a noteworthy fact that the professional criminal is not nearly so common in Spain as in France. -The Entomological society of Washington, founded but two years ago, has given an evidence of its activity by the publication of the first part of its first volume of proceedings. There can hardly be any place in the United States so favorably located as Washington for an active entomological society, and the list of well-known entomologists enrolled as members is an assurance that much can, and we believe will be, accomplished by the society. - Statistics from a German periodical give a very unfavorable showing of the crowded condition of Berlin. Of the forty thousand houses contained in the city, one half have from twenty to thirty tenements each, while in another thousand or more there are a still greater number of tenements. Among these apartment or tenements there are seventy-five thousand consisting of a single room, inhabited by two hundred and seventy thousand people, or an average of about four to each room. The apartments divided into two rooms also number about seventy-five thousand, occupied by three hundred and sixty thousand persons. The houses in the poorer quarter are five or six stories high, and built so close to each other that there is insufficient light and air. Filth and repulsive odors are the inevitable result. The promiscuous crowding into single rooms of adults and young of both sexes, naturally results in debased morals, and the city is renowned for the extravagant number of juvenile criminals who prowl around the streets. The death-rate of Berlin is one of the highest among the large cities of Europe. The Neurological review (Chicago, Rand, McNally & Co.) is the title of a new monthly to be devoted to original articles, as well as a review of the recent literature in this field of medical and psychological science. The largely increased number of periodicals devoted to these and allied subjects of late, is a strong evidence of the greatly increased activity in researches pertaining to the mental and nervous functions in America as well as in Europe. The present review appears to be well edited by Dr. J. S. Jewell. - Lanolin' is the name given to a substance which is being extensively recommended as a basis for ointments. It possesses properties which are not found in any other variety of fat. In 1868 Hartman and Schultze found that the fatty acids of sheep's wool were in combination with cholesterine. Such a fat will take up one hundred per cent of water, and will not readily decompose. Ordinarily the neutral glycerine fats and vaseline have been used as the bases of ointments. Fatty ointments by their decomposition form irritating substances, and thus tend to injure the skin. Vaseline is not readily absorbed. Lanolin appears to be free from both these objections, and will doubtless come into general use. Dr. Wooster Beach, in the Medical record for July 24, discusses the proper mode of infliction of the death penalty. He states that the autopsies of those who have been hung show that in not over five per cent is either dislocation, fracture, or any injury to the spinal cord observed. He thinks that any of the following methods could, with advantage, be substituted for hanging. The condemned man should be firmly secured, and a vital part should be struck by a ball from a rifle which had previously been sighted and secured fast; or electricity might be employed. The recent improvements in the apparatus for generating electricity make this method of causing death much surer than it formerly would have been. Dr. W. A. Hammond thinks that the usual apparatus of traps and weights should be dispensed with, and that the body of the criminal should be drawn up slowly by a rope around his neck. Death would be speedy, certain, and painless. Dr. N. E. Brill criticised, some months ago, the present methods of hanging, and as a result a committee of the Society of medical jurisprudence of New York drew up a bill and submitted it to the legislature, in which the condemned was permitted to select the method by which his life should be taken. This bill failed of passage. In Germany decapitation is done with the sword, in France with the guillotine, and in Spain by the garotte. Poisoning by carbonic-acid gas, chloroform, and hydrocyanic acid has also been suggested as substitutes for hanging. - A study of ten thousand physicians' prescriptions has recently been made by the editor of the Chemist and druggist. Spirits of chloroform, glycerine, and sirup of orange-peel, are the most frequently prescribed; then come bromide of potash, wine of ipecac, sulphate of quinine, bicarbonate of soda, liquor ammoniae acetatis, bicarbonate of potash, and sweet spirits of nitre. The commercial exportations of France during the year 1884, we learn from the Revue scientifique, amounted in total value to $843,400,000, an increase of only about $65,000 over that of 1869. The largest exportations during this time were in the years 1873, 1875, and 1882, when they were more than $100,000,000 greater. Of