312 



NATURE 



[June 8, 1916 



logical conditions at Greenwich . during the year end- 

 ing April 30, 1916, are : (i) the warm January with a 

 mean temperature 2° higher than any January from 

 1841 to 1915; (ii) the great pressures of wind in the 

 gales in the winter; and (iii) the heavy rainfall in 

 March, the wettest March since the commencement of 

 the Greenwich records in 1841. 



The following details of the chronicle of the weather 

 refer to the year ended April 30, 1916. The mean 

 temperature was 496°, or 01° above the average of 

 the' seventy years 1841-1910. The highest tempera- 

 ture in the shade was 872° on June 8, and the tem- 

 perature exceeded 80° on only six days, as against 

 twenty-one in the previous year- The lowest tempera- 

 ture was 23-0° on November 27, and on forty days 

 fell as low as 320°. 



The mean daily horizontal movement of the air was 

 287 miles, which is three miles above the average of 

 the previous forty-eight years. The greatest daily 

 movement, 955 miles, was recorded on February 16, 

 and the least, 63 miles, on October 15. The greatest 

 recorded pressure on the square foot was 350 lb. on 

 January i ; the greatest velocity in one hour 51 miles 

 on December 27. 



The duration of bright sunshine registered by the 

 Campbell-Stokes instrument was 1476 hours, out of a 

 possible 4473 hours, or 33 per cent. This is below the 

 average, principally owing to a deficiency in August 

 and March. 



The rainfall was 32-17 in., or 8-05 in. above the 

 average for the period 1841-1905. The number of 

 rainy days (0005 in. or over) was 168. June, with 

 056 in., was the driest, and December, with 5-20 irt., 

 the wettest month. The rainfall in March was 

 413 in. 



The scientific work of the observatory has neces- 

 sarily been somewhat curtailed, but it has been found 

 possible to keep up all observations of the sun, moon, 

 and planets ; sun-spots, latitude ; magnetic and 

 meteorological registers ; observations which would 

 otherwise be permanently lost.. The reductions are in 

 some cases behindhand, and must be brought up to 

 date later. Both the scientific staff and the workmen 

 have made everv effort to cope with the additional 

 work caused by the absence of their normal assistance. 

 In the course of the year six Belgian refugees have 

 been employed at the observatory. 



THE PLACE OF SCIENCE IN MODERN 

 METALLURGICAL INDUSTRIES. 



IT is significant of the position which science now 

 occupies in the iron and steel industry that Sir 

 William Beardmore, the head of a great armament 

 firm in Glasgow, and the president-elect of the Iron 

 and Steel Institute, in discussing the various factors 

 which determine the success of any particular process, 

 said in his recent presidential address : — " Science 

 comes first. It is the dominant factor because it 

 should be the beginning of all things. . . ." He went 

 on to point out that there is, however, a tendency at 

 the moment to neglect the other factors, and especi- 

 ally the attitude of labour towards improved rnethods 

 of manufacture which are evolved by scientific re- 

 search. This attitude amounts in many cases to an 

 absolute refusal to utilise such improvements, and 

 when manufacturers are charged with a lack of enter- 

 prise in not adopting modifications which are demon- 

 strably advantageous the reason frequently is that the 

 obstructionist attitude of labour organisations renders 

 those improvements impossible of execution. Sir 

 William Beardmore quite rightly insists that the ques- 

 tion is one of profound national importance. He 

 says : — 



NO. 2432, VOL. 97] 



"The employment of the people and their well-being 

 depend upon plenty of work. This in turn requires 

 the maintenance of a great export trade. Efficiency 

 and economy in manufactures can do much to win 

 and retain foreign as well as British Imperial markets. 

 This necessitates advance towards perfection of design 

 and greater volume of output, through improvement in 

 the mechanical means of production evolved by experi- 

 ment. It follows that research should be a charge 

 upon the selling price. To counterbalance this charge 

 it is essential that the volume of output should be 

 increased. Thus, when w-e reach the bedrock of in- 

 dustrial conditions we find that unless restrictions and 

 limitations dictated by workers' organisations are 

 abolished much of the gain possible to the nation due 

 to research and experiment must be lost." 



Seldom before has this point been made with such 

 brevity and convincingness. Sir William Beardmore 

 went on to give instances of the restrictive methods 

 of trade unions during the war, which would be 

 almost incredible if they were not, as they unfor- 

 tunately are, amply proved to be true. 



One of the best points made in his address was the 

 clear and proper distinction drawn between the two 

 main divisions of scientific research, which he classified 

 as " In one case purely theoretical, almost classical ; 

 in the other as distinctly technical, or practical," each 

 of which has its proper sphere. As regards the 

 former, the results obtained merely Indicate poten- 

 tialities for the future; as regards the latter, they 

 are generally contemporaneous with actual manufac- 

 ture. No more diflficult questions come up for decision 

 than the potentialities, from a commercial point of 

 view, of problems which have been solved In the 

 laboratorv. It Is very encouraging to scientific 

 workers In metallurgy to find such stress laid on the 

 importance of theoretical research bv a practical man 

 of the attainments of Sir William Beardmore. 



H. C. H. C. 



RECENT ENTOMOLOGY. 



THE Termites, or " white ants," of the United 

 States are described by Thomas E. Snyder from 

 the bionomic and economic point of view in Bulletin 

 333 of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Three 

 species of Leucotermes — one an inftroduced Immigrant 

 from South Europe — are included in the survey. The 

 principal injury caused by the termites Is the destruc- 

 tion of wooden buildings and other structures, but at 

 times they devour living trees and growing crops, as 

 well as books, papers, cloth fabrics, and stored grain 

 and flour. 



From the current number (part 3, vol. iv. B) of the 

 Review of Applied Entomology it is evident that the 

 destruction of lice infesting troops on the Eastern battle- 

 front is a problem confronting both German and 

 Russian army surgeons and sanitarians. From a 

 summary of Dr. A. Hase's recent paper in the Cen- 

 tralbl. Bakt. Parasit. u. Infektionskrankh (Ixxvii., 2, 

 1915), we learn that dirty, greasy underclothing causes 

 a high temperature which is deterrent to lice, and we 

 are struck Isy a touch of human interest rarely found 

 in the summary of a technical paper. " The troops were 

 all anxious to be freed from the pests with the exception 

 of an East Prussian, who said that the little creatures 

 reminded him of home." 



A recent number (vol. Hi., 3) of the Indian Journd 

 of Medical Research contains some papers of interest 

 to students of the DIptera. Major S. R. Christophers 

 revises the list of Indian Anophelini, and describes the 

 various stages of Anopheles plumheus — a species ap- 

 parently common to Europe, North America, and 

 India — the larvae of which were found inhabiting holes 



