556 



NATURE 



[February 23, 1911 



To enable the ship to rise or descend during flight there 

 ■are three parallel horizontal planes on both port and star- 

 board sides, forward and aft. These are comparatively 

 small, pivoted in the centre at each side, with a vertical 

 rod at each corner, and through these all are tilted to the 

 desired angle by wire gear operated from either gondola. 

 For lateral movement there are three groups of vertical 

 rudders, one having four parallel planes above and a j 

 similar one below the main structure near to the stern, j 

 while abaft of the propeller, in the after gondola, there 

 js a group of three rudders. Rudders, engines, and pro- 

 pellers were worked before the members of the advisory 

 committee at the trials. The committee are to be con- 

 gratulated, as well as Captain Sueter, who has had charge 

 of the work on behalf of the Admiralty, and also the 

 \'ickers Company on the important stage which their 

 unicjue work for the Navy has now reached. 



INFANT AND CHILD MORTALITY^ 

 "T^HE report before us is one of the most important 

 studies of infantile mortality yet produced. Adminis- 

 tratively, it will be of immense value, for it constitutes a 

 first guide to the " dark areas " of England. Scientific- 

 ally, it is also of value, for it brings actual administrative 

 ■data to bear on a fundamental social question, namely, 

 •does the prevention of infant deaths tend to the deteriora- 

 tion of the race? Whatever be the final reply to this 

 question, the work of prevention will certainly proceed as 

 if the question had never been asked, because the impulse 

 towards prevention is itself a fundamental impulse in 

 modem society, and will realise itself against all 

 .hindrances. 



It is, however, of immense importance to know whether, 

 on the whole, the methods of prevention in this particular 

 field are favourable to the rearing of a sound race or not. 

 Survival of the fittest, however, is no longer to be imaged 

 merely as survival of individuals of a single qualitv. 

 Rather it is imaged as survival of fit groups, and the 

 concept of the " group-person " is steadily gaining a place, 

 not in biology alone, but also in economics. The pre- 

 servation of the " group-person " implies that natural 

 selection must be regarded as operating on the group, not 

 on the ■ mere individual considered abstractly. Conse- 

 quently, it may well happen that, as the preservation of 

 the group is the primary and immediate object of social 

 organisation, the preservation of a certain proportion of 

 Telatively weak individuals may be ultimately harmless 

 even on the most stringent interpretation of the Darwinian 

 principle of natural selection. At all events, it is important 

 to have the problem studied in detail, as is the case in 

 this well-loaded document. If it turns out that the pre- 

 servation of the individual does not, even in a minor 

 «legree, impair the fitness of the group, all the better. 



It is this important consequence that Dr. Newsholme's 

 investigation, so far as it goes, tends to establish by actual 

 facts. The administrative results we may leave alone. 

 One of the primary intentions of the report was " to 

 determine, on the basis of our national statistics, whether 

 reduction of infant mortality implies any untoward in- 

 fluence on the health of the survivors to later vears " 

 (p. i). The figures of a single year, 1908, are taken and 

 ■carefully analysed. The counties of high infantile 

 mortality are compared in sufficient detail with the 

 counties of low infantile mortality. Infantile mortality is 

 ■compared and correlated with the mortality at later ages — 

 -age one to two, two to three, three to four, and four to 

 five, and even at age-groups five to ten, ten to fifteen, 

 fifteen to twenty. In this way, data variously presented 

 are obtained for testing the influence that the infantile 

 mortality has on the mortality of the survivors, even up 

 to adult ages. 



