680 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXI. No. 539. 



rics at one end with the American series, and 

 ultimately there will be a similar connection 

 established between Vancouver and Seattle, 

 thus completing the loop. 



Topographers and geologists of the United 

 States Geological Survey will be at work dur- 

 ing the coming summer in the region south 

 and east of Tonopah, Nevada. A party of 

 fifteen or twenty topographers under the di- 

 rection of Mr. R. H. Chapman will go into 

 the field about the middle of May. They will 

 make surveys for three topographic • maps. 

 Two of these maps will be detail maps made 

 by Mr. William Stranahan, one of the Gold- 

 field district, which is 23i miles southeast of 

 Tonopah, and one of the Bullfrog district, 

 which is about 60 miles east of Goldfield. 

 The Goldfield map will cover approximately 

 40 square miles and will be drawn on a scale 

 of 2,000 feet to the inch. Triangulation and 

 leveling will be carried from Owens Valley to 

 get control for the Bullfrog map, which will 

 also be drawn on a scale of 2,000 feet to the 

 inch. The third map will be a reconnaissance 

 map of an area about 120 miles long by 90 

 miles wide, or about 10,000 square miles, south 

 and southeast of Goldfield. It will include 

 Goldfield in its northwest corner. The recon- 

 naissance map will include part of the Death 

 Valley. Levels for the control of all this 

 work are now being carried forward from 

 Mohave by a topographic party under the di- 

 rection of Mr. R. H. Farmer. It is hoped 

 that there will be an opportunity of running a 

 level line to find the correct elevation of Death 

 Valley. Mr. E. M. Douglas, chief of the west- 

 ern section of topography has computed that 

 the lowest point in the Valley is 450 feet 

 below sea level, which makes it the lowest 

 point in the United States, but the elevation 

 has never been accurately and incontestably 

 determined. Geologic studies in these same 

 Nevada areas will be prosecuted during the 

 summer under the direction of Mr. J. E. 

 Spurr. With the assistance of Mr. S. H. Ball, 

 Mr. Spurr will investigate the general geology 

 of the district covered by the reconnaissance 

 map. Mr. Spurr will also make a special re- 

 port on the geology of the mining camps in 



this area. A third report will have to do with 

 the geology of the Goldfield district. Mr. 

 Spurr will be assisted in this last inquiry by 

 Mr. G. H. Garrey. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS. 



A TEACHING observatory will be established 

 by the Ontario government at the University 

 of Toronto. Dr. C. A. Chant expects to visit 

 the observatories of the United States to study 

 their plans and methods. 



The main building of Vanderbilt Univer- 

 sity was destroyed by fire on April 20. 



The Suez Canal Company has voted 50 

 guineas to be announced at the banquet over 

 which Mr. Chamberlain will preside on May 

 10, on behalf of the London School of Trop- 

 ical Medicine, this being a gift in recognition 

 of the school's services in the tropics. 



The Geological Department of Colby Col- 

 lege, Waterville, Maine, has been abolished by 

 the trustees of the college, the reason assigned 

 for the action being a financial one. Pro- 

 fessor W. S. Bayley, who has been in charge 

 of the department during the past sixteen 

 years will therefore sever his connection with 

 the institution at the close of the present 

 college year. 



Dr. Charles M. Bakewell, assistant pro- 

 fessor of philosophy in the University of Cali- 

 fornia, has been elected to a professorship of 

 philosophy in Yale University. 



Mr. Charles W. Brown, of Lehigh Uni- 

 ^•ersity, has been appointed instructor in geol- 

 ogy in Brown University. 



Eellowsiiips in zoology and entomology at 

 the Ohio State University have been granted 

 respectively to Mr. C. F. J ackson, of De Pauw 

 University, and Mr. W. B. Herms, of German 

 Wallace College, Berea, Ohio. 



Professor Walter Konig, of Greifswald, 

 has accepted a professorship of physics in the 

 University of Giessen. 



The council of University College, London, 

 has appointed Sir Thomas Barlow to the 

 Holme Chair of Clinical Medicine, vacant 

 through the resignation of Professor F. T. 

 Roberts. 



