Septembeb 17, 1909] 



SCIENCE 



377 



ungsrat Fred. Strohmer (Austria), Dr. Francis 

 Sachs (Belgium), Mr. Ou Kouanze (China), 

 Professor L^n Lindet (France), Geh. Regicr- 

 ungsrat Professor Dr. Otto X. Witt (Germany), 

 Professor Emanuel Paterno (Italy), Professor 

 Kuhara (Japan), Dr. S. Hoogewerff (Nether- 

 lands), N. Tavildaroff (Russia), Professor Pin- 

 erfta y Alvarez (Spain), Professor Arrhenius 

 (Sweden) and M. F. Reverdin (Switzerland). 



Four general lectures were arranged in Great 

 Hall of the Imperial Institute. Two short ones 

 on Friday, May 28, were given by Professors 

 Haller and Paterno. The writer was unable to 

 attend these and has not secured either the titles 

 or accounts of the lectures, hence he regrets he 

 can not give abstracts. 



On Monday, May 31, Professor Witt gave an 

 admirable address in perfect English on " Evolu- 

 tion in Applied Chemistry." A complete appre- 

 ciation of the charming lecture requires its per- 

 usal in the Transactions, ■which should appear 

 within the year. 



He said that evolution was no longer a working 

 hypothesis in natural science; it had become a 

 way of thinking. One of the best combinations 

 of empiricism and theory was the examination of 

 old empirical industrial processes by the methods 

 and in the light of modern science. Much valuable 

 information had been thus obtained, but what an 

 immense amount of information still remained 

 lying dormant in unread Egyptian papyri and 

 palimpsests! There is a great treasure of indus- 

 trial experience of the eastern nations, much of 

 which is equal to or superior to that of the 

 western peoples. We know so little about them, 

 and what we do know is from accounts of travel- 

 ers, who were not chemists. Industries which 

 have benefited by secrets derived from the East are 

 cotton-dyeing, calico-printing, indigo-dyeing and 

 porcelain. A duty of such international congresses 

 is to watch over the intellectual wealth of the 

 past and to collect it before it disappears forever 

 by the adoption of more rapid western methods. 

 The biological analogy of the influence of en- 

 vironment on the development of industries was 

 dwelt upon. Whenever an industry left its native 

 country, or often even when it moved from one 

 part of a country to another, it had to he re- 

 modeled to suit the different conditions. The 

 history of applied chemistry is filled with in- 

 stances in which the sur\-ival of the fittest meant 

 nothing more nor less than a victory for economy. 

 As a whole, progressive economy was not so de- 

 pendent upon improvement in apparatus as upon 



the simplification of the fundamental chemical 

 reactions — in other words, upon better utilization 

 of the energy involved. 



Only recently have we begun to have a con- 

 science for fuel. The quantity of fuel required to 

 produce the energy for any industrial process was 

 dependent upon the manner in which it was re- 

 quired to do its work. Once smoke was regarded 

 as an evil, then a nuisance, now it is known as a 

 waste, and none had better cause to wage war 

 against it than he who produced it. A smoking 

 chimney is a thief, not only because it carries 

 visible unburned carbon into the atmosphere, but 

 in a majority of cases invisible carbon mono.xide 

 and methane, with all the latent energy they con- 

 tained. Regenerative gas-heating not only pre- 

 vents smoke, but is a powerful means of econ- 

 omizing heat. The saving of national wealth 

 effected by it might amount to a sum sufficient 

 to pay the aggregate national debts of all the 

 civilized nations. Uncivilized nations were blessed 

 with neither national debts nor heat-regenerating 

 appliances. 



Professor Witt closed his lecture by reference 

 to symbiosis and aggregation. As plants and 

 animals of totally different nature and organiza- 

 tion combine for joint life and activity with the 

 object of self-protection in the great struggle for 

 existence, so the various forms of chemical in- 

 dustry were essentially dependent upon each other 

 for success and progress. The more varied and 

 numerous the factories, in spite of apparent com- 

 petition, the more they prospered. Congresses of 

 chemists, such as the one in session in London, 

 represent a modern form of human symbiotic 

 effort. " They proclaimed the great truth that 

 science knew no boundaries and frontiers, that it 

 was the joint property of all humanity, and that 

 its adherents were ready to flock together from all 

 parts of the world for mutual help and progress." 



On Tuesday afternoon, June 1, Sir Boverton 

 Redwood gave a lecture upon " Liquid Fuel," 

 which was rich in matter, suggestive, splendidly 

 illustrated and excellently presented. 



Upon the invention of the steam engine the 

 days of the windmill and old-time water wheel 

 seemed to be numbered; sailing ships had given 

 way to mechanically-driven vessels; gas-explosion 

 engines and electric power seemed to be driving 

 out the horse, without whose aid at one time it 

 was thought that no civilized nation could exist. 

 In some directions there was a disposition to 

 revert to the old order of things, as shown in the 

 utilization of water powers with improved appli- 



