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SCIENCE. 



[Vol. VIII., No. 200 



made as to the height and length of waves, with 

 the following result, as reported by Commander 

 Davis : height of wave from hollow to crest, 25 

 feet ; length from crest to crest, 375 feet ; wave- 

 period, 7.5 seconds. The wind- velocity at the 

 time was 10 miles per hour. The height of wave 

 was measured by the elevation at which an ob- • 

 server could see over the crest when the ship was 

 in the hollow. The wave-period was estimated by 

 counting the average number of waves per min- 

 ute. The wave-length was determined by the 

 time occupied by the crest in passing a measured 

 portion of the vessel's length. 



— Mr. George A. Bacon of Syracuse, editor of 

 the Academy, writes to tell us that the claim 

 made in the newspapers that New York, Brook- 

 lyn, and Buffalo were the only cities in New York 

 state without female representatives on the school 

 board, to which we referred {Science, viii. No. 197), 

 is without foundation. Mr. Bacon had before 

 him, at the time of writing, the list of members 

 of the school boards of Troy, Watertown, Sara- 

 toga, Ithaca, Auburn, Kingston, Syracuse, Pough- 

 keepsie, Rochester, and Binghampton, and in no 

 one of them did the name of a woman appear. 



— The volume on Hume by Professor Knight of 

 St. Andrews has been issued in Blackwood's series 

 of 'Philosophical classics for English readers.' 



— The report that Professor Tyndall would be 

 able to give the course of Christmas lectures at 

 the Eoyal institution proves to have been un- 

 founded. It has been arranged for Professor 

 Dewar to give them, and the subject will be the 

 * Chemistry of light and photography.' 



— Dr. Thomas Dwight, the successor of Dr. 

 Oliver Wendell Holmes as professor of anatomy 

 at Harvard, has just published in the memoirs of 

 the Boston society of natural history an article on 

 the structure of bone. It is concerned chiefly 

 with the an-angement of plates in the spongy 

 bones as seen in sections made after maceration 

 and drying. It is illustrated by three very beauti- 

 ful photographic plates, and makes known a series 

 of interesting observations. In the concluding 

 section the author presents some general views, 

 the character of which is indicated by the follow- 

 ing quotations: " It is customary now to quote 

 rudimentary organs and anatomical anomalies as 

 evidences of descent ; but it seems to me very 

 improperly, occurring, as many of them do, 

 quite out of the line of inheritance." "Clearly, 

 the crude notion that accidental, purposeless, ex- 

 ternal forces should be sufficient to change by 

 slow degrees one such organism into another of a 

 different species, is untenable. The doctrine of 

 chances alone shows it to be impossible. There 



is, moreover, the unanswerable argument of 

 the inevitable uselessness of incipient structures. 

 Where we see the need, we see the structure to 

 meet it already perfect. We see also the com- 

 bination of homology with teleology." " The 

 changes must be, for the most part, comparatively 

 sudden, and therefore due to an implanted, in- 

 ternal force acting in predetermined directions. 

 On the theory of external accidental forces, the 

 preservation of homology is incomprehensible." 

 It will be seen that Dr. Dwight is frankly opposed 

 to what might be caUed the orthodox evolution of 

 the day. 



— The detailed programme of the course of 

 lectures on Roman archeology to be delivered at 

 the Johns Hopkins university by Prof. Rodolfo 

 Lanciani of Rome, of which mention was made in 

 Science (viii. No. 194), is now published. The 

 lectures will begin on Tuesday, Jan. 4, and con- 

 tinue on successive Wednesdays, Fridays, and 

 Mondays until Jan. 24. The subjects of the lec- 

 tures are as follows : I. The foundation and pre- 

 historic life of Rome ; II. Fora and parks of 

 ancient Rome ; III. Public libraries of ancient and 

 mediaeval Rome ; IV. The Tiber and maritime 

 trade of Rome (quays, wharves, emporium, Ostia, 

 Partus Augusti, treasures of the bed of the river) ; 

 V. Police and garrison of Rome ; VI. Palace of 

 the Caesars ; VTI. House of the Vestals ; VIII. 

 House of the Vestals (continued) ; IX. The bronze 

 statues of Rome, especially those lately discovered ; 

 X. The campagna (aqueducts, etc.). 



— Alfred R. Wallace, LL.D., of London, is de- 

 livering a course of four illustrated lectures at the 

 Peabody institute, Baltimore. His subjects are 

 ' The theory of development,' and ' The origin and 

 uses of color in animals and plants.' 



— The Johns Hopkins university announces 

 some new appointments to minor positions on the 

 teaching staff. Adam T. Bruce, Ph.D., has been 

 appointed instructor in osteology and mammalian 

 anatomy, and Cameron Piggot, M.D., and Charles 

 L. Reese, Ph.D., have been made assistants in the 

 chemical laboratory. 



— The water-tower near Coney Island which 

 gave way while being tested recently, as men- 

 tioned in Science at the time, was 250 feet high, 

 with a diameter of sixteen feet for the lower fifty 

 feet. It then ' coned,' or decreased in diameter, 

 in a length of twenty-five feet, to eight feet, 

 which was continued to the top. The foundation, 

 of concrete and brickwork, was twenty-two feet 

 in diameter. The tower was constructed of steel 

 plates, varying in thickness from one inch, in the 

 plates at the lower part of the structure, to one- 



