78 



SCIENCE, 



[Vol. YI., No. 129. 



they will find here stated the present condition 

 of all the questions under this head. 



NOTES AND NEWS. 



The daily papers announce that the U. S. com- 

 missioner of agriculture has established as a part of 

 Dr. Kiley's division a branch of investigation relat- 

 ing to economic ornithology, and has appointed Dr. 

 C. Hart Merriam, a well-known ornithologist, and sec- 

 retary of the American ornithologists' union, a spe- 

 cial agent to take charge of this part of the work. 

 Dr. Merriam will make his headquarters at Sing Sing, 

 N.Y., until Oct. 1, and after that at Washington. 

 The scope of the investigation will cover the entire 

 field of inter-relation of birds and agriculture, par- 

 ticularly from the entomologist's staiid-point. The 

 inquiry will relate primarily to the food and habits 

 of birds, but will include also the collection of data 

 bearing on the migration and geographical distribu- 

 tion of North- American species. In this last inquiry 

 the department hopes to have the co-operation of the 

 ornithologists' union, Dr. Merriam being at the head 

 of the union's committee on migration. 



— The sixth annual meeting of the Society for the 

 promotion of agricultural science will be held at Ann 

 Arbor on Tuesday, Aug. 25. There will be public 

 sessions in the forenoon and afternoon, and a busi- 

 ness meeting in the evening. The entomological 

 and botanical clubs of the association will also hold 

 their meetings on Tuesday. 



— The Western society for psychical research vp-as 

 organized at Chicago in May, and held its first meet- 

 ing on Tuesday evening, June 3, at the Sherman 

 house in that city. The president, Dr. A. Reeves 

 Jackson, delivered an address, which has been 

 published. Committees were appointed on thought- 

 transference; hypnotism, clairvoyance, and somnam- 

 bulance; apparitions and haunted houses; physical 

 phenomena; and psychopathy, " under which head 

 attention may be given to what is popularly known 

 under the various names of ' mind-cure,' * faith-cure,' 

 ' metaphysical treatment,' ' magnetic healing,' etc." 

 The officers of the society are, president. Dr. A. 

 Reeves Jackson ; vice-presidents. Rev. C. G. Trusdell 

 and Professor Rodney Welch; secretary and treas- 

 urer, J. E. Woodhead. 



— The section of mechanical science (and engi- 

 neering) of the American association for the advance- 

 ment of science promises to have interesting sessions 

 at the Ann-Arbor meeting. The committee on the 

 best method of teaching mechanical engineering — 

 Prof. J. Burkitt Webb, Prof. George J. Alden, Dr. 

 Calvin M. Woodward, and Professor Arthur Beards- 

 ley — request all who are interested to make sure of 

 being present at the particular session to be devoted 

 to this subject, and to come prepared to take an ac- 

 tive part in the discussion of the same. The com- 

 mittee on the use and value of accurate standards, 

 screws, surfaces, and gauges, and of systematic draw- 

 ings in the modern machine-shop, — Prof. William 



A. Rogers, Mr. Oberlin Smith, and Prof. J. Burkitt 

 Webb, — have arranged for a special session upon 

 this subject; and they would urge those who feel its 

 importance to present papers, and join in the discus- 

 sion. 



— In his annual address as president of the Royal 

 geographical society, Lord Aberdare called particular 

 attention to a report (which is soon to be printed), 

 by Mr. Scott Keltic, on the state of geographical edu- 

 cation in Great Britain. According to this, it appears 

 that the books are poor, the instruction inadequate, 

 and the encouragement wanting in almost all schools, 

 and particularly in schools of high grade. Geography 

 as a class subject is not recognized by professorship 

 or readership in the universities. On the continent, 

 and especially in Germany, the case is very different. 

 Twelve professorships of geography may be found in 

 the twenty-one universities of Germany, and most of 

 the twelve have been founded within the last twelve 

 years. The ideal aimed at is a continuous course of 

 geographical instruction from the youngest school- 

 5^ear up to the university. Mr. Keltic gives examples 

 of some of the lessons which he heard, indicative 

 of a masterly as well as a practical treatment of the 

 subjects in hand. Lord Aberdare commended heart- 

 ily this new effort of the geographical society to se- 

 cure better geographical education. Toward the close 

 of his address, he referred to the past year as full of 

 geographical researches. "Never has the ferment 

 among nations been so wide-spread, or prophetic of 

 such great consequences," he remarked with refer- 

 ence to the operations of the French in Asia and 

 Africa; the Russians in central Asia; the English in 

 Afghan, on more than one border of India, on all 

 sides of Africa, and in Oceanica; the Germans on 

 the African coasts ; and the Italians on the Red Sea. 

 These invading hosts, he continues, have had in their 

 trains "naturalists, ethnologists, geologists, — men 

 trained in all the sciences which illustrate geography ; 

 . . . knowledge and conquest thus march hand in 

 hand; . . . out of the nettle danger, we pluck the 

 flower knowledge ; . . . however much we deplore 

 the violence, we cannot be blind to the scientific re- 

 sults which followed upon the displacement of bar- 

 barous people by the civilized." 



— It is suggested by the chairman of Section I of 

 the American association for the advancement of sci- 

 ence, that a subject, perhaps of principal investiga- 

 tion and discussion at the ensuing meeting, shall be, 

 " The daily ration of the food of working-people in the 

 different sections of the country. 1°. Of what does 

 this ration now consist, and what does it cost ? 2°. 

 What proportion does the average cost of food bear 

 to the total cost of living ? 3°. What is a true or 

 standard ration, measured by the relative proportions 

 of proteine, fats, and carbohydrates ? 4°. What are 

 the kinds of food which contain proteine in largest 

 proportion at the lowest relative cost ? 5°. In what 

 manner can a variety of daily rations be made up, 

 each of which shall contain the requisite quantities of 

 nutriment ? 6°. Can a schedule of rations at low cost 

 be presented, whereby much of the present waste of 



