Flies & Opening ceremony, metropolitan police laboratory.

Flies; attributed to Paul Ehrlich, the German immunologist. Fragments, probably from two or three quite distinct films, showing: -- (i) Various species of housefly (stubenfliegen); a fly juggling a ball -- (ii) Microscopic slides of bacteria under magnification (including streptococci and staphyllocci); -- (iii) Horses (apparently in the context of their immunity to certain fly-borne infectious diseases). 'Science joins the force'; scenes from the opening ceremony of the Metropolitan Police Laboratory, Hendon, 10th April 1935 - described as "a new "lab" to catch old "lags"". Scenes of scientists at work (including Dr. James Davidson, first Director of the Laboratory) and of opening speech by Sir John Gilmour, then Home Secretary. The final frames afford a brief glimpse of Sir Henry Wellcome, a few months before his death, seated among the V.I.P. guests on the platform to the left of Sir John Gilmour. Of great interest to historians of forensic science and medicine.