126 



NATURE 



[July 28, 191,0 



Under arithmetic and mathematics, models of surfaces 

 and of crystals are sliown ; also the calculating machine 

 of the late Charles Babbage, electrical machine for solving 

 equations, and electromagnetic device for solving equations. 



It has only been possible to direct attention brieflv and 

 imperfectly to the scope of the science exhibit, but this will 

 perhaps serve to give an idea to those interested in science 

 and cause them to visit and examine it in detail. In 

 concliasion, mention should be made of the anthropological 

 exhibit, an interesting feature being that a small space has 

 been set aside for the actual taking of measurements, so 

 that certain particulars of those attending the exhibition 

 can be taken and data added to the large collection already 

 obtained. F. M. P. 



THE PROGRESS OF CANCER RESEARCH. 

 "T^ HE annual meeting of the general committee of the 

 Imperial Cancer Research Fund was held at the Royal 

 College of Surgeons on July 20, Mr. A. J. Balfour being 

 in the chair. Sir William Church presented the annual 

 report, and gave an able exposition of its most, salient 

 features. 



The Duke of Bedford, who has been a strong financial 

 supporter of the fund from its foundation, was elected 

 president. Mr. A. J. Balfour moved a vote of thanks to 

 the members of the various committees, and to Dr. Bash- 

 ford and his staff. Mr. Balfour's remarks were mainly 

 directed to the layman, and have received such wide 

 publicity in the daily papers that we need not quote them 

 in full, well as they will bear quoting. Mr. Balfour 

 emphasised the progress made since he presided in July, 

 1903, and directed attention to the caution characterising 

 the statements emanating from the laboratory, urging the 

 need for patience upon the public, the members of which 

 are not always able to comprehend that the slow progress 

 made by scientific methods is the only progress that can 

 legitimately be expected. Mr. Balfour emphasised the fact 

 that heredity has been shown to be not of main importance, 

 meaning thereby, we infer, that the congenital germ-theory 

 of cancer has been discarded for good, in view of the facts 

 elicited by the Imperial Cancer Research Fund on the 

 association of cancer with peculiar irritants in human races 

 practising peculiar customs, and in some animals. 



Emphasis may be laid upon this point ; in India, draught- 

 cattle are liable to cancer at the root of the left horn, 

 not of the right horn ; cancer of the skin of the abdomen 

 is only frequent in the Kashmiris who wear the" Kangri," 

 or charcoal fire-basket ; cancer of the floor of the mouth 

 is only frequent in women who chew betel-nut. Surely 

 these peculiar incidences of cancer are not due to 'a 

 different distribution of congenital germs in the right than 

 in the left horn of cattle, or in the abdominal skin of 

 Kashmiris other than that in other races, any more than 

 is betel-nut cancer due to a peculiar accumulation of con- 

 genital germs in the mouths of those women who chew 

 betel-nut. All these forms of cancer could almost certainly 

 be greatly diminished if the parts attacked were not 

 irritated. 



Advance in knowledge must yield information regarding 

 other more obscure forms of cancer. Another point 

 emphasised by Mr. Balfour was his belief in the reason- 

 ableness of expecting that the cure and prevention of 

 the dissemination of transplanted cancer, as announced in 

 the report, foreshadows similar achievements for original 

 cancer, although perhaps so much may not be attained in 

 his lifetime. 



The other business was purely formal. 



The report itself states that King George has consented 

 to become Patron of the Imperial Cancer Research Fund 

 in succession to His late Majesty King Edward VII., who 

 was so largely responsible for its inception, as well as for 

 inciting the modern crusade against cancer, and who in 

 July, iqoi, when opening the congress on tuberculosis, 

 stated : — " There is still one other terrible disease which 

 has, up till now, baffled the scientific and medical men of 

 the world, and that is cancer. God grant that before long 

 vou may be able to find a cure or to check its course, and 

 T think that to him who makes the discoverv a statue 

 should be erected in all the capitals of the world." 



