4 
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FEBRUARY 5, I914| 
NATURE 
649 
lege, Cambridge (in addition to 10,0001. given during 
his lifetime), 10,o00l.; the Royal Victoria College, 
Montreal (under deduction of any payments made 
during his lifetime, and in addition to the college 
buildings and site provided by him at a cost of about 
80,000l.), 200,000l.; Yale University, Connecticut, 
U.S.A., 100,000l. ; the University of Aberdeen for chair 
of Agriculture, 5000l.; Queen’s University, Kingston, 
Canada, extension fund, 20,0001. ; the principal Church 
of Canada Presbyterian College, Montreal, 12,000l. 
Tue second volume of “Statistics of Public Educa- 
tion in England and Wales” for 1911-12-13 has been 
published by the Board of Education (Cd. 7204). It 
is concerned wholly with financial statistics. The first 
table in the volume shows that the total expenditure 
of the Board of Education in 1912-13 out of the Par- 
liamentary vote amounted to 14,329,551/., as against 
14,302,859 for 1911-12. During 1912-13, 11,748,331I. 
was spent on public elementary schools, 749,359!/. on 
secondary schools, 585,871/. on technical schools and 
classes, and 583,127l/. on the training of teachers. 
Among other grants made by the Board during the 
financial year mentioned were 41,647]. to university 
institutions in respect of technological work, 35,000. 
to the Imperial College of Science and Technology, as 
compared with 20,0001. in 1911-12, 17,7901. to the 
Science Museum at South Kensington, 20,590l. to the 
Geological Survey, and 22021. to the Committee on 
Solar Physics. 
TuE annual report of the distribution of grants for 
agricultural education and research in the year 1912— 
13 (Cd. 7179, price 84d.), recently issued by the Board 
of Agriculture and Fisheries, shows a very satisfac- 
tory advance on the older state of affairs. The new 
scheme made possible by the establishment of the 
Development Fund has now been in operation for a 
sufficient number of months to prove that it is in the 
main very satisfactory, and can accomplish the work 
it was intended to carry out. The general plan is set 
out very lucidly in an introduction by Mr. T. H. 
Middleton, and a number of details are given in the 
appendix, so that the reader can form a sufficient 
idea of the scheme and its working. For the first 
time scientific research is recognised as the starting 
point, and the sum of about 30,0001. per annum is, 
or will be, available for the research institutes that 
have been set up; in addition 3000l. per annum is 
granted for special investigations not quite falling 
within the scope of the research institutes. These 
institutes are not charged with the investigation of 
specific local problems or with the elaboration of tech- 
nical details; their business is to elucidate the funda- 
mental principles underlying the relationships of the 
soil, the plant, and the animal, and they have a 
perfectly free hand in the management of their affairs. 
They are:—Imperial College of Science and Tech- 
nology, for plant physiology and pathology; Agricul- 
tural Department, Cambridge University, for animal 
nutrition and for plant breeding; Rothamsted Experi- 
mental Station, for soil problems and plant nutrition; 
Bristol University, for fruit growing; Royal Veter- 
inary College, for animal pathology; University Col- 
lege, Reading, for dairying; University of Birming- 
ham, for helminthology; University of Manchester, 
for economic entomoiogy; University of Oxford, for 
agricultural economics. 
THE annual general meeting of the Royal College 
of Science Old Students’ Association was held at the 
college on January 31, the president (Dr. A. E. H. 
Tutton, F.R.S.) in the chair. Prof. H. E. Armstrong, 
F.R.S., was elected president for 1914, his place as 
one of the vice-presidents being filled by the election 
of Mr. A. T. Simmons. Mr. J. Allen Howe and Mr. 
tf. Ll. Humberstone were re-elected treasurer and 
NO. 2310, VOL. 92] 
secretary respectively. After the regular business, the 
report of the Royal Commission on University Educa- 
tion in London was discussed, with special reference 
to the recommendations relating to the college, and 
the following resolutions were adopted unanimously :— 
(1) That the Imperial College of Science and Tech- 
nology should be organised as a federation of colleges 
under a common government, each college being 
managed by a special committee; (2) that the Royal 
College of Science, the Royal School of Mines, and 
the City and Guilds (Engineering) College should be 
included in the federation, together with a fourth 
college devoted to higher teaching and research in 
Technology; (3) that if, and when, the Imperial Col- 
lege is linked more closely with the University of 
Lendon, the Royal College of Science, London, should, 
while remaining in the proposed federation of colleges, 
become a “‘constituent college” of the University in 
the faculty of science. The committee was empowered 
to make representations under these resolutions. The 
annual dinner of Old Students was held in the evening 
at the Criterion Restaurant, Dr. Tutton presiding. 
Sir John Rose Bradford, Sec.R.S., proposed the toast 
of the evening, ‘** The Royal College of Science, Lon- 
don, and the Old Students’ Association,” and Sir 
William Ramsay, F.R.S., and Prof. S. J. Truscott 
replied for the guests. The guests also included Dr. 
Herringham (Vice-Chancellor of the University), Sir 
Alfred Keogh, K.C.B., Mrs. Ayrton, Prof. Bateson, 
F.R.S., and Dr. Frank Heath. 
SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 
Lonpon. 
Royal Society, January 29.—Sir William Crookes, 
O.M., president, in the chair.—Prof. O. W. Richard- 
son: The origin of thermal ionisation from carbon. 
In a paper recently communicated to the society by 
Dr. J. N. Pring, experiments bearing on this subject 
were described. The smallness of the observed cur- 
rents and the variation of them with the pressure and 
nature of the gas, led Dr. Pring to the conclusion 
that considerable doubt was thereby cast on the theory 
of the emission of electrons from hot solids, and that 
these effects were to be attributed to chemical action. 
In the present paper the magnetic field due to the 
large heating currents employed by Dr. Pring are 
shown to curl up the paths of the electrons, and so 
prevent them from reaching the electrode. It is shown 
that with the larger currents none of the electrons 
could reach the electrode in these experiments, and 
owing to the complexity of the apparatus it is impos- 
sible to say what proportion would reach it at the 
lower temperatures. In the opinion of the author of 
this paper, the conclusions referred to cannot be re- 
garded as established by the experiments under con- 
sideration.—Prof. W. H. Bragg: The X-ray spectra 
given by crystals of sulphur and quartz. A crystal of 
quartz is found, on examination by the X-ray spectro- 
meter, to contain three interpenetrating hexagonal 
lattices of silicon atoms and six of oxygen. The angles 
of reflection in a number of important planes all agree, 
within 1 or 2 per cent., with the calculated values. 
Sulphur contains eight interpenetrating lattices, each 
of the kind formed by placing an atom at each corner 
of a rectangular parallelopiped and in the centres of 
two opposite faces. The edges of the parallelopiped 
are in the known ratios of the crystallographic axes. 
—Prof. L. N. G. Filon: The temperature variation of 
the photo-elastic effect in strained glass. The experi- 
ments described in this paper were undertaken to see 
whether the double refraction produced in glass by 
stress was at all affected by change of temperature. 
The results show that the refractive indices for rays 
polarised in and perpendicular to the line of stress are 
