January 26, 191 1] 



NATURE 



411 



President — Charles E. Bessey, University of Nebraska, 

 Lincoln, Nebraska. 



Vice-presidents. — A, Mathematics and Astronomy, Edwin 

 B. P"rost, Yerkes Observatory, Williams Bay, Wisconsin ; 

 13, Physics, Robert A. Millikan, University of Chicago, 

 Chicago, Illinois; C, Chemistry, Frank K. Cameron, U.S. 

 Department of Agriculture, Washington, D.C. ; D, 

 Mechanical Science and Engineering, Charles S. Howe, 

 Case School of Applied Science, Cleveland, Ohio ; E, 

 Geology and Geography, Bohumil Shimek, State Uni- 

 versity of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa ; F, Zoology, Henry F. 

 Nachtrieb, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minne- 

 sota ; G, Botany, Frederick C. Newcombe, University of 

 Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan ; H, Anthropology and 

 Psychology, George T. Ladd, Yale University, New 

 Haven, Conn.; I, Social and Economic Science (vacant); 

 K, Physiology and Experimental Science, William T. 

 Porter, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Mass.; L, 

 Education, Edward L. Thorndike, Columbia University, 

 New York, N.Y. 



Permanent Secretary. — L. O. Howard, Smithsonian 

 Institution, Washington, D.C. 



General Secretary. — ^John Zeleny, University of Minne- 

 sota, Minneapolis, Minnesota. 



Secretary of the Council. — Theodore S. Palmer, U.S. 

 Department of Agriculture, W'ashington, D.C. 



Secretaries of the Sections. — A, Mathematics and Astro- 

 nomv, George A. Miller, University of Illinois, Urbana, 

 Illinois; B, Physics, Alfred D. Cole, Ohio State Uni- 

 versity, Columbus, Ohio ; C, Chemistry. Charles H. 

 Herty, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, N.C. ; 

 D, Mechanical Science and Engineering, George W. 

 Bissell, Michigan Agricultural College, East Lansing, 

 Mich. ; E, Geology and Geography, F. P. Gulliver, Nor- 

 wich, Conn. ; F, Zoology, Maurice .A. Bigelow, Columbia 

 University, New York, N.Y. ; G, Botany, Henry C. 

 Cowles, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois ; H, 

 Anthropology tnd Psychology, George Grant MacCurdy, 

 Yale University Museum, New Haven, Conn. ; I, Social 

 and Economic Science, Fred C. Croxton, 1229 Girard 

 Street, Washington, D.C. ; K, Physiology and Experi- 

 mental Medicine, George T. Kemp, 8 West 25th Street, 

 Baltimore, Maryland ; L, Education, Charles Riborg 

 Mann, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois. 



Treasurer. — R. S. Woodward, Carnegie Institution, 

 Washington, D.C. 



SCIENCE AND POTTERY.'' 



THE English Ceramic Society, founded about 

 ten years ago, had its origin in a be- 

 lated attempt, made by a few enlightened manu- 

 facturers, to introduce scientific method into 

 the conduct of one of our most important in- 

 dustries. There is a proverbial connection be- 

 tween the potter and his thumb, and in no other 

 leading manufacture in this country is the rule of 

 thumb so dominant or so repressive as it is in that 

 of pottery. The ceramic art as practised in England 

 is for the most part empirical, and is therefore highly 

 conservative ; changes are few and progress is corre- 

 spondingly slow. At the same time, in certain 

 respects, the industry has reached a higfh degree of 

 mechanical perfection. English china is a product 

 sui generis, and its merits are widely recognised, even 

 by those w^ho decline to regard it as a variety of 

 porcelain. In the manufacture of the highest quali- 

 ties of earthenware no nation has hitherto surpassed 

 us. But signs are not wanting that our supremacy 

 is challenged, and each succeeding decade sees the 

 struggle becoming more and more acute. The in- 

 dustry is, in fact, between the upper and the nether 

 millstones of conflicting tariff systems. Industrial 

 conditions in the Potteries are, in some respects, with- 

 out parallel in any other manufacturing district. In 



I Transactions oft^'e F.nilish Ceramic Society. Vol. ix. Session 1Q09-10 

 (StoVe^nn-Trent. Staffor-lshire : Published by the Society ; Longton : Hughs 

 and Harber, Ltd., 1910.) 



