304 



NATURE 



[November ii, 19 15 



years, Sir Arthur Rucker (as a member of the Advi- 

 sory Committee on University Grants) took in framing 

 the federated superannuation system for universities, 

 now successfuUv adopted by all the university institu- 

 tions of modern foundation in England and Wales. 



Oxford.— Dr. E. \V. A. Walker, fellow of Unlver- 

 sity College, has been appointed lecturer in pathology 

 for five years from January i, 19 16. 



Prof. H. L. Bowman, Waynflete professor of 

 mineralogv, reports two valuable benefactions to his 

 department. (1) Under the will of the late Sir Arthur 

 Church has been bequeathed looL for the purchase 

 of apparatus and specimens, together with the chem- 

 ical and mineralogical apparatus and instruments irj 

 Sir Arthur's laboratory and his collection of mineral 

 specimens (other than cut gem-stones). (2) A valuable 

 collection of minerals made by the late Dr. Hugo 

 Miiller, containing some 2000 good specimens, has 

 been presented by Mrs. Miiller. 



Mr. a. R. Hinks, the Gresham lecturer on astro- 

 nomy, will deliver four lectures on "Navigation and 

 Maps " at Gresham College, Basinghall Street, E.C., 

 on November 16, 17, 18, and 19. The time of the 

 lectures is 6 p.m., and the admission is free. 



It is announced in the issue of Science for October 29 

 that the sum of about 80,000/. has been subscribed in the 

 University of Michigan alumni campaign for 200,000/. 

 with which to build and endow a home for the Michi- 

 gan Union, as a memorial to Dr. James B. Angell, 

 president emeritus; and that Delaware College, at 

 Newark, has received a gift of 100,000/., from a donor 

 whose name is withheld, for the construction and 

 maintenance of buildings. 



The Comit^ des Visites aux Blesses Beiges has col- 

 lected about three thousand volumes of French and 

 Flemish works in order to provide Belgian wounded 

 soldiers with literature in their own language. The 

 committee now informs us that amongst the' wounded 

 there are many students and technical workmen who 

 desire to follow up their studies, and for this purpose 

 want books on science and engineering, chemistry, 

 phvsical science, mathematics, mechanics, electricity, 

 and other sciences ; also commercial study books, tech- 

 nological works, etc. Any of our readers possessing 

 surplus volumes of this nature should address them 

 to Madame Carton de Wiart, at the library department 

 of the committee, Sardinia House, Sardinia Street, 

 Kingsvvay, London. 



We hope the appeal of the eminent physicians and 

 surgeons on behalf of the London (Royal Free Hos- 

 pital) School of Medicine for Women will meet with 

 a generous and immediate response. For the en- 

 largement of the school premises 30,000/. is required, 

 and already 18,000/. has been received. This school 

 (the only one in, London at which women can receive 

 a medical education) was rebuilt in 1900 in the expec- 

 tation of an average annual entry of thirty-five 

 students. During the last six years the annual entry 

 has risen to sixty students. This session no new- 

 students have entered the school. Enlargement of the 

 laboratories and lecture-rooms has become urgently 

 necessary, and, an adjoining site having been secured, 

 building has already begun. Already there is a grave 

 shortage of men medical students, and in view of the 

 valuable medical work women have done during the 

 last forty years, it is earnestly to be hoped that women 

 medical students will receive all the encouragement 

 and help it is possible to provide. 



The calendar of the twenty-fourth session, that for 

 1915-16, of the University College, Reading, has been 

 received. Notice is given in it that while the college 



NO. 2402, VOL. 96] 



will make every effort to adhere to the arrangements 

 announced in the calendar, it may be necessary to 

 modify them owing to the exceptional circumstances 

 brought about by the war. The teaching work of the 

 college is organised in three faculties— letters, science, 

 and agriculture and horticulture, and in three depart- 

 ments—fine arts, music, and commerce and technical 

 subjects. The faculty of agriculture and horticulture 

 dates from 1913, and grew out of a department of 

 agriculture formed in 1893. As a result of the De- 

 velopment Act of 1909, England has been divided into 

 ten agricultural provinces, each consisting of a group 

 of neighbouring counties and centred on a University 

 Agricultural Department or an Agricultural College. 

 The province which is centred upon University Col- 

 lege, Reading, consists of the following counties :— 

 Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Dorset, Hampshire, the 

 Isle of Wight, Middlesex, and Oxfordshire. It 

 is the desire of University College, Reading, 

 to assist in every possible way agriculturists 

 who are resident' in the Reading province, 

 and, in cases where the county council con- 

 tributes to the funds of the college, reductions are 

 made in the fees charged to residents in those counties. 

 As the result of an agreement with the British Dairy 

 Farmers' Association, the British Dairy Institute was 

 moved from Aylesbury to Reading in 1896. It is under 

 the control of a joint committee of representatives of 

 the association and of the college. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 

 Royal Society, November 4. — Sir William Crookes, 

 president, in the chair.— Prof. W. E. Dalby : A 

 diagram to facilitate the study of external ballistics. 

 The paper describes a semigraphical method for solving 

 problems relating to motion in a resisting medium, 

 with particular application to the motion of a pro- 

 jectile after it has left the gun. It is shown how 

 easily and rapFdly problems of direct fire can be solved 

 by the aid of the diagram, with an accuracy sufficient 

 for most practical purposes, and probably to the same 

 order of accuracy as that of the data from which 

 the primitive curve is derived. For a given muzzle 

 velocity, the range, the time of flight, the angle of 

 elevation corresponding to the range, the angle of 

 descent, found from the diagram, are respectively 

 multiplied by the ballistic coefficient to get the actual 

 values of these quantities. It is shown how easily 

 Siacci's function can be integrated, and a curve show- 

 ing the integral value of the function is added to the 

 diagram. The diagram may be used for the solution 

 of problems relating to high-angle fire just in the same 

 way as the ballistic tables are used. The actual velo- 

 ■'cities are replaced by pseudo-velocities calculated in 

 the way explained in the gunnery text-books, and then 

 these pseudo-velocities are used with the diagram. — 

 W. B. Hardy : An application of the principle of 

 dynamical similitude to molecular physics. The prin- 

 ciple of dynamical similitude is developed and applied 

 to the case of the internal latent heat of evaporation. 

 It is found that if temperature be proportional to the 

 mean energy of progressive motion of the molecules, 

 the internal latent heats of dynamically corresponding 

 states should be given by the equation LM = ar, where 

 L is the latent heat, M the gram-molecular weight, 

 a a constant, and r the temperature. This equation 

 may be used either to identify corresponding tempera- 

 tures or to test some assumption as to corresponding 

 temperatures.— R. Jones : The motion of a stream of 

 finite depth past a body. The method of considering 

 the two-dimensional flow of an infinite fluid past a 



