July i, 1909] 



NA TURE 



25 



of efficiency so that the scholarships might be filled up. 

 This danger, with others, has been under the considera- 

 tion of the committee, and steps have been taken in the 

 case of certain classes of scholarship to reduce the number 

 available, so that an efficient standard may be maintained. 

 In framing the regulations which will govern the award 

 of scholarships and exhibitions during the next academic 

 year, the committee has endeavoured to arrange that, so 

 far as possible, " no child or young person shall be 

 debarred by poverty from obtaining the kind of education 

 which will prepare him for the career for which his 

 talents and character best fit him, and that the pecuniary 

 emoluments attaching to the scholarships shall be sufficient 

 to enable students to obtain the kind of education, whether 

 industrial, scientific, or literary, which is best suited to 

 their needs and capacities, but not sufficient to induce 

 them to undertake a particular course of study with the 

 object of securing the pecuniary advantages attaching to 

 the scholarship." 



As indicating the wide scope of the London County 

 Council scholarship scheme, which has recently been 

 amended, it may be said that in 1905 the Council awarded 

 (a) 2O00 junior county scholarships to children between the 

 ages of eleven and twelve, and that the annual cost of 

 awarding one "of these scholarships annually was 85/. ; 

 (6) 390 probationer scholarships, each costing 56/., to 

 childre-n of thirteen to fourteen years of age; (c) 100 inter- 

 mediate county scholarships, each costing 129/., to boys 

 and girls of from fifteen to seventeen years of age ; 

 (d) fifty senior county scholarships, each costing some 

 200!., to students more than eighteen years of age; and 

 (c) various scholarships in science, art, and technology, at 

 an expenditure of more than 18,000/. To state the scholar- 

 ships which are to be offered for competition this year 

 will indicate some of the changes which have been made 

 as the result of four years' experience. There are to be 

 (a) 1800 junior county scholarships, costing each the same 

 as in 1905, and 300 supplementary junior scholarships of 

 lower value ; (h) 300 intermediate county scholarships, but 

 the value of each, for sufficient reasons, has been reduced 

 to 72!. ; and (c) 150 senior county scholarships, each as 

 in 1905, costing 200Z. But, whereas the total expenditure 

 in 1905 was 283,940/., the amount in igog has, notwith- 

 standing the greater wisdom of the conditions of award 

 in the scheme, been reduced to 263,080/. The report of 

 the Education Committee gives very satisfactory evidence 

 to show that the object the education authorities in London 

 have in view is to secure a high quality in the results 

 they obtain, rather than to spread an incomplete and rudi- 

 mentary education far and wide. 



A NUMHER of people interested in the teaching of house- 

 craft and domestic science visited Battersea Polytechnic 

 on June 29 to see the domestic economy training depart- 

 ment. Since the department was opened in 1894 more 

 than 400 students have obtained diplomas, and are now 

 occupying responsible positions in leading institutions and 

 schools ; the present number of students above eighteen 

 years of age in the department is 130. Students of the 

 department attend, in their first year, a course in " science 

 as applied to household work," which includes physics, 

 chemistry, physiology, and hygiene. This course is taken 

 in addition to the purely practical work of the domestic 

 arts. During the second session the scientific basis of 

 knowledge thus obtained is applied in the practice kitchens, 

 laundries, and housewifery rooms and hygiene laboratories. 

 In the third year's course the same subjects are treated in 

 greater detail, special attention being directed to bacterio- 

 logy and the examination of food-stuffs. The main objects 

 of the science work are : — (a) to explain, so far as possible, 

 the chemical composition and properties of the materials 

 dealt with in household work ; (b) to explain the principal 

 chemical and physical changes taking place in the common 

 household operations involved in cookery, laundrywork, 

 &c. ; (r) to give a training in the principles of scientific 

 method. Special stress is laid on the fact that household 

 work generally is reallv an application of a number of facts 

 and principles in chemistry, physics, hygiene, bacteriology, 

 Sic, and that, in order to understand the rationale of the 

 ordinary household processes, a knowledge of the gener.al 

 principles of the branches of knowledge just mentioned is 

 necessary. 



NO. 2070, VOL. 81] 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 

 Royal Society, May 27.— Sir Archibald Geikie, K.C.B., 

 president, in the chair.— Notes concerning tidal oscilla- 

 tions upon a rotating globe: Lord Rayleigh. — Ihe 

 absolute value of the mechanical equivalent of heat in 

 terms of the international electrical units: Pi'of. H. '1. 

