1146 The American Naturaitst. [| December, 
to at least five times the volume of the specimen should be used. 
When a specimen is to be transported by mail or express it should be 
transferred to a smaller bottle of alcohol of the same strength, and a 
very small /sose cotton plug placed both above and below it.—F. MALL, 
Clark University. 
PROCEEDINGS OF SCIENTIFIC SOCIETIES. 
The National Academy of Sciences met in New York at 
Coah College from November roth to 12th, inclusive. The follow 
ing papers were read: Some Aspects of Australian Vegetation; G. E: 
Goodale. The Nomenclature of Vegetable Histology ; G. L. Goodale. 
On Certain New Methods and Results in Optics; Charles S. Hastings. 
An Exhibition of the New Pendulum Apparatus of the U. S. Coast and 
Geodetic Survey, with Some Results of Its Use; T. C. Mendenhall. 
On the Use of a Free Pendulum as a Time Standard ; T. C. Menden- 
hall. On Degenerate Types of Scapula, and Pelvic Arches in the 
Lacertilla; E. D. Cope. The Proteids or Albuminoids of the Oat- 
Kernel (second paper); Thomas B. Osborne. -Astronomical Methods 
of Determining the Curvature of Space; C. S. Peirce. On Geograph- 
ical Variation Among North American Birds, Considered in Relation 
to the Peculiar Intergradation of Colaptes auratus and C. cafer; J. A. 
Allen. On the Variation of Latitude ; S. C. Chandler. The Tertiary 
Rhynchitide of the United States; Samuel H. Scudder. On a Color 
System; O. N. Rood. Preliminary Notice of the Reduction of Ruth- 
erfurd’s Photographs ; J. K. Rees. On the Application of Spectrum 
Analysis to the Analysis of the Rare Earths, and a New Method for 
the Preparation of Pure Yttrium; H. A. Rowland. A Nomenclator 
of the Families of Fishes ; Theodore Gill. Measurement of Jupiter’s 
Satellites by Interference; A. A. Michelson. The Follicle Cells of 
Salpa; W. K. Brooks. The academy was entertained on the evening 
of the roth by President Low, of Columbia College ; and on that of 
‘the 11th by Mrs. Henry Draper. A part of the latter entertainment 
consisted of an illustrated lecture by Prof. E. C. Pickering on the work 
of the Draper memorial fund in astronomical research in South 
America. 
Biological Society of Washington.— October r7th.—The fol- 
lowing communications were made : -Food Plants of the Indians of the 
Death Valley Region ; Frederick V. Coville. Notes on Paleopathol- : | 



