66 



NATURE 



[June i6, 1898 



ounties. Various matters connected with the administrative 

 arrangements between the local authorities and the Department 

 were considered and decided. 



At the instance of the Headmasters' Conference, the Head- 

 masters' Association, the Headmistresses' Association, and the 

 Conference of CathoHc Schools, a Bill dealing with the subject 

 of secondary education will be introduced into Parliament this 

 Session. The Bill proposes to transfer the powers relating to 

 secondary education now vested in the Charity Commission, the 

 Science and Art Department, and the Education Department to 

 one central authority under the Committee of the Privy Council 

 on Education, and to establish local secondary education authori- 

 ties to administer areas not less than those of a county or a 

 county borough. It is contemplated that the reconstituted Educa- 

 tion Department will consist of two sections, for secondary 

 and primary education respectively, these two sections being 

 under one permanent secretary, who will be advised by chief 

 assistant secretaries in regard to each of these two chief divisions 

 of departmental work. The Bill further provides for the regis- 

 tration of secondary schools according to their different types 

 and of teachers qualified to teach. The residue under the Local 

 Ta.xation (Custom and Excise) Act, 1890, is to be allocated to 

 education, and in the case both of residue and of Imperial grants 

 now paid through the Science and Art Department such portions 

 as the Treasury shall determine are to be allocated to secondary 

 education and to technical instruction respectively. 



The new buildings of Reading College, under which name 

 the University Extension College at Reading will in future be 

 known, were opened by the Prince of Wales on Saturday. The 

 College was established in 1892 as a direct outcome of Oxford 

 University Extension work. Mr. H. J. Mackinder was ap- 

 pointed Student of Christ Church, Oxford, his appointment 

 being made ' ' with a view to giving system and completeness " to 

 the educational work of one of the University Extension centres. 

 His services were offered to Reading, and were accepted ; and, 

 largely owing to his efforts during the past six years, the College 

 has advanced to the position it now occupies. The first home 

 of the College was restricted to an ancient building, formerly 

 part of the Hospital of St. John, attached to the Abbey of Read- 

 ing. The accommodation was soon found to be insufficient for 

 the increasing number of students. Mr. Herbert Sutton, chair- 

 man of the Council, purchased the vicarage of St. Lawrence, 

 adjoining the Hospitium, and the acquisition of this property 

 enabled certain necessary enlargements to be made, including 

 the building of a dairy institute. The cost of the College 

 properties and buildings exceeds upwards of 20,000/. ; and it 

 was this amalgamation of old and new buildings in one central 

 educational organisation, to be known as Reading College, that 

 the Prince of Wales formally opened on Saturday. In respond- 

 ing to the toast of " The Royal Family," at the luncheon after 

 the opening ceremony, the Prince of Wales remarked : — " In 

 the work we have done to-day, we have inaugurated an in- 

 stitution which has for its object the advancenient of higher 

 education, especially in those branches more particularly con- 

 nected with science, art, and agriculture. To me this is par- 

 ticularly interesting on account of the early associations which 

 render it a matter of interest to know that the new College owes 

 its inception and encouragement to the University of Oxford, 

 and to Christ Church, my old College. The presence of the 

 Vice-Chancellor of Oxford and of the Dean of Christ Church, as 

 well as the attendance of many other eminent men from Oxford, 

 is a proof of the interest they take in this movement. Let me 

 mention that the heads of colleges and the Hebdomadal Council 

 have satisfied themselves of the high standard of efficiency of 

 the education in Reading College, and have agreed with great 

 liberality to affiliate Reading College to the parent University 

 to the extent of conferring on it the privilege of allowing 

 students, after spending three years at Oxford and passing 

 certain scientific examinations there, to proceed to Reading, 

 where one year's further study in the science and practice of 

 agriculture should count as part of their University career, 

 and entitle them to the B.A. degree on the completion of their 

 full course. This proposal, although supported by a large and 

 influential University, was, on a division, rejected by two votes, 

 the numbers being 47 to 45. The interest which I take in 

 University Extension teaching, which now includes agriculture, 

 leads me to hope that another year may see the adoption of the 

 important policy advocated by the important bodies to which I 

 have alluded, and that its provisions may be carried through 

 the subsequent stages to render it law." 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 



London. 



