We cannot foresee to what extent the board will be called upon. It has not power to take the initiative; but we hope its rulings will prove acceptable; that it may establish a reputation that will be recognized by the people as well as by the departments interested in its organization; and that eventually rules may be recommended for the nomenclature of our own country that may be an acceptable guide in the determination of new names, as well as in the interpretation of those now in question. * * * * * MR. HERRLE: Any one conversant with the state of geographic nomenclature of a large part of the world cannot fail to appreciate the difficulties in the way of the establishment of a comprehensive and uniform system of writing geographic names, that would be acceptable to all nations using the Roman alphabet in their literature. But while some advance towards international uniformity has been made within the last five years, we are still very far from it; we may, however, at least rejoice in the prospect of the general acceptance of a uniform system in geographic orthography by all writing the English language. I refer to the action of the British Hydrographic Office and of the Royal Geographical Society in 1885, when they adopted certain _main_ principles to guide the orthography of geographic names, and thereby took an important and far-reaching step in the line of a reform which had already been too long delayed. In France a reform in geographic nomenclature had been earnestly agitated by Édouard de Luze since 1880, and soon after the publication of the system adopted by the Royal Geographical Society, the Société de Géographie appointed a commission which, in 1886, reported a system for the guidance of French geographers. In Germany, we also find individual attempts made (Egli, Kirchhoff, Ewald and others) to bring system into the orthography and pronunciation of geographic names, primarily with a view to secure uniformity in text books and in the teaching of geography in schools. No doubt influenced by the action of the British and French geographic societies the Imperial German Hydrographic office in 1888 also established rules for guidance in its future publications. We thus see three of the principal nations of Europe inaugurate a reform, the beneficial effects of which will not, however, become apparent until a sufficient time has elapsed, that is, until the British, French and Germans have had time to apply the rules in their publications, and particularly in the construction of new and in the correction of old charts. No reform of this nature can be carried through by the stroke of a pen, but a generation's life-time will be required to accomplish it. The adopted rules which lay down a general phonetic principle only require, of course, perfection in details, so as to furnish an unerring guide in the treatment of names belonging to special languages.