64 



NATURE 



[November io, 1910 



imperative to institute, instead of the old and primitive 

 methods, systematic technical training for young men. 

 There is probably no field of work in modern times where 

 so great an amount of well-ordered experimental investi- 

 gation has been undertaken as in engineering. Referring 

 to the advantages of engineering workshops, Mr. Parsons 

 said that knowledge, more especially of the practical kind, 

 must be acquired when a man is receptive, and at such 

 an age when ideas and impressions become so ingrained 

 as to constitute intuitive and guiding principles in after 

 life. In the engineering laboratory students are brought 

 face to face with materials and machinery for dealing 

 with and discovering principles ; they gradually acquire a 

 familiarity with practical engineering and the power to 

 think in engineering materials, and to form a mental pic- 

 ture when it is necessary to design a new or improve an 

 old machine or to design new methods of work. Such a 

 training fits a student to go out into the world with mind 

 and eyes alert, ready to acquire more knowledge, and fit 

 to command success in most branches of engineering. By 

 the help of good technical training a much larger propor- 

 tion of men of high standard are produced than formerly — 

 men of knowledge capable of taking the lead and com- 

 manding, and able and willing to deal fairly with their 

 subordinates. 



The executive council of the County Councils' Associa- 

 tion has made a series of recommendations with regard 

 to rural education. They follow the main lines of the 

 proposals of the Departmental Committee on Agricultural 

 Education, which reported two years ago. Among other 

 plans, the council encourages the formation of separate 

 agricultural committees appointed by the county education 

 committees. Another proposal is to appoint, in consulta- 

 tion with the agricultural college with which the counlv 

 may be associated, a resident agricultural instructor and 

 adviser at a salary of not less than 500Z. per annum, who 

 shall be under the control of the county council. The 

 duties of this officer will be to give courses of lectures 

 during the winter months ; to supervise experiments and 

 demonstration plots ; to visit farms, small holdings, or 

 allotments, and advise as to the appearance of disease in 

 crops, insect pests, and on other matters ; to meet bodies 

 of farmers at local exhibitions and shows for the purpose 

 of discussion ; to organise classes for instruction in farm 

 labour subjects and prize competitions in connection with 

 such subjects as hedging, ditching, and thatching ; and to 

 advise the committee as to the establishment of permanent 

 centres for agricultural instruction. It is also suggested 

 that each county should organise, with the aid of the 

 agricultural adviser, developments of a semi-educational 

 character in connection with cooperative small holdings, 

 instruction in pig-breeding, the establishment of poultry 

 societies for improving breed and management, the pro- 

 vision of instruction in bee-keeping, the establishment of 

 demonstration small holdings, the provision of a central 

 county garden with demonstration and experimental centres 

 for horticulture, and the provision of a demonstration 

 farm of 100 to 300 acres, which might be used later as the 

 nucleus of a farm institute. The association estimates 

 that 2ooo^ per annum will be needed as a commencement, 

 and suggests that an apolication should be made for a 

 grant of this amount. The association has adopted the 

 view of the Departmental Committee that " agricultural 

 education is of such vital importance to the United 

 Kingdom that no effort should be spared in making the 

 provision for it as full and complete as possible," and 

 that a complete system of technical agricultural education 

 is " the natural corollary to the vast sums spent on 

 elementary education in the rural parts of the countrv." 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 

 Roval Society, November 3.— Sir Archibald Geikie. 

 K.C.B., president, in the chair. — Sir D. Bruce and 

 others : (i) Trypanosome diseases of domestic animals in 

 Uganda. II. — Trypanosoma brucei (Plimmer and Brad- 

 ford). (2) Trypanosome diseases of domestic animals in 

 Uganda. III. — Trypanosoma vivax (Ziemann). — H. G. 

