55o 



NA TURE 



[April 9, 1903 



study, since during the present period of organisation and 

 development at the University of Birmingham it is of im- 

 portance that those responsible for its new commercial de- 

 partment should be intimate with German experience. It 

 is not sufficiently remembered, the writer of the article 

 insists, that these German institutions are new and in an 

 experimental stage, that they are characterised by great 

 diversity of organisation, and are the outcome, not of 

 Governmental initiative, but of the demands of the com- 

 mercial classes ; in most cases, indeed, their financial basis 

 was provided by private generosity and municipal support, 

 not by grants from the State. At Aachen, where the com- 

 mercial " course " is simply a department of the technical 

 college, the authorities abide by the gem 1. 1 ] rule for ad- 

 mission to universities and technical colleges, and refuse 

 to receive into full membership any who have not passed 

 the leaving examination of the Gymnasia, Realgymnasia, 

 or Ober-realschulen. In most cases the certificate is not 

 se( ured until nineteen. The three other institutions admit 

 men who have left school three years earlier (with the 

 certificate shortening their military service to one vear), on 

 condition that they have spent the three following years 

 in an apprenticeship or in some definite business experience. 

 At present the Aachen plan is hardl" practicable, and tends 

 to restrict the numbers. "The German movement is," 

 the article shows, " full of interest and instruction for 

 foreign observers. Its ideals are rising; and the two years 

 which form the present period of study are already beginning 

 to seem inadequate. There are grave difficulties' to be met'; 

 but an amount of ardour, of ability of a high order, and, 

 what is not unimportant, of money also, is being devoted 

 to the task, which ought to sting a reflective Englishman 

 with a sense of shame." 



SCIENTIFIC SERIAL. 



Biometrika. — The last three numbers continue to record 

 results of high biological interest. The excellence of Prof. 

 Karl Pearson's elaborate studies in statistical theory is be- 

 coming widely recognised, and his comments and criticisms 

 add much to the value of the work of other contributors. 

 in m.I. i. part iv. Mr. F. Galton states a new problem in 

 lie variation of a population with respect to a given 



< ter, which, generalised in a note appended by Prof. 

 K. Pearson, is seen to be likely to have important results 

 in statistical inquiry.— The same part contains an attempt 

 l'\ Dr. J. Y. Simpson, good as far as n goes, to demonstrate 

 the inequality of results in the binary fission of the Protozoa. 

 I»i. Simpson's conclusions so far recall those ,,| Maupas, 



but the difficulties in the \\a\ ..I a successful investig n 



nt this problem are extreme, and it cannot be said that he 

 liis met every possible objection. The inquirv is obviousl) 

 ol importance for the general theory oi variation, and it is 

 in he hoped that in spite of their difficulty the observations 

 will be continued. — The thorough-going studv of the 

 N'aqada crania carried out by Miss Fawcett with the help 

 oi Miss Alice Lee and other biometric students at University 

 College occupies the bulk of the present issue, and the part 

 concludes with a careful research, by C. Hengsen, on the 

 variations ol Helix nemoralis.—The subject of gasteropod 

 sL.lls (Nassa <>hsol<-t<i and N. trivittata) also finds a place 

 m the opening part of vol. ii., in which number will like- 

 wise be found Prof. Weldon's strictures on the ambiguity 

 'I some of Mendel's categories, e.g. "green" anil 

 " yellow " as applied to the cotyledons of peas.— The co- 

 operative paper on inheritance in the Shirlev poppy marks 

 another long step towards the establishment of a working 



■ ol heredity, the results reached being in gi 

 accordance with Galton 's law.— Among the "'Mis, ell , 

 may be noted Air. Whitehead's paper on variation in [doxa 

 moschatellina, and the first instalment of what promisi s to 

 • a most important series of test experiments, by Mr. 

 Darbishire, in the Mendelian theorv of heredity, faj 

 " waltzing mice," the colour of the coats of which' is white 

 with patches of pale fawn, were crossed with European 

 albinos, the hybrids being crossed inter se and also with the 

 albino parent stock. These experiments, some later results of 

 which are recorded and discussed in vol. ii. part ii., have 

 yielded data which are by no means easy of interpretation, 



NO. 1745, V0L - 67] 



and their further outcome will be awaited with keen interest. 

