October 15, 1886.] 



SCIENCE, 



345 



— Prof. William Ferrel, recently connected 

 with the signal service, has resigned his position, 

 and removed to Kansas City, Mo. 



— It is proposed to hold a meeting of the various 

 scientiiic societies in Australia and New Zealand 

 in 1888 (the one hundredth anniversary of the 

 foundation of those colonies) upon the lines of the 

 British association meetings, and to form an 

 Austrahan association for the advancement of 

 science with similar aims and objects. There are 

 some twenty scientific societies in the Australasian 

 colonies, and the number of members is between 

 twenty-five hundred and three thousand. The 

 sections proposed are, A, astronomy, mathematics, 

 physics, and mechanics ; B, chemistry and 

 mineralogy ; C, geology and paleontology ; D, 

 biology ; E, geography ; F, economic and social 

 science and statistics ; G, anthropology ; H, medi- 

 cal and sanitary science ; I, literature and the 

 fine arts ; J, architecture and engineering. In 

 addition to the general and sectional meetings for 

 reading and discussing papers, etc., it is proposed 

 that excursions should be organized to vaidous 

 places of interest, such as the various mining 

 districts, the Jenolan, Wambeyan, and other 

 caves, the Blue Mountains, and similar places of 

 interest to geologists and others. A ]Dreliminary 

 circular signed by A. Liversidge of the University 

 of Sydney has been issued. 



— The September number of the Political 

 science quarterly is largely devoted to economics. 

 Prof. Henry C. Adams of Cornell has a learned 

 article on ' American war financiering,' in which 

 he criticises, from a theoretical stand-point. Sec- 

 retaries Gallatin, Dallas, and Chase. Hon. Alfred 

 E. Lee writes very clearly and strongly concern- 

 ing ' Bimetallism in the United States,' showing in 

 a way that even ' cheap money ' advocates should 

 be able to understand the real status and effect 

 of our silver coinage. Prof. Richmond M. Smith 

 of Columbia, who described the state bureaus 

 of labor statistics in an earlier number of the Quar- 

 terly, noiw reviews favorably the first annual re- 

 port of the national commissioner of labor. Dr. 

 Bowen continues his interesting account of the 

 conflict in Egypt, and Dr. C. B. Spahr discusses 

 the ' Taxation of labor.' The department of book 

 reviews is unusually full : and the notices of 

 Gneist's ' Das Englische parlament ' by Mr. Good- 

 now, of von Treitscke's ' Deutsche geschichte im 

 neunzehnten jahrhundert ' by Pi'of . Munroe Smith, 

 and of a group of books on constitutional law 

 by Professor Burgess, are of more than passing 

 value. 



— Dr. Shakespeare of Philadelphia has just re- 

 turned from Europe, where for a year he has been 



investigating cholera. He has studied the disease 

 in Spain, France, and Italy. During his absence, 

 he also visited India to observe the disease in its 

 home. As Dr. Shakespeare was sent out by the 

 President, his report will be made to him, and 

 forwarded to congress at its next session. From 

 the little that we have been able to learn of Dr. 

 Shakespeare's opinions, we infer that he agrees in 

 the main with Koch and his German collabora- 

 tors, and that he regards the comma bacillus as a 

 diagnostic sign of the existence of cholera. 



— The next meeting of the National academy 

 of sciences will be held in Boston at the Institute 

 of technology, to begin Tuesday, Nov. 9, at noon. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



*i* Correspondents are requested to be as brief as possible. The 

 writer's name is in all cases required as proof of good faith. 



Education and the cost of living. 



I AM glad that your timely comment on education 

 and the cost of living {Science, viii. 313) seconds the 

 proposed abolition of tuition-fees at Columbia college, 

 in the case of graduate students, as 'a step in the 

 right direction,' — one which ' we trust . . . will be 

 taken, . . . and followed by other institutions.' It 

 is but just to add, that Cornell, possibly first and 

 alone among our great universities, has the honor 

 of having already taken this step, ' lo, these many 

 years ; ' that even in her days of poverty, as now 

 in her prosperity, her library, laboratories, and lec- 

 ture-rooms have been open to all college graduates 

 who would make good use of them ; and there has 

 been no charge except for breakage and for supplies 

 consumed. 



But the Cornell experience apparently confirms 

 your thought, that " more efficient and advantageous 

 ... is the foundation of numerous graduate 

 scholarships and fellowships." We have had here 

 such fellowships for more than two years ; and, 

 though there are only eight, their effect in raising 

 the standard of both graduate and undergraduate 

 work is, I think, quite marked. 



If the proper busine sofa university be to im- 

 prove the community's intellectual and educational 

 ideals by developing in young people that have al- 

 ready some general culture the power of independ- 

 ent, well-directed investigation, of course the pres- 

 ence of earnest graduate students can hardly be too 

 much encouraged. J. E. Oliver. 



Cornell university, Oct. 11. 



The genesis of the diamond. 



I send you the following abstract of a paper read 

 by me at the Birmingham meeting of the British 

 association for the advancement of science, Septem- 

 ber, 1886, in the hope that it may interest your 

 readers. 



The discovery of diamonds at Kimberley, South 

 Africa, has proved to be a matter, not only of com- 

 mercial, but of much geological interest. The con- 

 ditions under which diamonds here occur are unlike 

 those of any other known locality, and are worthy 

 of special attention. 



The first diamond found in South Africa was in 

 1867, when a large diamond was picked out of a lot 



