278 
conditions. There are two large laboratories for the 
preparatory and advanced stages of this special study 
of non-ferrous metals as used in the Sheffield trades. 
The lecture-rooms are two in number, one seating 
150 and the other fifty students, both being provided 
with up-to-date electric lantern arrangements. 
The micrographic laboratory has been made to a 
specially thought out design, each block of the polish- 
ing battery being run by a separate electric motor 
of one-seventh h.p., revolving at 1400 revolutions per 
minute. Adjacent*to the polishing and etching-room 
is a photomicrographic department complete with dark- 
room. The photomicrographic apparatus is by Zeiss, 
and is fitted with the. new arc lamp of this firm. 
There is a large staff and research laboratory, one 
side of which is devoted to calorimetric work. 
From the point of view of pure science the most 
important installation in the new metallurgical wing 
is a specially devised recalescence laboratory for ob- 
serving with great accuracy the critical points of 
iron and steel, the freezing points of metals, and the 
phenomena of solid solution in metals. There are 
coke-fired and electric vacuum: furnaces in which a 
complete vacuum can be obtained in about one minute 
by means of the ‘‘Fleuss” pump. The recalescence 
apparatus comprises an astronomical clock by the 
Synchronome Company, a chronographic recorder 
reading to a quarter of a second, and a delicate 
galvanometer reading direct or in connection with a 
potentiometer. This installation, which has been 
made to specification by the Cambridge Scientific 
. Instrument Co., has cost about 4ool., and is the most 
complete extant. 
The melting-shop for non-ferrous metal will re- 
gister the comparative melting efficiencies of coke, 
oil, gas, and electricity, each method being capable 
of making ingots of about go lb. weight. The static 
and dynamic testing of non-ferrous metals will be 
made in the ferrous department, which is provided 
with a single-lever Buckton machine on two centres, 
so that the machine may be arranged to read off the 
stress either in 3-in. ton moments or 12-in. ton 
moments. For more delicate work there is a two- 
ton static machine. The dynamic testing will be car- 
ried out on Arnold’s standard stress-strain machine, 
on which it is hoped to obtain important results on 
the adherence of silverplating of different thicknesses 
on different basis metals. 
In declaring the building open, Lord Haldane in- 
sisted most strongly that the industrial success of 
this country in the future depends upon the cordial 
cooperation of pure and applied science, which are 
practically indivisible. He said :—‘* Without a Kelvin 
or a Clerk Maxwell, or a Lister, or a man, to go 
further back, like Sir Isaac Newton, many of the 
things which we do to-day, and do so well, would 
not be done, but we have also to remember that unless 
other men of a similar type are produced in the future 
we cannot keep up to the level we are now at, but we 
should be at a disadvantage compared with other 
countries. You have done a very practical thing in 
founding this. great new department of applied 
science; you have done the right thing in keeping 
applied science and pure science in close relation, and 
bringing both into intimate organic relation with the 
spirit of the University, that great permeating spirit 
without which they cannot be on a high level. 
“What will be done in the department of applied 
science will be to go still further than has been pos- 
sible in the past in bringing the application of science 
to bear on the problems of industry. It will not be 
practical work merely; it will be work in the course 
of which the student will be trained in the highest 
knowledge. He also will be told that he must not 
NATURE 
[OcTOBER 30, 1913 ~ 
him, but must show his capacity to apply the conchy- 
sions at which he has arrived to the actual and prac- 
tical solution of the difficulties which confront the 
industrial world. In the old days pure science ap- 
peared to be something no one was interested in from 
the point of view of practical education. Now the 
greatest commercial discoveries depend upon new 
ideas, new conceptions being developed by men who 
have genius which makes them devoted to their work, 
even though they have to starve to do it. It is only 
in universities and technical schools that we find these 
men, and if British industry is to hold its own in the 
future, we shall have to realise the necessity there is, 
not only to turn to science, but to see that pure science 
has an opportunity of developing itself and being 
brought in contact with daily work.” 
Lord Haldane went on to contrast the rapid strides 
that are being made in the development of universities 
in America with what is being done in this country. 
He has, he said, great faith in the capacity of the 
British nation, but unless we wake up thoroughly 
in the matter of education, and particularly higher 
education, he is a little nervous as to what we may 
find the state of things concerning our industrial 
supremacy some fifteen or twenty years hence. 
““Nowadays not only Governments, but Government 
Departments are waking up about these things. For 
the last twelve months there has been a great deal of 
activity about the business of national education. 
Mr. Pease is carrying out what I _ believe 
to be a right line of policy. He is trusting the 
very highly expert officials at the Board of Education 
and consulting the education committees throughout 
the country. The local education committees have 
done splendid work, but the burden on them has been 
very heavy. The nation will have to make up its 
mind to give considerably more out of the taxes for 
this work. The plans are now fashioned. The 
Government knows exactly what to do to make ad- 
vance if only it has the nation at its back. 
I hate any idea of increasing expenditure, whether 
it is out of local or national resources, if it 
can be avoided. This expenditure, however, cannot ~ 
be avoided. Unless we spend it we shall go back as 
a nation. Our revenues, by which we keep up our 
fleets and armies, will shrink, because we shall not 
be holding our own with the industrial nations. What 
Sheffield has done will have to be done right through 
the country.” 
Lord Haldane also referred to the report of the 
Advisory Committee on University Grants, and men- 
tioned that this Committee, amongst other matters, 
has practically decided recently to deal with a pension 
fund for professors (see Nature, March 6, 1913, 
p. 21), which, he said, ‘‘meant that instead of a man 
having to cling on to his post as the alternative to 
starving when he felt himself old, he could retire, 
and let a young man take his place, and go on with 
the development still further of the teaching which 
the professor had carried so far.”’ = 
THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION AT 
BIRMINGHAM. 
SECTION M. 
AGRICULTURE. 
Opentnc ApprEss ny Pror. T. B. Woop, PRESIDENT 
OF THE SECTION. 
I propose to follow the example of my predecessor 
of last year, in that the remarks I wish to make 
to-day have to deal with the history of agriculture. 
Unlike Mr. Middleton, however, whose survey of the 
stop short at the conclusions to which science leads i subject went back almost to prehistoric times, I pro- 
NO. 2296, VOL. 92] 
