a presentiment of new truths; the far greater number merely develop and follow the ideas of others. In a few instances the presentiment is extraordinary, but it is always likely to be a brilliant example of the scientific use of the imagination. Of the first order of magnitude was Harvey's assumption of the existence of minute vessels uniting the arteries and veins and completing the circuit of the circulation. In his day the microscope was too primitive to reveal them; in fact, Malpighi's discovery of the capillaries occurred four years after Harvey's death and thirty years after the publication of the "Motion of the Heart and Blood in Animals."

At all periods, voices have occasionally been raised to decry the domination of medicine by science. These timid souls would return to the less aided senses in order to provide the so-called intuitive faculty of the physician with greater latitude. Just now this thesis has been put forward by an eminent German surgeon-Sauerbruch-and an active controversy has been started. The weight of opinion, fortunately, is more modern and logical, for while it is properly admitted that superficial science can never compensate for slipshod observation, and while it is allowed that one doctor's wits are sharper and quicker than another's, yet it is urged with easy conviction that without true knowledge even the supremely intuitive can reach no real goal nor pass beyond the limits of the "inspired ignoramus."

If, therefore, we may not seek to organize the subject-matter of research, we may nevertheless undertake to organize the facilities which make the prosecution of research more consistent and less a matter of chance. In carrying out this purpose, we must ever keep in mind that the outstanding discoveries in science are the accomplishments of real men and usually of great men. Now, as it has been well said, great men are just those who bring with them new ideas and destroy errors. They do not, therefore, respect the authority of their predecessors and they do not move in an ordered way. While it is of course true that the discoveries of the great men preceding them stand at the base of their own discoveries, yet neither is ever the promoter of absolute and immutable truths. "Each great man belongs to his time and can come only at the proper moment, in the sense that there is a necessary and ordered sequence in the appearance of scientific discoveries. Great men may be compared to torches shining at long intervals to guide the advance of science. They light up their time, either by discovering unexpected fertile phenomena which open new paths and reveal unknown horizons, or by generalizing acquired scientific facts and disclosing truths which their predecessors had not perceived. If each great man makes the science which he

vitalizes take a long step forward, he never presumes to fix its final boundaries and he is destined to be outdistanced and left behind by the progress of successive generations. Great men have been compared to giants upon whose shoulders pygmies have climbed, who nevertheless see further than they. This simply means that science makes progress subsequently to the appearance of great men, and precisely because of their influence. The result is that their successors. know many more scientific facts than the great men themselves knew in their day. But a great man is, none the less, still a great man, that is to say-a giant." And who would presume to confine, that is to restrict by organization, a band of giants? It is enough to provide them, as they may now hope to be provided, with suitable material resources with which to perform their gigantic, wonder-working tasks, of which they are often the unconscious agents. This, and as it seems to me, this alone is the purpose and the justification for the organization of science: to afford opportunity commensurate with the objects to be attained, for both the giants and their associates of smaller stature, for him who blazes the trail and him who clears the path, since both operations are needed in order that knowledge may be increased and the light be made to enter the still dark places, and the spirit of man be thereby enlarged and made to shine. with ever greater brilliance.

THE ROCKEFELLER INSTITUTE FOR MEDICAL RESEARCH, NEW YORK, N. Y.

SIMON FLEXNER

SCIENTIFIC EVENTS

THE CONVERSAZIONES OF THE ROYAL

SOCIETY

THE first of the two conversaziones given annually by the Royal Society has taken place at Burlington House, when, as usual, an array of exhibits was pro

vided for the instruction and entertainment of the visitors.

According to an article in the London Times one of the most striking demonstrations was that of Mr. A. A. King, who showed the application of ultraviolet radiation from a mercury vapor lamp to the detection and estimation of minute quantities of arsenic. When a mercury-arsenic stain on a piece of filter-paper sensitized with mercuric chloride is examined in ultra-violet light the unchanged mercuric chloride fluoresces blue, while the mercury-arsenic stains stand out as a black disc. Arsenic stains,

Bernard, Claude, "An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine," English Translation, 1927, p. 41.

which are quite invisible in ordinary light, may be revealed in this way, and it is said to be possible to detect and estimate quantitatively amounts of arsenic as small as 0.00001 of a milligram. Impurity in distilled water is also revealed by fluorescence in ultraviolet light, and it has not yet been found possible, even with the most refined methods of distillation, to prepare water that does not show some sign of fluorescence. An exhibit from the National Physical Laboratory also illustrated the difficulty of preparing substances in a state of absolute purity. It included specimens of iron, manganese and chromium, the impurities in which are detectable only with the spectroscope.

