NATURE 



[May 22, 1913 



NOTES. 



At a meeting on Monday, May 19, the council of 

 the Royal Society of Arts passed the following resolu- 

 tion : " On the occasion of the fiftieth award of 



the Albert medal of the Royal Society of Arts, the 

 council of the society desire to offer the medal to H.M. 

 King George V., for nine years president, and now 

 patron of the society, in respectful recognition of his 

 Majesty's untiring efforts to make himself personally 

 acquainted with the social and economic condition of 

 the various parts of his dominions, and to promote 

 the progress of arts, manufactures, and commerce in 

 the United Kingdom and throughout the British 

 Empire." The Albert medal was established in 1862 

 as a memorial of H.R.H. the Prince Consort, who 

 had been president of the society for eighteen years. 

 It is awarded annually for "distinguished merit in 

 promoting arts, manufactures, or commerce." In 

 1887 it was awarded to Queen Victoria on the occa- 

 sion of her jubilee, and in 1901 to King Edward VII., 

 when, on his accession to the throne, he relinquished 

 the presidency of the Society of Arts, which he had 

 held for thirty-eight years. 



Mr. Edwin Tate has just made a donation of 

 10,000!. to the Imperial Cancer Research Fund, for 

 the endowment of the research. 



Mr. H. H. Law has been appointed chief engineer- 

 ing inspector to the Local Government Board, in suc- 

 cession to Mr. G. W. Willcocks, C.B., retired. 



The King has appointed Commander E. R. G. R. 

 Evans, R.N., a Companion of the Order of the Bath 

 (C.B.), in recognition of his services with the British 

 Antarctic Expedition, 1910-12. 



Prof. Bateson's postponed lectures on the heredity 

 of sex and some cognate problems will be delivered 

 at the Royal Institution on Monday, June 2, and Wed- 

 nesday, June 4, at three o'clock. 



The Berlin correspondent of The Times announces 

 that Prof. H. Weber, professor of mathematics at 

 Strassburg University since 1894, died on May 17 at 

 seventy-one years of age. 



We learn with regret that Dr. Lester F. Ward, 

 professor of sociology at Brown University, Provi- 

 dence, R.I., and formerly palaeontologist of the U.S. 

 Geological Survey, died in Washington on April 18, 

 in his seventy-second year. 



The fifty-eighth general meeting of the Institution 

 of Mining Engineers will be held on Thursday, June 5, 

 at 11 a.m., in the rooms of the Geological Society, 

 Burlington House, Piccadilly, London, W. The insti- 

 tution dinner will be held at the Waldorf Hotel on the 

 evening of the same day. 



We learn from Science that a tablet in honour of 

 Dr. S. P. Langley was unveiled in the Smithsonian 

 Institution on May 6. Addresses were delivered by 

 Dr. Alexander Graham Bell and Dr. J. A. Brashear. 

 At the same time Langley medals were awarded to 

 M. Gustave Eiffel and Mr. Glenn H. Curtiss. Later 

 in the day the Aero Club of Washington arranged an 

 aviation display in the grounds of the Army War 

 College in honour of Dr. Langley. 

 NO. 2273, VOL. 91] 



The Paris correspondent of The Times announces 

 the death of M. Alfred de Foville, perpetual secretary 

 of the Academie des Sciences Morales et Politiques. 

 M. de Foville, who was in his seventy-second year, 

 was one of the most eminent political economists and 

 statisticians of his day. From 1877 to 1893 he was 

 chief of the Department of Statistics and of Legisla- 

 tion in the Ministry of Finance, and for a time he 

 concurrently occupied the chair of industrial economy 

 and of statistics at the Conservatoire des Arts et 

 Metiers. 



An influential international committee has been 

 formed to endeavour to establish a uniform notation 

 in the theories of potential and elasticity. The com- 

 mittee has already sent out a circular to all those 

 likely to be interested in the subject asking what are 

 the notions and notations with respect to which 

 uniformity is desirable. Discussions on the subject 

 will be arranged to take place at the international 

 congresses of mathematicians in 1916 and 1920, and 

 it is hoped that the final report of the committee will 

 be issued in 1921. 



The series of British land and fresh-water shells in 

 the British Museum (Natural History) has received an 

 important addition in the shape of a large collection 

 brought together by Mr. F. H. Sikes, of Burnham 

 Abbey, Burnham, Bucks, who has presented it to the 

 nation, on condition that it shall be exhibited in the 

 public galleries. The collection includes specimens 

 from the cabinets of Messrs. Cairns, Fitzgerald, 

 Grateloup, and Rogers, and is reoorted to be of special 

 value on account of the care with which the less 

 common species and subspecies have been named. The 

 collection has already been received at the museum. 



A message from the Paris correspondent of The 

 Times states that the Congress of the Royal Institute 

 of Public Health was opened on May 16 at the Sor- 

 bonne in the presence of a number of eminent French 

 and English men of science. The Under-Secretary 

 of State for the Interior, M. Paul Morel, welcomed 

 the members of the congress to Paris on behalf of the 

 Government. Prof. W. R. Smith said, in reply, that 

 the holding of the congress in Paris was a further 

 proof of the closeness of the relations existing between 

 the country of Lister and the country of Pasteur. 

 Speeches were also made by Prof. Landouzy, presi- 

 dent of the French section of the congress, Sir Thomas 

 Oliver, who is president of the industrial section, and 

 the Lord Provost of Glasgow. At the close of the 

 meeting Prof. Smith handed to Prof. Roux, director 

 of the Pasteur Institute, the gold medal of the Royal 

 Institute of Public Health. 



An impressive collection of photographs of scenes 

 connected with Capt. Scott's ill-fated Antarctic expe- 

 dition is reproduced in yesterday's Daily Mirror, May 

 zi. The pictures include a striking view of the cairn, 

 surmounted by a cross, erected over the tent where 

 the bodies of Capt. Scott, Dr. Wilson, and Lieut. 

 Bowers were found ; photographs of the explorers on 

 skis dragging their sleigh towards the south pole, and 

 i standing near Amundsen's tent, which they found 

 , upon arriving at their goal; the last photograph of 

 1 the party of five taken at the pole; and the tent in 



