(2,000 francs) and Mlle. I. Iotevko (2,000 francs); the Jérôme Ponti foundation to MM. Battandier and Trabut, for their botanical work in northern Africa.

SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS THE French Association for the Advancement of Science, in order to fulfil the provisions of its constitution, held a general assembly at Paris on October 28, when the president, M. Emile Picard, made an address, in which he discussed German and French contributions to science.

SIR ROBERT HADFIELD has been elected president of the Faraday Society, London.

DR. ELLSWORTH HUNTINGTON, of Milton, Mass., has been elected president, and Professor John W. Harshberger, of the University of Pennsylvania, vice-president of the Ecological Society of America.

AT the meeting of the Society of Directors of Physical Education and Colleges, held in New York on December 29, Dr. Joseph E. Raycroft, Princeton, N. J., was elected president.

THE New York State Science Teachers' Association, in convention at Syracuse, chose Professor R. C. Gibbs, of the department of physics of Cornell University, as its president.

DR. BARTON WARREN EVERMANN, director of the Museum of the California Academy of Sciences, has been elected president of the Cooper Ornithological Club.

PROFESSOR ROLLA CLINTON CARPENTER, of Sibley College, Cornell University, has resigned, his resignation to take effect at the end of this academic year. Professor Carpenter will reach the age of sixty-five on June 26, 1917, the day before commencement.

THE National Institute of Social Sciences has awarded medals of the society to Professor M. I. Pupin, of Columbia University, for his work in mathematical physics and electrical engineering; to Surgeon General William C. Gorgas, for his work in stamping out yellow fever in Cuba and Panama, and to Dr. George W. Crile, of Cleveland, for his contributions to surgery and allied sciences.

THE C. M. Warren Committee of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences has made an additional grant of $150 to Professor R. F. Brunel, of Bryn Mawr College, for the continuation of his research on the relation between the constitution of aliphatic radicals and their chemical affinities.

HENRY N. OGDEN, professor of sanitary engineering in the college of civil engineering of Cornell University, has been reappointed a member of the State Public Health Council by Governor Whitman. Professor Ogden was made a member of this council when it was created in 1913. Before that he had been for seven years engineer to the state board of health.

THE Bureau of Fisheries has engaged the services of Dr. N. L. Gardner, of the University of California, for comprehensive investigations of the marine algae of the Pacific coast, with reference to their more adequate utilization and their relation to fisheries.

PROFESSOR HENRI A. HUS, of the department of biology of the University of Michigan, who was granted a three years' leave of absence for the purpose of doing some experimental work for the United States Rubber Company at their plantation in Sumatra and in the botanical garden at Buitenzorg on the island of Java, has returned to the United States owing to lack of laboratory equipment due to the present war, and will continue his work in the New York Botanical Garden.

WE learn from Nature that Mr. F. A. Stockdale, director of agriculture, Mauritius, has been appointed by the British Secretary of State for the Colonies director of agriculture, Ceylon, and Dr. H. A. Tempany, government chemist and superintendent of agriculture for the Leeward Islands, has been appointed to succeed Mr. F. A. Stockdale as director of

agriculture, Mauritius.

ON December 25, Dr. Charles L. Parsons, chief chemist of the Bureau of Mines, returned from a ten-weeks' trip in Europe. As a representative of the War Department, Dr. Parsons visited Norway, Sweden, England, France and Italy, to make a study of nitrogen

fixation processes. He was offered unusual opportunities for studying the chemical industries, especially those whose development has resulted from the European war. He also visited the clay deposits and the tin and tin concentration works at Cornwall, England.

PROFESSOR VERNON L. KELLOGG, of Stanford University, continues his work of overseeing the feeding of the Belgian people for another six months. This gives him a year and a half of this work as first assistant to his Stanford colleague, Herbert Clark Hoover.

DR. G. H. A. CLOWES, director of the Gratwick Research Laboratory, spoke on "Colloidal Equilibrium" at the meeting of the Indiana Section of the American Chemical Society on December 8. Dr. Wilder D. Bancroft will address the Indiana Section on March 9, and Dr. E. V. McCollum on May 11.