Another exhibit from the National Physical Laboratory showed the structure of pure mercury in the solid state, the metal being kept frozen by liquid air or carbon dioxide snow and acetone and etched with a solution of hydrochloric acid that does not freeze at the temperatures employed. A collection of metallurgical specimens exhibited by Sir Robert Hadfield included sections from reinforcement bars of high tenacity non-corrodible steel, which are being used in the preservation work at St. Paul's to replace the original wrought-iron bars put in by Sir Christopher Wren.

Bolometers responding with remarkable rapidity to radiant heat were shown by Mr. H. Dewhurst; they consist of a narrow strip of bismuth, believed to be only 0.0000007 cm. thick, deposited on thin celluloid films by electrical evaporation. The thermostat of Lieutenant-Commander F. J. Campbell Allen and Mr. A. E. Salisbury depends on the fact that magnetic metals lose their magnetic properties at certain temperatures; in the apparatus an armature normally attracted by the metal drops as the temperature of the metal is raised, to be attracted again when the temperature falls.

Other physical exhibits included apparatus devised by Professor O. W. Richardson and Mr. F. S. Robertson for comparing the yield of soft X-rays from different substances; a demonstration by the British Thomson-Houston Company of the phenomena produced by an arc in a hot cathode discharge tube containing argon when tungsten vapor is injected; the Selényi method of measuring the vacuum in a lamp and new methods of using gas-filled photoelectric cells, one enabling very small illuminations to be detected without any delicate apparatus, and the other suitable for picture telegraphy, by the Research Laboratories of the General Electric Company; and apparatus for analyzing gases by means of high-frequency vibrations and for estimating flame temperature by spectrum line reversed, by the National Physical Laboratory.

AN INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR THE STUDY OF PEATLANDS

AN international organization for the study of peatlands (Moorforschung) has been formed as a subcommission of Commission VI of the International Society of Soil Science. The object is to promote peat investigations on an international basis and to coordinate and develop, in cooperation with governmental, state and private agencies such research and uniformity of methods in laboratory and field praetices as are deemed in the interest of the fullest investigation, utilization and protection of peatland resources. The work of the organization is to be carried on by the following officers: Dr. A. P. Dachnowski, U. S. Department of Agriculture, chairman; Dr. Hugo Osvald, director Peat Experiment Station. Jönköping, Sweden, secretary; Professor Dr. B. Tacke, Germany; Colonel J. Girsberger, Switzerland; Dr. L. von Post, Sweden; Professor S. H. McCrory, Washington, D. C.; Dr. F. J. Alway, Minnesota, U. S. A.; Dr. W. S. Dokturowski, U. S. S. R. (Russia); Dr. A. Kirsanov, U. S. S. R. (Russia).

Cooperation has been assured by an International Peat Committee which consists of leading members well known for their investigations in the geographical distribution of peatlands, in paleobotany, stratigraphy, agronomy, forestry, engineering and other special phases of peatland utilization.

The formation of the organization was initiated at informal conferences with directors of peat institutes and peat specialists in several countries of Europe. The proposal was made and approved of holding a special peat session in the United States and organizing during the sessions of the First International Congress of Soil Science, held in Washington, June 13 to 22, 1927.

The value of the special peat session just closed was shown by the interest in an exhibit of different types of peat and profile sections of peat areas, and by the commission's formal recognition of the advantages of genuine international action in common projects. It aims at the coordination of fundamental peat investigations with the practical technique of utilizing areas of peat for different purposes. At its final session the Congress recommended to secure uniformity of methods of procedure for the investigation and handling of peatlands, with the ultimate aim of obtaining an accurate determination of the agricultural and industrial possibilities of peatland resources throughout the world.

Persons engaged in any aspect of this subject and desiring to associate themselves with the work of the international sub-commission are invited to join a members. Communications may be addressed to Dr.

