Febeuaey 19, 1897.] 



SCIENCE. 



303 



THE CHACO IDIOMS. 



Students of American languages are laid 

 under further obligations to Mr. Samuel A. 

 Lafone Quevedo by his recent publications 

 on the Mbaya dialect, and those of the 

 Matacos and Mataguayos. They are pub- 

 lished in the Boletin del Instituto Geo- 

 grafico Argentine, Tom. XVII. The last 

 mentioned is drawn from the vocabularies 

 of the traveler d'Orbigny, and is prefaced 

 with a valuable introduction. The Mbayas 

 are the Guaycurus of the older writers. 



The tribes of the Gran Chaco have re- 

 mained in the utmost entanglement and 

 doubt until the numerous and careful 

 studies of Lafone Quevedo have enabled us 

 to classify them with a close approach to 

 correctness. Here, as elsewhere, when it 

 becomes possible to compare in detail a 

 number of tongues, we find that many of 

 their dissimilarities disappear, and the sup- 

 posed diverse stocks melt into related 

 groups of dialects. 



D. G. Beinton. 



Univeesity of Pennsylvania. 



ASTRONOMICAL NOTES. 

 We learn from the February number of 

 Popular Astronomy that Dr. See and Mr. Cog- 

 shall have discovered a number of new 

 southern double stars at the Lowell observ- 

 atory in the city of Mexico. Five objects 

 are enumerated. Strange to say, three of 

 these objects are bright stars with very faint 

 companions of about the 13th magnitude, 

 all situated at pretty nearly the same dis- 

 tance and position angle with respect to 

 the principal star. The a priori probability 

 of such a triple discovery is so small that 

 we suspect the possibility of the observer's 

 having been misled by a ' ghost.' "We shall 

 look with interest for a confirmation of these 

 discoveries, if there is any other large tele- 

 scope far enough south to examine these 

 objects with any hope of success. Possibly 

 the new McLean telescope, soon to be 



mounted at the Cape of Good Hope, will be 

 able to show these double stars. 



The Astronomische Nachrichten of January 

 15th contains an article by Dr. F. Cohn, in 

 which he gives a new explanation of the 

 systematic errors of heliometer measures. 

 It has been found by various astronomers 

 that measures of small distances made with 

 this instrument require positive corrections. 

 Dr. Cohn now points out that these pecu- 

 liarities can be explained if we assum^ that 

 all distances, both large and small, require 

 the same systematic correction. This idea 

 leads to the simplest explanation of these 

 puzzling systematic errors that we have yet 

 seen. 



In the January 26th issue of the same 

 journal Dr. Wilsing considers the question 

 of the absorption of light in astronomical 

 objectives, and shows that, if the size of ob- 

 jectives be continually increased, a point is 

 soon reached where the absorption more 

 than counterbalances the increase in the 

 light-gathering power. If the size of the 

 objective be increased beyond this point 

 the quantity of light reaching the focal 

 plane will diminish. 



We have received a Doctor's dissertation 

 by W. Ebert, in which the author deals 

 with the possible disruption of the Solar 

 System by the passage through it of a star 

 having very great velocity. He comes to 

 the conclusion that such an event would 

 probably not produce disturbances of any 

 great importance, unless one of the planets 

 should happen to lie very near the course 

 of the passing star. 



H. J. 



SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS. 



M. A. Chatin has been elected President of 

 the Paris Academy of Sciences in succession to 

 M. A. Cornu. M. M. Cornu has been elected 

 President of the Botanical Society of France. 



M. Faye, the eminent astronomer and 

 meteorologist, who is now eighty-three years 



