474 



NATURE 



[August 3, 1916 



Glastonbury bowl is that of the goldsmiths of 

 Mykenae. The whole evidence pjoints to a wide inter- 

 course with the other British tribes, as well as to 

 a commerce with those of the Continent, extending 

 so far south as the highly civilised peoples of the 

 Mediterranean. It falls in line with that offered by 

 other discoveries recorded in other parts of Britain, 

 in settlements and tombs, by General Pitt-Rivers, Sir 

 Arthur J. Evans, and others, proving that the inhabi- 

 tants of Britain were highly civilised, and were not 

 isolated from the high Mediterranean culture for some 

 two hundred years before the Roman conquest. 



We may infer from the absence of Roman remains 

 that the lake village was abandoned before the influ- 

 ence of Rome was felt in Somerset. All doubt, how- 

 ever, as to this point is removed by the recent explora- 

 tions of Wookey Hole Cavern, where the group of 

 objects in the lake villages was found in five well- 

 defined layers underneath two superficial strata of 

 Roman age, the latter being dated by the coins, rang- 

 ing from the time of Vespasian (a.d. 69-79) to Valen- 

 tinian II. (a.d. 375-392). Here we have proof that 

 the civilisation of the prehistoric Iron age was pre- 

 Romap, and that it ended in Somerset with the 

 Rornan conquest. It has been traced in other parts 

 of Britain so far back as 150 to 200 B.C. 



The lake villagers were of pure Iberic stock, without 

 admixture with other races. They belong to the 

 small aborigines in Britain in the Neolithic age, char- 

 acterised by long or oval heads, who were conquered 

 in the Bronze age by the invading Goidels, and in 

 the prehistoric Iron age by the invading Brythons, 

 both of whom have left their mark in the topography 

 of the district, by river names, such as the Axe 

 (Goidelic) and the Avon (Brythonic for water), and 

 hill names, such as Dundry dun (Gold) = fort, Mendips 

 Maen (Bryth) = stone, Pen (Bryth) = hill. From these 

 it may be concluded that the language spoken by the 

 lake villagers was closely allied to the Welsh. They 

 were closely related to the Silures, the ruling tribe in 

 South Wales at the time of the Roman conquest. 



The village was sacked, and, as the skulls exhibited 

 show, the inhabitants had been massacred, prob- 

 ably during the conquest of that region by the Belgic 

 tribes, whose further progress was arrested by the 

 Romans. This remarkable discovery is being followed 

 up by the examination of another lake village at 

 Meare, on the same waterway, and belonging to the 

 same pre-Roman age. The first volume was published 

 in 191 1, and the second is now nearly completed. 

 When the whole story is told, by Bulleid and Gray 

 and the other contributors to "The Lake Village of 

 Glastonbury," it will fill a blank in the prehistory of 

 Britain, and form a sound basis for history. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE. 



Mr. T. E. Gordon has been appointed professor of 

 surgery in Trinitv College, Dublin, in succession to 

 Prof. E. H. Taylor. 



The Astley Cooper prize for the present year, for a 

 treatise on "The Physiology and Pathology of the 

 Pituitary Body," has been awarded to Dr. W. Blair 

 Bell, of Liverpool. 



Dr. T. G. Moorhead (Captain, R.A.M.C.) has been 

 elected professor of the practice of medicine in the 

 school of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, in 

 the place of Sir John Moore, retired. 



Efforts are being made by the Kansas State Board 

 to get the State universities to co-operate in an en- 

 deavour to induce the Government to establish a 



NO. 2440, VOL. 97] 



health exf>eriment and research laboratory in connec- 

 tion with each university school of medicine under the 

 U.S. Public Health Service. 



The Board of Education has recently issued an in- 

 teresting Memorandum on the teaching of coal-mining 

 in part-time schools (Circular 953 ; price 4d.J, upon 

 lines which constitute a departure to some extent from 

 the methods of teaching coal-mining students that 

 have hitherto obtained, in that they definitely recog- 

 nise the principle already tacitly admitted by 

 some of the most experienced teachers of min- 

 ing, namely, that the subject in which coal- 

 mining students least need instruction is that 

 of coal-mining. The coal-mining communities may 

 to-day claim to rank amongst the most intelli- 

 gent of our working classes, a condition of 

 things due largely to the fact that a man is required 

 to pass a written examination before he can enter the 

 ranks of the higher colliery officials. All British coal- 

 fields have accordingly arranged some system of 

 mining tuition, and the object of the present Memo- 

 randum is to co-ordinate these, and to base the 

 methods of instruction upon sound principles. The 

 insistence upon a scientific training as the basis of all 

 mining education is a welcome feature of this Memo- 

 randum, and there can be no doubt that its general 

 adoption will prove useful. It is perhaps legitimate 

 to regret that its wording is in places open to mis- 

 construction ; thus the expression " practical mathe- 

 matics " is here used in the sense of elementary mathe- 

 matics applied to practical purposes, instead of in its 

 generally adopted sense; again, it is a pity that the 

 term "mining science" is repeatedly used when the 

 real meaning is science applied to mining. The 

 main point, however, is that the Board of Education 

 has now issued a definite scheme in which a systematic 

 and progressive education in scientific principles is 

 recognised as the correct method of training coal- 

 mining students. 



The report of the Board of Education for the year 

 1914-15 (Cd. 8274) is now available. The period dealt 

 with coincides almost exactly with the first year of 

 the European war, and the report is consequently con- 

 cerned largely with the dislocations and modifications 

 in the educational services brought about by the con- 

 flict. For reasons of economy the Board has suspended 

 the great bulk of its statistical work, and many of the 

 illuminating tabular statements of previous years are 

 wanting. The report not unnaturally emphasises the 

 need for economy in the administration of the public 

 services ; but we notice with satisfaction the admis- i 

 sion :^ — "We desire, however, to record our conviction I 

 that the claim to regard reductions of expenditure on I 

 the public service of education as true economies re^j 

 quires, in the case of every item, the most careful | 

 scrutiny." All grades of education are dealt with fully! 

 in the report, but it is possible here to refer to one or| 

 two points only. The demand for munitions of war; 

 has had two effects upon technical schools : first, many^ 

 schools have been engaged in actual munition work, 1 

 and, secondly, many schools have inaugurated experi- 

 mental courses for the training of unskilled persons 1 

 for the purpose. As to the number of students in 

 attendance at continuation and technical schools in 

 England, the report states that the number of evening 

 and other part-time schools recognised by the Board for 

 1913-14 was 6269, and the number of individual 

 students under instruction at any time during the year 

 in these schools was 726,626. In the same year 

 twenty-seven institutions providing instruction courses 

 were recognised, the total number of such courses in 

 them being seventy-eight. The number of institution? 

 in w^hich day technical classes were recognised in 



