especially in seeking to devise trustworthy processes for the assay of crude drugs and their preparations, and to the extent to which they have succeeded they have contributed in their measure to the benefits conferred on suffering humanity by the healing art.

A few pointed observations reflecting my personal opinion on certain aspects of the question of standardisation may not, I trust, be considered inappropriate with which to conclude my address. In my estimation the aim should be to produce preparations that will represent the sum total of therapeutic activity of the drugs operated on except in cases where it is desired to obtain the medicinal effects of certain definite principles the physiological action of which is indisputable. As an illustration a preparation of opium may be cited where the presence of narcotine may be considered objectionable. Further, in respect of a given preparation it must be required of the pharmacist to devise suitable processes not only for the estimation of the chief medicinal constituent, but as far as possible the several medicinal constituents and the proportion in which they are present. I would go even further, and say that in the near future it may be necessary to determine certain principles hitherto disregarded, which modify the therapeutic activity of the drug. The pharmacologist may be depended on to point the way, and despite the heavy tax 'his call for fuller investigation will put upon the resources of the pharmacist, I am encouraged to believe he will prove equal to the demand. Without reflecting on modern methods of standardisation, which undoubtedly have met with general acceptance, I cannot suppress the conviction that their tendency is not free from a suspicion of narrowness. The besetting temptation consists in a disposition to restrict the medicinal properties of a drug to a potent principle, the therapeutics of which are universally recognised by clinicians, and acting on this assumption to proceed to produce a preparation and to standardise it on the basis of the particular principle and with little or no regard to other constituents that may directly or indirectly be of value. For instance, according to present-day knowedge, the chief active principle of the three drugs belladonna, scopola, and henbane is hyoscyamine. If a tincture of each be prepared so as to contain the same percentage of alkaloid or alkaloidal content, will it be seriously contended that therapeutically considered the three are interchangeable, and therefore it is a matter of indifference which of them is selected for use? If the physician finds it a distinct advantage to administer the belladonna tincfure in one case and the henbane tincture in another, surely t is because he is satisfied that the two preparations do rot produce identical results. May this not be taken as prima facie evidence that there are in the tinctures constituents present, other than hyoscyamine or alkaloidal content, which claim to be reckoned with?

LONDON.-The senate has accepted the offer made by The Secretary of State for the Colonies of the sum of 70 a year for five years for the purpose of instituting chair of protozoology. Of this sum, 200l. a year is a contribution from the Rhodes trustees, and 500l. a year represents a moiety of a grant originally made from the tropical diseases research fund to the Royal Society for promotion of research work, and by the Royal Society surrendered for the purpose of endowing the chair. It Ras decided to devote the whole amount as salary of the professor, and to set aside a further sum of 200l. a year to defray the cost of assistants and laboratory expenses in connection with the chair.

Mr. Edgar Schuster, the Francis Galton research Fellow in national eugenics, has presented a report containing a preliminary account of inquiries which have been made into the inheritance of disease, and especially of feeblemindedness, deaf-mutism, and phthisis.

Of the five commissioners under the Bill promoted by the university and University College for the determinaton of the conditions under which the college will be incorporated in the university, which measure received the Royal assent on July 11, Lord Justice Cozens-Hardy and

Sir Edward Busk were nominated by the university, and Sir John Rotton and Prof. J. Rose Bradford by the college. The remaining commissioner is to be appointed by His Majesty in Council, and will act as chairman. Sir Edward Fry, late Lord Justice of Appeal, has consented to allow his name to be submitted to His Majesty in Council for this post, and it is expected that the Order in Council announcing his appointment will shortly be published.

Under the will of the late Dr. Nathaniel Rogers, a prize of 100l. is offered for an essay on "The Physiology and Pathology of the Pancreas." Essays, preferably typewritten or printed, must be sent to the secretary of the senate by, at latest, May 1, 1907.

THE services rendered to science by the late Dr. T. M. Drown, president of Lehigh University, are to be fittingly recognised, subscriptions having been invited for the purpose of erecting at the university a building to be called Drown Memorial Hall in his honour.

