Scott, professor of zoology at Princeton University, will preside, succeeding Dr. W. W. Keen, who after ten years of distinguished service would not permit himself to be reelected.

The general lecture will be given in the hall of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania on the evening of April 19, by Lieutenant Colonel R. A. Millikan, of the Department of Science and Research of the Council of National Defence, whose subject will be "Science in relation to the war."

The annual dinner will be held at the University Club, on the evening of April 20.

On the afternoon of April 20, there will be a symposium on "Food-problems in relation to the war" the program of which is as follows:

Introductory Remarks, by Herbert C. Hoover, B.A., U. S. Food Administrator, and by Alonzo E. Taylor, M.D., professor of physiological chemistry, University of Pennsylvania.

"Physiological effects of prolonged reduced diet on twenty-five men," by Francis G. Benedict, Ph.D., ScD., director of the Nutrition Laboratory of the Carnegie Institution of Washington.

SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS Ar a meeting held on March 19, the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia elected as correspondents, John H. Comstock, Herbert S. Jennings, Frank R. Lillie, Alfred G. Mayer, John C. Merriam, George H. Parker and Charles R. Van Hise.

Ar a meeting of the Rumford Committee of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences held on March 13 last the following grants for research were voted: To Professor F. K. Richtmyer, of Cornell University, in aid of his researches on the optical properties of

thin films (additional to a former appropriation), $500. To Professor Arthur L. Foley, of the University of Indiana, for his research on the photography of the electric spark at different periods of its history, $150. To Professor Orin Tugman, of the University of Utah, for his research on the conductivity of thin metal films when exposed to ultra-violet light, $100.

THE following fifteen candidates have been selected by the council of the Royal Society to be recommended for election into the society: Charles Bolton, Henry C. H. Carpenter, Thomas A. Chapman, Gerald P. L. Conyngham, C. Clifford Dobell, Ernest Gold, Henry B. Guppy, Albert G. Hadcock, Archibald V. Hill, James C. Irvine, Thomas Lewis, Srinivasa Ramanujan, Arthur W. Rogers, Samuel Smiles and Frank E. Smith.

THE Paris Academy of Sciences has elected two national correspondents for the sections of anatomy and zoology. M. Vayssière, professor of the faculty of sciences at Marseilles, has been elected to take the place of the late M. Renaut, and M. Cuénot, professor at the University of Nancy, has been elected to take the place of the late M. Maupas.

THE introduction of compulsory rationing in Great Britain and the discontinuance of the voluntary propaganda department has led the food controller to reorganize the food economy division of the ministry hitherto conducted by Sir Arthur Yapp. It will now consist of four branches: public services food consumption, national kitchens, public catering, and an educational branch under the direction of Professor E. H. Starling, F.R.S. The coordination and control of the departments will be exercised by a Food Survey Board, of which the directors of the several departments will be members, with Lieutenant Colonel A. G. Weigall, M.P., as chairman.

PROFESSOR W. W. WATTS, professor of geology at the Imperial College of Science and Technology, has been elected a member of the Athenæum Club, London, for "eminence in science."

MR. R. BULLEN NEWTON, of the geological department, British Museum (Natural History), has completed fifty years active government service. During the earlier part of his official career, which commenced on January 6, 1868, Mr. Newton was one of the assistant naturalists of the Geological Survey under the late Professor Huxley. He was transferred to the British Museum in August, 1880, at the time of the removal of the Natural History Collections to Cromwell Road.

PROFESSOR C. H. LEES has been elected president of the Physical Society of London. The Vice-presidents are Professor J. W. Nicholson, Professor O. W. Richards, Dr. S. W. J. Smith and Dr. E. W. Sumpner.

PROFESSOR TUFFIER, of Paris, has been promoted to the rank of commander of the Legion of Honor in recognition of his eminent services as consulting surgeon to the French armies.