NO. 2152, VOL. 85] 



no other staple trade of like magnitude is to be found 

 so numerous a class of small manufacturers — persons 

 of little or no capital and employing few hands — some 

 of them no more than the members of their own 

 famines. These are for the most part ignorant of 

 anything beyond the ordinary technique ot their art. 

 Even in the case of larger concerns, it was, until of 

 late years, rare to meet with any evidence of practical 

 recognition of the scientific principles underlying the 

 industry. Such a condition of things cannot possibly 

 tend to' development in the art itself, or to improve- 

 ment in the welfare of the workers engaged in it. 



Ceramics is a branch of applied chemistry and 

 physics, of chemical engineering in its most com- 

 prehensive sense. That this fact is beginning to be 

 slowly appreciated may, we think, be inferred from 

 the gradual increase in the number of the members 

 of the English Ceramic Society. The society started 

 in 1900-1 with 29 members; in 1909-10 its numbers 

 were 261, but of these, it ought to be said, a certain 

 fraction are engaged in American and Continental fac- 

 tories. But, after all, this growth in numerical 

 strength is hardly commensurate with the value and 

 importance of the society's objects, or with the in- 

 fluence it may be expected to exercise upon the 

 development of the industr\- with which it is con- 

 cerned. In the United Kingdom there are some 550 

 potteries ; of these 329 are concentrated in the group 

 of towns known as the North Staffordshire Potteries. 

 It is not unreasonable to expect that in the case of an 

 institution centrally situated and in close proximity to 

 Burslem, Fenton, Hanley, Longton, and Tunstall, 

 there would, after ten years of existence, be a mem- 

 bership equal at least to the number of factories in 

 the neighbourhood. That such is not the case is only 

 one more instance of the supineness and indifference 

 of our manufacturers, as a class, to the bearing of 

 physical science, its methods and its teaching, upon 

 their industries. 



Of the general character of the twent>'-two con- 

 tributions to the scientific work of the society con- 

 tained in this volume we have nothing but commenda- 

 tion to offer. They all bear directly on problems of 

 practical interest to the potter. The papers of Mr. 

 Fowler on the control of kiln and oven gases ; of 

 Messrs. Cobb and King on the fluxing power of the 

 common oxides ; the papers by Dr. Mellor on cylinder 

 grinding, vitrification of clays, surface factors, soften- 

 ing temperatures of lead silica glazes, and the two 

 excellent papers by Mr. Thomason, on the toxic possi- 

 bilities of fritted lead glazes and on white lead and 

 plumbism are of permanent value as additions to cera- 

 mic literature. The latter papers are of special in- 

 terest at the moment in relation to the question of 

 lead-poisoning in pottery manufacture. Mr. Thomason 

 points out that the official returns from such factories 

 as are working under the 5 per cent, standard of 

 solubility, as defined by the method prescribed by Sir 

 Edward Thorpe, and adopted in the Home Office 

 special rules, show no cases of plumbism amongst 

 workers in the prepared glazes, and that the informa- 

 tion available from the Continent is to a similaf effect. 

 It has been objected to this method that it bears no 

 real analog}- to what actually goes on in the human 

 system. Mr. Thomason effectually meets this objec- 

 tion. After a careful experimental inquiry of which 

 full details are given in the papers, and in which, so 

 far as possible, all the conditions known to occur in 

 the animal body were separately and collectK'ely 

 studied, Mr. Thomason concludes that the solubility 

 of a glaze in the stomach is properly gauged by the 

 official method, and that the figures so obtained are 

 fair statements of its toxic possibilities. 



These papers were evidently not ver\' pleasant hear- 



