342 



SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



An important bibliography of contributions to 

 American Economic Entomology compiled by Mr. 

 Nathan Banks, is issued by the Division of Ento- 

 mi logy in the United States Department of Agri- 

 culture, Washington. About four thousand titles 

 are included. 



Heer Hauer, who was formally Director of the 

 National Geological Museum and Superintendent 

 ■of the Eoyal Natural History Museimi, died in 

 Berlin on the 21st of March. He was a Privy 

 ■Coimeillor and a well-known naturalist. 



To meet the convenience of the local Society, 

 we understand the Annual Congress of the South- 

 Eastern Union of Scientific Societies will be held 

 at Eochester on the 25th, 26th, and 27th of May, 

 instead of on dates previously arranged. The 

 Honorary General Secretary is Mr. G. Abbott, of 

 33, Upper Grosvenor Eoad, Tunbridge Wells. 



Mrs. M. p. Fleming has been appointed 

 curator of astronomical photographs in the Har- 

 vard University. Her name is the first woman's 

 to be placed with other officers in the University 

 •catalogue. A list of women astronomers, however, 

 compiled by Herman S. Davies, contains as con- 

 temporary workers in that science, the names of 

 seventeen American women who have taken part 

 in astronomical research. 



To find a recent skull of an elephant on an 

 English shore is not the lot of most naturalists. 

 No doubt Mr. D. Murray, of Kilsea, near Spurn, 

 in Yorkshire, was not a little astonished at 

 finding such an object on his coast line. As he 

 suggests, it was probably owned by a captive 

 elephant that died at sea, and was thrown over- 

 board. The object was exhibited, with several 

 •good fossils from the same beach, at a recent 

 sectional meeting of the Hull Scientific and Field 

 Naturalists' Club. 



The Moss Exchange Club, of which the Eev. 

 ■C. H. Waddell, Saintfield, Co. Down, is the 

 Honorary Secretary, has just 'isstied its report 

 for the years 1896-7-8. Considering the restricted 

 number of students of this section of cryptogamic 

 botany, the club seems to be in a flourishing and 

 progressive condition. It was established in 1896 

 with thirteen members, and now has three-fold 

 that number. There are some notes on mosses, 

 and a list of species that do not fruit in these 

 islands. 



Professor McIntosh has prepared a work for 

 the Cambridge University Press, founded on his 

 many years' experience in the Scotch Department 

 of Fisheries. It is entitled the " Eesources of the 

 Sea," or "An Enquiry into the Expei-iments on 

 Trawhng and Closure of Areas." Our view, fre- 

 quently expressed in this journal, that man very 

 rarely directly causes the extinction of any wild 

 animals, is fully supported by Professor Mcintosh, 

 -with regard to marine food-fish. 



We are sometimes asked to recommend a handy 

 little first book on Science to give to intelligent 

 children. We cannot do better than suggest as a 

 primer the English edition of M. Paul Bert's 

 " First Year of Scientific Knowledge." 



The " Practical Electrician's Pocket Book and 

 Diary " for 1899, an entirely new work, has been 

 issued from the ofiice of " Electricity," 11, Ludgate 

 Hill, London. It contains much useful information ; 

 but in the next edition it would be an improvement 

 if another quality of paper were used. The pub- 

 lished price is one shilling. 



By the death of Sir Douglas Galton, on 

 March 10th, at the age of seventy-seven years. 

 Science has lost one of her hardest workers. His 

 chief labour was in sanitary science, and much of 

 the high sanitary condition of the Metropolis is 

 due to his exertions and influence. He was elected 

 anF.E.S. so long ago as 1863. 



Science has been honoured in Liverpool by a 

 banquet given on March 4th by the Lord Mayor 

 of Liverpool to Professor Oliver Lodge in recogni- 

 tion of his having received the Eumford Medal of 

 the Eoyal Society for important discoveries in 

 Light and Heat. The dinner was attended by Sir 

 William Crookes and other eminent investigators. 

 Dr. Charles Drurt Edward Fortnum, a, 

 trustee cf the British Museum and a mineralo- 

 gist of renown, died on the 13th March. He was 

 an exjalorer for minerals in South Australia in the 

 forties, and presented a valuable collection of 

 Natural Science objects to the Oxford University. 

 An interesting paper was i-ead by Mr. F. J. 

 Brodie, before the Eoyal Meteorological Society, 

 on the 15th of March. It dealt with " The Pro- 

 longed Deficiency of Eain in 1897 and 1898." It 

 appears that London and South Eastern England 

 generally, has during the last two years passed 

 through its dryest period since 1841, the rainfall 

 of the district varying from 51 per cent, to 80 

 per cent, below the average. During the same 

 period Ireland and N.W. Scotland have had more 

 than their usual rainfall. 



. The report for the two years ending September • 

 1898, of the Bristol Museum and Eeference 

 Libraiy feelingly refei-s to their former curator, 

 the late Edward Wilson, F.G.S., whose death was 

 referred to in these pages at the time of its 

 occurrence. The museum has benefited by the pre- 

 sentation, by his sister and brother, of Mr. Wilson's 

 private collections. Mr. G. C. Griffiths, F.E.S., 

 has rearranged the museum collection of British 

 Lepidoptera and added to its usefulness by pre- 

 senting a large number of specimens from his own 

 collection. Much vigour is indicated by this report 

 under the auspices of Mr. HerbertBolton,F.E.S.E., 

 the present curator and secretary. 



Astronomers of this country have again 

 had their ranks thinned by the ' death, on 

 5th of March, of Miss Elizabeth Brown, 

 of Further Barton, Chichester. This lady 

 had attained considerable reputation as one 

 of the most successful of British amateur 

 astronomers. Her special work was on sunspots 

 which she observed and drew with much accui'acy, 

 being director of that department of the British 

 Astronomical Society, a post she had also filled in 

 the Liverpool Astronomical Society. Miss BroAvn 

 travelled in 1887 to Moscow, in 1889 to Trinidad, 

 and in 1896 to Vadso in Lapland, in each instance 

 to observe a total eclipse of the sun. 



