battle. The King escaped, so that reports of further trouble may be expected at any time. These difficulties have been complicated by the mutiny of a portion of the Soudanese force engaged upon another expedition, under Major Macdonald, into the interior of Uganda. The trouble, which appears to be only another expression of the prevailing Mohammedan revival wherever the rcligion of Mahomet is held, broke out October 19, when an attack was made on the British camp and four English officers were killed before the mutineers could be driven off. A detachment of Indian troops stationed at Mombasa was at once sent to reinforce the Wasoga native troops who remained faithful to the English officers; and the effective punishment of the revolted forces may confidently be predicted.

The Cavendish Expedition. Mr. H. S. H. Cavendish, the twenty-one year old cousin of the Duke of Devonshire, with his friend, Lieutenant Andrew, started in the summer of 1896 on a sporting expedition after big game in Eastern Central Africa. On October 2, 1897, a dispatch from Rome announced the massacre of every one connected with his expedition; and fifteen days later, he returned to London in person, reporting a remarkably successful expedition, not only from the point of view of a sportsman, but from that of a scientific explorer. He visited a considerable tract of unexplored territory, of which he made careful maps, showing many interesting geographical features. His records of the game and flora of the country, as well as of the people whom he encountered, are replete with important information of scientific value.

Abyssinia. Historically, the most interesting results of the Cavendish expedition are the details which it brought back of events in Abyssinia since the battle of Adowa. Several European missions have visited the capital of Abyssinia since the defeat of the Italians; but none of these, apparently, learned of the military operations which succeeded that very momentous battle. Ras Makonnen, the great Abyssinian general, led his forces, full of the ardor of victory, on a campaign of conquest against their Soudanese neighbors, the Somali. They proceeded on their raid down the Webbe-Shebeyli river nearly to the forty-fifth parallel. There their enemies turned upon them, and overwhelmed them with superior

numbers, Ras Makonnen and all of his force being killed. or enslaved, save a few who were sent home with a taunting announcement of the event. The reports of this battle received by Mr. Cavendish were supplemented by those obtained by Mr. J. Bennett Stanford, who returned in October from an exploring expedition into Somaliland. Both parties were shown numerous Italian rifles, which seemed to confirm the stories told by the native chiefs.

SCIENCE.

The Yerkes Observatory.-A new era in the history of astronomical progress was undoubtedly ushered in with the formal dedication, on October 21, of the Yerkes Observatory of the University of Chicago. In facilities for astronomical research, that institution now leads the world.

The location of the observatory, selected from twenty-six eligible sites, is near Lake Geneva and just outside the village of Williams Bay, Wis. It is thirty-eight miles west of Lake Michigan and seventy-five miles northwest of Chicago.

This observatory, with its 40-inch objective and all the attendant equipment, is in every way the leading astronomical station on the globe. Mr. Charles T. Yerkes, who donated this plant, costing more than $350,000, is the street railway multi-millionaire of Chicago. For the lens alone Mr. Yerkes paid $66,000; for the equatorial mounting, $55,000; for the “rising floor" and dome, $45,000; for the building and mechanical appointments, $145,000; for the land, $50,000; while many lesser expenses are not known to the public.

The building, of brown Roman brick with terra cotta trimmings, is shaped, as may be seen from the picture, like the Latin cross, the "stem" running west with the cross at the east end. The big telescope is mounted under a dome, 92 feet in diameter, at the western end of the "stem." Smaller domes rise at each end of the cross. In one of these is a 12-inch glass, and in the other a 16-inch glass.

The great 40-inch glass is mounted in a tube sixty-four feet long. The "dew cap," which shelters the object-glass from mist or frost, extends eight feet from the large end; and a "spectroheliograph" about ten feet long is attachable at the eye end. The telescope is hung 43 feet above the base, so that the "dew cap" is 80 feet above the base. The floor is movable, to accommodate the astronomer when he changes the angle of the mighty instrument with the horizon. The clock which "drives" the tube as it sweeps the heavens, weighs a ton, and moves a mass of instruments and

appointments weighing twenty tons. For photographing the sun there is an attached tube 64 feet long with a six-inch lens. There is also an appliance for photographing the stellar spectra. Now for the first time these experts, who have it in charge, George E. Hale, S. W. Burnham, E. E. Barnard, and F. L. O. Wadsworth, can "divide close doubles," which has hitherto been impossible. This glass has one-fourth more power than the largest glass in use up to this time-the 36-inch objective at the Lick Observatory on Mount Hamilton, near San Jose, Cal. George E. Hale, the director, is a young man, but one of the most ingenious and brilliant astronomers in the world.

