April 28, 1910J 



NATURE 



-DD 



lies of emigration were vitiated by the omission of 

 anv deduction in respect of the return of persons 

 temporarily leaving the country ; and he induced the 

 Government to appoint a committee to consider the 

 whole question ot official statistics. 



In 1878 he read before the Statistical Society an 

 important paper on recent accumulations of capital in 

 the United Kingdom, which is an excellent example 

 of the comprehensiveness and accuracy of his statis- 

 tical methods, and of his faculty of drawing trust- 

 I worthy inferences from materials that at first sight 

 I appear insufficient. Great as was the increase of 

 ! wealth which he had to record, he was sanguine 

 I enough to hold that it would be the fault of the Eng- 

 lish people if their progress were not in future even 

 [ more rapid than in the past, and his forecast has 

 I been verified. In the same year he took part in the 

 i foundation of the Statist newspaper, and was the dele- 

 I gate of the Government to the International Statis- 

 tical Congress at Paris. 



In 1879 he contributed to the Statistical Society a 

 itise on the fall of prices of commodities in recent 

 years, and undertook the duty of editor of the society's 

 journal. The Treasun,- committee on statistics made 

 its report, to which was appended an important 

 memorandum by Sir Robert Giffen on the compilation 

 and printing of the statistics of the United Kingdom. 

 In 18S2 he read a paper to the Statistical Society on the 

 use of import and export statistics, and was elected 

 president of the society. His inaugural address was 

 on the utility of common statistics. In the following 

 year the University of Glasgow, of which he had 

 been a student, conferred upon him the degree of 

 Doctor of Laws. His inaugural address to the 

 Statistical Society for that year was on the progress 

 of the working classes in the last half-centur\\ It is 

 characteristic of his thorough devotion to any duty 

 which he undertook that he was present at every 

 meeting of the society held during his presidency. 

 In the year 1884 he was elected a mernber of the 

 Athenaeum club under the rule which enables the 

 committee of the club to confer that honour on persons 

 distinguished in literature or the arts or for public 

 service. In 1885 he contributed to the Statistical 

 Society's jubilee volume a paper on some general uses 

 of statistical knowledge ; and, in the following year, 

 read to the societv further notes on the progress of 

 the working classes. In 1887 he was nominated by 

 the International Statistical Congress at Rome as the 

 English member of a committee on standards of 

 value ; and in the same year he was appointed by the 

 British Association president of the section of econ- 

 omic science and statistics (section F) for the meeting 

 at Manchester^ and delivered an address on the recent 

 rate of material progress in England. He also took 

 part in the proceedings of a committee of the associa- 

 tion appointed to investigate variations in the value 

 of the monetar\- standard, and in the following year 

 drew up the reoort of that committee. He afterwards 

 became its chairman. 



In 1890 Sir Robert Giffen took part in the 

 formation cf the British Economic Association, now 

 the Royal Economic Society, and became a vice- 

 president of it. In i8qi he was created a Companion 

 of the Bath, and in 1892 elected a Fellow of the Royal 

 Society. In 1894 the Roval Statistical Society (as it 

 had then become) paid him the well-earned compli- 

 ment of awarding him their Guy medal in gold as a 

 recognition of his great services. In 1895 he took the 

 second step in the ladder of the Order of the Bath, 

 being promoted to the dignity of Knight Commander, 

 and in 1897 he retired from the public service after a 

 career of great usefulness and distinction, having 

 taken a large share in the creation and development 

 of the labour, commr-'^'-l and statistical depart- 

 XO. 21 13, VOL. 83] 



ments, of which he was the first controller-general. 

 In 1900 he was elected president of the Manchester 

 Statistical Society, and delivered an address ; and in 

 190 1 the British Association appointed him, for the 

 second time, president of section F, and he delivered 

 an address at Glasgow on the importance of general 

 statistical ideas. 



His separate published works were: — ".American 

 Railways as Investments" (1872), '.Stock Exchange 

 Securities" (1877), "Essays in Finance" (3 editions), 

 "The Case against Bimetallism" (2 editions), "Econ- 

 omic Inquiries and Studies" (2 vols., 1904). 



This formal record of a life spent in the study of 

 subjects usually thought to be dry and uninteresting 

 would not be complete if it were not supplemented by 

 the statement that in personal character and private 

 life he was one of the most genial of men. 



NOTES. 



The eighteenth " James Forrest " lecture of the Institu- 

 tion of Civil Engineers will be delivered at the institution 

 on Wednesday, June 22, at 8 p.m., by Sir John Gavey, 

 C.B., his subject b;'ng " Recent Developments of Tele- 

 graphy and Telephony. 



A Reuter message from Washington states that the 

 proposed American Antarctic expedition under the joint 

 auspices of the Peary Arctic Club and the National Geo- 

 graphic Society has been abandoned for this year on 

 account of lack of funds. 



We learn from Science that Prof. R. P. WhitSeld, 

 curator in the .American Museum of Natural History since 

 1877, and the author of important contributions to 

 palaiontology and geology, died on April 6, at the age of 



eighty-two years. 



The death is announced, at sixty-one years of age, of 

 Dr. C. B. Plowright, formerly professor of comparative 

 anatomy and physiology at the Royal College of Surgeons, 

 and the author of a standard work on fungi. 



M. de Moxtefiore, we learn from the Revue 

 scientifique, has given 150,000 francs to the Paris Academy 

 of Sciences to create a new triennial prize of 12,500 francs 

 to assist the progress of electrical science. 



It is announced in the Times that a National College of 

 -Agriculture is soon to be established in Pretoria. General 

 Botha has promised to set aside 100,000/. as a first instal- 

 ment for the execution of the project, and the Town 

 Council has unanimously decided to give the Government 

 the whole of the town lands of Groenkloof as a site. The 

 area comprises 3681 acres, and contains arable and pasture 

 lands as well as a large plantation. 



The Geological Society of France has this year awarded 

 its Danton prize to M. Gosselet. The prize is given to the 

 geologist whose discoveries are likely to benefit industrv 

 most, and was awarded to M. Gosselet for the part he 

 has taken in the development of coal-mining in the north 

 of France. The Viquesnel prize, intended to encourage 

 geological research, has been awarded to M. Robert 

 Douville for his stratigraphical work on the geologv of 

 Spain and his palaeontological researches on the foramini- 

 lera and ammonites. 



The Geologists' Association has arranged a Whitsuntide 

 excursion to Swanage, Luhvorth Cove, and Bournemouth 

 from May 14-18. The parrv' will leave Waterloo on 

 Friday, May 13, at 4.10 p.m. The excursion to Lulworth 

 Cove will be carried out only if the sea is calm, and 



