of Vassar College, were sisters. Her father, Aaron Perkins, served the Baptist church as minister for over seventy years. The Perkins family also settled in Massachusetts early in the seventeenth century.

Professor Whitman was born and spent his boyhood years in Troy, N. Y. After attending a private academy, the high school, and also for a while a private home school in Pittsfield, he entered Brown University and graduated in 1874. He was a member of Alpha Delta Phi, Phi Beta Kappa, a Junior Exhibition speaker and on the commencement list. After graduation he taught in the English and Classical High School of Mowry and Goff for four years, at the same time pursuing graduate studies at Brown University, and received the master's degree in 1877. In the year 1878-9 he studied physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, at the same time making astronomical observations with E. C. Pickering, and working on lenses with Alvan Clark. He spent the following year at the Johns Hopkins University. During this time he was associated with Mr. Newton Anderson, who later founded the University School in Cleveland.

In 1880 Professor Whitman was called to the professorship of physics at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute at Troy, where he remained until he came to Cleveland. His work in Adelbert College and the College for Women began in 1886, and continued until 1918, when, after a year's leave of absence, he became professor emeritus. He acted as dean of Adelbert College from 1903 to 1906.

He was chairman of the physics section of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and thus vice-president of the association, in 1898. His vice-presidential address was on the subject color-vision. Two years before he published a paper on the subject of the flicker photometer, an idea not original with him, but he developed its possibilities and it has since been perfected by others. His scientific ability was critical rather than creative. For this critical faculty there developed few opportunities, hence his scientific activities were confined mainly to

college halls. He was not a research scholar and never wished to be considered one, but he did have a profound knowledge of the great problems of physics and astronomy, and he kept up with the research work done in these branches. He devoted much of his attention to the possibilities of lecture experiments as a means of instruction. The construction and administration of the physics laboratory naturally received much of his time and interest. He never failed in the mass of executive work which is required in a college, and in this field he showed the greatest capacity and usefulness. In addition to his minor interest in local organizations, he was a member of Sigma Xi, of the American Physical Society, of the American Astronomical Society and of the Illuminating Engineering Society. He received the honorary degree of Sc.D. from Brown University in 1900. He was a trustee of the University School of Cleveland, and took an active interest in its development.

During his long connection with Western Reserve, Professor Whitman endeared himself to his colleagues in an unusual degree by his unfailing courtesy and generosity, the charm of his personality, the wisdom of his counsel, and the absolute integrity of his conduct. A righteous man, whose ear was ever open to the voice of an enlightened conscience, he inspired complete confidence and made himself a trusted leader. He brought honor to his profession, happiness to his friends, a rich service to the university; and in the halls of memory, his figure will long remain a type of perfect faithfulness.

HORATIO C. WOOD

HORATIO C. WOOD, M.D., LL.D., emeritus professor of materia medica, pharmacy and general therapeutics in the University of Pennsylvania Medical School, died, January 3. The obituary notice in the Pennsylvania Gazette states that for three generations members of the Wood family have been on the medical faculty. Dr. George Bacon Wood, one of the founders of the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy, and an uncle of Horatio C. Wood,

was professor of materia medica at Pennsylvania from 1835 until 1850, and professor of the theory and practise of medicine until 1860, when he resigned. Dr. Horatio Charles Wood, Jr., is professor of pharmacology and therapeutics, having succeeded to one of the chairs held by his father when he retired. He is survived by these children: James L. Wood, Milford, Pa.; Dr. George B. Wood, Dr. Horatio Charles Wood, Jr., and Miss Sarah K. Wood.

Dr. Wood was born in Philadelphia, January 13, 1841, a son of Horatio Curtis and Elizabeth Head Bacon Wood. His first American ancestor, Richard Wood, emigrated from Bristol, England, in 1682, settling first in Philadelphia and afterwards in New Jersey. Horatio C. Wood was educated at Westtown School and Friends' Select School, and was graduated from the medical department of the University of Pennsylvania in 1862.