MAJOR J. G. FITZGERALD, associate professor of hygiene and director of the Connaught and Antitoxin Laboratories in the University of Toronto, has left for active service overseas in the Royal Army Medical Corps, having been transferred from the Canadian Army Medical Corps.

DR. WILLIAM P. WOOD, assistant professor of chemical engineering at the University of Michigan, has resigned, to join the Signal Corps of the Army.

CAPTAIN LAWRENCE MARTIN, National Army, ordinarily associate professor of physiography and geography at the University of Wisconsin, is on duty in the Military Intelligence Section, War College Division, Office of the Chief of Staff, War Department, Washington, D. C. He has charge of the map room at the War College and of the maps in the offices of the War Council and of the Chief of Staff, and does geographical work for the General Staff in the combat branch of the Intelligence Service.

ACCORDING to the Journal of the American Medical Association Dr. Edgar M. Green, of Easton, Pa., a member of the advisory board of the state health department, is mentioned

as the probable successor of the late Dr. Samuel G. Dixon, health commissioner of Pennsylvania.

F. B. HOWE, M.S. (Iowa State College '16), has accepted a position as land classifier with the U. S. Geological Survey.

On the evening of February 20, Dr. Edmund Otis Hovey, curator of geology in the American Museum of Natural History, gave a lecture at Mount Holyoke College on the subject, "Two years' experience in the Arctic with the Crocker Land Expedition."

PROFESSOR H. C. SHERMAN, of Columbia University, spoke to the Virginia Section of the American Chemical Society at Richmond, on March 15, and at the Randolph-Macon Woman's College, Lynchburg, on March 16, on "The food situation from the viewpoint of nutrition."

THE fourth Guthrie Lecture of the Physical Society of London was delivered on March 22, at the Imperial College of Science, South Kensington, by Professor J. C. McLennan, of the University of Toronto. The subject was "The origin of spectra."

THE Journal of the American Medical Association states that the attention of the Surgeon-General of the United States Public Health Service has been called to the fact that men from the military service who are carriers of various infectious diseases, particularly meningitis, have been discharged into the civil communities of the country. Dr. Oscar Dowling, president of the Louisiana State Board of Health, has made a particularly strong protest against this action by the government authorities, calling attention to specific instances in which meningococcus carriers have been discharged from the service.

UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL
NEWS

A FELLOWSHIP in physiological chemistry has been established at the University of Chicago by the Fleischmann Company, of Peekskill-onHudson, New York, for the purpose of in

vestigating some of the scientific questions which have arisen in the course of the manufacture of compressed yeast under present war conditions. The university has appointed the first fellow on this foundation, who is now engaged in research upon the problems.

DR. WILLIAM M. JARDINE has been appointed president of the Kansas State Agricultural College and entered upon his duties on March 1. Dr. Jardine had been connected with the college for about eight years, first as professor of agronomy and for five years as dean of the division of agriculture and director of the Agricultural Experiment Station.

DR. F. E. DENNY, of the University of Chicago, has been appointed research assistant in horticulture in the Oregon Agricultural College, to fill the vacancy left by the resignation of Mr. Magness, the appointment to take effect on April 1.

DR. HELEN M. GILKEY, of the University of California, has been appointed assistant professor of botany and curator of the herbarium in the Oregon Agricultural College, to succeed the late H. S. Hammon.

DR. ETHEL M. TERRY, of the department of chemistry of the University of Chicago, has been appointed to an assistant professorship.

DR. FRED W. UPSON, for the past four years professor of agricultural chemistry in the Nebraska College of Agriculture, will, on June 1, become head of the department of chemistry in the University of Nebraska. A chemical laboratory which is modern in every respect, will be ready for occupancy at that time.

DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE AN APPARENTLY NEW PRINCIPLE IN THE FLOW OF HEAT

SUPPOSE a number of horizontal metallic strips are maintained at constant temperatures, the first one at a low temperature, the next at successively higher temperatures, the last one being at the maximum temperature of a Bunsen flame, say a white heat. Let them all be of the same metal and have like surfaces.

