6d8 



NA TURE 



[October 19, 1905 



A VIOLENT shock of earthquake occurred at Monteleone 

 at 3.40 p.m. on . October 14. The shock was felt at 

 Messina at 3.42 p.m. ; and a shock is reported to have 

 occurred gt Reggio di Calabria at 2.45 p.m. 



\Ve learn from .the Times that, the Roval Prussian 

 .Aeronautic Observatory, recently com,pleted, was opened 

 on .Montfnv; October. 16, at Liindenberg, in the province of 

 Brandenburg, in the presence of the Emperor William and 

 the Prince of Monaco. The Emperor, in a speech, eulogised 

 the many services rendered by the Prince of Monaco to 

 science, and conferred upon him the large golden medal 

 for science. . 



The post-graduate college, West London Hospital, was 

 opened on October 12 with an introductory address by 

 Mr. Tweedy, the president of the Roval College of 

 .Surgeons, who emphasised the need for post-graduate 

 training in medicine, and suggested that a post-graduate 

 course should be made compulsory after a certain period 

 in .1 man's career. 



Mr. Wvndh.^m, .M.P., was present at the annual con- 

 versazione of the Chester Society of National Science and 

 Literature on October 12, and delivered an address. He 

 accompanied Lady Grosvenor, who made a presentation 

 to Mr. Robert Newstead, formerly curator of the 

 Grosvenor Museum and now attached to the Liverpool 

 School of Tropical Medicine. The gift consisted of a life- 

 size carbon portrait of himself and a purse of more than 

 two hundred guineas. Lady Grosvenor also presented the 

 Kingsley medal to Dr. C. Theodore Green. 



.■\n interesting account is given in the Times (October 10) 

 of the cancer department and cancer research at the 

 Middlese.-c Hospital. .Since 1792 the hospital has main- 

 tained a separate cancer department by an endowment 

 which first came through John Howard from Samuel 

 Whitbread. The cancer wards, which now contain forty- 

 nine beds, combine the functions of an almshouse or 

 asvlum with those of a hospital, for, in accordance with 

 the purpose of the original foundation, the stav of patients 

 is not limited. Howard also contemplated new discoveries 

 from the investigation of a large number of patients and 

 from the accumulated records of these. 



The programme of the London Institution for the 

 session 1905-6 includes the following lectures among 

 others : — The origin of the elephant, Prof. E. Ray 

 Lankester, F.R.S. ; submarines. Sir W. H. White, K.C.B., 

 F.R.S. ; geographical botany interpreted by direct response 

 to the conditions of life, Rev. George Henslow ; the Upper 

 Nile, Sir Charles Eliot, K.C.M.G. ; variation in man and 

 woman. Prof. Karl Pearson, F.R.S. ; our atmosphere and 

 its wonders, Prof. \"ivian B. Lewes. 



The Sociological Society has now issued its programme 

 of meetings arranged for the winter session, along with 

 a list of papers to be delivered before its affiliated societies 

 in the universities of Oxford and Manchester. It is notice- 

 able that a new departure has been made by the Socio- 

 logical .Society in the holding of research meetings (at 

 which papers of interest to specialists only will be read 

 and discussed) in addition to its ordinary monthly meet- 

 ings for the reading and discussion of papers of general 

 interest. The following papers have been arranged for the 

 ordinary monthly meetings : — The biological foundations of 

 sociology, Dr. .\rchdall Reid ; the origin and function of 

 religion, Mr. A. E. Crawley ; and the Institut de Sociologie, 

 its equipment and work, M. Waxweiler. The papers to be 

 NO. 1877, VOL. 72] 



delivered at the research meetings are : — The study of the 

 individual. Dr. I. L. Tayler ; and biological methods in 

 application to social problems, M. Wa.\weiler. 



.\n address of considerable importance from the stand- 

 point of the connection between scientific training and 

 industrial development was recently delivered by Mr. W. 

 Burton on the occasion of the prize distribution to students 

 of the county pottery classes at Tunstall, Staffordshire. 

 .'\t the outset Mr. Burton emphasised the fact that manu- 

 facturers in Staffordshire are beginning to realise the 

 value cf technical schools as a means of training students 

 to be of real service to them. But, looking backwards, 

 few industries in this country have during the past thirty 

 years drawn so little aid from the resources of science a> 

 the pottery industry. The methods employed in pottery 

 at the present day do not differ very greatly from those 

 in use at the time of Josiah Wedgwood. But in science 

 there has been an almost phenomenal advance since the 

 early discoveries cf Priestley, the contemporary and friend 

 of Wedgwood. In taking up the study of pottery to-day. 

 the student has to commence for himself almost entirely 

 from the beginning ; there is no accumulated store of 

 knowledge and experience, such as exists in all branches 

 of science, from which he may draw. The supreme gift 

 of scientific training in method, Mr. Burton continues, 

 is the power to see. " How many problems are there 

 that present themselves to us every day in our businesses 

 that really disappear — are no longer problems — if we once 

 see them clearly?" The commercial organiser of a busi- 

 ness has tv^•o problems always facing him, first the 

 eionomic production of his goods, and secondly the dis- 

 posal of these goods in the market. A scientific training, 

 in so far as it gives knowledge tending to the solution of 

 these problems, is of direct value to the commercial side 

 of business ; many problems can be solved only by scientific 

 methods. But, Mr. Burton urges in conclusion, manu- 

 facturers should not look for too immediate results from 

 the employment of a scientifically trained man. " Re- 

 member, he must have time to apply his science to your 

 industry. He must have lime for experiment, and must 

 be given both leisure and the fullest opportunity to follow 

 out those lines of prolonged and systematic investigation 

 on which alone scientific knowledge has been built." 



The September issue of the Proceedings of the Phila- 

 delphia Academy contains the first portion of a long paper 

 by Mr. C. S. Sargent on the species of thorns of the genus 

 Cratiegus found in eastern Pennsylvania, mainly based on 

 collections and notes made by several local botanists. . 



The Irish Naturalist for October opens with an illus- 

 trated paper by that enthusiastic ornithologist Mr. E. 

 Williams on the recent occurrence in Ireland of a number 

 cf specimens of the Greenland and Iceland falcons, more 

 especially the former. Previous records of the occurrence 

 in Ireland of the Greenland falcon included nineteen 

 instances, now raised to twenty-eight by the occurrence of 

 no less than nine examples during the present year. On the 

 other hand, only two previous records of the occurrence of 

 the Iceland falcon were known, this number being raised 

 to three by the capture of an immature female in Galway 

 in March. The author speculates why the Iceland falcon 

 should be so much more rare in Ireland than the far more 

 distant Greenland species. 



The Halifax Courier of September 30 contains a full 

 report of a long paper, read at the first meeting for the 

 present session of the Halifax Scientific Society, on the 

 educational value of the Bankfield Museum, bv Mr. L. 



