phrase, "the harmonious expansion of all the powers which make the beauty and worth of human nature." But whether the scope which Arnold, at a particular moment, assigned to culture was narrower or wider, the instrument of culture with which he was chiefly concerned was always literature. Culture requires us, he said, to know ourselves and the world; and, as a means to this end, we must "know the best that has been thought and said in the world." By literature, then-as he once said in reply to Huxley-he did not mean merely belles lettres; he included the books which record the great results of science. But he insisted mainly on the best poetry and the highest eloquence. In comparing science and literature as general instruments of education, Arnold observed that the power of intellect and knowledge is not the only one that goes to the building-up of human life; there is also the power of conduct and the power of beauty. Literature, he said, serves to bring knowledge into relation with our sense for conduct and our sense for beauty. The greater and more fruitful is the progress of science, the greater is the need for humane letters, to establish and maintain a harmony between the new knowledge and those profound, unchanging instincts of our nature.

It is not surprising that, in the last third of the nineteenth century, Arnold's fascinating advocacy of literature, as the paramount agency of culture, should have incurred some criticism from the standpoint of science and of philosophy. The general drift of this criticism was that the claim which he made for literature, though just in many respects, was carried too far; and also that his conception of intellectual culture was inadequate. As a representative of such criticism, I would take the eminent philosopher whose own definition of culture has already been cited, Henry Sidgwick for no one, I think, could put more incisively the particular point with which we are here concerned. Matthew Arnold's method of seeking truth,' says Sidgwick, "is a survival from a pre-scientific age. He is a man of letters pure and simple; and often seems quite serenely unconscious of the intellectual limitations of his type. The critic proceeds to enumerate some things which, as he affirms, are "quite alien to the habitual thought of a mere man of letters." They are such as these: "How the crude matter of common experience is reduced to the order and system which constitutes it an object of scientific knowledge; how the precisest possible conceptions are applied in the exact apprehension and analysis of facts, and how by facts thus established and analysed the conceptions in their turn are gradually rectified; how the laws of Nature are ascertained by the combined processes of induction and deduction, provisional assumption and careful verification; how a general hypothesis is used to guide inquiry, and, after due comparison with ascertained particulars, becomes an accepted theory; and how a theory, receiving further confirmation, takes its place finally as an organic part of a vast, living, evergrowing system of knowledge. Sidgwick's conclusion is as follows: "Intellectual culture, at the end of the nineteenth century, must include as its most essential element a scientific habit of mind; and a scientific habit of mind can only be acquired by the methodical study of some part at least of what the human race has come scientifically to know.

There is nothing in that statement to which exception need be taken by the firmest believer in the value of literary education. The more serious and methodical studies of literature demand, in some measure, a scientific habit of mind, in the largest sense of that expression; such a habit is necessary, for instance, in the study of history, in the scientific study of language, and in the higher criticism." Nor, again, does anyone question that the studies of the natural sciences are instruments of intellectual culture of the highest order. The powers of observation and of reasoning are thereby disciplined in manifold ways; and the scientific habit of mind so formed is in itself an education. To define and describe the modes in which that discipline operates on the mind is a task for the man of science; it could not, of course, be attempted by anyone whose own training has been wholly literary. But there is one fact which may be noted by any intelligent observer. Many of our most eminent teachers of science,

and more especially of science in its technical applications, insist on a demand which, in the province of science, 1× analogous to a demand made in the province of literary study by those who wish such study to be a true instr.ment of culture. As the latter desire that literature should be a means of educating the student's intelligence and sympathies, so the teachers of science, whether pure cr applied, insist on the necessity of cultivating the scienti imagination, of developing a power of initiative in the learner, and of drawing out his inventive faculties. Ther urge that, in the interests of the technical industries thenselves, the great need is for a training which shall b more than technical-which shall be thoroughly scientific. Wherever scientific and technical education attains its highest forms in institutions of University rank, the aim is not merely to form skilled craftsmen, but to produce men who can contribute to the advance of their respective sciences and arts, men who can originate and invent There is a vast world-competition in scientific progress, on which industrial and commercial progress must ultimately depend; and it is of national importance for every country that it should have men who are not merely expert things already known, but who can take their places in the forefront of the onward march.

