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In discussing cholera and its probable appearance in the United States, Dr. Sternberg said, "It is perhaps too soon to speak with confidence with reference to the action taken by the sanitary officials of the port of New York upon the recent arrival of two cholera-infected vessels from the Mediterranean; but we have good reason to hope that the measures taken will prove sufficient, and that this pestilential disease, which has for several years been threatening us from a distance, has not effected a lodgement upon our shores. Whether it would be practicable to put our seaports in such a state of sanitary defence that it would be safe to open the door and defy the foe, is extremely doubtful. I have never believed that yellow-fever was excluded from New Orleans in 1862 and 1863 by the sanitary regulations enforced by General Butler, as has been claimed. The exemption from this disease enjoyed by the unacclimated soldiers from the North, who filled the hospitals in that city at the time mentioned, was due, in my opinion, to the absence of commerce during the military occupation of the city, and to the rigid enforcement of quarantine restrictions.

"But I do believe that this and other cities similarly located can be preserved from such devastating epidemics as have too often occurred in the past, and that, by the carrying-out of needed sanitary improvements and the constant supervision of expert sanitary officials, supported by an enlightened public sentiment and sufficient appropriations, the ravages of pestilential diseases may be restricted within very narrow limits.

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As regards cholera, the system of local defence is even simpler than in the case of yellow-fever. Ample evidence demonstrates that the epidemic extension of this disease depends largely, if not exclusively, upon the water-supply. Where this is subject to contamination by the discharges of the sick, there cholera is liable to become epidemic. On the other hand, cities like Rome, in Italy, which have an ample supply of pure water, drawn from a source not likely to be contaminated, seem to be cholera-proof, notwithstanding the filth and squalor in which a considerable portion of the population live. The same thing is seen in Naples, which in 1884 suffered terribly, but which, since the completion of its new system of water-works in 1885, has enjoyed a comparative immunity, notwithstanding the fact that cholera still prevails in Italy, and that we have evidence of its presence in a malignant form in the city referred to. When I was in Naples, in 1885, the mayor of the city invited a number of the delegates to the sanitary conference to the municipal palace for the purpose of conferring with them with reference to projected sanitary improvements, and especially with reference to the best system of sewerage for the city, which, up to the present time, remains destitute of sewers, and which, I may add, is a noted stronghold of typhoid-fever. In the course of the conversation, I suggested to the mayor Colonel Waring's American system, which has been tested with such favorable results in this city. My recommendation was sustained by the distinguished German bacteriologist, Dr. Robert Koch, who was one of the delegates present. I may remark that I have recently received a letter from Dr. Koch, asking me to give him full particulars with reference to the details of this system as carried out in the city of Memphis."

In commenting upon quarantine as at present practised in this country, the president said that he considered it a wrong principle that commerce should be taxed for the support of quarantine establishments. In his judgment, the people who are protected should pay the cost of such protection. He was not so much concerned with the unjust tax laid upon ship-owners as with the gross injustice to passengers practised at many ports in various parts of the world where they are so unfortunate as to be detained at a quarantine station. He narrates the history of a case of this kind which fell under his own observation. He says, "When I left Brazil, in the month of August last, small-pox was epidemic both in Rio de Janeiro and at Para. Our ship touched at Para, and five days later at Barbadoes. A passenger for this port was not allowed to land, beeause of the prevalence of small-pox in Brazil. Proceeding to St. Thomas, less than two days' sail from Barbadoes, our passenger was again refused permission to land, except to go to the quarantine station for a certain number of days. This was all right, but the conditions upon which he would be received seemed

to me to be all wrong. Either he himself or the ship must guarantee the payment of the quarantine fees, which would be three dollars a day for his board, and five dollars a day to the quarantine physician, if he were alone. If others were at the station at the same time, this fee would be divided between them. One can easily imagine what a hardship such a tax would be for a person of limited means, who had only provided himself with funds for the journey he had undertaken. The agent of the ship refused to take any responsibility, and our passenger had no resource but to submit to the imposition, or to come on to New York, paying his passage to that port."

