178 



NATURE 



[July 5, 1917 



In detail the field is too vast for compass by any one 

 human mind. The situation is, moreover, becommg 

 more and more aggravated by the rapidly growing 

 accumulation of the facts of science. There is specific 

 need for the development of a new branch of science, 

 the science of the use of science. Some of the factors 

 of such a science or scientific method are presumably 

 (i) the development of a great clearing-house of 

 scientific facts and human needs, with improvement 

 in methods of classifying and storing away such facts 

 in the record ; (2) the development of a special type 

 of mind keen to detect correspondence between the 

 needs of humanity and the facts of science ; (3) the 

 organisation of a corps of workers under the guidance 

 of such trained and developed minds, and whose pur- 

 pose shall be the working out of the correspondences 

 noted above. 



In any exhaustive or complete sense the field seems 

 too vast to be compassed by human effort. Both the 

 accumulated store of science and the pressing needs 

 presented by our modern complex civilisation have far 

 outrun the seeming compass of any method we can 

 imagine whereby such correspondences might be deter- 

 mined in a definite and assured manner. Because the 

 field is too vast for compass in an exhaustive or com- 

 plete manner, however, it does not follow that no 

 effort whatever should be made. On the contrary, it 

 seems clear that something': should be done towards 

 the development of a more orderly method for the 

 establishment of correspondence between the needs 

 of humanity and the facts of science, and we should 

 look forward to this effort as one of the distinctive 

 marks of progress in the twentieth century^ — the be- 

 ginning, at least, of the development of a science of 

 the use of science. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE. 



London. — The Education Committee of the London 

 County Council has approved a grant of 26,140/. per 

 annum to the University for the three years 1917-20. 

 This is an increase of 1460/. over the grant for \<)i6-i'/. 

 Increased grants are given to the Evening School of 

 History at Universitv College, 140L ; to Italian, 600/. ; 

 to Slavonic languages, 500L ; and to phonetics at Uni- 

 versity College, 220I. It is proposed to establish a 

 professorshio in Italian, and the Senate is asked to 

 prepare a scheme for the teaching of this language. A 

 chair in Russian is also to be established, and the work 

 will be concentrated at King's College. The other 

 grants remain unaltered as to amount or purpose, in- 

 cluding the block grant of 10,000/. in accordance with 

 the Technical Education Board scheme. Irnportance 

 is attached bv the Senate to the development of 

 phonetics, and it is pointed out that a large phonetic 

 laboratory was fitted out on a lavish scale a few years 

 ago in connection with the Colonial Institute "at Ham- 

 burg. The higher sub-committee states that, "having 

 regard to the increasing importance of a knowledge 

 of modern European languages to those engaged in 

 commerce, and also to the large number of languages 

 spoken in the British Empire, it appears that the 

 provision for the teaching of phonetics in England 

 cannot be regarded as adequate." An increased grant 

 of 220/. for the teaching of phonetics is accordingly 

 sanctioned. The maintenance grant of 300/. per 

 annum is to be continued to Bedford College for the 

 next three years. 



The somewhat novel experiment of using a private 

 garden for educational purposes has of recent vears 

 been tried at "Westfield," Reading, by Dr. J. B- 



NO. 2488, VOL. 99] 



Hurry, and has excited considerable interest amongst 

 the teachers and older school children, as well as 

 amongst residents of that town. A number of plots 

 have been laid out in which are grown a variety of 

 plants used in industry and commerce. Series A in- 

 cludes plants used in medicine, e.g. eucalyptus, bella- 

 donna, aconite, stramonium, gentian, liquorice, podo- 

 phyllin, asafcetida, valerian, henbane, castor oil, cin- 

 chona, and the opium poppy. Series B includes plants 

 used for food, e.g. maize, millet, sugar, rice, bananas, 

 arrowroot, ginger, chicory, pepper, olive, and carda- 

 moms. Series C includes plants used for clothing and 

 textiles, such as flax, hemp, cotton, jute, Phormtum 

 tenax, and ramie nettle. Series D includes plants 

 that vield dyes, such as woad, indigo, madder, dyer's 

 weed," turmeric, anatto, and alkanet. In the adjacent 

 conservatories are exhibited more delicate economic 

 plants, such as tea, coffee, soya beans, monkey-nuts, 

 guava, chick pea, cinnamon, and camphor. Adjoining 

 the conservatories is a small museum in which are 

 collected various products made from the above-men- 

 tioned plants, everv article being accompanied by a 

 descriptive label, so' that the living plant can be studied 

 in conjunction with the economic products derived from 

 it. Every summer the garden, conservatories, and 

 museum are thrown open free on several half-holidays 

 to visitors and the older school children of the borough, 

 who in large numbers avail themselves of the privilege 

 of seeing some of the important plants used in indus- 

 try. A printed catalogue is supplied to every visitor, 

 and from time to time demonstrations of the more 

 interesting exhibits are given by Dr. Hurry and his 

 assistants. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 

 Royal Society, June 21. — Sir J. J. Thomson, presi- 

 dent, In the chair.— Sir Napier Shaw : Revolving fluid 

 in the atmosphere. It is generally assumed, as 

 appears particularly from a recent paper by Lord 

 Rayleigh with reference to a former paper by Dr. J. 

 Aitken, that the motion of air in cyclones and anti- 

 cyclones may be classed as the motion of revolving 

 fluid, symmetrical about a vertical axis. Reasons are 

 given to show that this assumption with regard to 

 cvclones and anticyclones of middle latitudes is 

 erroneous; that circular isobars on the map do not 

 indicate revolving fluid, and, vice versa, that travel- 

 ling revolving fluid would not be indicated by a system 

 of circular isobars. The next point for consideration 

 is how a mass of revolving fluid travelling with a 

 speed of translation of the same order as the speed of 

 rotation, and of sufficient size, would be represented 

 on a map. Diagrams are drawn showing the dis- 

 tribution of velocity in four cases for different ratios 

 of the velocity of translation to the velocity of rota- 

 tion, and assuming that systems of velocities could 

 be fitted to pressure lines of the same shape, it is 

 inferred that cases of travelling revolving fluid would 

 be indicated bv isobars similar to those which are 

 classed meteorologicallv as belonging to small second- 

 aries, or distortions of the isobars, generally on the 

 southern side of the great cyclonic systerns. Condi- 

 tions are next considered which must exist if a colurnn 

 of rotating fluid is maintained and transported within 

 a current represented bv the isobars of a great cyclonic 

 depression. The conditions arrived at are briefly : 

 (i) That the velocitv of translation must be the velo- 

 city corresponding with the separation of the isobars 

 of 'the main depression unaffected bv the presence of 

 the revolving mass.- (2) The column must probablv 

 extend throughout the trooosohere, otherwise it could 

 not be "capped." (3) The" velocity of the current 