But meanwhile the claims of literary culture, as part of the general higher education, must not be neglected or undervalued. It may be that, in the pre-scientific age, those claims were occasionally stated in a somewhat exaggerated or one-sided manner. But it remains as tru as ever that literary studies form an indispensable element of a really liberal education. And the educational valu of good literature is all the greater in our day, becaus the progress of knowledge more and more enforces early specialisation. Good literature tends to preserve breadth and variety of intellectual interests. It also tends to cultivate the sympathies; it exerts a humanising in. fluence by the clear and beautiful expression of noble thoughts and sentiments; by the contemplation of Creat actions and great characters; by following the vari 1 development of human life, not only as an evolut. governed by certain laws, but also as a drama full interests which intimately concern us. Moreover, as hul well been said, if literature be viewed as one of the fr arts, it is found to be the most altruistic of them all since it can educate a sensibility for other forms of beauty besides its own. The genius of a Ruskin can quicke our feeling for masterpieces of architecture, sculpture, and painting. Even a very limited study of literature, if it t only of the right quality, may provide permanent spring of refreshment for those whose principal studies occupations are other than literary. We may recall her some weighty words written by cne of the very greatest of modern men of science. If I had to live ins again,' said Charles Darwin, "I would have made it rule to read some poetry and listen to some Musc least once every week. The loss of these tastes loss of happiness, and may possibly be injurious to thintellect, and more probably to the moral character, by enfeebling the emotional part of our nature.) The a lesson is enforced by John Stuart Mill, in that remarkabpassage of his Autobiography where he describes hoo while still a youth, he became aware of a serious defect a great lacuna, in that severe intellectual training which for him, had commenced in childhood. It was a training from which the influences of imaginative literature Fu been rigidly excluded. He turned to that literature fo mental relief, and found what he wanted in the poetry Wordsworth. "I had now learned by experience "-tis his comment "that the passive susceptibilities neede to be cultivated as well as the active capacities, and r quired to be nourished and enriched as well as guides Nor is it merely to the happiness and mental well-be of the individual that literature can minister. By render ing his intelligence more flexible, by deepening humanity, by increasing his power of comprehence, others, by fostering worthy ideals, it will add somethi", to his capacity for cooperating with his fellows in every station of life and in every phase of action; it will reas him a better citizen, and not only a more sympathetic ba also a more efficient member of society.

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One of the urgent problems of the higher education in our day is how to secure an adequate measure of literary culture to those students whose primary concern is with scientific and technical pursuits. Some of the younger English Universities, which give degrees in Science, contribute to this purpose by providing certain options in the Science curriculum; that is, a given number of scientific subjects being prescribed for study with a view to the degree of B.Sc., the candidate is allowed to substitute for one of these a subject taken from the Arts curriculum, such, for instance, as the Theory and Practice of Education. This is the case in the University of Wales and in the University of Birmingham; and there are indications, I believe, that this example will be followed elsewhere. Considering how hard and sustained is the work exacted from students of science, pure or applied, it seems important that the subjects from which they are to derive their literary culture should be presented to them, not in a dryasdust fashion, not chiefly as subjects of examination, but rather as sources of recreation and changes of mental activity. From this point of view, for British students of science the best literature of the English language offers unequalled advantages. It may be mentioned that the Board of Education in London is giving particular attention to the place which English literature should hold in the examination of students at the Training Colleges, and has under consideration carefully planned courses of study, in which portions of the best English writers of prose and of verse are prescribed to be read in connection with corresponding periods of English history, it being understood that the study of the literature shall be directed, not to philological or grammatical detail, but to the substance and meaning of the books, and to the leading characteristics of each writer's style. If, on the other hand, the student is to derive his literary culture, wholly or in part, from a foreign literature, ancient or modern, then it will be most desirable that, before leaving school, he should have surmounted the initial difficulties of grammar, and should have learned to read the foreign language with tolerable ease.

