There is great, though not obtrusive, dissatisfaction in Scotch educational
circles, and even beyond them, at the unprecedented delay of the Home Office in filling up the Chair of Natural History in the University of Edinburgh, which Sir Wyville Thompson long ago resigned. The post is the academic blue riband of natural science in Great Britain. The annual emoluments, between fees and endowment, come to close upon &MO. The work of the Chair is not arduous, and the occu- pant has the advantage of living in the most charming of pro- vincial cities, and of being lionised by its society. Some of the most eminent biologists in the United Kingdom, including the Professors of Natural History in the three other Scotch Universities of Glasgow, Aberdeen, and St. Andrew's, are candidates for the Chair. But Lord Rosebery, with whom, as Under-Home Secretary, the appointment virtually lies, is understood all over the country—we hope falsely—to be desirous to appoint Professor Ray Lankester, of University College, whose cause is actively championed by Professor Huxley. Able as Professor Ray Lankester is, we should greatly regret, in the interests of Scotland, to see the appointment of so very relent- less a champion of vivisection, nay, even of a large extension of vivisection, to a Chair of influence in Edinburgh.
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