712 



NATURE 



[February 26, 1920 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE. 



Aberdeen. — The honorary degree of LL.D. is to 

 be conferred on Sir J. C. Bose, founder of the Bose 

 Research Institute, Calcutta; Prof. W. Bulloch, 

 professor of bacteriology, London Hospital ; Prof. 

 J. Wight DutY, .'\rmstrong College, Newcastle-upon- 

 Tyne ; Sir Daniel Hall, Permanent Secretary to the 

 Board of .Agriculture; Mr. J. H. Jeans, secretary of 

 the Royal Society; and Sir Robert Jones, lecturer on 

 orthopaedic surgery, Liverpool University. 



Capt. James W. Low has been appointed assistant 

 in the natural history department. University College, 

 Dundee (University of St. .\ndrews). 



.^PPLIC.MIONS are invited for the RadclifTe Crocker 

 travelling scholarship in dermatology at L'niversity 

 College Hospital Medical School. The scholarship is 

 of the approximate value of 280/., and tenable for one 

 year. Particulars are obtainable from the Dean, 

 University College Hospital Medical School, Gower 

 Street, W.C.i. 



The next election — the seventh — to Beit fellowships 

 for scientific research will take place on or about 

 July 15 next. The latest time for receiving applica- 

 tions is .\pril 19. Forms of application and informa- 

 tion respecting the fellowships are obtainable, by 

 letter, from the Rector, Imperial College of Science 

 and Technology, South Kensington. 



.\ MOVEMENT has been started to form a properly 

 constituted Old Students' .Association at King's Col- 

 lege, London. .^ committee has drawn up a provi- 

 sional constitution, and a general meeting has been 

 called for March 4, at 6 p.m., at the college.. It has 

 been possible to send notices of this meeting only to 

 those old students whose names are on the register, 

 buT: it is hoped that the meeting will be made widely 

 known, and that as many old students as possible will 

 be present. 



The first meeting of the International Federation 

 of University Women, which will include delegates 

 from the women's colleges throughout the world, will 

 meet in London in July next. The chairmen of the 

 International Federation are Dean Virginia Gilder- 

 sleeve, of Barnard College, Columbia University, 

 U.S. .A., and Prof. Winifred Cullis, of the London 

 (Royal Free Hospital) School of Medicine for Women, 

 University of London. 



The Chadwick Trustees announce three public 

 lectures on " Military Hygiene in Peace and 

 War," by Gen. Sir John Goodwin, K.C.B., 

 in the lecture-room, Roval Society of Arts, John 

 Street, Adelphi, W.C.2, on Mondays, March 8, 15, 

 and 22, at 5.15 pm. The titles of the lectures are : — 

 Army Hygiene prior to the Recent War, Army 

 Hygiene during the Recent War (.Application of its 

 Principles to Active Service Conditions), and The 

 Future of Armv Hygiene (Its Relation to the Hygiene 

 of the Civil Cornmunity). All information about 

 Chadwick public lectures may be obtained from the 

 secretary, Mrs. Aubrey Richardson, at the offices of 

 the Trust, 40 (6th) Queen Anne's Chambers, West- 

 minster, S.W. 1. 



The opening of the British Bureau of the Office 

 National des Universites et Ecoles Frangaises at 

 50 Russell Square by M. Lucien Poincar^ took place 

 on Monday, February 23, in the presence of many dis- 

 tinguished university men of both countries. The bureau 

 is intended to .serve as a university liaison office between 

 the two countries, giving advice to British students 

 who may wish to study abroad or French students 

 seeking to pursue their studies in England, and so 



NO. 2626, VOL. 104] 



bringing British and French universities into closer 

 touch with one another. M. Poincare, in declarmg 

 the bureau open, said the work which would be done 

 in Russell Square would be of the greatest use, par- 

 ticularly to England and France. He hoped the day 

 would come when all Englishmen would speak French 

 and all Frenchmen would speak English. It was too 

 early, he thought, to say we were internationalists, 

 using the word in its better meaning. We were rather 

 inter-Allies. It was still necessary to struggle for 

 civilisation. He trusted that the Office National 

 would be a powerful factor in uniting England and 

 Fra/ce in closer bonds and for working for the good 

 of humanity. In the evening, M. Millerand, the 

 Prime Minister of France, in the chair, a dinner given 

 by the Groupe Inter-Universitaire Franco-Britannique 

 was held at the Connaught Rooms in honour of 

 M. Poincare and to celebrate the formal opening of 

 the bureau. Many public men were present, and the 

 general trend of the speeches during the evening was 

 to emphasise the possibility of this alliance of the 

 universities helping to cement the already established 

 union between France and England. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 

 Royal Society, February 12. — Sir J. J. Thomson, 

 president, in the chair.— J. W. McBain and C. S. 

 Salmon : Colloidal electrolytes. Soap solutions and 

 their constitution. For the first time a comprehen- 

 sive theorv of soap solutions has been set up. This 

 has led to a definition of colloidal electrolytes, a 

 class the members of which will probably prove more 

 numerous than acids and bases put together. They 

 are salts in which one of the ions has been replaced 

 bv an ionic micelle. The ionic micelle in the case 

 of soap exhibits an equivalent conductivity equal to 

 that of potassium ion, and double that of the palmitate 

 ion which it has replaced. Its formula may corre- 

 spond to (P'), • »i(H.O), but more probably it is 

 (NaP)^(P'), . (H,0)„, where P' is the anion of the 

 fattv acid in question. In concentrated solutions 

 soaps exist chiefly in colloidal form, together with 

 sodium or ootassium ion, equivalent to the ionic 

 micelle present, whereas in dilute solution both un- 

 dissociated and dissociated soaps are crystalloids of 

 simple molecular weight. In mixtures of soaps the 

 tendency is to form more micellae. .Addition of electro- 

 lytes, however, exerts opposinginfluences, dehydrating 

 and driving back dissociation. The conception of the 

 ionic micelle .serves to explain the behaviour of solit- 

 tions of dvestuffs, indicators, and proteins. .\ modi- 

 fication of the dew-point method is described, which 

 has enabled measurements of osmotic activity and 

 "molecular weight" to be carried out, free from _ the 

 uncertainties of interpretation of the results obtained 

 for colloids bv the osmometer method, and^ super- 

 seding the well-known but erroneous data of Krafft. — 

 C. C. Farr and D. B. Macleod : The viscosity of 

 sulphur. The results are discussed of a number of 

 experiments, under a great variety of conditions, on 

 the viscosity of sulohur with temperatures rising and 

 falling between 123° C. and 278° C. The method 

 employed was that of rotating cylinders, usually with 

 a bifilar suspension. .A unifilar suspension was, 

 however, employed in the neighbourhood of the point 

 of minimum yiscositv. Great care was taken to 

 secure that the sulphur had actually attained the tem- 

 perature indicated bv the thermometer u.sed. The 

 effects were observed of prolonged heating, also the 

 effects of the absorption of gases, especially NH, and 

 SO,. The relation' of the viscosity to the amount 

 of " insoluble sulphur " present is considered. — C. V. 



