436 JOURNAL OF THE SOCIETY OF COSMETIC CHEMISTS This surely throws some light on the old controversies "Is natural musk a true fixative"? I have always believed it to be a superb blender but not a true fixative capable of evening out the varying rates of evaporation of the more and the less volatile components of a perfume blend. The opposite view has been defended by references to the Van der Waals effect of the macrocyclic bodies present in natural musk. If 10 per cent of pentadecanolide prolongs the evaporation time of methyl amyl ketone by about 50 per cent, how much natural musk would be needed to produce even this modest increase in "lasting power" in a perfume ? MR. I). •E. BUTTERFIELD : Naturally, one must agree that natural musk in the concentrations normally used can have very little fixative effect. The author's results do show however that the newer musks have this unusual effect of decreasing the rate of evaporation of methyl amyl ketone compared with more orthodox materials. The figures quoted in Table 1 certainly don't prove that any musks exert an important fixative effect in practice, but do suggest that there is anomalous behaviour which is worthy of further investigation. SOCIETY OF COSMETIC CHEMISTS OF GREAT BRITAIN 1960 Summer Conference THE 1960-61 Summer Conference of the Society was held on the 24th and 25th of August at the Royal Society of Arts. The Conference opened with a Cocktail Party on the evening of the 24th, when all participants and their guests were received by the President and Mrs. Hibbott. The Scientific Sessions took place on the 25th of August, and the Society's President, Dr. H. W. Hibbott, took the chair for the morning session. In opening the Conference, the President welcomed those attend- ing and extended a special welcome to the members of the American Society, which included their President, Mr. H. J. Amsterdam, and to other overseas visitors. For the afternoon session, Dr. R. H. Marriott, Immediate Past-President, was in the chair. The eight papers having been circularized in full to all participants prior to the Conference, the authors in the main restricted themselves to introductory remarks which allowed for a full discussion after each paper. Four of the papers are reprinted in this issue of the Journal, and the remainder will appear in subsequent issues.

SOCIETY OF COSMETIC CHEMISTS OF GREAT BRITAIN 437 Simultaneously with the Scientific sessions the ladies visited Windsor Castle and Hampton Court Palace. The party was ably "chaperoned" by Mrs. K. Bohemen. The Conference was rounded off by an informal dinner at the Connaught Rooms. During the dinner Mr. H. J. Amsterdam, President of the United States Society, presented Dr. H. W. Hibbott with a Lennox dish, as a memento of the visit by the American group. Altogether 128 persons registered, and participants came not only from the U.S.A. but also from Germany and Holland. .:'f :-,• '•,.. ' •':' ½? :• ?..%.. 5.? ..• ¾ ,•' :. .... .' •': -•:•'• ., ½.., '.. --'•}z-i -: • 1 ': .. :"•,• "5_. ... •.. -... .:: ß '" ..'",i•,•..,'•.:. , . •. '*'5::•*•' -'• '- - ':- '•-" .......... .... .... .... .:.. •"• .. ,.'•. -:-• . ..... ......... :•: .,. . . . • ..-.• ...... . .............. ... • .: . . .._. .......... • ,::•..•:.:{ The President holding the Lennox dish presented to him by Mr. H. J. Amsterdam.