Sir William Dawson, F. E. S., that the 

 Eoj'^al Society of Canada was of opinion that 

 it is in the interests of science and seamen 

 in all parts of the world that a final de- 

 termination be speedilj^ reached regarding 

 the unification of the nau.tical, astronomical 

 and civU days, so that all may begin everj^- 

 where at midnight, and that as the proposal 

 can with least difficultj^ be carried into 

 effect on January 1st, 1901, the Council 



be requested in the name and on behalf of 

 the Society to adopt such measures as may 

 be considered expedient to bring about the 

 desired result. This is a subject to which 

 Dr. Sandford Fleming has devoted much 

 and fi'uitful attention. 



The following officers were elected for 

 the ensuing year : President, Dr. E. S. C. 

 SelwjTi, C. M. G., F. E. S., ex-Director of the 

 Geological and Natural Historj" Survey ; 

 Vice-President, the Archbishop of Halifax, 

 Dr. O'Brien ; Secretary', Dr. J. G. Bourinot, 

 C. M. G.; Treasurer, Prof. J. Fletcher. 

 Prof. Bovey, Dean of the Facultj- of Ap- 

 plied Science, McGill University, was chosen 

 president of the thu-d section ; Prof. Dupuis, 

 of Queen's College, Kingston, Out., Vice- 

 President, and Capt. E. Deville, Surveyor- 

 General of the Dominion, Secretarj'. In the 

 fourth section, the following choice was 

 made: President, Prof. Wesley Mills, M. 

 A., M. D., McGill University; Vice-Presi- 

 dent, Prof. Penhallow, B. Sc, of the same 

 institution ; Secretary, Dr. Burgess, Super- 

 intendent of the Protestant Insane Asj'lum, 

 Verdun, near Montreal. J. T. C. 



CORRESPONDENCE. 

 VOLCANIC DUST IN UTAH AND COLORADO. 



Science of April 26th contains an article 

 by H. W. Turner, of Washington, D. C;, 

 upon ' Volcanic Dust in Texas . ' It may perhaps 

 be of interest to some of the readers of Sci- 

 ence to learn that large deposits of volcanic 

 dust occur in Utah, and also in the extreme 

 northwestern portion of Colorado. In the 

 j^ear 1890, while I was a professor in the 

 Universitjr of Utah, mj^ attention was called 

 to an extensive deposit of a grayish-white 

 substance near Stockton in the Oquirrh 

 range of mountains, some sixty miles south- 

 west of Salt Lake City, bj' Mr. Ben Johnson 

 of that place. Upon examination I found 

 it to consist almost whollj- of microscopic, 

 transparent, siliceous flakes of various, ir- 

 regular forms, one of the most common be- 



