198 



NATURE 



[July 12, 19 17 



tion of the new departure, this attempt to prolong the 

 stay of pupils at secondary schools, and to raise the 

 standard of attainment in such schools, will be wel- 

 comed by all who appreciate the growing- need for 

 a large supply of well-equipped students for our 

 universities in the years immediately following the 

 declaration of peace. 



The question of improving the facilities for the 

 medical education of women was referred to by Sir 

 Gregory Foster, provost of University College, Lon- 

 don, at the assembly of the faculties on July 5. He 

 said : "Arrangements have now been completed which 

 will make it possible, when certain structural altera- 

 tions, to be carried out during the long vacation, 

 have been done, to provide accommodation for women 

 students in the department of anatomy. By taking 

 this step, all the departments of the faculty of medical 

 sciences, like those in the faculties of arts, laws, and 

 science, will be open to women on the same terms 

 as men. The question of providing and extending 

 clinical facilities for women students is still to be 

 dealt with. Its solution is fraught with many diffi- 

 culties, not the least of which is the absence of many 

 of the senior members of the staffs of the medical 

 schools on the business of war. In the meantime, an 

 arrangement has been arrived at between this college 

 and University College Hospital Medicai School 

 under which the teaching of pharmacy is available 

 for women on the same terms as men." The provost 

 also remarked in his address : " It is to be hoped 

 that the Government Reconstruction Committee, 

 which, among other duties, is to undertake the 

 general supervision and review of the changes that 

 may be required in our national system of education, 

 will not overlook the university problem in London. 

 It is, we venture to think, perhaps the most impor- 

 tarit of the problems relating to higher education, 

 and it should be speedily solved in the mterests, not 

 only of this country, but of the Empire as a whole. 

 It is generally admitted that the machinery of 

 government of the University is not what it should 

 be. Machinery of government is not everything, but 

 it is difficult to promote and maintain the true spirit 

 of university life xyith our present university con- 

 stitution." 



Mr; Fisher, President of the Board of Education, 

 distributed the prizes at University College, London, 

 on July 5, and in his speech referred to the great loss 

 of young men of genius and talent caused by the 

 war. Both in France and in this country, he said, 

 the casualty lists have been filled with names which, 

 but for the fatal accidents of war, would certainly 

 have been made illustrious for splendid service to the 

 great cause of life. It is impossible to estimate the 

 extent to which the world will be impoverished in 

 quality by the disappearance of so much youthful 

 genius and talent. Referring to the plans in con- 

 templation for the development of scientific teaching 

 at University College, Mr. Fisher emphasised one 

 feature of university progress which will not, he 

 hopes, be confined to London. It is probable that 

 universities, being faced by enlarged responsibilities 

 involving increased expenditure, will be compelled to 

 resort in increasing measure to assistance from public 

 funds. The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge 

 may preserve that full measure of education which 

 has been not the least among the causes of their 

 influence and progress, but the newer universities, 

 with their meagre endowments, are exposed to the 

 double control of the local authority and the State. 

 Of these two forms of supervision, neither of them 

 free from danger, the latter is greatly to be preferred 

 as likely to be inspired by some comprehensive prin- 

 ciple of academic policy. Mr. Fisher thinks that the 



NO. 2489, VOL. 99] 



universities would exercise a greater influence in the 

 life of the country if they could bring themselves to 

 co-operate more closely with one another, and in par- 

 ticular he would like to see a system under which it 

 would be possible for selected students in any one 

 university to spend a term or- two of their university 

 residence under some distinguished teacher of their 

 own special subject in another university. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 



London. 



Challenger Society, June 27. — Dr. E. J. Allen in 

 the chair. — Dr. G. H. Fowler : A statistical method 

 of analysis of tidal stream oibservations. By plotting 

 on a diagram of 360° the exact direction of the tidal 

 stream at every hour during a complete lunation, the 

 profound effect of prolonged wind and other extrinsic 

 causes became obvious. Hence in order to obtain 

 a normal (probable) result, abnormal observations 

 must be neglected. This is most safely done by 

 arranging all observations at each hour under their 

 proper directions, plotting them into curves of fre- 

 quency, and rejecting those observations which are 

 then seen to be due to premature or belated turns 

 of the stream, etc. As the available observations 

 were not numerous enough for other methods, they 

 were grouped under sixteen points of the compass 

 — for example, all observations between N. 12 W. and 

 N. 33 W. were grouped as N.N.W. For each hour 

 after H.W. Dover, the value of each compass-point 

 in degrees of a circle was then multiplied by the 

 number of selected occurrences ; the sum of the pro- 

 ducts divided by the sum of the factors then gave 

 the probable direction of the stream at that hour. 

 Velocities were then simply meaned; and from the 

 data thus obtained ellipses were constructed which 

 showed the direction and velocitv of the stream at 

 each hour after H.W. Dover for twelve hours.— C. 

 Tate Regan : The distribution of the Clupeinae. The 

 anadromous habit of the fishes of the shad group 

 leads to localisation and the evolution of jjenera and 

 species with a restricted distribution ; in the strictly 

 marine herrings, sardines, etc., with pelagic larvae, 

 the maioritv of the e^enera and species are more 

 widely distributed. 



Edinburgh. 



Royal Society, June 4. — Dr. J. Home, president, in 

 the chair.—Prof. Jehu and Dr. R. Campbell : The 

 Highland border rocks in the Aberfoyle district. These 

 rocks were arranged in two divisions : (a) the lower 

 series of cherts, shales, and spilitic lavas, with igneous 

 intrusions and bands of highlv metamorphosed rocks ; 

 (h) the upper, or Margie, series of errits, shales, and 

 limestone, with a basement breccia. The upper series is 

 unconformable on the lower. The fossils obtained 

 from the cherty beds include radiolaria, graptolites. 

 hingeless brachiooods, and phyllocarid crustaceans, and 

 fix the horizon of the lower series as Upper Cambrian 

 or the passage beds into the Ordovician. The uoper, 

 or Margie, series is placed hisrher up in the Ordo- 

 vician, confirmatory evidence being afforded by the 

 remains of crinoids and other organisms found in the 

 bedded limestone. The igneous rocks, both lavaform 

 and intrusive, includinc: their metamorphosed repre- 

 sentatives, show affinities indicatinfr derivation from a 

 common magma. The schists of ierneous origin have 

 resulted from dynamic metamorphism along a belt of 

 intense shearing, and ihe altered sediments, are due 

 to dvnamic superposed on contact metamorphism. The 

 Hie-hland border rocks were shown to be affected by 

 crush lines runniner with the strike of the rocks. A 

 line or lines of dislocation separated them from the 



