6oo 



NA TURE 



[October 12, 1905 



greater successes in the future than have been attained in 

 the past. Mr. R. L. Morant, permanent secretary of the 

 Board of Education, in moving a vote of thantis to Prof. 

 Judd, said the college stood for the essential necessity of 

 practical work as a proper means of the study of science. 



The new College of Hygiene and Physical Training 

 instituted by the Carnegie Dunfermline trustees, which 

 was described in our issue for .September 28 (p. 550), was 

 opened formally on October 4 by Lord Linlithgow, Secre- 

 tary for Scotland and vice-president of the Council of 

 Education in Scotland. The chairman, Dr. John Ross, 

 delivered the opening address. He said the work of the 

 college is to be two-fold. Following the method established 

 for the training of the teachers in elementary schools, 

 there is provided first what may be called a great prac- 

 tising school with 4500 pupils, consisting of all the school 

 children, and next there is the college proper, consisting 

 of young women prepared to adopt the teaching of physical 

 culture as a profession, or to acquire for their own 

 personal benefit a knowledge of themselves and the most 

 rational rules of life. As yet only young women are to be 

 received, but it is anticipated that it will be possible in 

 the near future to receive young men. Lord Linlithgow, 

 during the course of an interesting speech, said there is 

 no doubt that the country is waking up to the necessity 

 of some sort of physical training for young people, and 

 to the necessity of a better understanding of the laws of 

 hygiene. It is well that the public should understand 

 what physical training means. Lord Linlithgow defined 

 it as the careful development of the general health to the 

 advantage of the whole body, and indirectly to the 

 advantage of the mind. The Carnegie trustees are, he 

 continued, doing a great and valuable service to Scotland 

 in taking up this subject. They are doing a work which 

 no school board can do, for it is doubtful whether public 

 opinion has as yet ripened sufficiently to allow the Educa- 

 tion Department to apply any considerable portion of the 

 national fimds to a purpose of this kind. It will come in 

 time, for the public is taking an increasing interest in all 

 that concerns the feeding, the management, the cleanli- 

 ness, and physical welfare of the young generation. It is 

 being recognised more and more that the amount of in- 

 formation, or book-learning, which a child acquires at 

 school is a matter of comparatively little importance. 

 What is wanted is the healthy training of the boy or girl 

 both physically and mentally. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 



London. 



Royal Society, July 14. — "The Phagocylosis of Red 

 Blood-cells." By Dr. J. O. Wakelin Barratt. Com- 

 municated by Sir Victor Horsley, K.R.S. 



The author has investigated the conditions under which 

 phagocytosis of red blood-cells, by means of leucocytes, is 

 brought about. Metchnikoff, who studied this process, 

 attached great importance to the part played by the 

 leucocytes, but Sawtchenko discovered that the chief factor 

 in the production of this form of phagocytosis is sensi- 

 bilisation of the red blood-cells, which can be brought 

 .about by the serum of animals which have been previously 

 injected with the variety of red blood-cells employed for 

 phagocytosis, and he attributed the action of the serum 

 to the presence of amboceptor (immunisine, fixateur). 

 That this is not so, however, is shown by the circumstance 

 that, in the absence of amboceptor, strongly marked phago- 

 cytosis may be brought about by serum, and further 

 experiments showed that the effective constituent is an 

 opsonin. In addition, it was found that erythrocytic 

 opsonins are sometimes present, usually in relatively small 

 quantities, in normal sera, and in suitably chosen con- 

 ditions of experiment may be used to prepare red blood- 

 cells for ingestion by leucocytes. 



Pakis. 



Academy of Sciences, October 2. — M. Trnn!.t in ihe 



chair. — Summary of the observations of the solar eclipse 



of August 29-30 made at Sfax, Tunis : G. Bigoui-dan. 



Light clouds were present during the eclipse, but were not 



NO. 1876, VOL. 72] 



sufficiently numerous to interfere seriously with the observ- 

 ations. Particulars are given of the determination of time, 

 the observations of the contacts, the photography of the 

 inner corona, the monochromatic photography of the 

 corona, the work done with the spectrographs, ocular and 

 photographic photometry, the influence of the passage of 

 the shadow on the magnetic state of the earth, meteorology 

 and actinometry, drawings made with the naked eye, 

 observation of the moving shadows, the darkness during 

 the eclipse, and the visibility of the stars. — On the laws 

 of sliding friction : Paul Painieve. An extension of the 

 results obtained in a previous paper and a reply to some 

 objections. — Observation of the eclipse of the sun of 

 August 30 at the Observatory of Marseilles : M. Stephan. 

 The atmospheric conditions were quite satisfactory. The 

 times of first and second contact are given, and the 

 changes of temperature were automatically registered. — 

 On some differential equations of the second order : Richard 

 Fuchs. — On minimum surfaces : S. Bernstein. — Experi- 

 mental verifications of the undulatory form of the photo- 

 graphic function ; Adrien Gucbhard. — On isostrychnine : 

 A. Bacovesco. Isostrychnine is obtained hy heating 

 strychnine with water in sealed tubes at 160° C. to 180° C. 

 The colour reactions of the isomer resemble those of the 

 original alkaloid, but tliere are points of difference. The 

 poisonous properties of the isomer are less marked than 

 in strychnine, and, indeed, rather approximate to those of 

 curare. That the two alkaloids are structurally different 

 is shown by the action of sodium ethylate, which converts 

 isostrychnine integrally into the isostrychnic acid of Tafel. 

 — On the mode of propagation of some aquatic plants : 

 Louis Franpois. — On the geology of the Sahara : R. 

 Chudeau. — On the direction of the permanent mag- 

 netisation of a metamorphic clay from Pontfarlin (Cantal) : 

 Bernard Brunhes. 



CONTENTS. PAGE 



Two Recent Volumes on Arachnida. By R. I. 



Pocock . cyy 



The Citizen and the State 578 



Practical Organic Chemistry. By A. N. M 579 



Our Book Shelf:— 



Frolich : "Die Entwickelung der electrischen 



Messungen " 579 



"Zoologischer Jahresbericht fur 1904." — R. L. . . . 579 

 Tuckey : " Examples in Arithmetic " ; " The Primary 



Arithmelic," Parts i. and ii 580 



Letters to the Editor: — 



A Magnelic Survey of Japan.— Prof. A. Tanakadate 580 



A Polarisation Pattern.— T. Terada 581 



A Focusing Screen for Use in Photographing Ultra- 

 violet Spectra. — Prof. W. N. Hartley, F.R.S. . 581 

 The Omission of Titles of Addresses on Scientific 



Subjects.— A. P. Trotter 581 



The International Congress on Tuberculosis ... 581 



The British Association in South Afrira 583 



The British Science Guild 585 



Sir William Wharton, K.C.B., F.R.S. By A. M. F. 586 

 George Bowdler Buckton, F.R.S. By W. F. 



Kirby 587 



Notes 588 



Our Astronomical Column : — 



Further Eclipse Results by French Observers ... 591 



Cosmical Evolution ccji 



Visibilityof Faint Stars at the Lowell Observatory . , 592 



The Orbit of f Tauri 592 



The Constant of Aberration 592 



The Natal Government Observatory . . 592 



The Opening of the Medical Session in London . . 592 



Diamonds. By Sir William Crookes, F. R.S. . . . 593 



University and Educational Intelligence 599 



Societies and Academies 600 



