462 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. IX., No. 223 



seem unfortTinate that the skull in the Proceedings 

 of the zoological society should have been figured as 

 a typical cranium, and that no mention should have 

 been made of the fact that it was aberrant in so im- 

 portant a particular. Fbederic A. Ltjcas. 

 Washington, D.C., May 3. 



Some trees. 



In September of 1885, I was present at and assisted 

 in the following measurements of an iron or lever- 

 wood tree (Ostry virginica) on the grounds of Lyman 

 Child, Esq., near Bethel village in Vermont: cir- 

 cumference at ground, 128 inches ; one foot above 

 groiind, 83 inches ; four feet above ground, 69 

 inches ; with corresponding diameters of 3 feet 7 

 inches, 2 feet 7 inches, and 1 foot 11 inches; height 

 of tree, 38 feet ; lateral extent of branches, 47 feet. 

 It stands on a barren, precipitous hillside, and can 

 find nutriment in little else than the disintegrated 

 granite rock. In much travel and a long life in east 

 and west, I have never seen one but this, of even 

 one-half this size. 



At Excelsior Springs in Clay county, Mo., some 

 thirty miles from Kansas City, stands a maple (Acer 

 Sach) and white-oak (Quercus alba) joined in one 

 symmetrical body, from the ground up about six 

 feet ; thence dividing into two separate trees of some 

 fifteen to eighteen inches diameter each. The line 

 of union of the bodies is only indicated by a slight 

 crowding of the bark. 



Near the same Excelsior Springs an oak and maple 

 of some twelve inches diameter each, stand at the 

 ground two feet apart. At about fifteen feet above 

 the ground, in their earlier growth, a limb from the 

 maple was projected horizontally across the body of 

 the oak. Time and growth have embedded the limb 

 from the maple in the body of the oak ; and now the 

 appearance is, on the one side of the oak, an anas- 

 tomosis with the maple by a three-inch arm, and, on 

 the other side, a two-inch maple-limb produced from 

 an oak-tree. 



A slippery-elm tree (Ulmus fulva) stands in our 

 yard here in Kansas City, of some thirty inches di- 

 ameter, at one foot from the ground, and averaging 

 twenty inches for twenty feet upwards, and thence 

 twelve inches for forty feet; entire height, about 

 eighty feet. I find no such Ulmus fulva in Gray ; 

 but its sweetish, mucilaginous inner bark pronotmces 

 it a real fulva. Its terminal branches, often in 

 whorls of from three to seven, are blunt and club- 

 like, unlike the light pendant terminals of many of 

 the American or white elms. Other specimens of 

 this elm are in the vicinity, but not often so sym- 

 metrical in form. A. L. Child, M.D. 



Kansas City, Mo., May 3. 



The Daniel Scholl observatory. 

 It occurred to me that it might be of interest to 

 you and your readers to hear that in the old his- 

 toric town of Lancaster City, Penn., an obser- 

 vatory named the Daniel Scholl observatory has been 

 erected on the grounds of Franklin and Marshall 

 college. The equipments consist of meteorological 

 apparatus, chronometer, Seth Thomas thirty-day 

 regulator, chronograph, transit instrument of three 

 inches aperture, and a Clark-Repsold equatorial 

 telescope of eleven inches aperture. The telescope 

 has a set of negative and positive eye-pieces, with 

 reversion prisms for three of the micrometer eye- 



pieces, a Mertz solar eye-piece, and a comet eye- 

 piece, together with a micrometer with complete il- 

 luminating apparatus for bright and dark field as 

 worked out hj the Repsolds. Since this is compara- 

 tively new, and, as far as we know, the only microm- 

 eter and purely equatorial mounting by Eepsold in 

 this coiintry, we thought it might be of some interest 

 to those who have not had the opportunity to see 

 this form of mounting and micrometer. 



Jeffeeson E. Kekshnek. 

 Lancaster City, Penn., May 7. 



Death of Prof. William Ashburner. 



William Ashburner, the well-known mining engi- 

 neer of San Francisco, died in that city, April 20, 

 after a brief illness. The deceased held a high place 

 in his profession, and was greatly esteemed by all 

 who knew him. He was born in Stockbridge, Mass., 

 in 1831. He attended the public schools of his 

 native town. In 1849 he entered the Lawrence 

 scientific school at Cambridge, and after two years 

 went to Paris, where he pursued such studies as are 

 requisite to the profession of mining engineer, at 

 the Ecole des mines. In 1854 he returned to this 

 country, and, accompanied by the late Professor 

 Eivot, he devoted several months to the examina- 

 tion of the mineral region of Lake Superior. In 

 1859 he was engaged in the exploration of a part of 

 the island of Newfoundland, and in 1860 he went to 

 California as one of the chief assistants in the state 

 geological survey of which Prof. J. D. Whitney was 

 the director. In 1864 he was appointed one of the 

 commissioners of the Yosemite Valley and the Mari- 

 posa Big-Tree Grove, a position he held until 1880. 

 From 1862 until 1883 Professor Ashburner was ac- 

 tively engaged in his professional work, and trav- 

 elled almost incessantly in the mining districts of 

 the United States. British Columbia, and Mexico, 

 also in the more distant regions of South America 

 and Asia. 



In 1874 he was made professor of mining in the 

 University of California, and subsequently honorary 

 professor of mining in the same college. In 1880 he 

 was appointed by the governor, regent of said uni- 

 versity, and was a member of the board of regents 

 at the time of his death. He was selected by the 

 late James Lick as one of the trustees of the Cali- 

 fornia school of mechanical arts, this latter being 

 one of Mr. Lick's public benefactions, and was 

 also chosen by Mr. Stanford one of the trustees of 

 the Leland Stanford, jun., university. Professor 

 Ashburner was otherwise prominent in various scien- 

 tific and educational societies, particularly in the 

 California academy of sciences, in which for many 

 years he was one of the trustees. He was also a 

 member of the microscopical, historical, and geo- 

 graphical societies of San Francisco. 



In the community in which he lived for so many 

 years, he was universally recognized as a public- 

 spirited and honorable gentleman. His quiet and 

 unostentatious manners, as well as other agreeable 

 personal qualities, endeared him to a large circle of 

 friends. 



The enthusiastic and active interest he took in 

 every thing conducive to the growth and intellectual 

 advancement of the Pacific coast made him a valu- 

 able citizen, and his death may well be regarded as 

 a public loss. E.. E. C. S. 



Smithsonian institution, Washington, May 9. 