PROF. W. A. TILDEN, F.R.S., has been appointed dean of the Royal College of Science, South Kensington, in succession to Prof. J. W. Judd, C.B., F.R.S., who retired from the position on July 31.

MR. H. J. HUTCHENS has been appointed demonstrator of bacteriology in the University of Durham. He will continue his work for the Royal Commission on Tuberculosis.

THE subject of the health essay (Durham University) for 1908 is " Injuries and Diseases of the Arteries, Veins and Capillaries, and their Treatment." Essays must be typewritten or printed, and reach the professor of surgery not later than March 31 of the year for which it is to be awarded.

A REPORT on the work of University College, London, for the session 1904-5, was read by Prof. Cormack, dean of the faculty of science, at the assembly of the faculties of arts and laws and of science on July 5. The report records that the Bill for the incorporation of the college in the University of London has passed the House of Lords, and has also passed its first and second readings, as well as the committee stage, in the House of Commons. It is therefore expected that the Bill will receive the Royal assent before the end of the present Parliamentary session. In that case the commissioners, appointed under the Bill to carry out the incorporation of the college in the university, will begin their meetings after the long vacation, and it ought to be possible to complete the actual incorporation by September, 1906. Of the sum of 200,000l. required for this purpose, all but 17,000l. has been obtained. In the department of applied mathematics the most important event of the session was the generous grant by the Worshipful Company of Drapers of 400l. yearly for five years to continue the biometric and research work of the department. This grant has put on a more permanent footing the work already instituted by the same company two years ago. Six memoirs have been specially published as a Drapers' Research Series, and a number of others are in preparation. The work for these has been rendered possible almost entirely by the financial aid provided by this gift. The number of research papers emanating from this department is eighteen, and among them may be noted a paper on "Some Disregarded Points in the Stability of Masonry Dams," which directs attention to a number of complicated and highly important technical questions, and is a valuable contribution both to theory and practice. The research work done in the Pender laboratory during the session has included such practically important matters as :—additional improvements in means for the photometric measurement of the value of incandescent electric lamps; a long research on the magnetic qualities of alloys, not containing iron, which promises to be of great technical importance; and the invention of instruments called cymometers, which are, in effect, electrical spectroscopes, and enable the frequency of the oscillations in any electric circuit to be measured with great accuracy. Several important contributions to science have come from the department of chemistry; and the list of publications by investigators in this and other departments shows that the activity of the college in producing original work is being maintained.

The

Academy of Sciences, July 24.-M. Troost in the chair. -On the total eclipse of August 30: M. Janssen. Observations will be taken at Alcocebre, near Valencia, in Spain. On a simple case from which can be easily calculated the mutual action of consecutive rings constituting a tube, and on the influence of this mutual action on the propagation of liquid waves in this tube: J. Boussinesq.-On the nature of the hydrocyanic glucoside of the black elder: L. Guignard and J. Houdas. bruised leaves were macerated with water for twentyfour hours at a temperature of 25° C.; the liquid gave a distillate from which semicarbazide separated a crystalline precipitate, identical with benzaldehyde semicarbazide. This result, together with the formation of hydrocyanic acid, shows that the elder leaf contains amygdalin.-The catalytic decomposition of monochlor-derivatives of methane hydrocarbons in contact with anhydrous metallic chlorides : Paul Sabatier and A. Mailhe. The chlorides of nickel, cobalt, iron, cadmium, lead, and barium, at a temperature of about 300° C., readily decompose the fatty alkyl chlorides, giving hydrochloric acid and the corresponding ethylene. The reaction does not take place with methyl chloride, but ethyl, propyl, isobutyl, and isoamyl chlorides readily decompose under these conditions, barium chloride being the most convenient catalytic agent.--The convergence of rational fractions: H. Padé.-Experimental researches on the effect of membranes in liquid chains M. Chanoz. The effect of the membrane on the