Now suppose the same Bunsen flame be applied under like conditions to each strip. Ac

cording to text-books and the laws of the transference of heat as usually taught, one would be led to believe that the coldest one should absorb the heat from the flame most rapidly, the next one less rapidly, and so on. Tests made by the writer, however, show this to be an error and that up to a certain high temperature exactly the reverse is the case; the coldest one will absorb the least amount of heat from the flame, the next hotter one will absorb more and so on up to a temperature at which the rate of absorption will be a maximum, after which it diminishes again, becoming zero for the one whose temperature is equal to that of the flame.

As stated in the premises, the heat which enters the metal from the flame is supposed to be conducted away as fast as it enters, and it is this heat which is measured. This could be carried out by using flat-bottomed iron cups crucibles containing various materials having successively higher but fixed boiling points, say like liquid air, water, sulphur,

or

zinc, etc.

When a very hot gas, like that in a flame, impinges on a relatively very cold surface from which the heat is led off as fast as it enters, like in the boiling of water by flame heat, a peculiar phenomenon takes place in that the equivalent of a very thin film of extremely high thermal resistance is formed on the surface exposed to the flame. Considered as a thermal resistance, the writer finds that for a constant temperature flame its resistance decreases rapidly as the temperature of the absorbing surface increases, contrary to what would have been supposed. The transmission of heat therefore increases as the absorbing surface becomes hotter and reaches a maximum which appears to be roughly when the drop of temperature from the flame to the surface is equal to that from this surface to the constant temperature boiling liquid; the transmission then must fall again, becoming zero when the temperature of the boiling liquid is equal to that of the flame. This increase of temperature of the surface (to about a red heat when water is being boiled) can be brought about by inserting a properly pro

portioned thermal resistance between the heatreceiving surface and the boiling liquid. This was shown by the writer in an article on "A New Principle in the Flow of Heat" in the Journal of the Franklin Institute, January, 1918, page 75, and another in Power for January 1, 1918. In this way the writer has transmitted heat from a flame to water from 25 to 30 times as fast through the same area of surface.

It seems likely that this supposed high-resistance film is not a true thermal resistance, its estimated resistivity being many times that of good insulators like felt, but that the true explanation is that when hot gases impinge on a relatively very cold surface much of the heat is reflected and but little is transmitted. Perhaps the transference of the momenta of the moving molecules constituting heat is the explanation, in which case that part of the energy which is not transmitted is reflected. CARL HERING

PHILADELPHIA, PA., February 15, 1918

THE AURORA OF MARCH 7, 1918 THOSE who saw the aurora of August 26, 1916, did not expect to see such a display repeated within a life time, but on March 7, 1918, there was a similar spectacle which from reports must have been visible over practically all of the northern hemisphere of the earth. I first noticed the aurora low down in the north, about 7 P.M., but in half an hour clouds had come, which continued for an hour or so. At 9.30 I happened to be out of doors and saw that something startling was in prospect, as the sky was clear and the aurora was growing rapidly. The general effect and appearance of the display was accurately described by Dr. Tomlinson of our geology department,1 and I shall limit my account to the determination of the position of the radiant or apparent focus of the auroral streamers. It was very striking that just when the display was at its maximum the streamers seemed to come from Saturn.

In the following notes Central Standard 1 SCIENCE, March 22.

Time, 6 hours slow of Greenwich is used, the position being latitude 40° 6' north, longitude 88° 13' west.

9h. 31m. Streamers rising. Cloud-like form in southeast.

9h. 36m. Radiant exactly at Saturn. Half of sky or more covered. To west and over Jupiter a broad band of red, 10° or 15° wide. This is southern edge of the aurora in that direction.

9h. 41m. Radiant 2° north of Saturn. Radiant 2° northeast of Saturn. Radiant fainter.

9h. 44m.