In his youth he developed a fondness for natural history and before studying medicine became a worker in the Academy of Natural Sciences, distinguishing himself by his original work. After spending several years in hospitals, Dr. Wood began private practise in 1865, making a specialty of therapeutics and materia medica, meanwhile continuing his natural history studies and publishing numerous papers on this branch of science, especially cell botany. In his early life Dr. Wood also was a student of entomology and published thirteen original memoirs upon the subject. He abandoned these studies after 1873 and devoted his whole attention to medicine.

He was appointed professor of botany in 1866 in the auxiliary faculty of medicine in the university which had been established and endowed by his uncle, Dr. George B. Wood, and held this position ten years. He also made a special study of nervous diseases and upon the organization of the University Hospital in 1874 was appointed clinical lecturer, becoming professor in 1875 and retaining this chair until 1901. He also was professor of materia medica and therapeutics from 1875 until he retired.

Dr. Wood was the author of numerous med

ical and scientific works including "Thermic Fever or Sunstroke," 1872; "Materia Medica and Therapeutics," 1874; "Brain Work and Overwork," 1880; and "Nervous Diseases and their Diagnosis," 1874. In cooperation with Professors Bennington and Sadtler he revised the United States Dispensatory.

Lafayette College conferred upon him the degree A.M., in 1881 and LL.D. in 1883. He received the degree LL.D. from Yale in 1889 and from the University of Pennsylvania in 1904. He was a member of many learned societies including the National Academy of Sciences, was president of the American Pharmacopoeial convention from 1890 until 1910, and was president of the College of Physicians in 1902 and 1903.

SCIENTIFIC EVENTS

WATER-POWER AND DARTMOOR

As similar problems must frequently be solved in the United States, the following may be quoted from Nature:

The proposal to develop electrical energy from water-power on Dartmoor has led to a strong protest against interference with the amenity of the moor as appreciated by the lovers of solitary places. Mr. Eden Phillpotts first directed attention to the matter by a letter in the Times of December 10, in which he called on the Duchy of Cornwall, the landlords of Dartmoor, to act quickly and help to create a body of Parliamentary opinion; otherwise the destructive and illconsidered enterprise may receive sanction from an indifferent House of Commons next session." A Plymouth correspondent supplied to the Times of December 23 an account of the scope of the proposed scheme, and on later days other writers expressed their strong disapproval of the project from local, engineering, or esthetic points of view.

The scheme of the Dartmoor and District Hydro-electric Supply Company is briefly to utilize the great rainfall and high altitude of Dartmoor in the generation of electricity at several power stations situated on different streams, to convey the current to the neighboring towns and villages for ordinary municipal purposes, and possibly to erect industrial establishments where current might be used for electrolytic or power purposes. It is claimed that this work will furnish needed employment for the population of the district,

provide a continuous and economical supply of electricity for lighting, traction and heating, reduce the congestion of railway traffic by diminishing the demand for coal, and generally increase prosperity and confer public benefits more than sufficient to counterbalance any interference with agriculture, fishing rights, or the pleasure of visitors to the Moor.

The general, and especially the local, public is not qualified to weigh the rival claims, and as things now stand Parliament must proceed by the old, cumbrous, and very costly method of hearing eloquent advocates and technical experts on all the points raised.

At present the whole question of the water resources, and especially of the water-power of the British Isles is being investigated by a committee of the Board of Trade, and on this account Parliament may be inclined to postpone the consideration of private bills dealing with water, if not of special urgency, until the committee has reported. There are few areas in England where an unused gathering-ground exists at an altitude allowing of the development of water-power, and it may well be considered inexpedient to allocate them finally before a hydrometric survey has been carried out to enable the available power and its cost to be calculated on a sure basis before work is commenced.

MEDICAL EDUCATION

THE Council on Medical Education of the American Medical Association, the Association of American Medical Colleges and the Federation of State Medical Boards of the United States will hold a congress on medical education and licensure at Chicago on March 1, 2 and 3. The program is as follows:

MONDAY, MARCH 1, 1920
Morning Session, 9:30 A.M.

Introductory Remarks by Dr. Arthur Dean Bevan, chairman of the Council on Medical Education, Chicago.

