444 



NATURE 



[January i, 1920 



model producing i kg. per hour of ammonia, desired 

 by the authorities. It was at this stage that his 

 industrial experience with Messrs. Hutton at Shi ffield 

 aided him both in the choice of suitable materials and 

 in the proper design of apparatus. No member of 

 Dr. Greenwood's staff had had previous experience 

 with the operation of gases under very high pressures 

 or with the design of suitable- plant, yet he not only 

 brought his work to a successful issue, but he also 

 effected the training of the staff in such a way that 

 they could operate the extremely complicated plant 

 unaided. This in itself is a tribute to his technical 

 and executive abilities; and his work on "Industrial 

 Gases," published since his death, is a worthv record 

 of his knowledge of an important department of 

 applied chemistry. 



The loss of that keen geologist, Prof. Joseph Barrel!, 

 of Yale, who died at the comparatively early age of 

 fifty on May 4 of last year, will be felt far bevond 

 those who met him and appreciated at first hand his 

 mental energy and accuracy of perception. .\ sym- 

 pathetic memorial of Prof. Barrell's work, with a por- 

 trait and bibliography, appears in the issue of the 

 American Journal of Science for October last, and it 

 is followed by two important papers by him on the 

 theory of isostasy. An obituary notice of Barrell by 

 Prof. Schuchert appears in Science (vol. xlix., p. 605, 

 1919). It is here pointed out that his reasoning 

 powers were applied to the relations of climate to 

 organic evolution, as well as to those problems of 

 earth-structure that he made peculiarly his own. 



The Government of India has appointed a Com- 

 mittee, consisting of European and Indian experts, 

 to inquire into the conditions and prospects of the 

 sugar industry. At present most of the sugai pro- 

 duced is locally consumed in the crude form of 

 "jaggery," but there seems little doubt that if capital 

 and modern methods of manufacture could be '.ntro- 

 duced India might become one of the great sugar- 

 producing areas in the world. The annual consump- 

 tion of sugar in India, as elsewhere, has rapidly in- 

 creased. India until recent years stood first of all 

 the countries in the world in its area under sugar- 

 cane and its estimated yield of cane-sugar, and e\ en 

 now ranks second only to Cuba. Yet it is notorious 

 that the yield both of cane and raw sugar per acre 

 and the available sugar extracted from the cane are 

 undesirably low. In view of the conservative habits 

 of the Indian peasant, the Government, in inducing 

 him to adopt improved methods, has a difficult task 

 to encounter. 



At a conversazione of the Eton College Scientific 

 Society, held on December 15, a presentation from 

 ])ast and present members was made to the retiring 

 presidcMit, Mr. W. D. Eggar, who, in returning 

 thanks, referred to the losses which the society had 

 suffered since the last conversazione in 19 14, and 

 in particular mentioned the names of W. S. Stewart, 

 .\. G- Parsons, and H. G. J. Moseley.. Henry 

 Moseley was " in college " with a brilliant band of 

 classical scholars. He obtained his scholarship at 

 Trinity, Oxford, in chemistry and physics, but the 

 NO. 2618, VOL. 104] 



only paper which he contributed to the society was on 

 deep-sea fishes. At the 1905 conversazione he demon- 

 strated the simpler properties of those X-ravs which 

 afterwards he investigated to such purpose that his 

 name, like that of Robert Boyle, links Eton with a 

 law of Nature. After attending the British Associa- 

 tion meeting in Australia, Moseley hurried back to 

 join the Army, and fell in Gallipoli on August 10, 1915. 

 Dr. Leonard Hill, who demonstrated in an amusing 

 and instructive lecture the advantages of oxygep for 

 athletes, deplored the loss to science in Moseley 's 

 death. Dr. R. \\'hytlaw Gray is the new president 

 of the society. 



The council of the Scottish Meteorological Society 

 proposes to hold a series of meetings, mainly in Edin- 

 burgh, at which lectures on popular lines will be 

 given or discussions opened on c]ueslions of meteoro- 

 logical interest. The first of these lectures has, 

 indeed, already been given in Glasgow by Capt. 

 Franklin, who opened the winter session of the Roval 

 Philosophical Society of Glasgow bv an address on 

 "The Study of Meteorology in Schools and L'niversi- 

 ties." The report of the council, adopted at the 

 annual business meeting on December 19, refers 

 to climatological stations maintained by voluntary 

 observers, and says it has become evident that the 

 country should no longer depend so largely on volun- 

 tary effort for a record of important economic factors. 

 It is felt that those who may be in charge of any 

 scheme of reconstruction should regard it as a vital 

 matter that there should be a sufficient skeleton 

 network of stations the permanence of which is 

 guaranteed bv some local authority or by some 

 Government Department the interests of which are 

 directly concerned. The president of the society for 

 the ensuing year is Dr. C. G. Knott ; vice-presidents. 

 Prof. T. Hudson Beare and Mr. D. A. Stevenson ; 

 and hon. secretary. Dr. E. M. Wcdderburn. 



The executive committee of the National Union of 

 Scientific Workers has appointed Major A. Church to 

 be whole-time secretary of the union, the appointment 

 to date from January i, 1920. 



A NEW era of prosperity for the Zoological Society 

 of London seems to have dawned. At the last 

 monthly general meeting, held on December 17, it 

 was announced that the number of visitors to the 

 gardens from January i to November 30 showec^ an 

 increase of 653,187 as compared with the previous 

 year, while the money received for admission in the 

 gardens during the same period showed an increase 

 of 22,977/. as compared with the corresponding period 

 in igiS. 



We are glad to note that vigorous measures are to 

 be taken to suppress the practice of bird-liming in 

 Lower Eg\pt. The Ministry of Public Works, Egypt, 

 has just issued a report by Mr. J. Lewis Bonhote 

 setting forth the hidcousness of this traffic and the 

 grave results to agriculture which must follow unless 

 it is speedily stopped, for the victims are almost 

 exclusively small, insectivorous birds. In an intro- 

 duction to the report Major Stanley Flower, Director 

 of the Zoologicar Service, remarks that in the past, in 



