Dr. B. A. Gould, who had recently begun the publication of the first astronomical journal in the country devoted to research work. In 1854, through the influence of Dr. Gould, Mr. Stockwell was appointed a computer in the Longitude Department of the United States Coast Survey and moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts, in order to carry on his work under Dr. Gould's direction.

Eight months later he returned to his uncle's home in Brecksville and resumed his farm work, giving all of his spare time, as before, to mathematics and astronomy. Before 1860 he had mastered the methods of computation of the orbits of planets and comets, and had computed the orbits of two comets which appeared in 1853. He computed the orbit, the perturbations and ephemeris of Virginia, the fiftieth asteroid, for its opposition in 1859. These results were published in the Astronomical Journal. In 1860 he published a new method of solving a set of symmetrical equations having indeterminate coefficients. In addition to these investigations, by 1860 he had begun a very extensive and elaborate computation of the secular variations of the planetary orbits arising from mutual attractions of each other. This work was interrupted by the war, however, and was not completed until 1872, when it was published in the Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge. In 1861 he was given the position of computer in the United States Naval Observatory and continued in this work until 1864. At that time the United States Sanitary Commission, which had collected a large quantity of statistics in regard to sanitary conditions, requested Dr. Gould to reduce and discuss them, and he in turn asked Mr. Stockwell to assist him.

One day, while in Cleveland, he was inquiring in a bookstore in regard to the nonarrival from Europe of some books on the theory of probabilities. Shortly after that the book dealer mentioned this to Leonard Case, afterwards the founder of Case School of Applied Science, who said that he would loan these books to Mr. Stockwell as he happened to have them in his library. This act led to

the acquaintance and friendship between these two men which continued for many years. Through the influence of Mr. Case, Mr. Stockwell soon afterwards moved to Cleveland and lived there during the remainder of his life. Mr. Case, a graduate of Yale University and a great lover of mathematics, persuaded Mr. Stockwell to undertake a complete discussion of the mathematical theory of the moon's motion. This work was never wholly finished but many specific problems in relation to the subject were completed and published from time to time.

During 1891 and later, Mr. Stockwell pubished a series of articles in various astronomical magazines on the subject of the ancient eclipses. If the theory of the moon's motion used in such computations is correct, then the predicted time of an eclipse will agree with the historical time, but if there are errors in the theory, the computed time will evidently differ from the historical time. Mr. Stockwell was able to prove that in a large number of cases the historical times agreed very closely with the theoretical times computed by his tables, and this proved that his theory of the moon's motion was substantially correct. Nearly a hundred ancient eclipses were computed and many of the results were published.

In 1881, after the death of Mr. Case, Case School of Applied Science was opened. It was but natural that the board of trustees should invite Dr. Stockwell (he had received the degree of doctor of philosophy from Western Reserve College in 1876) to become professor of mathematics and astronomy. He continued to serve in this capacity until 1887, but his tastes were for research and not for teaching and in the latter year he resigned his professorship and through the remainder of his life, devoted himself to that science which he had cultivated for so many years.

Among the many articles contributed by him to the journals, we find that a large proportion have to do with the theory of the moon's motion or the computation of eclipses based upon such theory. There are, however, many articles upon the orbits of comets,

chronology by means of ancient eclipses, inequalities in the motions of many of the planets, the procession of the equinoxes, and the mutual perturbations of planets.

In 1919 he published a new solution of the problem of the tides. In the preface to his work he says:

The cause of the tides was sufficiently and correctly explained by Sir Isaac Newton in the year 1687; and the mathematical development of the effects produced by that cause upon the waters of the ocean has been the great unsolved problem before the scientific world for more than 230 years.

Mr. Stockwell believed that he had solved this problem, and in his recent pamphlet he gives two different solutions and a set of tables of the solar and lunar tidal waves, together with the method of computing the tides at any point on the earth's surface.

In 1855 he was married to Sarah Healy, a foster-daughter of his uncle, and they lived together for over sixty-one years until she died, at the age of eighty-three. Their life together was an ideal one. Besides taking upon herself much of the burden of domestic cares in order that her husband might devote himself more fully to his scientific work, she sympathized fully with him in all that he was doing and gave him her encouargement.