Another illustration of the evils arising from the present system of supporting quarantine establishments was given by Dr. Sternberg, in his address, as being his own experience when he recently arrived at New York quarantine on his return from Brazil. "With the deputy health-officer, who boarded our ship, came a man with a jug. I was informed by one of the officers of the ship that he was to disinfect the vessel. Being somewhat curious to know the method of disinfection employed, I asked the ship's surgeon to go with me to inspect, when, after a detention of less than one hour, we had started from the quarantine station for our wharf. We found that the man with the jug had lowered a bucket by means of a rope through one of the hatches between decks. Upon pulling up this bucket, I found that it contained two or three pounds of some powder which had been wet, probably with acid solution, and which gave off an odor of chlorine. No doubt, when first lowered between decks, there had been a considerable evolution of chlorine: but, in the vast space to be disinfected, it was so diluted that at the end of an hour I did not detect the odor of chlorine-gas when I lifted the hatch, and it was only by approaching my nose to the bucket that I was able to ascertain what disinfectant had been used. The most curious part of the story is, that I was informed that the bucket had been lowered between decks to disinfect a quantity of hides which were stored in the hold. What was the object of this 'disinfection? Evidently not to disinfect, for no one at the present day would think of maintaining that the hides in the hold had been disinfected by the procedure of the man with the jug. The only object that I can conceive of depends upon the fact that there is a fee for disinfecting, which must be paid by the agents of the ship; at least, I was so informed by one of the officers of the ship." The president referred to the fact that. while exotic pestilential diseases, such as yellow-fever and cholera, were the levers which move corporations to make necessary sanitary improvements, these are, as compared with certain indigenous or naturalized infectious diseases, of secondary importance. The chief aim of the American Public Health Association should be to ascertain what measures are most effectual for the restoration of their endemic maladies, such as typhoid-fever and the malarial fevers, and for the banishment of all diseases in which the contagion is given off from the persons of the sick, such as scarlet-fever and small-pox. So far as the diseases of the class last mentioned are concerned, we may safely say that we know how they may be banished from a community; viz., by isolation of the sick, and disinfection of all infectious material, and, in the case of small-pox, by vaccination. The main mission of the sanitarian, therefore, is to insist upon the thorough execution of these measures.

Other topics dealt with in the address were the necessity for instruction of the people in the principles of personal hygiene, in which labor Mr. Henry Lomb of Rochester had borne so noble and generous a part, by giving prizes for essays on the construction of the homes and the composition of the food of the workingman; the erection of laboratories, such as that at Johns Hopkins University, the Hoagland at Brooklyn, and others at New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and Ann Arbor; the infectious diseases of animals, — anthrax, swine-plague, hydrophobia, etc. With reference to the germ of cholera, Dr. Sternberg said,

"With reference to cholera, I may say to you that recent researches give support to the conclusions of Koch as to the pathogenic rôle in this disease, of the spirillum discovered by him in the intestines of cholera patients. Its constant presence in this disease seems to be demonstrated, and it is now generally admitted by bacteriologists that there are definite characters by which it may be distinguished from similar organisms obtained from other

sources, such as the Finkler-Prior spirillum and the cheese spirillum of Deneke, which closely resemble it.

"Lustig, director of the cholera hospitals at Trieste, examined the dejecta in one hundred and seventy cases of cholera, and found the spirillum of Koch in every case: on the other hand, the bacillus of Emerich was only found in forty out of the whole number of cases examined. Tizzoni and Cattani also found Koch's spirillum in the contents of the intestine in twenty-four cases examined by them during the epidemic at Bologna in 1886. At Padua, also, researches made by Canestrini and Morpurgo gave the same result: the spirillum was constantly found in the dejecta in recent cases. These observers state that the cholera spirillum retains its motility and reproductive power for a considerable time in sterilized distilled water. They were able to obtain cultures after two months from such water. This important fact has been verified by Pfeiffer, who found, however, that in the presence of common saprophytic bacteria the cholera microbe soon died out. Hueppe has shown that the cholera spirillum forms reproductive elements, which he calls arthrospores. These are not so readily destroyed by desiccation as are the fresh bacilli, but they have nothing like the resisting power to heat and chemical agents which characterizes the endogenous spores of the bacilli. The exact proportion in which various disinfecting agents are destructive of the vitality of the cholera spirilla has now been determined with great precision, and will be stated in detail in the report of the committee on disinfectants for the present year. This committee has also made extended experiments of the same kind, in which the typhoid bacillus and various other pathogenic organisms have served as the test of germicide power. The chemical products developed in cultures as a result of the vital activity of the cholera spirillum have been studied by Bitter, Buchner, and Contani. The last-named author claims to have demonstrated the presence of a poisonous ptomaine in cholera cultures, which, when injected into the peritoneal cavity of dogs, gives rise to symptoms resembling those of cholera. A recent observation of value is that of Bujwid, who finds that bouillon cultures of the cholera spirillum have a peculiar chemical re-action by which they may be distinguished. According to this author, the addition of a 5-10-per-cent solution of hydrochloric acid to such a culture gives rise, within a few minutes, to a rose-violet color, which subsequently, when exposed to light, changes to a brownish shade. The re-action does not occur in impure cultures. The Finkler-Prior spirillum is said to give a similar re-action after a longer time, but the color first developed is of a more brownish hue."

