May io, 1900] 



NATURE 



45 



fruit, and we should not find ourselves out-shot by semi-birbarous 

 farmers. 



Hope is the j^reat incentive to exertion. Without it a nation 

 is dead. Without it we lose all belief in the pissibility of ini- 



Erovement, and improvement at once becomes impo«ible. The 

 istory of electrical engineering, the utilisation of the all-pervading 

 ether for the service of man, should strenghen our hope and our 

 belief in the possibility of improvement. For has it not re- 

 volutionised society and enabled high and loiv, rich and poor, to 

 lead better lives, by making life less hard and grimy, and thus 

 improved the well-being of man both materially and, what is 

 far more important, morally as well ? 



UNIVERSITY A. WD EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE. 



O.XFORO. — The following are the principal lectures announced 

 for this term: — Prof. Clifton, practical physics: Mr. Baynes, 

 elementary electricity and magnetism ; Mr. Jervis-Smith, 

 dynama and motor machinery, with electrical testing ; Prof. 

 Odiing, silicon compounds ; Dr. Fisher, metals and organic 

 chemistry ; Mr. Watts, organic chemistry ; Mr. Marsh, practice 

 of organic chemistry; Mr. Hartridge, aromatic compounds; 

 Mr. Vernon Harcourt, subjects of the preliminary examination ; 

 Mr, Elford, the elements treated in the periodic order ; 

 Mendeleet's periodic system. Groups vii. and viii. ; great 

 chemists and their work ; Mr. Walden, synthetical methods 

 in organic chemistry ; Mr. Wilderman, equilibrium and 

 velocity o( physical and chemical reactions in heterogeneous 

 systems ; Prof. Miers, the new theories of crystal structure ; 

 Mr. Bowman, the crystallography of optically active substances ; 

 Prof. Sollas, history of the earth ; Mr. Mackinder, the natural 

 regions of the Old World ; Mr. Dickson, the climatic 

 regions of the globe ; Mr. llerbertson, mountain types ; Prof. 

 Weldon, general course of morphology ; variation, inherit- 

 ance, and natural selection ; Mr. Goodrich, annelids ; Mr. 

 Jenkinson, vertebrate embryology ; Mr. Giinther, arthropoda ; 

 Mr. Barclay Thompson, mammalian morphology ; mam- 

 malian palaeontology ; Prof. Gotch, the central nervous 

 system ; Prof. Gotch and Mr. Rimsden, adv.inced course 

 of physiology ; Mr. Mann, advanced histology of nervous 

 system ; Mr. Burch, physiological physics ; Mr. Minn, practical 

 histology ; Prof. Vines, elementary course of botany ; Prof. 

 Tylor, early stages of civilisation (arts of subsistence and pro- 

 tection); Sir J. Burdon Sanderson, general pathology; Dr. 

 Ritchie, pathological bacteriology ; Dr. Collier, medical diag- 

 nosis ; Mr, Symunds, fractures and dislocations ; Prof. Thom- 

 son, vascular and respiratory systems; Mr. Smith Jerome, 

 medical pharmacology and materia medica ; Prof. Esson, the 

 synthetic geometry of conies ; Prof. I^ove, hydrostatics and 

 hydronamics: Prof. Elliot, the theory of functions. 



Mr. William Hatchett Jackson, science tutor of Keble Col- 

 lege, who has been elected to the post of liadcliffe's librarian, 

 vacant by the resignation of Sir Henry Acland, has entered on 

 his duties. The new Radcliffe Library, erected for the Uni- 

 v.rsity by the Drapers' Company, is meanwhile approaching 

 completion. 



Scholarships in natural science are announced by the following 

 colleges : — Merton and New, July 3 ; Balliol, Christ Church and 

 Trinity, December 4 ; Magdailen, December 11. 



It has been decided that diplomas in geography shall be 

 r mted by the University ; the details of the scheme have yet 



come before Congregation and Convocation. 



Ca.mbridge. — Honorary degrees are to be conferred on the 

 Hon. Edmund Barton, delegate from New South Wales in con- 

 nection with the Australian Commonwealth Bill, and on H.M. 

 ilie King of Sweden and Norway. 



There are vacancies at the University Tables in the Zoological 

 Stations ot Naples and Plymouth. Applicants should write to 

 Prof. Newton before May 24. 



It is proposed to affiliate the University of Tasmania. 

 Bachelors of Arts and Bachelors of Science of that University 

 will thereby be entitled to proceed to Cambridge degrees after 

 two years' residence. 



