404 



NA TURE 



[February 23, 1899 



sciences, ihe tendency is to look forward and not backward ; 

 but it must not be forgotten that the future will be but a 

 develcipment of the present, as the present has been a develop- 

 ment of the past. The evolution of chemistry has taken place 

 along one continuous line, broken here and there by great 

 fundamental discoveries, which have been rather apt at first to 

 warp the line of development, and to make it a little one-sided. 

 Thus the striking aptness of Dalton's atomic theory to explain 

 the laws of chemical combination, which he had formulated, 

 and the tables of proportional numbers deduced from them, 

 attracted the attention of chemists to the determination of 

 atomic weights. The importance of molecular weights, or as 

 Prof. Odiing preferred to call them unit weights, of compounds 

 was not fully recognised till some half-century later, although 

 Avogadro had pointed tlie way in his hypotliesis put forward in 

 181 1. In the forties Laurent and Gerhardt began to investigate 

 unit weights, and laid the foundation of our present system. In 

 this country Williamson and Brodie were the chief workers at 

 the subject, and Prof. Odiing described himself as their junior 

 colleague to whose .share much of the fighting fell. They had 

 before them the problem of determining correct atomic weights 

 for the elements, a problem which could only be solved after 

 correct determinations of the unit weights of their compounds ; 

 and they considered that physical evidence as to unit weights 

 must be confirmed by the chemical behaviour of substances. 

 Hence the importance of Williamson's theory of etherification ; 

 for by showing that ether was not merely the oxide of a hydro- 

 carbon radical, but tliat it was a combination of two hydro- 

 carbon radicals with o.\ygen, he was able to deduce the unit 

 weights of alcohol, ether, and other compounds compared with 

 that of water, and to show that the carbon always combines in 

 multiples of twelve, and oxygen in inultiples of sixteen, and so 

 these numbers must represent the real atomic weights. It was 

 some years, however, before these new atomic weights, based 

 on a true conception of unit weights, were generally accepted. 

 The first text. book in which sixteen was used throughout as the 

 atomic weight of oxygen being Prof Odling's "Manual of 

 Chemistry," published in 1861. Subsequently Newlands, from 

 the revised atomic weights, suggested the periodic .system of the 

 elements, which was develo|)ed by Prof Odiing and Lolhar 

 Meyer, and completed by .Mendeleefl". The chief work of 

 chemists during the last quarter of a century might be briefly 

 described as the investigation of the internal structure of the 

 chemical molecule, and this, being dependent on an accurate 

 knowledge of unit and atomic weights, is but the natural 

 development of the most important work of the fifties^the 

 correct determination of unit weights. 



Mr. \. v.. H. Love, F.R .S., Fellow of St. John's College, 

 Cambridge, and University Lecturer in Mathematics, has been 

 elected Sedleian Professor of Natural Philosophy in succession 

 to the late Prof. Bartholomew Price. 



C.WIBRIIKIR. — A Frank Smart Studentship in Hotany, value 

 100/. a year for two or three years, will be vacant in June. 

 Candidates must be H. .\.s who have taken honours in Natural 

 Science, and are of less than fourteen terms' standing. Names 

 are to be sent to the Master of Cionville and Caius College by 

 June 10. 



Mr. A. W. Hill, of King's College, has been appointed 

 Demonstrator of Botany. 



Graces for the acceptance of the benefactions offered towards 

 (he establishment of a deuartment of Agriculture will be sub- 

 mitted to the Senate on March 2. 



A Salomons Scholarship of 70/. a year for three years will be 

 vacant in igoo at Cains College. Candidates will be examined 

 in November 1899 ; they must be under nineteen, and must 

 declare their intention of entering the engineering profession. 



Till-; first of a series of occ.isional lectures at Bedford College 

 will be given by Dr. \V. J Russell, 1'. R.S. , on " Mow pictures 

 can be taken on a photographic pl.Ue in the dark," to-morrow, 

 February 24. 



