December i6, 1920] 



NATURE 



5'9 



the vote of last Wednesday ; otherwise, this vote must 

 brinK a reaction which may, in due course, sweep 

 much farther than the original proposals. 



Mr. J. Gray, fellow of King's College, has been 

 elected Balfour student. 



London. — Mr. F. R. Fraser has been appointed 

 for a period of four years as from October 20 last to 

 the University chair of medicine tenable at St. 

 Bartholomew's Hospital Medical School. In 1912 -Mr. 

 Frastr was appointed assistant in medicine at the 

 Rockefeller, Institute for .Medical Research in New- 

 York, and two years later Instructor in clinical medi- 

 cine at Columbia University. During the war he 

 serv'fd with the R..\..M.C., and on demobilisation was 

 appointed assistant director of the Medical Clinic and 

 assistant physician at St. Bartholomew's Hospital. 

 He is the author of publications on electrocardio- 

 graphic changes and acute poliomyelitis. 



Oxford. — Mr. R. T. Gunther, fellow and tutor of 

 Magdalen College, has been elected by that college 

 to a research fellowship in order to continue his 

 researches on land levels in the Mediterranean. .\ 

 science tutorship at .Magdalen will thus become 

 vacant, and it will certainly be acceptable to bio- 

 logists in Oxford if another biologist be elected to 

 succeed .Mr. Gunther. Magdalen College has long 

 been favourably distinguished for the support it has 

 given to scientific study and research, especially in 

 subjects connected with the sciences of life. 



Pkof. J. C. Irvine, professor of chemistry in the 

 University of St. .Andrews, has been approved by the 

 King, on the recommendation of the Secretary for 

 Scotland, as Principal of the University in succession 

 to the late Sir John Herkless. 



Applications are invited by the council of Btd- 

 ford College for Women, Regent's Park, for a 

 scholarship in semiology tenable at the college for 

 two years, and of the yearly value of 80/. Candi- 

 dates must be women holding a university degree or 

 Its equivalent. The latest date for receiving applica- 

 tions is January 15. 



The Association of Science Teachers will hold a 

 general meeting on Tuesday, January 4, at Uni- 

 versity College, London, when the presidential address 

 will be delivered by .Miss M. B. Thomas, Girton Col- 

 lege, and a lecture on vitamines will be given by Dr. 

 (. C. Drummond, reader in physiological chemistry, 

 'niversity College. The hon. secretary of the asso- 

 ' 'ttlon i.s Miss F ^' KidlfV, 10 f,r<"^li> Ro,,.!, 

 idon, N.19. 



I IIK Salters* luMUuir ol Indu^tri.il ( licmisiry liio 

 f awarded five fellowships for post-graduate stodv in 

 the laboratories indicated : — Mr. A. H. .\dcock (Liver- 

 pool University), Mr. J. .A. Gentle (Oxford), Mr. S. J. 

 Saint (Reading), Mr. C. B. Taylor (Imperial College 

 of Science and Technology), and Mr. Donald Turner 

 (Sheffield). Scholarships have been awarded to 

 Messrs. M. D. F'orbes and G. M. Lowe (Imperial 

 College of .Science and Technology), A. W. Pritchard 

 and F. W. Turner (East London College). Forty. five 

 grants in aid have been awarded to chemical assis- 

 tants occupied in factories in or near London to 

 facilitate their further studies 



Announcement has been made that four fellowships 

 of looo dollars each have been established through a 

 co-operative agreement between Yale University and 

 the Bishop Museum of Honolulu, Hawaii. The 

 fellowships are available for graduates of any institu- 

 tion, but are primarily designed for students who 



^f• alnadv attained the degree of doctor of philo- 

 liv. Prrferrnre will be given to applicants who 



' " I . 106] 



desire to carry on research in anthropology, botany, 

 zoologv, geography, or geology in Hawaii or other 

 parts of Polynesia. Detailed information may be ob- 

 tained from the Dean of the Graduate School, Yale 

 University. 



The annual meeting of the Mathematical .Associa- 

 tion will be held at the London Day Training College 

 on Tuesday, January 4. The programme includes the 

 following papers and discussions : — Relativity, Prof. 

 .A. S. Eddington ; Aeroplane Mathematics, Dr. S. 

 Brodetskv ; The Teaching of Mathematics to Boys 

 whose Chief Interests are Non-Mathematical, the 

 'Rev. S. H. Clarke; Some Unsolved Questions and 

 Topics for Research, Prof. E. T. Whittakcr; Results 

 of Visits Paid to Lycees of Paris and other Centres, 

 and the Study of Education there, particularly from 

 the point of view of Mathematics, >liss E. M. Read. 

 January 17, iqzi, will be the iiftieth anniversary of 

 the first recorded meeting of the association. 



Prof. Donnan gave an interesting address on " The 

 Finance of Research at Universities " at a meeting 

 convened by the London branch of the National 

 Union of Scientific Workers at University College on 

 December 9. He said that scientific research must 

 be financed mainly out of Treasury funds, and as the 

 Treasury is influenced greatly by public opinion, it 

 behoves scientific workers to create the right atmo- 

 sphere. The Government, no less than the general 

 public, is apt to overlook the fact that there are three 

 equally important factors in the creation of wealth. 

 Two of these, new knowledge and trained men to 

 apply it, arc the right products of the universities; 

 increased production is not merely a question of the 

 hours of labour of the manual worker. The nation 

 has already reached a time of financial stress which 

 will probably continue for another five years. 

 Hitherto the Government has treated educational 

 institutions as charities, to be given doles in times 

 of prosperity, to be ignored at the call for economy. 

 Unhappily, this attitucle is unchanged, and the prospect 

 of universities receiving the necessary financial assist- 

 ance from the Treasury for research workers is a 

 poor one unless the Department of Scientific and 

 Industrial Research realises in time that this is the 

 more productive field for cultivation, and unless 

 those best equipped an<l best entitled to benefit by 

 grants, viz. the junior teaching staffs, are aided to 

 undertake research work instead of being forced by 

 inadequate salaries to make ends meet in other ways. 

 Prof. Donnan concluded by paying a tribute to the 

 work of the Department of Scientific and Industrial 

 Research in fostering industrial research associations, 

 but expressed the doubt as to whether it would not 

 have been the more profitable investment to have 

 started with the university research workers. 



.Anyone who understands the best possibilities of 

 the kinematograph, or has seen some of the instruc- 

 tive films now available, must realise that the Instru- 

 ment mav be made a verv valuable educational aid. 

 In scientific instruction, for exainplc, the slowing 

 down of ultra-rapid pictures enables movements to 

 be analysed most clearlv; or, on the other hand, a 

 film may show in a few minutes the life-history of a 

 plant or animal, and thus synthesise changes which 

 mav extend norm;illv over sever.il months. What- 

 ever ran be said in favour of the use of pictures In 

 text-books can be applied with far greater force to 

 the motion picture, for movement impresses Itself 

 upon the mind much more deepiv than still-life. This 

 is particularlv true of geogniphiVal subjects, the aim 

 of which is to give pupils clear Meas of the charac- 

 teristics of cmintries and T>eonIes in various parts of 

 I the world. It ha>; hitherto been difiicult to nbtair> 