Dr. George Blumer, president of the Association of American Medical Colleges, New Haven, Conn. Dr. David A. Strickler, president of the Federation of State Medical Boards, Denver, Colo.

"Present status of medical education," Dr. N. P. Colwell, secretary of the Council on Medical Education, Chicago.

Symposium on "The needs and future of medical education," Dr. George E. Vincent, president of the Rockefeller Foundation, New York City.

Dr. Ray Lyman Wilbur, president of Leland Stanford University, Stanford University, Calif.

Dr. Henry S. Pritchett, president, Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, New York City.

Dr. Harry Pratt Judson, president, University of Chicago, Chicago.

Mr. Abraham Flexner, secretary of the General Education Board, New York City.

Monday Afternoon, 2 P.M.

The larger function of state university medical schools," Dr. Walter A. Jessup, president of the State University of Iowa, Iowa City.

"Full-time teachers in clinical departments," Dr. William Darrach, dean of Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York City.

"Research in medical schools, laboratory departments," Dr. Oskar Klotz, professor of pathology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh.

"Research in medical schools, clinical departments," Dr. G. Canby Robinson, dean, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis.

TUESDAY, MARCH 2, 1920 Morning Session, 9:30 A.M. "Graduate medical instruction in the United States,' "" Dr. Louis B. Wilson, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn.

"Interallied medical relations; qualifying examinations, licensure, examinations, graduate med. ical instruction," Dr. Walter L. Bierring, secretary of the Federation of State Medical Boards, Des Moines.

"Essential improvements in state medical licensure," Dr. John M. Baldy, president of the Pennsylvania Bureau of Medical Education and Licensure, Philadelphia.

"Interstate relations in medical licensure," Francis W. Shepardson, director of the Department of Education and Registration of the State of Illinois, Springfield.

Tuesday Afternoon, 2 P.M.

Reports on Medical Teaching from the Committee on Medical Pedagogy of the Association of American Medical Colleges.

Remarks by the chairman, Dr. W. S. Carter, dean, University of Texas, department of medicine, Gal

veston.

Anatomy: Dr. Charles R. Bardeen, dean, University of Wisconsin Medical School, Madison.

Histology and embryology: Dr. F. C. Waite, secretary, Western Reserve University School of Medicine, Cleveland.

Physiology: Dr. E. P. Lyon, dean, University of Minnesota Medical School, Minneapolis.

Biological chemistry: Dr. Otto Folin, professor of biological chemistry, medical school of Harvard University, Boston.

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 3, 1920

Morning Session, 9:30 A.M. Pharmacology: Dr. C. W. Edmunds, assistant dean, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor.

Pathology: Dr. James Ewing, professor of pathology, Cornell University Medical School, New York City.

Bacteriology and parasitology: Dr. A. I. Kendall, dean, Northwestern University Medical

School, Chicago.

Public health and preventive medicine: Dr. Victor C. Vaughan, dean, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor.

Wednesday Afternoon, 2 P.M.

Separate business meetings will be held by the Association of American Medical Colleges and the Federation of State Medical Boards.

SCIENTIFIC LECTURES

THE faculty of medicine of Harvard University offers a course of free public lectures, given at the medical school, Longwood Avenue, Boston, on Sunday afternoons, beginning February 1 and ending March 28, 1920. The lectures begin at four o'clock and the doors will be closed at five minutes past the hour. No tickets are required.

February 1. Child welfare. Dr. Richard M. Smith.

February 8. Smallpox and vaccination. Dr. Edwin H. Place.

February 15. Protection against infection in diseases other than smallpox. Dr. Harold C. Ernst.

February 22. Diseases of the teeth in relation to systematic disturbances. Dr. Kurt H. Thoma. February 29. Pneumonia. Dr. Frederick T. Lord.

March 7. Some aspects of alcohol. Dr. Percy G. Stiles.

March 14. New conceptions of the structure of matter. Dr. William T. Bovie.

March 21. Health and industry. Dr. Cecil K. Drinker.

March 28. Some points of interest to the public in regard to medical education as brought out by the recent war. Dr. Channing Frothingham.

