586 



NA TURE 



[October 15, 1903 



but prophesy that the future is more than hopeful, now that 

 the public is beginning to be educated in education. It 

 will demand, and its wants will be supplied. 



APPENDIX. 



Number of Schools of Science and their Grants. 



189s 

 1898 

 1 901 

 1903 



£ 



39.163 



98,849 



118,833 



Notyetknown^ 



Number of Schools teaching Shortened Course of Science. 

 Year No. 



1902 ... ... ... ... ... .-. 127 



1903 184 



Number of Laboratories recognised. 



Grants paid for Science Instruction. 



THE GERMAN ASSOCIATION AT CASSEL. 

 nPHE seventy-fifth meeting of the German Association for 

 ■^ the Advancement of Science and Medicine took place 

 in brilliant weather in the picturesque town of Cassel. « By 

 Saturday evening, September 19, members and associates 

 began to arrive, and on Sunday a large number of gaily 

 coloured " rosettes " were visible in the streets. Advantage 

 was taken of this gathering of men of science to present to 

 Prof. Graebe, of Geneva, an address on the completion of 

 the twenty-fifth year of occupancy of his chair of chemistry, 

 and M. Moissan, of Paris, on behalf of the Chemical Society, 

 conveyed to him the Lavoisier medal of the Institute of 

 France. Prof. Graebe, who, in conjunction with Prof. 

 Liebermann, of Berlin, achieved the first important chemical 

 synthesis — that of artificial alizarine — was an old assistant 

 of Prof. V. Baeyer, of Munich, who then occupied the chair 

 of chemistry in the Gewerbe Akademie in Berlin. Prof. 

 V. Baeyer, in his opening address, directed special attention 

 to the cooperation of men of science with technologists, 

 which was the fruit of this important synthesis — a cooper- 

 ation which has had enormous influence on the develop- 

 ment both of German science and industry. The rector of 

 the University of Geneva followed, and he mentioned that, 

 during the twenty-five years of Prof. Graebe 's tenure of 

 the'thair, he had published 196 memoirs on chemical sub- 

 jects, while more than 400 papers were published by workers 

 in his laboratory. Prof. Moissan, who, as delegate of the 

 Acad^mie des Sciences, handed to Prof. Graebe the 

 Lavoisier medal, referred in an eloquent speech to the great 

 influence which Graebe's work has had in developing 

 synthetical organic chemistry, and after the presentation 

 of addresses from the Royal Academy of Sciences of Bavaria, 

 from the German Chemical Society, from the Societies of 

 1 In 1902 124,300/. was paid. 



Geneva and Frankfort, and from the University of 

 Lausanne, Prof. Graebe received from the chairman a gold 

 plaque, engraved with his portrait, and from M. Am6 

 Pictet, on behalf of his old students, a bound copy of his 

 own papers. Dr. Brunck, on behalf of the " Badische " 

 Chemical Company, of which he is managing director, 

 added a tribute to Graebe from the point of view of 

 technology, and in an eloquent reply Prof. Graebe ex- 

 pressed his gratitude and thanks. About sixty of the 

 audience remained to a dinner given in honour of Prof. 

 Graebe, at which numerous toasts were drunk, and the 

 proceedings were kept up until a late hour. 



The members and associates met for the first time on 

 Sunday evening, September 20, in the grounds of the 

 Hessian Brewery, where a- large hall had been adapted for 

 the purpose of the general meetings, and on Monday morn- 

 ing, after words of welcome from Prof. Hornstein, of 

 Cassel, the local secretary, from President von Trott zu 

 Solz, from the mayor and others, the president of the 

 Association, Prof, van 't Hoff, returned thanks in the name 

 of the Association. An address was then delivered by Prof. 

 Ladenburg on the influence of science on our views of life. 

 The address treated of the gradual development of scientific 

 knowledge and its opposition by the church ; the necessity 

 of education in the phenomena and laws of nature, and the 

 insignificant position of man among natural phenomena ; 

 the doctrine of the immortality of the soul and the dicta 

 of science on the subject. He contended that Christianity 

 alone had been unable to induce mankind to accept the 

 doctrine of liberty, equality, and fraternity, and that this 

 doctrine, indispensable for our future progress, must be 

 the future object of scientific endeavour. The general 

 opinion of the audience appeared to be that Prof. Laden- 

 burg's address was unnecessary, and that he had assumed 

 for science an infallibility similar to that claimed by the 

 Apostolic See. The second address, by Prof. Ziehen, of 

 Utrecht, treated of impressions and sensations, and their 

 connection with the surface of the brain. Sensations may 

 be termed positive or negative, according as they produce 

 pleasant or unpleasant emotions, and their intensity depends 

 less on the degree of excitability of the regions of the brain 

 affected than on the capacity for " discharge " or com- 

 munication with other regions. " Negative " sensations are 

 more numerous than positive ; the lecturer attempted to 

 prove this by the fact that, in German, words denoting un- 

 pleasant are more numerous than those which denote 

 pleasant sensations. But up to now it had been impossible 

 to bridge the gap between the mechanism of the brain and 

 the sensations and perceptions. 



In the afternoon the sections met, and in the evening the 

 opera of " Tannhauser " was well performed in the theatre. 

 September 21 was devoted to sectional meetings, and in the 

 evening the members and associates dined together in the 

 " Festhalle," and many toasts were proposed. On the 

 morning of the next day addresses were delivered by Prof. 

 Penck, of Vienna, on geological time ; by Prof. Schwalbe, 

 of Strassburg, on the early history of man ; and by Dr. 

 Alsberg, of Cassel, on inherited degeneration as a con- 

 sequence of social influences. On the morning of Sep- 

 tember 24 the medical side of the congress was represented 

 bv Dr. Allan Macfadyen, who gave an address on inter- 

 cellular toxines ; by Dr. Paul Jensen, on the physiological 

 action of light ; and by Dr. Rieder, on the curative results 

 obtained by treatment with light. 



Later in the morning, in order to open a discussion on 

 the place of mechanics in our views of nature, papers were 

 read by Dr. Schwarzschild, of Gottingen, on astronomical 

 mechanics, by Prof. Sommerfeld on technical mechanics, 

 and by Prof. Otto Fischer on physiological mechanics. 

 Dr. Schwarzschild began by stating that Newton's law of 

 gravitational attraction still remains the leading factor in 

 astronomy, and every observation only serves as a confirm- 

 ation of its correctness. It has been proved to be correct 

 to two parts in one hundred millions. The chief aim of 

 astronomical mechanics is to represent exactly the actual 

 path of the planets. But the classical " Mechanics of the 

 Heavens " fails, if it is applied to very long periods of time. 

 The formulae which are applied would, if extended, point 

 to a destruction of the planetary system. There are, how- 

 ever, two reasons for believing that such a conclusion would 

 be incorrect. The problem of " secular disturbances " was 

 solved by Lagrange, and that of " commensurabilities " 



NO. 1772, VOL. 68] 