When we look at this problem-how to combine the scientific and the literary elements of culture-in the light of existing or prospective conditions in South Africa, it appears natural to suppose that, in a teaching University, the Faculty of Education would be that with which literary studies would be more particularly connected. And if students of practical sciences, such as Engineering and Agriculture, were brought together at the same where the Faculty of Education had its seat, then it should not be difficult, without unduly trenching on the time demanded by scientific or technical studies, to provide such students with facilities for some measure of good literary training.

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A further subject is necessarily suggested by that with which we have been dealing-I mean the relation of University to Secondary Education; but on that I can only touch very briefly. Before University Education can be widely efficient, it is indispensable that Secondary Education should be fairly well developed and organised. Secondary Education should be intelligent-liberal in spirit-not too much trammelled by the somewhat mechanical uniformity apt to result from working for external examinations, but sufficiently elastic to allow for different aptitudes in the pupils, and to afford scope for the free initiative of able teachers. It is a gain for the continuity of education when a school-leaving examination can be accepted as giving admission to the University. examination must be conducted under the authority of the University; but there is much to be said in favour of the view that, under proper safeguards, the school-teachers should have a part in the examination ; always provided that the ultimate control, and the decision in all cases of doubt, shall rest with the University. A system of school-leaving examinations for this country was earnestly advocated, I believe, by Mr. P. A. Barnett, who has achieved such excellent work for the cause of education in Natal. To discuss the advantages or difficulties of such a proposal, as they at present affect South Africa. would demand knowledge which I do not possess; and 1 must content myself with the expression of

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But the limit of time proper for a Chairman's address has now almost been reached. I thank you sincerely for the kindness and patience with which you have heard me. In conclusion, I would only say how entirely I share a conviction which has been expressed by one to whose ability, to whose generous enthusiasm and unflagging efforts the cause of education in this country owes incalculable debt-I refer to Mr. E. B. Sargant. Like him, I believe that the progress of education in all its grades, from the lowest to the highest, is the agency which, more surely than any other, will conduce to the prosperity and the unity of South Africa. For all workers in that great cause it must be an inspiring thought that they are engaged in promoting the most fundamental and the most far-reaching of national interests. They are endeavouring to secure that the men and women to whom the future of this country belongs shall be equal to their responsibilities and worthy of their inheritance. In that endeavour the sympathies which they carry with them are world-wide. As we come to see, more and more clearly, that the highest education is not only a national but an Imperial concern, there is a growing desire for interchange of counsels and for active cooperation between the educational institutions of the Colonies and those of the Mother