The etiological rôle and biological character of the typhoid bacillus, discovered by Eberth in 1880, were fully discussed. Dr. Sternberg says that there is very little doubt that this organism is the cause of typhoid fever, although no satisfactory proof by inoculation in lower animals has as yet been found. This, however, he does not regard as surprising, inasmuch as we have no evidence that any of the animals experimented upon are liable to contract the disease, as man does, by drinking contaminated water. In speaking of malaria and its causative micro-organism, he said, "Among the most important investigations of the past year are those of Councilman of Baltimore, and Osler of Philadelphia, with reference to the presence of micro-organisms in the blood of malarial-fever patients. Both of these observers confirm the discovery of Laveran, who in 1880 announced, as the result of extended researches made in Algeria, that blood drawn from the finger of such patients during a febrile paroxysm contains a parasitic infusorium, which presents itself in different phases of development, and which in a certain proportion of the cases was observed as an actively motile flagellate organism. Osler and Councilman have found all of the forms described by Laveran; and the last-named observer reports that in recent researches in which blood was obtained directly from the spleen, the flagellate form was almost constantly found. Whether the amoeboid plasmodium' found by Marchiafava and Celli, of Rome, represents an early stage in the development of this organism, or whether it simply represents a change in the redblood corpuscles, which occurs also in other diseases, as is claimed by Mosso, has not yet been definitely determined. It is somewhat curious that just when we are receiving satisfactory evidence of the parasite of Laveran in the blood of malarial-fever patients, the

bacillus of Klebs and Tomassi-Crudelli, which appeared to be dead and buried, has again been introduced to our notice by the distinguished German botanist Ferdinand Cohn. In his paper, published in June last, he gives an account of the researches of a young physician named Schiavuzzi, who has made researches in the vicinity of Pola, a malarial region in Istria. The method followed was that of Klebs and Tomassi-Crudelli; viz., examination of the air and water in malarial localities, and inoculation experiments in rabbits.

"The bacillus was constantly found in the air, and the rabbits inoculated presented symptoms and pathological lesions believed to be identical with those of malarial-fever in man. I cannot at the present time go into a critical discussion of the evidence presented, but would refer you to an experimental research made by myself in New Orleans in the summer of 1880, in which I repeated the experiments of Klebs and Tomassi-Crudelli, and arrived at the following general conclusions:

"Among the organisms found upon the surface of swamp mud, near New Orleans, in the gutters within the city limits, are some which closely resemble, and perhaps are identical with, the bacillus malariæ of Klebs and Tomassi-Crudelli; but there is no satisfactory evidence that these, or any of the other bacterial organisms found in such situations, when injected beneath the skin of a rabbit, give rise to a malarial-fever corresponding with the ordinary paludal fevers to which man is subject.

