Abstract
AT the anniversary meeting of the Royal Society, held on Tuesday, November 30, the report of the council was presented, and the president, Sir Joseph Thomson, delivered his valedictory address. Sir Joseph succeeded Sir William Crookes in the presidential chair in 1915, and has therefore served through as difficult a period as any in the history of the society. What the society and the nation owe to his activity and genius can be understood only by those who have been associated with him on some of the many committees or other bodies constituted during these troublous years to maintain national life and security. All the resources of British science have been organised and rendered available for public service with these ends in view; and a record of the aid thus afforded to the country by the society during Sir Joseph Thomson's presidency would afford convincing evidence of the value of science to the nation and of the patriotic spirit of scientific workers. Sir Joseph is succeeded as president by Prof. C. S. Sherrington, Waynflete professor of physiology in the University of Oxford, a short account of whose notable work on the central nervous system appears elsewhere in this issue.
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Anniversary Meeting of the Royal Society. Nature 106, 452–453 (1920). https://doi.org/10.1038/106452a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/106452a0