288 



NATURE 



[December 13, 191 7 



new light from modern viewpoints on Linne's per- 

 sonality; to draw up a catalogue of all known memo- 

 rials; and to found a complete Linnean library. The 

 president is Dr. Tycho Tullberg, a lineal descendant 

 of Linn6. 



The following are among the lecture arrangements 

 at the Royal Institution before Easter :^Prof. J. A. 

 Fleming, a course of six experimentally illustrated lec- 

 tures, adapted to a juvenile auditory, on "Our Useful 

 Servants: Magnetism and Electricity "; Prof. W. M. 

 P'linders Petrie, three lectures on Palestine and Meso- 

 potamia — discovery, past, and future ; Prof. Arthur 

 Keith, three lectures on the problems of British anthro- 

 pology; Dr. Leonard Hill, two lectures on (i) the 

 stifling of children's health, (2) the climatic adaptation 

 of black and white men ; Sir R. T. Glazebrook, two 

 lectures on the National Physical Laboratory ; Sir 

 Napier Shaw, two lectures on illusions of the atmo- 

 sphere; Prof. W. J. Pope, two lectures on the chemical 

 action of light; M. Paul H. Loyson, two lectures on 

 the ethics of the war; Sir J. J. Thomson, six lectures 

 on problems in atomic structure. The Friday meetings 

 will commence on January 18, when Sir James Dewar 

 will deliver a discourse on studies on liquid films. Suc- 

 ceeding discourses will probably be given by Prof. J. 

 Townsend, Prof. A. S. Eddington, Principal E. H. 

 Griffiths, Prof. A. G. Green, Prof. E. H. Barton, and 

 Sir J. J. Thomson. 



L\ the October issue of the Agricultural Journal 

 of India (vol. xii., part iv.), Mr. Wynne Sayer discusses 

 the present position of sugar manufacture and the 

 measures required to place it upon a permanently 

 sound basis. Notwithstanding the present high price 

 of sugar, there is an actual decline in cane cultivation 

 in India, notably in Bengal. Various reasons are pro- 

 pounded for the moribund state of the Indian white 

 sugar industry, such as the predominance of low-grade 

 varieties of cane, the popularity of unrefined sugar 

 or gur, minute subdivision of the land, and the com- 

 petition of crops, such as paddy, jute, and cotton ; but 

 it is urged that the greatest difficulties arise from 

 the grossly inefficient manufacturing methods used. 

 Where modern, well-managed factories exist, Indian 

 sugar can be produced at a sufficiently low cost to 

 compete with foreign sugar. Great improvements are 

 also required in the gur industry, where inefficient 

 methods commonly reduce the possible output by 35 

 to 50 per cent. Immediate action is urged with the view 

 of placing both the gur and the white sugar industries 

 on a satisfactory basis. The nomination of a strong 

 committee of experts is suggested for the purpose of 

 carrying out a survey of the sugar-producing areas 

 and of considering the extent to which State assistance 

 to the pioneer factories may be needed. 



In the September-October number of the Bulletin 

 de la Sociiti d' Encouragement pour I'Industrie 

 Nationale Prof. Marcel Brillouin discusses the question 

 of the desirability of establishing in Paris a research 

 and test laboratory for the musical instrument trade. 

 He submits that any experiments carried out by indi- 

 vidual firms have a value that is strictly limited to 

 the manufacturers concerned. Further, such re- 

 searches are not available to the majority. The 

 laboratory which he now proposes should be created, 

 at the common expense of all musical instrument 

 makers, would comprise three sections : (i) Raw 

 materials ; (2) instrumental acoustics ; and (3) testing 

 and verifying. The laboratory would be staffed by 

 a certain number of physicists qualified by their train- 

 ing to carry out the work satisfactorily. Section (i) 

 would deal with the physical and mechanical properties 

 of every raw material entering into the composition 



NO. 25 1 1, VOL. 100] 



* 



of pianos, and string, wood-wind, and wind instru- 

 ments ; section (2) would deal with researches in 

 sound as applied to instruments, utilising the theories 

 of Helmholtz, Rayleigh, Stokes, Gouy, Hugoniot, and 

 others; while section (3) would consider methods of 

 checking and testing instruments and their parts and 

 implies the close co-opveration of manufacturers. 

 Hitherto German manufacturers — especially of piano- 

 fortes — have made very extended use of the results of 

 Helmholtz and other authorities on sound, and it is 

 claimed that the suggested new institution would go 

 far, by utilising existing knowledge, to obtain 

 empirical data which, in combinajtion with the artistic 

 (as applied to tone-quality) peculiarities of individual 

 firms, could not fail to improve the quality of musical 

 instruments in general. 



The death is announced, in the German Army 

 Geological Service, of Prof. Fritz Daniel Freeh, pro- 

 fessor of geology and palseontology in the University of 

 Breslau. Born in Berlin on March 17, 1861, Prof. 

 Freeh was educated in the University of that city, and 

 graduated as Ph.D. in 1885. His thesis dealt with 

 the coral-fauna of the Upper Devonian rocks of Ger- 

 many, and he devoted his life to the study of fossil 

 invertebrata, with special reference to their use in 

 stratigraphical geology. For a few years he was 

 engaged on the geological survey of Prussia, and 

 among his early publications was an official memoir 

 on the geology of Nassau (1888). In 1893 he was . 

 appointed successor of Prof. Ferdinand von Roemer > 

 in the University of Breslau, and he immediately began f 

 to direct most of his energies to the great compendium 

 of stratigraphical geology which von Roemer had 

 planned and just begun under the title " Lethaea 

 Greognostica," following a similar work of earlier date 

 by Bronn. Prof. Freeh himself wrote the greater 

 part of the section relating to Palaeozoic formations 

 and the whole of the volume describing the Trias, be- 

 sides editing some sections of later parts of the treatise 

 by other authors. So far as completed, this is the 

 most exhaustive and useful work of reference on 

 stratigraphical geology that has hitherto appeared, 

 and is full of interesting generalisations based on 

 broad views and wide experience, A few years ago 

 Prof. Freeh planned another important work of refer- 

 ence, a " Fossilium Catalogus," intended to comprise a 

 systematic list of all known fossils, critically compiled 

 with full quotations of literature by a series of special- 

 ists. He himself contributed the section on Devonian 

 Ammonoidea and edited a few other sections, but, as 

 publication did not begin until 1913, little progress has 

 naturally been made. In 1913 Prof. Freeh also suc- 

 ceeded Prof. Ernst Koken as one of the editors of the 

 Neues Jahrbuch fiir Mineralogie. His energy was 

 equalled by his ability, and geological science is dis- 

 tinctly the poorer by his loss. 



The contrast bet^veen Oriental and Western thought 

 is well illustrated by a curious list, published in The 

 New East (vol. i.. No. 5), entitled " 190 Things 

 Japanese do differently." In Japan a man is free, 

 woman carries the burdens; in the West "man acts 

 as the packhorse for his lady." Japanese wear the 

 thimble between the first and second joints of the 

 middle finger of the right hand, Europeans on the tip 

 of the middle finger; a Japanese tacks the kimono 

 after, the European before, stitching. The Japanese 

 mother-in-law is a terror to the bride; in Europe she 

 is the husband's bugbear. The Japanese blow their 

 noses with both hands ; Europeans usually with one. 

 The Japanese carpenter pulls at his saw ; the Euro- 

 pean carpenter uses his triceps muscle rather than his 

 biceps. Japanese take off their shoes, Europeans their 

 headgear, on entering a house. Japanese say "four 



