376 



NATURE 



[December II, 1919 



gravitational field and enter into the differential 

 equations which constitute the new law of 

 gravitation. 



It is, of course, impossible to convey a precise 

 impression of the mathematical basis of this theory 

 in non-mathematical terms. But the main purpose 

 of this article is to indicate its very general nature. 

 It differs from many theories in that it is not 

 devised to meet newly observed phenomena. It 

 is put together to satisfy a mental craving and 

 an obstinate philosophic questioning. It is essen- 

 tially pure mathematics. The first impression on 

 the problem being stated is that it is incapable of 

 solution ; the second of amazement that it has been 

 carried through ; and the third of surprise that it 

 should suggest phenomena capable of experimental 

 investigation. This last aspect and the confirma- 

 tion of its anticipations will form the subject of the 

 next article. E. Cunningham. 



LORD WALSINGHAM, F.R.S. 



LORD W.VLSINGHAM, whose death from 

 pleurisy took place on December 3, in his 

 seventy-seventh year, was a man very highly 

 esteemed in many circles, and in none more than 

 in those devoted to the study of natural history. 

 As an entomologist he was greatly distinguished, 

 and the work and influence which he brought to 

 bear in promoting the study of insects were widely 

 known, and have borne much good fruit. His 

 work was not of the type associated with the 

 name of Fabre, the famous French observer, but 

 he by no means neglected the study of the living 

 insect, and was keenly interested in every problem 

 on which entomology could help to throw light. 

 He saw also its economic importance, and he had 

 the wisdom to know how greatly its value in 

 every direction depended upon the accurate identi- 

 fication of species, and how this in its turn de- 

 pended upon good methods of classification and 

 arrangement, and upon an exact and stable system 

 of nomenclature. His own studies, and such in- 

 fluence as he could exert, were, in consequence, 

 largely directed towards the fundamental work of 

 naming and describing species, and improving the 

 means that would lead to their more easy 

 identification. 



From an early age Lord Walsingham gave his 

 time freely to a study of the Microlepidoptera, or 

 small moths, and he lost no opportunity to add to 

 his collection of these obscure but very important 

 insects. He maintained his interest in them up to 

 the last, and, a month or so before his death, 

 he was to be seen still working at them in the 

 Natural History Museum, to which his own very 

 large collection, together with a valuable library 

 of entomological works, had been transferred as 

 a gift in the year 1910. He was elected a trustee 

 of the British Museum in 1876, and a fellow of 

 the Royal Society in 1887. As a trustee of the 

 museum, more especially during the time when 

 he was a member of the Standing Committee, he 

 was always actively interested in its affairs, and 

 it was doubtless due to his initiative that the 

 NO. 2615, VOL. 104] 



entomological staff was increaised, and entomology 

 afterwards made into a separate department. He 

 would like to have seen the staff still further in- 

 creased, for he was greatly impressed with the 

 necessity of having a large and competent staff 

 to deal with the rapidly accumulating accessions 

 of specimens. 



Lord Walsingham was president of the Ento- 

 mological Society in 1889-^, and in one of his 

 addresses he pointed out that of the more 

 than two million species of insects estimated to 

 he living on the globe, less than a tithe had been 

 named and described, and the vast majority were 

 still altogether unknown. His entomological pub- 

 lications, beginning in the year 1867, were numer- 

 ous, and always showed careful and accurate 

 work. They appeared in the " Biologia Centrali- 

 Americana," the "Fauna Hawaiensis," in cata- 

 logues of the British Museum, and in the trans- 

 actions and proceedings of the Entomological, 

 Zoological, and Linnean Societies, to eacii of 

 which he belonged as a fellow ; and also in the 

 Entomologists' Mojithly Magazine, of which he 

 had been one of the co-editors, as well as in other 

 scientific journals. Entomology, however, w-as 

 not his only interest ; ornithology and other 

 branches of natural history shared in his atten- 

 tions. He was a traveller and a keen sports- 

 man, and in his time was noted as a great shot. 

 He was a graceful and gifted speaker, and as a 

 man of wide knowledge and good judgment was 

 always listened to attentively at the scientific or 

 other meetings in which he used so frequently to 

 take a part. Although he might have made his 

 mark in almost any sphere of life, Science, has 

 reason to be gratified that so great a part of his 

 time and work had been devoted to her service. 



NOTES. 



The Electricity (Supply) Bill was read a second time 

 in the House of Lords on December 8. 



The council of the Royal Institute of Public Heahli 

 has appointed Prof. Maurice NicoU, of the Pasti'ur 

 Institute, Paris, Harben lecturer for 1920. 



We regret to learn that Prof. A. Werner, professor 

 of chemistry in Zurich University, Nobel prize 

 man for chemistry in 1913, and foreign mcml)er of 

 the Chemical Society, died on November 15 ai fift 

 two years of age. 



Sir Richard Redmayne, who has been Chief 

 Inspector of Mines since 1908, will shortly resign his 

 post. He proposes to devote himself in the future to 

 the work of the Imperial Mineral Resources Bureau 

 of which he is the chairman, and to the practice o 

 his profession as a consulting mining engineer. 



The late Dr. John Aitken bequeathed the sum o 

 1500/. to the Roval Society of Edinburgh for the pur 

 pose of publishing in book form a collection of hi.- 

 papers read before various societies. He also left tc 

 th^' L'niversities of Edinburgh and Glasgow any of hi 

 dust, colour, or other apparatus which they may wisl 

 to possess. 



The Elliot medal for 1918 of the U.S. \ationa 

 .Academy of Sciences has been awarded to Mr. C. W 

 Beebe, of the New York Zoological Society, on tlie com 