" This comparison is important, because attempts to 

 reduce infant mortality are regarded by many as an inter- 

 ference with natural selection, which must be inimical to 

 the average health of those surviving. According to this 

 school of_ thought" (we think Dr. Newsholme too 

 generous, if he is not ironical, in dignifving those some- 

 what casual theorists by the name of " school "), " efforts 



1 Supplement to the Thirty-ninth Annual Report of the Local Govern- 

 ment Board, igog-io. By Dr. Arthur Newsholme, Medical Officer to the 

 Board. (London: Wyman and Son?, Ltd., 1910.) Price is. jd. 



to save infant life merely prevent the weeding out of th^.- 

 unfit, and ensure the survival of an excessive proportion 

 of weaklings " (p. g). The results of the " correlations " 

 are startling, though some of them may equally be come 

 at by general reasoning. However we turn the figures, 

 it remains true that " a high infant death-rate in a given 

 community implies, in general, a high death-rate in th" 

 ne.xt four years of life, while low death-rates at both age- 

 periods are similarly associated " (p. 13). ITius of the 

 eight administrative counties with highest infant death- 

 rates, the infant death-rate was 139-1 per 1000 births, and 

 the death-rate at age one to five was 69-2, while in the 

 eight administrative counties with lowest infant death- 

 rate, the corresponding figures were 77-9 and 32-6. 



This relationship is found also in the comparisons of 

 the individual counties. But the correlations reveal the 

 further fact that at the later ages the same general rela- 

 tion is true. " Speaking generally, it will be seen that 

 the eight counties having a high infant mortality also 

 had a relatively high death-rate of males during each of 

 the four first lustra of life, and the eight counties having 

 a low infant mortality had also a relatively low mortalitv 

 at ages 0-5 and 5-10, and to a diminishing extent at 

 10-15 and 15-20 " (p. 16). Probably at the later ages 

 other special influences, such as migration, complicate the 

 issue. 



The problem of the " selective influence " is analysed 

 and estimated in greater detail in a special section by Mr. 

 Udny Yule, whose general conclusion, frcHn somewhat in- 

 adequate data, is " that there is little definite evidence of 

 such selection beyond the second year of life, and that 

 after the third year the environmental influences even of 

 infancy alone appear to preponderate over any possible 

 selective influence " (p. 78). There is no space even to 

 indicate the wealth of fact that goes to the discussion of 

 the causes of infant mortality. The broad conclusion is 

 that no effort should be spared to reduce the mortality of 

 infants and to remove all removable causes of death. 

 Philanthropic impulse is thus reinforced by scientific 

 analysis of the facts. This report will be followed next 

 year by a similar study of infant mortality in the large 

 towns. Dr. Newsholme is to be congratulated on tiis 

 admirable combination of scientific analysis with pr.ictical 

 administration. 



FIXATION OF ATMOSPHERIC NITROGEN. 

 CINCE the work of Lord Rayleigh in 1894, when he 

 •^ repeated the experiments of Cavendish with improved 

 apparatus and more modern methods, continual progress 

 has been made in connection with the oxidation of atmo- 

 spheric nitrogen. Rayleigh 's experiments, carried out on 

 a large laboratory scale, showed the feasibility of obtain- 

 ing nitric acid or nitrates from the atmosphere, and, given 

 cheap f>ower and appropriate appliances, the possibility of 

 it being done on a paying commercial scale. 



The pioneering work which followed for a long time 

 spelt — commercially — failure. But as first one idea and 

 then another was shown ^o be unsatisfactory, and had to 

 be discarded, knowledge increased, as is always the case 

 with research, and in 1903 Birkeland and Eyde designed 

 and erected a plant which, at any rate, in part solved the 

 problem. In a lecture delivered before the German 

 Association of Naturalists and Physicians in September 

 last, Prof. J. Zenneck takes up the subject at that stage, 

 and reviews this process and others which have since been 

 devised (Leipzig: S. Hirzel, 1911). The lecture was 

 evidently delivered to a popular audience, because Prof. 

 Zenneck describes and illustrates the processes in a wa\ 

 which will interest and instruct those who may have very 

 little knowledge of chemistry. For example, by means of 

 a model, he showed how in the Notodden process of Birke- 

 land and Eyde the air is driven by means of a compressor 

 through the furnace containing the disc-shaped arc, then 

 how gases are partially cooled and the heat given up is 

 used for the generation of steam and for evaporating th^ 

 liquors. We believe, indeed, that coal is not required in 

 the works at all for heating purpvoses. The Notodder, 

 plant, however, is so well known that it will be superfluou- 

 to describe it further, except to mention that very good 

 diagrams and pictures of the works are included in the 

 printed lecture. 



NO. 2156, VOL. 85] 



