April 6, 19 16] 



NATURE 



127 



brought forward, and dealt with it in detail in an 

 article in Nature of May ii, 191 1 (vol. Ixxxvi., p. 349). 

 A correspondent suggests that we should reprint this 

 article, but we doubt whether the corporations who 

 want Parliament to do for them what they could do 

 for themselves by changing their habits would be 

 convinced by any appeal to authoritative opinion. 

 They might not be in favour of altering temperature 

 standards during certain months of the year, so that 

 in the summer 80° shall be called 70° by Act of Par- 

 liament, in order to pretend that the weather is not 

 really so hot as the thermometer indicates, yet the 

 principle which they adopt so cheerfully is precisely 

 the same. If they understood the meaning of time- 

 standards so well as they know those of length, 

 weight, and temperature, the "'Daylight Saving" 

 scheme would long since have passed into the limbo of 

 forgotten things. 



The enterprise of the Times in the issuing of an 

 ■" Imperial and Foreign Trade Supplement," to be con- 

 tinued monthly, is both commendable and timely. The 

 purpose is to bring enlightenment to the British pro- 

 ducer and merchant, and to induce them to support 

 measures sound in policy and method with a view to 

 enable them to compete on advantageous terms, both 

 at home and abroad, with their foreign rivals, especi- 

 ally those of Germany. A frank,_ well-informed, and 

 unprejudiced discussion of the intricate problems in- 

 Aolved, having always the welfare of the home con- 

 sumer in mind, can result in nothing but good. An 

 instructive article is contributed by Sir Philip Magnus 

 on the value of science in its application to commerce 

 and industry, in which the economic success of Grer- 

 nany and the results of her peaceful, penetrating 

 efforts throughout several decades are ascribed to the 

 effective school training, which has not only enabled 

 the citizens to develop in their own country new and 

 profitable industrial undertakings, but also to estab- 

 lish themselves in a dominating commercial position 

 in other, countries. Drastic changes are urged in 

 respect of the organisation of our education, not 

 necessarily on German lines, throughout all its grades, 

 but especially in the training given in our universities 

 and technological schools, which is compared very 

 unfavourably with that available in similar German 

 institutions, and with the number of students engaged 

 therein in op>erations involving specialised scientific 

 research. There is also an important article by Sir 

 Algernon Firth on British trade policy, in which refer- 

 ence is made to the recent great commercial confer- 

 ence held in the Guildhall, and to the approval given 

 to the demand that the Empire should produce within 

 its own borders all that it requires from its own soil 

 and factories, and that the Government should be 

 urged to provide larger funds for the promotion of 

 scientific research and training. Only the barest allu- 

 sion is made, however, to this necessity' in communica- 

 tions received from numerous correspondents through- 

 out the countrv-, the chief stress being laid upon fiscal 

 restrictions. 



There is still no news of Sir Ernest Shackleton's 

 ship Endurance, but that need not increase the 

 anxiety as to her safetv, as, owing to the unfavourable 

 ice season, her return may be delayed until the middle 

 of April. The Aurora was towed into Port Chalmers, 

 M 5^^'^"^' ^" Monday, April 3. It appears that on 

 May 6, 1915, a violent gale tore the vessel from her 

 moorings, and that she was then carried with the 

 '^^° the north. The rudder was crushed on Julv 21, 

 and the vessel was not able to emerge from the ice 

 until March i 4last last, when it was in a badlv 

 clamaged condition. Whether the Aurora will be fit to 

 return to the Ross Sea in the next Antarctic summer 



NO. 2423, VOL. 97] 



appears doubtful. The fact that she had to be towed 

 during the last part of her voyage to New Zealand was 

 due to the loss of her rudder, though a jur}- rudder was 

 rigged up. The cautious remarks attributed bv the 

 cable to .\Ir. Stenhouse, the chief officer of the Aurora, 



I suggest, however, doubt as to whether, in his opinion, 

 the Aurora will be available. He is reported to have 

 expressed the hope that the staff of the Aurora will 

 return as a relief party, but he says nothing as to the 



I return of the ship herself. We must hope, however, 

 by next week to have news of the Endurance, and of 

 the seaworthiness of the Aurora. 



Dr. M. O. Forster, F.R.S., the chairman of the 



Technical Committee of British Dyes, Ltd., and Mr. 



J. Tu'^her, the manager of the works, have been 



, offered, and have accepted, seats on the board of the 



I company, and Dr. J. C. Cain has been appointed chief 



chemist of the new works at present under construc- 



{ tion at Dalton, Huddersfield. 



, We regret to announce the death, on April 4, in his 

 eighty-first year, of Sir John Gorst. F.R.S., vice- 

 president of the Committee of Council on Education 

 ! from 1895 to 1902, and the first president of the 

 I Educational Science Section of the British Association. 



I Mr. W. B. Hardy, Sec.R.S., Admiral Sir H. B. 



I Jackson, K.C.B., F.R.S., and Sir G. A. Smith, Prin- 



: cipal and Vice-Chancellor of Aberdeen University, have 



1 been elected members of the Athenaeum Club under 



the rule which empowers the annual election of a 



certain number of persons " of distinguished eminence 



in science, literature, the arts, or for public services." 



The day lectures at the Royal Institution after 

 Easter include : — Prof. C. S. Sherrington, Harvev and 

 Pavloff ; Dr. T. M. Lowrv", optical research and chem- 

 ical progress; Sir Ray Lankester, flints and flint im- 

 plements ; Prof. W. H. Bragg, X-rays and crystals (the 

 Tyndall lectures); Prof. H. S. Foxwell. the finance 

 of the great war; Sir James G. Frazer, folk-lore in 

 the Old Testament. The Friday evening discourses in- 

 clude : — Sir J. M. Davidson,' electrical methods in 

 surgical advance; Colonel E. H. Hills, the move- 

 ments of the earth's pole; Prof. C. G. Barkla, X-rays; 

 Mr. E. Clarke, eyesight and the war. 



Dr. H. R. Mill reports in the Times of April 3 

 that while the average rainfall for March at Camden 

 Square for fifty years is 175 in., this vear the total 

 rainfall, including melted snow, up to' a few hours 

 before the end of the month, was 467 in. The record 

 of rainfall at Greenwich Observatorv for the past 100 

 years includes only one instance of a 4-in. fall in 

 March, 405 in. having been measured in 185 1. A 

 search through the numerous rainfall records kept in 

 and near London back to the beginning of the 

 eighteenth century has failed to show anv March with 

 as much as 4 in. of rain. 



The annual general meeting of the Ray Societ>- was 

 held on March 23, Prof. W. C. xMcIntosh, president, 

 in the chair. The report of the council showed a con- 

 siderable loss of membership owing to the war, and 

 stated that two volumes for 1915, the '"Principles of 

 Plant-Teratolog>-," vol. i., by Mr. W. C. Worsdell, 

 and the '"British Fresh-water Rhizopoda and Helio- 

 zoa," vol. iii., by Mr. G. H. Wailes, had been issued 

 to the members, and also the " British Marine Anne- 

 lids," vol. in., part 2, by the president, being one of 

 the issues for the present vear, for which the second 

 and concluding volume of "Plant-Teratology" is also 

 in preparation. A work on the "Trematode Parasites 

 of British Marine Fishes," by Dr. William Nicoll, and 

 one on the "British Diatomaceae," by Mr. George 



