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SCIENCE 



[N. S.- Vol. XLIII. No. 1122 



chemist living who had attended the famous 

 meeting at Karlsruhe in 1860. 



I chanced to visit Professor Schiff's labora- 

 tory at Florence in 1913 and found him a de- 

 lightful gentleman, who, although over eighty 

 years of age and suffering greatly from the 

 gout was still able to give his course of lec- 

 tures. He spoke with feeling of his friend- 

 ship for some American chemists, especially 

 for the late Professor Caldwell, of Cornell Uni- 

 versity, whom he had met while the two were 

 students together in Woehler's laboratory at 

 Gottingen. 



Professor Schiff was a German and educated 

 in German universities. He was compelled to 

 leave his native land, however, because of his 

 rather advanced political views and went some 

 forty years ago to the Royal Institute of Flor- 

 ence, where his brother was professor of 

 physiology. Professor Schiff made numerous 

 contributions to chemistry and was the discov- 

 erer of the compounds known as Schiff's bases. 

 He had no use for physical chemistry and 

 would not allow the use of electricity in his 

 laboratory. This recalls the fact also that 

 Professor Baeyer's laboratory at Munich did 

 not include any laboratory devoted to physical 

 chemistry until 1913, when a small room was 

 fitted up for this work. 



William McPherson 



Ohio State Univeesity 



SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS 



Dartmouth College has conferred the de- 

 gree of doctor of laws on Ernest Fox Nichols, 

 retiring president of the college, who has re- 

 signed to accept a chair of physics at Yale 

 University. 



Dr. WiLLUM H. Welch, professor of pathol- 

 ogy at Johns Hopkins University, received the 

 honorary degree of doctor of laws from the 

 University of Chicago at the commencement 

 exercises. 



Yale University has conferred its doctorate 

 of science on Dr. Theobald Smith, of the 

 Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, 

 and the degree of master of arts on Professor 

 A. D. Bevan, of the Rush Medical College. 



In conferring degrees of doctor of science 

 and master of arts, respectively, at the Har- 

 vard University commencement exercises. 

 President Lowell said : 



Eiehard Pearson Strong, knight errant of these 

 latter days, armed not like the knights of old, but 

 with the power of science, yet running greater risks 

 than they; destroying dragons invisible to mortal 

 eye, and saving not one or two, but hundreds and 

 thousands by his art. 



Ernest Henry Wilson, a botanist, who has ex- 

 plored the flora of the Chinese-Tibetan laud, and 

 enriched with many Asiatic shrubs and trees the 

 gardens of the western world. 



Dr. Harmon N. Morse, professor of chemis- 

 try in the Johns Hopkins University, has re- 

 ceived the doctorate of laws from Amherst 

 College, from which he graduated in 1873. 



The degree of doctor of science was con- 

 ferred on Dr. Ludvig Hektoen, director of the 

 Memorial Institute for Infectious Diseases, 

 Chicago, by the University of Wisconsin, at 

 the commencement on Juue 21. 



The honorary degree of doctor of science was 

 conferred on John J. Carty, of New York, chief 

 engineer of the American Telephone and Tele- 

 graph Company, at the commencement of Bow- 

 doiii College. 



Dr. Edward J. Nol.^n was given the degree 

 of doctor of science by Villanova College at 

 the last annual commencement, in recognition 

 of his many years' service as librarian and sec- 

 retary of The Academy of Natural Sciences of 

 Philadelphia. 



At the recent commencement the University 

 of Pittsburgh conferred the honorary degree 

 of doctor of laws on Dr. Otto Klotz, Dominion 

 astronomer, Ottawa. 



Dr. N. a. Cobb, of the Department of Agri- 

 culture, has received from the National Asso- 

 ciation of Cotton Manufacturers a medal " for 

 his work in establishing methods of determin- 

 ing the properties and value of cotton." 



On King George's birthday many titles were 

 conferred, among them that of knight on the 

 following scientific men: Dr. G. T. Beilby, 

 F.R.S., the chemist; Dr. M. A. Ruffer, form- 

 erly professor of bacteriology at Cairo Medical 



