SCIENCE. 



[Vol. X. No. 2. 



upon Mr. H. F. Allen, a fellow at the Johns Hopkins, made the 

 announcement that the Semitic seminary of the university pro- 

 posed publishing at an early date a complete Assyrian glossary. 

 The work would be issued under the superintendence of Professor 

 Haupt, and, while not intending to supersede the great Assyrian 

 dictionary now in course of publication by Prof. Friedrich Delitzsch 

 of Leipzig, will aim to supply the need of students of Assyrian 

 better than the latter work does. The principles which will guide 

 the compilers in their work were briefly set forth. Professor Haupt 

 followed with a second announcement, also of great interest to 

 Semitic scholars, regarding a series of contributions to Semitic 

 comparative philology, which he proposes editing in conjunction 

 with the above-mentioned Professor Delitzsch ; and it must have 

 seemed to many as though an Assyriological ' craze ' had broken 

 out when Dr. Cyrus Adler added a third announcement, which 

 was no less gratifying than the preceding ones. 



The National Museum at Washington has recently entered into 

 an arrangement with the Johns Hopkins University with a view of 

 obtaining as complete a collection as possible of facsimiles and 

 casts of seals coming from Mesopotamia, and to include eventually 

 in the collection also important cylinders and tablets bearing cunei- 

 form inscriptions. The beginning will be made with the antiquities 

 scattered throughout the museums and private collections in this 

 country. Besides the copy of each piece to be deposited in Wash- 

 ington, another copy will be given to the Johns Hopkins, in consid- 

 eration of which the latter institution will superintend the collection 

 at the national capital. The project is one which promises to 

 arouse considerable interest ; and the hope that it may yet lead to 

 an exploring and excavating expedition from this country to the 

 mounds in Mesopotamia, which still harbor such untold treasures, 

 may not be an utterly futile one. 



President Oilman exhibited photographs of the famous Greek 

 manuscript, ' The Teachings of the Apostles,' the discovery of 

 which some years ago created a veritable sensation. The original 

 manuscript is in an Eastern monastery, but the photographic re" 

 productions are executed with an excellence that makes them fully 

 as reliable for students as the original copy. Dr. Binion of Balti- 

 more had some specimens of a magnificent illustrated work on the 

 art of ancient Egypt, which he is about issuing. The cost of the 

 work, which will contain all the important Egyptian monuments, 

 will be one hundred and fifty dollars a copy. Professor Frothing- 

 ham closed the interesting programme with a description of a monas- 

 tery he recently saw in Italy, dating from the Byzantine period, and 

 which possesses a most remarkable twelve-sided tower, — the only 

 instance of the kind in the world. 



Thursday morning again found the members in Hopkins Hall. 

 Professor Lanman presented a brief paper from Professor Whitney. 

 Dr. Peet had an interesting treatise on animal and sun worship 

 among the American Indians, which brought forth some curious 

 points of coincidence between the religious notions of the Indians 

 and other ancient peoples. Dr. Cyrus Adler of the Johns Hopkins 

 presented two papers bearing on Assyriological research. One of 

 these treated of the views of the Assyrians on life after death. They 

 believed in a future life, but the notion of a future punishment does 

 not seem to have arisen among them, nor do we find that any dis- 

 tinction is made by them between the abode of the good and of the 

 wicked. It is probable that they supposed all would share in the 

 hfe to come. 



Professor Hopkins of Bryn Mawr called attention to some prov- 

 erbs in the Mahabharata paralleling those found among other 

 nations. Among these, there is the 'golden rule,' which, how- 

 ever, is formulated negatively in the Sanscrit : " Do not unto others 

 what thou wouldst not have others do unto you." A discussion 

 followed in which several members participated. Professor Lan- 

 man remarked that in Chinese the maxim also has the negative, 

 form, as is also the case in the Talmud, where the saying is put in 

 the mouth of the famous rabbi Hillel. 



Mr. Allen had a suggestive paper on a proposed method of trans- 

 literating the letters of the Semitic languages. There is scarcely 

 any point in regard to which scholars differ so much as in the 

 method of reproducing the Semitic sounds, and yet it is eminently 

 desirable that some uniform method be adopted. The system pro- 

 posed by Mr. Allen endeavors to proceed upon the principles of 



phonetics, and has at least the advantage of simplicity; but 

 whether it will meet with the approbation of scholars remains to be 

 seen. 



