4 66 



NA TURE 



[March 19 1903 



training' and attainments. He illustrates his point by 

 giving an outline of the organisation of a typical 

 chemical works in Germany. The management con- 

 sists of a business man, a chemist and an engineer, 

 and attached to each department is a special research 

 laboratory. Both the laboratories and workshops are 

 splendidly fitted with every appliance necessary for 

 carrying out the most complicated and exact oper- 

 ations. The expenditure upon chemicals, books and 

 apparatus would appear to a British manufacturing 

 company to be absolute lunacy, the Badische Anilin 

 und Soda Fabrik alone spending more than 5000/. a 

 year on glass and porcelain apparatus. The consulting 

 library attached to the laboratories of F. Baeyer and 

 Co., of Elberfeld, contains no less than fourteen 

 thousand volumes and twenty-three thousand pam- 

 phlets of an original character. 



As to the methods of research, when a new com- 

 pound has been discovered which is found to have, 

 say, dyeing properties, it is sent to the dyeing depart- 

 ment, where a chemist, who has made a speciality of 

 that particular branch of chemistry, subjects it to the 

 most exhaustive tests, and tries its behaviour on cotton, 

 wool, silk, paper, leather, &c. Should any of these 

 tests turn out in a satisfactory manner, the substance 

 is then subjected to tests on a semi-manufacturing 

 scale. Again, a new preparation which may be 

 expected to possess therapeutic properties is sent to 

 the medical department, where its physiological 

 effects are tried. These articles having successfully 

 passed through the experimental stages, the business 

 man is called in, and they are placed on the market. 

 Circulars and pamphlets are sent out, which set forth 

 the effects and uses of the articles. These circulars 

 are printed in all the European languages, and often 

 in those of Asia. Samples are sent out, and travellers, 

 who are accomplished chemists, visit works and busi- 

 ness houses where the articles may be used. These 

 men place their knowledge and skill at the service of 

 the consumer, while they demonstrate how the articles 

 may be used to the greatest advantage. In no case do 

 they endeavour to plant their products upon their 

 customers against their will, and, if necessary, the 

 articles are so far as possible modified to meet their 

 customers' tastes and prejudices. Little or nothing is 

 left to chance; everything that ingenuity and business 

 experience can suggest is resorted to in order to obtain 

 the market. 1 



Prof. Haller recognises that the patent laws of 1878 

 have been of great benefit to the German manufac- 

 turers. But patent laws are only useful when there 

 are inventions to be patented and processes to be pro- 

 tected. He further recognises that the mineral wealth 

 of Germany has been of incalculable value to the 

 nation, because it has, to a large extent, rendered it 

 independent of outside nations for its raw products. 

 For example, the wonderful deposits of Stassfurt en- 

 able the Germans not only to supplv themselves, but the 

 world at large, with potassium salts. 



Prof. Haller considers the scientific training obtain- 

 able at the universities and polytechnics to be the main 

 reason of the astonishing development of the German 

 chemical industry. It must not be forgotten that be- 

 side the universities and polytechnics, there are special 

 academies where the general outlines of chemistry are 

 taught, and where special applications of science to 



" 1 J e .. Br ' t ; sl1 merchant fells the goods which he deals in and has 

 selected himself, and leaves it to the customer to adapt himself to the 

 merchandise. The German individualises and meets the wants of his 

 customers; he adapts his merchandise, credit, conditions of sales 

 decoration, packing. &c, to the wants and desires of his client Thus he 

 often gains a start, for the buyer is but seldom in a position to value quality 

 and prices. Another point is forced on the observer, and this is the great 

 start in scientific training which Germany can boast of." (Diplomatic and 

 Consular Reports, No. 2484.) 



industry are studied. For example, the Mulhausen 

 School of Dyeing and Printing, the Electrochemical 

 Institute at Darmstadt, the Mining Academy at Frei- 

 berg. Then there are purely technical schools, where 

 such subjects as sugar making, brewing, pottery, &c, 

 are taught. 



The Germans believe in an aristocracy of brains, and 

 owing to this and the high social standing which 

 follows educational success, many are attracted to the 

 universities, not simply to obtain university polish, but 

 to devote their energies to hard study and scientific re- 

 search. The British man of science is inclined to look 

 upon the commercial applications of science as beneath 

 him. But is there not a tendency for the German man 

 of science to go to the other Extreme, and look upon 

 science as simply an aid to commercial success? We 

 do not want to commercialise science, but we do desire 

 to make commercial methods more scientific. 



We await with interest Prof. Haller's further article 

 upon the chemical industry of England, Russia and the 

 United States. F. Mollwo Perkin. 



REMARKABLE WINTERS. 



'"I""' HE period of winter for purposes of the present 



-l article may be defined as embracing the six months 



October to March, although when dividing the year into 



four seasons, the winter then for meteorological pur- 

 poses is comprised in the months of December, January 

 and February. Generally speaking, temperature is 



the most important factor in deciding whether a winter 

 is severe or otherwise, although there are other aspects 

 which render the weather disagreeable. When gales 

 occur with more than ordinary frequence the winter is 

 characterised as stormy, and similarly when rains are 

 heavy and of common occurrence the winter is charac- 

 terised as wet. Our winters in England vary to so 

 great an extent in their general character that it is 

 not always easy to say with scientific precision whether 

 a winter may or may not be styled as remarkable. 

 It generally happens that when a winter is cold the 

 weal her is fairly dry and there are fewer gales than 

 usual, although, on the other hand, the quiet conditions 

 are favourable to fog formation. In a mild winter the 

 weather is usually wet, and storms are of common 

 occurrence, the mild weather being very intimately 

 associated with the arrival of cyclonic disturbances 

 from the Atlantic, and as the common track of these 

 storms takes the centres of the disturbances over the 

 northern portion of our area we, in England, for the 

 most part experience the south-westerly and westerly 

 winds which bring us the moist and warm air from 

 off the ocean to the westward of us. For the purposes 

 of comparison the data used refer almost wholly to 

 Greenwich, where the long series of observations made 

 at our national observatory is eminently suitable, and, 

 so far as the weather of a winter is concerned, there is 

 probably no real disadvantage in restricting the area 

 of comparison to one locality, since in a general sense 

 it would be equally applicable to most other parts of 

 England. The coldest winters of recent years are 

 those of 1890-1 and 1894-5, ' n which there were re- 

 spectively ten and eleven days with the temperature 

 below 20 F. at Greenwich. In the last sixty years 

 there have only been two other winters with so low a 

 temperature on ten days ; these were 1854-5 with twelve 

 such cold days, and 1880-1 with ten days. The greatest 

 number of days with frost during the period of sixtv 

 years was eighty in the winter six months of 1887-8', 

 and the winters with seventy or more days of frost 

 were 1844-5, 1S46-7, 1S54-5,' 1874-5, '878-9, 1879-S0, 

 1885-6, 1886-7, 1887-8 and 1890-1. Using this as a 

 test for the mildness of the winter, the least number 



NO. 1742, VOL. 67] 



