3 AUGUST 1907, Page 3

The British Association began its meetings at Leicester on Wednesday,

and on Thursday all the sections sat to hear the presidential addresses. Unfortunately, we cannot find space this week to deal with any of the papers in detail, but must be content with a bare mention of Lord Kelvin's speech on the subject of ether and electrons, which appears to have been of unusual interest. "It seems to me," said Lord Kelvin, "that in reality ether is structureless, which means that every portion of ether, however small, has the same electric pro. perties as any portion, however great. There is no difficulty in this conception of something utterly homogeneous and elastic, occupying the whole of space from infinity to infinity in every direction."