April 6, 1900.] 



SCIENG'J. 



557 



one of its originators. He was the inventor of 

 several valuable forms of fish -hatching appara- 

 tus, especially for the treatment of adhesive 

 eggs, and of the well-known ' refrigerating box ' 

 by which he solved successfully the problem of 

 transporting fish-spawn across the ocean. He 

 was several times employed on foreign missions 

 connected with the fisheries. Under the N. 

 Y. State Fish Commission he established the 

 station at Cold Spring Harbor, and directed its 

 operations for nearly fifteen years. He will 

 also be remembered in themes of fish and fish- 

 ing as a popular writer of rare talent. Born 

 near Albany, N. Y., in 1833, he died at Cedar 

 Island, on the Brule river, Wisconsin, on Feb- 

 ruary 14th. 



De. Emanuel Liais, the astronomer, has 

 died at Cherbourg at the age of seventy-four 

 years. 



The death is announced of Professor John 

 Henry Pepper, an analytic chemist and public 

 analyst in Brisbane, Queensland, at the age 

 of 79 years. 



Peofessor G. E. Morrow died, on March 

 27th, at the age of 60 years. He was for about 

 20 years professor of agriculture in the Univer- 

 sity of Illinois. 



Dr. Zukal, associate professor of botany in 

 the Agricultural Institute at Vienna, died on 

 the 15th of February, aged 55 years. 



By the generosity of Mr. William H. Crocker, 

 of San Francisco, the Lick Observatory will be 

 able, as we announced last week, to send a 

 party to Georgia, to observe the total solar 

 eclipse of May 28th. Only two observers, 

 Messrs. W. W. Campbell and C. D. Perrine, 

 will be sent out from the observatory : but sev- 

 eral European astronomers have expressed a 

 desire to join the party, and similar requests 

 have also been received from astronomers con- 

 nected with American colleges, which do not 

 intend to send out expeditions of their own. 

 The Instrumental equipment of the expedition' 

 will be quite complete. The principal instru- 

 ment for photographing the corona will be the 

 5-inch telescope of 40 feet focal length, used by 

 the Lick Observatory parties in South America 

 and India. For photographing the corona on 

 a smaller scale there will be several cameras of 



from five to six inches aperture, and others 

 of smaller size. One slit spectrograph, and two 

 objective spectrographs arranged to give a con- 

 tinuous record of the changing spectrumi at 

 the beginning and end of totality, are also in- 

 cluded in the equipment. Observations of 

 contacts will be made. Any observers, having 

 experience in astronomical or physical work, 

 who wish to join the party at their own ex- 

 pense, like the gentlemen referred to above, 

 are invited to communicate with the Director 

 of the Lick Observatory before April 20th, and 

 after that date with Professor W. W. Campbell, 

 Lick Observatory Eclipse Expedition, Atlanta, 

 Georgia. 



Since September, the collections at the Gray 

 herbarium of Harvard University have been in- 

 creased to the extent of several thousand speci- 

 mens from various parts of the world. Among 

 the acquisitions is a collection of Central Ameri- 

 can plants, 875 in number, jjresented by Captain 

 J. Donnell Smith, of Baltimore. Another, con- 

 sisting of some 900 specimens, has come from 

 Puerto Rico. The United States Department of 

 Agriculture has sent 621 specimens of American 

 grasses, the botanic garden of the University of 

 Vienna, 877 Austrian plants, and the New York 

 botanical garden, 561 plants from Idaho and 

 Montana. In addition, 852 specimens from the 

 Galapagos Islands have been received for the 

 purpose of critical study. The staff is giving 

 considerable attention to the continuation of 

 the Synoptical Flora of North America, begun 

 by Dr. Gray, and now being edited by Professor 

 Benjamin L. Robinson. The usual amount of 

 research work is in progress. Among those 

 engaged in it are Professor Piper of the Wash- 

 ington Agricultural College and Professor Hen- 

 derson of the Idaho Agricultural College, who 

 are studying the type specimens of Western 

 plants in the herbarium. . 



A CIVIL service examination will be held on 

 April 17th to 18th to fill two vacancies in the 

 position of cartographic draftsman in the Hy- 

 drographic Office, Navy Department. 



A New York State Civil Service examination 

 will be held on or about April 18th for the 

 position of electrical engineer, with a salary of 

 $900 and maintenance ; and for the position of 



