356 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XI. No. 270. 



others which have been recorded as occurring 

 in this country. Some of the latter are rare, 

 some of doubtful occurrence, while others are 

 based on erroneous determinations. 



The report of the Botanist of the United 

 States Department of Agriculture, recently is- 

 sued, gives one some idea of the many kinds of 

 work taken up by that division, including 

 poisonous plants, seed testing, seed and plant 

 introduction, economic plants of the tropics, etc. 



Botanists may obtain a suggestion as to how 

 to secure the publication of some of the matters 

 they wish to distribute to the people, from a 

 tiny pamphlet on the ' Stinking Smut of Wheat,' 

 by Professor Bolley, of the North Dakota Agri- 

 cultural College, which was ' published for the 

 farmers of Minnesota and North Dakota ' by 

 one of the enterprising railway lines. It is 

 popularly written, and at the same time is sci- 

 entifically reliable. 



Recent 'Contributions to the Flora of Queens- 

 land ' by F. M. Bailey, Colonial Botanist, enu- 

 merate and describe many new plants, and call 

 attention to certain plants ' reputed to be pois- 

 onous to stock. ' 



A RECENT report on the ' Timber Trees of the 

 Herberton District of North Queensland,' by 

 J. F. Bailey, assistant to the Colonial Botanist, 

 is interesting to American botanists on account 

 of the fact that but one of the genera enumer- 

 ated {Zanthoxylon) is native to this country. 

 One obtains little idea of the appearance of the 

 Queensland forests from an examination of the 

 descriptive list of one hundred and eleven 

 names. What notion, for example, does one 

 have of species of Acronychia and Halfordia 

 (Rutaceae), or Blepharocarya, Euroschinus and 

 Pleiogynium (Auacardiaceae), or Aleurites, Balo- 

 ghia and Mallotus (Euphorbiaceae) ? 



The successive numbers of the Forester, 'a 

 monthly magazine devoted to the care and use 

 of forests and forest trees and to related sub- 

 jects' contain so much that is botanical, and are 

 so beautifully illustrated that we cannot do 

 otherwise than commend it to botanists as a 

 most helpful journal. 



Charles E, Bessey. 



The University of Nebraska. 



SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS. 



Sir Michael Foster has been returned to 



Parliament as representative of the University 



of London. The final vote was : Sir Michael 



Foster, 1271 ; Dr. Collins, 863 ; Dr. Busk, 586. 



The Paris Academy of Sciences has elected 

 as a corresponding member, Dr. H. G. Zeuthen, 

 professor of mathematics at the University of 

 Copenhagen. 



Professor C. Baeus, of Brown University, 

 has been asked by the committee in charge to 

 present a report on pyrometry at the Interna- 

 tional Congress of Physicists of the Paris Expo- 

 sition. 



Professor Ira Rbmsen, of Johns Hopkins 

 University, will deliver the address at the dedi- 

 cation of the new chemistry building of the 

 University of Kansas next fall. 



The following named botanists and zoologists 

 have recently joined the Washington Academy 

 of Sciences as non-resident members : C. E. 

 Bessey, University of Nebraska ; John M. 

 Coulter, University of Chicago ; G. L. Goodale, 

 Harvard University ; C. S. Sargent, Arnold 

 Arboretum ; W. P. Wilson, Philadelphia Com- 

 mercial Museums ; W. B. Scott, Princeton 

 University ; Henry F. Osborn, Columbia Uni- 

 versity ; David S. Jordan, Stanford University ; 

 William Brewster, Cambridge, Mass. ; J. A. 

 Allen, American Museum of Natural His- 

 tory ; E. A. Andrews, Johns Hopkins Uni- 

 versity ; H. C. Bumpus, Brown University ; 

 Carl H. Eigenmann, Indiana University ; 

 Walter Faxon, Harvard University ; Chas. 

 H. Fernald, Mass. Agricultural College, S. A. 

 Forbes, University of Illinois ; Simon H. Gage, 

 Cornell University ; Samuel Garman, Museum 

 of Comparative Zoology, Cambridge ; Alpheus 

 Hyatt, Boston Society of Natural History ; C. 

 C. Nutting, State University of Iowa ; Arnold 

 E. Ortmann, Princeton University ; W. E. Rit- 

 ter. University of California ; R. E. C. Stearns, 

 Los Angeles, California ; R. P. Whitfield, Amer- 

 ican Museum of Natural History ; Edmund B. 

 Wilson, Columbia University. 



As we have already announced. Professor R. 

 W. Wood, of the University of Wisconsin, is at 

 present in England, having been invited by the 

 Society of Arts to lecture on ' The Method of 



