October 16, 1896.] 



SCIENCE. 



569 



At Blue Hill Observatory, on October 8th, 

 Messrs. Clayton, Ferguson and Sewatland sent 

 a series of kites carrying a meteorograph to a 

 height of 9,385 feet, more than three miles of 

 piano wire being used. The temperature fell 

 from 46° at the hill to 20° at an altitude of 

 8,750 feet. 



It is proposed to organize at the University 

 of Pennsylvania a mathematical club. A pre- 

 liminary meeting will be held on October 16th, 

 at which a paper setting forth the objects of 

 such an organization will be read by Dr. E. S. 

 Crawley. 



The seventh Congress of the Italian Medical 

 Society will be held in Eome, beginning October 

 20th. The ninth Congress of Italian Alienists 

 was held at Florence, beginning October 5th. 



It is stated that in the great cyclone which 

 passed over Paris on Thursday, September 10th, 

 damage to the extent of $15,000 was done at the 

 Musee d'histoire naturelle. 



The archseological and paleontological mu- 

 seums of the University of Pennsylvania have 

 recently received from H. W. Seaton-Karr, 

 of England, by exchange, a collection of flint 

 implements secured in Somali Land, South 

 Africa. 



It is announced in Nature that it is proposed 

 to establish an International Botanical Station 

 at Palermo, under the superintendence of Prof. 

 Borzi, who desires the cooperation of botanists 

 of all countries. 



. Mr. George F. Becker, of the United 

 States Geological Survey, has returned to 

 Washington after an absence of six months in 

 South Africa. He visited the diamond mines 

 at Kimberley, but spent most of his time near 

 Johannesburg, studying the gold deposits. A 

 projected trip through the Chartered Com- 

 pany's territory was prevented by the Kafl&r 

 war. Mr. Becker expects to print some of his 

 results during the winter, but probably, in 

 England; his data having been. collected at the 

 expense of English capitalists. 



It is stated in the daily papers that the Mt. 

 Lowe observatory at Echo Mountain, California, 

 has been placed in the hands of a receiver, and 

 that Mr. , Lewis Swift, the astronomer, will 



probably remove his telescope and other instru- 

 ments to some other point. 



The Lancet states that the memorial stone of 

 the Hope Hospital for Langholm was laid on 

 the 21st inst. , by Miss Hope, of New York. The 

 hospital is one of the results of a sum of £100,- 

 000 left by the late Mr. Thos. Hope, of New 

 York, to Langholm as his native place, the 

 capital to be administered by trustees for the 

 benefit of the inhabitants. The building is to 

 be a very handsome one, and the plans are in 

 every respect drawn on a most liberal scale. 

 The cost is estimated at £17,000. 



According to the New York Sun^ Rockall, a 

 desolate rock rising only seventy feet above the 

 sea, between Iceland and the Hebrides, is to be 

 made an English meteorological station. It 

 lies 250 miles from land, the nearest point to it 

 being the little island of St. Kilda, 150 miles 

 away, and itself nearly a hundred miles from 

 the main group of the Hebrides. Rockall is in 

 the path of the cyclonic disturbances on the 

 Atlantic, and the station there would give 

 timely warning of storms approaching the 

 British coast. 



We announced recently the resignation of 

 the professor of hygiene in the University of 

 Moscow, F. F. Jerisman. It is reported that 

 he has been excluded from further service at 

 the University by the Ministry of Instruction, 

 owing to his liberal views in political matters. 



The international race for horseless carriages 

 from Paris to Marseilles and back, on October 

 3d, was won by carriages propelled by Daimler 

 motors. The distance of 1,100 miles was covered 

 in seventy-two hours. Of the thirty-eight 

 carriages that started two were run by steam 

 and the others by petroleum. 



According to the Progres medical vaccination 

 is carried out in Texas by sending a squad of 

 policemen with the physician who cover the 

 patient with their revolvers while the operation 

 is being performed. The French paper thinks 

 that this system has many merits and should 

 be adopted in France. We are also informed 

 by a French journal. La Nature^ that silver has 

 been transformed into gold in America, not re- 

 ferring to the recent action of one of our po- 

 litical parties nor even exclusively to the case 