the exportation in 1884, about $200,000,000 went to England, $83,000,000 to the United States, $103,000,000 to Belgium, $75,000,000 to Germany, $61,000,000 to Switzerland, etc. The exportation to the United States has increased $105,000,000 since 1869, though in 1872 it was somewhat greater, and in 1882 reached a total value of $107,000,000. Professor Forbes publishes in the 'Bulletin of the Illinois state laboratory of natural history,' vol. ii. pp. 257-321, an account of the continuation of the interesting studies on the contagious diseases of insects begun by him in 1883. In this account he describes at length a common and highly destructive disease of the European cabbage-worm (Pieris rapae). This disease he believes to be caused by a spherical micrococcus, of which he gives two excellent microphotographs. More complete and conclusive studies were made of a disease of the silkworm, which was apparently that known as jaundice. Of especial interest is the fact that he was able to produce this disease in cabbage-worms by moistening their food with culture-fluids containing the bacteria of this disease derived from silkworms. These experiments seem to us to be of the highest importance. If this or some other bacterium could be used against the cotton-worm, how much more effectual it might be than the poisons which are now used! These are liable to be washed away by the first rain, and will not multiply themselves. Professor Forbes also reports at length on a disease attacking two species of datana in his breedingcages. This disease he is positive is the wellknown flacherie of the silkworm. -One of the most interesting special reports issued in connection with the last census is part i. of the report on Social statistics of cities,' by Col. George E. Waring, jun., the sanitary expert, which is now going through the press, and will be ready to be issued Sept. 1. The subject-matter of this volume is confined to the statistics of certain cities in New England and the middle states; and the second part, which is still to appear, will be devoted to the cities in the southern and western states. The method pursued is to give a historical sketch of the town, which is followed by a description of the climate, the drainage, the financial condition, the gas supply, interments, manufactures, parks, reformatories and healing institutions, police, places of amusement, population, public buildings, streets, water-works, and, in fact, complete statistics of the social life in the places described. In many instances, maps are given showing the system of sewerage, the location of places of amusement, parks, libraries, and inuseums. The sketches of the cities of Boston, New York, and Philadelphia are very elaborate, especially in relation to the subject of sanitary drainage. The second volume will contain a sketch of New Orleans, furnished by Mr. George W. Cable, the novelist. The report complete will contain about 2000 pages. -The Ophthalmological society of Heidelberg has awarded Professor Helmholtz a gold Graefe medal and the sum of fifty dollars yearly, as the greatest benefiter of science. The Commissioner of agriculture has prepared a circular containing rules and regulations for co-operation between the department of agriculture and the authorities of the several states and territories, for the suppression and extirpation of contagious pleuro-pneumonia of cattle. It will be remembered that congress appropriated $100,000, at its last session, to be employed in such manner as the commissioner may think best, to prevent the spread of pleuro-pneumonia. - The following changes have been made in the personnel of the coast survey since our last issue : Assistants Boyd, Bradford, and Ellicott have been instructed to organize a party to perform fieldwork on the coast of Maine, and to survey the topography of the north-eastern corner of the state. The steamer Bache, Lieutenant Hawley commanding, is doing the hydrographic work; Messrs. Vinall, Hodgkins, Van Orden, and Gray have taken the field on the re-survey of Long Island Sound; Mr. E. L. Taney, with a topographical party, is at work on the Kill von Kull; Captain C. O. Boutelle is organizing the parties for furnishing points for state surveys. The appropriations for this purpose this year being so limited, only four parties can be put in the field. The constitution of a permanent tide station on Sandy Hook has begun, and will be finished in about two months. It is hoped when this gauge is finished that an uninterrupted series, both winter and summer, extending over a period of 19 years, will be obtained. The number of deaths from yellow-fever in Rio de Janeiro for the fifteen years preceding the last was 15,338. The fever first appeared in 1849, and has been continuous since, though much more severe at times. In 1850 the number of deaths of cases treated in the hospitals was twentysix per cent, in 1870, seventeen per cent, and in 1883, thirty per cent. - New discoveries of gold in West Australia, where it has hitherto not been known to exist. are causing