* * * * *

The AMERICAN SCIENTIFIC ASSOCIATION assembled this year at New Haven, and Was presided over by Alex.  D. Bache, LL.  D. of the Coast Survey.  It was attended by many of the most eminent men of science in this country, among whom were President Woolsey, Professor Denison Olmsted, the elder and the younger Silliman, E. C. Herrick, and E. Loomis, of Yale College; Professors Louis Agassiz, E. N. Hosford and Benjamin Pierce of Harvard University; Lieutenant Charles H. Davis, U. S. N.; Professor O. M. Mitchell, Superintendent of the Cincinnati Observatory; Dr. A. L. Elwyn of Philadelphia; Professor Walter R. Johnson of Washington; Professor Joseph Henry, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution; William C. Redfield of New York; and an unusual number of amateur scholars from various parts of the Union.  There were several papers of remarkable value, among which that of Mr. Squier, our Charge d’Affaires for Central America, was perhaps at this period of the most general interest.  Others were puerile, and as unfit in subject as in ability for presentation in such an assembly.  It is to be regretted that the Association does not adopt the only protection against such discreditable annoyances, by insisting upon the submission of everything offered for its consideration to a competent private committee.

* * * * *

A GREAT NATIONAL SOCIETY FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING, is said to have been discussed recently at the meetings of inferior societies, and we have read a circular upon the subject, which contemplates a convention of scholars and men of letters, at Washington, some time in the coming winter.  The American Philosophical Society, founded by Franklin, and made respectable by the labors of many eminent men, is no longer in authority, and its proceedings command little attention.  The various societies for the cultivation of the natural sciences, in Philadelphia, Boston, and New York, are undoubtedly accomplishing much good, but the spheres and degrees of their influence would be greatly enlarged under a central organization.  In such a design, the initiative should be taken by men of nerve as well as men of abilities, so that the dead weights of mediocrity so constantly obtruding into and making ridiculous the present societies, should be altogether excluded.

Hitherto, in this city, the most reputable and dignified association connected with the advancement of learning, has been the Ethnological Society.  It is to be feared that with the death of Mr. Gallatin, its president, and the dispersion of so many of its active members in the diplomatic service, its action hereafter will deserve less consideration than has thus far been awarded to it.

LAMARTINE’S APOLOGY FOR HIS CONFIDENCES.