25» 



NATURE 



[May 29, 19 19 



the late Sir Henry Thompson in the chair of physio- 

 logy in Trinity College, Dublin. 



Applications will be received until June 28 by the 

 British Medical Association, 429 Strand, for an Ernest 

 Hart memorial scholarship, value 200L per annum, for 

 the study of some subject in the department of State 

 medicine, and for three annual research scholarships, 

 each of the value of 150^., for research in some sub- 

 ject relating to the causation, prevention, and treats 

 ment of disease. 



Gapt. Eustace H. Cluver has been appointed to 

 the new chair of physiology at the South African 

 School of Mines and Technology at Johannesburg. 

 Capt. Cluver went as a Rhodes scholar to Hertford 

 College, Oxford, in 1914, and took a First Class in 

 the Final Honour School of Physiology in 1916. 

 After a varied medical experience he went out to the 

 front with the South African Medical Corps, where he 

 was engaged until the time of the armistice. 



The following munificent benefactions towards the 

 cost oi developing the work of the Imperial College 

 of Science at South Kensington are announced : — 

 Mr. Otto Beit, ^ member of the governing body, has 

 placed at the disposal of the governors the sum of 

 io,oooZ., to be used for building and equipment pur- 

 poses for such departments of the college as may be 

 found most urgently to require assistance for develop- 

 ment; and an old student of the Royal College of 

 S.cience has contributed a sum of 8000L for the equip-, 

 ment of an intermediate-scale laboratory in organic 

 chemistry, a new building for which is now in course 

 of erection. 



The eighth annual meeting of the Old Students' 

 Association of the Royal College of Science, London, 

 was held on May 24, Prof. H. E. Armstrong presiding. 

 A_ resolution was adopted appointing a special com- 

 mittee to consider and report on the reorganisation 

 pf the association to an adjourned meeting to be held 

 in October. Sir Richard Gregory was elected president 

 for 19 19. A discussion took place on the question of 

 raising the status of the Imperial College to that of a 

 university, in the course of which Mr. T. LI. Humber- 

 stone,_ secretary of the association, expressed strong 

 opposition to the proposal, which, he considered, would 

 entail endless friction, as well as disorganisation and 

 duplication of effort. The annual dinner was held in 

 the evening at the Caf^ Monico. 



An invitation has been sent bv the Chief of the 

 Imperial General Staff to the universities and other 

 institutions of higher education to nominate repre- 

 sentatives to a conference on June 11 and 12 with 

 representatives of the Dominions, to discuss educa- 

 tional problems that have presented themselves to the 

 Imperial Education Committee of the War Office as 

 a result of experience gained in the working of the 

 educational schemes within the British Army and the 

 Forces of the Dominions. The conference will be 

 held in Australia House. The Chief of the Imperial 

 General Staff will preside at the opening session, 

 when an address will be given by Mr. Fisher, Presi- 

 dent of the Board of Education. Lord Milner, Sir 

 Henry Hadow, and Sir Daniel Hall will preside at 

 subsequent sessions, when reciprocity between the 

 universities of the Empire in the organisation of studv 

 and research to meet the technical, commercial, and 

 agricultural needs of the Empire will be discussed. 

 Sir Henry Hadow has relinquished the post of Assis- 

 tant Director of Staff Duties (Education), and Mr. 

 P. A. Barnett, formerly Chief Inspector of Training 

 Colleges, has been appointed Civil Adviser to the 

 Educational Department of the Staff Duties Direc- 

 torate, War Of!ice. 



NO. 2587, VOL. 103] 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 

 Royal Society, May 15. — Sir J, J. Thomson, presi- 

 dent, in the chair.— Prof. W. H. Young : (i) The area of 

 surfaces. Many attempts by well-known writers have 

 been made to frame a theory of the area of surfaces. 

 These efforts have been attended with so little success 

 that even the mosit recent text-books define the area 

 of a curved surface by means of the formula known 

 to hold in the case of a surface of revolution. Not 

 even in the matter of the definition itself has anything 

 which can be regarded as final been achieved, stiH 

 less has it been found feasible to proceed from the 

 definitions which have been given to the formula 

 required. In the present communication the author 

 attacks the question from an entirely new point of 

 view. The definition given is based on what is itself 

 a new concept, namely, that of the area of a closed 

 skew curve. It is characterised further by the use to 

 which is put the idea that the surface is, like a curve, 

 an ordered manifold, the order being double instead 

 of single. The surface is accordingly supposed defined 

 by equations of the form 



x = xiu,v) y=y(u,v) t=^t{u,v) 



and divided up by the curves 



If = const. 0) = const. 



On the fact that the sum of the areas of the 

 boundaries of the portions of surface thus obtained 

 has a unique limit, the definition of the area of a 

 surface is based. The curve boundaries have, in fact, 

 an area whenever they possess a length. Moreover, 

 the unique limit obtained for their sum is shown 

 under very general conditions to have precisely the 

 value given by the well-known formula. (2) Change 

 of the independent variables in a multiple integral. — 

 Prof. W. A. Bone and R. J. Sarjant : Researches on 

 the chemistry of coal. Part i. : The action of pyridine 

 upon the coal substance. The paper records the 

 results of an experimental investigation of the so- 

 called solvent action of pyridine and homologues upon 

 the coal substance, with the double object of clearing 

 up certain discrepancies in the work of previous 

 investigators and of determining the real nature of 

 the action in question. It is shown that the presence 

 of oxygen has an important retarding action upon 

 the extraction process* (the extent of which varies 

 considerably with the nature of the coal), and that 

 in order to obtain consistent results in any such proceS:^ 

 it is necessary not only to employ an anhydrous 

 solvent, but also to exclude oxygen. The application 

 of the method to two tvpical isomeric bituminous 

 coals is fully described. It is shown that when such 

 extraction is carried out at ordinary pressures, with 

 exclusion of oxygen, a practical limit is finally at- 

 tained. In the case of the two coals in question, this 

 limit considerably exceeded the amount of "volatiles" 

 yielded by them' on carbonisation at 950°. At higher 

 pressures this first limit was considerably passed, and 

 when conducted in sealed tubes between 130° and 150° 

 as much as two-thirds of the coal substance was ren- 

 dered soluble. — Prof. E. F. Burton : A new method 

 of weighing colloidal particles. When fine colloidal 

 particles are dragged up and down for equal periods 

 in a liquid by the application of a vertical electrical 

 field a net settling of the particles is noted. It is 

 thought that, though for small forces such as gravity 

 alone the Brownian movement prevents the attainment 

 of any limiting velocity, yet when the particles are 

 dragged by a much larger force the comparatively 

 insignificant gravitational force is added to the elec- 

 trical for downward motion and subtracted for upward 

 motion, thus becoming effective in producing a net 