Royal Society, May 12.— "The Electrical Response of 

 Nerve to a Single Stimulus investigated with the Capillary 

 Electrometer." Preliminary communication. By F. Gotch, 

 M.A., F.R.S., Professor of Physiology, University of Oxford, 

 and G. J. Burch, M.A. (Oxon). 



By means of a very sensitive capillary electrometer the authors 

 have obtained photographic records of the electrical response in 

 the sciatic nerve of the frog when excited by a single stimulus. 

 The records differ in character according to the condition of the 

 nerve. In uninjured nerve a rapid displacement of the meniscus 

 in one direction is followed by a corresponding displacement in 

 the other direction. In nerve which is the seat of a persistent 

 electromotive change, whether through local injury or the 

 passage of an appropriate polarising current, the record shows 

 that the initial rapid displacement is succeeded by a prolonged 

 after-effect of similar sign. The records are sufficiently pro- 

 nounced to allow of the calculation of the E.M.F. of the poten- 

 tial difference between the electrometer contacts causing the 

 initial displacement ; this may reach as much as 0*032 volt, and 

 attains its maximum very rapidly. In fresh nerve at 6° C. the 

 first indications of such electrical change occur 0'002 second 

 after the single stimulus has been applied at a distance of 30 mm. 

 from the capillary contacts. The after-effect develops more 

 slowly, taking from o'oo6 to O'Oi second to culminate, its 

 maximum E.M.F. is only one-tenth that of the initial change, 

 and it subsides slowly ; it is present in every nerve when one 

 of the capillary contacts lies upon the cross section of the nerve. 



"On the Magnetic Susceptibility of Liquid Oxygen." By 

 Profs. J. A. Fleming, F.R.S., and James Dewar, F.R.S. 



May 26. — "Note on the complete Scheme of Electrodynamic 

 Equations of a Moving Material Medium, and on Electro- 

 striction." By Joseph Larmor, F.R.S. , Fellow of St. John's 

 College, Cambridge. 



This paper (in continuation of previous memoirs) undertakes 

 in general form the exact expression of the electrodynamic rela- 

 tions of moving media which are polarisable, or are in motion 

 through the aether. No foundation is available from which to 

 investigate the modification that the ordinary equations of 

 MacCullagh and Maxwell must then undergo, without going 

 back to molecular theory. When that is done the crucial point 

 in the investigation is the transition from a theory concerned 

 with the individual molecules to a mechanical theory concerned 

 only with the element of volume : this requires a separation 

 between the influence of neighbouring molecules which affects 

 only the structure of the material at that place, and the influence 

 of the matter in general which induces polarisation and me- 

 chanical strain in the structure. It is shown that to express the 

 influence of magnetic polarisation of the material, and also the 

 influence of convection of electrically polarised material, these 

 agencies must be replaced analytically by equivalent distribu- 

 tions of electric current. The resulting scheme of equations is 

 wide enough to include the whole field of electrical and optical 

 phenomena in continuous bodies, whether fixed or in motion, of 

 of which various cases are again incidentally considered. 



Physical Society, June 10.— Mr. Shelford Bidwell, Pre- 

 sident, in the chair. — Dr. S. P. Thompson described and ex- 

 hibited a model illustrating Max Meyer's theory of audition. 

 Max Meyer abandons the audition theory of Helmholtz, and 

 contends that analysis takes place in the ear otherwise than by 

 resonance of the Corti organ. Imagine a jointed system, like a 

 hand, to be oscillated from one end, i.e. from the finger-tips, 

 A small motion affects only the top joints, but a large motion 

 affects the whole structure. Such a structure is the membrane 

 of the inner-ear. It widens towards one end, and is effectively 

 damped by the contained liquid. Wave-motions of different 

 amplitudes run along it to different distances before they are 

 extinguished ; these distances are recorded by nerves, and are 

 thereby communicated to the Corti organ. In the model, the 

 com pound- wave to be analysed is cut out on the edge of a disc 

 of zinc, so that, as the disc revolves, the motions are com- 

 municated to a frame- work. If the frame is thus moved through 

 more than a certain distance, a displacement occurs which sets 

 a second frame in motion, and so on to a third and fourth. The 

 depth to which the motion penetrates is indicated by a series of 

 glow-lamps connected electrically to the frames. Prof. Ayrton 

 said it had for some time past occurred to him, when consider- 



NO. 1494, VOL. 58] 



