472 Scientific News. [July, 
and enon to be kept open to the public on fixed days, and 
to workers in science at all times. They. have a commodious 
hall, futáished with skelves, and a janitor in charge of the same. 
It is near the centre of this growing city of 35,000 : inhabitants 
Officers, Geo. Little, 1 thes nae Fred. Bell, vice-president 
Kates, secretary ; J. M. Ellis, treasurer; J. S.S Bell, libran (pro 
tem). They have already had about 40 lectures by professors in 
the State university, and other scientific gentlemen. They would 
be glad to receive publications as valuable additions to the library. 
Any contribution to the museum will also be gratefully received. 
— The Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science for 1877 
and 1878, contains a number of short articles of much general 
interest. Prof. F. H. Snow contributed a number of lists of Colo- 
rado and Kansas insects, Prof. B. F. Mudge contributes an arti- 
cle entitled, The connection of the fossil forests of the Dakota 
-Groups in Kansas with the fossil forests of Greenland ; and S. 
Williston gives a brief popular resumé of existing knowledge of 
the Dinosauria 
auiiihet (issued March 4, 1879,) of Siebold and Kolliker’s 
Zeitschrift gives the names of authors and a detailed index of all 
the articles which have eats in volumes 16-30, and the sup- 
plementary volumes 25 and 30. 
— In Ethopia there is found, in oea cavities (according 
to M. Villiers), a honey made without wax by an insect resem- 
bling a large mosquito. This honey is called tazma, The natives 
use it to cure throat disease. On analysis, M. Villiers finds it to 
contain 32 per cent. of mixed fermentable sugars and 28 per cent. 
of dextrine. The composition is like that of mannas of Sinai 
and Kurdistan, saccharine matter from the leaves of the lime-tree, 
and ordinary honey ; but it differs from those substances in the 
absence of cane sugar 
— The results of the disastrous phenomenon of sudden freezing 
of rain in France, lately referred to, are now coming more freely. 
to light. Ina paper in Revue des Deux Mondes on the subject, 
by M. Lamin, it is stated that the forests affected in the Depart- 
ment of Seine-et-Marne have an extent of some 21,0230 hectares. 
_ The volume of wood broken is estimated at 200,000 steres, the 
Forest of Fontainebleau alone counting for 150,000 steres. For 
about fifty years past the Service des Foréts has been seeking to 
restore the ruined cantons by plantation of Scotch firs. It had 
thus covered 4000 to 5000 hectares, and every year the woods 
were carefully thinned for better developme ent. It is now found 
at these woods of fir have been destroyed in the proportion of 
sixty to seventy per cent. Some parts, indeed, have been ruined — 
completely. It will be necessary to raze immense portions and 
=~ commence anew. The work of restoration of the Forest of Fom. : 
tainebleau has been thrown back thirty iere 
