place where it may dry and become mingled with the atmosphere. (3) Never drink from the same glass with a consumptive. (4) Never kiss a consumptive upon the mouth. These rules are equally applicable to pneumonia and perhaps also to bronchitis. It will, therefore, be best to call them, not rules for consumptives, but for all persons who cough and expectorate. This will save the patient from the shock of a positive and perhaps too hasty diagnosis.
Dr. J. S. Burdon Sanderson, Waynflete Professor of Physiology in the University of Oxford, has been nominated for President of the British Association at the Nottingham meeting, 1893.
The claim of Prof. Cyrus Thomas that he has found the Maya hieroglyphics to be in part phonetic, and has ascertained the interpretation of a sufficient number to form a key to the solution of the problem, having been disputed by the distinguished Americanist, Dr. Seler, Prof. Thomas is preparing a paper corroborating his views for publication by the Bureau of Ethnology. In the mean time he has published a paper, presenting some of his proofs, in Science for October 7th.
The programme of lectures of the Franklin Institute, Philadelphia, for the season 1892-'93, includes the topics of thirty-two lectures to be delivered on Fridays and Mondays, from November 4th to February 27th, on subjects relating to transportation, mining and engineering, economics, electricity, chemistry and physics, evolution, art, and other subjects of scientific and popular interest.
The name of fluorography is given to a process for transferring pictures to glass by means of inks containing fluorides. These inks, when sulphuric acid is applied to them, disengage hydrofluoric acid, which etches upon the glass. A composition, described in the Genie civil, consists of 400 parts by weight of glycerin, 200 of water, 100 of fluor spar, 100 of tallow, 50 of borax, and 50 of lampblack.
Old newspapers are said to be of value for wrapping up winter clothing in summer, because the printer's ink is as noxious to moths and their larvæ as camphor and coal-tar. Being impervious to air, they also make good wrappers for ice and for liquids which it is desired to keep cool.
The measure of a snail's pace has at last been found. Camille Flammarion is quoted in Dahcim as estimating it at fifteen ten-thousandths of a metre per second.
The modern case of exorcism, related by Prof. Evans in the December Monthly, is supplemented by a news item in the New York Herald of November 21st. The woman Herz brought an action for slander against Father Aurelian, on account of his saying that she had sent a devil into her boy. The case was tried in the courts of Eichstadt, Bavaria, and the woman was awarded small damages. In his defense Father Aurelian testified that he had exorcised the devil from the boy, and supported this evidence by quotations from the writings of the fathers. The boy himself deposed that he knew nothing of the alleged exorcism.
Prof. C. Schorlemmer, a distinguished chemist, Professor of Chemistry in Owens College, Manchester, England, died on June 27, 1892. He became assistant to Prof. Roscoe in Owens College in 1861, and was appointed to a professorship in 1874. He was the author of A Manual on the Chemistry of the Carbon Compounds, and, in conjunction with Prof. Roscoe, of an extensive treatise on chemistry.
Lieutenant Frederick Schwatka, the arctic explorer, died in Portland, Oregon, November 2, 1892, from the effects of an overdose of laudanum which he had taken to relieve a habitual stomach pain. He was born in Galena, Ill., in 1849; studied at the university in Salem, Oregon; worked as a printer; was graduated from West Point in 1871, and became a lieutenant in the cavalry; was admitted to the bar in Nebraska in 1875; and received a medical degree at Bellevue Hospital Medical College, New York, in 1876—all while in the army. In 1878 he organized an Arctic expedition, and, accompanied by William H. Gilder, sailed for King William's Land in order to recover relics of Sir John Franklin which the Eskimos said were buried in that region. This expedition, which was successful in its main object, was marked by the longest sledge journey that had been made at that time, and by the discovery of the branch of Back's River that was named after President Hayes. Lieutenant Schwatka afterward explored the course of the Yukon River in Alaska, and commanded the New York Times Alaska Exploring Expedition in 1886. He was the author of several books and magazine articles relating to his travels, and was a popular lecturer. He was an honorary member of several foreign geographical societies, and wore some of their medals.
The death was recently announced, in the seventy-ninth year of his age, of Robert Grant, Professor of Astronomy in the University of Edinburgh. He was appointed Professor of Astronomy in the University of Glasgow in 1859. In observing the eclipse of the sun in 1860 he discovered the proof of the existence of a continuous envelope round that body. He was the author of numerous astronomical papers and cyclopædia articles; and of a catalogue of 6,415 stars, which is in considerable use.
