Personal and Scientific News. 193 
rations are confined to Advent bay, a branch of the ice fiord 
of west Spitzbergen, where coal has been opened on both 
sides of the bay. The deposit has been followed north- 
wardly for about ten miles, and for an equal distance west- 
wardly. 
The chief enterprise is on the easterly side of the bay, 
where the bed is somewhat less than five feet thick. The 
coal from the upper part is splint-like, while that from the. 
lower part is brilliant and somewhat prismatic. The divis- 
ions show a notable difference in the percentage of volatile, 
the upper containing about ten per cent more than the 
lower. The coal shows no tendency to coke, and that from 
the lower portion is attacked energetically by caustic 
potash. 
The coal was compared with that from other localities 
in which the benches show notable difference in volatile. 
The results of tests with caustic potash made upon a num- 
ber of coals appeared to show that non-coking coals are 
attacked promptly, while coals yielding a firm coke are not 
affected even after prolonged boiling. 
Professor J. F. Kemp spoke upon "New Sources of the 
Supply of Iron Ores." Emphasis was first placed upon the 
enormous demands made by the iron industry of to-day 
upon the mines of the United States, Great Britain and Ger- 
many. The conviction is held by many that within fifty 
years the local American sources of rich ores of whose 
existence we now know will be exhausted and the iron 
masters compelled to seek new deposits. The following 
possible new districts were passed in review : the Labrador 
prospects discovered by Mr. A. P, Low, of the Canadian 
Geological Survey, which might also ship to Europe; 
Adirondack areas of r'ei)orted magnetic attraction and pos- 
sible lean ores, the Temagami district and the Michipicoten 
range, Ontario; the southern continuation of the Marquette 
range beneath the drift; the southern half of the Afesabi 
probable syncline beneath the swamps northwest of Du- 
luth, as suggested by C. P. P)erkey; the Baraboo range; the 
deposits in Iron county, Utah, and in the Wasatch moun- 
tains ; the magnetites of southern California and the pros- 
pects in Washington and along the coast. The speaker em- 
phasized the important reserves in the titaniferous magne- 
tites and their great quantity. 
The neces.sary connection between the coal fields and 
any great development of the iron and steel industry was 
emphasized and the future of the three great producers of 
to-day forecast as involved in the permanency of the coals. 
The reserves of coal are greater in Germanv and America 
than in Great Britain, The province of Shan-si, China, 