considerable excitement in that part of the continent. The locality is in the northwestern part, four hundred miles from King Sound, in a wild, desolated, and almost impassable region. The gold is found near the surface in alluvium. The Pacific coast tide tables' for 1887 have been received from the printer by the coast survey. It is a curious fact that these are the most perfect ever yet received, and close examination thus far reveals not a single error or misprint in the entire edition. The Atlantic coast tide tables' will be given to the public in about a week. Section xvi. of the topographical survey of the District of Columbia is in the hands of the photo-lithographer. This beautiful sheet covers the country in the vicinity of the picturesque village of Tenallytown, near which the summer house of President Cleveland is located. The chart of Puget Sound, the Gulf of Georgia, Straits of Fuca, etc., in one sheet, will probably be placed in the hands of agents within two weeks. This chart will supply a long felt want to the people of Washington Territory, covering, as it does, all the inland waters from Gray's Harbor, on the Pacific coast, to the Nanaimo coal fields, in British Columbia. Assistant Schott is well advanced with the computation of magnetic observations of the Greely party in the Arctic regions; the computations of Arctic tides from observations made by the same explorer are also well under way. The annual exportation of ivory from Africa has of late years been nearly four hundred thousand pounds, about two-thirds of which is obtained from the eastern part of the continent. These figures represent a sum of about four million dollars, and the death of sixty-five thousand elephants. The fiftieth anniversary of the founding of South Australia in December, 1836, will be celebrated by an international exposition to be opened on the twentieth of June next at Adelaide. The population of the colony now numbers three hundred and thirteen thousand, but at present it is decreasing rather than increasing. Computations from statistics show about one million as the number of blind persons throughout the world, which, estimating the population of the globe at 1,400,000,000, gives about one blind person to every fourteen hundred. In Austria there is one to every 1,785 inhabitants; in Sweden, one to every 1,418; in France one to every 1,191; in Prussia, one to every 1,111; in England, one to every 1,037, etc. The greatest proportion of blind persons is in Egypt, where, in Cairo, there is one among every twenty inhabitants. Australia shows the greatest variation; in New Zealand there is only one to every 3,550 inhabitants, while in Tasmania there is one to every 625. The nation possessing the greatest number of institutes for the blind is Germany with thirty-five; next comes England with sixteen; France with thirteen ; LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. **Correspondents are requested to be as brief as possible. The writer's name is in all cases required as proof of good faith. The source of the Mississippi. IN June, 1884, the New York Herald announced that recent explorations had revealed the true source of the Mississippi River to be, not the lake discovered by Schoolcraft in 1832 and named by him Itasca, but a tributary lake to the south of it, discovered and first explored by a Capt. Willard Glazier in 1881. In commenting upon this alleged discovery, Science says (May 15, 1885): "To this lake he (Glazier) gives his own name, that the fame of his achievement may be perpetuated. It is perhaps unfortunate that, as this whole region was sectionized by the general land office several years previously, lines having been run at every mile, a prior claim to this great discovery may arise." 6 This comment was thought to be sufficient to impress upon all the absurdity of a claim to have discovered, at this late day, a lake of any considerable size in the region referred to; but as one of our pop. ular school geographies' has indorsed the genuineness of this discovery (?) by adopting Glazier Lake' as the source of the Mississippi, and as the makers of our school geographies have a bad habit of blindly following each other's lead, it will be well, perhaps, to examine a little more closely Mr. Glazier's claim to such recognition. In 1806 Lieut. Zebulon Pike, and in 1820 Governor Lewis Cass, penetrated to Red Cedar or Cass Lake: but there is no record of definite explorations beyond this lake earlier than those of Henry R. Schoolcraft, who in 1832, under authority of the war department, led a well-equipped expedition through this region. In his brief official report, dated at Sault Ste. Marie, Sept. 1, 1832, Schoolcraft states that Lieutenant Allen accompanied him as topographer, and that he carefully collected material for maps and plans of the entire route. Upon his return to Detroit, Schoolcraft wrote, in 1833, a full narrative of the expedi 1 'Barnes's complete geography'. By JAMES MONTEITH. New York and Chicago, A. S. Barnes & Co. Copyright 1885. AUGUST 13, 1886.] 