April i, 1920] 



NATURE 



145 



jeopardised, the Director of the Office must be a 

 Wan of high scientific standing- who will maintain 

 \\\Q. leading place which the Office now takes among 

 ihe nations of the world. For the credit of the nation 

 ind in the interests of science we trust that the new 

 Director will be a worthy successor of the one who 

 hos given so much scientific honour to the post. 



Mr. C. E. Groves, F.R.S., for some years lecturer 

 In chemistry at Guy's Hospital, consulting chemist to 

 the Conservators of the River Thames, and vice- 

 presidont of the Chemical Society from 1899-1902, 

 who died on February i, left estate of the gross value 

 of 33,022?.,. of which amount 2o,oooi. is left in trust 

 for his live sisters for life, and on the death of the 

 survivor of them io,oooL to the Royal Institution for 

 the Groves Endowment Fund for the promotion of 

 scientific research. 



Two scholarships, each of the annual value of 300Z., 

 are being offered by the Grocers' Company, the object 

 II heing the promotion of original research in sanitary 

 - ''nee. In addition to the sum named, there will be 

 allowance to meet the cost of apparatus and other 

 itnses in connection with the work. The scholar- 

 's will be tenable for one year, but may be ex- 

 iled for a second or third year under certain condi- 

 ns. The elections will take place in June next, 

 1 applications have to be made, on a special form 

 Aided, before May i to the Clerk of the Grocers' 

 npany. Grocers' Hall, Princes Street, E.C.2, 



K- spite of the fact that no regulations have been 

 icd concerning standard time in Finland, Helsing- 

 : IS time (ih. 40m. fast on Greenwich time) has 

 li en almost generally adopted in the country. The 

 inconvenience of following a time which differs from 

 the international zone system based upon Greenwich 

 time was the principal cause of a proposal, made last 

 autumn by the Geographical Society of Finland, to 

 fix Greenwich time +2h. as the standard time of the 

 Republic. A correspondent, "H.^R.," informs us that 

 on March 12 the President arrived at a decision ip 

 accordance with this proposal. The new standard 

 time of Finland will be adopted by the railways from 

 May I, 192 1, and the calendars for 1921 will intro- 

 duce it from the beginning of the year. The question 

 of adopting the twenty-four-hour day is under dis- 

 cussion. 



The Works Council Bill has now passed into law 

 in Germany. It provides for the formation of a works 

 council in every works having at least twentv em- 

 ployees (operatives and office staff). Representation 

 then proceeds ^ro rata up to a works employing any 

 number. .\11 male and female workers from the age 

 of eighteen who are in possession of citizen rights are 

 entitled to vote. Among the various provisions of 

 the Act mention may be made of the obligation of the 

 councils in assisting the management by advice with 

 the view of obtaining the greatest economy in carry- 

 ing out manufacturing operations. They must also 

 co-operate in the application of new methods and in 

 preventing disputes, and assist in the welfare work, 

 etc. These provisions presuppose considerable 

 technical and industrial knowledge on the part of the 

 NO. 2631, VOL. 105] 



members of the council— which, it may be added, 

 must not exceed thirty in any one establishment. 



At the annual general meeting of the Chemical 

 Society, held at Burlington House on March 25, the 

 following were elected officers and council for the 

 ensuing year :— President : Sir James J. Dobbie. 

 Vice-Presidents: Prof. J. B. Cohen, Prof. F. G. 

 Donnan, Dr. H. J. H. Fenton, Prof. S. Smiles, Prof. 

 J. Walker, and Prof. W. P. Wynne. Treasurer: 

 Dr. M. O. Forster. Secretaries: Dr. J. C. Philip 

 and Dr. H. R. Le Sueur. Foreign Secretary: Dr. 

 A. W. Crossley. Ordinary Members of Council: 

 Prof. A. J. Allmand, Dr. E. F. Armstrong, Julian L. 

 Baker, Francis H, Carr, Prof. A. Findlay, Prof. 

 F. E. Francis, J. A. Gardner, Prof. J. C. Irvine, Dr. 

 C. A. Keane, Sir Robert Robertson, Prof. J. M. 

 Thomson, and E. W. Voelcker. It was announced 

 that, the supplementary charter now having been 

 granted, an extraordinary general meeting of the 

 fellows would be held at Burlington House on April 29 

 at 5 p.m. to consider the alterations in the bv-laws 

 proposed by the council. 



We have on several recent occasions referred to the 

 advances which were made during the war in wireless 

 telephony to and from aeroplanes. There is also 

 another important use to which electric waves have 

 been put in connection with aerial navigation, in the 

 wireless direction-finding apparatus, which has like- 

 wise been brought to a considerable degree of perfec- 

 tion. An interesting demonstration of both these 

 applications was given under the auspices of the 

 Marconi Co. on a Har.dley Page machine on March 25, 

 when conversations were held with the Marconi estab- 

 lishment at Chelmsford, and messages were picked up 

 and transmitted to the Times office in London. The 

 direction-finding apparatus, which was also demon- 

 strated, is apparently a development of the "wireless 

 compass " used at sea, founded on the radio-goniometer 

 of Bellini and Tosi, in which the angular relation of 

 two coils connected' respectively to two independent 

 aerial systems at right angles is varied. By rotating 

 a pointer carrying one of these coils a position is 

 found where the signals received reach a maximum 

 loudness and the direction of the incoming waves is 

 ascertained. By plotting cross-bearings of two 

 stations obtained in this way on a chart, the true 

 position can be found. The Marconi form of the 

 apparatus has a working range of 200 to 300 miles 

 when used in conjunction with low-power coast, wire- 

 less stations. The converse process was used during 

 the war for finding the position of enemy craft from 

 more than one home station, and it is well known 

 that the Zeppelins used a wireless position-finder ex- 

 tensively for navigation during raids. The principle 

 on which this worked is, however, believed to have 

 been somewhat different. 



The report of the Royal Commission on Decimal 

 Coinage has just been issued. The majority report, 

 which represents the views of about two-thirds of 

 the members of the Commission, is not in favour of 

 making any change in the denomination of the cur- 

 rency and money of account in order to place them 