"I see no reason to modify the opinion here expressed, notwithstanding the indorsement given by Cohn to the results announced by Schiavuzzi. These researches relating to organisms in the air and water, and experiments on rabbits, especially in the hands of an inexperienced investigator, cannot have any great scientific value in the elucidation of an etiological problem. The sources of possible error are too numerous, and the method is in any case inadequate for the complete solution of the problem. It is essential that the infectious agent, especially one so easily demonstrated as this bacillus, be proved to be present in the blood or tissues of malarial-fever patients; and in the absence of such proof, experiments on rabbits, and researches in the air of malarial regions, can have but little weight. It may well be that in the swampy districts of warm climates, where malarial-fevers prevail, one or more species of bacillus will be found in the air or in the water, which are absent from the drier air and running waters of non-malarious uplands; but this is simply an interesting fact in natural history, relating to the distribution of organisms of this class, and by itself cannot be accorded any value in a consideration of the important question of etiology. The method of research pursued by Laver an, by Marchiafava and Celli, by Councilman and by Osler, is the true one, and none of these gentlemen have encountered the bacillus of Klebs and Tomassi-Crudelli in their extended researches. On the other hand, they are in accord as to the presence in the blood of a flagellate organism, and of certain spherical and crescentic bodies, which are believed to represent different stages in the life-history of this infusorium."

The address, taken as a whole, is one of the best which has ever been delivered before the association, and will doubtless excite great interest among sanitarians. We shall take occasion to refer hereafter to some of the recommendations made by Dr. Sternberg.

THE THEOSOPHICAL MOVEMENT IN INDIA. ERNST VON WEBER prints in Ueber Land und Meer an interesting paper on the theosophists of India, and accompanies it with the illustration which is reproduced on p. 262. He calls attention to the fact that students of Völkerpsychologie cannot fail to be impressed by India's awakening from her long intellectual sleep. To-day the new and fresh intellectual life may be observed from. the Himalayas to Ceylon, and from the Indus to the fruitful lands of Burmah. This movement owes as much to the spread of the English language as to any other one cause. It is now customary for all educated Hindus to be able to speak the English language fluently, and the British Government has helped this on by its system of schools.

The Aryan Hindu is naturally of a metaphysical and speculative. turn of mind, and it is therefore not to be wondered at that the

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Mr. Cooper.

E. v. Weber.

Subba Rad. Colonel Olcott. Mr. Leadbeater. Bavanishangar.

General Morgan. ANNUAL CONGRESS OF THE THEOSOPHICAL BROTHERS AT ADYAR.

Prince Harisingshee.

newly aroused intellectual activity should have found expression in the so-called theosophical movement. The first impulse to this idealistic development did not come, however, from India itself, but from abroad. It came from the land which, as the writer cynically expresses it, is the most unfruitful soil for idealistic fruit, the United States of America. It was in New York, as long ago as 1875, that Colonel Olcott laid the corner-stone of the theosophical structure which was soon to exercise so wide-spread an influence. The principles of the cosmopolitan brotherhood of theosophists, which in certain particulars resemble those of the Freemasons or those of the Jewish sect of the Essenes, rapidly spread through other countries. The indefatigable apostle of the new society did his work so well, that the number of associate societies, which in 1879 was only two, increased in 1883 to ninety-three, and in 1886 to one hundred and thirty-two. Of this last number, 107 are in India, 8 in Europe, 15 in America, I in Africa, and 1 in Australia. The headquarters and administrative centre of all these societies is Adyar, a rural capital in Madras, where Colonel Olcott dwells, on the banks of a river in a paradise of palms and flowers. His villa also serves as the gathering-place where each year in Christmas week more or fewer of the delegates of the theosophical societies throughout India assemble in convention. Colonel Olcott has managed to imbue thousands of men of the higher circles of India with his ideas. He is greatly honored by his fellow-theosophists, and is loved as a father and benefactor. His occasional journeys through the country are like triumphal processions, and his influence over the cultured classes of the Hindus throughout India is extraordinary.

Some idea of the objects and aims of the Theosophical Society may be gathered from the following selection from the declaration of principles adopted at the annual assembly of the delegates in 1886. The objects of the society are there set forth as, (1) to lay the foundation for a universal brotherhood of man, without distinction of race, religion, or color; (2) to promote the study of the Aryan and other Oriental literatures, religions, and sciences; (3) to investigate hitherto unknown natural forces and the psychical powers of man (which is pursued by a part of the brotherhood only). The brotherhood invites to membership all those who love their fellow-men, and who believe the divisions following from differences of race, religion, and color, to be an evil; all students and scholars; all earnest seekers after truth; all philosophers in the East as well as in the West; all those who love India and desire the return of its former spiritual greatness; and, finally, all those who are striving after permanent good, and not mere passing pleasures and the interests of a wordly life, and who are ready to make personal sacrifices in order to attain to knowledge of the highest good. The society professes no special religion, and has in no wise the character of a sect, for it includes followers of all religions. It demands of all its members only such tolerance of other faiths as each man asks for his own. The society interferes in no way with the Indian laws of caste, nor with any other social customs and usages.