 Plimmer, W. B. Fry, and H. S. Ranken : Further results 

 of the experimental treatment of trypanosomiasis : being 

 NO. 2 141, VOL. 85] 



a progress report to a committee of the Royal .Socieiv 

 This paper gives detailed results of the continuation <•! 

 the work which has been going on under the direction v 

 a subcommittee of the Royal Society. The general result 

 have confirmed an opinion which the authors have befoi 

 expressed, viz. that antimony is a more powerful trypan< 

 cide than arsenic, and that such compounds as they ha\ 

 tried have not shown such severe toxic effects as som 

 arsenic compounds have. But there are unpleasant effeti- 

 produced (varying according to the animal used) by anti- 

 mony, such as sloughing and necrosis at the seat of injec- 

 tion and severe pain, so they have devoted considerable 

 time to the study of new methods and new forms of 

 antimony. Finding that in dogs the subcutaneous and 

 intramuscular administration caused pain and sloughing of 

 the tissues, intravenous injections of the salts were tried. 

 The elimination of the antimony was so rapid, however, 

 that, beyond prolonging life, little good effect was pro- 

 duced ; so that eventually the injection of the metal itself, 

 in state of finest division (devised and prepared for thenT 

 by Dr. R. H. Aders Plimmer, of University College), was 

 tried. This is taken up by the leucocytes, and is gradu- 

 ally transformed into some soluble compound, and their 

 idea was that perchance it might be carried to parts of 

 the body not easily accessible to other methods of adminis- 

 tration. The results so far have been, on the whole, more 

 satisfactory than those of any other means they have 

 tried, but the technique in many animals is difficult, ancf 

 there have been difficulties in the preparation of the 

 antimony. .Although putting a metal into the circulation 

 sounds impossible, they have not had any case of plugging 

 of capillaries in rats, guinea-pigs, rabbits, dogs, goats, or 

 horses. It of course acts much more slowly than the 

 salts, and takes from two to three times as long to clear 

 the peripheral circulation of trypanosomes as subcutaneous 

 injection of a salt does. But the excretion is also much 

 slower, so that the blood and organs are in much longer 

 contact with antimony than when a salt is administered. 

 If carefully administered no irritation of the tissues is 

 produced, and the vessel walls are not affected. Animals 

 appear to be more susceptible to overdosage than with 

 the salts ; and it is curious that an animal with trypano- 

 somes in the biood can bear well a dose which is fatal 

 to a healthy animal. It has also been used intra- 

 peritoneally successfully in rats and rabbits. A number of 

 experiments have been made with silver salts, with nega- 

 tive results in every case. A number of experiments have 

 been made with two new compounds (one an arsenic- 

 camohor compound, one an organic antimon ,' compound) 

 kindly sent to them by Dr. Morgan, of .he Imoerial 

 College of Science, with negative results. — D;-. J. W. W. 

 Stephens and Dr. H. B. Fantham : The peculiar 

 morphology of a trypanosome from a case of sleeptng 

 sickness, and the possibility of its being a new species 

 (Trypanosoma rhodesiense). The main points of the 

 paper may be thus summarised : — (i) This trvpanosome 

 was first observed by one of the authors (J. W. \V. S.) 

 in February in the blood of a rat infected from a case 

 of sleeping sickness. (2) The patient, W. A., infected 

 in Rhodesia, had never been in Glossina paJpalis areas, 

 though he had been in areas infested with G. morsitans 

 and G. fusca. (3) The trypanosome shows long forms and 

 short stout or stumpy forms with hardiy any free 

 flagellum, but it is unique in that about 6 per cent, of 

 the forms have the nucleus at the posterior (non-flagellar) 

 end near the blepharoplast. and in some cases actually 

 posterior to it. (4) Such forms have not been described 

 before in any known strain of T. gambiense. (5) Pro- 

 longed search has been made for them in the stock labora- 

 tory strain of T. gambiense, but they have not been found. 

 (6) They are not due to the drying of the blood films, 

 because they can be seen by intra vitam staining, and 

 because dried films of the ordinary T. gambiense strain 

 do not show them. (7) They are not degenerate, as 

 division forms of them occur. (8) Thev are not due to 

 drug treatment, because the original animals were inocu- 

 lated before treatment was begun. (0) These forms still 

 persist in rats, guinea-pigs, rabbits, and monkevs. (10) On 

 morphological grounds the authors believe they are deal- 

 ing with a new species of human trypa^osome also 

 causing sleeping sickness, for which they prop' e the name 

 T. rhodesiense. — Dr. F. W. Mott : Not-v upon the 



