November 27, 1902] 



NA TURE 



87 



any electric development is foreshadowed or suggested in any 

 one of our colonies, especially those in which my firm acts as 

 consulting engineer, we at once receive intimation of the fact 

 from Germany and often from America. We never once have 

 received similar information from any British source ! I have 

 endeavoured, to the best of my ability, on every occasion to 

 point out that the retardation in commercial progress in the 

 United Kingdom is not due so much to want of scientific edu- 

 cation in the men as in the masters. It is the masters who have 

 allowed the Americans and the Germans to oust them out of 

 their own markets, not by any superiority in the qmlity of their 

 goods, but by lower prices, by superior knowledge of the 

 demands of the markets, by the establishment of new markets, 

 by better direct communication with foreign countries, by 

 superior methods of business ways, by establishing regular 

 intelligence departments, and, above all, by possessing and 

 exercising superior commercial technical knowledge. There is 

 a science in business as in manufacture. We want our business 

 men to be technically educated. Their brains must be trained 

 as the Germans have been trained — to guide their business 

 habits by language, observation, generalisation and common 

 sense. They must lay aside the habits of their fathers. It 

 is very satisfactory to find our new Universities establishing 

 commercial faculties." 



We have received from Mr. G. G. Davis, director of the 

 Meteorological Service of the Argentine Republic, vol. xiv. 

 (1901) of the Anales (xi + 520 large quarto pages). At the time 

 of the last published organisation report (1897), the system 

 embraced 156 stations of various classes, including a few in 

 Paraguay ; six stations are provided with self-recording instru- 

 ments of the most approved patterns, and the observations are 

 all taken and reduced with much care. At four of the principal 

 observing stations, elaborate discussions of the climate, under 

 each element, are published in the volume in question, and 

 form a very valuable contribution to the meteorology of South 

 America. 



We learn from the! Report on the administration of the 

 Meteorological Department of the Government of India in 

 1901-2 that at the end of the year the total number of observ- 

 atories was 235, of which 186 were maintained by the Govern- 

 ment. Seven only were of the first class, furnished with auto- 

 matic instruments for continuous records of the various meteor- 

 ological elements. Rainfall was observed at 2389 stations, and 

 seismological observations were satisfactorily recorded by means 

 of Milne's self-registering instrument at three stations ; the curves 

 of the latter have been forwarded to the Earthquake Investigation 

 Committee of the British Association. The movements of the 

 upper clouds by means of photogrammeters have already been 

 published for Allahabad ; similar observations have recently 

 been made at Simla, and the results are ready for publication. 

 The important work of collection of observations from ships' 

 logs has been continued with much activity at Bombay and 

 Calcutta, and the results are utilised in the preparation of pilot 

 charts, giving month by month the normal meteorological con- 

 ditions over the Indian seas. These seas were remarkably free 

 from severe storms during the year ending March 31, 1902, 

 there being only seven disturbances, of which four were of 

 slight intensity ; due warning was given in all cases to the ports 

 concerned. 



The most recent addition to the valuable series of wind charts 

 published and in preparation by theJMeteorological Office shows 

 the mean direction and force of winds round those parts of the 

 coasts of South America which lie south of the equator (" Wind 

 Charts for the Coastal Regions of South America," Meteorological 

 Office Official Publications, No. 159). The coastal regions are 

 broken up into areas from two to five degrees " square," and in 



NO. 1726, VOL. 67] 



each is shown a wind rose, represented by arrows which fly with 

 the winds and show the frequency of the winds by their length, 

 and the force by their thickness. The charts embody the results 

 of 264,639 observations of wind, the numbers ranging from 

 20,033 for September to 24,072 for January. In addition to 

 the wind roses, mean isobars are given for the same areas. The 

 atlas forms an advance part of the series of charts for the South 

 Atlantic Ocean and the eastern margin of the South Pacific 

 Ocean, in course of preparation under the direction of 

 Commander Campbell Hepworth. Maps of this kind furnish 

 material to the investigator as well as to the navigator which is 

 absolutely inaccessible elsewhere. As illustrating the unique 

 value of such charts, the light thrown on the distribution of 

 cyclonic winter rainfall far up the east coast of South America 

 may be mentioned, a distribution which no charts of mean 

 pressure would account for. We look forward with the more 

 interest to the completed charts of the South Atlantic, inasmuch 

 as they will give a still more extended opportunity of studying 

 the external relations and internal eeonomy of an oceanic area 

 of low mean pressure. 



We have received from Messrs. J. W. Gray and Son <i 

 pamphlet on scientific protection against lightning, written by 

 Mr. A. Hands. The writer gives a careful explanation of the 

 principles which must be observed in erecting lightning con- 

 ductors ; as the pamphlet is written in non-technical language, 

 it is to be hoped it may be the means of disseminating inform- 

 ation amongst the public, since there are few subjects on which 

 more ignorance and superstition exist. The importance of 

 careful protection may be gathered from the fact that Mr. 

 Hands estimates the damage caused annually by lightning in 

 this country alone at from 50,000/. to 100,000/. 



The Engineering Magazine for November contains an inter- 

 esting review of wireless telegraphy from the pen of Mr. A. F. 

 Collins. The writer gives a brief historical risuml and explains 

 the theoretical basis of the subject, and then proceeds to a 

 detailed examination of the different systems of Hertzian tele- 

 graphy which have been developed in the'past few years. Those 

 who have attempted to follow the development know that the 

 number of workers has been large and that each has evolved a 

 system having certain distinctive features, and they will welcome 

 an account which describes and illustrates the peculiarities of 

 each. Mr. Collins describes the systems worked out by Mr. 

 Marconi in England, Messrs. Slaby and Arco and Braun in 

 Germany, Messrs. Popoff and Ducretet in France, Messrs. 

 Fessenden and de Forest in America, Senor Severa in Spain, 

 and the repeating system tried by M. Guarini in Belgium. 



Die Zeiischrift fiir das gesammtc Brauwesen publishes a highly 

 interesting notice, by Dr. Klocker, of Prof. Emil Chr. Hansen, 

 written on the occasion of the celebration of the twenty-five 

 years' connection of the eminent investigator with Carlsberg. 

 Hansen's early years shadowed nothing of the career which he 

 ultimately carved out for himself in the scientific world ; indeed, 

 a talent for portrait painting led him to migrate from his home 

 at Ribe to Copenhagen with the intention of studying art. 

 Here, however, he worked hard at science, and after passing 

 his examinations at the Polytechnik, he devoted his ability 

 and indomitable energy to botanical studies, and in 1876 he 

 obtained the gold medal of the University for his treatise on 

 Danish manure-moulds. In 1S79, he was appointed director of 

 the physiological department of the Carlsberg Laboratory, 

 founded by the enlightened brewer, J. C. Jacobsen. Hansen's 

 work on yeasts has made his name known in every quarter of 

 the globe, and his methods and discoveries have inaugurated a 

 new era in the history of brewing. In the new Fermentation 

 Institute opened about two years ago, of which Hansen is 

 director, neither money nor skill has been spared to supply him 