The appeal which the investigations of the Imperial 

 NO. 2126, VOL. 84] 



Cancer Research Fund make to students throughout the 

 world is exemplified by the number of foreign voluntary 

 workers attracted to its laboratories. They have flocked' 

 to them from Germany, Italy, Belgium, Norway, .Austria- 

 Hungary, Roumania, the United States, Holland, and 

 Japan, and manv now hold independent appointments 

 abroad. Thus the British national investigations on cancer 

 may be said to have fulfilled their immediate purpose in 

 that the English school of cancer research commands 

 world-wide confidence, which we hope will be confirmed and 

 extended by the director's necessarily technical report, from 

 wRich we give below extracts of a few important passages. 

 The report makes no pretence to appeal to the man in 

 the street who wishes to know if the cause, the cure, or 

 the means of preventing cancer have been discovered. 

 Nevertheless, to all with " inside " knowledge, the pro- 

 gress made by the indirect method of attack — by the intelli- 

 gent sapping and mining of hitherto unassailable citadels — ■ 

 must appear full of encouragement for the future. 



Cancer in Vertebrates. 

 Much additional information has been obtained on the 

 occurrence of cancer in lower vertebrates. It is gratify- 

 ing to record that the systematic investigation of cancer 

 in the animal kingdom has found numerous adherents both 

 at home and abroad. Particular attention has been devoted 

 to the incidence of the disease in cattle and in mice. While 

 in mice the phenomena are presented in miniature even in 

 their most advanced stages, in cattle they are demonstrated 

 0.1 a magnified scale as compared with man, although the 

 universal minuteness of the early stages is independent of 

 the size of the animal. In the course of the past six 

 months, ninety cases of malignant new growths in cattle 

 were obtained from a single abattoir. The histological 

 types comprise the majority of the forms met with in man. 



Breeding Experiments hearing on Heredity and Contagion. 

 The advantages of using short-lived animals for study- 

 ing the possible influence of heredity were pointed out in 

 1903. The breeding experiments which have been in pro- 

 gress for five years have yielded a material of nearly 2000 

 animals of known age and ancestry. Of these, 700 females 

 attained the age of si.x months or more. In them, seventy- 

 five cases of cancer of the mamma have appeared spon- 

 taneously. This material is very complete as regards 

 diagnosis of the disease, age, pedigree, and other important' 

 data, and it is now sufficiently large to permit of the most 

 exact analysis of the influence of ancestral constitution on 

 the liability of mice to spontaneous cancer of the breast. 

 -Analysed so as to bring out the liability to cancer accord- 

 ing as the young were born before or after it appeared in 

 the mother, the figures show a higher incidence in those 

 born before the mother developed the disease. Since the 

 conditions necessary for contagion were present, the 

 opposite result would have been obtained had any analogy 

 existed between cancer and the recognised infective diseases. 



Constancy and Variahility of Tumour Cells. 

 Tumours growing in a living animal can be protected 

 from all outside influences, and, when propagated in large 

 numbers of young mice of the same strain, the conditions 

 are as constant as it is possible to provide. In these 

 circumstances, it would not be surprising, on the one hand, 

 if tumours showed little or no departure from the features 

 they exhibited at the outset of propagation ; on the other 

 hand, it would not have been surprising if tumours widely 

 different in chamcter had tended all to appro.ximate to a 

 common type, in response to the unvarying nature of their 

 environment. What has actually come out is both interest- 

 ing and instructive, in that it shows that the tumour cells 

 possess a relative constancy in their general biological 

 properties, but, at the same time, exhibit an inherent 

 tendency to vary in spite of the constancy of the environ- 

 ment, and therefore apparently for reasons independent of 

 it. Each tumour preserves its individual features, and if 

 there be variation, then the variations likewise are in- 

 dividual. The constancv mav be verv perfect, so that 

 strains of the same tumour propagated separately for three 

 and four years remain indistinguishable in all their proper- 

 ties. On the other hand, the variations arising may be 