 One remarkable result is that every hybrid of the first gener- 

 ation was dark-eyed, though the eyes of all the parents were 

 pink. In a certain proportion, however, of the progeny of 

 the first hybrids the pink eyes reappeared, as did some other 

 parental characters. A recent letter in Nature shows that 

 Mr. Bateson, at all events, is not disposed to admit that 

 the tacts so far obtained are discordant with Mendel's law, 

 but it must be allowed that much of the evidence is prima 

 facie in favour of ancestral inheritance. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 



London. 



Physical Society, March 27. — Dr. R. T. Glazebrook, 

 F.R.S., president, in the chair. — On refraction at a cylin- 

 drical surface, by Mr. A. Whitwell. The object of the 

 paper is to describe and illustrate the position and form 

 of the focal areas produced by the refraction, at a cylindrical 

 surface, of light diverging from or converging to a point. 

 In general, if a plane can be drawn through the point to 

 cut the surface symmetrically, then all the light passes 

 really or virtually through an area in this plane. In the 

 case of the cylinder there are two such planes. One con- 

 tains the radiant point and the axis of the cylinder, the 

 other contains the point, and is normal to the axis. The 

 equation of the locus of intersections of symmetrical rays 

 which intersect in the first plane, for small apertures, is 

 obtained in terms of the distance of the radiant point from 

 the axis of the cylinder a, the radius r, and the index of re- 

 fraction p.. The loci of the intersections of symmetrical rays 

 which intersect in the second plane, when the aperture is 

 small, are shown to be circles described about the radiant 

 point as centre and having radii equal to (/i — 1) (a — r). — 

 The evaluation of the absolute scale of temperature, by Dr. 

 R. A. Lehfeldt. Formulas are given for the constant- 

 pressure and constant-volume thermometers. An attempt 

 is made to work out the latter with the aid of existing data. 

 It is found that T„ = 273'i8 from hydrogen and 273^2 from 

 nitrogen. The deviation of the constant-volume scale from 

 the absolute scale is indicated by curves. At 100° absolute 

 the constant volume (hydrogen) thermometer reads o'i or 

 o'2 too low. — Prof. Callendar, in a communication sent 

 subsequent to the meeting, said that in his paper on the 

 thermodynamical correction of the gas thermometer {Phil. 

 Mag., January) he had incidentally mentioned that the 

 correction lor the constant-volume gas thermometer could 

 not be directly deduced from the Joule-Thomson cooling- 

 effect alone, without additional data, unless a formula were 

 assumed for the variation of the cooling-effect with temper- 

 ature ; but that the value of the absolute zero could be de- 

 duced from the pressure coefficient if the Joule cooling-effect 

 in free expansion were known. The experimental measure- 

 ment of the latter was, however, impracticable. — Mr. 

 Blakesley exhibited and described a lens possessing the 

 following properties -The two conjugate foci always move 

 with the same relative rate along the axis. The size of the 

 object always bears to the size of the image the same ratio, 

 so that using the same object the image is always of the same 

 size. The instrument is of one piece of glass, and constitutes 

 a telescope the magnifying power of which is the ratio 

 which the object bears to the image in size, linear. The 

 relation of the rate of motion of the object to that of the 

 image is the square of the magnifying power. 



Chemical Society, March iS — Prof. J. Emerson Reynolds- 

 F.R.S., president, in the chair. — The following papers were 

 read : — Essential oil of hops, by Mr. A. C. Chapman. 

 This oil consists principally of two terpenes, one being 

 identical with that present in oil of bay, and named b\ its 

 discoverers myrcene, and the second a sesquiterpene, which 

 has been named humulene ; there are present in addition to 

 the foregoing small quantities of the odoriferous alcohols 

 linalool and geraniol, the latter being present in the form 

 of its isononoic ester. -A compound id dextrose with 

 aluminium hydroxide, by Mr. A. C. Chapman. When 

 dextrose dissolved in alcohol is treated with aluminium 

 chloride there separates a white amorphous compound of 

 the formula 3C ( H ]2 6 ,sAL0 3 ,IlH 2 0. — Action of phos- 

 phorus haloids on dihydroresorcins. ii. Dihydroresorcin,, 



