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SCIENCE. 



|Vol. VII., No. 160 



of the side-lights should make an angle of 45° 

 with the horizon. The system which has received 

 the most attention, however, is known as that of 

 the double side-lights. Various arrangements of 

 these have been proposed, but all include the use 

 of two lights on each side, in different positions 

 with respect to each other, and at different dis- 

 tances apart. The subject of lighting ships, and 

 also that of 'the rules of the road,' should be 

 referred to an international commission, whose 

 recommendations should be accepted and rigidly 

 enforced by all maritime nations. 



The study of the political sciences has made 

 great progress of late in this country. Columbia, 

 Cornell, and the University of Michigan, have 

 established special schools of political science, all 

 of which are successful ; special attention is paid 

 to these subjects at Harvard and Johns Hopkins ; 

 and the historical, economic, and social science 

 associations, which have sprung up during the 

 last decade, with their published proceedings, have 

 all contributed to stimulate an interest in the 

 scientific treatment of history, law, and econom- 

 ics. The latest advance in this field is the estab- 

 lishment of the Political science quarterly, edited 

 by the faculty of political science of Columbia 

 college, and published by Ginn & Co. The first 

 number of this new quarterly will appear in 

 March, and it will furnish a field for the discus- 

 sion of all questions — historic, economic, or legal 

 — which concern the organization of the state, 

 the evolution of law, the relation of states one to 

 another, and the relation of government to the 

 individual. The quarterly will demand no polit- 

 ical or economic orthodoxy, but will admit all 

 articles within its scope which are at once scien- 

 tific and of general interest. A feature of the 

 publication will be its bibliography, which will 

 be very complete and elaborate. The great suc- 

 cess of the Johns Hopkins series of studies in 

 historical and political science has doubtless led 

 the Columbia professors to the establishment of 

 this journal ; and there is every prospect that it, 

 too, will meet with favor. The whole develop- 

 ment of which the above are the indications is a 

 healthy and vigorous one. It betokens the intro- 

 duction and application of scientific tests and 

 methods in a domain which has in the past been 

 too fruitful of partisan strife and dissensions. 



In 1880 a site was purchased for a new naval 

 observatory a short distance beyond Georgetown, 



in the District of Columbia : but no appropriation 

 has yet been made for erecting the necessary 

 buildings, and removing the instruments from the 

 present location. On account of this delay the 

 secretary of the navy, in April, 1885, called upon 

 the National academy of sciences for an expression 

 of opinion as to the advisability of proceeding 

 promptly with the erection of a new naval obser- 

 vatory ; and the reply of the committee of the 

 academy is contained at length in a letter from 

 the secretary of the navy, just published as 

 Executive document No. 67. The conclusions of 

 the committee we give in the language of the 

 report. This report is signed by F. A. P. Barnard, 

 A. Graham Bell, J. D. Dana, S. P. Langley, Theo- 

 dore Lyman, E. C. Pickering, C. A. Young. 1. It 

 is advisable to proceed promptly with the erection 

 of a new observatory upon the site purchased in 

 1880 for this purpose. 2. It is advisable that the 

 observatory so erected shall be, and shall be styled, 

 as the present observatory was styled originally, 

 the ' National observatory of the United States,' 

 and that it shall be under civilian administration. 

 3. It is advisable that the instruments in the 

 present observatory, with the exception of the 

 26-inch telescope, the transit circles, and the 

 prime vertical transit, shall be transferred to 

 the observatory at Annapolis, with such members 

 of the astronomical staff as may be required to 

 operate them ; also that such books of the library 

 as relate chiefly to navigation shall take the same 

 destination ; the instruments above particularly 

 specified, with the remainder of the library, being 

 reserved as part of the equipment of the new 

 national observatory, to which also the remaining 

 officers of the astronomical staff shall be assigned 

 for duty. 4. It is advisable that the observatory 

 at Annapolis shall be enlarged, if necessary, and 

 adapted to subserve as effectually as possible the 

 wants of the naval service, whether practical, 

 scientific, or educational ; that it shall be under 

 the direction of the department of the nav} T , and 

 shall be styled the 1 Naval observatory of the 

 United States.' The grounds upon which this 

 decision is based are set forth in the document to 

 which we have referred ; and numerous letters 

 are appended, from astronomers and others, in 

 regard to the administration of the observatory, 

 and from physicians of Washington, upon the 

 healthfulness of the portion of the city in which 

 the observatory is at present situated. It will be 

 seen immediately that this report is intended to 

 favor the establishment of an observatory worthy 