Dr. Stockwell continued his mathematical work up to within three weeks of his death. Although he lived to be eighty-eight years of age, his mind was perfectly clear, and until attacked by his last illness, he was able to carry on his work with much of the vigor which had always characterized his investigations. Occasional visits by him to my office kept me in touch with what he was doing, and I was very glad to be able to loan him, from the college library, some books which he did not possess. He was a natural mathematician and acquired his knowledge without a teacher because his clear, analytical mind was able to grasp and understand any mathematical or astronomical theory which intereted him. The long list of his published papers shows that he was also possessed of that rare type of mindthe type which can work out for itself new

things in mathematics and science which clearly interpret the great laws of our uni

verse.

CHARLES S. HOWE

SCIENTIFIC EVENTS

CHAIR OF LOGIC AT THE UNIVERSITY OF LONDON

DR. C. A. MERCIER, the distinguished London alienist, in his will offered $100,000 to London University to endow a chair under stipulations, sent us by Dr. E. E. Slosson. They are:

Scheme for the establishment of a Professorial Chair of Rational Logic and Scientific Method. The purpose of this foundation is that students may be taught, not what Aristotle or any one else thought about reasoning, but how to think clearly and reason correctly; and to form opinions on rational grounds: the better to provide that the teaching shall be of this character, and shall not degenerate into the teaching of rigid formulæ and worn out supersitions, I make the following conditions:

The professor is to be chosen for his ability to think and reason and to teach, and not for his acquaintance with books on logic, or with the opinions of logicians or philosophers. Acquaintance with the Greek and German tongues is not to be an actual disqualification for the professorship, but in case the merits of the candidates appear in other respects approximately equal, preference is to be given first to him who knows neither Greek nor German; next, to him who knows Greek but not German; next, to him who knows German but not Greek; and last of all, to a candidate who knows both Greek and German,

The professor is not to devote more than one twelfth of his course of instruction to the logic of Aristotle and the schools, nor more than one twenty-fourth to the logic of Hegel and other Germans. He is to proceed upon the principle that the only way to acquire an art is by practising it under a competent instructor. Didactic inculcation is useless by itself. He is, therefore, to exercise his pupils in thinking, reasoning and scientific method as applied to other studies that the students are pursuing concurrently, and to other topics of living interest.

Epistemology and the rational grounds of opinion are to be taught. The students are to be prac

COURSE ON SCIENCE AS APPLIED TO
INDUSTRY

THE Sheffeld Scientific School at Yale University announces a new general course, to be given during sophomore and senior years on "Science as Applied to Industry" to be given next fall for the first time. The official pamphlet says:

The object of this course is to give students a broad training, based upon a knowledge of certain of the fundamental sciences and of scientific methods, for executive and managerial positions in the business world. The course is not designed for -students seeking preparation for a professional career in some particular branch of science, such as chemistry, geology, or metallurgy, where problems of production are likely to occupy their attention.

In accordance with the theory of the freshman year, this course may be chosen by any member of the first-year class. The best approach, however, is said to be by Group II. of that year, comprising English, history, mathematics, chemistry or physics, and French, German or Spanish. The electives come only in junior and senior years; and the student will find his work closely laid out for him until then. The sophomore will take calculus, physics, his chosen modern language, a course in contemparary English, qualitative analysis, and mineralogy and crystallography.

In junior year the student will take physical chemistry, physical and historical geology, elementary metallurgy, drawing, industrial mineralogy, business finance, elementary economics, and more of the same sort of English. He may also elect from elementary botany, biology, or modern language, sufficient hours to fulfill the required number. When he becomes a senior, he will take general chemistry, economic geology, statistics and reports, in

dustrial management, principles of accounting, elementary petrology and applied structural geology, metals and alloys, industrial management, and cost analysis. For electives, he may choose from elementary organic chemistry, industrial chemistry, economic and regional geology, business law, insurance, metallurgy of iron and steel, transportation and economic problems. The total of recitation, lecture, laboratory work and preparation comes to forty-six hours in sophomore year, forty-five and one half hours in junior year, and forty-five hours in senior year.

