January 24, 1907] 
NATURE 309 
weighted the coach. Small brains have been strained 
further than they should be; a smattering rather than a 
real grounding in knowledge, and a ‘‘ cramming” rather 
than a forming of character, have been given. He hopes 
that the revival of the interest in secondary education is 
a sign that we are going to mend our ways in these direc- 
tions. My own belief, he continued, is that the proper 
form for education to take is to teach very few subjects 
in the elementary schools and to teach them thoroughly. 
Then, instead of wasting time in making a level of medio- 
crity, let promising children be taken out of the elementary 
schools, and, when they are really likely to profit by 
superior and special instructions, bring them into secondary 
schools. All the population who show that they are able 
to profit by the advantages of secondary education should 
receive it. Some of the money spent on elementary educa- 
tion might be saved and spent on technical education. 
Pror. Scuuster has offered to the University of Man- 
chester during the next three or four years an annual sum 
of 350l. as the stipend of a reader in mathematical physics. 
The council and senate have accepted with great gratifi- 
eation Prof. Schuster’s generous gift, and the post will be 
instituted forthwith. The reader will be attached to the 
department of physics. His primary duty will be the pro- 
motion of research in the subject of mathematical physics, 
but he may also be called upon to give a course of lectures 
on the subject. Prof. Schuster, in a letter to the Vice- 
Chancellor, gave his reasons for making his offer, as 
follows :—‘ I have been watching for some time with 
considerable apprehension the growing separation between 
the subjects of mathematical and experimental physics. 
This separation followed perhaps naturally on the rapid 
growth and exceptional success of the experimental side 
during the last twenty years, but it cannot, in my opinion, 
fail to be detrimental to the further progress of the science. 
I have been trying in the physics honours school of our 
university to give equal weight to the two branches of the 
subject, and the offer I now make is intended to emphasise 
the close connection which should exist between experi- 
mental and theoretical work. I believe that at the present 
moment the foundation of such a readership as I con- 
template would be of advantage to science generally and 
to our school of physics.” 
Mr. E. B. Sarcant, education adviser to the High Com- 
missioner of South Africa, read a paper at the meeting of 
the Royal Colonial Institute on January 15 on federal 
tendencies in education. Among other subjects of educa- 
tional importance, Mr. Sargant dealt with movements 
especially characteristic of higher education, such as the 
unceasing stream of young men of good circumstances 
which flows from the various parts of Greater Britain 
through our ancient universities, a movement which, in 
the case of Oxford, was so powerfully reinforced by the 
bequest of the late Mr. Rhodes. From the point of view 
of our larger national character, it is difficult to put too 
great a value upon the influence exerted by such a circula- 
tion of students through the heart of our higher educa- 
tional system. He then spoke of the need of reproducing 
this kind of education in the colonies themselves, and said 
that our great public schools and colleges ought to realise 
that at no distant date they may themselves be asked to 
extend into Greater Britain. Mr. Sargant also discussed 
the federal stimulus in education, of which the London 
University, in its purely examinational aspect, must be 
considered to be a first cause, and observed that, from an 
Imperial point of view, the University of London has 
centred the thoughts of many of our fellow-subiects in all 
parts of the British Dominions upon the value of some 
‘unity of educational aim, even though it may be only a 
unity of standard. In the discussion which followed, Sir 
A. Riicker pointed out that in any dominion of the Crown 
it is possible for a candidate to test himself in order to 
see whether he has attained a standard equal to that which 
is attained by a good English schoolboy or undergraduate. 
Pror. Rupotr Tomso, jun., of Columbia University, 
has compiled an interesting set of registration statistics 
concerning the principal universities of the United States. 
The statistics are published in the issue of Science for 
December 21, 1906. Comparing the figures for 1906 with 
NO. 1943, VOL. 75] 
those of the preceding year, it is seen that California, 
Leland Stanford, Johns Hopkins, North-Western, and 
Columbia universities have all suffered a decrease in attend- 
ance. The greatest gains have been made by Pennsyl- 
vania, New York, Indiana, Missouri, Syracuse, Virginia, 
Nebraska, Ohio, Cornell, Illinois, Chicago, and Michigan 
universities. Harvard and Yale with a few other universi- 
ties have remained stationary in numbers. Examining 
the numbers of students taking different faculties, most of 
the institutions this year show an increase in enrolment 
in the arts department. This is true, so far as men are 
concerned, of every institution in the table, with the 
exception of Johns Hopkins and Wisconsin, though several 
universities for a number of years have registered con- 
tinual losses in their arts departments, these losses being 
in many cases due to corresponding gains in the scientific 
schools. Prof. Tomba says a reaction has apparently set 
in in this direction, at least at a number of institutions. 
At Princeton, for example, the number of arts students 
has increased from 629 to 758, at Yale from 1323 to 1350, 
at Columbia from 557 to 606; whereas the number of 
science students at the same institutions has decreased 
from 624 to 484 in the case of Princeton, from 1028 to 
929 in the case of Yale, and from 566 to 524 in the case 
of Columbia. At Harvard the discrepancy is even greater. 
The largest gain in the number of science students has 
been made by Illinois (from 880 to 1020). 
Tue Times recently published some details of the work 
done by the London County Council Education Committee 
in the direction of the proper training of children on the 
physical side. With regard to hygiene and medical work, 
the head teachers of the schools are instructed to give 
attention to such questions as ventilation, the scrubbing 
of floors, and the inspection of the ‘‘ offices.’ Children 
who come to school dirty are washed, or if further purifi- 
cation is needed they are sent home. Notification is made 
to the medical officer when any child attends school suffer- 
ing from an infectious disease or after coming from an 
infected home. Defective children receive special atten- 
tion, and lists are made in order that they may be medically 
inspected. The staff of trained medical nurses now 
numbers thirty-two. The nurses are constantly at work 
visiting the schools, where they closely examine the 
children, confer with the teachers, schedule the unclean 
and those suffering from skin diseases, and generally con- 
tinue the work of the teachers in these matters. The 
education committee has its own medical officer, an 
assistant, and twenty-three other qualified medical men or 
women, who give a half or a quarter of their time. These 
medical officers, if necessary, exclude a child from school, 
and recommend the temporary closing of the school itself 
in case of extensive prevalence of infectious disease. In 
examining the children reported to be defective, if they 
find that the defect is such as to make it desirable that 
the child should be remitted to a ‘‘ special ’’ school, they 
recommend accordingly. The question of bad teeth is not 
overlooked. Much care is devoted to cases of defective 
sight. Care is exercised in seeing that no child’s sight 
is strained, and the number of children who visit the 
hospitals for treatment is yery large. Physical exercises, 
including all that modern scientific and practical experi- 
ence can suggest as best fitted for the pupils, form an 
important part of the curriculum of every school. The 
exercises are health-giving, and are enjoyed by both boys 
and girls. Games are also encouraged and-even organised 
by the voluntary efforts of the teachers. Most schools have 
their athletic clubs, and the Council is now making a new 
departure by providing playing grounds. 
SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 
LONDON. 
Royal Society, November 15, 1906.—‘‘ Calcium as an Ab- 
sorbent of Gases, and its Applications in the production of 
High Vacua and for Spectroscopic “Research.” By 
Frederick Soddy. Communicated by Prof. J. Larmor, 
Sec.R.S. 
By means of a special electric. furnace, surrounded by a 
porcelain tube and enclosed within a glass tube, it has 
been found possible to heat reagents in vacuo, in sealed 
