oratory of the Gas Defense Plant, Long Island City, N. Y.

DR. SOLON SHEDD, head of the department of geology, State College of Washington, has been granted leave of absence for a year to engage in the production of casing head gasoline in the Oklahoma oil fields.

DR. J. N. ROSE, associate curator of the division of plants, U. S. National Museum, has returned from Ecuador where he spent three months' making botanical collections and has brought back a large series of specimens.

AT the anniversary meeting of the Mineralogical Society, London, held on November 5, the following officers and members of council were elected:-President: Sir William P. Beale, Bart. Vice-presidents: Professor H. L. Bowman and Mr. A. Hutchinson. Treasurer: Dr. J. W. Evans. General Secretary: Dr. G. T. Prior. Foreign Secretary: Professor W. W. Watts. Editor of the Journal: Mr. L. J. Spencer.

Ar the annual meeting of the New York Academy of Science on December 16, the address was given by Professor S. A. Mitchell, of Leander McCormick Observatory, University of Virginia, his subject being "Results of the eclipse of 1918."

MR. VILHJALMUR STEFANSSON was presented with the gold medal of the American Geographical Society at its monthly meeting on the evening of December 17, in the Engineering Societies building, 29 West 39th Street. Mr. Stefansson delivered an address on "The value of northern exploration."

WE learn from Nature that the council of the Chemical Society, London, has arranged for three lectures, bearing on the ultimate constitution of matter, to be delivered during the present session. The first lecture, entitled "The conception of the chemical element as enlarged by the study of radio-active change," was delivered by Professor F. Soddy at the ordinary scientific meeting held at Burlington

House on December 10.

M. PAUL KESTNER, the president of the French Society of Chemical Industry, delivered an address on "The Alsace potash deposits

and their economic significance in relation to terms of peace," to the London Section of the Society of Chemical Industry on November 4.

ON November 20 the opening address of the one hundred and sixty-fifth session of the Royal Society of Arts was delivered by Mr. Alan A. Campbell Swinton, chairman of the council, his subject being " Science and the future."

THE death is announced of Dr. Henry Gustav Beyer, U. S. N., retired, who died at his home in Washington, D. C. He was born in Saxony in 1850, and was graduated from the Bellevue Hospital Medical College in 1876. He entered the United States Navy in that year as an assistant surgeon and reached the rank of medical director in 1911, retiring a year later.

HARVEY E. VASEY, associate professor of botany in the Colorado Agricultural College, died at Fort Collins, Colorado, on December 10. At the time of his death he was second lieutenant in the Students' Army Training Corps, assigned as personnel adjutant.

MISS ROSE M. TAYLOR, M.S., for ten years instructor in botany at the Michigan Agricultural College, died on December 6, after a short illness as a consequence of influenza.

VERN B. STEWART, Ph.D. (Cornell), succumbed to pneumonia on December 3, aged thirty years. Dr. Stewart held a research position as assistant professor of plant pathology at Cornell University for five years, during which time he made numerous contributions to his science. The most notable of these concern diseases of horticultural and ornamental nursery stock. On July 1 last he became pathological adviser to the eastern market inspectors of the U. S. Department of Agriculture. This work had to do particularly with detecting incipient disease in shipments of perishable plant products intended for the army and navy. Exposure in the performance of this duty led to the fatal attack.

MAJOR HARRY DOUGLAS GILL, for thirty years connected with the New York University Veterinary College as member of the teaching staff in surgery, secretary and president,

died at Waynesville, N. C., on October 3 at the age of fifty-seven years. The college announces the establishment of the Major Harry Douglas Gill Scholarship "to give some poor New York boy an opportunity to get four years' training in veterinary surgery and medicine."

PROFESSOR H. E. J. G. Du Bois, known for his contributions to the knowledge of magnetism, died at Utrecht on October 2.

SIR HENRY THOMPSON, professor of physiology and later of medicine at Dublin, the author of important researches on physiological chemistry and nutrition, was one of the victims of the sinking of the Leinster on October 10.