The pamphlet explains that "while no attempt is made to cover the entire field of natural and physical science as a foundation for the more practical business studies which form in the last two years an integral part of the course, attention is centered upon three branches of science, those of chemistry, geology, and metallurgy, the work in these sciences being so arranged that the natural and logical order of development is followed, covering in some cases four years of work in a single field. The scientific studies are supplemented in each of the years by general or cultural studies in English or modern language, and in junior and senior years by the study of economics, and of selected subjects within the general field of business administration."

STANDARDIZATION OF INDUSTRIAL LABORA

TORY APPARATUS

The Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry states that through the efforts of certain apparatus manufacturers, there met informally at the Chemists' Club, New York City, representatives of the following companies to discuss the advisability of drawing up standard specifications for laboratory apparatus to be used in their industrial research and works control laboratories: Barrett Company, General Chemical Company, Atmospheric Nitrogen Corporation, Grasselli Chemical Company, National Aniline & Chemical Company, New Jersey Zinc Company, Solvay Process Company, Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, and E. I. du Pont de Nemours & Company.

Since most of these companies are members of the Manufacturing Chemists' Association of the United States, a committee composed of these members was appointed by the association to pass on the proposals of the informal committee and to recommend the adoption of the specifications resulting from the informal committee's work as standard for the members of the Manufacturing Chemists' Association.

Arrangements have been made for full cooperation with the committee on guaranteed reagents and standard apparatus of the American Chemical Society, and also with the committee on standards of the Association of Scientific Apparatus Makers. These specifications will be considered carefully by committees of these three societies, and it is expected that they will then be published as tentative for a period of 6 months in order to give time for general criticism. At the end of that time the specifications will be adopted as final. In carrying on this work an effort will be made to obtain specifications which will insure the cheapest mode of manufacture of a given instrument consistent with the duties that it must perform. The committee desires to cooperate fully with all industries, and any communications should be forwarded to the chairman, Dr. E. C. Lathrop, E. I. du Pont de Neumours & Co., Wilmington, Delaware.

SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS HENRY ANDREWS BUMSTEAD, professor of physics at Yale University and director of the Sloane Physical Laboratory, on leave of absence this year to act as chairman of the National Research Council, died suddenly on the night of December 31, while returning from attendance on the scientific meetings at Chicago.

AT the Chicago meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, vice-presidents of the association and chairmen of the sections were elected as follows: Mathematics, Oswald Veblen, Princeton University; Physics, G. W. Stewart, State University of Iowa; Chemistry, W. D. Harkins,

of

University of Chicago; Astronomy, S. A.
Mitchell, Leander McCormick Observatory,
University of Virginia; Geology and Geog-
raphy, Willet G. Miller,
G. Miller, University
Toronto; Zoological Sciences, Charles A.
Kofoid, University of California; Botanical
Sciences, Mel T. Cook, Rutgers College;
Anthropology, Albert Ernest Jenks, Univer-
sity of Minnesota; Psychology, E. A. Bott,
University of Toronto; Agriculture, J. G.
Lipman, Rutgers College; Education, Guy M.
Whipple, University of Michigan.

PROFESSOR BRADLEY M. DAVIS, professor of botany at the University of Michigan, was elected president, and Professor H. E. Crampton, of Columbia University vice-president, at the Chicago meeting of the American Society of Naturalists.

THE American Society of Zoologists has elected as president Professor Charles A. Kofoid, of the University of California, and as vice-president Professor Aaron L. Treadwell, of Vassar College.

FIFTY-FOUR members attended the annual meeting of the American Society of Biological Chemists, Inc., held in Chicago from December 28 to 30. Officers elected for the year 1921 were: President, Donald D. Van Slyke; Vicepresident, Philip A. Shaffer; Secretary, Victor C. Myers; Treasurer, Harold C. Bradley; Additional Members of the Council, Stanley R. Benedict, Otto Folin and Walter Jones.