The Financial Board estimate that, owing to the loss of fees, 

 &c,, consequent on the absence of many members of the Uni- 

 versity in South Africa, the income of the Chest will next year 

 fall short of the necessary expenditure by 650/. 



Seventeen additional Ireshmen were matriculated on May 5. 

 NO. 1593, VOL. 62 J 



Mr. Thopnas Andrews, F.R.S., has presented to the Chemical 

 Laboratory a valuable echelon spectroscope, for which the special 

 thanks of the University have been ordered. 



Dr. Tunnici.ikfe has been appointed to the chair of materia 

 medica and pharmacology in King's College, London. 



Dr. John Wyi.i.ie has been elected to succeed the late Sir 

 Thomas Grainger Stewart in the chair of medicine in the Uni- 

 versity of Edinburgh. 



In order to enable Essex dairy-farmers, and ladies engaged in 

 dairy-work, to gain an insight into the organisation and practice 

 of the agricultural industries of Denmark, the Essex Technical 

 Institution Committee have made arrangements for a party to 

 visit that country. Visits will be made to a number of schools 

 and other institutions, farms, and manufactories concerned with 

 dairying, and a valuable insight will be obtained into Danish 

 methods. Full particulars of the programme can be obtained 

 from Mr. T. S. Dymond, County Technical Laboratories, 

 Chelmsford. 



The growth of municipal technical schools in England during 

 the ten years which followed the passing of the Technical Insti- 

 tution Act, 1889, formed the subject of an inquiry made by 

 the National Association for the Promotion of Technical and 

 Secondary Education a short time ago. The results showed 

 that a capital sum of 2,340,651/ had been spent on technical 

 schools, and that there were 239 such schools (including agri- 

 cultural and dairy schools and domestic science schools) irv 

 existence or in course of establishment. Since the conclusion of 

 the inquiry, technical schools had been erected, or it had been 

 decided to erect them, in several other towns, and the latest 

 report shows that the total amount incurred for 272 schools . 

 under municipal and public bodies is now at least 2,643,172/. 



The progress of science and education in the United States 

 is largely due to the interest taken in the work of colleges andi 

 universities by private benefactors. Scarcely a week passes 

 without affording instances of generous gifts to institutions of this 

 kind, by persons who desire to promote the development of 

 national character and industries. As an example of this 

 public spirit, we have the case of Dr. D. K. Pearson, of 

 Chicago, who, on attaining his eightieth birthday recently, de- 

 cided to add 525,000 dollars to the 2,000,000 dollars he had 

 previously given to colleges. Then we have the announcement 

 in Science that Mr. Andrew Carnegie has promised the trustees 

 of the Carnegie Institute, Pittsburg, Pa., to become responsible 

 for 3,000,000 dollars, the amou it estimated as necessary for the 

 proposed extension and enlargement of the building at the 

 entrance of Schenley Park. The new Imilding will be nearly 

 six times as large as the present one. We should be glad to be 

 able to record many similar gifts to institutions devoted to sc'ence 

 and education in this country. 



One of the good efifects of the technical education movement 

 during the past ten years is that many secondary schools, sucb- 

 as grammar and endowed schools, which formerly excluded 

 science from their curricula, have had to adapt themselves to 

 modern requirements as a condition of receiving assistance from 

 technical- education authorities. The annual report of the- 

 National Association for the promotion of Technical and Second- 

 I ary Education refei's to aii inquiry undertaken to determine the- 

 extent of the changes which have been brought about in thi^ 

 way, both by the establishment of new secondary schools and by 

 the adaptation of existing secondary schools for the purposes of 

 technical education. The facts revealed by the inquiry go to 

 show that in England alone, since 1889, 81 new public secondary 

 schools have been established, while 215 existing schools have 

 been extended mainly for the purposes of science teaching. As 

 regards the schools in the latter category, the extensions to 195 

 of them have resulted in the addition of 251 physical and chemi- 

 cal laboratories, 77 workshops for manual training, 76 lecture- 

 rooms, and 50 class-rooms. The total sum of money involved 

 by these developments is 764,449/ By their capital grants to 

 secondary schools. County Councils have exerted a direct in- 

 fluence in the reorganisation, and have secured a voice in the 

 management and control of the schools. By the Councils' 

 annual maintenance grants, the work of reorganisation has beeri 

 gradually consolidated, and the permanence of proper manage- 

 ment and control has become assured. It is not surprising, there- 

 fore, that the latter, as a continuous source of income to secondary 

 schools, have been increasing in number and in value during 

 recent years. 