To exemplify these tolerant principles, the assembly hall at Adyar contains life-size portraits of the representatives and founders of all the great religions. One of the matters in which the society is busily engaged is the collecting of rare books of the old Indian literature, written often on palm-leaves. The value of this Sanscrit library increases daily, and it is hoped to make it in time the most complete in the world.

The illustration on p. 262 shows the delegates who assembled at Adyar in 1885. The beautiful Indian costumes, with their bright colors, and the high turbans often sewn with gold and silver threads, made the group peculiarly artistic and pleasing. Among the distinguished theosophists shown are President Olcott, Prince Harisingshee, the English general Morgan, the theosophist evangelist Leadbeater (formerly an Anglican clergyman), the Sanscrit scholar Bavanishangar, Mr. Cooper Oakley, an American and the editor of the Theosophist, and the Hindu philosopher Subba Rad. At these assemblies it is noticed by visitors that the delegates confine themselves to a vegetarian diet, and do not partake of any liquor whatsoever. The assembly closed with a brilliant gardenparty, at which old Sanscrit songs were sung to Indian music, and the delegates were sprinkled with rose-water and bedecked with flowers.

BOOK REVIEWS.

The Education of Man. By FREIDRICH FROEBEL. Tr. by W.
N. HAILMANN. New York, Appleton. 12°.
Elementary Psychology and Education. By J. BALDWIN. New
York, Appleton. 12°.

DR. HARRIS is issuing the volumes of his International Education Series with great promptness. Volume V. in the series is Froebel's classic work translated. Since this was written, now more than sixty years ago, its readers have increased in number year by year. Inaccessibility and bad translations have hindered its progress in this country, but both these obstacles are now overcome, and no teacher who is imbued with the spirit of his profession will fail to have the Education of Man' by him for careful study and constant reference. We believe that posterity will award to Froebel the highest place among modern educators. He was infinitely more practical than the authors of 'Emile' and 'Levana,` and infinitely more profound and philosophical than Pestalozzi. The spirit of the kindergarten is Froebel's greatest achievement : the kindergarten itself is a mere detail. The spirit runs through all sound education, and the great manual-training movement, now the distinguishing feature of our educational development, is but another manifestation of it. The present translation of Froebel is a very good one, and leaves little to be desired. We regret that the translator has disfigured the text and broken the continuity by interjecting observations of his own.

Volume VI. is Baldwin's Elementary Psychology and Education. Of it we cannot conscientiously say any thing complimentary, and we confess our surprise at its finding a place in the series. We do not object to making psychology as elementary as one pleases, but we do object to making it pre-Kantian. The present author may have heard of the Kritik der reinen Vernunft, but he certainly has never read it. We agree most heartily with Dr. Harris, that a teacher should know something of psychology, and we would go considerably further than he does in emphasizing the fact. But we submit that to teach psychology that is positively wrong and unscientific under the pretence that it is elementary, is worse than to teach nothing of it at all. Illustrations of loose statement and positive error abound in this book. We read, for example, of sense-perception, conscious perception, and noumenal perception." The enduring self,' matter, mind, space, causation, right, beauty, and the like, are included under noumena.' We are told also that 'choice is uncaused cause," and the fact that "literature represents man as free and responsible" is cited as an argument for freedom of the will. It is not profitable to multiply the evidences of the author's incapacity to write the book. It is in no respect worthy of a place in this series.

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NOTES AND NEWS.