DR. IRA N. HOLLIS, president of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, visited the University of Illinois last week, to give an address to the faculty and students in the college of engineering, on the subject of "The Relation of Efficiency to Democracy."

PROFESSOR DOUGLAS W. JOHNSON, of Columbia University, addressed the American Philosophical Society on January 5, on the subject, "The Strategic Geography of the Balkan Campaign."

THE death has occurred at his home in New Rochelle, N. Y., of Henry Gordon Stott, past president of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers and of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. He was born in the Orkney Islands in 1866.

ROBERDEAU BUCHANNAN, computer in the U. S. Naval Observatory from 1879 to 1910, the author of works on mathematics, astronomy and genealogy, died on December 18, at the age of seventy-seven years.

THE REV. BROTHER CHRYSOSTOM (Joseph J. Conlen), professor of philosophy and psychology at Manhattan College, died on January 24, aged fifty-four years.

MR. JUAN J. RODRIGUEZ, of Guatemala City, Guatemala, died on December 22, aged seventyfive years. Mr. Rodriguez for many years

studied and collected the fauna of Guatemala, and was well known to naturalists as the discoverer of many new and interesting species. MR. WILLIAM MARRIOT, for forty-three years assistant secretary of the British Meteorological Society and for thirty years editor of the Meteorological Record, died on December 28, at the age of sixty-eight years.

SIR EDWARD BURNETT TYLOR, Hon. D.C.L., M.A., formerly keeper of the Oxford University Museum, professor and reader in anthropology and professor emeritus, died at Wellington, Somerset, on January 2.

CAPTAIN F. C. SELOUS, known for his zoological explorations in Africa, has been killed in action in East Africa, aged sixty-five years.

SIR E. B. TYLOR, professor emeritus of anthropology in the University of Oxford, distinguished for his publications in ethnology, died on January 2, at the age of eightyfour years.

DR. J. LITTLE, Regius professor of physic, Dublin University, has died in his eightieth

year.

DR. B. R. POPPIUS, the Finnish entomologist, died on November 27 at the age of forty years.

UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL
NEWS

A BILL has been introduced into the state legislature of Arkansas providing a half-mill tax for the University of Arkansas. The bill has been recommended by the trustees of the university and approved by the governor.

Two industrial fellowships for the chemistry of indiarubber have been established in the University of Akron, provided by the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company and the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company. These fellowships are of the value of $300, and the holder may subsequently enter the employ of the company.

THE building of the Hunterian Laboratory of the Johns Hopkins Medical School, completed at the cost of $115,000, has now been opened. According to the Journal of the American Medical Association, the building is connected by tunnels with the medical school and

the physiological building. On the first floor are the medical library and the department of art as applied to medicine. Work at the laboratory is directed by a committee of professors and instructors of the medical school. Dr. Milton C. Winternitz is chairman of the committee, and has a laboratory on the fourth floor. The second floor has been leased to the Carnegie Embryological Institute. The third floor will be devoted to work in clinical medicine and children's diseases and the fourth floor to the pathological department.

DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE
NOTICE OF POSSIBLE SUSPENSION OF THE
RULES OF NOMENCLATURE IN THE CASES
OF HOLOTHURIA 1758 VS. PHYSALIA
1801, AND BOHADSCHIA 1833 VS.
HOLOTHURIA 1791

IN accordance with the requirements prescribed by the International Congress of Zoology, notice to the zoological profession is hereby given that on or about October 1, 1917, the undersigned proposes to recommend to the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature that the rules be suspended in the following cases:

Holothuria Linn., 1758 (type physalis), vs. Physalia Lamarck, 1801 (type pelagica). The effect of suspension will be to retain Physalia as generic name for the Portugese man of war. Bohadschia Jaeger, 1833, vs. Holothuria Bruguière, 1791. The effect of the suspension will be to retain Holothuria for the sea cucumbers.

The motion for suspension includes the following points:

cases will result in greater confusion than uniformity, because

(b) The cases involve a transfer of generic names, almost universally accepted in the sense given above since 1791 (for Holothuria) and since 1801 (for Physalia), to genera in other groups in connection with which they have been used by only a very few authors during more than 100 years.