1. P. Dachnowsky, U. S. Department of Agriculture, Vashington, D. C.

AN AGRICULTURAL CENSUS OF THE

WORLD

AN agricultural census of the world is planned nder the direction of Mr. Leon M. Estabrook, of the aternational Institute of Agriculture at Rome. Plans ere prepared and approved by the general assembly f the institute in April, 1926.

Since June, 1926, Mr. Estabrook has been visiting inisters of agriculture and heads of the statistical visions of various governments in regard to the roject.

All European countries and surrounding countries, cluding Russia, Turkey, Syria, Palestine, Egypt and e North African Colonies, have promised cooperaon in taking the census, France offering the most tential difficulties. The European nations also omised to aid the institute in obtaining the cooperan of the colonies.

Mr. Estabrook is visiting Canada at the present ae and will proceed to Mexico, Cuba, Jamaica, aiti, Santo Domingo, Porto Rico, Panama and ence across the Pacific to Hawaii, Japan, China, do-China, the Philippines, Dutch East Indies, Auslia, New Zealand, India and the countries west, inding Arabia and others, to the colonies of eastern rica. He will then proceed to South Africa and nce to South America. He hopes to return to me, having completed the circuit of the world and ited practically every country, in time for the meetof the general assembly in October, 1928. This is the first attempt ever made to induce all mtries to take an agricultural census. Out of the countries listed by the International Agricultural stitute, only 60 have ever taken an agricultural cenand less than 40 have taken one since 1900. Of se not more than four happened by chance to take ensus in the same year, and no two have taken their sus in the same manner.

f the present attempt is successful, the institute es to obtain funds for its continuation, with colion of statistics every ten years.

Each country has agreed to pay for its own census to issue its own report, which will be utilized in paring the institute world report for each product.

THE GEOLOGIC SURVEY OF

PENNSYLVANIA

HE Topographic and Geologic Survey of Pennsylia is carrying on the following projects during present field season in addition to the cooperative graphic work:

G. H. Ashley. Preparing a popular report on the rocks of Pennsylvania.

R. W. Stone. Field work on building stones of Pennsylvania.

J. D. Sisler. Detailed reconnaissance of the oil and gas fields of Pennsylvania.

Anna I. Jonas. Detailed areal mapping in the Middletown and York quadrangles, with some cooperation from George W. Stose, of the United States Geological Survey. Herbert Hughes. Detailed areal mapping of the Freeport quadrangle.

Frank Leverett, of the United States Geological Survey. Cooperative study of glacial geology, especially that outside the terminal moraine.

George H. Chadwick. Stratigraphic studies in the oil and gas region of northwestern Pennsylvania.

Henry Leighton, University of Pittsburgh. Studies in the clay deposits of Pennsylvania of the Pittsburgh district, with field and laboratory studies by Professor J. B. Shaw at State College.

Charles R. Fettke and W. A. Copeland. Detailed plane-table mapping and studies in the Bradford oil field. Freeman Ward, Lafayette College. Areal studies of the sand and gravel deposits of Pennsylvania. Charles H. Behre, Jr.

of Lehigh River.

Detailed studies of slate west

Arthur M. Piper. Underground water resources of northwestern Pennsylvania.

On May 7 the state printery was nearly destroyed by fire. The survey's remaining stock of bulletins was on the third floor of this building and practically all destroyed. It is hoped that the more recent of these bulletins may later be reprinted from insurance funds.

FIELD EXPEDITIONS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO

FIELD expeditions from the University of Chicago have started on divergent trails to study scientific records of America in anthropology, geology, archeology and paleontology.

Professor Fay-Cooper Cole, of the department of anthropology, will continue the extensive study of the Illinois mounds which he began last year. Illinois, according to Professor Cole, is the key state in anthropology for prehistoric America. His work this summer will be part of a program that may take ten years to complete. Information will be gathered on the mounds of the state by advanced students under his direction, and some preliminary excavations will be made.

Paul Miller, curator of Walker Museum, will continue his research on dinosaurs and other extinct animals in an area of east-central Wyoming.

Professor Edwin Sapir, of the department of anthropology, and Fang-Kuei Li, Chinese student, will

study the language of a group of Hupa Indians in northwestern California. Li, who is specializing in linguistics, is working under the committee on American Indian languages of the Council of American Learned Societies. He will teach Chinese at the university next year.

