1879. } Scientific News. 275 
— We regret to learn that in the great press of business which 
occupied the last hours of the late National Congress, the 
amendment to the Legislative, etc., Appropriation Bill, abolishing 
the existing Geological Surveys of the Territories, was passed. 
The fact that this measure had been defeated in the Committee 
on the Whole, and also in the House by votes of two to one, did 
not prevent its passage in consequence of a transfer at the last 
moment to the Sundry Civil Bill. A large number of scientific 
men will now have opportunity to repent at leisure their apathy in 
having allowed the substitution of one organization in place of three 
or four, which will, in all probability, not receive from Congress 
even the third of the aid which the surveys have been accustomed 
to obtain. The only remedy is to give the direction of the new 
Bureau to the man who has shown himself most influential in 
impressing Congress with the importance of making large appro- 
priations for scientific work. The plausible plea that the geologi- 
cal surveys have been misused for the prosecution of zoological 
and other work, however it may affect the Executive, will not 
receive much sympathy from men of science. It is not true that 
a generous sympathy with all branches of science unfits a man 
for the directorship of a scientific survey. 
— With much regret we have to announce the deith of the 
distinguished palzontologist and comparative anatomist, Paul 
ervais, which took place on February the roth, in Paris. Prof. 
Gervais was born at Paris, on September 26, 1816. After taking 
the degree of doctor in science and medicine, he served as one of 
the aide-naturalistes of the Muséum d’Histoire Naturelle. In 
1841 he became professor of zodlogy to the Faculté des Sciences 
of Montpellier; and on the death of Gratiolet, in 1865, he was 
appointed to the vacant professorial chair at the Muséum d’His- 
toire Naturelle, which he filled till his death. M. Gervais’ pow- 
ers and industry are attested by the value and number of his 
scientific papers, which in 1873 amounted to a hundred and sixty- 
our in number. In these he touched on almost every group of 
the animal kingdom; b 
the higher classes, especially to the mammalia, recent and 
was principal editor of the Journal de Zoölogie. TA 
n 1873 M. Gervais was elected a member of the Académie 
des Sciences, and he was a foreign member of the geological and 
z00logical societies of London. 
rof. Gervais was one of the few living authorities on the 
paleontology of the Vertebrata, and was engaged at the time of 
