5i8 



NATURE 



[August 28, 19 19 



Capt. F. Downie, of the South Wales School of 

 Mines, has been appointed head of the new electrical 

 engineering department of Rutherford Technical 

 College, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. 



Dr. J. K. Wood, principal assistant in the 

 chemistry department of University College, Dundee, 

 has been appointed lecturer in physical chemistry at 

 the Manchester Municipal College of Technology. 



A DEPARTMENT of Italian studies has been established 

 in the University of Manchester, and Dr. E. G. 

 Gardner, of the University of London, has been 

 appointed to the newly instituted chair of Italian. 



An Agricultural History Society has been estab- 

 lished in Washington, having for its object the 

 stimulation of interest, the promotion of study, and 

 the facilitation of publication of researches in agri- 

 cultural history. The president is Dr. R. H. True, 

 and the secretary-treasurer Mr. L. Carrier, both of 

 the Bureau of Plant Industry, Washington. 



The new prospectus of the Merchant Venturers' 

 Technical College, which provides and maintains the 

 faculty of engineering of the University of Bristol, 

 has been received. We note that the courses include 

 schemes of study for persons intending to engage in 

 civil, mechanical, electrical, or automobile engineer- 

 ing. These schemes comprise not only the" usual 

 engineering subjects, but also instruction in French 

 and German for scientific purposes, as well as in book- 

 keeping, accountancy, works administration and 

 organisation, commercial law, and estimating and 

 writing specifications. 



An interesting and useful piece of work has been 

 inaugurated by the Staffordshire Education Com- 

 mittee, viz. the placing of an exhibit in flower-shows 

 throughout the county embodying the life-histories 

 of some of the most troublesome insect pests which 

 infest gardens and orchards ; a prepared collection of 

 potato diseases which are prevalent in the county, 

 with instructions how to control them; varieties of 

 potatoes grown on the county demonstration plots, 

 all of which varieties are resistant to black scab or 

 wart disease; early varieties of culinary and dessert 

 apples ; samples of bottled fruit and vegetables, fowl 

 and rabbit ; bees, with model hives and full com- 

 plement of apparatus ; and diagrams and charts 

 demonstrating the best methods of planting, pruning, 

 and training fruit-trees. Pamphlets on the subjects 

 are also distributed. An expert pruner and propaga- 

 tor of fruit-trees is to be appointed for the purpose 

 of furthering fruit-growing in the county. 



The London County Council has issued its " Hand- 

 book of Classes and Lectures for leachers" for the 

 session 1919-20. The lectures are available to all 

 teachers actually employed in teaching within the 

 administrative County of London, irrespective of the 

 particular institution at which they may be engaged. 

 Teachers employed in teaching elsewhere than within 

 the administrative county may be admitted where 

 accommodation permits. Among the courses of lec- 

 tures in science the following may be mentioned : — 

 Five lectures on practical astronomy for schools, by 

 Prof. T. Percv Nunn, at the London Day Training 

 College, on Wednesdays at 6 p.m., beginning on 

 September 24 ; ten lectures on the history of the 

 development of fundamental principles of physics, by 

 Prof. Bragg and Mr. Orson Wood, at University 

 College, on Tuesdays at 5.30 p.m., beginning on 

 March 16, 1920; ten lectures on modern views of 

 electricitv and matter, by Prof. O. W. Richardson, at 

 King's College, on Saturdays at 10.30 a.m., beginning 

 on October 4. There will also be courses of lectures 

 on experimental psychologv, the experimental study of 



NO. 2600, VOL. 103] 



children, psycho-analysis, and psychological problems 

 in special schools. Copies of the handbook can be 

 obtained on application to the Education Officer, 

 L.C.C. Education Offices, Victoria Embankment, 



W.C.2. 



An interesting address delivered at Manchester to 

 the newly formed Association for the Scientific De- 

 velopment of Industry by Mr. E. C. Reed, of London, 

 on "Education for Genius," has been published in 

 pamphlet form (The Abbey Press, Westminster, 31 pp., 

 price 6d.). Mr, Reed propounds the theory that it 

 is possible, given the necessary facilities, to educate 

 for genius, and thereby increase largely the world's 

 supply of geniuses in every department of productive 

 life. It is argued that by developing natural aptitude, 

 by training and deepening the intuitive and allied 

 faculties of the superconscious mind, the supply of 

 genius can be much enlarged. Talent is defined by 

 the author as labour plus aptitude, and genius as 

 labour plus natural aptitude plus intuition, and the 

 latter, it is contended, can equally be made the sub- 

 ject of training. But this is surely to beg the whole 

 question. Speaking of the genius which produces 

 great art, Ruskin truly and forcibly says in " Modem 

 Painters " that every system of teaching is false which 

 holds forth "great art" as in any wise to be taught 

 to students. Great art is precisely that which never 

 was, and never will be, taught ; it is pre-eminently and 

 finally the expression of the spirits of great men.' And 

 in his " Joy for Ever " he further remarks : — " You have 

 always to find your artist (your man of genius), not 

 to make him; you can't manufacture him, any more 

 than you can manufacture gold. You can find him 

 and refine him ; you dig him out as he lies nugget- 

 fashion in the mountain stream ; you bring him 

 home, and you make him into current coin or house- 

 hold plate, but not one grain of him can you originally 

 produce." That "genius must frequently waste its 

 years and dissipate its efforts in trying to make head- 

 way against an indifferent or hostile atmosphere " may 

 be freely admitted, and it must therefore be the busi- 

 ness of the nation to create for its nurture a sym- 

 pathetic and appreciative environment, " in which all 

 phases," as the author of the address observes, "of 

 intellectual and cultural activitv, mechanical, literary, 

 sesthetic, are each highly developed and equally 

 honoured." The address is well worthy of thoughtful 

 study. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 



Paris. 

 Academy of Sciences, August 4. — M. Leon Guignard 

 in the chair. — G. Humbert : The formation of a 

 fundamental domain of an automorph group. — 

 P. Marchal : The evolutive cycle of the woolly Aphis 

 of the apple-tree (Eriosoma lanigera). It has been 

 proved that in America the American elm harbours 

 the sexual generation of American blight, whilst the 

 apple and some other trees of the same group act as 

 intermediate hosts. In Europe the cycle would appear 

 to be different; the sexual generation does not occur, 

 and the species is continued during the winter by 

 hibernation on the apple-tree, the reproduction being 

 parthenogenetic. — E. Aries : The density of the 

 saturated vapour of propyl acetate and the density 

 of the liquid emitting 'this vapour. — A. Denjoy : 

 Riemannian integration. — N. E. Norlund : The poly- 

 nomials of Euler.— R. Gamier : The irregular sin- 

 gularities of linear differential equations. — E. Kogbet- 

 liantz : The integral of Angelesco. — C. Trdmont : New 

 methods for the mechanical testing of metals. 

 Description and diagrams of two simple pieces of 



