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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLIV. No. 1141 



abreast of his progress in physics. It is by 

 these three staunch aids alone that the trio of 

 physiology, physiological chemistry and phar- 

 macology may be successfully faced. 



It may be objected that the man who sacri- 

 fices his biological training — and by this I 

 mean takes no more than the present minimum 

 required by the medical school of his selection 

 — while he may find himself in better shape for 

 physiology, etc., will not be better off in his 

 medicine and surgery later on. By the same 

 voice we shall hear that general practise does 

 not need this scientific underpinning. I do 

 not know what the training of that vague per- 

 son, the " practical family doctor," should be, 

 but I do know that he will make poor shift to 

 graduate well from the modern medical school 

 unless he heed his early training, and poorer 

 shift still to keep up with current medical 

 literature later on if he has failed to appre- 

 ciate the direction in which medicine is grow- 

 ing. 



The constant establishment of surgical and 

 medical research laboratories with the conse- 

 quent injection of scientific methods into the 

 practical branches, is a matter of general com- 

 ment, and emphasizes the large influences 

 which are shaping medicine into a science. It 

 is possible that most men who advise college 

 premedical students are somewhat aware of 

 the facts which I have tried to bring out in 

 this paper, but feel strongly that such early 

 and emphatic specialization as has been advo- 

 cated may have a narrowing influence. If 

 this be their attitude they are not consistent 

 in permitting wide excursion into anatomical 

 biology with the idea of better equipment for 

 medicine later on, and it is against the futility 

 of such a course that I protest. 



It is often hard to point out to students the 

 utility of subjects, essentially somewhat ab- 

 stract, in their relation to medicine. This is 

 especially true when one is confronted by the 

 fact that medical school catalogues do not 

 advise the prospective student to fulfil the 

 given requirements, and then if possible to ex- 

 tend his course in the directions I have indi- 

 cated. Yet there is no doubt that the man 

 well grounded in these fundamental subjects, 



which become very inaccessible after the med- 

 ical school is once entered, possesses an ad- 

 vantage over his less fortunate fellows which 

 can be turned to most vivid and permanent 

 account. Cecil K. Drinker 



Department of Physiology, 

 Harvard Medical School 



the auroral display of august 26 

 To the Editor of Science: The notes by 

 Dr. Nutting and others in Science on the 

 Aurora of August 26 have been read with 

 much interest by the writer. None of these, 

 however, mentions the appearance of this phe- 

 nomenon from a point as far south as Wash- 

 ington. On the evening in question, I was 

 sitting on the front porch (facing north) of 

 my residence here. It had been quite a warm 

 day and in the north was a heavy bank of 

 clouds in which lightning had been playing all 

 through the twilight and early evening; the 

 sunset glow seemed to be unduly prolonged 

 back of this bank of clouds. My attention 

 was first called to what I took to be a small, 

 faintly luminous cloud, about the shape of a 

 mirror image of the map of Nevada, which 

 covered a portion of the constellation of the 

 Great Dipper. The length of this supposed 

 cloud was about equal to that of the handle 

 of the Dipper, with the longer axis at right 

 angles to the handle. After persisting for 

 some time this little patch moved away rather 

 rapidly to the west and disappeared, only to 

 reappear in its original position after the lapse 

 of several minutes. Meanwhile, the seemingly 

 prolonged sunset glow above the bank of clouds 

 in the north had become a fringe of pale steady 

 light, apparently extending out over the edge 

 of the cloud a considerable distance. While 

 the small patch of light over the Dipper soon 

 disappeared again, the glow back of the cloud 

 bank persisted for a long time. No distinct 

 color was observed, the light being a uniform 

 faint white; no streaming or other movement 

 was observed, except that of the small patch of 

 light already described. 



F. Alex. McDermott 

 Washington, D. C, 

 October 26 



