November 19, 19 14] 



NATURE 



l^^l 



Teall, Mr. F. N. Ashcroft, Prof. H. Hilton, Mr. A. 

 Russell, Mr. W. Campbell Smith, Dr. J. W. Evans, 

 Dr. F. H. Hatch, and Mr. J. A. Howe. 



At a meeting of the council of the British Associa- 

 tion, held on November 6, it was resolved: — "That 

 the council of the British Association for the Advance- 

 ment of Science, at its first meeting in London since 

 the return of members from Australia, desires to place 

 on record its high appreciation of the generous re- 

 ception given to the members of the overseas party 

 throughout the Commonwealth by representatives of 

 the Governments of the Commonwealth and the 

 .States, and by other authorities and Australian citi- 

 zens generally, on the occasion of the meeting of the 

 association in Australia in 19 14. The council hereby 

 expresses its grateful thanks for the hospitality, privi- 

 leges, and concessions extended so freely to visiting 

 members, and also for the willing and valuable colla- 

 boration of all those who undertook so successfully 

 I he work of organisation in Australia in connection 

 with the meeting." 



Bv the death of Sir Walter Gilbey at Elsenham 

 Hall, his Essex residence, on November 12, the country 

 is distinctly the poorer, as the deceased baronet had 

 an unsurpassed practical knowledge of horses and 

 horse-breeding, more especially as regards "shires," 

 hackneys, and ponies. His two little books on these 

 breeds are models of what such works should be, 

 teeming, as they are, with practical and historical 

 information condensed into the briefest-possible space. 

 -Sir Walter was the founder of the Shire Horse Society, 

 which published its first stud-book in 1880, and held 

 its first show at the Agricultural Hall in 1881. He 

 also took an active part in the establishment of both 

 the Hackney Horse Society and the Hunters' Improve- 

 ment Society, and he was likewise instrumental in 

 diverting the grants for "Queen's Plates" to the more 

 useful purpose of premiums for thoroughbred sires. 

 He was in turn president of both the Shire Horse and 

 the Hunters' Improvement Society. It may be added 

 that Sir Walter did no less good ser\-ice for stock- 

 breeding and agriculture in general. He had attained 

 the ripe age of eighty-three years. 



A.MER1CA has lost one of her leading geographers by 

 the death, in his sixty-ninth year, of Mr. Henr\- 

 Gannett. After graduating at the Harvard Scientific 

 and Mining .Schools, he was for a short time an 

 assistant at the Harvard Observatory. From 1872 to 

 1879 he acted as topographer for the Hayden Survey 

 of the Territories. When the U.S. Bureau of Geo- 

 logical .Survey was established in 1879, Mr. Gannett 

 assisted in planning out its work, and from 1882 until 

 his death he held the position of its chief geographer. 

 He was geographer to three decennial censuses and to 

 the Conservation Commission of 1908-9, chairman of 

 the U.S. Geographical Board, and president of the 

 National Geographic Society. His published works 

 Included gazetteers of twelve States, the statistical 

 atlases of three censuses, the contour map of the 

 United States, a manual of topographic surveying, 

 ind numerous official reports. In an editorial note on 

 lis career the New Yor^i- Evening Post pays him the 

 NO. 2351, VOL. 94] 



tribute that, in spite of the notable results of his own 

 industry, it is as a stimulator of other geographers 

 and map-makers that he chiefly deser\es to be remem- 

 bered. 



We are glad to see again the familiar pages of the 

 Revue Scientifiquc, the publication of which was sus- 

 pended at the beginning of August, on account of the 

 \\ar. The number which has just reached us is the 

 first to be published since August i, and it bears the 

 date August 8-November 14. The main part of the 

 issue is made up of the papers upon the nature and 

 treatment of wounds, presented to the Paris Academy 

 of Sciences on August 10 and September 28, and 

 referred to already in our columns. Following these 

 is a translation of the statement signed bv German 

 professors as to the cause of the war, with a complete 

 list of signatures, and replies to the manifesto made 

 b\- the Academy of Sciences, the French Academy, 

 Institute of France, representatives of Russian art, 

 literature, and science, and British scholars. Sir 

 William Ramsay's article on " Germany's Aims and 

 Ambitions" is translated from Nature of October 8, 

 and there is also a translation of the letter from Dr. 

 C. W. Eliot, president of Harvard University, pub- 

 lished in the New YorJz Times of October 2. We 

 trust that our contemporar}' will find it possible to 

 continue its weekly issue as formerly. La Nature, 

 which suspended publication on August i, has not yet 

 started a re -issue. 



Accounts of the valuable work which the officers 

 of the Royal Army Medical Corps have accomplished 

 in Boulogne for our wounded are given in the Times 

 of November 10 and 14. The description of the 

 Boulogne hospitals affords a clear picture of the verj- 

 best sort of hospital administration and practice, 

 thanks to Colonel Lynden Bell, Sir Almroth Wright, 

 and all members of the staff and nursing staff of each 

 hospital. From the potent and unfamiliar infections 

 of the Belgian soil, which has been under intensive 

 cultivation and incessant manuring for a quarter of a 

 century, comes a host of troubles. The majority of 

 the wounds are contaminated at the moment of in- 

 fliction. The usual ritual of the antiseptic and aseptic 

 method, perfect in time of peace for this or that formal 

 operation of surgery in a placid, well-appointed hos- 

 pital, may not suffice for the treatment of men 

 wounded in the trenches by shrapnel or shell frag- 

 ments, their clothes and their skins caked thick wirh 

 mud, and that mud carrying dangers of its own. 

 Against the risk of tetanus, we have the protective 

 use of the tetanus antitoxin; against gangrene, we 

 have the injections of oxygenated water, and the later 

 •open-air" treatment of the wound, and there are 

 other methods by which science is used to reduce 

 suffering at the Boulogne hospital base and elsewhere. 



Is- Man for November, Prof. Carveth Read examines 

 the question of the differentiation of man from the 

 anthropoids. He dwells on the importance of the 

 change from a vegetable to a carnivorous diet on the 

 habits, functions, and structure which distinguish 

 man from the higher apes. This change of diet he 

 urges, explains the adaptation of our species to a 

 ground-life and to a world-wide diffusion. This in 