ANOTHER important acquisition to our store of knowledge has recently been made, says Nature. Glucose, commonly called grape-sugar, has been artificially prepared by Drs. Emil Fischer and Julius Tafel in the chemical laboratory of the University of Würzburg. This happy achievement, which is announced in the number of the Berichte just received, is one which has long been looked forward to, and which cannot fail to give deep satisfaction in chemical circles all over the world. As is generally the case in syntheses of this description, not only has the sugar itself been actually prepared, but, what is at least quite as important, considerable light has been thrown upon that much-discussed question, the constitution of sugars. A most remarkable, and yet only to be expected, attribute of this artificial sugar is that it is found to be entirely incapable of rotating a beam of polarized light. As is well known, there are several naturally occurring varieties of glucose, all of which may be expressed by the same empirical constitution, and all possessing the power of rotating the plane of polarization : dextrose, or grape-sugar, the best-known of these varieties, as its name implies, deviates the plane of polarization to the right, as do several other less important varieties; while lævulose, or fruit-sugar, rotates the plane to the left. But in artificially preparing a glucose there is just as much tendency for one kind to be formed as another, and the probability is that both dextro and lævo are simultaneously formed, and thus neutralize each other, producing a totally inactive mixture. It may be that, as in the case of racemic acid,

the two kinds are formed side by side, and neutralize each other in the solution; or it may even be, that, as is the case with truly inactive tartaric acid, there is a true neutralization within the molecule itself. Which of these hypotheses is correct is a question for further work to decide.

- Gaillard's 'French for Young Folks' (New York, Werner) is constructed on a sound pedagogic plan, has numerous and good illustrations, and is nicely gotten up. It devotes special attention to the subject of French pronunciation, and gives some very practical directions on the subject. We only question whether the introductory chapters do not employ too many long words to be easily comprehended by the beginner.

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-The Fish Commission steamer Albatross' left Washington last week on her extended cruise to the Pacific coast. The voyage was arranged by the late Professor Baird, and is now being carried out by his successor, Mr. G. Brown Goode, the new commissioner. The Albatross' has been engaged for several years in the deepsea work of the Fish Commission in the Atlantic, the results obtained being of great economic and scientific value. There has come a demand from the Pacific coast for similar work there, where the fisheries have not been developed to any extent, little being known of the number or character of the food-fishes of that coast. To hunt out the food-fishes, locate their habitats, and to develop the resources of the great Pacific, is the task before the Albatross,' which is thoroughly equipped for the scientific work. The scientific party aboard will consist of Prof. Leslie A. Lee of Bowdoin, who goes as chief naturalist; Mr. Thomas Lee, who has been engaged on the deep-sea work of the commission for a long time; and Mr. C. H. Townsend, who has just returned from an expedition to Central America. The Albatross' is officered and manned by the navy, and is under the command of Lieut.-Com. Zera L. Tanner. The Albatross' will reach California next May. Stops will be made en route, which will delay the voyage somewhat, the time being occupied by the scientists in making shore-collections. The ship goes out without any definite period fixed as to its return, but it is not probable the vessel will be seen in the Atlantic again for three or four years. It is deemed important to carry on investigations not only in the latitude of California, but off the Alaska coast. The ship will touch frequently at ports on the Pacific coast, and be in constant communication with the Fish Commission. It is probable, too, that from time to time other scientists will join her for the purpose of doing special work. The scientific outfit of the vessel is declared by those who have examined it to be the best that was ever put aboard a vessel.

- Dr. Cohn, oculist at Breslau, has invented a new apparatus for testing the eyesight of children. This is a matter which is scarcely attended to at all in this country. Periodical tests have shown that there is much more small mischief in the eyes of young students than is generally supposed, which can easily be stopped if the necessary precautions are taken in time. Dr. Cohn's invention consists of a white board twenty-five centimetres square, to which are fastened six rows of hooks, shaped thus, one centimetre square. He who possesses a normal eyesight will be able to tell, at a distance of six metres in ordinary daylight, in which direction wards, downwards, to the right, or to the left - the hooks, which are painted of different colors, are turned. Pupils who cannot do this injure their eyes by constantly looking at the blackboard. The same board may be used to determine whether the ordinary daylight is sufficient for the rooms. As soon as the teacher cannot distinguish the direction of the hooks at a distance of six metres without straining his eyes, the gas ought to be lighted at once.