9h. 46m.

9h. 51m. 10h. 38m.

All of light is now below Polaris.
Only faint glow low down.

No further display was noted by our observers at the telescope, who worked until several hours after midnight.

Averaging the three estimates, we have that at 9h. 40.3m. the radiant was 1°.1 north and 0°.5 east of Saturn. The magnetic elements for Urbana are: declination 3° 13′ east, dip 71° 5', determined by Mr. Merrymon in 1917, and kindly communicated by the superintendent of the U. S. Coast and Geodetic Survey. From the ephemeris position of Saturn, we readily find then for comparison:

against the belief, formerly held by some, that this phenomenon is due solely to local conditions.

Here the broad central arc formed low in the northern sky, its highest point being about 20° above the horizon and identical in direction with our magnetic north. It first appeared about 8 P.M. and was then most pronounced (though without definite form) in the northwest. In color the light consisted chiefly of white, yellowish green, and dull red but was at no time very bright, though its varied radial streamers attracted much attention. Its maximum was reached about 10 P.M., when it advanced beyond the zenith to a point about 60° above the southern horizon and covered the major portion of the sky.

IOWA STATE COLLEGE,

P.M.

AMES, IOWA,

March 18, 1918

JOHN E. SMITH

On the evening of March 7 there occurred at La Crosse, Wisconsin, the finest display of northern lights that the writer has ever seen here. There seems to be no record or remembrance of any equal display. The lights were observed more or less from 7:30 till 12 The best were seen from 9:45 to 10:45 P.M. During this time shafts of light starting from the horizon would shoot to the zenith. These shafts would be in the north, northeast, or northwest. After these started, others would follow them till three fourths of the heavens were covered with these shafts of light, for they extended south of west and south of east. In the parts of the heavens farthest south the shafts of light were broken just below the zenith but in the other parts of the heavens the shafts were continuous from the horizon to the zenith. The shafts did not flicker or flash as observed at other times but they remained stationary for a period and then died out.

The most remarkable thing was the colors exhibited. After the shafts had been established faint tinges of red appeared which became brighter till the heavens from the northwest to the northeast, and for three fourths of the way from the horizon to the zenith

were covered with a bright crimson red glow. The scene was magnificent and never to be forgotten.

The above light forms would stay for some minutes and then they would all die away and leave only a greenish hue in the north. In a few minutes more all would be repeated again. This repetition was noted several times in succession till about 10:45 it all faded into the greenish hue which lasted an hour.

Other colors were observed as yellows and purples. These were seen as faint light toward the zenith but the prominent color was the red which with the definitely formed shafts gave a special character to these northern lights which will be easily remembered by the observers. G. H. BRETNALL

STATE NORMAL SCHOOL,

LA CROSSE, WIS.

AN OLD RECORD OF ALBINO TURKEY
BUZZARDS

THE appearance in SCIENCE at intervals during the past two or three years of accounts by various observers of albino birds has interested the present writer very much, and all the more because he has never been so fortunate as to see such a bird. Recently while reading the voyages of Captain William Dampier, his attention was forcibly called to the account by this keen-eyed explorer which is given herewith in the belief that it may prove of interest and value to some of the readers of SCIENCE.

Carrion crows are blackish Fowles, about the Bigness of Ravens; they have bald Heads and reddish bald necks like Turkeys. . . These live wholly on Flesh (and are therefore called Carrion Crows). . . . Some of the Carrion Crows are all over white, but their Feathers look as if they were sullied: they have bald Heads and Necks like the rest; they are of the same Bigness and Make; without any Difference but in Color; and we never see above one or two of these white ones at a time; and 'tis seldom also that we see a great Number of the black ones, but that we see one white one amongst them. The Logwood-Cutters [of Campeachy] call the white ones King-Carrion Crows.

This account is found on page 168 of Volume II. of the 1729 edition of Dampier's "Voyages" as edited by John Masefield and