Country. The development of education in South Africa will command keen attention, and will be followed by earnest good wishes, not only in England but throughout the British dominions. One of the ideas which are bound up with the history and the traditions of our English public schools and Universities is the idea of efficient work for the State. Those institutions have been largely moulded, from generation to generation, by the aim of ensuring a supply of men qualified to bear a worthy part, either in the government of the nation, or in professional activities which are indispensable to the national welfare. In our own time, and more especially within the last thirty years, one particular aspect of that idea is illustrated by the closer connections which have been formed between the Universities and the higher branches of the Civil Service. The conception of work for the commonweal is in its turn inseparable from loyalty to those ideals of character and conduct by which English life and public policy have been built up. It is by the long and gradual training which such ideals have given that our race has been fitted to grapple with responsibilities which have inevitably grown, both in extent and in complexity, far beyond anything of which our forefathers could have dreamed. That training tends also to national self-knowledge; it makes for a sober estimate of our national qualities and defects; it quickens a national sense of duty to our neighbour. The munificence of a far-sighted statesman has provided that selected youths, whose homes are in this land, and whose life-work may be here, shall go for a while to England, shall breathe the intellectual and social atmosphere of a great English University, and shall learn to judge for themselves of the sources from which the best English traditions have flowed. That is excellent. But it is also most desirable that those traditions should pass as living forces into the higher teaching of South Africa itself, and that their spirit should animate educational institutions the special forms of which have been moulded by local requirements. That, indeed, has been, and is, the fervent wish of men whose labours for South African education have already borne abundant fruit, and are destined to bear yet larger fruit in the future. those labours prosper, and may that wish be fulfilled! The sooner will come the day when the inhabitants of this country, this country of vast and still indefinite possibilities, will be able to feel, in a sense higher and deeper than citizens of the Roman Empire could conceive, Cuncti gens una sumus ("We are all one people "). It the work which lies before us, in this Section of the British Association, should result in contributing anything towards the promotion of those great objects, by helping to elucidate the conditions of further progress, our deliberations will not have been held in vain.

May

UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL INTELLIGENCE.

THE Goldsmiths' College, New Cross, the gift of the Goldsmiths' Company to the University of London, will be opened to-morrow, September 29, by the Earl of Rosebery, K.G., K.T., F.R.S.

ON October Prof. J. W. Judd, C.B., F.R.S., will distribute the medals, prizes, &c., gained by the students of the Royal College of Science. The distribution will take place in the lecture theatre of the Victoria and Albert Museum, South Kensington, at 4 p.m.

THE University of Wisconsin has established a course in chemical engineering. Besides the regular professorial instruction, arrangements have been made for occasional lectures by prominent engineers. The course, covers four years, includes gas engineering and electrolytic work, as well as other branches of chemical practice.

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CONSEQUENT upon the closing of Coopers Hill College, it has been decided that probationers for the Indian Forest Department will take their theoretical course at Oxford. The writer of an article in the Indian Forester (July) on the future training of the upper staff of the Indian Forest Department recognises several advantages in the change. But while approval is expressed with the nature of the theoretical course and the experience that will be gained at Oxford, it is pointed out that a practical course in India, as, for instance, at Dehra Dun, would afford greater scope and provide more useful training for the work that is required of Indian forest officers than sending candidates to study forestry practice on the Continent.

THE French and Prussian Governments have recently established a system under which a number of young masters in English secondary schools may be attached for a year to certain secondary schools in their respective countries. The authorities of the foreign Ministries of Public Instruction are most anxious to extend the scheme and to find similar opportunities in suitable English secondary schools for young graduates who will afterwards be employed in their State schools. In the opinion of the Board of Education, the proposal has much to recommend it, and, provided that proper care be exercised in the selection of the candidates and in the arrangements made for their work, it is thought that the presence of such teachers on the staff of a school would add materially to the effectiveness of the modern language teaching. Headmasters who are willing to cooperate and to employ such assistants are requested to communicate with the Director of Special Inquiries and Reports, Board of Education Library, St. Stephen's House, Cannon Row, Westminster, S.W.

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THE following free public introductory lectures will be delivered at University College, London, during October. Sir William Ramsay, K.C.B., F.R.S., will lecture some advances in chemistry; Prof. L. M. Brandin on la critique littéraire au xixe siècle"; Prof. L. W. Lyde on the teaching of geography to children; Prof. H. S. Foxwell on some aspects of competition in modern business; Prof. F. Mackarness on the origins of Roman Dutch law and its introduction into the British Empire; Prof. E. A. Gardner on architectural sculptures; and Sir John Macdonell on some present directions in legislation. In the department of chemistry of the college several courses of work have been arranged for the ensuing session, viz. Sir William Ramsay, K.C.B., F.R.S., will lecture on the inactive gases of the atmosphere, and on the physics and chemistry of colours; Mr. E. C. Baly will give a course of lectures on spectroscopy and spectrum photography; Mr. J. H. K. Inglis one on recent advances in inorganic chemistry; and Mr. N. T. M. Wilsmore one on electrochemistry. A laboratory course in experimental psychology, consisting of lectures and practical demonstrations, will be given by Mr. W. McDougall, and a course of about thirty lectures on advanced psychology will be delivered by Prof. G. Dawes Hicks. Six lectures, open to the public without payment or ticket, will be given during November by Mr. G. U. Yule on the vital statistics of England and Wales.

