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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. L. No. 1285 



publications, and lie may do sometliing toward 

 getting scientific truth into it. 



May I also add just a word on political 

 science ? 



It is one of the calamities of democracy that 

 most economic and social problems are first 

 worked out by experts, who embalm their re- 

 sults in books which are interred in university 

 libraries, and are then, long after, worked out 

 by rule of thumb, by practical politicians and 

 business men. One of the supreme problems 

 of our universities is to bridge this gap. 



Of the popular scientific magazines, I 

 scarcely need speak. Tou know them better 

 than I do. But do they need to appeal so 

 nearly exclusively to the mechanical curiosity 

 of boys? Some magazines, like Good House- 

 heeping, are doing excellent work in popular- 

 izing dietetic science among women. Is there 

 not some way to penetrate the indurated in- 

 tellects and the atrophied imaginations of our 

 adult men, also? 



I realize that I have added little to your 



knowledge of any subject, by these desultory 



remarks. May I hope, however, to have 



aroused at least a little imscientific curiosity ? 



Chester H. Rowell 



EMIL FISCHER 

 The news has just reached us that Emil 

 Fischer is no more. Since the fateful 

 August, 1914, Germany has lost her Bhr- 

 lich, her Buehner, and her Baeyer; Eng- 

 land, her Ramsay, Crookes and Moseley. 

 Deaths occur, wars or no wars; yet Bueh- 

 ner might have lived had not a shell cut 

 short liis existence; and young Moseley 

 had barely started along his brilliant 

 career when he, like the promising Rupert 

 Brooke, laid dovm his life for his beloved 

 England. Ramsay's end, we know, was 

 hastened by manifold war duties. To what 

 extent Fischer was a victim of the war is 

 still unknown to us; but we were told, 

 from time to time, of his violent pan- 

 Germanism, doubtless encouraged by the 

 exalted position he held under the crown. 



The magnitude of Germany's debacle 

 would have crushed a spirit less proud 

 than Geheimer-Regierungsrat Fischer. 



What ever opinions we may have re- 

 garding Fischer's political affiliations there 

 can be no question of his position in the 

 history of chemistry. His bitterest ene- 

 mies are the first to pay tribute. He 

 easily takes his place among the greatest 

 organic chemists of our generation. 



To appreciate his work a little more we 

 must look into the state of the science when 

 Fischer began his labors. 



That animal and vegetable life were 

 largely made up of carbon compounds, 

 that the food we eat could be largely di- 

 vided into fat, proteins and carbohydrates 

 — all this was known. If, then, a knowl- 

 edge of the composition of these sub- 

 stances, as truly belonging to organic 

 chemistry as marsh gas or 'benzene, was 

 vague and wholly unsatisfactory, this was 

 due to the complexity of their make-up. 

 Chevreul and Berthollet had largely 

 cleared the situation in so far as the fats 

 were concerned, but the chemistry of the 

 carbohydrates, and particularly that of 

 the proteins, remained as mysterious as 

 ever. The three foodstuffs were the bor- 

 derland where chemistry ended and biol- 

 ogy 'began; the lack of a solution of the 

 composition of at least two of these food- 

 stuffs left the finishing touches of the edi- 

 fice of organic chemistry still undone, and 

 gave a wholly unsatisfactory foundation 

 for the science of physiology. 



To the solution of this problem Fischer 

 pledged his life while still a student, and 

 brilliantly did he fulfil his life's task. 

 With an imagination tempered only by a 

 splendid scientific training, an originality 

 of mind which made a lasting impress 

 upon every piece of work with which he 

 was associated, and a rare skill in devising 

 apparatus, he, first by his own labors, and 



