76 



NATURE 



[May 28, 1891 



recognizing any of the Kafifrarian species ; and perhaps at 

 some future time Mr. Sim, who was trained at Kew, will 

 extend his area so as to cover the whole colony, for which 

 the total number of ferns known is between 130 and 140. 



J. G. Baker. 



Rider Papers on Euclid. Books l.-ll. By Rupert 



Deakin, M.A. (London : Macmillan and Co., 1891.) 

 This little book consists of a series of graduated riders so 

 arranged that the beginner may be able to thoroughly 

 understand and grasp the principal propositions of the 

 first two books of Euclid. One of the chief errors that the 

 author endeavours to avoid is the great stress teachers 

 lay on some of the propositions, which are treated as 

 most important, while others are more or less overlooked. 



The method he adopts is to treat each proposition first 

 as a rider, and by giving the enunciation and drawing 

 the figure, see if any of the class can show how it is proved. 

 By this means the subject can be made interesting, as 

 beginners can then look upon each rather as a puzzle than 

 as a stiff piece of work. 



The two books are divided into nine parts, each part 

 consisting of six papers, and the riders in each paper, 

 with the exception, of course, of the first, deal with 

 all the preceding propositions. The student is ad- 

 vised in the first six papers only to draw the figures, in 

 order to accustom himself to one of the chief difficulties 

 which, as the author says, " experience shows me that all 

 students feel more or less in solving riders." 



At the end are printed the enunciations of the proposi- 

 tions of the two books, followed by several papers set at 

 various examinations. Altogether, teachers will find this 

 an admirable help for classes in which the subject is 

 being treated for the first time. 



Die Krystalla7ialyse oder die chetnische Analyse durch 

 BeobacJitung der Krystallbildung mil Hiilfe des 

 Mikroskops mil theilweiser Bemttziing seines Buches 

 iiber Molekularphysik. Bearbeitet von Dr. O. Lehmann. 

 (Leipzig : Engelmann, 1891.) 

 We have so recently noticed at length the splendid work 

 of Dr. O. Lehmann on " Molecular Physics " (see 

 Nature, vol. xlii. p. i) that it is only necessary in this 

 place to call attention to this pamphlet of 82 pages, 

 illustrated by 73 woodcuts, in which the author gives 

 the necessary directions for the work of micro-chemical 

 analysis. The instruments used and methods employed 

 are concisely stated, and all the essential details of the 

 operations are supphed to the chemist in this Httle hand- 

 book. Dr. Lehmann claims, not unjustly, that the 

 methods of micro-chemical analysis must play the same 

 part in the laboratory of the organic chemist as spectral 

 analysis does in the laboratory of the inorganic chemist. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



[ The Editor does not hold himself responsible for opinions ex- 

 pressed by his correspondents. Neither can he undertake 

 to return, or to correspond with the writers of, rejected 

 manuscripts intended for this or any other part <?/ Nature. 

 No notice is taken of anonymous communications. ^ 



The University of London. 



My friend, Mr, Thiselton Dyer, invites me, by his references 

 to what I have written on this subject, to a discussion in your 

 columns. I am very unwilling to accept the invitation, because I 

 have already and often stated my views, and because I see by 

 the length of Mr. Dyer's letter that I may be led into an inter- 

 minable labyrinth of side-issues. The official report in which are 

 published the minutes of the evidence given before the Royal 

 Commission which sat on this subject in the year 1888, contains 

 a more lengthy discussion of the subject by myself and others 

 than it is possible to carry through in the columns of Nature ; 

 and I could wish that for once those interested in a subject 



NO. I I 26, VOL. 44] 



would rescue from proverbial oblivion the pages of careful state- 

 ment entombed in a Blue-book. Since, however, my friend trails 

 his coat, it would be doing violence to my old-established regard 

 for him to refuse to tread on it — just a little. 



The question raised by Mr. Dyer seems to be, why should not 

 the examining board in Burlington Gardens undergo certain 

 reforms and continue to be the so-called University of London ? 