THE Marquis of Linlithgow, Secretary for Scotland and vice-president of the Committee of Council on Education in Scotland, is to open the Dunfermline College of Hygiene and Physical Training on Wednesday next, October + A correspondent writing to the Times says that the establishment of a college of hygiene may be described as an afterthought on the part of the Carnegie trust. When the palatial gymnasium and baths, given to his native city by Mr. Carnegie at a cost of about 40,000l., was approaching completion, it attracted the notice of the highest educational authorities in Scotland, who recognised the fitness of the building, with its splendid equipments, to supply what they considered a serious defect in the national provision for education, viz. the instruction of teachers in physical training. After careful consideration the Carnegie trustees, who have charge of the building, agreed to entertain the appeal of the experts to link the local benefaction, of which they are the administrators, with a national service which, while bringing additional distinction to the city, would ensure greater efficiency in the physical training supplied to the local schools. The lady superintendent of athletic instruction has been transformed into the principal of the physical training college, a residence for women students has been acquired, a medical officer has been appointed to devote his whole time to the work of the college, and a course of study has been marked out to extend over two years and to include hygiene, anatomy, physiology, educational and remedial gymnastics on the Swedish system, games, swimming, dancing, &c.

SIR DONALD CURRIE's letter to the president of Queen's College, Belfast, offering a sum of money under certain conditions for the better equipment of the college was submitted at a private meeting of the executive committer of the college fund on September 22. It was unanimously resolved to convey to Sir Donald Currie the thanks of the committee for his proposal. It was also resolved that in view of the munificent offer of Sir Donald Currie, the committee earnestly appeal to all old students of the college and all who are interested in the promotion of education in Belfast and Ulster to assist in raising the required surn of 20,000l. before Christmas. The Rev. Dr. Hamilton, president of Queen's College, writing to the Belfast papers on September 23 in reference to Sir Donald Currie's offer of 20,000l., says that for some time Queen's College has been engaged in a strenuous effort to better its equipments, SO as to bring them into line with the scientific and educational advances of our time and with its own growth and development in recent years. This enterprise was inaugurated four years ago, and, notwithstanding adverse circumstances, quickly attained a gratifying success. A sum of more than 30,000l. has been raised, by means of which most important additions have been made to the working power of the college. One laboratory has been built and equipped, and the foundation of a second will, it is hoped, be laid before many weeks have passed. If the college succeeds in satisfying the reasonable conditions. which Sir Donald Currie lays down, the fund will be increased to 70,000l., and the college will be placed in a financial position such as it never before occupied.

AMONG the calendars and educational directories published during the past few days we notice those of the Northampton Institute at Clerkenwell, the Armstrong College at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and the Plymouth Educa tion Authority. At the Northampton Institute the following classes are worthy of mention, viz. the day and evening courses in mechanical and electrical engineering, in technical optics, and in horology. In addition to these there are evening courses in technical chemistry and in domestic economy. The Armstrong College was formerly known as the Durham College of Science. The college forms an important part of the University of the North of England, and the degrees of Durham in science and in letters, and its diplomas in engineering, are open to students of this Newcastle institution. It may be noticed that, in addition to the biological laboratories at The college, a marine biological laboratory has been opened at Cullercoats, and by the generosity of the Northumberland Sea Fisheries Committee is available for students The agricultural department has been entrusted with the

scientific direction of the farm acquired for the purpose of experiment and demonstration by the Northumberland County Council. The new calendar contains full information of all the courses of work arranged for the coming session. The Plymouth directory contains an excellent diagram showing in a graphic manner the arrangements made by the local education authority to coordinate the work in all Plymouth schools. The classes at the school of science and technology make it possible for any workman anxious to acquaint himself with the scientific principles of his calling to do so easily.