DR. E. E. SLOSSON, associate editor of The Independent and formerly professor of chemistry in the University of Wyoming, has been elected editor of the Science Service, the temporary headquarters of which are at 1701 Massachusetts Avenue, Washington, D. C.

J. D. MACKENZIE has succeeded Charles Camsell, now deputy minister of mines, in charge of the British Columbia office of Geological Survey at Vancouver.

PROFESSOR SANARELLI, director of the Institute of Hygiene of the University of Rome, and editor of Annali d'Igiene, and Dr. Nicola Badaloni, a well-known writer on social medicine, have recently been made Roman senators.

MR. FRANK BACHMANN has resigned his position as chief chemist, Industrial Waste Board, Connecticut State Department of Health, to accept a position in the sanitary engineering department of the Dorr Company of New York City.

R. S. WOGLUM, entomologist in charge of citrus fruit insect investigations in California for the Federal Bureau of Entomology, who for many years has been conducting researches in orchard fumigation with hydrocyanic acid, resigned on September 1 to head the newly established Bureau of Pest Control, in the California Fruit Growers Exchange, a cooperative organization of more than 10,000 citrus fruit growers.

DR. JOHN LOVETT MORSE, professor of pediatrics at the Harvard Medical School, who has been connected with the university since his graduation in 1887, has resigned, his resignation to take effect on July 1.

PROFESSOR A. B. MACALLUM, of McGill University, Montreal, will deliver a course of lectures, extending over seven months, at the medical college in Peking, China. He will leave for the Orient in March.

AT the annual meeting of the Washington Academy of Sciences held on January 11, Dr. J. R. Johnston, chief of the Office of Plant Sanitation, Cuba, and director of research for the United Fruit Company, delivered the address on "Some problems in economic biology in tropical America." The 153d meeting of the academy will be a joint meeting with the Chemical Society of Washington and will be held in the Assembly Hall of the Cosmos Club (entrance on the south side of Cameron House) at 8:15 P.M., on Thursday, January 20, 1921. The retiring president of the academy, Dr. C. L. Alsberg, chief of the Bureau of Chemistry, U. S. Department of Agriculture will deliver an address on "The relation of chemical structure to physiological action."

THE Cutter lectures on preventive medicine and hygiene were delivered at the Harvard Medical School on January 11 and 12, by Dr.

Alonzo Taylor, on "General and specific effects of prolonged subnutrition."

PROFESSOR E. W. SKEATS, of the University of Melbourne, Australia, made an address on January 4 before the Geological Conference at Harvard University on "The geology of the state of Victoria."

PROFESSOR JOHN MERLE COULTER, head of the department of botany at the University of Chicago, gave two lectures in Cleveland last month on the McBride Foundation of Western Reserve University. The subject of the lectures was "History and present status of organic evolution." The purpose of the Foundation is to offer to the citizens of Cleveland semi-popular lectures upon various subjects by representatives from other universities.

SERVICES in memory of the late Major-General William C. Gorgas will be held in the hall of the Americas of the Pan-American Building, January 16, under the auspices of the Southern Society of Washington. The Secretary of War, Secretary of the Navy, Secretary of State, Adjt.-Gen. Peter C. Harris, Sir Auckland Geddes, and diplomatic representatives of Cuba, Panama and South American countries will deliver memorial addresses.

THE Journal of the American Medical Association writes that at the suggestion of the Niederrheinische Gesellschaft für Natur- und Heilkunde, a memorial tablet is to be placed on the birthplace in Bonn of the Berlin physiologist N. Zuntz, who died last spring. To the pupils and friends of Zuntz the society has issued an appeal for contributions.

DR. JOHN EMORY CLARK, professor of mathematics in the Sheffield Scientific School of Yale University from 1873 to 1901, died on January 3, in his eighty-ninth year.

REGIS CHAUVENET, president emeritus of the Colorado School of Mines, chemist and metallurgist, died in Denver recently at the age of seventy-eight.

ELIJAH P. HARRIS, emeritus professor of chemistry at Amherst College, has died at Warsaw, N. Y., at the age of eighty-eight. Dr. Harris retired as professor of chemistry at Amherst in 1907.