COPIES of Nature just received contain obituary notices of five men who attained to distinction in science while engaged primarily in other work and who died at the average age of ninety years. Sir Edward Fry, a distinguished English jurist, who at the same time made valuable contributions to botany, died on October 18, in his ninetieth year; the Rev. A. M. Norman, F.R.S., honorary canon of Durham, and an eminent worker in many fields of natural history, died on October 26, at eighty-seven years of age; Mr. Thomas Codrington, who died on October 21, aged eighty-nine, was a civil engineer, who made important contributions to geology; R. Brudenell Carter, the English ophthalmic surgeon and author of works upon ophthalmic subjects, died on October 23 at the age of ninety years, Sir Herman Weber, the distinguished London physician an authority on climatology, died on November 11, in his ninety-fifth year.

THE directors of the Fenger Memorial Fund have set aside $500 for medical investigation. It is preferred to assist in work of a direct clinical bearing which may be carried out in an established institution, which will furnish the necessary facilities and ordinary supplies free of cost. Applications with full particulars should be sent to L. Hektoen, 637 South Wood Street, Chicago, before January 15, 1919.

THE American Veterinary Medical Association through its president, Dr. V. A. Moore, of Ithaca, N. Y., has appointed committees, one of five from the United States and one of three from Canada to assist in the war departments of the respective countries, and dealing with veterinary reconstruction problems.

THE executive committee of the American Federation of Biological Societies has voted to withdraw the annual meeting scheduled for Baltimore this year. It has been suggested

that a meeting be held some time during the spring.

THE annual meeting of the American Association of University Professors will be held at the Johns Hopkins University Club, Baltimore, on Saturday, December 28. The program will be largely devoted to a discussion of college and university education under conditions of reconstruction. Professor John M. Coulter, of the University of Chicago, is president of the association as well as of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Profesor H. W. Tyler, Massachusetts Institute of Technolgy, is the secretary.

THE Bay Section of the Western Society of Naturalists held a two-day session at Stanford University, November 29 and 30, 1918. The local committee of arrangements included J. R. Slonaker, J. O. Snyder and G. J. Peirce, and an enjoyable and profitable program of scientific papers and social affairs was provided. Those who presented papers were as follows: David Starr Jordan, Miss Alice Eastwood, Ivan C. Hall, W. E. Allen, J. R. Slonaker, A. W. Meyer, Miss Annie May Hurd, J. Grinnell, Barton W. Evermann, C. H. Shattuck, W. W. Cort, E. B. Babcock, J. O. Snyder, E. P. Rankin, R. W. Doane, J. A. Long, G. J. Peirce, E. D. Congdon, Charles V. Taylor, S. D. Townley, Forrest Shreve and D. T. MacDougal.

L'Italia che Scrive for June last contains an article on Italian geographical periodicals by Roberto Almagià, which is abstracted in the British Geographical Journal. Of these the Bollettino della R. Società Geografica

Italiana is, of course, the most important. L'Esplorazione Commerciale, the organ of the "Società Italiana di esplorazioni geografiche e commerciali," and L'Africa Italiana, published in Naples by the Società Africana Italiana, have both shown signs of increased activity of late years. They are monthlies and deal respectively with commercial and African geography from the Italian point of view. The Archivio Bibliografico Coloniale is a quarterly devoted entirely to the new colony of Tripoli. From the energetic "Istituto Geografico De Agostini of Novara comes La Geografia, Rivista di Propaganda Geografica, ten numbers now being published annually. The purpose of the Rivista Geografica Italiana is to stimulate interest in geography, more especially in the geography of Italy. It is the organ of the "Società di Studi Geograpfici e Coloniali," but it is quite independent. It also appears ten times during the year. The Rivista owes not a little of its importance to the support of the able professors of geography, notably the Marinellis, father and son, who have done so much to make Florence the leading center of geography in Italy. In Florence also are published Giotto Dainelli's Memorie Geografiche, which take the form of long monographs, more especially those dealing with the geography of Italy; the Rassegna della Letteratura Geografica, a critical view of geographical literature; and the Rivista di Geografia didattica, which is concerned with the educational side of geography. All these are published under the auspices of the Rivista Geografica Italiana. The writer goes on to regret the absence of a periodical devoted exclusively to the geography of Italy. The publications of the Italian Alpine Club and the monthly bulletin of the "Touring Club Italiano," however, do something to supply this want.

