NOVEMBEB 5, 1909] 



SCIENCE- 



625 



lems that can and must be studied quanti- 

 tatively. The solution of these problems 

 will be not only of the greatest importance 

 to abstract science and to industry, but will 

 take first rank in giving an insight into the 

 fundamental processes in plant and animal 

 life, which involve both chemical and 

 physical phenomena in homogeneous and 

 heterogeneous sj'stems. 



These problems will, in my opinion and 

 that of some of my physical chemical col- 

 leagues, be solved most easily hj organic 

 chemists, and not by physical chemists. 

 The worker who would do great service to 

 this branch of the science must have as the 

 great essential such a broad and deep 

 knowledge of organic chemistry that he 

 can recognize wrong interpretations of re- 

 action mechanisms almost by intuition: he 

 must not make wrong postulations regard- 

 ing reactions as Ostwald did in the theory 

 of indicators and in the catalysis of amides, 

 and as Euler did in the saponification of 

 esters, mistakes which were corrected by 

 organic chemists. Then he must turn to 

 his physical chemistry and learn three 

 things tvell— the ma.ss law, thermodynamics 

 and electrochemistry; even then he must 

 constantly advise with some well-trained 

 real physical chemist, and with some mathe- 

 matician, who can to some extent under- 

 stand the problems. 



No man can do trustworthy work in 

 physico-organic chemistry with half-way 

 preparation, but the chemist who is well 

 equipped will render great service to the 

 science. S. F. Agree 



Johns Hopkins Univeesitt, 

 Baltimore, Md., 

 December 30, 1908 



BACTERIOLOGY AS A yOX-TECnXICAL 

 COURSE FOR PUBLIC SCHOOLS' 

 B.\CTERioLOGY, a biological science as dis- 

 ' Presented at the Baltimore meeting of the 

 Society of American Bacteriologists, December 31, 



Koa. 



tinct from a useful art, has hardly received 

 any material recognition as yet in this coun- 

 try. The writer would advocate the academic 

 study of certain of its phases as illustrating 

 the general bases of life, as a mental training, 

 and as furnishing a field for thought. 



Again realizing that sociology, in ultimate 

 analysis, is strictly dependent upon and lim- 

 ited by biological laws, sociological teaching 

 which neglects the biology and physiology of 

 the individual neglects the study of its primal 

 units. Hence the value of, even necessity for, 

 the elementary biological training of the pros- 

 pective sociologist. But sociology ■ is more 

 than the study of certain units in multiple. 

 It is the study of the interrelations of these 

 units. Therefore, the study of the anatomy 

 and physiology of a single example of man 

 (or for convenience and by analogy of the 

 frog or the plant) furnishes no actual labora- 

 tory biological study analogous to the study 

 of the interrelations of man in the world. 

 Bacteriology supplies this missing link, for 

 bacteriology deals hardly at all with the indi- 

 vidual — almost wholly with aggregations of 

 individuals. Symbiosis, antagonism — the ef- 

 fect of overcrowding, the survival of the fittest 

 — coordination of partial efforts of different 

 cooperating species to produce a sum total 

 result — all these phases of sociology, chosen 

 from many more for this address at random, 

 can be illustrated in a bacteriological course 

 — and with materials directly under control, 

 subject to experimental variation and, from 

 the rapidity of bacterial development, without 

 waste of time. 



Finally, beyond these purely scholastic 

 views lies a practical value of bacteriology as 

 a general study, especially for women, in that 

 it furnishes an armamentarium in dealing 

 with certain every-day problems of household 

 life which come into play during at least one 

 half of the conscious waking life of man and 

 almost the whole of the conscious waking life 

 of the alma mater of the family — the house- 

 keeper and actual food provider, as the wife 

 and mother must always be in nine tenths of 

 the population. The w^ite^ will discuss the 

 third of these phases, i. e., bacteriology for it8 