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-In the December number of Harper's is an article by Mr. George F. Kunz, the gem expert of Messrs. Tiffany & Co., on the precious stones of America. Mr. Kunz makes it clear that the alleged recent discoveries of diamonds in Kentucky amounts to nothing; but sapphires, spinels, crystals of topaz, beryls, garnets the finest in the world, tourmalines, amethysts, and turquoises are obtained in several localities in considerable profusion. The striking feature of the article is the lithographed page of these gems, containing a diamond, Manchester, Va.; sapphire, Helena, Montana; sapphire, Franklin, N.C.; topaz, Crystal Peak, Col.; emerald, Stony Point, N.C.; aquamarine, Stoneham, Me.; beryl (golden-colored),

Litchfield, Conn.; garnets (cut and natural), Gallup, N.M.; peridot, Gallup, N.M.; tourmaline, Mount Mica, Paris, Me.; tourmaline (green with red centre), Paris, Me.; lithia emerald (hiddenite), Stony Point, N.C.; amethyst, Stow, Me.; cairngorm stone, Pike's Peak, Col.; turquoise, Nevada; arrow-points of obsidian, carnelian, and agatized wood, Oregon; pearl, Paterson, N.J. To produce this plate, fully twenty impressions were required, and we believe this was the first colored plate ever published in Harper's.

At a special meeting of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution held Nov. 18, Prof. S. P. Langley was elected secretary of the institution, to succeed the late Prof. S. F. Baird.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.

The attention of scientific men is called to the advantages of the correspondence columns of SCIENCE for placing promptly on record brief preliminary notices of their investigations. Twenty copies of the number containing his communication will be furnished free to any correspondent on request.

The editor will be glad to publish any queries consonant with the character of the journal. Correspondents are requested to be as brief as possible. The writer's name is in all cases required as proof of good faith.

Cheyenne.

IN the note published in your issue of Nov. 11, I made an unaccountable mistake, and wish to correct it. The Cheyennes are the 'cut-arms,' and in the sign-language are designated by drawing the hand, in imitation of a knife, across the biceps of the arm. It is the Pawnees whose sign is wolf-ears made with thumb and forefinger.

Your types say loo-yah erroneously for loo-hah.

The French trappers told me a legend of the Sioux to the effect that once in holding a council they were disturbed by the noisy play of the children, and moved over to another creek to hold the council in quiet. In attempting to overtake their parents, the children took the back track on which the village had lately come in. They kept going, and the boys and girls grew up and intermarried, and became another tribe, the Cheyennes. The Sioux call themselves Lah-ko-ta (the strongly dental), not Dakota, meaning 'cutthroats,' the sign being the open hand drawn edgewise across the throat. GEO. WILSON.

Lexington, Mo., Nov. 15.

The Act of God' and the Railway-Company. RETURNING from New York Nov. 12, the train was crowded with passengers. At the forward end of the car was a large stove full of red-hot coals. This stove had no guard, nor hardly any thing to prevent it from upsetting. A slight collision would have emptied the contents of the stove, and probably several people would have been burned to death. Would Mr. Appleton Morgan consider such an affair an Act of God'? ASAPH HALL. Washington, Nov. 19.

Changes in Indian Languages.

I OBSERVE a blunder I made in attributing the word quisquis (a hog') to Schoolcraft instead of Zeisberger, in my communication on changes in Indian languages, in Science of Nov. 18. The Onondagas now pronounce it kweaskweas, almost in four syllables, and with a resemblance to a hog's melodious note. I may add that the Onondagas divide · Hiawatha,' a name of their own, differently from many white people. It is pronounced by them ‘Hi-a-wat-ha.' 'Onondaga' they sound like the whites in talking with them, but retain the old broad sound among themselves.

Baldwinsville, N.Y., Nov. 19.

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W. M. BEAUCHAMP.

Natural History Notes on Alaska.

IN my 'Natural History Notes on Alaska,' forming Part III. of the Report of the Cruise of the Steamer "Corwin" in the Arctic Ocean in 1885,' which has recently been published as Ex. Doc. 153, Forty-ninth Congress, second session, I notice two plates of fishes, and one plate representing a plant. I desire to say that I never saw these plates before they appeared in this sketch, nor can I explain how they came to be inserted in it. I disclaim all responsibility for the plates, and I do not indorse them. They are inaccurate, and absurd pictures of what they purport to represent. CHAS. H. TOWNSEND.

Washington, Nov. 20.

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