A group of twenty-five students from a dozen universities and colleges met in June at the University of Chicago geological field station near St. Genevieve, Missouri, for a period of intensive study under Professor Stuart Weller. The site and buildings were presented to the university by W. E. Wrather, an alumnus.

Professor J Harlen Bretz, also of the department of geology, will continue studies of an area of 12,000 square miles in Washington, south of the Spokane River and east of the Columbia. Six graduate students and one undergraduate will assist him during part of the study.

Several members of the department of geology will work under the State Geological Survey, Dr. Paul McClintock continuing a detailed study of Illinois glacial deposits, and Dr. Jerome Fisher studying oil and gas possibilities in the southeastern part of the state. Associate Professor A. C. Noé, paleontologist, who is now in Russia engaged in the investigation of coal mines for the government, will later conduct a course on fossil plants in the coal fields of Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky.

A field class under the direction of Professor Edson S. Bastin, chairman of the department of geology, is now at work in the region of Devil's Lake, Wisconsin. Later Professor Bastin will complete a study of fluorspar deposits of Illinois and begin work on the asbestos deposits south of Quebec.

RESOLUTIONS IN MEMORY OF VICTOR

LENHER

A MEMORIAL resolution in honor of Dr. Victor Lenher, late professor of analytic and inorganic chemistry at the University of Wisconsin, was adopted at the last meeting of the faculty. Introduced by Professors R. Fischer, C. K. Leith and J. H. Mathews, it recalls the life and labors of Dr. Lenher, who died on June 12, 1927, at the age of fifty-four years.

Professor Lenher was called to the University of Wisconsin as assistant professor of general and theoretical chemistry in 1900; he was previously at Columbia University. In 1904 he became associate professor and in 1907 he was made professor. The resolution reads further:

For fourteen years he was a member of the board of education of the city of Madison, and for two years he was a member of the state board of health. His constant interest in municipal and state affairs was of in

estimable value to the city and to the commonwealth. During the early part of the world war, he interested himself in researches on gas warfare in collaboration with the bureau of mines and the gas service. Later he was commissioned as major in the chemical warfare service and served first as chief of university relations, and later as adjutant on the staff of Major-General Sibert, director of the chemical warfare service. He was honorably discharged, December 5, 1918.

In the study of the chemistry of gold, tellurium and selenium, he reached preeminence. His researches on the chemistry of these elements number over 60, covering a period of over twenty-five years.

The resolution eulogizes Professor Lenher as an edu cator and for his interest in students, and continues: In the death of Professor Lenher, the university has suffered an irreparable loss. He came to the university at a time when strong, capable men were specially needed, the beginning of a period of rapid expansion. He not only lived through this most interesting quarter-century of development of the university, but contributed largely to the wise direction of that development. His life. though shortened by an untimely death, was a full life and a happy one; he enjoyed his work, his students, his associates, and his family. He has left an imperish able record of achievement of which the University of Wisconsin will ever be proud.

SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS

DR. WHITMAN CROSS, from 1888 to 1925 geologi of the U. S. Geological Survey, and Professor A. G Högbom, of the University of Upsala, have beer elected foreign members of the Geological Society o London. Professor F. X. Schaffer, University of Vienna; Professor C. Schuchert, Yale University Professor F. Slavik, University of Prague, and Dr. E O. Ulrich, of the U. S. Geological Survey, have bee elected foreign correspondents.

DR. ROBERT A. MILLIKAN, of the California Inst tute of Technology, sailed for Geneva on July 11. t attend a meeting of the Committee on Intellectual Co operation of the League of Nations.

DR. W. D. MATTHEW, who recently resigned as he curator of the geological sciences in the America Museum of Natural History, has arrived in Berke to take up his work as professor of paleontology ar head of the department in the University of Cal fornia.