observed electromotive force may be provisionally explained by the formation at the expense of the electrolyte of a double electric layer in contact with the membrane.-The hysteresis of magnetisation of pyrrhotine: Pierre Weiss. -On a dihedral stereoscope of large field, with bisecting mirror Léon Pigeon.-On fluorescence: C. Camichel. An experimental proof that the coefficient of absorption of a fluorescent body does not vary at the moment of fluorescence, and that the intensity of the light emitted by the fluorescence is proportional to the intensity of the exciting light. The influence of water vapour on the reduction of carbon dioxide by carbon: O. Boudouard. The reduction of carbon dioxide by carbon at temperatures between 650° C. and 1000° C. is practically unaffected by the presence of water vapour, the state of equilibrium being nearly identical whether the gases are dry or moist.-On an extension to oxide of zinc of a method of reproduction of silicates of potassium and other bases: A. Duboin.On a sub-iodide of phosphorus and the part played by this body in the allotropic transformation of phosphorus: R. Boulouch. The sub-iodide is produced by the action of sunlight on a solution of iodine and phosphorus in carbon disulphide; it is formed as a precipitate, being insoluble in carbon disulphide, and has the composition P,I. It is decomposed by dilute potash solution, losing its iodine and apparently forming P,OH.-On a potassium iridiochloronitrite: L. Quennessen. The action of sodium sulphite upon ethanal: MM. Seyewetz and Bardin. Under certain conditions, details of which are given, crotonic aldehyde is formed in this reaction, the yield (40 per cent.) being sufficiently good to make this a preparative method.-On sparteine: the hydrates of methyl-, dimethyl-, and trimethylsparteine: Charles Moureu and Amand Valeur.-On gentiine: Georges Tanret. Gentiine is the glucoside accompanying gentiopicrin. Hydrolysed with dilute sulphuric acid, gentienine, glucose, and xylose are formed. It is noteworthy that this is the first known glucoside which gives xylose amongst its products of hydrolysis. The chemical equilibrium of the system: ammonia gas, isoamylamine chlorhydrate: Félix Bidet. Pressures are given both for the direct and inverse reaction at -23°. -9°, -5°, 0°, and 16°, the concordance between the two sets of observations being quite satisfactory. --On the regeneration of the bruised radicle: P. Ledoux. There is no regeneration of the parts cut, and in the case of the lateral roots there are other anatomical differences. -On the shrimps of the genus Caricyphus arising from the collections of the Prince of Monaco: H. Coutière.—

On the growth in weight of the chicken: Mlle. M. Stefanowska. Curves of growth are given for both sexes; there is a point of inflection in the curves for the male when it has attained 77 per cent. of its maximum value, and for the female at 21 per cent. The results of the observations are expressed empirically in two hyperbolas.-Experiments on the mechanical washing of the blood: Ch. Répin.-Intra-organic combustions measured by the respiratory exchanges as affected by residence at an altitude of 4350 metres: G. Kuss. These observations were carried out on several subjects at the summit of Mt. Blanc. There were seven persons under experiment; they stayed at the observatory on the summit from four to ten days, their respiratory coefficients being determined several times daily. Both before and after their stay on Mt. Blanc observations were made at Chamonix (1065 metres) and at Angicourt (100 metres). The conclusions drawn from the whole of the experiments are that the respiratory exchanges are not sensibly modified by a prolonged stay at great altitudes, and a slight attack of mountain sickness is also without influence on the results. -On the presence of poison in the eggs of bees: C. The eggs of bees contain a small amount of poison of the same nature as that present in the adult bee. Each egg contains about 0-001 mgr. of the venom, and as each egg weighs about 0.15 mgr. it follows that the toxic substances present amount to about 1/150th part of its weight. On the production of mechanical work by the adductor muscles of the Acephala: F. Marceau.-On the structure of the muscles of the mantle of cephalopods with respect to their mode of contraction: F. Marceau.-The germination and growth of the artificial cell: Stéphane Leduc. The study of the diaphragm by means orthodiascopy H. Guilleminot. The general movements of the atmosphere in winter: Paul Garrigou-Lagrange.

Phisalix.

CONTENTS.

of

PAGE

KARYOKINESIS

in root of Allium, about 150 Serial Sections of an entire root-tip. In case, 10/6.

APICAL CELL in Aspidium rootlet, about 100 Serial Sections, also shows stages in Cell division. In case, 7/6. See NATURE, July 20, 1905, page 278.

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