The trustees of the Ropes Memorial announce that the eighth course of lectures on botany is being given in the trustees' room at the Ropes Mansion, 318 Essex Street, Salem, Mass., by Professor M. L. Fernald, of Harvard University, on Thursday afternoons, at 4.15 o'clock, the subject being The Geographic Origin of the Flora of Northeastern America. The lectures are:

January 15. The maritime flora: the flowering plants of sea-margin salt marsh tidal estuaries and strands.

January 22. The coastal plain flora: the plants of sand hills; of Cape Cod; of eastern Newfoundland.

January 29. The deciduous forests: the Alleghenian flora and its history.

February 5. The Canadian forests: similarities and variations of circumpolar forest plants.

February 12. The actic-alpine flora: the contrasting ranges of the floras of the granitic, limestone and serpentine mountains of northern New England, Quebec and Newfoundland.

February 19. The cosmopolitan flora of the future.

The objects of the course are to present in brief outline the more striking features in the history of the floras of the northern hemisphere their antiquity, probable migrations and wholesale extinctions in geological time; and to make clear why, unless the more sensitive and easily exterminated of our wild flowers are intelligently safeguarded, they are doomed to early extinction.

THE ILLINOIS ACADEMY OF SCIENCES

THE thirteenth annual meeting of the Illinois State Academy of Science will be held at Danville. The preliminary program is as follows:

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 20

11 A.M. Business session. Reports of officers and committees.

2 P.M. General scientific session for the reading of papers.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 21

9 A.M. General scientific session for the reading of papers.

1:30 P.M. Business session. Election of officers.

The Indiana Academy of Science has been invited to participate and will send a number of delegates as well as contribute to the program. The South American expedition conducted jointly by the University of Indiana and the University of Illinois will be discussed by the director, Dean C. H. Eigenmann, of the University of Indiana.

Amendments to the constitution providing for the affiliation of the academy with the American Association for the Advancement of Science and creating two classes of members, viz., national members and local members, have been unanimously accepted and will come up for final adoption.

GIFT OF THE CARNEGIE CORPORATION TO THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES AND THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL

THE Carnegie Corporation of New York has announced its purpose to give $5,000,000 for the use of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Research Council. It is understood that a portion of the money will be used to erect in Washington a home of suitable architectural dignity for the two beneficiary organizations. The remainder will be placed in the hands of the academy, which enjoys a federal charter, to be used as a permanent endowment for the National Research Council. In announcing this gift the report from the council says:

This impressive gift is a fitting supplement to Mr. Carnegie's great contributions to science and industry.

The council is a democratic organization based

upon some forty of the great scientific and engineering societies of the country, which elect delegates to its constituent divisions. It is not supported or controlled by the government, differing in this respect from other similar organizations established since the beginning of the war in England, Italy, Japan, Canada and Australia. It intends, if possible to achieve in a democracy and by democratic methods the great scientific results which the Germans achieved by autocratic methods in an autocracy while avoiding the obnoxious features of the autocratic régime.

The council was organized in 1916 as a measure of national preparedness and its efforts during the war were mostly confined to assisting the government in the solution of pressing war-time problems involving scientific investigation. Reorganized since the war on a peace-time footing, it is now attempting to stimulate and promote scientific research in agriculture, medicine, and industry, and in every field of pure science. The war afforded a convincing demonstration of the dependence of modern nations upon scientific achievement, and nothing is more certain than that the United States will ultimately fall behind in its competition with the other great peoples of the world unless there be persistent and energetic effort expended to foster scientific discovery.

SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS DR. BURTON E. LIVINGSTON has been elected permanent secretary of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, to succeed Dr. L. O. Howard, elected president of the asociation. Dr. Livingston will retain the professorship of plant physiology at the Johns Hopkins University, and the office of the association will remain at the Smithsonian Institution.

DR. W. A. NOYES, head of the department of chemistry of the University of Illinois, has been elected president of the American Chemical Society.

AT the Cincinnati meeting of the Federation of Societies for Experimental Biology, presidents of the constituent societies were elected as follows: The American Physiological Society, Professor Warren P. Lombard, of the University of Michigan (reelected); the American Bio-chemical Society, Professor Stanley J. Benedict, of Cornell University;