216 
Personal and Scientific News . 
is more readily handled, and the cost o£ equipment and main¬ 
tenance is very greatly reduced. 
The McAuley process of burning pulverized fuel, a pro¬ 
cess invented by J. GL McAuley of Lansing, Michigan, is likely 
to work something of a revolution in the consumption of fuel. 
A very good description of the process is given in u Science 1 ’ for 
December 28th, 1888. A test trial of the process was made at 
the works of the Warren Iron and Steel Co., at Warren, Ohio, 
some time ago and was attended with the most satisfactory re¬ 
sults. Two puddling-furnaces were charged with iron, and 
pulverized coal to the amount of 12,260 pounds was used in 
putting it through the puddling process. The fuel cost $5.43. 
By the old method the process would have required an amount 
of coal worth $16.50, or about three times what is needed by 
the McAuley method. Moreover there is a saving in iron by 
the McAuley method that more than pays for the fuel. 
Professor Meek, of Coe College, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, a 
former pupil of President Jordan, is at work on the native fishes 
of Iowa, and has already made considerable progress. 
Prof. F. H. Snow, of the Kansas State University re¬ 
cently made careful examination of the rocks now being 
mined for nickel in Logan county, Kansas. According to his 
report there is an entire absence of crystalline rocks. The so- 
called “nickel ore” is the prevailing fragmental rock of the 
Tertiary age, the characteristic conglomerate or pudding-stone 
which overlies the eroded surface of the Niobrara limestones 
and shales. The color of this rock at the “mines” is darker 
than that of the ordinary conglomerate, but it is unmistakably 
the same kind of rock. A chemical analysis of specimens of 
these rocks by Prof. E. H. S. Bailey reveals the presence of 
nickel and cobalt in very small quantities. A special examina¬ 
tion of one specimen said to be among the richest, showed not 
more than one third of one per cent of cobalt and one-tenth of 
one per cent of nickel. The specimens examined were of his 
own selection. 
Prof. Snow explains the presence of nickel in this rock by re¬ 
ferring it to meteoric origin, from dust that fell into . the old 
Tertiary ocean, in the same manner as it now falls into the 
Atlantic ocean, as revealed by the dredgings of the Challenger 
expedition. 
Dr. Halstead has resigned the professorship of Botany, in 
the Iowa Agricultural College to take a position in connection 
with the Agricultural Experiment Station at Rutger’s College, 
New Brunswick, N. J. 
Mr. Chas. A. HELViEof the State University at Bloomington, 
Indiana, will spend a portion of the summer of 1889 in collect¬ 
ing marine invertebrates at Wood’s Holl, Mass., and offers to 
supply zoological laboratories throughout the country at very 
reasonable rates. Mr. Helvie will work in connection with Dr. 
J. S. Kingsley. 
