November 29, 19 17] 



NATURE 



253 



THE EDUCATION BILL. 



THE important conference between representatives 

 of the local education authorities ajid Mr. Fisher, 

 President of the Board of Education, held in London 

 on November 20, is indicative of the keen interest taken 

 b\^ responsible men in the Education Bill so far as its 

 vital clauses are concerned. Mr. Fisher was not called 

 from his high office as Vice-Chancellor of the Univer- 

 sity of Sheffield simply that he might promote a 

 measure embodying certain changes in methods of 

 educational procedure and administration, or to in- 

 crease the bureaucratic powers of the Central Authority 

 with some possible advance in the essential features 

 of education, but in response to a growing and in- 

 sistent demand, largely induced by the lessons of the 

 fierce conflict in which we are engaged, which has 

 thrown a lurid light upon the defects of our educa- 

 tional system, that Parliament should initiate a liberal 

 measure of educational reform so complete and all- 

 embracing that no child of the nation shall be allowed 

 to escape from its fostering care, however insistent 

 may be the demands of industry. 



Mr. Fisher has enthusiastically responded to this 

 demand, and by his speeches in and out of the Hous^ 

 has aroused a deep and almost universal desire that his 

 educational reforms, by no means rising to the height 

 of his aspirations or fulfilling the ardent hopes of 

 some educationists, should be given a chance of legis- 

 lation. Unfortunately, the measure is weighted with 

 certain provisions which, in the opinion of many per-- 

 sons jealous of the claims of local government, are 

 likely to impede the initiative and sap the public spirit 

 and independence of the local authorities. From the 

 tenor of the interview mentioned above it is fairly 

 clear that Mr. Fisher is prepared to go a long way to 

 meet the criticisms offered so far as certain of Xhe 

 administrative clauses are concerned, and there is hope 

 therefore that an agreed measure may result which 

 will dispose of the excuse that the Government cannot 

 find the necessary time for its discussion. 



Many measures of reconstruction, to take effect after 

 the war, are afoot, but most of them are likely to 

 be futile of result in the absence of an educational 

 measure of the character Mr. Fisher has placed before 

 the nation. It is accordingly with warm approval that 

 we note that an important body like the British .Science 

 Guild has on this ground approached the Prime Minis- 

 ter with a demand that facilities shall be given to 

 enable the Bill, after due consideration and such 

 amendments as may be found necessary, to become 

 law in the course of the present session of Parliament. 

 In all, 331 resolutions, of which 156 are from Labour 

 organisations, have been received by the Government 

 urging that the Bill should be pressed forward with all 

 possible speed. The prospects of the Bill becoming 

 an Act have, indeed, improved greatly during the past 

 few days. On November 23 Mr. Fisher, in a speech 

 at Brighton, declared that the Government intends to 

 pass the Bill, and the Parliamentary correspondent of 

 the Times says it is understood that the Government 

 is prepared to consider favourably the giving of facili- 

 ties for the Bill this session, provided that a guarantee 

 is given that the debates in the House of Commons 

 are limited to a specific number of Parliamentary days. 



A large deputation, representative of all parties in 

 the House of Commons, waited upon the Prime Minis- 

 ter on Monday to urge the importance of passing the 

 Bill into law without delay. Mr. Lloyd George was 

 unable to give any definite pledge, but he suggested 

 that if the present session were prolonged it might be 

 possible to take the Bill towards the end of the session, 

 and if not, it would be given priority next session. It 

 is possible, therefore, that the second reading will be taken 

 before Christmas, and, in any case, the Bill is to be given 

 precedence next session if it does not come on before. 



NO. 2509, VOL. 100] 



MARINE BIOLOGY. 



FOURTEEN papers, forming vol. xi. (1917, pp. 360), 

 are issued from the Department of Marine 

 Biology of the Carnegie Institution of Washington. 

 Three papers record observations on the scyphomedusa, 

 Cassiopea xamachana, which is common in shallow 

 water near the laboratory at Tortugas, Florida. This 

 medusa, which thrives well in aquaria, is accustomed 

 in nature to a considerable range in salinity and in 

 temperature, and, having commensal algal cells, is in 

 some measure independent of the oxygen supply of the 

 surrounding water. On removing, by means of two 

 circular cuts, the peripheral region, including the 

 sense-organs, and the central stomach, an annular piece 

 of tissue is obtained which is paralysed (owing to 

 removal of the sense-organs), but is capable of stimu- 

 lation by an induction shock until a contraction wave 

 going in one direction is entrapped in it. Such a wave 

 may maintain itself for days with little change of rate 

 provided the temperature, CO2, salinity, and H-ion 

 concentration of the sea-water remain constant. Such 

 rings of tissue provide extremely favourable material 

 for the study of variations in the rate of nerve-con- 

 duction in natural sea-water and in artificial sea- 

 water solutions. Dr. A. G. Mayer • concludes, after 

 many experiments on these rings, that nerve-conduction 

 is due to a chemical action involving the cations 

 sodium, calcium, and potassium (magnesium is non- 

 essential), the sodium and calcium combining with 

 some proteid. The high temperature-coefficient of 

 ionisation of this ion-proteid may account for the high 

 : temperature-coefficient of the rate of nerve-conduction. 

 ; Dr. L. R. Cary has carried out experiments to test the 

 1 influence of the sense-organs of the medusa on meta- 

 bolism and regeneration. The oral arms and stomach 

 having been cut away, a strip of subumbrellar ecto- 

 derm, in which alone the nervous elements are con- 

 tained, was removed along a diameter, and thus 

 nervous connection between the halves of the disc 

 prevented. Comparison of such insulated halves, in 

 one of which the sense-organs were present, while in 

 the other they had been removed, showed that the 

 half-disc with sense-organs always regenerated more 

 rapidly, especially in the early stages. The experi- 

 ments indicate that the rate of regeneration is simply 

 an expression of the general metabolic activity of an 

 animal, and as such is subject to the influence of the 

 nerve-centres Dr. S. Hatai gives an account of the 

 composition of normal and starved medusae. 



Prof. E. N. Harvey describes experiments on, and 

 discusses, the chemistry of light-production in 

 animals. He has studied in detail a Japanese marine 

 ostracod Crustacean, Cypridina hilgendorfi, in which 

 light-giving material is formed in a gland opening 

 near the mouth and, on agitation of the animal, is readily 

 extruded as minute yellow globules which dissolve in 

 water to a colourless solution. Oxygen is necessary 

 for light-production, in which two substances — "photo- 

 genin " and " photophelein " — are shown to be con- 

 cerned. Photogenin, present in the luminous gland 

 cells, is colloidal, and probably a proteid. Photo- 

 phelein, which is found in high concentration through- 

 out the body of Cypridina, is crystalloidal and of un- 

 known composition. One part of the gland in 

 1,700,000,000 of water will give visible light on the 

 addition of photophelein. A similar photogenin-photo- 

 phelein reaction was found in Japanese fireflies 

 (Luciola). Mrs. Harvey records observations on Noc- 

 tiluca, the luminescence of which is traceable to 

 granules (photogenin) in the protoplasm, but photo- 

 phelein could not be demonstrated. 



Dr. A. J. Goldfarb has investigated the variability of 

 the eggs of sea-urchins; Dr. H. L. Clark records the 

 habits and reactions of a Comatulid (Tropiometra) ; Dr. 

 A. L. Tread well describes several new species of Poly- 



