ETHYLENE AND CARBON MONOXIDE.

29 examination.

Here, he thinks, is work for the and Lister and quoting modern instances such as is nothing, or very little, in the insulin. Finally he pointed out the relation of experi-

pharmacist, yet there pharmacist’s training To

remedy the

courses

should

be

instituted so that students could be thoroughly trained in such processes as sterility tests, the preparation of vaccines, the examination of throat swabs, and so on. There is no doubt much to be said in support of Dr. Burn’s ideals, but the average pharmacist may think them too lofty for practical purposes. Perhaps the most cogent argument in his favour was the one used by the secretary to the Pharmaceutical Society who, in the course of the discussion which followed the reading of the paper, said it was the function of the pharmacist to provide any medicinal agent which might be required by a medical practitioner. We are not in the secrets of the pharmaceutical authorities, but it seems significant that both the Society’s secretary and one of its chief scientific officers should show by public utterances that they are in favour of providing means to equip pharmacists for this new work. Unfortunately, the idealists will find very little active support and no enthusiasm in the rank and file. We say this on the evidence of a pharmacist who is in close touch with members of his calling. The small, very small, band of pharmacists who have fitted themselves for work of the kind which Dr. Burn has in mind have had very little encouragement to go on with it. Some of them have found work to do, but when they were just getting into their swing a county council or some other public body has relieved them of their task, and, indeed, the general tendency in this matter .seems to be towards centralisation. The subject is not a new one ; we discussed it in these columns some two years ago, and can now see no reason to alter the conclusion we then reached that at some future time we shall probably see two classes of pharmacist-the one class with lip sticks as a side line," to use an expression familiar to the confraternity, and the other composed of the poor but faithful sons of Galen. "

____

THE STEPHEN

ments on animals to the control of animal diseases such as rabies, anthrax, and glanders. The Research Defence Society should not be looked on as a body merely organised to resist attack on the essential methods of medical research, but as a body prepared to fight actively against ignorance and apathy.

to fit him to do this work.

deficiency

PAGET MEMORIAL LECTURE.

closely WI1Jll tne stepnen j-aget activities of the Research Defence Society that a lectureship endowed in his name is a fitting memorial. The first Stephen Paget memorial lecture was given on June 21st by Mr. Julian S. Huxley, until recently professor of zoology in the University of London. Mr. Huxley has recently relinquished his chair in order to devote all his time to the interpretation of scientific facts and advances to the general public, and he has started his new career well in expounding at the outset the value of research to the community. The scope of his lecture included a review of the relations of animals and plants to their environment and of the dangers of introducing either to new - countries without careful consideration of the possible consequence. The upset of the balance maintained by the normal checks to multiplication and spread of any species in its natural setting might be followed by On the other hand, efforts to disastrous results. exterminate animals or plants that were found to do damage must be undertaken only after careful study of their prey or habits of growth, since some other worse pest might become manifest without their restricting influence. The, economics of the transport and acclimatisation in different countries of medicinal or edible plants were discussed in even greater detail recently by Dr. A. W. Hill in a lecture given at the Royal Institution. Both lecturers made it clear that agricultural research is a paying proposition for any was associated so

nation, and even the most conservative and dogmatic of " practical farmers " benefits indirectly from the modern work on heredity and parasitology which he still affects to despise. A more delicate matter is the need to convince the public that experiment as well as observation is required for the progress of medical science. Prof. Huxley cited examples of benefits to mankind and to animals that had resulted from experiment, recalling the testimony of Pasteur

ETHYLENE AND CARBON MONOXIDE. symptoms following the inhalation of ethylene at the St. Francis Hospital, Pittsburg, led to an inquiry into the chemistry of the gas, from which some conclusions have been drawn which are of much practical import. It has become obvious that unless special care is taken in the production and in the storing in cylinders of ethylene there is risk of contamination with carbon monoxide. The symptoms of poisoning alluded to above were in fact attributable to carbon monoxide, and at least one fatality due to this poison has followed the inhalation of ethylene. The manufacturers of the ethylene used offered every facility for the inquiry, and the result of this work should be a uniformly high standard of ethylene production in America. So far as we are aware, there has as yet been no reason to suspect the purity of any of the ethylene made for anaesthetic purposes in Great Britain. The use of the gas here has of course been on a very much smaller scale than in the United States, and indeed it does not so far appear from the literature and from experience that there is any large number of cases in which ethylene can give results superior to those obtainable from nitrous oxide, oxygen, and ether, properly employed. Considering also the unpleasantness of its odour, and the elaborate precautions recommended for abolishing all risks of explosion, we find it hard to become enthusiastic for frequent employment of ethylene. Toxic

the

GOOD AND BAD MATING. NEARLY at the end of his life Francis Galton wrote : " When the desired fullness of information shall have been acquired, then and not till then will be the fit moment to proclaim aJehad ’ or Holy War against customs and prejudices that impair the moral qualities of our race." Such is the sane pronouncement of the founder whose followers have sometimes been less discreet in their enthusiasm. He saw at any rate that nothing could be done in a hurry, and that the aim of human eugenics was something beyond fleshly perfection. Whether he would be satisfied with the progress which has been made in acquiring the necessary information we do not know ; in many ways little seems to have been accomplished, but Galton probably realised that the unravelling of human would be no trivial business. He would inheritance surely have been pleased with the moving appeal which the Galton professor delivered to London school teachers in November last, an audience which perhaps sees the good and evil results of human matings more nakedly displayed than do most people. He urged upon them that enough was now known to justify practical action in some cases and to convince everyone who would look at the facts that eugenics is a really serious matter which needs their close attention. More particularly he desired them to cultivate the frame of mind which looks upon the production of a bad child, or a child which may be bad, as a thing which is not done ; the mating of a woman of a hsemophilic family is racial incest and should be abhorred as is family incest. Prof. Karl Pearson points his argument with the familiar family trees of defects-claw hand, haemophilia, mental deficiency, cataract-and repeats his gloomy prophecy that if man evades the selective action of natural selection and does not replace it by reasoned conduct he is bound to deteriorate. We doubt

I

1 The Right of the Unborn Child. Eugenics Lecture Series XIV. By Karl Pearson, F.R.S. Cambridge University Press. 3s.