The undersigned cordially invites zoologists to communicate, not later than September 1, 1917, to him or to any other member of the commission, either their approval or disapproval of the proposed action.

C. W. STILES,

Secretary to Commission

DO THE FOWLER'S TOAD AND THE AMERICAN TOAD INTERBREED?

NOTING a communication under "Discussion and Correspondence" on pages 463 and 464, of the September 29, 1916, issue of SCIENCE, as regards the song of Bufo fowleri Putn., I would say that in over fifteen years of experience as observer and student of Amphibians, I have never been able positively to trace the clear, trilled song, lasting from 10 to 30 seconds, to any but the American toad, Bufo americanus Le Conte. In any large collection of both species, where both occur together, there are individuals which seem to combine the external characteristics of both species. In the study collection of the American Museum of Natural History, New York City, there are, for instance, a number of toads which at first glance would be identified as Bufo americanus. They have the large kidney

spotted belly of B. americanus, but also the

head, and much finer texture of skin, especially

4. Accept Holothuria as dating from Bruguière, 1791, despite the existence of Holothuria 1758 (if rejected);

5. Said suspension is not to be construed as invalidating any specific name.

The grounds advanced for suspension will be: (a) A strict application of the rules in these

pattern alone can not always be relied upon, as B. americanus often has the narrow median pale line, the distinct black spots arranged in longitudinal rows, sometimes confluent, and the peculiar greenish gray ground color, of B. fowleri, and vice versa, B. fowleri has sometimes the reddish brown ground color, with indistinct vertebral streak and but few

scattered black spots and spotted undersides of B. americanus. All this, in conjunction with Mr. H. A. Allard's notes and observations, would lead one to believe that both species are closely related, and that they possibly interbreed occasionally, these forms with the characteristic marks, etc., of both species representing the hybrids.

In conclusion I will state that the typical B. americanus and the typical B. fowleri differ in the following characters, based on examination of hundreds of specimens, covering a period of ten or more years:

Bufo americanus Le Conte

1. Head broad, profile sloping towards tip of snout. 2. Cranial crests always diverging from the nostrils.

3. Skin covered with comparatively large round warts, often arranged in rows or groups, the former on the back, the latter on hind limbs. The undersides are more or less granular. The larger warts often have spiny tips, especially in large females.

4. The legs are stout, and moderately long, the foot large and thick, the fingers rather short and thick.

Bufo fowleri Putnam

1. Head narrow, very thick, profile abruptly rounded towards the tip of the snout. 2. Cranial crests sometimes parallel, often fused in the midline, forming a distinct lump between the eyes. This never occurs in B. americanus. 3. Skin finely granular above, with groups of larger warts. These warts are never spiny in this species. The under sides are either very finely granular or entirely smooth.

4. The legs are longer, in proportion to the body, than of B. americanus, the foot is rather delicate, fingers and toes are long and slender. RICHARD DECKERT

N. Y. ZOOLOGICAL PARK, NEW YORK CITY

THE POPULAR NAMES OF NORTH AMERICAN PLANTS

TO THE EDITOR OF SCIENCE: In the course of our work here, considerable numbers of plants are frequently sent in by teachers to be named, and doubtless many similar requests for information are received by the officers of the provincial governments and the experiment

stations throughout the United States. In replying to such enquiries the Latin name of the species is always given and the English name where such exists. It is clear, however, that pupils in the public schools, as well as many of their teachers, do not and can not reasonably be expected to take any interest in or to remember the Latin names of plants. This being so, it is highly desirable that every species of plant inhabiting the United States or Canada should have an English name. It is further desirable that the name should not be a local one, but should be applicable to the plant wherever it is found, from the Atlantic to the Pacific ocean. If possible, the name should be such as to distinguish the plant from allied species, the name being based on some structural character such as height, hairiness, color of flowers, etc.; or on the habitat, such as marsh, mountain, wood, etc.; or on its use in the service of man, Indian names when such exist being adopted.

