398 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XI. No. 271. 



Eastern District of Pennsylvania, Judge Mc- 

 Pherson ; the Comptroller of the Currency, 

 Hon. Charles G. Dawes, and the Assayer of the 

 New York Assay Office, Dr. Herbert G. Torrey. 

 The work of the Commission consists in count- 

 ing, assaying and weighing samples representing 

 the coinage of the mints at Philadelphia, New 

 Orleans and San Francisco. For this trial one 

 one-thousandth of all gold coins and one two- 

 thousandth of all silver coins made during the 

 year are sent to the Philadelphia mint under 

 seal and kept for the meeting of the Commis- 

 sion. The coinage during the past year was 

 larger than ever before and hence the labor of 

 the Commission was increased. The trial pieces 

 numbered over forty-one thousand. The work 

 of the Commission was divided among three 

 committees ; the chairman of which, as an- 

 nounced by Mr. George C. Roberts, Director 

 of the Mint were : Counting, Hon. E. J. Hill ; 

 Assaying, Dr. H. S. Pritchett ; Weighing, Dr. 

 J. A. Mathews. The investigations of these 

 committees serve as a check upon the accuracy 

 of the work at the several mints, as well as 

 upon the Bureau of the Mint in Washington. 



SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS. 



Since making appropriations in March, 1899, 

 ■of 1500 to Professor Charles L. Doolittle, and 

 of $300 to Mr. Henry M. Parkhui-st, from the 

 Benjamin Aptborp Gould Fund, a considerable 

 additional amount of income has accrued, for 

 the distribution of which the Directors are pre- 

 pared immediately to arrange. Applications 

 for appropriations may be made by letter to 

 Mr. Lewis Boss, Albany, Dr. Seth C. Chandler, 

 Cambridge, or to Professor Asaph Hall, Cam- 

 bridge. 



An item in the Urgency Deficiency Bill, 

 which has now passed both Houses of Congress, 

 makes an appropriation of $7500, for continuing 

 the biological and economic investigations on 

 the lobster and clam. The investigations deal 

 with the practical aspects of the subject, and it 

 is purposed to carry on the work in all States 

 having clam and lobster fisheries, from Maine 

 to Delaware inclusive. 



A COMMITTEE, Consisting of Mr. James E. 

 Scripps, Mr. George W. Bates, of Detroit, and 



Professor Francis W. Kelsey, of the University 

 of Michigan, was appointed at the annual 

 meeting of the Detroit branch of the Archaeo- 

 logical Institute of America, and was instructed 

 to name a general committee to prepare a 

 memorial to be submitted to the next State 

 Legislature on the subject of an archaeological 

 survey of Michigan. The present knowledge 

 of Michigan archaeology is meagre, and is given 

 in 'The Data of Michigan Archaeology,' by 

 Harlan I. Smith, published in the American 

 Antiquarian for May, 1896. 



The University of Edinburgh will confer 

 the degree of LL.D., on Eleanor A. Ormerod, 

 the entomologist. The University of Edin- 

 burgh has not hitherto conferred an honorary 

 degree on a woman. 



Wabash College, situated at Crawfordsville, 

 Indiana, has conferred an honorary degree of 

 Ph.D. on Professor Asa H. Morton, professor of 

 romance languages, at Williams College. If 

 Professor Morton has not been consulted in re- 

 gard to this doubtful honor, he may see fit to 

 decline it. 



Dr. Charles W. Dabney, president of the 

 University of Tennessee, has received notice 

 from the French Government of his appoint- 

 ment as a member of the Committee on Inter- 

 national Awards at the Paris Exposition. 



•Pkofessob R. W. Wood, of the University 

 of Wisconsin, who is now in England, will re- 

 turn to Madison at the end of March after 

 visiting Berlin and Paris. 



Mr. William C. Whitney has presented 

 two fine bisons to the New York Zoological 

 Park. One of them is from the herd of the 

 late Austin Corbin at Blue Mountain Park, N. 

 H. The other is from Mr. Whitney's herd at 

 Lennox, Mass. 



Professor E. J. McWeeny, professor of 

 pathology and bacteriology at the Catholic 

 University of Dublin, has been appointed to 

 the newly created post of bacteriologist to the 

 Irish Local Government Board. 



The trustees of the Philadelphia Academy 

 of Surgery announce that the Samuel D. Gross 

 prize was not awarded on January 1st, as no 

 suitable essay was presented. It will be 

 awarded on October 1, 1901. The prize, the 



