SCIENCE. 



FRIDAY, JULY 16, 1886. 



COMMENT AND CRITICISM. 

 The U. S. fish commission is now well started in 

 its summer work. Professor Baird and a party of 

 a dozen scientific men and investigators are at 

 Wood's Holl ; the Albatross is in northern waters, 

 engaged in dredging for marine life ; the Fish 

 Hawk has gone to St. Jeromes, on the Chesapeake ; 

 and the Lookout has been engaged for some time 

 in the lower Chesapeake, conducting experiments 

 in hatching crabs and Spanish mackerel. At St. 

 Jeromes the principal work is in oyster-culture. At 

 this season the spawning oysters are secured, and 

 the spawn taken from them artificially by methods 

 devised by Professors Eyderand Brooks. Perhaps 

 the most significant features of the work of the 

 commission this season, however, are the experi- 

 ments in the propagation of crabs and Spanish 

 mackerel, which bid fair to be as successful as 

 those recently inaugurated at Wood's Holl in the 

 artificial propagation of the lobster. One of the 

 results of these experiments will be the transpor- 

 tation of millions of young crab to the Pacific 

 coast, where, when once firmly established, they 

 will add materially to the food-products of the 

 waters of that section. Scientific experts on the 

 commission state that no crab of the Pacific waters 

 can ever take the place of the blue or edible crab 

 of the Atlantic coast. 



The Pasteur institute in France is more suc- 

 cessful in its appeals for financial aid than a simi- 

 lar institute organized for the same purpose in 

 the city of New York. The French people have 

 already contributed more than one million francs 

 towards the perpetuation of the Paris institute, at 

 which more than a thousand persons have been 

 inoculated for the prevention of rabies, while we 

 are informed that the support given to Dr. Mott 

 for a similar purpose is so meagre that his work 

 will probably be discontinued after a few weeks. 

 The American people were willing to subscribe 

 an unlimited amount to send a few children to 

 Paris ; but, now that an opportunity is given 

 them to provide protection to the whole popula- 

 tion of the United States, they fail to respond. 

 No. 180. — 1886. 



The controversy over the glacial origin of 

 lake-basins has had a satisfactory termination in 

 at least one case. Heim of Zurich has main- 

 tained the inefficiency of glacial erosion, and re- 

 fused to admit that the Swiss or any other large 

 lakes could have such an origin. Penck, lately 

 of Munich, now in Vienna, has insisted that the 

 Bavarian lakes were cut out by ice, and implied 

 that Lake Zurich and many others were also. 

 Last fall these two i)rofessors undertook a joint 

 excursion, going together to the ground formerly 

 examined by each one alone, and they found that 

 their problems are really distinct. Heim now 

 admits that the Bavarian lakes are, after all, most 

 probably glacial excavations in gravel deposits ; 

 and Penck sees that dislocation has had an 

 essential share in the formation of Lake Zurich, 

 although ice may have given it the finishing 

 touches. The concluding paragraph of their joint 

 report, as translated in the Geological magazine 

 for June, teaches a larger lesson than many con- 

 troversialists have learned : "There is, therefore, 

 no real difference of opinion between us, touch- 

 ing the Lake of Zurich and the lakes of the 

 Bavarian highlands, either as regards the facts 

 or the conclusions from them ; and as in the 

 present case, so also does it often hapj)en, that, by 

 a more exact conjoint examination, differences 

 become of much less importance than they ap- 

 pear to be from a distance." 



Lady Flora Wilmot died at Swansea, Eng., 

 after taking chloroform in a dentist's chair, for 

 the extraction of a tooth. The anaesthetic was 

 administered by a physician. The patient had 

 taken chloroform twice before without any bad 

 effects. In all, but two drams were used. All 

 attempts to restore the patient by the use of 

 nitrite of amyl and artificial respiration were of 

 no avail. The physician remarked immediately 

 after the extraction of the tooth, "I hate giving 

 chloroform for you dentists, because you will have 

 your patients sitting up." Both the dentist and 

 the physician were exonerated by the jury which 

 was called to hold an inquest. The evidences of 

 the danger in the administration of chloroform 

 are so overwhelming, except in a very few cases, 

 that no one is justified at the present day in using 



