The exacting claims of home and foreign politics compel us
to restrict our notice of the proceedings of the British Association within the narrowest compass. The President, Sir David Gill, dealing with his special study—Astronomy —laid stress on the value of exact measurement and patient observation, a lesson which, mutatis mutandis, was enforced by Professor Smithells, the President of the Chemical Section, who protested strongly against the vague and sensational theorising indulged in by modern men of science. Professor Cushny's references in the Physiology section to the exaggerations of anti-alcoholists led to an interesting but inconclusive debate. No clear guidance is available for laymen when experts differ diametrically. In the Anthropological section Professor Flinders Petrie gave a lecture of fascinating interest on the Egyptian soul houses and other discoveries made in Egypt in 1906-7, the later types of these pottery houses having two storeys, furnished with models of couch, chair, stool, fireplace, water jar, and a donkey with a manger.
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