December 4. 1902J 



NATURE 



117 



his brother had had in Germany, and the fee was 47/. 13/. gd. 

 for a year. The explanation is given by the secretary of the 

 London college, who pointed out in a letter to Mr. Holzapfel 

 flint " the continental colleges are endowed by the State, but 

 in England they have to live on the fees of students for the 

 most part, with a very small grant from the State in some cases 

 and what they can raise voluntarily from the public." But it is 

 evident that while the highest form of instruction in science 

 can be obtained at so small a cost, there will never be a lack 

 of properly trained men to look after the manufactures of 

 Germany. 



Full particulars have now been published of the first annual 

 conference of persons in the north of England concerned in 

 primary, secondary, technical and other forms of higher educa- 

 tion, which was announced in our issue for July 17. The con- 

 ference will be divided into four sessions — two meetings on each 

 of the days January 2 and 3, 1903 — presided over respectively 

 by Mr. M. E. Sadler, director of special inquiries to the 

 Board of Education ; Prof. H. E. Armstrong, F.R.S., Prof. 

 Smithells, F.R.S., and Prof. L. C. Miall, F.R.S. There will 

 be a reception by the Lord Mayor of Manchester of members 

 of the conference on January 2, in the Municipal School of 

 Technology, Manchester, where the meetings will be held, 

 after which various papers will be read. Miss S. A. Burstall, 

 head mistress of the Manchester High School for Girls, will 

 take up the subject of the curriculum in different types of 

 schools. Dr. Kimmins, at the afternoon meeting of the first 

 day, deals with the coordination and delimitation of science 

 teaching in various grades of schools. The methods of teach- 

 ing experimental science in its early stages will be discussed on 

 the morning of January 3, Mr. W. French, principal of the 

 Storey Institute. Lancaster, taking up physics, and Mr. R. L. 

 Taylor, of the Central School, Manchester, considering chemis- 

 try. At the last meeting, Mr. H. W. T. Wager will introduce 

 the subject of methods of nature-study. Great care has been 

 taken to encourage discussion at each meeting ; the names of 

 well-known teachers are included in the programme as having 

 promised to contribute to the debates. In connection with the 

 conference, there will be an exhibition of apparatus, prepara- 

 tions and diagrams, such as teachers themselves have prepared 

 or which pupils have made, to illustrate methods of nature-study 

 and the teaching of experimental science. A class-room, fitted 

 up as a model of what it is desired should be provided for the 

 teaching of physics and chemistry in their early stages, will 

 form part of the exhibition. The admission to the conference 

 will be free, by ticket, to be obtained from the honorary secre- 

 taries, Dr. H. Lloyd Snape, Director of Education to the 

 Lancashire County Council, and Mr. J. H. Reynolds, Director 

 of Technical Instruction for the city of Manchester and principal 

 of the Manchester Municipal Technical School, which is the 

 office of the conference. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS. 



Transactions of the American Mathematical Society, vol. iii. 

 No. 4 (October). — G. A. Miller, on the groups of order p'" 

 which contain operators of order/"' - ' 2 . It appears that if/>2 

 and m > 5, there are two and only two such groups not containing 

 either an invariant cyclic subgroup of order p" l ~- or else an 

 abelian subgroup of type {m - 2, 1). These two groups are 

 conformal respectively with the abelian groups of type (m - 2, 2) 

 and of type(>«-2, 1, 1). — C. A. Scott, (1) on the circuits of 

 plane curves ; (2) on the real inflexions of plane curves. — J. 

 Hadamard, on the theory of plane elastic plates. — E. J. 

 Wilczynski, covariants of systems of differential equations, and 

 applications to the theory of ruled surfaces. The system 

 considered is y'+p-n/ +Pn z ' + a ny + a i« z -° ar, d another 

 similar equation with 2" for y". All covariants can be 

 expressed in terms of three, together with invariants. — A. S. 

 Gale, on the rank, order and class of algebraic minimum 

 curves. — H. F. Blichfeldt, on the determination of the distance 

 between two points in space of m dimensions. Without assuming 

 the continuity and independence of the coordinates, but assum- 

 ing that distance-relations exist, a series of axioms is laid down 

 and possible forms deduced for the analytical expression for the 

 distance between two points. — H. Maschke, on superosculating 

 quadric surfaces. — E. H. Moore, a definition of abstract groups, 

 t— A. Emch, algebraic transformations of a complex variable 

 realised by linkages. 



NO. 1727, VOL. 67] 



American Journal 0/ Mathematics, vol. xxiv. No. 4 (October). 