A COMMISSION from the medical faculty of the U versity of Havana is visiting the United States ar Canada as the guest of the Rockefeller Foundation The commission includes the following: Dr. Sola Ramos, dean and professor of biological chemist and chairman of the commission; Dr. Carlos Fina professor of ophthalmology, representing the clin

subjects in medicine. Dr. Finlay's father was among the first to suspect that yellow fever was transmitted by the Stegomyia mosquito; Dr. Aristides Agramonte, who has been acting dean of the medical school and who was a member of the original yellow fever commission; Dr. Felix Martin, professor of the school of engineers and architects, who is in charge of planning for the new medical buildings to be erected by the Cuban University. The commission will spend about eight weeks visiting medical institutions in the United States and Canada.

PAUL C. MILLER, paleontologist in the Walker Museum of the University of Chicago, has been made a Knight of the Order of Danebrog by the King of Denmark.

WARREN K. MOOREHEAD, director of the department of archeology at Phillips Academy, recently received the honorary degree of doctor of science from Oglethorpe University, in recognition of work in American archeology.

DR. EDWARD W. ARCHIBALD, director and professor of the surgical department of McGill University, was recently made an honorary fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of London.

THE title of emeritus professor of anatomy in the University of London has been conferred on Professor Edward Barclay-Smith as from the end of the session 1926-27, when he retires from the university chair of anatomy tenable at King's College.

DR. EDWIN GRANT CONKLIN, professor of biology at Princeton University, has been elected a member of the board of directors of the American Eugenics Society.

DR. H. H. DALE, head of the department of biochemistry and pharmacology in the National Institute for Medical Research at Mount Vernon and a secretary of the Royal Society, has been nominated to be for five years a member of the General Council of Medical Education and Registration.

PROFESSOR HENRY LOUIS, of Newcastle, was appointed by the council of the Institution of Mining Engineers at their summer meeting at Newcastle to succeed Dr. J. S. Haldane as president at the annual meeting in London in November.

THE following have been elected officers of the Manufacturing Chemists Association for the ensuing year: President, Henry Howard, Grasselli Chemical Co.; Vice-presidents, W. D. Huntington, Davidson Chemical Co.; H. A. Galt, Columbia Chemical Division, Pittsburgh Plate Glass Co.; Treasurer, Phillip Schleussner, Roessler & Hasslacher Chemical Co.; Secretary, John I. Tierney, 614 Investment Bldg., Washington, D. C.

DR. E. W. LINDSTROM, head of the genetics department of the Iowa State College at Ames, is sailing on August 5 for France to assist the directors of the European office of the International Education Board, particularly in their work in biology and agriculture. His address for the next twelve months will be: International Education Board, 20, rue de la Baume, Paris (8°), France.

PROFESSOR C. F. BAKER has resigned, to take effect in November, from the College of Agriculture at Los Baños, Laguna, P. I., with which institution he has been associated for many years. He expects to spend next year with one of the Pan-Pacific research committees on the South Sea survey and thereafter will make headquarters at the University of Hawaii with President David Crawford. Arrangements have been made to house his large collection of natural history material at the Bishop Museum.

PROFESSOR C. W. HOWARD, who for the past ten years has been working on the upbuilding of the silk industry of Southern China, is returning from Canton to this country as head of the department of biology at Wheaton College. A correspondent writes that beginning his work in the department of biology of the Canton Christian College, Professor Howard developed the work in sericulture to such an extent that the Chinese government established the Kwongtung Provincial Bureau for the Improvement of Sericulture under his directorship. In response to the urging of the government officials, he will retain his connection with this work, returning to Canton for the summers for the next few years.

DR. WILLIAM H. TALIAFERRO, professor of parasitology, and Drs. Lucy Graves Taliaferro and Frances A. Coventry, research associates in the department of hygiene and bacteriology of the University of Chicago, have returned from a three months' trip to Central America. Through the courtesy of the United Fruit Company they spent most of their time working on the serology and immunology of malaria and various intestinal worms at the hospital of the Tela Railroad Company, in Tela, Honduras. Dr. Taliaferro has been invited to the school of tropical medicine of the University of Porto Rico as visiting professor of parasitology during the winter quarter of 1928.

PROFESSOR A. S. HITCHCOCK, curator of the grass herbarium of the U. S. National Museum, left Washington on July 1 for two months' field work on the Pacific Coast, especially in the Olympic Mountains.

DR. W. O. RICHTMANN, professor of pharmacognosy at the University of Wisconsin and superintendent of the pharmaceutical garden of the Wisconsin Pharmaceutical Experiment Station, is abroad for a