The

In order to facilitate the adoption by secondary schools of systematic courses in geography, the Board of Education has issued a circular indicating in outline the points to which the attention of inspectors will be directed when inspecting classes in this subject. Each school desiring the approval of the Board for its course in geography should be prepared to submit a course providing, first, an outline scheme dealing with the great land and water areas in such a way that on completing the course the pupils shall have gone through the geography of the world; and, secondly, a suitably graded series of exercises connected with the subjects included in the course. Board lays it down that the aim of the teaching should be to produce a vivid impression of connected facts through considerations, such as those of cause and effect, and the practical bearings of the facts selected. Referring to the exercises, the circular states that these may consist of (a) questions and answers designed to elicit, through causes and consequences, subject-matter for entry in the pupils' note-books; (b) notes and diagrams which should include worked-out problems together with original maps and plans; (c) mapping; and (d) field work, excursions, factory visits, &c. Suggestions for a four-year course in geography, together with an outline plan for preliminary instruction, are also given. The work suggested for the preliminary instruction as suitable for children from eight to twelve, and the statement of what these pupils should be expected to know before entering upon the four-years' course, presume a standard of attainment which the Board can scarcely expect to be realised at present. The knowledge of physiography, for instance, to be expected of these young people would be a credit to students several years older. As so few teachers of geography understand what is meant by the scientific study of their subject, it would have been an advantage if the instructions as to the practical work to be done could have been made more explicit. The circular refers to "worked-out problems,' "" but it might with advantage have included a few typical examples of the problems required. The real difficulty will be to find teachers capable of acting in the spirit of the suggestions made by the Board; but it is something for them to have a method indicated which not only is sound in principle, but is being put into practice here and there. The circular is a decided step in advance, and brings nearer the time when scientific instruction in geography will be general in schools of all grades.

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SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES.
LONDON.

Royal Society, June 8.- "The Pharmacology of Indaconitine and Bikhaconitine." By Dr. J. Theodore Cash, F.R.S., and Prof. Wyndham R. Dunstan, F.R.S. The present paper deals with the physiological action of aconitines," which have been isolated at the Imperial Institute from two varieties of Indian aconite. One is an alkaloid, which has been named indaconitine. It was found in the roots of the Indian aconite, called by Bruhl Aconitum napellus, var. hians, since identified by Stapf as a new species which has received the name of Aconitum chasmanthum. The other alkaloid has been named bikhaconitine," being derived from one of the highly poisonous forms of aconite known in India under the vernacular name of Bikh. This aconite was named by Bruhl Aconitum ferox, var. spicatum, but has been renamed Aconitum spicatum by Stapf, who regards it as a distinct species.

Results of experiments with these two substances are summarised as follows:-

The two aconitines, indaconitine and bikhaconitine, agree in their qualitative effects with the other alkaloids of this series, aconitine, japaconitine, and pseudaconitine, which have been dealt with in our previous papers.

The toxicity of indaconitine is less than that of bikhaconitine towards warm-blooded animals; in this respect the former stands very near to the aconitine of A. napellus, whilst the latter, being somewhat stronger than japaconitine, is to be referred to a position between this alkaloid and pseudaconitine from forms of A. ferox, which is much the most active of the series.