143 Lake Plantagenet of the Mississippi South Fork Travers (Bunidji Lake) the expedition ascended the Plantagenian Fork, 'carried' over a six-mile portage to Lake Owashkos (Elk), which Schoolcraft named Itasca, and descended the Itascan Fork, having spent three days in making the circuit. That Schoolcraft knew of an inlet to Lake Itasca is evident from his map, on which an inlet leading from a smaller lake to the south is indicated, but in addition to this he says on p. 58 of his Narrative:' "The outlet of Itasca Lake is perhaps ten to twelve feet broad, with an apparent depth of twelve to eighteen inches. The discharge of water appears to be copious, compared to its inlet." It may be asserted that Schoolcraft knew of an inlet only from visiting its mouth, but that he neglected to ascend and explore it, and that his knowledge of the existence of the small lake from which it leads was gathered from his Indian guide-or was entirely hypothetical. Although this is unlikely, owing to the object of the expedition and to the fact that the map does not show other and larger lakes which were not visited, still, as no mention of this small lake is made in the narrative, let this view of the case be conceded, and let us pass to the next explorer. Four years later, in 1836, Mr. J. N. Nicollet visited and made an instrumental exploration of this region. The results of his explorations he incorporated in a Sabine meain FIG. 2.-NICOLLET'S MAP.-1843. From his report we learn that Nicollet approached "Now, of the five creeks that empty into Itasca 144 SCIENCE. upon an additional length of two or three miles, it "The honor of having first explored the sources In the table on pp. 124 and 125 are to be found Nicollet's determination of the geodetic position and elevation of this region-among others Lake Itasca (Schoolcraft's Island) 47° 13' 35" north latitude, 95° 2' west longitude, and 1,575 feet above the Gulf of Mexico and the "utmost sources of the Mississippi, at the summit of the height of land, six miles south of Lake Itasca - elevation 1,680 feet above the Gulf." Nicollet, therefore, fully explored, recorded, and mapped all the inlets to Lake Itasca, found that these inlets, or some of them, came from lakes or lakelets; and, recognizing that the source of a river is the one most distant from its mouth, considered none of the tributary lakelets he had explored as sufficiently important to even merit a name. In addition to this he distinctly states that "the honor of first exploring the sources of the Mississippi belongs to Messrs. Schoolcraft and Allen." But it may be urged, that opinions may differ as to the relative importance of the Itascan lakes; that the smaller tributary lake, though discovered and explored in 1836, was not then named; and as it is nearer than Lake Itasca to the ultimate head spring of the Mississippi, it was fair game for the traveller who should reach it and affix a name to it. This, I am unable to give the exact date at which the township including the immediate vicinage of Lake Itasca was surveyed and subdivided into one-mile sections; but it is marked, by the little cross, as having been so subdivided, on the land office map or two years before of Minnesota, issued in 1879 Mr. Glazier's trip. A tracing from this map is reproduced here, and on it is shown not only a small lake south of and tributary to Lake Itasca, but a name, 'Elk Lake,' is affixed to this lake. Probably the surveyors in sectionizing this region, remembering the old Indian name, 'Owoshkos,' of the lake which Schoolcraft called Itasca, thought to preserve it by affixing its English equivalent to the small tributary lake to the south. A further inspection of the landoffice map proves the integrity of its makers. East of Lake Itasca is an area not crossed by township lines; it had not been surveyed by the land-office at the time this map was made, and consequently all topographical features, streams, and lakes, were omitted. Thus only part of the east, or Plantagenian, branch of the Mississippi is shown, though the existence and course of the river was well known; and on other government maps, as, for instance, the post route maps for 1876- the whole course of this branch is indicated. And now, having seen that the small lake south of and tributary to Lake Itasca was mapped by Schoolcraft in 1832; fully explored and mapped by Nicollet in 1836; and surveyed, mapped, and named by the land office prior to 1879 - what remains to justify Mr. Glazier's claim to discovery in 1881 ? His own detailed account of his trip entitled the 'Recent discovery of the true source of the Mississippi, By Captain Willard Glazier,' was published in vol. 1 of the American meteorological journal (Detroit, 1884), and was illustrated by a map of the region 'drawn from delineations by his Indian guide.' A • Goose!. R. Wolf Pond Lak Nawwa R. Roate of Expedition to Source of the MissSIS Source of the Mississippi River. 3134 miles from the Gulf of Mexico Reached July 22. 1651. Chenowagerte Sheridan Paine Portage George R. L. Kulpatric Garneu Agency |