 — M. Bocher, on systems of linear differential equations of the 

 first order. This contains proofs of some existence-theorems 

 by a method of successive approximation. — T. M. Putnam, on 

 the quaternary linear homogeneous group and the ternary linear 

 fractional group. The determinant being unity, and the group 

 being symbolised by substitutions, the canonical forms of the 

 generators fall into eleven principal types, with various sub- 

 divisions. The periods of the substitutions are considered, and 

 different commutative subgroups investigated. — A. N. White- 

 head, on cardinal numbers. The results of this paper are all 

 expressed in Peano's symbolism, on which there is an introduc- 

 tory section. — G. A. Miller, on a method of constructing all 

 the groups of order p'" (p being any prime). — II. F. Stecker, 

 non-Euclidean properties of plane cubics and of their first and 

 second polars. This is a continuation of a former paper in vol. 

 xxii. of the same journal. 



Annals of Mathematics (2) vol. iv. No. 1. (October). — G. A. 

 Bliss, on the geodesic lines on the anchor-ring. The author 

 obtains explicit formulae, involving elliptic functions, which 

 define a doubly infinite family of geodesies. He also shows 

 that, according to Mangoldt's classification, the points on the 

 inner equator are of the first kind and all others of the second 

 kind. Good illustrative diagrams are given. — H. F. Blickfeldt, 

 proof of a theorem concerning isosceles triangles. — L. E. Dick- 

 son, an elementary exposition of Frobenius's theory of group- 

 characters and group-determinants. — E. V. Huntington, on Mr. 

 Ransom's mechanical construction of conies. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 

 Chemical Society, November ig. — Dr. J. Emerson Reynolds 

 V P.R.S., president, in the chair. — The "dynamic isomerism " 

 of thiourea and ammonium thiocyanate. When the ammonium 

 salt is heated, there is formed a definite compound of this with 

 25 per cent, of thiourea formed irom it ; further, melting-point 

 curves of mixtures of these two substances show that other 

 molecular combinations occur. — Isomeric partially racemic salts 

 containing quinquevalent nitrogen ; part S, resolution of the 

 hydrindamine camphor sulphonates, by Dr. F. S. Kipping. The 

 author has confirmed the theory proposed by him in iSgg to 

 account for the existence of these salts by the resolution of the 

 partially racemic salt into four isomerides. — The oxime of mes- 

 oxamide and some allied compounds, by M. A. Whiteley. A 

 description of the disubstituted derivatives of mesoxamide, all of 

 which possess the characteristic properties of furnishing yellow 

 alkali salts and purple ferrous compounds. — Interaction of 

 ketones and aldehydes with acid chlorides, by F. H. Lees. 

 When methyl «-nonylketone is acted upon by benzoyl chloride, 

 there is formed j8-benzoxyundecylene ; this reaction has been 

 extended to other ketones, and a series of benzoxyolefines so 

 produced. — The synthesis of aa-dimethylglutaric acid, hydroxy- 

 aa dimethylglutaric acid, and of the cis- and /7-a«s-modifications 

 of aa-dimethylglutaconic acid, by Dr. W. H. Perkin and A. E. 

 Smith. — A reaction of some phenolic colouring matters, by- 

 A. G. Perkin and C. R. Wilson. Potassium derivatives of a 

 number of naturally occurring colouring matters have been pre- 

 pared by interaction with potassium acetate. — Note on mixtures 

 of constant boiling point, by Dr. S. Young. The composition 

 of the mixture of carbon tetrachloride and methyl alcohol having 

 the minimum boiling point is shown to contain 80 per cent, of 

 the former. — The vapour pressures and boiling points of mixed 

 liquids, part 2, by Dr. S. Young and E. C. Fortey. Part 3, by 

 Dr. S. Young. An investigation of the formula proposed by 

 the authors expressing the relation between the vapour 

 pressure of the mixture and those of its constituents. Note 

 on the condensation points of the thorium and radium emana- 

 tions, by E. Rutherford and F. Soddy. When the emanations 

 from thorium and radium compounds are passed through a 

 copper spiral immersed in liquid air, they are condensed and 

 retained in the copper tube and are volatilised when the term 

 perature is raised to - 125 in the case of thorium emanation and 

 to - 130" in the case of radium. — Note on the action of barium 

 hydroxide on dimethylvioluric acid, by M. A. Whiteley. The 

 principal product of this action is isonitrosomalondimethyh 

 amide. — The determination of strychnine and brucine in nux 

 vomica, by E. Dowzard. The brucine is determined by colori- 

 metric estimation of the tint produced by the solution of the 

 alkaloidal residue in nitric acid. 



