October 14, 1920] 



NATURE 



221 



Prof. F. Francis, professor of chemistry in the 

 University of Bristol, has been elected a correspond- 

 ing member of the Belgian Royal Academy of 

 Medicine. 



.\ Ramsay memorial fellowship of the value of 300/. 

 a year for three years has been founded by subscrip- 

 tions received from the Swiss Government and from 

 Swiss donors through the good offices of Prof. Ph. k. 

 Guye, of Geneva. The first fellow to be elected is 

 M. Etienne Rou.x, of Vich (Vaud), Switzerland, who 

 has decided to work in the laboratories of Prof. W. H. 

 Perk in at Oxford. 



ViscOLNT Haldanr, O.M., will give an address on 

 "The Industrial Question" to members of the 

 Institute of Industrial .\dministration at the Central 

 Hall, Westminster, on Saturday, October 23, at 

 8 p.m. Sir Lynden Macassey will take the chair. 

 Invitation tickets may be obtained from the hon, 

 secretary, Mr. E. T. Elbourne, no Victoria Street, 

 S.W.I. ' 



The Thomas Vicary lecture of the Royal College of 

 Surgeons of England will be delivered on Thursday, 

 November 11, at 5 o'clock, by Sir D'.Xrcy Power, 

 who will take as his subject "The Education of a 

 Surgeon under Thomas Vicary." The Bradshaw 

 lecture of the same institution will be delivered at 

 5 o'clock on Monday, December 6, by Sir Berkeley 

 Moynihan. The subject will be "The Surgery of the 

 Diseases of the Spleen." 



The annual May lecture of the Institute of Metals 

 for 192 1 is to be delivered on May 4 next by Prof. T. 

 Turner. The annual general meeting of the institute 

 is to take place on March 9 and 10, 1921, at the 

 Institution of Mechanical Engineers. The May lec- 

 ture will be given in the same hall. .An interesting 

 I)rogramme of lectures in connection with the local 

 sections of the institute at Birmingham, Glasgow, 

 and Sheffield has been prepared. Among the lec- 

 turers are Lord Weir of Eastwood, Dr. W. Rosen- 

 hain, and Prof. C. H. Desch. 



With reference to the letter which appeared in 

 Nature for .August 5 last, p. 709, on the loss of 

 fragrance in musk plants, it is interesting to note that 

 Mrs. W. H. Cope, joint secretary of the Birming- 

 iiam Field Naturalists' Club, has observed a similar 

 absence of perfume from all the musk plants which 

 ^he purchased in the o|)en flower market this year. 

 I'he observation was corroborated by other members 

 'if the club, and a suggestion was made that the loss 

 if odour was due to the atrophy of scent-producing 

 rells consequent on a change in the type of insects by 

 which fertilisation was effected. 



TiiK Rev. S. Claude Tickeli. informs us that a 

 movement is being promoted at .Santa Barbara, Cali- 

 fornia, whereby all egg-collectors are invited to 

 accumulate local eggs, with a view to world-wide 

 • xchangp with other collectors. We agree with Mr. 

 Tickcll that the movement is crude and cruel, and 

 that "recollection" by drawing should be substituted 

 for "collection" and the consequent molestation of 

 wild birds. For this purpose Mr. Tiikcll advocates 

 NO. 2659, VOL. 106] 



the establishment of complete, permanent collections 

 of birds' eggs in the museums of the larger towns so 

 that children might have opportunities of drawing and 

 memorising the eggs; this might do away with the 

 thousands of incomplete and transitory collections 

 which exist at the present time. 



It is a very charming and modest account of 

 Winchester College Museum that the Rev. S. A. 

 .McDowall contributes to the October issue of the 

 Museums Journal. We do not gather from it how 

 much use is made even of the Greek and Roman 

 collections in actual school work, but that the boys 

 out of school-hours are encouraged to take part in 

 curatorial activities appears from the statement that 

 "a collection of local spiders owes its existence to 

 the keenness of a boy still in the school." By leading 

 boys on in this way to take the first steps in research, 

 school museums and school natural history societies 

 may do more than professed classes. Two excellent 

 photographs of the interior of the mus<'um, by a boy 

 in the school, are reproduced as one of the plates. 

 .\mong much else that is of interest in the varied 

 contents we note a discussion by Mr. E. E. Lowe 

 of the Public Libraries Act of 1919 and its effect on 

 the future policy of (municipal) museums. 



In the Geographical Review for April-June (vol. ix.. 

 No. 4) Dr. V. E. .Shelford has a long article, well 

 annotated with bibliographical references, on the 

 aquatic biological resources of the United States. 

 While much attention has been given to water-supply 

 for domestic purposes, to water-power, and to the 

 disposal of sewage. Dr. Shelford points out that other 

 asjjects of aquatic resources are more or less neglected. 

 These include, in addition to marine fisheries, fresh- 

 water fisheries and mussels, the provision of fish-ways 

 in rivers, the breeding of edible frogs and turtles in 

 swamps and lake-margins, the preservation of insect- 

 destroying birds, and the cultivation of certain aquatic 

 plants of economic value. Dr. Shelford further 

 makes a special plea for the preservation of large 

 swamp areas unless their presence can be shown to 

 be actively detrimental to health. The pollution of 

 rivers and coastal waters is condemned as harmful to 

 natural resources. 



The Congo Expedition of the American Museum of 

 Natural History is the subject of a short article, 

 accompanied by a map, in the Bulletin of the museum 

 (vol. xxxix., p. XV.). The expedition, which .spent 

 more than six years in the Congo, returned to New 

 York in 1915 with some 20,000 vertebrate and more 

 than 100,000 invertebrate zoological specimens, 

 besides large collections in anthropology and botany. 

 The district explored was in the north-east of the 

 Belgian Congo, from the .\ruwimi River to the head- 

 waters of the Welle River. The leader of the expedi- 

 tion was Mr. H. Lang, who was nssiste<l by Mr. J. P. 

 Chapin. It is proposed to publish the results in four 

 series : scientific papers, which will be collected into 

 twelve volumes after appearance in the Bulletin; 

 special memoirs; three ethnological albums; and the 

 narrative of the expetlition. As some .icknowledg- 

 mcnt of the generous co-operation of the Belgian 

 Government in the work nf (he expedition, it has 



