70 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XII. No. 2i 



— The circular of the New York Mineralogical Club, with its 

 programme of Saturday afternoon field-meetings during June and 

 July, was widely distributed, and aroused much interest, not only 

 among the membership of the club, but among many others en- 

 gaged in kindred studies. The trips taken have been both pleasant 

 and profitable, and have been attended by increasing numbers. A 

 second circular has been issued, in the belief that it will not alone 

 afford the club further opportunities of useful study and agreeable 

 intercourse, but tend yet more to bring together the workers in 

 allied fields. Several other scientific societies and circles have ex- 

 pressed a wish and purpose to join in some of the proposed trips, 

 and the club has already enjoyed the company of a number of 

 friends and co-workers. 



— Cupples & Hurd will publish at once a cheap edition of ' The 

 'Story of an African Farm ; ' also an illustrated guide to the Island 



of Bermuda, by James H. Stark. Ginn & Co. will publish early 



next month ' Footprints of Travel, or Journeying in many Lands,' 

 by Maturin M. Ballou. The purpose of this work is to furnish a 



reader for use in public schools. Stuart Cumberland, the 



' thought-reader,' is about to publish a volume on ' Famous Men I 



have known.' IVIr. George Redway, London, who has made a 



specialty of this class of literature, announces an ' esoteric ' series, 

 to consist, for the most part, of reprints of old books dealing with 

 alchemy, astrology, freemasonry, magic, and Rosicrucian mysti- 

 cism. Among the first to appear will be the works of the anonymous 

 cosmopolite philospher, known as Eirenaeus Philalethes ; and the 

 ' Lumen de Lumine ' of Thomas Vaughan, who wrote under the 



name of Eugenius Philalethes. Henry Stevens & Son, London, 



have in press a volume entitled ' Americanisms, Old and New : a 

 Dictionary of Words, Phrases, and Colloquialisms Peculiar to the 

 United States, British America, the West Indies, etc.; their Deriva- 

 tion, Meaning, and Application, together with Numerous Anecdotal, 

 Historical, Explanatory, and Folk-Lore Notes, and a Critical Intro- 

 •duction,' compiled and edited by John S. Farmer, author of ' Ex 

 Oriente Lux,' ' 'Twixt Two Worlds,' etc. The book will be printed 

 for private circulation among a limited number of subscribers only. 



The Reform Club has begun, at 52 William St., New York, 



the publication of a semi-monthly journal of handy dimensions, 



called Tariff Reform. The July issue of the Westminster 



Review (Leonard Scott Publishing Company) has articles of cos- 

 mopolitan interest on ' Nurses and Nursing;' 'Mental Deteriora- 

 tion, Some of its Avoidable Causes ; ' and ' Characteristics of Ameri- 

 can Cities.' The Cosmopolitan Magazine, the publication of 



which was suspended last May, will now be issued monthly by a 

 new company. Mr. J. N. Hallock, of The Christian at Work, is a 

 ■member of the new company, and the editorial department will be 



conducted by Mr. E. D. Walker. The Journal of Pedagogy, 



Athens, 0., beginning with No. 11 of Vol. I., will contain from 

 twenty to twenty-four pages of reading-matter, instead of sixteen as 

 heretofore. — In the Century for August, Professor Holden be- 

 gins his series of two articles on sidereal astronomy, old and new. 

 The one now given briefly chronicles the data which astronomy has 

 collected up to date : it tells of the methods of naming the stars, 

 their number, the star charts, catalogues, etc. These articles are 



appropriate to the star-gazing season. In the Andover Review 



for August the opening article is by Morrison I. Swift, Esq., who 

 treats of the duty of society with reference to ' trusts.' He states 

 the objections to such combinations, reviews proposed methods of 

 treatment, and argues intelligently for their ' acceptance and 

 thoroughgoing regulation.' Rev. Francis H. Johnson contributes 

 a criticism of methods of harmonizing Christianity and science by 

 sacrificing the distinctive characteristics of the former as a divine 

 revelation. — — In the midsummer issue of Tlie American Maga- 

 :zine. Dr. W. F. Hutchinson presents the fourth of his illustrated 

 articles in the series ' Along the Caribbean,' in this instance dealing 

 -with Trinidad ; and Frederick G. Schwatka tells about ' The 



American Arctic Savage.' Ticknor & Co. have ready 'A History 



■of Presidential Elections,' by Edward Stanwood. 



