514 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. IX., Mo. 225 



want of date, when the latter wrote, by which to 

 fix the age of the Nasik inscriptions of the Andhra 

 kings. It is one evidence of the value of the epi- 

 grapliical researches by the Archeoiogical survey 

 that thpy enable scholars to determine, within 

 so very nari'ow limits as Dr. Burgess is understood 

 to prove, the age of so intez-esting a monument as 

 this of Amaravatl. At Jaggayyapeta, a large 

 village farther up the Kistna River, anrl close on 

 the Hyderabad frontier, Dr. Burgess discovered 

 another ruined StCipa. This is also described and 

 illustrated, and the inscriptions from it translated. 

 Though much smaller than that at Amaravati, it 

 proves to be of much earlier date ; and its very 

 archaic sculptures, though few and much injured, 

 are of the greatest interest in the illustration of 

 early Indian art. The work is all in type, and 

 only waits the completion of some of the plates, 

 which may be expected within a short time. 



— The garbage crematory at Wheeling, W.Va., 

 is said to be completed, and to have stood the 

 tests which have been applied, to the satisfaction 

 of the authorities. Pittsburgh. Penn., is also en- 

 deavoring to solve the difficult problem of the dis- 

 posal of garbage, and has advertised for bids to 

 construct furnaces. We regret to learn that the 

 Milwaukee, Wis., authorities have deciled to re- 

 move the garbage of that city to the country, and 

 there bury it in the ground. Such a method of 

 disposal is, at the best, unsanitary, and can be but 

 a temporary relief. 



— Dr. Albert Kellogg, the pioneer botanist of 

 the Pacific coast, and the last surviving charter 

 member of the California academy of sciences, died 

 at Alameda, March 31, 1887. 



— The U. S. coast-survey parties on tiie Pacific 

 coast are now all in the field. Assistant Pratt, on 

 the west coast of Washington Territory, will 

 complete the astronomical and plane-table recon- 

 naissance from Cape Flattery to Gray's Harbor, 

 over a region which has been traversed by few 

 persons, and has been absolutely unsurveyed ex- 

 cept for the hydrographic reconnaissance made by 

 Captain Alden early in the fifties. The preliminary 

 astronomical and topographical reconnaissance 

 and survey along the coast of Washington Terri- 

 tory from Columbia River to Port Orford, under 

 the charge of Assistants Rockwell and Dickens, 

 will also be completed this year. The magnetic 

 apparatus at Los Angeles is giving splendid re- 

 sults, almost unbroken curves having been main- 

 tained at this station for several years. Every 

 great earthquake which has occurred has affected 

 the magnetic elements, and has been faithfully 

 recorded, some of the waves in lines of the record 

 being quite remarkable. The steamer Blake, on 



her way from the Gulf Stream explorations which 

 have been in progress on the south of Key West, 

 will call at Brunswick harbor, Georgia, and make 

 an examination of that bar, at the request of citi- 

 zens interested in the progress of the port. The 

 Blake will also stop at Cape Fear, and will make 

 a hydrograj)hic survey in that vicinity, where re- 

 markable changes have occurred in the last 

 twenty years. Two topographic parties and one 

 hydrographic party are now at work on the coast 

 of Maine in the vicinity of Cobscook Bay. The 

 surveys on this coast are rapidly approaching 

 completion. 



— Commercial Agent Smith reports from May- 

 ence that the peronospora, which is a pest as 

 rapacious as the phylloxera, has made its appear- 

 ance in the vineyards of Germany, threatening to 

 accomplish on the Moselle and Rhine what the 

 phylloxera has failed to effect, — the destruction 

 of the vineyards on the banks of those rivers ; 

 and the vine-dressers are filled with alarm for the 

 future. The chamber of commerce at Coblenz 

 has called the attention of the government at 

 Berlin to the pest, and asks that the remedy 

 adopted in America, of burning the leaves upon 

 which the insect has fixed itself, be employed by 

 the police. 



— The navy department has just issued a fine 

 submarine cable chart of the world. 



— The U. S. fish commission sent a car last 

 week with 4,000,000 shad-eggs and 1.500,000 shad- 

 fry to New York state for stocking the waters of 

 the Hudson River. 



— The international convention just ratified by 

 the President, securing patentees in the United 

 States the right to take out patents in other coun- 

 tries at any time within seven months after letters 

 have been issued to them by our government, con- 

 fers a j)iivilege which will be highly valued by 

 inventors. 



— Lieut. John P. Finley of the signal office has 

 just issued a new publication on the subject of 

 tornadoes. 



— Gen. A. W. Greely, chief signal ofiicer, has 

 received from the secretary of war a gold medal 

 presented to him by the Paris geographical so- 

 ciety, in recognition of his valuable contributions 

 to the knowledge of high latitudes. 



— In May, 1887, Messrs. Ticknor & Co. begin 

 the publication of a set of handsome and con- 

 venient paper-covered volumes, for leisure-hour 

 and summer-day reading, to be made up of some 

 of the choicest and most successful novels of late 

 years, together with several entirely new novels 

 by well-known and popular writers. They will be 

 issued regularly, once a week, for three months. 