Further papers were presented by Dr. Ward on some Baby- 

 lonian mythological symbols ; by Professor Bloomfield on ' The 

 Fire-Ordeal Hymn in the Athavar-Veda,' by Dr. T. W. Jackson ; 

 and finally one — which, however, was only read in abstract by 

 Professor Lanman — from Mr. Rockhill, of the American legation 

 at Pekin, on the relations of Corea to China. Mr. Rockhill is en- 

 gaged in important researches which promise to clear up many ob- 

 scure points in Chinese history. In a communication to Secretary 

 Lanman, he cites an instance to show how untrustworthy the or- 

 dinary information concerning China is. It seems that in the re- 

 cent census an entire province was overlooked, which contained 

 some sixty million inhabitants ; so that the figures usually given 

 must be changed to three hundred and seventy-nine millions. A 

 number of new members, both corporate and corresponding, were 

 elected, and the following honorary members : Sir Henry C. Raw- 

 linson, the well known Assyriologist, and editor of the great publi- 

 cation undertaken by the British Museum, ' The Cuneiform In- 

 scriptions of Western Asia ; ' Prof. George F. Buhlan, a distin- 

 guished Sanscrit scholar of Germany, and editor of the latest vol- 

 ume of the ' Sacred Books of the East ; ' and Prof. Edward Sachan 

 of the University of Berlin, who has been called to take charge of 

 the Oriental institute which has just been established by the Ger- 

 man Government for the training of diplomates and officials in the 

 Eastern service. All the chief European capitals, with the excep- 

 tion of London, now possess institutions of this nature, where the 

 important Oriental languages are taught, and it has been said that 

 the Emperor of Brazil contemplates the establishment of one at Rio 

 Janeiro. The Berlin school has opened with the amazingly large 

 number of one hundred pupils. 



The next meeting of the Oriental Association will be held in 

 Boston during the month of May, 1888. 



HEALTH MATTERS. 

 Cholera Cases at Quarantine. 



In Science of Oct. 14 we noted the arrival at New York of the 

 steamship ' Alesia ' from Italy, with cholera onboard. Since then 

 another steamer, the ' Britannia,' from the same ports, has arrived. 

 This vessel was detained at quarantine, and during this detention 

 one of the passengers, a child, was taken sick with what is now 

 known to have been cholera. Two other cases of cholera have de- 

 veloped on this same vessel, the latter of them on Oct. 24. It is said 

 that the report of the surgeon of the vessel gave not the slightest 

 indication of the existence of cholera on board, and it is more than 

 probable, that, had not the arrival of the ' Alesia ' with developed 

 cholera on board occurred prior to that of the 'Britannia,' the cases 

 of cholera which occurred on the latter steamer would have first 

 been heard of in some hotel or boarding-house of New York. 



So far as we have seen, no statement has yet been made of the 

 health of the passengers and crew of the ' Britannia ' during the 

 voyage from Italy to New York. It would be criminal on the part 

 of the surgeon of that steamer to have concealed the fact if cases 

 of cholera occurred during the voyage ; and, if they did not, it 

 would seem to be a warrantable inference that cholera may develop 

 on a ship even after a voyage across the Atlantic, and that, as hap- 

 pened in the case of the ' Britannia,' the health-officer is justified in 

 detaining in quarantine a vessel from ports in which cholera is 

 known to exist, even though she may not have had sickness on 

 board during the voyage. It is stated that urgent demands were 

 made on the health-officer to permit the ' Britannia ' to come to the 

 city without detention, and that it was claimed that the sickness of 

 the child passenger was simply cholera-infantum. 



Dr. Smith is to be congratulated on having exercised the author- 

 ity which the State has conferred upon him, in having detained the 

 ' Britannia,' and he may be assured that the people of this great 

 country will uphold him in the exercise of the most arbitrary pow- 

 ers so long as the public health is in the imminent danger that it is 

 in at the present time. A lack of intelligent action now may result 

 in the introduction of cholera germs, which, though they may lie 

 dormant during the winter, may result in a plentiful harvest when 

 next summer comes. 



