PERSONAL. 
Mr. Bagster has just about completed his investigations into an 
effective method of decolourization of leather tanned by mangrove bark, 
and his report will soon be issued. 
Mr. OC. E. Lane Poole, who has been Conservator of Forests in 
Western Australia for some years, and a member of the Advisory 
Council of Science and Industry, has been appointed one of the Victorian 
Forest Commissioners, at a salary of £800 a year. 
Professor H. ©. Richards, of Brisbane, has been recommended as a 
full member of the Advisory Council of Science and Industry. He has 
been an associate member from the first, and has done excellent work 
as Honorary Secretary of the Queensland State Committee. 
Dr. H. G. Chapman is still working on his bread-making experi- 
ments, and is very satisfied with the results. 
Professor Douglas Stewart hopes to visit Western Australia in con- 
nexion with tick eradication during the long vacation. 
Mr. D. Avery, of Avery and Anderson, consulting chemists, has been 
added to the special committee which is carrying out investigations into 
fuel economy. 
Mr. E. E. Turner, M.Sc. (Lond.), B.A. (Camb.), A.I.C., has been 
appointed additional lecturer and demonstrator in the Organic Chemistry 
Department of the University of Sydney. 
Status of the Chemist: His Relation to Manufacture. 
By BERTRAM BLOUNT. 
I happen to know Germany fairly well, having been there more times than | 
can count, and having conferred with German chemists and manufacturers on many 
occasions and on many technical subjects, and I can safely say that in that 
country the right of a man trained as a chemist to control of works depending 
for its existence and vitality on chemical science is fully recognised. 
What is.the result? The highly-trained young man enters a large business 
establishment, not as a chemical hack, but on much the same terms as a junior 
partner on the commercial side, and, as he grows in experience and standing, will 
delegate this routine chemical work to other young men, just as the ordinary 
rising business man deputes his work to his manager and clerks. From the start 
he not only ranks equally with his commercial colleagues, but, having special 
knowledge of the basis on which their joint business rests, he naturally becomes its 
head, as I have seen again and again in Germany, but rarely here. 
Now, the position in this country is all wrong, and until it is righted we might 
as well reconcile ourselves to the old blundering methods most properly condemned 
by Sir Gerard Muntz. It must be remedied by a closer co-operation between the 
manufacturer, the practical chemist, and the pure scientist. All three can con- 
tribute, and the immediate need is collaboration between the practical chemist 
and the manufacturer, 
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