 It has done good service to education, he says, and with the 

 removal of more than half its members and their replacement 

 by gentlemen who either really know or really care about 

 University education it might do more. If it were, he suggests, 

 to rise superior to all its most solemn obligations and falsify the 

 pledges of its founders by undertaking to teach as well as to 

 examine, it would really be as much of a " teaching University " 

 as is either Oxford or Cambridge, and its non-collegiate sup- 

 porters from all parts of Britain might enjoy the spectacle of the 

 mother-college (University College) from which this examining 

 board took birth, abandoning in favour of Burlington Gardens 

 those traditions of scientific research which have made the 

 College in some measure a lealization of Fichte's ideal. 



[Mr. Dyer seems to have forgotten the facts when he con- 

 tends that such teaching as Fichte sketched in his plan for the 

 University of Berlin, cannot be carried on in the same institution 

 or by the same men who administer the teaching required by a 

 University student at the commencement] ofhis career. Fichte's 

 plan was carried out in the University of Berlin, and has been 

 followed by every other University in Germany. The very 

 questions which we are no w debating were debated in the early 

 years of this century in Germany, and the Jesuits' plan of edu- 

 cation by examination was rejected. University College was 

 founded (except so far as it was a private enterprise) on the 

 lines of a German University, and only required the prestige and 

 independence conferred by the power of granting University 

 degrees to enable it to fulfil in London Fichte's ideal. Its pro- 

 fessors have never been (as Mr. Dyer well knows) mere in- 

 structors for examination purposes. The researches of Graham, 

 Williamson, Sharpey, and of Michael Foster, Sanderson, 

 Schafer, Kennedy, and many others have been carried on in its 

 laboratories. The proposal to detach such work from the 

 London Colleges, and to associate it with the examining board 

 in Burlington Gardens, on the ground that it is inconsistent 

 with the teaching of University undergraduates, appears to me to 

 involve an erroneous conception of what University education and 

 University organization should be. This by way of parenthesis.] 

 The point which I wish to insist on is that, excepting the pro- 

 posal to undertake higher professorial teaching, I have no 

 objection whatever to the reforms of the examining body in 

 Burlington Gardens advocated by Mr. Dyer. 



What I desire (and I merely use the first person singular for 

 the purpose of discussion, and not because I stand alone in my 

 wishes, or undervalue the support of others) is that, without any 

 interference with the Burlington Gardens board, the privilege 

 of granting degrees should be conferred by the Crown upon a 

 combined Senate consisting of the Professors of University and 

 King's Colleges (the authority of the councils of the two Colleges 

 being duly guarded). 



The fact that Burlington Gardens are in London and that 

 University and King's College are also in London, as well as the 

 talk about a teaching University "in and for" London, have 

 very little bearing upon the question as to whether it is or is not 

 desirable to grant University privileges to the two Colleges. 

 There is population enough and accommodation enough for a 

 dozen Universities within the metropolitan area. As ft\r as I am 

 able to judge as to the principles which should guide the Crown 

 in bestowing the privilege of incorporation as a University, the 

 only questions to be asked are : " Does the body which asks for 

 this privilege consist of learned men whose work will be facili- 

 tated by the granting to them of this ancient and honourable 

 position ? Do they give guarantees of material support, and of 

 a public demand for their teaching, which will enable them to 

 discharge the functions of a University with dignity and efficiency, 

 now and hereafter ? Will the concession to them of this privi- 

 lege tend directly or indirectly or both to the public welfare?" 

 I cannot imagine that anyone will undertake to give a negative 

 response to these questions in reference to the combined Colleges, 

 University and King's. Certain it is that during the acute dis- 

 cussion which has been carried on for the last four or five years, 

 no one has ventured to do so. What has happened is simply 

 this, that persons connected with Burlington Gardens have 

 opposed the bestowal of University powers on the two Colleges, 