The depression of the respiratory function by indaconitine is less than that produced by bikhaconitine, and to this the greater toxicity of the latter is referable. Repeated doses of alkaloids administered at regular intervals and in similar fractional proportions of the lethal dose are followed by a more marked toxic effect when bikhaconitine is administered rather than indaconitine. Towards frogs the toxicity of the two alkaloids under discussion is practically equal; bikhaconitine is more active than indaconitine in reducing the respiratory activity. On the other hand, it is somewhat less active in abolishing the excitability of muscular and intramuscular motor nervous tissue (immersion experiments), and in reducing the ability of the muscle-nerve preparation poisoned in situ for the performance of work sufficient to cause fatigue. The local effect of the two aconitines when applied to the skin by inunction is equal and similar to that of the aconitines already considered.

Indaconitine and bikhaconitine may therefore be substituted for aconitine and pseudaconitine for internal use, intlaconitine being administrable in the same dose as aconitine (from A. napellus) and bikhaconitine in proportion of 0.75 of the unit dose of the former, whilst for local application they may be used as constituents of ointments in similar proportions to aconitine.

Pseudaconine from Pseudaconitine and Bikhaconitine. The action of these is, towards frogs, identical. Their toxicity appears to be practically equal and their effect generally similar that of aconine (from aconitine). Their action is in the main curari-like in character.

to

"On the Physiological Activity of Substances Indirectly Related to Adrenalin." By H. D. Dakin. Communicated by Prof. E. H. Starling, F.R.S.

The following deductions are made provisionally, until further experimental evidence is available :--

(1) It appears that the catechol nucleus is essential for the production of physiologically active substances of the type of adrenalin.

(2) It is of importance that the hydrogen atoms of both hydroxyl groups in the catechol nucleus be unsubstituted. (3) An alkyl group of low molecular weight (e.g. methyl, ethyl) attached to the nitrogen tends to produce a much more active substance than when an aromatic group is attached, whilst derivatives of piperidine, heptylamine, and benzylamine occupy an intermediate position.

(4) The reduction of ketonic bases of the type

where R is a simple aliphatic group, results in the production of bases with enormously increased physiological activity.

(5) In the substances examined there appears to be a connection between chemical instability and physiological activity, and vice versa.

July 8. An Experimental Inquiry into the Nature of the Substance in Serum which influences Phagocytosis." By Dr. George Dean. Communicated by Prof. J. Rose Bradford, F.R.S.

The author's conclusions are as follows:

(1) As has been shown by a number of workers, e.g. Denys, Metchnikoff, Savtschenko, Levaditi and others, there is produced in the blood serum of animais actively immunised by bacterial injections a specific immune substance which has among its properties that of preparing the microbe for phagocytosis.

(2) This immune substance is thermostable, resisting a temperature of 60° C. for several hours.

(3) In normal serum there is present a substance having a similar action and which also resists a temperature of 60° C. for hours, and may persist in the serum of the horse for years.

(4) The experiments recorded in this paper tend to confirm the idea that the substances are identical, i.e. that in normal serum there is present a small amount of the immune substance having the property of preparing the microbes for phagocytosis.

(5) Cocci fully occupied by the substance from heated immune serum when passed through fresh normal serum do not remove the substance from normal serum, whereas fresh cocci remove a large part of it.

(6) The converse of the above is also true, viz. that cocci fully occupied by the substance from normal serum do not remove the substance from immune serum, whereas fresh cocci do.

(7) The thermostable substance in normal serum is no doubt identical with the "fixateur " or "substance sensibilisatrice of the French school and with Wright and Douglas's "opsonin.'

Seeing that the terms "fixateur" and "substance sensibilisatrice " which have been employed by Metchnikoff's school to include the property of preparing the microbes for phagocytosis are used to designate a number of other properties of immune serum, it may be convenient to adopt Wright and Douglas's term of opsonin " for the particular property in question. The only danger attached to such a course is that one might be led to regard the “ opsonin as actually a different substance, and not merely a property of immune serum.

PARIS.

