556 



sciuisrcE. 



[Vol. VIII., No. 203 



been expended, to provide additional quarters for 

 the accommodation of the increasing number of 

 students, and the natural demands for expansion 

 in the specialties of each department. At the 

 present moment an additional section of the mu- 

 seum would barely meet our requirements." We 

 understand that work will commence on this 

 another season. Nor is the interest wholly con- 

 fined to the students. Most of the exhibition- 

 rooms having been thrown open to the public, the 

 number of visitors has greatly increased, so that 

 it has become necessary to begin the erection of a 

 large portico-front to the main entrance on the 

 middle of the south side, and to transfer to it the 

 staircases, which are now wholly insufficient to 

 accommodate the stream of visitors. At the same 

 time it will greatly relieve the now somewhat 

 barren facade of the building. 



The November Iowa weather bulletin, by Dr. 

 Gustavus Hinrichs, closes with an intimation of 

 the character of the coming winter. ' ' The prob- 

 ability is very high that the winter now begun 

 will be a mild one in Iowa and the north-west. 

 The very fact that the last two winters have been 

 severe ones greatly increases the probability stated. 

 It should, however, not be forgotten that even 

 the mildest of Iowa winters has spells of severe 

 weather and blizzards." We must not infer from 

 this that Dr. Hinrichs has any intention of com- 

 peting with such long-range weather prophets as 

 Mr. Blake, editor of a self-complacent sheet called 

 the Future, or others of that class. The predic- 

 tion here quoted is probably based simply on the 

 fact that the mean temperature of a region for a 

 long term of years is essentially constant, and 

 hence severe winters will generally be compen- 

 sated by mild ones ; but studies of this kind in 

 Europe show that any rules thus based are very 

 often broken. No one could safely order a smaller 

 supply than usual of winter coal, or attempt to 

 make a corner in ice, on such indications, espe- 

 cially as the term ' mild winter ' is not considered 

 incompatible with some spells of severe weather 

 and blizzards. Severe winters may, on the other 

 hand, have low mean temperatures, while they 

 are relatively free from heavy snows, which form 

 the chief element of severity in the mind of a 

 railroad superintendent. 



ISAAC LEA, LL.D. 

 Dr, Isaac Lea, the Nestor of American natu- 

 ralists, died at his home in Philadelphia on the 8th 



instant. Dr. Lea was born in Wilmington, Del., 

 March 4, 1793. He was of Quaker descent, his 

 ancestors coming from Gloucestershire, England, 

 with William Penn on his second visit. His taste 

 for natural history exhibited itself at an early 

 period, and was fostered by his mother, who 

 was fond of botany, and by his association with 

 Vanuxem, then a youth, who was devoted to 

 mineralogy and geology, then hardly organized 

 as sciences. Their studies were undirected, and 

 only in 1815 did they become members of the 

 Academy of natural sciences, then about three 

 years old. Lea forfeited his birthright in the 

 Society of friends by joining a company raised 

 for the defence of the country, in 1814, though 

 the organization was never called into service. 

 Though engaged in learning mercantile business, 

 young Lea became an active member of the 

 academy, and published a mineralogical paper in 

 its journal in 1817. This was followed by a very 

 long series of conti'ibutions to mineralogy and 

 conchology, recent and fossil, which have made 

 his name familiar to naturalists all over the world. 

 He married, in 1831, Miss Frances A. Carey, the 

 daughter of Mathew Carey, the well-known econo- 

 mist, and became a member of the publishing- 

 house of Carey & sons, from which he retired in 

 1851. Mr. Lea's married life was exceptionally 

 long and happy, lasting fifty-two years, and 

 blessed with two sons and a daughter, who still 

 survive. 



In 1885 began those studies of the fresh-water 

 and land shells, especially the Unios, with which 

 Dr. Lea's name will always be associated. In 

 1837 he published his first paper on the genus 

 Unio. In 1836 he printed his first ' synopsis ' of 

 the genus, a thin octavo of fifty-nine pages. The 

 fourth edition of this work appeared in 1870, 

 when it had grown to two hundred and fourteen 

 pages quarto. 



Dr. Lea was a member of most American and 

 many foreign scientific societies. He visited 

 Europe, and studied his favorite mollusks at all 

 the museums, where he made the acquaintance of 

 Ferussac, Brongniart, Gay, Kiener, and other dis- 

 tinguished men, whose names now sound like 

 echoes of a past epoch. 



In 1833 Dr. Lea published his ' Contributions to 

 geology,' at that time the best illustrated paleon- 

 tological work which had ever appeared in the 

 United States, the text of which was remarkable 

 for the care and judgment evinced in its prepara- 

 tion. Up to 1874 he continued ever busy ; and 

 the number of new forms, recent and fossil, made 

 known by him, amounts to nearly two thousand. 

 His activity continued almost unabated up to 

 some ten years ago. Not content with figuring 