Where different genera have the same English name, some qualifying word will be specially necessary. For example, fireweed may mean either Erechtites hieracifolia Raf., or Epilobium angustifolium L. This ambiguity would be removed by calling the former white fireweed and the latter purple fireweed.

In order that each species of plant may have an English name, it would be necessary to draw up a list of the species inhabiting the United States and Canada, and it seems to the present writer that in drawing up such a list a very wide interpretation should be given to the meaning of the term species. At the present rate of progress, it will be many years before the "North American Flora "-the standard work on the subject for this continentwill be completed, and discussion as to the limits of so-called species may be expected to continue for a much longer period. Consequently, a provisional list should be issued, no attempt being made to define the limits of a species in too critical a manner, the popular English names not being suited for such fine distinctions. The common English name should be applied to aggregate rather than segregate species. For example, pipsissewa or prince's

pine should be regarded as applicable to either Chimaphila corymbosa Pursh., or C. occidentalis Rydb., the two species into which C. umbellata Nutt. has been split up in the "North American Flora."

There is, of course, room for discussion as to the best method of procedure to adopt. Many botanists-especially those who are never called on to name plants for the general public-are quite satisfied with the Latin names alone, and from them in all probability no assistance can be expected in devising English names. The subject is one that might well be discussed at some conference of American botanists, as it mainly concerns ourselves alone. J. ADAMS

CENTRAL EXPERIMENTAL FARM,
OTTAWA, CANADA,

November 21, 1916

PROPULSION BY SURFACE TENSION TO THE EDITOR OF SCIENCE: In November, 1911, I described in your columns a little motor boat which I supposed to be novel. A wooden boat only a couple of inches long, was provided with a stern consisting of a slab of soap, and when placed on clean still water moved about with noticeable rapidity.

I have just learned that M. Henri Devaux constructed an absolutely equivalent craft many years ago (La Nature, April 21, 1888). His boat was made of tinfoil and the " peller" was a scrap of camphor attached to the stern.

pro

Pray allow me to tender to M. Devaux my apologies and compliments.

GEORGE F. BECKER

SCIENTIFIC BOOKS

A Sylow Factor Table of the First Twelve Thousand Numbers. By HENRY WALTER STAGER. Carnegie Institution of Washington, 1916. Pp. xii +119.

Dr. Stager's tables are intended to furnish the possible number of Sylow subgroups for all groups whose order does not exceed 12,000. For every number within that limit are listed all the divisors which are of the form p(kp+1), where p is a prime greater than 2

and k is greater than zero. In determining the possible number of Sylow subgroups such divisors must be known before further methods are applicable. Thus from the table we learn that 1,080 is divisible by 3(1X3+1), 3(3X3+1), 3(13 X 3+1), 5(1X5+1), 5(7X5+1) and 5(43 × 5+1). From these results we know that for a group of order 1,080 there may be 1, 4, 10 or 40 subgroups of order 33 and 1, 6, 36 or 286 subgroups of order 5. The exact number is to be determined by other principles of group theory. The table also gives the expression of each number up to that limit as products of powers of primes.

The making of tables, a tedious and apparently mechanical task, is of the highest importance in all branches of science. It is likely that more fundamental theorems have been discovered by the examination of listed results than by any other means. This is certainly true in the theory of numbers, and it is possible that workers in the theory of groups have not made enough use of this method of investigation. The construction of tables for the theory of groups is especially difficult on account of the great complexity of the material. Only brief tables have hitherto been undertaken and it is to be hoped that Dr. Stager's work in this direction may be the beginning of a systematic campaign in this important field.

The construction of an extensive table almost always brings to light hidden relations, suggesting new theorems for investigation. In Dr. Stager's table certain numbers are noted which have no divisors of the sort indicated above. Such numbers seem to resemble primes in many ways, and in particular their curve of frequency" seems to run roughly parallel to the corresponding curve for primes. Dr. Stager has made a study of these numbers, and has added a list of them up to the limit

66

of his table.

The author is to be congratulated upon the completion of so important and formidable a piece of work. While the reviewer has, of course, not checked over any part of the table he has the utmost confidence in the accuracy of the list. The printing has been done by the