;58 



NATURE 



[July 4, 19x8 



i7;!,ooo dollar.s. The subjects of research, a list of 

 which is giveh in Science, indicate a wide range both 

 in inorganic and organic chemistry. Dr. Raymond F. 

 Bacon, who succeeded the late Prof. Duncan as 

 director, has been commissioned in the American 

 Army In command of the C'hemical Service Section. 

 A considerable number of the research fellows are 

 working on war problems assigned to the institute by 

 the National Research Committee, and others have 

 entered military service. The shortage of research 

 men of the type demanded by the fellowship system 

 has forced the institute to hold in abeyance a number 

 of desirable research problems. " It required the 

 cataclysm of the great war,' the n jwirt observes, "to 

 bring men to realise fully tlie ]:»ail which applied 

 science is placing, and, more particularly, viill play, in 

 the life of nations"; and the Mellon Institute is proud 

 that it has been a pioneer in this field, and set an 

 example to other institutions. The report is signed 

 by Dr. E. R. Wcidlein, the acting director. 



The Education (Scotland) Bill was read a second 

 time in the House of Commons on June 26. The 

 Bill is divided into two parts — administrative and 

 educational. The educational area will be the county. 

 The authority will be what is commonly known as 

 an ad hoc authority, or an authority specially elected 

 for the purposes of education. The members of the 

 authority will be all directly elected. As the simple 

 rnajority vote does not afford reasonable protection 

 to existing minorities, or give them the opportunity 

 of making their voices heard in the councils of the 

 community, it has been decided to introduce the prin- 

 ciple of proportional representation. The main object 

 of the Bill is the better education of the whole of the 

 people of Scotland, irr( sjKrlivc of social class, age, 

 sex, or place of residence. The effect of the two main 

 proposals of the measure is that when the Act comes . 

 into full operation the education of practically every 

 young person will be continued, in one form or 

 another, until he or she reaches the age of eighteen. 

 There is also ample provision to prevent the exploita- 

 tion of child-labour by parents or employers. It is 

 not proposed at first to raise the age for compulsory 

 attendance at continuation schools beyond sixteen. But 

 power is taken in the Bill to raise the age further by 

 instalments to seventeen and eighteen as circumstances 

 permit. It is proposed to make a special grant in 

 aid towards the local expenditure of those authorities 

 who in the discharge of a national duty find them- 

 selves obliged to impose upon their constituents a 

 burden higher than that which is the average in the 

 counti'x . 



TnK Library Association (Caxton Hall, Westmin- 

 ster) has issued a " Clas§ List of Current Serial 

 Digests and Indexes of the Literature of Science, 

 Technology, and Commerce," published as Appendix A 

 to the final report of the Library Association Technical 

 and Commercial Libraries Committee. The list is 

 intended to show the minimum bibliographical equip- 

 ment of a library professing to specialise in certain 

 departments of knowledge, and is issued for the guid- 

 ance of librarians. For example, we are told that a 

 library that specialises in chemistry should include the 

 abstracts published by the American Chemical Society 

 and by the Chemical Society of London. Similar 

 information is given with regard to some fifty other 

 subjects in piure and applied science, manufactures, 

 Inw, aiid econorriics. In making their recommenda- 

 tions as to the choice of publications containing ab- 

 stracts of the literature of the different subjects con- 

 sidered, the compilers of this list have ignored German 

 serial diijests except when no suitable .substitute in 

 another language could be found. It is not explained 



NO. 2540. VOL. lOl] 



why this course is taken, but probably it is thought 

 that libraries should not be encouraged to buy German 

 books at the present time, even if they are able to 

 do so. At all events, the list will direct special atten- 

 tion to English and American bibliographies and ^ 

 abstracts, which may be used instead of the German 

 publications, to which, perhaps, in the past undue 

 preference has been given. In recommending this list 

 to all who are interested in the formation and main- 

 tenance of libraries, we would lay stress on the state- 

 ment that it represents a minimum equipment of 

 periodical works of reference. There are, of course, 

 many similar works, not included in the list, that a 

 good library should possess. 



In the Revue Scientifique for April 20-27 M. Paul 

 Otlet has an article on "Transformations op6rees dans 

 I'appareil bibliographique des sciences — Repertoire, 

 Classification, Office de Documentation." By the 

 term "repertoire" or "repertory" he means a card 

 catalogue or a loose-leaf catalogue in which new matter 

 can be quickly inserted in its proper place without 

 disturbing any other part of the catalogue. M, Otlet 

 urges that all catalogues of books and papers should 

 be arranged in this way. As to the details of classifica- 

 tion, M. Otlet is, as is well known, a strong advocate 

 of the decimal system. As this systein is by no means 

 generally understood, we may quote an example given 

 in this article The number 31 stands for statistics, 

 331-2 for salaries, (44) for France. " 17" for the seven- 

 teenth century. The full expression 31 : 331.2 («14) " 17 '" 

 means : " Statistics of salaries in France in the seven- 

 teenth century." But these four numbers may be re- 

 arranged on the index-card in all possible permuta- 

 tions. For example, (44) 31 : 331.2 " 17 " would be 

 translated : " France : statistics of salaries in the 

 seventeenth century"; while " 17 " (44) 31 : 331.2 

 would mean: "The seventeenth century in France, 

 statistics of salaries." It is to be •observed that 

 the colon, brackets, and quotation marks are 

 integral parts of the decimal system as used by 

 M, Otlet. In the .third section of M. Otlet's article 

 it is explained that an office of documentation is a 

 library in which all books, and even parts of books, 

 have been indexed -on cards in accordance with the 

 decimal system of classification. It is claimed that 

 anyone possessing the key to the classification will 

 then be able in a few minutes to obtain a list of all 

 the books in the library bearing on a particular subject 

 in which he may be interested. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 

 Zoological Society, June 11. — Mr. A. Ezra, vice- 

 president, in the chair. — Lt.-Col. .S. Monckton Cope- 

 man : Observations on a colony of burrowing bees 

 (Andrena fulva). — Dr. A. Smith Woodward : Two new 

 Elasmobranch fishes from the Upper Jurassic litho- 

 graphic stone of Bavaria. — Morley Roberts : The func- 

 tion of pathological states in evolution. 



Mineralogical Society, June 18. — Mr. W. Barlow, 

 president, in the chair.^W. A. Richardson : The origin 

 of septarian nodules. Septarian structure consists not 

 of a simple combination of radial and concentric 

 circles, but of irregular polygons closely simulating 

 mud-cracking. By experiments with clay balls and 

 films, and comparison with timber cracks, it was 

 shown that radial cracks widening inwards are pro- 

 duced by internal circumferential contraction, radial 

 cracks widening outwards by internal expansion, con- 

 centric cracks bv contraction towards the centre, and 



