i 9 : 



NATURE 



[Atril 24, 1913 



population. The next return is scarlet fever, 2'g8 

 per 1000. This takes no account of the difference 

 in mortality or disability entailed by these two 

 diseases, and if allowed for would greatly raise 

 the former. 



The committee is to be congratulated upon an 

 earnest attempt to deal constructively with a com- 

 plex question. Its tendency throughout to ignore 

 the medical department of the Local Government 

 Board will doubtless be rectified later in the in- 

 terests of unified public health administration. 



NOTES. 



The Secretary of State for the Colonies has ap- 

 pointed a Commission to study the nature and the 

 relative frequency of the fevers occurring amongst the 

 Europeans, natives, and others in West Africa, 

 especially with regard to yellow fever and its minor 

 manifestations. The members of the Commission 

 are :— Sir James K. Fowler, K.C.V.O. (chairman), 

 Major Sir Ronald Ross, K.C.B., F.R.S., Colonel Sir 

 William Leishman, F.R.S., Prof. W. J. R. Simpson, 

 C.M.G. Mr. A. Fiddian, of the Colonial Office, has 

 been appointed secretary to the Commission, and Mr. 

 T. F. G. Mayer assistant secretary. In the absence 

 of special reasons, the members of the Commission 

 will not themselves proceed to West Africa, but local 

 investigators will work under their direction at certain 

 centres. As at present arranged, those centres will 

 ho Freetown in Sierra Leone and Sekondi and Accra 

 on the Gold Coast. The investigation will be set on 

 foot towards the end of April or early in May. En- 

 deavours have been made to enlist the cooperation of 

 all medical men practising in the British dependencies 

 in West Africa, whether as Government medical 

 officers or otherwise. The funds for this investiga- 

 tion will be provided by the West African depend- 

 encies. 



M. Jules de Payer has furnished the Paris corre- 

 spondent of The Pall Mall Gazette with particulars of 

 his projected arctic expedition, which is intended to 

 leave France in the summer. With the support of 

 the Government and various societies, he will follow 

 his father, the distinguished explorer, in making for 

 Franz Josef Land. One of his objects is to locate the 

 margin of the polar basin to the north-east of that 

 archipelago, an investigation which, if successfully 

 carried out, will provide data for an estimate of the 

 relative areas of the basin and the continental shelf in 

 that quarter of the arctic region. A scientific staff will 

 accompany M. de Paver, with equipment for the prose- 

 cution of research in all the various departments which 

 have become associated with polar work; among them 

 the investigation of the upper atmosphere by means of 

 kin- i- specially indicated. The party will be provided 

 for a sojourn of one year or longer in the north, its 

 ship returning in the meantime. It is to be provided with 

 two aeroplanes, the utility of which as instruments in 

 polar research will be observed with interest : a visit 

 to the pole itself is mentioned as a possibility, but 

 due- not appear as a prime object of the expedition. 

 1 telegraphy will be installed at the head- 

 quarters. 



NO. 22hq, VOL. 91] 



All who had the pleasure of the acquaintance of 

 Mr. Carl Hagenbeck — whose death occurred at Ham- 

 burg on April 15 — could not fail to recognise the 

 indomitable will and dogged perseverance of the man, 

 coupled as they were with a manner of unusual 

 gentleness and kindliness. It was no doubt owing to- 

 this unusual combination that Hagenbeck was so 

 signally successful in his trade, for by the former 

 traits he carried out in the most thorough manner 

 every venture upon which he embarked, while by the 

 latter he attracted and tamed his captives in a manner 

 peculiarly his own. Born in a suburb of Hamburg 

 in 1844, young Hagenbeck early acquired an interest 

 in animals from his father, and eventually succeeded 

 in securing the greater portion of the world's trade 

 in wild In lasts. In fact, if an animal was wanted you 

 had but to tell Hagenbeck, and, unless war or other poli- 

 tical obstacles barred the way, it was practically sure to- 

 come. But Hagenbeck's fame was largely based on 

 his novel ideas with regard to the treatment of wild 

 animals in confinement, more especially in the matter 

 of an outdoor life for tropical species in Europe, and 

 in the abolition of visible walls and bars, so that 

 spectators might behold the captives in a state of 

 I'omparative freedom. These ideas were embodied 

 in the animal park at Stellingen. In 1899 Hagen- 

 beck published, under the title " Von Tieren und 

 Menschen," an account of his life and experiences, 

 an abbreviated English translation of which appeared 

 during the same year. 



The South Metropolitan Gas Company has appointed 

 Mr. J. S. G. Thomas as research physicist to under- 

 take investigations for technical purposes. 



The death is announced, at fifty-two years of age, 

 of Prof. A. C. Elliott, professor of engineering at the 

 University College of South Wales and Monmouth- 

 shire, and president of the Institution of Locomotive 

 Engineers. 



Mr. A. R. Hinks, F.R.S., chief assistant at the 

 Cambridge- University Observatory, has been ap- 

 pointed Gresham professor of astronomy, London, in 

 succession to the late Mr. S. A. Saunder. 



Prof. L. J. Landouzy, dean of the Paris faculty 

 of medicine, and known by his researches in connec- 

 tion with nervous diseases and tuberculosis, has been 

 elected a member of the Paris Academy of Sciences, 

 in succession to the late M. Teisserenc de Bort. 



On Thursday last, April 17, Mr. G. Hamel, accom- 

 panied by a passenger, accomplished a non-stop flight 

 on a two-seater Bleriot monoplane from Dover to 

 Cologne, the direct distance being nearly 250 miles, 

 in about four hours and a quarter. 



At the ordinary scientific meeting of the Chemical 

 Society, held on Thursday, April 17, the president, 

 Prof. YV. H. Perkin, F.R.S., announced that an extra 

 meeting will be held in the rooms of the society on 

 Thursday, May 22, at 8.30 p.m., when a lecture in 

 honour of the memory of the late Prof. Jacobus Hen- 

 ricus van't Hoff, honorary and foreign member, will 

 be delivered by Prof. James Walker, F.R.S., of Edin- 

 burgh. 



