Projective geometry derives both interest and importance from the fact that it assumes only the simplest and most fundamental axioms. The following sketch of the first principles, and proof of the fundamental theorem, is taken from Prof. Federigo Enriques' Projektive Geometrie (B. G. Teubner, Leipzig, 1903, 8vo, pp. xiv, 374). This work is specially adapted for school teaching. The first (Italian) edition appeared in 1898, and the axioms on which it is founded were explained, four years earlier in the Rendiconti R. 1st. Lombardo, Vol. 27, pp. 550-567.

Projective geometry is the geometry originated by von Staudt in the Geometrie der Zage, of which an excellent account by Prof. C A. Scott has already been given in the Mathematical Gazette, Vol. I., Nos. 19, 20, 22, pp. 307, 323, 363. Russell's very original Foundations of Geometry is the only English work which treats the subject from a strictly logical standpoint, but is unfortunately very unreliable as far as the mathematics is concerned.

It is well known that the simpler regular solids can be assembled into compounds which have, as a whole, the symmetry of a more complicated solid : two tetrahedra with a symmetry of a cube, five cubes with that of a dodecahedron, and so forth ([1] p. 134, [2] p. 134).

Miss L. D. Adams had a personality of such warmth and generosity that her loss will be deeply felt by very many people associated with education. Some will have known her personally through her visits to schools as H.M.I., or her lively contributions at conferences and refresher courses. We in this Association mourn her as one of our most distinguished members. She had an unbroken record of fifty-one years of membership and during that period had served on the Teaching Committee for some twenty years, exerting a strong formative influence which helped the Committee to broaden its enquiries until it can now claim to have produced reports on the whole range of school mathematics. The quality of thought that she brought to the Association’s discussions was recognized in 1959 when she was elected President, only the second woman to hold that office in the long years from 1871. To Miss Adams this tribute from the Association brought surprise and much pleasure, for in her natural modesty she had not thought of herself as possessing any gifts to merit her election.

In talking about the relations of mathematics and culture or, rather, about the cultural value of mathematics, I think it advisable that I should first say a little about what I suppose the word “culture” to mean. In its general use it contains, I think, two ingredients, as it were. It refers to information and it refers to sensibility An ignorant man, however refined his natural sensibilities may be, is not regarded as cultured. And a man who has amassed an immense knowledge of facts, but is quite unable to distinguish between what is valuable and what is not valuable in his information, is not regarded as cultured. Of these two elements, I am inclined to think that sensibility is the more important. What the old writers on aesthetics used to call taste is, I think, more important than knowledge for the formation of a cultured outlook.

PASCAL is becoming increasingly available on microcomputers—the type of computer most commonly found in schools. There are strong educational arguments for teaching novices a subset of the programming language PASCAL rather than BASIC. This article presents a comparison of these two languages at an introductory level.