OcrosER 18, 1918] 
Hitherto the United States has either imported 
artists or art, or else its people have followed 
rather slavishly the ideals of Europe. This is espe- 
cially true in the matter of design as affecting fab- 
ries, textiles, wallpapers, furniture and decoration 
generally. The University Museum believes that 
this no longer will be the case. Even the old world 
nations will branch out on new lines, It would 
seem as if the greatest nation on earth, that which 
is raising the greatest army and commercial navy 
in the world, that which is destined to give the 
deathblow to the nation which is the foe of all art, 
the nation which has exceeded all others in inven- 
tion for the material comforts of mankind, as- 
suredly it seems that such a nation has within itself 
the power of creative imagination to establish its 
own school of independent art. 
All art harks back more or less to former 
achievements, but the genius of a nation as of an 
individual is shown by the original use made of 
such available material. The University Museum 
has within its walls collections which have cost 
millions of dollars and which are valuable for more 
than their mere objective beauty or cultural quali- 
ties. They cover the whole field of civilization 
from the earliest dawn to the present, and prac- 
tically every tribe and nation as well as every field 
of artistic achievement. 
It is the belief of the managers of the University 
Museum that in its rich and rare collections of the 
art of the past as well as of the primitive races 
still existing there will be found inspiration and 
stimulus to aid in developing a truly American art. 
Without going into the larger aspects of the 
situation it can be said that this city which owes 
so much of its prosperity to manufacture of tex- 
tiles, furniture, wall-papers and other decorative 
objects will have a wide field of opportunity before 
it when the war ends. The nation is building the 
greatest commercial fleet in the world which it an- 
nounces is to be used for trade as soon as peace 
comes. To secure trade this nation and this city 
must provide the best and most beautiful of com- 
modities or give way to other nations who will 
supply the demand. 
There are thousands of objects in the University 
Museum ranging from the treasures of ancient 
Egypt, Crete, Persia, Greece, Italy and South 
America and the primitives of Oceanica from which 
inspiration can be drawn with excellent results. It 
is not presumed that there will be any lavish copy- 
ing but in this wide range of objects there will be 
found designs or color schemes which will afford 
seope to the creative imagination of artists and 
designers. 
SCIENCE 
389 
WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY MEDICAL 
GROUP 
Two years ago a plot of land which approxi- 
mated fifteen acres in extent, known as the 
Ford Estate, was purchased as a site for the 
new buildings of the Medical Department of 
Western Reserve University and for a new 
Lakeside Hospital, for a babies’ and for a 
maternity hospital. It was the plan to create 
a group of hospital buildings combined with 
the medical school to make an ideal teaching 
plant for the teaching of medicine. This tract 
is situated next to the literary departments of 
Western Reserve University and the Case 
School of Applied Science. Although the war 
has postponed the erection of any of these 
buildings, Lakeside Hospital lately received 
some noteworthy contributions and bequests 
which will materially hasten the building. 
By the will of the late Colonel Oliver Payne, 
a large and generous gift of one million dol- 
lars come to Lakeside to be used at the dis- 
cretion of the trustees. By the will of the late 
Mr. W.S. Tyler, Cleveland, a trustee of Lake- 
side, a bequest of two hundred thousand dol- 
lars came to Lakeside to be used at the dis- 
erection and endowment of a maternity ward 
on the new site. Mr. Samuel Mather, presi- 
dent of Lakeside, opened the new building 
fund of the hospital by a gift of three hundred 
and fifty thousand dollars. There is also a 
fund held by the trustees of Lakeside for the 
benefit of the children’s and maternity wards 
amounting to something over one hundred and 
fifty thousand dollars. 
By these gifts the realization of the plans 
for an ideal teaching group are brought nearer. 
THE NEW YORK POST-GRADUATE MEDICAL 
SCHOOL 
SEvEN members of the laboratory staff of 
the New York Post-graduate Medical School 
and Hospital are in government service. 
Ward J. MacNeal, M.D., Ph.D., professor of 
bacteriology and director of laboratories, is 
now a major in the Medical Corps and in 
charge of the Central Laboratory of the Med- 
ical Department, France. Richard M. Taylor, 
M.D., professor of pathology, now a captain in 
the Medical Corps, is likewise doing laboratory 
