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SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. IV. No. 90. 



each organization appoint one of its members 

 as an associate member of this committee with 

 authorization to collect and forward the sub- 

 scriptions. No one is expected to subscribe an 

 amount so large that it will detract in the least 

 from the pleasure of giving. A large number 

 of small subscriptions freely contributed and 

 showing the popular appreciation of this emi- 

 nent Frenchman is what is most desired. 



GENERAL. 



The American Society of Naturalists meets 

 at Boston December 29th and 30th, 1896. The 

 American Physiological Society, The American 

 Morphological Society and The American Psy- 

 chological Association have signified their in- 

 tenion to hold their meetings at the same time 

 and place. The program of the Naturalists' 

 meeting will be announced at an early date. 



The International Zoological Congress will 

 hold its next meeting in September 1898, in 

 Cambridge, England, which is also the place 

 and time of meeting of the International 

 Physiological Congress. The International 

 Psychological Congress will next meet in Paris 

 in 1900, as will also the International Congress 

 of Electricians. 



We are compelled this week to record a number 

 of deaths among foreign men of science. Prof. 

 Luigi Palmieri, the well-known meteorologist, 

 has died at the age of eighty-nine years. He 

 had been professor in the University of Naples 

 since 1847, and was director of the Meterological 

 Observatory of Mt. Vesuvius. Dr. Philipp 

 Ludwig Ritter von Seidel, professor of mathe- 

 matics in the University of Munich, died on 

 August 13th at the age of sevdnty-jSve years. 

 M. Carriere, an officer of the Jardin des Plantes, 

 Paris, and the author of imj)ortant contribu- 

 tions to the subject of variation in plants, died 

 on August 18 at the age of seventy-nine years. 

 The deaths are also announced of Ferdinand 

 von Herder, formerly librarian of the botanic 

 garden of St. Petersburg; of Cajetan de Kras- 

 zewski, a Polish astronomer and meteorologist; 

 of Dr. Joh. Jak. Egli, professor of geography in 

 the University of Zurich, and of Dr. Minne- 

 gerode, professor of mathematics in the Uni- 

 versity of Greifswald. 



According to the daily papers, a despatch 

 from Odessa, Russia, states that M. Kildi- 

 schowsky, an electrician, has discovered an im- 

 provement in the telephone, by the use of 

 which distance has no effect upon the hearing. 

 In an experiment between Moscow and RostoflF, 

 a distance of 890 miles, talking, music and sing- 

 ing were heard with perfect distinctness. For 

 the purpose of this experiment an ordinary 

 telegraph wire was used. M. Kildischowsky 

 will go to London to experiment with his im- 

 provement on the Atlantic cables between Lon- 

 don and New York. 



A SPECIAL laboratory for the study of diph- 

 theria under the direction of Prof. Fliigge has 

 been opened in connection with the laboratory 

 of hygiene in the University of Breslau. 



The Electrical Standardizing Testing and 

 Training Institution of London, has made ar- 

 rangements to give instruction in medical elec- 

 tricity, including applications of the Rontgen 

 rays to surgery. 



M. BiJOURDAN proposes to determine, under 

 the direction of M. Janssen, the force of gravity 

 on Mt. Blanc. An observer at Chamonix in 

 telegraphic communication with the observa- 

 tory at Paris, will send the times to the summit 

 of Mt. Blanc by an optical system. 



The Leander McCormick Observatory of the 

 University of Virginia, under the direction of 

 Prof. Ormond Stone, has been engaged in the 

 observation of the relative positions of the 

 satellites of Saturn and valuable results have 

 already been secured, from which it is hoped to 

 obtain greatly improved orbits of those bodies. 



The autumn meeting of the Iron and Steel 

 Institution of Great Britain, was held this year 

 at Bilboa, Spain, beginning on August 31st. 

 There were special reasons for meeting at this 

 place, as for the last 20 years the north of Spain 

 has supplied the blast furnaces of South Wales, 

 Middlesbrough, Scotland, and to a less extent 

 of other districts, with the greater part of their 

 raw materials, apart from a certain quantity of 

 local ores. The exports of iron ores from 

 Bilboa during the current year are estimated 

 at over 6,000,000 tons, but the supply now 

 threatens to become exhausted, and there is 

 much competition among the iron and steel 



