March 31, 1905.] 



SCIENCE. 



519 



tion, but will be graded for education, experi- 

 ence and publications. Examinations are also 

 announced by the civil service commission 

 on April 26-27, for forest assistants in the 

 Bureau of Forestry, Department of Agricul- 

 ture, at salaries of $1,800, $1,400 and four at 

 $1,200; on April 12, for assistant in the 

 Division of Biological Survey, U. S. Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture, at a salary of $900; and 

 on April 19, for hydrogTaphic aids, municipal 

 water supply, U. S. Geological Survey, at 

 salaries of $1,000 to $1,500. 



The Fourth International Ornithological 

 Congress, under the presidency of Dr. R. 

 Bowdler Sharpe, of the British Museum, will 

 be held in London from June 17 to 12 in- 

 clusive. Drs. J. A. Allen, Chas. W. Richmond 

 and Leonhard Stejneger, and Messrs. F. M. 

 Chapman, D. G. Elliott and Robert Ridgeway 

 represent the United States on the general 

 committee. 



We have received the official program of 

 the second International Botanical Congress, 

 which will be held at Vienna on June 11-18. 



The fifteenth German Geographentag will 

 be held at Danzig on June 13-15. 



,We learn from the Amej-ican Mathematical 

 Journal that the firm of J. A. Barth in 

 Leipzig has undertaken to pi;blish a directory, 

 compiled by F. Strobel of Jena, of all living 

 mathematicians, physicists, astronomers and 

 chemists. A new edition is to appear every 

 two years. 



Replying to questions in the House of 

 Commons, Mr. Brodrick, secretary of state 

 for India, said that the latest figures on the 

 plague in India showed that for the four weeks 

 ending February 28 in the Bombay presidency 

 there were 13,475 deaths, and that for the four 

 weeks ending March 11 in the rest of India 

 there were 123,550 deaths. The total number 

 of deaths from the plague in the Bombay 

 presidency from January 1 to February 28 

 were 28,721, and in the rest of India, from 

 January 1 to March 11, 318,178. Mr. Brod- 

 rick said he had communicated with the vice- 

 roy of India, looking to a remedy for this 

 deplorable loss of life, and that it had been de- 

 cided to send out a scientific expedition to in- 



vestigate the causes. The expedition will 

 start immediately. 



Mr. Arthur Erwin Brown, secretary of the 

 Zoological Society of Philadelphia, in a recent 

 address before the Academy of Natural Sci- 

 ences said : " The ' Origin of Species ' was first 

 published in London on November 24, 1859. 

 On March 27, 1860, Charles Darwin was 

 elected a correspondent of the academy. On 

 May 8 he wrote to his life-long friend, Charles 

 Lyell : ' This morning I got a letter from the 

 Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 

 announcing that I am elected a correspondent. 

 It shows that some naturalists there do not 

 think I am such a scientific profligate as many 

 think me here.' It appears from the record 

 that this academy was the first among scien- 

 tific societies to confer its honors upon Charles 

 Darwin after the publication of his immortal 

 work." 



It was announced at the last monthly meet- 

 ing of the London Zoological Society that the 

 total number of visitors to the garden during 

 the year 1904 had been 706,074, exceeding the ' 

 numbers in 1903 by no less than 48,866. The 

 receipts for admission at the gates during the 

 year amounted to £17,063, being an increase 

 of £1,151 as compared with the year 1903. 

 The total number of fellows elected during the 

 year had amounted to 249, showing an in- 

 crease of 31 as compared with the previous 

 year. The total number of fellows on the 

 roll on December 31 last was 3,557, being the 

 largest number ever recorded in the history of 

 the society. 



The tenth International Anti-alcohol Con- 

 gress is to be held at Buda-Pesth from Sep- 

 tember 12 to 16. Among the questions pro- 

 posed for discussion are : The influence of 

 alcohol on the resisting power of the human 

 and animal organism; is alcohol a food? 

 alcohol and sexual life; alcohol and the penal 

 law; alcohol and physical fitness, with special 

 reference to military training; the organiza- 

 tion of the temperance movement; school and 

 education in the struggle against alcoholism; 

 the reform of the liquor trade; and the cor- 

 rupting influence of the trade in spirituous 

 liquors on the natives of Africa. 



