Mr. Ellis makes a number of acute psychological and literary suggestions and concludes that a numerical study of color vision "possesses at least two uses in the precise study of literature. It is, first, an instrument for investigating a writer's personal psychology, by defining the nature of his æsthetic color vision. When we have ascertained a writer's color formula and his colors of prediction we can tell at a glance, simply and reliably, something about his view of the world which pages of description could only tell us with uncertainty. In the second place, it enables us to take a definite step in the attainment of a scientific æsthetic, by furnishing a means of comparative study. By its help we can trace the colors of the world as mirrored in literature from age to age, from country to country, and in finer shades among the writers of a single group. At least one broad and unexpected conclusion may be gathered from the tables here presented. Many foolish things have been written about the 'degeneration' of latter-day art. It is easier to dogmatize when you think that you are safe from the evidence of precise tests. But here is a reasonably precise test. And the evidence of this test, at all events, by no means furnishes support for the theory of decadence. On the contrary, it shows that the decadence, if anywhere, was at the end of the last century, and that our own vision of the world is fairly one with that of classic times, with Chaucer's and with Shakespeare's. At the end of the nineteenth century we can say this for the first time since Shakespeare died."--Science. * * * * * WHAT THE SEA HAS TAKEN. It was recently announced that the committee sitting under the presidency of Minister Lely, at the Hague, had determined to reclaim the Zuider Sea, and that for this purpose a dam is to be constructed from the peninsula of North Holland to the opposite coast of Friesland. This announcement brings back to recollection the proud old Dutch proverb: "God created the sea, the Hollander the coast." The proposal is to construct a dam from Ewyk, on the northeastern point of North Holland, to the island of Wieringen, and then from the eastern point of this island another dam, 18½ miles long, to the coast of Friesland, by the shortest route. The Hollanders, in their great reclamation works, the Sea of Harlem, for instance, prepare the entire foundation first and then gradually raise the dam on it. The watercourse is not narrowed during the progress of the work, as the dam is raised uniformly throughout the whole length; the current therefore passes slowly over it, and the dam is not subject to damage from flood waters. These deposit enormous quantities of sand and mud within the intercepted area, and after a few years the land shows above the surface of the water; the land while still in course of formation is locally known as "Heller," and the reclaimed land as "Polder."