THE ANALYST. 317 PROCEEDINGS OF THE SOCIETY OF PUBLIC ANALYSTS. THE monthly meeting of the Society was held on Wednesday evening, November 1, in the Chemical Society’s Rooms, Burlington House, the President (Mr. W. W. Fisher, M.A.) occupying the chair. The minutes of the previous meeting were read and confirmed. Certificates of proposal for election to membership in favour of the following candidates were read for the second time : E. C. P. Barber, Chemist to the Anglo- Chilian Nitrate Railway Company, TOGO, Chili ; Frederick Davis, 51, Imperial Buildings, Ludgate Circus, London ; William Francis, Chief Analyst to the Con- densed Milk Company, of Ireland, Limerick ; Alfred Lucas, Analytical Chemist, Public Works Department (Geological Survey Branch), Cairo ; Edward Russell, B.Sc.(Lond.), F.I.C., Demonstrator of State Medicine, King’s College, London ; and F. L. Slocum, Ph.D., Pittsburgh, Pa., U.S.A. And in favour of the following Candidates for the first time: John Alfred Foster, A.I.C., Assistant Chemist, Her Majesty’s Dockyard, Portsmouth ; J. B. P. Harrison, A.I.C., Assistant Analyst to the Aylesbury Dairy Company, London; and D. Lloyd Howard, of Messrs. Howard and Sons, Stratford. Messrs. T. W. Glass, B.Sc., H. D. Hewitt, D. L. Thomas, and S. A. Woodhead, B.Sc., were elected members of the Society. The PRESIDENT, referring to the subject of Food and Drugs legislation, said318 THE ANALYST. thEtt since the Society’s last meeting the Sale of Food and Drugs Act, 1899, had received the Royal Assent, and would come into operation on January 1 next.It was satisfactory to note that the representations which the Society had made through its officers to the Government while the Bill was being considered had been favour- ably received, and for the most part adopted in the Act, which showed a considerable iniprovement when compared with the Bill as first proposed. VE‘ith regard to the clause which empowered the Board of Agriculture to direct officers to take samples under certain circumstances, there had arisen, from the manner in which the clause was worded in the Bill, an uneasy feeling that it might be interpreted as an attempt to centralize the work of analysis. The Society, however, had been assured by the President of the Board of Agriculture that there was no such intention, and it had been made perfectly clear that such samples would be submitted to the public analyst for the district in which they were taken, and treated as part of his ordinary local work.The central idea which the Society had expressed in regard to any further legislation-viz., thatl something in the nature of a standing departmental committee of reference should be established-was not given effect to in the form in which it was suggested, but a nucleus had been established by the new Act, and it remained to be seen in the future how far it would be developed and made useful. The wording of the section relating to the proportion of butter-fat to be permitted in margarine has been modified in accordance with a suggestion made by the Council, and a proposal which the draft Bill contained, involving an alteration of the form of certificate, had been abandoned, the form of certificate remaining as it was, The provision that any legal proceedings must be taken within twenty-eight days of the time of purchase would probably not inflict any great hardship on public analysts, given a reasonable amount of consideration on the part of those whose duty it was to purchase and submit samples.Various new articles had been brought within the Act, and one of the most useful alterations was the amendment of the definition of the word ‘‘ food,” the necessity for which had been impressed strongly upon the Government. Altogether, a distinct amount of progress had resulted from the recommendations which the Council had laid before the Government. It might also be mentioned that a committee had been recently appointed by the Local Government Board to inquire into the use of preservatives and colouring matters in food, and had invited the Society’s evidence on the subject, in the collection of which members had been asked to assist the Council by recording the results of their experience in a schedule which had been issued to them for the purpose. A paper was read by Dr. J. Lewkowitsch on ‘‘ The Meaning of the Acetyl Value in Eat Analysis.”