July 28, 192 1] 



NATURE 



691 



Notes. 



The Dean and Chapter of Westminster Abbey have 

 given consent for a memorial tablet to the late Sir 

 William Ramsay to be placed in Westminster Abbey 

 as part of the Ramsay memorial. The tablet will be 

 placed immediately below the tablet erected to the 

 memory of Hooker, the botanist. The Ramsay 

 Memorial Committee has commissioned Mr. Charles 

 L. Hartwell to prepare the tablet with a portrait 

 medallion of Sir William Ramsay, and Mr. Hart- 

 well is now at work upon the tablet. 



The council of the Royal Photographic Society has 

 opened a fund by means of which some permanent 

 memorial may be set up at Lacock to W. H. Fox 

 Talbot, upon whose researches the present-day prac- 

 tice of photography and of photo-engraving has been 

 built up. As president of the society. Dr. G. H. 

 Rodman appeals to all who are interested in photo- 

 graphy to contribute to the fund. Donations, large 

 or small, to the memorial will be gratefully 

 accepted and acknowledged by Mr. W. L. F. Wastell, 

 vice-president, Royal Photographic Society, 35 Russell 

 Square, London, W^.C.i. 



It is announced that a medal, to be known as the 

 Meldola medal, will be presented annually by the 

 Society of Maccabaeans for the most noteworthy 

 chemical work of the year carried out by a British 

 subject who is not more than thirty years of age on 

 completing the work. The award will be made by 

 the council of the Institute of Chemistry acting with 

 one member of the Society of Maccabaeans, and power 

 to vary the conditions of award is vested in the corn- 

 mittee of the society and the council of the institute 

 acting jointly. The object of instituting the medal is 

 to recognise merit among the younger generation of 

 chemists and to perpetuate the memory of Prof. 

 Raphael Meldola, the distinguished chemist who 

 served as president both of the society presenting tlie 

 medal and of the Institute of Chemistry. It is hoped 

 that the first presentation will be made at the annual 

 general meeting of the Institute of Chemistry on 

 March i, 1922. 



The ever-increasing demands for information re- 

 garding the vegetable resources of South Africa, its 

 plant poisons and plant pests, have given consider- 

 able stimulus to botanical research in that country. 

 One result has been the establishment of the National 

 Herbarium at Pretoria, which now includes all the 

 more important private collections in the country. 

 It has also been decided to issue from time to time a 

 publication, which has been named Bothalia in honour 

 of the first Union Premier and Minister of Agri- 

 culture, the late General Botha, consisting of contri- 

 butions from the National Herbarium. It will in- 

 clude descriptions of new or little-known plants, 

 cryptogamic and phanerogamic. Workers in systematic 

 botany will find this publication of considerable in- 

 terest and value, and intending subscribers should 

 communicate with the Chief, Division of Botany, 

 P.O. Box 994, Pretoria. The first part is now ready 

 for issue, and may be obtained from the above 

 address, price ys. 6d. post free. 



NO. 2700, VOL. 107] 



At the meeting of the Royal Society of New South 

 Wales held on June i Mr. R. T. Baker, curator and 

 economic botanist of the Technological Museum, 

 Sydney, was presented with the Mueller medal by 

 the president, Mr. E. C. Andrews. This medal was 

 awarded to Mr. Baker by the Australasian Associa- 

 tion for the Advancement of Science at the annual 

 congress held in Melbourne last January for his 

 eminent services to botany, particularly in regard to 

 the Eucalypts. In addition to his work on the 

 Eucalypts, Mr. Baker is the author of more than 

 100 original papers on the Australian flora, as well 

 as of several monographs, such as "The Cabinet 

 Timbers of Australia " and his magnum opus, "The 

 Hardwoods of Australia," recently published. On 

 the art side he has published a work on "The Aus- 

 tralian Flora in Applied Art," a book just now in 

 request by art designers in England and America. 

 Mr. Baker is also the author of several monographs 

 in conjunction with Mr. H. G. Smith, assistant cura- 

 tor of the museum. These, like those mentioned 

 above, are all written for the express purpose of 

 developing the natural resources of Australia, and so 

 lead to extended industrial enterprise for the good of 

 the community. The two most important oi this 

 collaboration are "The Pines of Australia " and "The 

 Eucalypts and their Essential Oils," both of which 

 have opened new fields for the development of the 

 valuable assets amongst Australia's natural resources. 

 Although Australian botany was specially mentioned 

 by the Australasian Association for the Advancement 

 of Science, yet Mr. Baker's work has extended into 

 other branches of technology covered by the various 

 sections of the Sydney Technological Museum, which, 

 ' besides being a museum, is a bureau of scientific 

 information for the commercial world around it. 



Prof. Arthur Dendy discusses in a recent number 

 of the Eugenics Review the perennial problem of 

 human evolution. He believes that " the evidence of 

 progress in conformity with a great general principle 

 or law of Nature is conclusive." But evolution tends 

 to take place in a wave-like manner, and not in a 

 continuous straight line. There is apt to be a set- 

 back after each climax. The reason for this is partly 

 because available stores of energy become exhausted, 

 and the race may not be plastic enough to adjust 

 itself to new conditions or skilful enough to tap new 

 supplies. The line of racial persistence is one of re- 

 adjustment in the light of education. "The great 

 principle of evolution . . . consists in sacrifice and 

 re-birth at more or less frequent intervals — sacrifice of 

 all those accretions which have become effete or 

 develof>ed beyond the limits of usefulness, and re- 

 birth by making a fresh start with a clean sheet." 

 Man has a unique capacity for this task, since he has 

 the gift of foresight and the power of deliberate con- 

 trol. But this is as yet inadequately developed. It 

 must be developed by education — an education which 

 will on one hand seek to utilise the available results 

 of scientific investigation — on which are based, as 

 Huxley said, the rules of the life-and-death game — 



