Where, when, and by whom the absolute zero will be first reached are questions that may be answered from the most unexpected quarter. But it is interesting to know that great preparations are being made today in the laboratories of the Royal Institution for a further attack upon the problem. Already the research equipment there is the best in the world in this field, and recently this has been completely overhauled and still further perfected. It would not be strange, then, in view of past triumphs, if the final goal of the low-temperature workers should be first reached in the same laboratory where the outer territories of the unknown land were first penetrated three-quarters of a century ago. There would seem to be a poetic fitness in the trend of events should it so transpire. But of course poetic fitness does not always rule in the land of science. IV. SOME PHYSICAL LABORATORIES AND PHYSICAL PROBLEMS SIR NORMAN LOCKYER AND SOLAR CHEMISTRY SIR NORMAN LOCKYER is professor of astronomical physics and director of the solar observatory at the Royal College of Science in South Kensington. Here it is that his chief work has been done for some thirty years past. The foundation-stone of that work is spectroscopic study of the sun and stars. In this study Professor Lockyer was a pioneer, and he has for years been recognized as the leader. But he is no mere observer; he is a generalizer as well; and he long since evolved revolutionary ideas as to the origin of the sidereal and solar systems. For a man whose chief occupation is the study of the sun and stars, smoky, foggy, cloudy London may seem a strange location. I asked Professor Lockyer about this, and his reply was most characteristic. "The fact is," he said, "the weather here is too fine from one point of view: my working staff is so small, and the number of working nights so large, that most of the time there is no one about to do anything during the day. Then, another thing, here at South Kensington I am in touch with my colleagues in the other departments--physics, chemistry, and so forth--and can at once draw upon their special knowledge for aid on any obscure point in their lines that may crop up. If we were out in the country this would not be so. You see, then, that it is a choice between weather and brains. I prefer the brains."