66

Academy of Sciences, September 18.-M. Troost in the chair.-Preliminary note on the total eclipse of the sun of August 30 at Burgos: H. Deslandres. Details are given of the instruments set up and the observations attempted. Owing to clouds, the second and third contacts could not be observed. The corona was seen for a minute about the middle of totality. M. Fabry succeeded in making a photometric measurement of the total light of the corona, and an observation of the brightness of one of its points. M. Bernard also was successful in some photometric observations, and M. d'Azambuja in measurements of the heat spectrum of the corona. Details of the work will be published later.-Observation of the eclipse of August 30: H. Andoyer. The apparatus was installed at El-Arrouch, 32 kilometres from Philippeville, and the weather was very favourable. The object was to obtain as many direct photographs as possible. Forty-four were obtained, eleven during totality.-Observation of the solar eclipse of August 30 at Athens: D). Eginitis. The observations were made under good atmospheric conditions.-On the isolation of terbium: G. Urbain. In a preceding communication the author has described the separation of a rare earth characterised by a single absorption band λ=488, corresponding to an element named Z8 by M. Lecocq de Boisbaudran. This has been submitted to a long series of further fractionations, first as a double nitrate with nickel, and afterwards by precipitation with ammonia. The final product was 7 grams of an earth apparently homogeneous, for which the author proposes to reserve the name of terbium. The principal bands in the absorption spectrum are given, and the atomic weight, 159.2 (O= 16).

NEW SOUTH WALES.

In

and the typical female (form A), the abdomen being thicker than in the male, but with the tip distinctly enlarged; while in colouring it almost exactly resembles the male. but bears not the slightest resemblance to the typical female. Both forms, however, possess the pale pterostigma on the forewing, whereas in the male this is black. -Notes on the older Tertiary foraminiferal rocks on the west coast of Santo, New Hebrides: F. Chapman. The examination of the oldest sedimentary rocks seen and collected by Mr. Mawson in the Island of Santo proves them to be of Miocene age (Aquitanian and Burdigalian). A point of particular interest brought out by the present investigations is the association of Lepidocyclina with the excentric forms of Miogypsina in the New Hebrides. From this it appears that faunas, distinct in the European area, were living together in the New Hebrides Miocent sea. A similar association of species occurs here as in the Miocene limestones of Christmas Island, and also of Madoura, and other parts of the Dutch East Indies, with which the New Hebrides marine area was most probably connected when these fossiliferous beach and shallow-water deposits were laid down.-On the occurrence of a bed of

fossiliferous tuff and lavas between the Silurian and Middle Devonian at Cavan, Yass, N.S.W., similar in age and character to the Snowy River porphyries of Victoria: A. J. Shearsby. The role of agglutination in immunity: R. Greig Smith. The research has shown that (1) normal typhoid bacteria are incapable of being absorbed by the leucocytes when these have been freed from adhering serum; (2) typhoid bacteria, when treated with active agglutinating serum which has been heated to destroy the opsonins, are agglutinated and are then englobed by the leucocytes; (3) typhoid bacteria which have been grown in agglutinating serum, heated or not heated, are also absorbed (4) while active agglutinating serum prepares the microbes for inception by the phagocytes, the so-called chemical agglutinating substances do not possess this property; and (5) the role of agglutinin is, therefore, to coat the bacteria with a precipitate which is positively chemotactic towards the leucocytes; and thus, by facilitating the absorption of the microbes, agglutination plats an active part in immunity.

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Ephemeris of the Variable Asteroid (167) Uida The Ultra-violet Chromospheric Spectrum The Formation of Ice and the Grained Structure of Glaciers. By Prof. G. Quincke, For. Mem. R. S. The British Association :

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Section L.-Educational Science.-Opening Address by Sir Richard C. Jebb, Litt. D., D. C. L., M.P., President of the Section

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The Fayum. (Illustrated.) By J. W. J.
The Royal Photographic Society's Exhibition
Prof. Leo Errera. By Prof. Jean Massart.
Notes. (Illustrated.)

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Astronomical Occurrences in October
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