America easily leads the world in astronomical wisdom and research. Her first great triumph in the field of astronomy was in 1763-7, when Mason and Dixon's line was run beyond the possibilities of dispute by means of astronomical observations. A second American triumph was in connection with observations of the comet of 1843 and the discovery of Neptune, made possible by new American observatories. The first of these equipments was a private telescope in Dorchester, Mass., followed by a brilliant leadership at Yale, and culminating in the National Observatory at Washington. The third great advance was at the time of the Civil War, when the spectroscope was invented, changing the whole aspect of astronomical achievement, opening an era unparalleled in scientific history. Princeton led off in the "race of the telescopes," of which there are now eight large glasses in America. Prof. Charles A. Young of Princeton, with a 23-inch glass, gave the world its first authentic list of lines in the spectrum, 1872, and his authority has not been questioned. In 1893 Percival Lowell, a Boston literarian, had an 18-inch glass made for observations at an altitude of 7,250 feet, at Flagstaff, Arizona, and in 1896 a 24-inch glass for the same observatory; and as a result he has added materially to our knowledge of Mars, Venus, and Mercury. In 1895 Harvard secured a glass nearly as large as Mr. Lowell's, the gift of Miss Bruce of New York. This is constructed quite differently from the other glasses. It was taken to the Andes, Arequipa, Peru-at an elevation of 8,200 feet. It is the largest purely photographic telescope in the world, and is being used to obtain a photograph of the Southern heavens. Professor William Harkness of the Naval Observatory at Washington has a 26-inch glass. The Chamberlain University, Denver, Col., has a 20-inch glass; and the University of Virginia has a 26-inch glass. Until the Yerkes, the Lick Observatory, with a 36-inch glass, placed ten years ago at Mt. Hamilton, San Jose, Cal., was the largest glass in the world. This cost $50,000, and was the gift of Mr. D. O. Mills. Prof. E. S. Holden was long in charge of this observatory. It is said that the Paris Exposition in 1900 is to have, if possible, a 48-inch glass.

It may be said that since 1872 Young and Langley have revealed the sun in a new light; Hough and Lowell have revolutionized the planets; Brooks and Barnard have placed the comets on a new scientific course; while Draper and Pickering have given new life to the stars.

Now the Yerkes Observatory, by adding one-fourth to the power by which the heavens are viewed, opens a fourth era, in which already much that is new and interesting is being discovered

daily. This glass brings the moon nearer to Boston than Albany or New York. The glass was cast in the rough in Paris about twenty years ago, and was designed for the University of California; but when it was learned how much it would cost to finish it, the plan was abandoned, and the grinding of the glass was not undertaken until 1893. Mr. Clark was four years in finishing it for Mr. Yerkes.

The opening of this observatory in October was a memorable occasion. For five days there was assembled the most remarkable gathering of astronomers from all over the world ever brought together. This group

of nearly a thousand persons listened to addresses such as have never been delivered in one week upon this great subject. The great scientists all "camped out" in luxurious style in the observatory itself; and these festivities. of science ended at the University of Chicago when President and Mrs. W. R. Harper gave a luncheon to the distinguished scientists, and Mr. Yerkes gave a dinner to the visitors which was in every way worthy the occasion.

This 40-inch refractor was the last masterpiece of Alvan G. Clark of Cambridge, Mass., who died before the observatory was dedicated (p. 516). The father, Alvan Clark, and the son, made every great glass used in the world's modern astronomical research. This is a fitting crown to the great work of these masters.

It is the purpose of the trustees to keep the observatory force down to solid work, and consequently the public will have no privileges there for the present. In this way the sensational element is to be eliminated, and special attention will be given to micrometrical observations of stars, satellites, comets, and nebulæ; to solar investigations; to spectroscopic researches on the chemical composition of the stars and their motion as related to the earth; and to providing for special investigations of astronomical or related physical problems.

Patagonia Explored.-Early in 1896 an expedition was organized by Princeton University, under control of Prof. Scott of the United States Geological Survey, for the purpose of exploring Patagonia. It returned in August,

1897.

The principal object of the expedition was to collect vertebrate fossils from the tertiary deposits, and the skins and skeletons of recent birds and mammals. The objective point was the port of Gallegos, on the east coast of southern Patagonia. From this point investigations were conducted along the coast from Sandy