Nature states that the German Chemical Society has celebrated its jubilee by collecting a fund of two and one half million marks for the more extensive publication of chemical works of reference, such as Beilstein. In a report of the annual general meeting an agree

ment has been concluded with the Verein deutscher Chemiker with regard to publications. The Chemisches Zentralblatt will deal more fully with technical chemistry, and will be available to the members of the latter society at a reduced rate. The Berichte will be subdivided, one section dealing with reports of meetings, notices, etc., the other containing the original scientific publications. The annual subscription to the German Chemical Society will become 10 marks, but will then only entitle members to receive the first of the abovenamed sections. A separate subscription will be required for the scientific section, as was already the case with the Zentralblatt.

WE learn from Nature that in accordance with the decision arrived at at the extraordinary general meeting of the Institute of Chemistry held on April 27, local sections are now being formed in various important centers. The inaugural meeting of the Liverpool and North-Western section of the institute was held on Thursday, September 12. The registrar, who was in attendance by the direction of the council, referred to the objects to be attained by the establishment of local sections. It is anticipated that local sections will be inaugurated during the coming session at Manchester, Birmingham, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Gretna, and probably other centers.

Ar the request of the Bureau of Standards at Washington, government testing of rubber tires will henceforth be carried on at the labortories of the University of Akron for the Akron district and all factories west of Akron. Tires purchased on specification by the government from various rubber companies will be chemically tested by a staff of men assigned to the laboratories under direction of the Bureau of Standards. The work will be installed and supervised under the direction of Mr. Arnold Smith, an Akron man and formerly a student at the municipal university, now employed at the Bureau of Standards. In all probability a force of at least a dozen chemists will be employed in this work. Entire direction of the work will be assumed by the Bureau of Standards and the University

of Akron will furnish space and to a certain extent equipment.

UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL
NEWS

THE late W. J. Murphy, owner and publisher of the Minneapolis Tribune, left a large part of his fortune in trust for the establishment of a school of journalism in the University of Minnesota.

THE endowment fund being raised for the establishment of a University College in Swansea has been augmented by donations of £25,000 from Mr. F. Cory Yeo and £10,000 from Mr. W. T. Farr, retiring directors of the Graigola Merthyr Co., Ltd. More than £100.000 have so far been subscribed.

THE sum of £1,000 has been given to the City of London School by Professor Carlton Lambert for the foundation of a science scholarship.

DR. HERMAN CAREY BUMPUS, president of Tufts College for the past four years, has resigned. Dr. Bumpus had been previously professor of comparative anatomy, at Brown University and director of the American Museum of Natural History.

PRESIDENT EDMUND J. JAMES, of the University of Illinois, has withdrawn his resignation. Some time ago he asked to be permanently relieved of his duties at the university in order that he might devote all his time to war work. With the signing of the armistice he has reconsidered that decision.

DEAN E. C. JOHNSON, for the past seven years dean of the division of extension at Kansas State Agricultural College, has accepted an appointment as dean of the College of Agriculture and director of the Experiment Station at the State College of Washington.

DR. LAWRENCE JOSEPH HENDERSON has been promoted to be professor of biological chemistry at Harvard University.

STEPHEN S. VISHER, Ph.D. (Chicago, '14), has accepted an assistant professorship in geography in the University of Indiana.

MR. HARRY L. COLE, who has been in the Aviation Service while on leave from the State College of Washington, will resume his academic duties on January 15, as instructor in the department of chemistry.

DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE SYNTHESIS OF PALEONTOLOGY AND MEDICAL HISTORY

THE study of the ancient evidences of disease, for which the term paleopathology was proposed by Ruffer in 1914 during his studies on the pathology of ancient Egyptian mummies, is a phase of medical history which must depend upon paleontological data for its extension. That pathological lesions, especially those on the bones, retain all of their characteristics after many hundreds of thousands and millions of years has been clearly shown and distinct evidences of disease are known as far back in geological time as the Carboniferous. Evidences of traumatism, fractures with the formation of callosities on the inner surface of the shells of brachiopods have been seen as old as the middle of the Ordovician. Reasoning from the theoretical aspects of paleopathology, on the basis of possible parasitism of early hosts, disease may have originated in the Archeozoic but there is no definite recorded evidence prior to the Pennsylvanian.