In response to Mr. Balfour's recent appeal for the endow- 

 ment of medical education and research. Sir Frederick Wills 

 has forwarded to the treasurer of Guy's Hospital a donation of 

 5000/. to be used for the benefit cjI the meiiical school. 

 t^ 1 1 is remarked in Siiieme that Harvard University .some time 

 agoestabli.shed a class somewhat similar to the docents cf (he 

 German University, though the lectureships are limited to a 

 period not exceeding four months, anil the University does not 



NO. 1 530, VOL. 59] 



even collect such fees as may be charged. The first lectures" 

 under this system are now announced. 



Thk Glasgow University General Council have decided that 

 the memorial to Princi|ial Caird shall take the form of a window 

 on the east side of the Bute Hall. The total cost is estimated 

 at 9CX3/., of which S34/. have been subscribed. Mr. Archibald 

 Crai;;, 156 St. Vincent Street, Glasgow, will be glad to receive 

 contributions to make up the sum required to complete the 

 memorial. 



Thk trustees of the Reid Trust for the education of women 

 have decided to offer a scholarship at the London School of 

 Medicine for Women, in memory of their co-trustee, the late 

 Miss liostock, of Penmaen, Glamorganshire. The value of the 

 scholarship will be 60/. a year, tenable for two <ir four years, and 

 awarded on the result of the preliminary scientific examination 

 of the University of London. The Hostock scholar must read 

 for the London medical degree. Further particulars may be 

 obtained from the hon. secretary of the Reid Trust, Bedford 

 College, York-place, W. 



In the House of Lords on Monday, Lord Norton asked the 

 Lord President of the Council when the Kducation Bill would 

 be introduced. In reply the Duke of Dev<insliire said that 

 there appeared to be some !nisapi>rehen3ion as to the character 

 of his I5ill. The Bills which he introduced last year were for 

 the creation of a Board of Education and for the registration 

 of teachers. Neither of those Bills could be described as an 

 Education Bill. The measure which he should introduce would 

 not, as far as he was aware, go beyond the scope of the Bill 

 which he introduced last year. He hoped that next week or 

 the following week he might be able to present the Bill again, 

 and be able perhaps to name the day when the second reading 

 would be taken. 



Thic sub-committee on Commercial Education, appointed by 

 the London County Council in May 1S97, have presented their 

 report to the Technical Education Board. The committee have 

 considered in detail the improvements desirable in elementary 

 and .secondary schools for pupils who propose to enter on a 

 commercial career. .Among the recommendations are the 

 following : — 



(i) That it is desirable that there should be in many of the 

 public secondary day schools in London of the second grade 

 departments devoting themselves primarily and avowedly to the 

 preparation for commercial life of boys who will leave school at 

 sixteen ; that in such departments, while a good general education 

 should be given, special attention should be devoted to modern 

 languages in such a way as to turn out pupils able to speak and 

 correspond fluently in at least two modern languages, to the 

 teaching of arithmetic so as to secure perfect facility in the use 

 of the nietiic system, and to ensuring a good general ac- 

 quaintance with the commercial geography of foreign countries 



(2) That it is desirable that there should be provided in 

 London in at least one public secondary day school of the first 

 grade a department devoting itself primarily and avowedly 10 

 the preparation for business life of boys leaving school at eighteen 

 or nineteen : that the curriculum of such department should not 

 lead up to a classical or mathematical career at the Universities, 

 but should qualify its pupils either to enter the higher ranks of 

 commercial life, or to pursue an advanced course of study in the 

 economic and commercial faculty of the new London University, 

 or in other institutions of higher commercial education. 



(3) That it is desirable that full and express recognition should 

 be given to higher commercial education in the reorganisation 

 of London University, and that it be referred to the special sub- 

 corn nillee of the Hoard, dealing with the I'niver.sity, to cim- 

 sider whether it would not be wise to urge upon the Commis- 

 sioners the establishment, frcun the first, of a separate faculty of 

 economic and commercial science, the provision of endowed 

 professor.ships in the various subjects of higher commercial 

 education, and such arr.angements as will facilitate and en- 

 courage those designed for or engaged in the higher ranks of 

 business to take advantage of University teaching. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS. 



Bulletin of I lie tmeriiaii Malheinatiial Sotiely (January). — 

 Report on the theory of projective invariants : the chief 

 contributions of a decade (by Prof. H. S. White), was read 

 before Section A of the American Association for the Advance, 

 ment of Science in August 1S98. The starting-point is from ih 



