June 12, 1919] 



NATURE 



287 



" Historically," it is said, " there is no doubt 

 that the institution of examinations did much to 

 raise the standard of education in this country in 

 the last century. It is equally certain that, while 

 they are good servants, they are bad masters." 

 There is no doubt that schoolmasters chafe because 

 all schools do not teach the same subjects along 

 the same lines, and when a general examination is 

 set some inequalities are imposed. This in many 

 cases, however, implies lack of care or skill on the 

 part of the examiners rather than inapplicability of 

 the examination test. 



The object of the conference, however, was to 

 advocate principles, without formulating details, 

 and concessions from both sides will help towards 

 progress. Thus the suggestion that candidates 

 for science scholarships should offer an historical 

 or other literary subject as subsidiary to their main 

 one is met by a resolution in favour of allowing a 

 knowledge of science to count in history scholar- 

 ships. This is quite as it should be, for the ignor- 

 ance of literature and philosophy displayed by men 

 of science in the past could only be matched or 

 surpassed by the ignorance of the literate, not only 

 of the physical world and the details of life around 

 them, but also of all the great conclusions of 

 science concerning man's origin, nature, and 

 destiny. 



Another subject dealt with by Sir Frederic 

 Kenyon is the question of the relation of school to 

 university and the shortening of school life. Not- 

 withstanding some difference of opinion between 

 Sir J. J. Thomson's committee and the conference, 

 there is reason for thinking that many of the great 

 schools possess both staff and apparatus which 

 qualify them to carry out effectively the work 

 undertaken in the first year of a university course. 

 " The student," says the conference, " on coming 

 to the university should come under the influence of 

 the great teachers of the subject (instead of being 

 placed, as is sometimes the case, in the hands 

 of junior lecturers or demonstrators), and should 

 be inspired with the views and the spirit of those 

 teachers." What, then, it may be asked, is the 

 use of a junior staff if it is not to be employed, 

 and what was the advantage to the mass of under- 

 graduates of the majority of the great men of the 

 past, whose teachings they were unable to follow? 



Clerk Maxwell, Stokes, Kelvin, and others who 

 might be named were not, and could not be, 

 appreciated by more than the select few, and by 

 them chiefly for the sake of general illurnination 

 rather than for specific instruction. Historical 

 and literary subjects afford a better field, but origi- 

 nality is sometimes bewildering to the beginner, 

 and the professor eminent in research is the best 

 leader in most subjects only when the student is 

 able to follow at the same pace. 



The report affords interesting reading, and it 

 contains an appendix which gives a summary of 

 the main facts regarding the distribution and value 

 of scholarships to the universities, with suggestions 

 which will doubtless lead to further consider- 

 ation. 



NO. 2589, VOL. 103] 



SIR BOVERTON REDWOOD, BART. 



SCIENCE and the petroleum industry have 

 suffered a severe loss in the sudden death 

 of Sir Boverton Redwood, Bart., which occurred 

 at his residence, The Cloisters, Avenue Road, 

 Regent's Park, on June 4. Despite his profound 

 knowledge of the subject he had made his own. 

 Sir Boverton Redwood will perhaps be best re- 

 membered by those of us who had the privilege 

 of being associated with him in any of his numer- 

 ous interests for the charm of his individual per- 

 sonality. The unique position he occupied in the 

 petroleum world was doubtless in large measure 

 due to this personal attraction, which, as chairman 

 of committee, or as witness, or in mere friendly 

 discussion, exerted an influence the value of 

 which in giving expression to his views it would 

 be difficult to over-estimate. His death leaves a 

 blank which it is safe to say will never be com- 

 pletely filled. 



Born in April, 1846, Sir Boverton was in his 

 seventy-fourth year when he died — an age which 

 would have fairly justified his retirement from 

 active work. This, however, was the last thing 

 he desired, and it is more than probable that the 

 strain of four years of war, during which he gave 

 of his best to the Admiralty and to the Petroleum 

 Executive, seriously reduced his power of resist- 

 ance to the illness to which he succumbed. 



It was in the year 1869 that, as a young ana- 

 Wtical chemist, he was appointed secretary of the 

 Petroleum Association and thereupon determined 

 to specialise in this subject. That he was soon 

 recognised as a leading authority is evidenced by 

 his appearance in 1872 as a witness before a 

 Select Committee of the House of Lords ; and a 

 few years later, when it was decided to replace 

 the somewhat untrustworthy open "flash-point " 

 testing apparatus by the Abel instrument, it was 

 Boverton Redwood who, by a series of more than 

 a thousand separate tests, demonstrated that the 

 equivalent of the existing legal standard of 100° F., 

 open test, was, by the new close test, 73° F., and 

 this figure was adopted in the amending Act of 

 1879. ^^ 1883 he accompanied Sir Vivian 

 Majendie in an extended tour on the continent 

 of Europe to study the methods employed by 

 foreign Governments in dealing with the storage 

 of petroleum oil and spirit, and a few years later 

 he paid a similar visit to the United States. 

 There was, indeed, scarcely an oil-bearing dis- 

 trict in the world that he had not visited. 



For many years Sir Boverton was technical 

 adviser to the Corporation of the City of London 

 and to the Port of London Authority, and hono- 

 rary adviser to the Home Office, the Admiralty, 

 the India Office, and the Colonial Oflfice, and in 

 1912 he was appointed a member of the Royal 

 Commission on Oil-fuel presided over by Lord 

 Fisher. He had already served as a member of 

 the Committee appointed by the Home Secretary 

 in 1908, with Sir Henry Cunynghame as chair- 

 man, to report on the existing legislation regard- 

 ing petroleum spirit. 