The relation of paleontological data to medical history is based on the assumption that the manifestations of disease are the same whether seen on man or in animals, and the infection of a Cambrian crustacean by Protozoa is as much a matter of medical history as the presence of osteophytes on the femur of Pithecanthropus, the fractured ulna of the Neanderthal man, or bilharziosis among ancient Egyptians.

Many lesions are so commonly seen among fossil vertebrates especially that paleontologists have not referred to them at all, or merely mentioned them incidentally, forgetting that such evidences are of extreme importance in tracing the origin and antiquity of phenomena which are of such vital importance to humanity to-day.

The importance of paleopathology is that it gives an opportunity of studying evidences of disease over a great period of time, and especially is this true in regard to the data offered by paleontology. That the study of these evidences may aid in the solutions of problems which are at present not solved is evident when we consider that many epidemics which sweep the world, such as the one just past, are doubtless the result of an accumulation of changes over a long period of time. It is well known in medical history how whole populations have been swept away by scourges, which, had the people understood them, could have been avoided, and in the future when we come to understand all of the events of past history we may be better prepared to avoid future conditions of a like nature.

A disadvantage under which the student of paleopathology works is that the results of epidemics are scarcely ever recorded especially in paleontological material. The presence of tsetse flies in the Oligocene of Colorado suggests the possibility of trypanosomiasis among the herds of artiodactyls and perissodactyls of the early Tertiary but it can be considered merely suggestive. The search for such evidences is, however, just begun, and we may in future learn more of the epidemics which, in the past, must have swept through the herds of early animals.

The careful description, illustration and study of ancient cases of fracture, of diseased bones or any evidences of pathology is extremely desirable and will advance the study of paleopathology. Evidences of disease may be detected in the positions assumed by animals at death, the opisthotonos, the pleurothotonos and related phenomena. It is a question open to discussion whether the opisthotonic attitude is a manifestation of disease, but it is as suggestive of neuro-toxic disturbances as may well be. Whether the position assumed by the fossilized skeleton is the same as the animal assumed at death, how much is due to shifting before fossilization, are matters of minor importance to the student of medical history who is chiefly impressed with the fact that a dinosaur preserved in the opisthotonic

attitude suggests to him the spasms seen in many recent diseases. The student of medical history is interested in a Mesozoic fracture because it extends his knowledge of traumatism, and if the study of the fracture is complete it adds to his knowledge of general pathology.

The relation of disease to extinction, and other more important relations, may be cleared to some extent by a study of paleontological material. The part disease has played in the evolution of forms, whether retarding, changing, or ending their development also attracts the attention of the student of paleopathology.

Medical history, like all other histories, is based on an accumulation of data from widely different fields, and it is the privilege of paleontologists to add to the great wealth already accumulated, more data as to what happened among the animals with which they are familiar, representing the inhabitants of the earth millions of years ago. The subject is

worthy of more careful consideration than has been given it in the past. Paleopathology has attracted scant attention among paleontologists but eminent students such as Cuvier, Soemmering, Goldfuss, Schmerling, Leidy, Williston have found the subject of interest. It remained for the men who had been trained in pathology, men like von Walther, Mayer and Virchow, to show the exact relation of pathological lesions among extinct animals to the general problems of disease which are interesting men to-day.

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS, CHICAGO

ROY L. MOODIE

A RECENTLY DISCOVERED ART CAVERN IN FRANCE

UNDER the auspices of the French Académie des Inscriptions and over the signature of M. Ch. Dauzats, there appeared in Le Figaro of September 7 an interesting notice of another remarkable discovery of ancient cave paintings in southern France. A translation of the article follows:

These are the most ancient records of human art, as M. Salomon Reinach was remarking yesterday when congratulating Count Begouen who, with his three sons, has just