2o8 THE SCIENTIFIC MONTHLY
cial government is the work of the Dr. Frederic W. Simonds, professor of
irrigation companies, which number geology in the University of Texas, was
nearly three hundred in the province; elected president for the year. Dr.
most of them, of course, control only Simonds was one of the first five grad-
a few miles of pipe lines and have a uate students elected to membership in
low capitalization. The largest irriga- the Cornell chapter.
tion project in Canada is at Bassano, «„„ t * *.- i tt i^i. /^ .„ *^ "^ , . .^ ,, ., ,. „ .^ The International Health Commis- Alberta, and m it the Canadian Pacific . i. ..v t» i - n -r^ , ..
T, ., , , , . , , A,.An/./A sion of the Rockefeller Foundation, sent
Railway has already invested $10,000,- ^ ^ ., , , , ,. ,
nriA \iru * 4.1. 1- i! 1.1. *o Brazil to make a general medical
000. Whatever the dimensnons of the ^ , , **
„ , ^ ., ij i. *v i. * purvey of the southern part of the
company, however, the fact that its "^ ^
revenues depend upon a supply of '^"°*'^' ^*" returned. The oommis- water from the hills and the additional "^^'^ consisted of Professor Richard M, fact that stripping the hills of timber ^^"^' ^^ *^® University of Pennsyl- growth ruins the water supply, brings ^^^^^^ chairman; Major Bailey K. Ash- to the side of forest protection a very ^^^^^ «>^ ^he U. S. Medical .Corps; Dr. fjtrong influence. John A. Ferrell, of the International
In the interior of British Columbia, H®*^^** Commission, and a secretary, from which the accompanying photo- They were absent for about four graphs were taken, irrigation has ■ months and the work included a study reached a high degree of perfection. ' of the general educational system in Barren lands were bought up by com- Brazil, the medical schools, hospitals panies at a few dollars an acre and an<l dispensaries, and public health or- resold at a thousand dollars an acre, ganization.— The Carnegie Institution Those who have bought at these prices expedition to Tobago, British West have in numbers of cases made large In<lieF, was exceptionally successful, profits from' fruit cultivation. The The southwestern end of Tobago eon- growth of fruit trees and of the fruit sis^s of elevated coral-bearing lime- is very rapid because of the steady atones and the coast from Milford Bay supply of moisture, although the quality northward is flanked by a modern coral of the product is regarded by many as reef. Dr. Hulwrt Lyman Clark, of not quite equal to that of non-irri- Harvard University, collected 73 species sated lands. of echinoderms in this region, and of
these Dr. Th. Mortensen, of Copen-
SCIENTIFIC ITEMS hagen University, reared 10 throughout
Dr. Charles Horace Mayo, of their larval stages; among them a
Rochester, Minn., was elected president crinoid Tropiometra which was abund-
of the American Medical Asociation at ant over the shallow reef-flats. Dr. A.
the recent Detroit meeting. Dr. Wil- G. Mayer studied the Siphonophores, the
liam J. Mayo, his brother, was presi- pelagic life being abundant, due to the
dent in 1906. — Dr. Henry M. Howe, fact that the water of the great equa-
emeritus professor of metallurgy in torial drift of the Atlantic strikes im-
Columbia University, has been appointed , mediately upon the coast of Tobago,
honorary vice-president of the Iron and ' The coastal waters of Tobago are those
Steel Institute of Great Britain. — At of the clear blue tropical ocean, for
a meeting of the Texas chapter of the the inland lies to the northward of the
Society of the Sigma Xi, on June o, muddy shores of Trinidad.
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