44^ Biochemical News, Notes and Comment [June-September 



Sir Wm. Ramsay, recently writing on German " Kultur," shows 

 that o£ the 58 awards made during the past 12 years by the Swedish 

 Nobel Commit., only 17, or merely 30 percent, were received by 

 Germans and Austrians. The ratio of German and Austrian foreign 

 members and associates of the principal academies of the world is 

 only 28 percent. 



" Our foreign exchanges now contain an occasional article with 

 the subheading, ' Dedicated to Elias Metchnikoff on the occasion of 

 his 70th birthday, May 16, 191 5.' These articles had been prepared 

 for an international Festschrift, which was to have been presented 

 to him on that date, but the war broke up the plans for the volume, 

 and the contributions are being published separately in various 

 neutral Journals. He is a native of southern Russia but has had a 

 lab. at the Paris Pasteur Inst, since its erection, over 27 years ago. 

 His discoveries in phagocytosis were made previously in Italy. 

 Although he studied under German physicians, he never took a 

 degree in medicine." Jour. Amer. Med. Assoc, 191 5, Ixiv, p. 2080. 

 (See page 246.) 



Notes on the sanitation of military quarters and battlefields. 

 Dr. F. Bordas, Substitute prof., Coli, de France, has suggested to the 

 Acad. des sciences that the disinfection of cantonments, trenches 

 occupied by troops, and battlefields, be effected by copious spraying 

 with petroleum emulsified in water by means of a suitable amount of 

 rosin soap. 



" In the present war, in which the battle f ronts extend in France 

 and Belgium alone over more than 375 miles, the question of the 

 sanitation of battlefields has a special importance. ... In general, 

 the use of chemical agents and spray applications (coal tar, phenol, 

 ferrous sulfate, zinc sulfate, chlorinated lime, etc.), is recommended. 

 These chemical agents, however, are rather expensive and it is not 

 always possible to obtain them. It is therefore of interest to recall 

 that, in 1871, the Conseil d'hygiene publique recommended, and ap- 

 plied with success, an altogether different method, based on the 

 power possessed by vegetable growths of absorbing and transforming 

 decaying animal substances. By this method bodies are left where 

 they fall, but covered with a layer of earth no thicker than about 

 15 to 20 inches. It is necessary, however, to take care to bring the 



