Apbil 22, 1887.] 



SCIENCE. 



389 



cyclonic movements in New England ; 2. |150 to 

 Samuel Rideal, Esq., of University college, Lon- 

 don, England, for investigations on the absorp- 

 tion of heat by odorous gases ; 3. $75, to H. M. 

 Howe, Esq., of Boston, Mass., for the investiga- 

 tion of fusible slags of copper and lead smelting ; 

 4. $500 to Prof. J. Rosenthal of Erlangen, Ger- 

 many, for investigations on animal heat in health 

 and disease ; 5. |50 to Joseph Jastrow, Esq., 

 of the Johns Hopkins university, Baltimore, 

 Md., for investigations on the laws of psycho- 

 physics. The board of trustees consists of H. P. 

 Bowditch, president ; William Minot, jun., treas- 

 urer ; Francis A. Walker ; Edward C. Pickering ; 

 Charles Sedgwick Minot, secretary. 



— The fish-commission schooner Grampus, re- 

 cently finished, has been engaged during the 

 winter in catching cod-fish and gathering cod- 

 eggs, and also in catching mackerel. It is the 

 purpose of the commission to study the migra- 

 tions of the mackerel from its first appearance 

 until it enters the Gulf of Maine. The seasons and 

 conditions favorable to spawning will he closely 

 observed. The migrations of menhaden, blue- 

 fish, and other fishes, will also be studied. 



— The conference of astronomers called by Ad- 

 miral Mouchez, director of the Paris observatory, 

 for the purpose of forming a plan of co-operation 

 in photographing the whole sky, will doubtless re- 

 sult in tTie accomplishment of this project. The 

 proposition is to enlist ten or twelve observatories 

 in the undertaking, so located that their combined 

 range will take in the whole skj'. It is suggested 

 that each plate be four degrees square, which if 

 adopted, would require eleven thousand plates. 

 It is estimated, that, with an average of one hun- 

 dred plates per year from eleven observatories, 

 each plate covering four degrees square, it would 

 take ten years to comj)lete the whole work. 



' — We learn from the Athenaeum that the Hib- 

 bert lecturer this year will be Professor Sayce, 

 and the subject will be Assyrian and Babylonian 

 religion. The lectures will be delivered at the end 

 of April and during May, both in London and 

 Oxford. The Hibbert trustees have also in the 

 press a work by one of their scholars, Mr. H. W. 

 Wallis of Cambridge, ' On the cosmology of the 

 Rig Veda : a study in Indian logic' 



— Rev. W. Lucas Collins, editor of the popular 

 series of ' Ancient classics for English readers,' is 

 dead. 



— Professor Mobius of Kiel is the new director 

 of the Zoological museum at Berlin. 



— Messrs. B. Westermann & Co., New York, 

 have published a second edition of Lemcke's " An 



illustrated grammar of skat, the famous German 

 game of cards now attracting so much atten- 

 tion." 



— Entrance examinations for the Massachusetts 

 institute of technology will be held in Boston, 

 Mass. , on Thursday and Friday, June 2 and 3 ; 

 also in New York, Philadelphia, Montreal, Chi- 

 cago, St. Louis, Cincinnati, San Francisco, Wash- 

 ington, NashviUe, St. Paul, Atlanta, and Pitts- 

 burgh. 



— The Lancet reports the case of a woman 

 dying from myxedema whose temperature ranged 

 from 66° F. to 76° F., the normal temperature be- 

 ing 98.5° F. The pulsations of this patient's 

 heart were 36, and her respirations 12 to the min- 

 ute. The temperature is said to be the lowest 

 human temperature on record. 



— The New York medical journal of April 9 

 contains a detailed account, with illustrations, of 

 the induction balance and the telephonic probe 

 employed for the detection and location of metal- 

 lic masses in the human body. 



— The Boston medical and surgical journal 

 reports that a large number of calves from one 

 hour to three days old are said to have been 

 slaughtered in Herkimer and Oneida counties, 

 and sent to New York, where they are put up 

 as ' canned chicken.' 



— From the report of the hospital for Chinese, 

 in Shanghai, we learn that in China smaU-pox in- 

 oculation is still in vogue. For this purpose a rag 

 is moistened with the variolous matter and placed 

 in the nostril. That the disease is prevalent in 

 China is easily understood after this explanation. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



*^*The attention of scientific men is called to the advantages 

 of the correspondence columns of Science for placing promptly 

 on record brief preliminary notices of their investigations. 

 Twenty copies of the number containing his communication 

 will be furnished free to any correspondent on request. 



The editor will be glad to publish any queries consonant with 

 the character of the journal. 



Correspondents are requested to be as brief as possible. The 

 ivriter^s 7iame is in all cases required as proof of good faith. 



Mole-lore. 



Here are three items of mole lore in the District of 

 Columbia : — 



1. A mole's feet cut off and hung around a child's 

 neck will help it in teething. In some instances in 

 Virginia these odd amulets have been handed down, 

 I am told, for generations. They are equally believed 

 in by colored people of Maryland. ' That's what the 

 old-time people say,' is the only explanation. The 

 superstition comes into the District from both these 

 neighboring states. 



2. Once the mole was an over-proud young lady. 

 She is condemned to travel under ground as a pun- 

 ishment for her pride. Unlike the former, this is 

 told with a smile, and probably quite without belief. 



