October 14, 1915] 



NATURE 



175 



tin- work he did for the colony in the introduction 

 of useful and interesting- plants. He also did 

 much for the improvement of the sugar-plantings 

 industr}-, and investigated many other problems 

 of economic importance. In 1908 the Government 

 grant for the g-arden and herbarium was much 

 reduced, but althougfh sadly hampered Medley 

 Wood did not relinquish his efforts, and he was 

 k-cnly interested in his work up to the end. 



' )r. Medley Wood was appointed director of 



Natal Garden, but he ceased to hold that 

 < ...ce when it was recently handed over to the 

 Corporation of Durban, and he then became 

 director of the Natal Herbarium. 



Two years ago the honorary degree of D.Sc. 

 ",!s conferred upon him by the University of 



Cape of Good Hope, an honour which was a 

 fitting recognition of the great value of his 



ices to botanical and agricultural science in 



ih Africa, and gave much pleasure to his many 



ids. 



NOTES. 



We notice with much regret the announcement of 



till death, at ninety-two years of age, of M. J. H. 



e, whose patient studies of the life-histories of 



I ts, as recorded in his " Souvenirs Entomo- 



lui^iques" and other works, placed him in the front 



rank of outdoor naturalists throughout the world. 



The Faraday Society will hold a general discussion 

 nn 'The Transformations of Pure Iron" on Tuesday, 

 ber 19. The president. Sir Robert Hadfield, will 

 de over the discussion, which will be opened by 

 A. E. Oxley, of Sheffield. Tickets may be ob- 

 d from the secretary of the Faraday Society, 82 

 . ioria Street, S.W. 



We learn from Science that Dr. Max Planck, pro- 



r of physics at Berlin, and Prof. Hugo von 



^-;er, director of the Munich Observatory, have 



made knights of the Prussian Order of Merit. 



Ramon y Cajal, professor of histology at Madrid, 



Dr. C. J. Kapteyn, professor of astronomy at 



lingen, have been appointed foreign knights of the 



Order. 



IE council of the Chemical Society has arranged 



hree lectures to be delivered at the ordinary sclen- 



meetlngs during the coming session. The first 



< se lectures will be delivered on November 18, by 



i'. J. Russell, who has chosen as his subject, "The 



iples of Crop Production." The titles of the two 



lectures to be delivered on February 3 and May 



>>y Prof. W. H. Bragg and Prof. ' F. Gowland 



ivins, respectively, will be announced later. 



IE new session of the Royal Geographical Society 

 open on November 15 with a paper by the presi- 

 , Mr. Douglas W. Freshfield, on the southern 

 iers of Austria. Among other papers to be read 

 \ ening meetings are : — The work of the Peru- 

 ia Boundary Commission, Sir Thomas H. 

 iich; The geographical and ethnic position of the 

 > between the Adriatic and the Drave, Sir Arthur 

 l.vins; Cyrenaica, Prof. J. W. Gregory; The Troad 

 NO. 2398, VOL. 96] 



and the command of the Dardanelles, Dr. Walter 

 Leaf; The valley of Mexico, A. P. Maudslay; and 

 the Gold Coast, A. E. Kitson. 



A Reuter message from Paris states that the 

 French Minister of War has appointed a consulting 

 committee of experts attached to the Under-Secretary- 

 ship of Military Aeronautics. Among other well- 

 known names, the Committee, which is presided over 

 by the Under-Secretary himself. Includes M. Appell, 

 who occupies one of the chairs of mechanics at the 

 Sorbonne; M. Robert Esnault ; M. Pelterie; M. Des- 

 landres, director of the Meudon Obsrvatory; M. 

 Deutsch, president of the Aero Club; M. Renault; 

 M. Clement Bayard; M. Eiffel; and M. Kling, director 

 of the Municipal Observatory. 



We regret to notice that the Engineer for October 8 

 announces the death in action in France of Capt. W. 

 McLeod Macmillan, of the nth Argyll and Sutherland 

 Highlanders. Capt. Macmillan was the chairman 

 and managing director of the old-established ship- 

 building firm of Archibald Macmillan and Son, Dum- 

 barton, and was in his fortieth year. He was educated 

 at Fettes College, Edinburgh, and succeeded his 

 father in 19 10. He acted for a period as chairman 

 to the Clyde Shipbuilders' Association, and was a 

 member of the council of the Institution of Engineers 

 and Shipbuilders in Scotland. 



At the recent International Congress of Mathe- 

 maticians at Cambridge It was decided that the next 

 congress should meet at Stockholm in 1916. The 

 King of Sweden offered a gold medal with the likeness 

 of Karl Weierstrass and a sum of 3000 crowns for an 

 original Important discovery In the domain of the 

 theory of analytical functions. Competing manu- 

 scripts were to have been sent to the editor of Acta 

 Mathetnatica before October 31 next, the centenary 

 of the birth of Weierstrass. We are Informed by 

 Prof. Mittag-Leffler that In accordance with a widely 

 expressed wish, the King of Sweden has decided. In 

 view of the European war, to postpone the last day 

 for the receipt of competing memoirs until October 31, 

 1916. 



It is announced in the Pioneer Mail that the third 

 annual meeting of the Indian Science Congress will 

 be held in Allahabad from January 13-15, 1916, when 

 Sir Sidney Burrard, F.R.S., will be president. The 

 chief sections will be physics, chemistry, zoology, 

 botany, agriculture, and ethnology, and the presidents 

 of the respective sections Dr. Simpson, of the Meteoro- 

 logical Department; Dr. Sudborough, of the Research 

 Institute, Bangalore; Dr. Woodland, of Allahabad; 

 Dr. Howard, of Pusa ; Mr. Coventry, of Pusa ; and 

 Mr. Burn. It is hoped that the local committee will 

 persuade Dr. Bose to give a public lecture on his own 

 researches. The local secretaries for this year are Dr. 

 Hill, of Muir College, and Mr. P. S. Macmahon, of 

 the Canning College, Lucknow, to the latter of whom 

 all communications should be addressed. The con- 

 gress Is under the general control of the Asiatic Society 

 of Bengal. 



We announce with regret the death in action in 

 Flanders on September 25 of Major A. J. N. Tre- 



