Scientific Work and the War

Abstract

DR. CALMAN's plea (NATURE, October 22, p. 398) for the continuance as usual of the work of our learned societies, or even a wider plea for the calm prosecution of all our scientific studies, may be supported on many grounds, but the only one that I wish to emphasise is the moral effect thus produced upon those neutral nations whom our opponents seek to delude into the belief that we are panic-stricken. To the reality of this effect the following sentences in a letter just received from a correspondent in Florence bear witness:—“. . .e sapendo, d'altra parte, che l'Inghilterra sta fortemente sostenendo la sua bella lotta, senza perdere il tradizionale sangue freddo; per modo che Ia vita continua costa quasi inalterata. La regolarit, con Ia quale i periodici scientifici continuano ad apparire ne é la prova migliore”.