— -According to Agricultural Science, Prof. W. P. Brooks, at 

 present president of the Imperial College of Agriculture, Sapporo, 

 Japan, is to be the next professor of agriculture at the Massachu- 

 setts Agricultural College. Professor Brooks went to Japan about 



twelve years ago to teach agriculture in the newly started college. 

 Later he became its president. He is considered one of the ablest 

 graduates of the Massachusetts Agricultural College, and his selec- 

 tion for the place in question is for many reasons a wise one. Pro- 

 fessor Brooks was born in 1851. 



— In .accordance with the provisions of the constitution, the 

 committee of the Nineteenth Century Club has selected from the 

 list of vice-presidents Mr. Daniel G. Thompson as president, to 

 fill Mr. Palmer's unexpired term. 



— The American Statistical Association recently issued the first 

 number of its Proceedings, on ' Statistics of Water-Power,' by G. F. 

 Swain. This association has been organized and maintained for 

 nearly half a century ; up to this time, however, it has been almost 

 entirely a local society of Boston. It now desires to extend its 

 scope, so as to make its interests and influence national. It is in- 

 tended in an early number of the publications to begin a record of 

 statistical publications in various departments of knowledge, — a 

 record which it is hoped will be a serviceable guide. 



— The Middlesex Institute, Maiden, Mass., has issued ' Flora of 

 Middlesex County,' by L. L. Dame and F. S. Collins. The authors 

 acknowledge their indebtedness to Dr. Gray, Dr. Farlow, and other 

 leading botanists. 



— It is now seven years since the International Geographical Con- 

 gress at Venice adjourned, and it seemed as though these important 

 conventions which have proved so fruitful for the promotion of 

 geographical investigations were totally abandoned. It is therefore 

 with great pleasure that we learn of the plan of the French Geo- 

 graphical Society to convene an international geographical con- 

 gress during the universal exhibition that is to be held next year. 

 Each society represented at the congress will be invited to submit 

 a report on the progress of geographical work in the country to 

 which it belongs, during the last century, and this plan promises to 

 yield interesting and valuable results. 



— Since the report of Dr. Elkin to the Board of Managers of 

 the Observatory of Yale University in 1887, the series of observations 

 on the parallaxes of the ten stars of the first magnitude in the north- 

 ern hemisphere has been brought to a close. The average or 

 mean parallax of the stars is -|-o."o85 +o."oi5, to which should 

 probably be added -t-o."oo4 as the probable parallax of the com- 

 parison stars which are in the mean of about the eighth magnitude, 

 giving -f-o."o89 +o."oi5 for the result sought for. Dr. Elkin does 

 not, however, in view of the wide range of distance implied by the 

 values of his table, feel at all certain that this result may be taken 

 as a measure of the average distance of the stars in question, and at 

 all events it must be considered only as provisional and partial 

 until it can be combined with the result for the first-magnitude 

 stars of the southern hemisphere, now in course of determination 

 by Dr. Gill. At the same^ime he draws attention to its near coin- 

 cidence with the values derived by Gylden (o."o84) and Peters 

 (o."io2), without laying too much stress on this agreement. 



— Arrangements have been made for re-determining the differ- 

 ence in longitude between Paris and Greenwich. The geodetic 

 station at Montsouris, which has already been connected with the 

 principal European surveys, will be used for the French observa- 

 tions, and Greenwich Observatory for the English. 



— The length of pipe laid in Paris for the distribution of power 

 by compressed air already exceeds 30 miles. The compressing- 

 engines are of 3000-horse power, and about 3,000,000 cubic feet of 

 air are compressed daily to a pressure of 80 pounds per square 

 inch, at an expenditure of 50 tons of coal. 



— In the last number of the Zeitschrift fiir Hygiene, under the 

 title of ' Experimente iiber die bacterienfeindlichen Einfliisse des 

 thierischen Korpers,' Dr. George Nuttall of San Francisco pub- 

 lishes some interesting results of a large number of experiments 

 made by him in FlUgge's laboratory during the past year and a 

 half. He finds that freshly drawn blood, humor aqueus, pericar- 

 dial fluid, and in the case of man also pleuritic exudate, have the 

 power of killing off bacteria to an astonishing degree, but only for 

 a period of three to four hours after removal from the body. The 

 blood of various animals acted differently ; for instance, that of an 

 immune sheep killed off four times as many anthrax bacilli as that 



