UST 19. 1920] 



NATURE 



785 



Notes. 



Arc H.JEOLOOisTS will fully appreciate the announce- 

 ment that one of the first official acts of the new 

 nigh Commissioner of Palestine has been the estab- 

 lishment of a Department of Antiquities. An Inter- 

 national Board will advise the director on technical 

 matters. Provision is made for an inspector, for a 

 museum, and for the custody of the historical monu- 

 ments. The museum starts with more than ico cases 

 of antiquities collected by the Palestine Exploration 

 I'und and other bodies before the war. On August 9 

 ihe new British School of Archaeology was formally 

 opened at Jerusalem by Sir Herbert Samuel. 



.\t the council meeting of the National Association 

 of Industrial Chemists, held at Sheffield on August 7, 

 the hon. secretary reported that a number of firms 

 had given a definite undertaking to consult the 

 officials of the association in all matters relating to 

 chemists, their appointment, salaries, and conditions 

 t>f employment. On the whole, the salaries paid to 

 members of the association were fairly satisfactory ; 

 ■!! this connection a report had been issued giving a 



hedule of minimum salaries, and this would be 



irculated shortly. The hon. secretary took a gloomy 



view of the future before industrial chemists. He 



stated that the number of unemployed was increasing 



ipidlv, and there was every indication of a coming 



eat slump in the engineering and allied industries 

 in which their members were employed. It was more 

 than ever imperative for industrial chemists to unite 



> preserve their interests. Mr. A. B. Searle (Shef- 



Id) was unanimously elected president for the 

 oming year, and Mr. J. W. Merchant appointed 



cretary. The proposal to appoint an organising 

 -1 cretary for propaganda work was also carried. 



A MEMORIAL hns been nre;?ented to the German 

 National Assemblv urging the formation of an 

 Imperial Chemicotc^chnical Test Laboratory, which it 

 is recommended should be formed from the Military 

 Test Bureau which existed during the war. Accord- 

 ing to a report in the Zeits. des Vereines deutscher 

 In^enieure for May 29, it is suggested that the 

 functions of the new laboratory should be, inter alia, 

 the execution of scientific and technical investigations 

 relative to raw materials', and particularly (i) the 

 nroduction of materials of importance to the public, 

 ;f. spirit from wood and acetylene instead of from 

 otatoes, and of fatty acids from the products of 

 oal- or lignite-tar or paraffin, and the utilisation 

 nd improvement not only of cellulose as' a substitute 

 ir cotton, but also of ammonium nitrate obtained 

 \ nthetically in large quantities as a fertiliser; 

 ruid (2) the determination of substitutes for 

 chemical and metallurgical products not avail- 

 ible in the colintry or of which there is a 

 lortage, i.e. substitutes for parafTin, camphor, and 

 lycerine, for substances used in the preservation of 

 leather and metals, also substitutes for lubricants, 

 rubber, gutta-percha, etc. In addition, the pro- 

 posed new institute would carry out researches 

 of general interest, e.g. or rust-prevention and 

 the corrosion of metals, on the determination of 

 NO. 2651, VOL. 105] 



stresses in internal-combustion engines, on the efTect 

 of winter cold and upper-air temperatures on imple- 

 ments and raw materials, and on the testing and im- 

 provement of aeroplane and airship fabrics. It is 

 also suggested that scientific and technical investiga- 

 tions should be carried out dealing with the preven- 

 tion of accidents and the protection of workers in a 

 number of important industries. 



The autumn meeting of the Institute of Metals will 

 be held at Barrow-in-Furness on September 15-16, 

 under the presidency of Sir George Goodwin. 



We have received the quarterly report of the 

 Research Defence Society containing an account of 

 the annual general meeting. The Jenner Society has 

 become afiiliatcd to the society, and its hon. secretary, 

 Dr. Drury, has joined the committee. At the close 

 of the meeting Col. McCarrison gave an address on 

 "Vitamines," an abstract of which is published in 

 the report. 



Medical Science: Abstracts and Reviews for August 

 (vol. ii.. No. 5) contains a review of recent work and 

 articles upon " lethargic encephalitis " (see Nature, 

 January i, p. 452), a disease which appeared in this 

 country at the commencement of 1918. Cases have 

 been reported in almost every European country and 

 in Africa, India, the United States, and Canada. 

 Netter points out that descriptions of a similar disease 

 are given by Hippocrates, Aretaeus, and Caelius 

 Aurelianus, and the works of Celsus contain a chapter 

 on "lethargic fever." Sydenham in the seventeenth 

 century also gave a description of the same kind of 

 disease under the name of "comatose fever." It 

 appears reasonable to suppose, therefore, that this 

 disease is not new, but has been in abevance for 

 seventy years or more. No causative organism has 

 yet been discovered. 



On the occasion of the opening of the third labora- 

 tory of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine on 

 July 24 (see Nature, July 29, p. 696) the Liverpool 

 University Press issued a volume (103 pp., 37 plates) 

 giving an account of the inception of the School and 

 its history frpm that time up to the present. In 

 addition to the records of the important contributions 

 of the School to the advance of our knowledge of 

 tropical diseases, the volume records the bene- 

 factions which hav3 enabled the School to develop 

 and to perform its functions so successfully. Among 

 recent developments may be mentioned the estab- 

 lishment of research laboratories at Mandos and at 

 Sierra Leone, where continuous investigations into 

 the diseases of these localities can be carried on. 

 We join in the confident hope expressed that the city 

 of Liverpool and those " whom destiny binds in diverse 

 ways to tropical lands " will continue to support the 

 School. 



The Research Defence. Society has issued a paper 

 by Major-Gen. Sir David Bruce on the prevention of 

 tetanus during the Great War by the use of antitetanic 

 serum. Sir David Bruce states in his introduction 

 that the object of this paper is to controvert the 

 assertions of the supporters of anti-vivisection in. 

 regard to tetanus, and to prove that antitetanic serum 



