September 23, 1922] 



NA TURE 



435 



and space, then it would be necessary to have separate 

 fires for oven, hot water, and hot - plate. This is 

 obviously impracticable ; but, on the other hand, in 

 a well-insulated oven heated over a small fire without 

 excess of air by leakage, an efficiency of 30 per cent, 

 might easily be achieved, and, he adds, " there is no 

 reason why a whole dinner could not be cooked in 

 such an oven with 2 lbs. of fuel." But beyond 40 

 or 50 per cent, efficiency in the oven it is impossible 

 to go, and the ideal conditions can be attained only 

 by electrical heating. 



The adoption of an independent boiler would raise 

 the efficiency of the fuel for the hot water supply 

 from an average of 8 to 10 per cent, to 40 to 45 per 

 cent., a figure which Dr. Fishenden gives for a coke- 

 fired boiler. On the other hand, for a small household 

 such a boiler is too large, and a small boiler is difficult 

 to fire and keep alight, especially with coke. 



The principal cause of loss from a hot water equip- 

 ment is not so much the low efficiency of the apparatus 

 as the subsequent loss of heat from the storage vessel 

 by radiation. Hot water should be generated when 

 it is required, and this can be done only by gas as in 

 the gas geyser, which is efficient and useful though 

 clumsy and dangerous. If the appliance can be so 

 arranged that the fire can be lighted and burn itself 

 out, a sufficient supply of hot water would be pro- 

 duced for a whole day's use provided the heat was 

 not allowed to escape by proper insulation. 



The report contains a lot more useful, practical 

 information as to the method of installation, but 

 perhaps the most significant and encouraging part 

 of the report is the improvement in efficiency which 

 Mr. Barker has himself effected in ranges of his own 

 design whereby he has reduced the fuel consump- 

 tion by about 70 per cent. It is to be hoped that 

 this new type of range will soon be placed on the 

 market. J. B. C. 



University and Educational Intelligence. 



Leeds. — The hon. degree of Doctor of Science has 

 been conferred on the following : Sir Charles Scott 

 Sherrington, G.B.E., president of the British Associa- 

 tion ; the Due de Broglie, Institut d'Optique, Paris ; 

 Dr. C. G. Joh. Petersen, director of the Danish Bio- 

 logical Station, Copenhagen ; and Prof. P. Weiss, 

 director of the Institut de Physique, University of 

 Strasbourg. 



London. — Mr. T. A. Stephenson of Kingswood 

 School and Universitv College, Aberystwyth, has 

 been appointed assistant in the department of 

 zoology and comparative anatomy at University 

 College. 



A programme of public lectures, admission to 

 which is free and without ticket, to be delivered 

 at University College during the coming term, has 

 been issued. It includes lectures on social life in 

 Egypt by Prof. Flinders Petrie, on recent excavations 

 in Malta by Miss M. A. Murray, on the beginnings of 

 science by Prof. G. Elliot Smith, on the nature of 

 intelligence bv Prof. C. Spearman, and a series of 

 lectures on phonetics, including one on the nature 

 and reproduction of speech sounds by Sir Richard 

 Paget. At King's College there will be a course of 

 ten lectures by Prof. H. Wildon Carr, commencing 

 on October 5, on the new method of Descartes and the 

 problems to which it gave rise ; five lectures by Miss 

 Hilda D. Oakeley on the Stoic philosophy, com- 

 mencing on November 9 ; one lecture on October 9, 

 at 5.30, by Prof. G. B. Jeffery on Einstein's theory 

 of relativity ; six lectures, commencing October 17, 

 on modern hydro-electric engineering practice by 

 E. M. Bergstrom ; and three lectures, commencing 

 November 28, on the fuel problem from an engineering 



NO. 2760, VOL. I IO] 



standpoint by Dr. C. H. Lander. Complete lists of 

 the lectures can be obtained on application, enclosing 

 a stamped addressed envelope, to the secretary of 

 the college in question. 



An article on " The New University of London," 

 by T. LI. Humberstone, appears in the English 

 Review for September. After showing that so far 

 back as the twelfth century there existed in London 

 all the necessary elements for the formation of a great 

 university, and speculating as to the reasons why, 

 nevertheless, it was not until the nineteenth that one 

 came into being, the writer describes the establish- 

 ment of the University of London as an examining 

 board in 1836 and its reconstitution as a teaching 

 university in 1900. Of the " third incarnation," 

 now inaugurated with the gift by the Government 

 of eleven and a half acres of land adjoining the site 

 of the British Museum, he writes : " Our task is to 

 open a new Pierian spring to quench a world-thirst " : 

 the new university of London is destined to play a 

 great part in the re-establishment of the cosmopolitan 

 spirit which, under the influence of the Roman 

 Church, tended in the Middle Ages to make Europe 

 a single nation. Time will show whether these 

 aspirations, stimulated by Mr. Fisher's speech at 

 University College last February, can be realised. 

 Meanwhile there is one obstacle, easily removed, to 

 which attention was directed at the recent conference 

 at Basle of delegates from British and Swiss universi- 

 ties. There London's policy in regard to the admis- 

 sion of foreign students was criticised as illiberal. 

 Why, it was asked, should London insist on verifying, 

 by a special matriculation examination, the attain- 

 ments of students who hold certificates qualifying 

 for admission without further examination into the 

 universities of Switzerland, and implying matricula- 

 tion standards of attainment in the subjects of the 

 London examination ? Cambridge has lately adopted 

 a comprehensive exemption formula recognising the 

 sufficiency of the standards implied by such foreign 

 certificates, and it was hoped that London would do 

 likewise. 



The University of Colorado Catalogue, 1921-22, 

 issued in March 1922 with announcements for 1922- 

 1923, presents several interesting features, exempli- 

 fying recent developments in American State univer- 

 sities. The University Extension Division, organised 

 in 1912, " aims to make the campus of the university 

 co-extensive with the State, in keeping with the new 

 idea that a State university exists for all the people 

 and not for a favoured few alone." It has a Faculty 

 comprising 12 administrative and secretarial officers, 

 besides professors and instructors in the various 

 university departments, and a non-resident staff 

 numbering 31. Among its varied activities are: 

 correspondence courses, in which form one-fourth of 

 the work for the A.B. degree may be taken ; class 

 instruction, more or less on the lines of our university 

 extension lecture courses, but qualifying equally 

 with courses taken in the university towards degrees ; 

 courses in secondary education ; _ social surveys of 

 towns, with a view to the solution of community 

 problems ; business surveys for determining the 

 commercial resources and trade possibilities of a 

 communitv , visits to stores and firms " for the pur- 

 pose of rendering individual assistance in meeting 

 business problems." Quite distinct from the Exten- 

 sion Division is a " Summer Quarter " of ten weeks, 

 in which are provided courses, some of post-graduate 

 standard, in arts and pure sciences, engineering, 

 medicine, and law. These, if pursued through the 

 whole quarter, carry the same credit as similar courses 

 in any other quarter. 