 Barnes. It is pointed out that the Clark cells used by 

 the author in his determinations of the mechanical equi- 

 valent of heat in terms of the electrical units were pre- 

 pared according to the old specifications. The absolute 

 measurements of the Clark cell now being: carried on 

 with such precision in the various standardising labora- 

 tories are expressed in terms of the new form of cell with 

 specially prepared mercurous sulphate. There is an 

 important difference between the cells, which Wolff and 

 Waters have shown amounts to 0-03 millivolts. The author 

 has compared a set of modern cells with cells set up 

 according to the old specifications, and finds the same 

 constant difference. Taking 14330 international volts at 

 15° C. as representing the modern cells, then the cells 

 made bv the old specifications must be taken as 1-4333 

 international volts at 15° C. The author's measurements 

 of the mechanical equivalent at different temperatures 

 were calculated on the basis of a value for the Clark cell 

 equal to 14342 international volts at 15° C. Re-cakulating 

 on the new basis, the value of the mean calorie is found 

 to be 4-1849 joules. This agrees with Reynolds and 

 Moorby's directly determined mean, which, expressed 

 accurately for an interval of temperature between 0° C. 

 and 100° C, comes to 4-1836 joules. Rowland's mean 

 value between 5° C. and 35° C. is 4-185 joules, while the 

 author's value between the same limits of temperature is 

 4- 1826 joules. Thus, assuming the variation of the specific 

 heat of water to be correctly determined, the value of the 

 Clark cell, equal to 14330 international volts, brings the 

 electrically determined mechanical equivalent into excellent 

 agreement with the same constant measured by mechanical 

 means. — .'\n approximate determination of the boiling 

 points of metals : H. C. Greenwood. Although high 

 temperatures can now be easily attained by means of 

 electric heating, no general investigation of the boiling 

 points of metals has yet been carried out. Moreover, 

 such values as are available have in most cases been 

 deduced indirectly, and are very discordant. In the pre- 

 sent investigation apparatus was devised for directly 

 measuring the temperatures of ebullition under atmospheric 

 pressure of a considerable number of metals, allowing of 

 use up to 2700° C. Heating was effected electrically, and 

 the metal, when unaffected by carbon, was contained in 

 a thin-walled graphite crucible on the outside of which 

 the temperature was estimated by means of a Wanner 

 optical pyrometer. The difference 'in temperature between 

 the internal and external surfaces of the crucible walls 

 was found to be negligible. Accuracy of the temperature 

 measurements was secured by checking the pyrometer 

 against the "black body" melting points _ of specially 

 purified strips of platinum, rhodium, and iridium. The 

 following values were found : — aluminium, 1800° C. ; 

 antimony, ' 1440'^ C. ; bismuth, 1420° C. ; chromium, 

 2200° C. ; copper, 2310° C. ; iron, 2450° C. ; magnesium, 

 1120° C. ; manganese, 1900° C. ; silver. 1955° C. : tin, 

 2270° C. In dealing with the metals aluminium, 

 chromium, iron, and manganese, which readily combine 

 with carbon, considerable " difficulty was experienced in 

 avoiding contact with carbon at the high temperatures in 

 question. This was finally accomplished by the use of 

 graphite crucibles brasqued with previously fused rnag- 

 nesia. In the absence of this protective lining the boiling 

 point was very greatly modified by carburisation. The 

 temperatures indicated for aluminium and manganese were 

 far below those hitherto supposed necessary for ebullition. 

 —Some results in the theory of elimination : .'\. L. Dixon. 

 The eliminant of two quantics *(.v), ij/fx), each of the (/'h degree, 

 may be expressed as a di-terminant the elements of which are 

 (,7„ r,), where {a. r) is [ct>{a)Mr) - <p{>-)'l'la)V''^ " ')- =>"'' "i- • ■ • 

 (7„, ;-,, . . . r„ are two sets of ;/ arV)itrary quantities. For 

 Ihiee quant ics .<)(.r, v), J.(,v, r), x(>-> />. f^ch of the form 

 2A,,r'i'" (rs», fSw;), the elimmant is a determinant the elements 

 of which are F(a„ /•„ o„ $,) where F(a, *, a, 0) = [ip{a, b), 



