/s

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY

9908

EDITED BY

J. MCKEEN CATTELL

VOL. LIX
MAY TO OCTOBER, 1901

NEW YORK

THE SCIENCE PRESS

I 90 I

Copyright, 1901,
THE SCIENCE PRESS.

PRESS OF

THE NEW ERA PRINTrNG COMPANY,
LANCASTER, PA.

Vol.. I.I.X. — 1

o

r-t

H
H

I— I
o

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY.

MAT, 1901.

THE CAENEGIE MUSEUM.*

^^^tWy;

vw'fnr'^'r

Y 3 iyf

/tM Vl' .Po'-^-

y

By W. J. HOLLAND, LL. D.,
DIRECTOR OF THE MUSEUM.

IT was a glorious summer day. The sunlight gleamed through the
trees, which covered the mountain-top. Checkers of light and
shade wove themselves upon the fern-clad soil. Seated upon the trunk
of a fallen tree the man whose name to-day is borne by scores of in-
stitutions, which his more than princely benevolence has founded,
talked to a friend in relation to his plans for the great city, the history
of the growth of which is closely linked with the story of his own
wonderful career. "The Allegheny Library will before long be nearing
completion," he said, "and the time is approaching to execute my de-
sigQB for Pittsburgh. In my original offer I agreed to give Pittsburgh
a quarter of a million of dollars with which to build a library, but I
mean to enlarge my gift, and make it a million. I have given Allegheny
a library and a music-hall. I wish to do as much for Pittsburgh. The
library idea is central. My convictions on that subject are established.
But I wish to do something more than to found a library in Pittsburgh.
I am thinking of incorporating with the plan for a library that of an
art-gallery in which shall be preserved a record of the progress and
development of pictorial art in America, and perhaps also of making
some provision for advancing knowledge among the people through
the addition of accommodations for the various societies which
in recent years have struggled into existence among us. These societies
deserve to be encouraged. I mean the Art Society, the Botanical Society
of Western Pennsylvania, the Microscopical Society of Pittsburgh, and

• Prepared at the special request of the Editor of the Popular Sciknce
Monthly.

4 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

all those other societies. Get them to join their forces and unite to
form one society — call it the Academy of Science and Art of Pittsburgh,
if you please — and I will furnish accommodations for them when I
come to build the library in Pittsburgh. We can treat with one central
organization better than with half a dozen different societies. Some of
these societies are forming collections of books, historical objects, nat-
ural history specimens. These things ought to be kept in tire-proof
quarters. That is another point on which I am sound. I believe in
fire-proof construction. There are your butterflies, for instance. Such
collections should not be exposed to the risk of fire. "When I build the
library I will provide a good place in which to keep them.'' So the
plan was unfolded and its outlines sketched while the leaves rustled and
the birds sang overhead.

Nine years took their flight, and at last the dream was transmuted
into stone and marble. The structure which the fancy had outlined
stood revealed in the beauty of architectural form and the still greater
beauty of definite purpose and usefulness. When on November 5, 1895,
the edifice was formally presented to the city of Pittsburgh by its donor
it was found to contain accommodations for a great central library, with
provision for the administration from this center of a number of
branch libraries, for the erection of which ample funds had been pro-
vided. Under the same roof was a music-hall, one of the most perfect
of its kind in the United States, an art gallery of noble proportions and,
forming the southern wing of the great building, the Museum, on the
first floor of which was provided a spacious lecture-hall adapted to the
uses of the learned societies, which, in pursuance of the suggestion of
the founder, had been merged into the Academy of Science and Art
of Pittsburgh.

Prior to the opening of the building arrangements were made by" the
Academy of Science and Art to gather together a collection of objects
suitable for exhibition in a museum. The Curator of the Academy,
Dr. Gustave Guttenberg, labored strenuously to place the material in
proper order, and was aided by his associates, who freely gave their time
and generously contributed of their means to make the exhibition
Avorthy of the occasion. The result revealed, as all such attempts in
our great cities are certain to show, how large an accumulation of
really choice specimens exists in the hands of individuals who are
possessed of artistic and scientific tastes. Ethnological, mineralogical
and zoological collections of no small merit Avere rapidly brought to-
gether from the homes of scores of citizens, whose interest had been
awakened, and the collections in the possession of the Western Uni-
versity of Pennsylvania were laid under heavy contribution to fill up
any gaps, which required for the time being to be closed, in order to
replenish the cases and dress the lialls.

THE CABNEGIE MUSEUM. 5

When,, on Xovember 5, 1895, the edifice was thrown open to the peo-
ple, the splendid generosity of the gift produced a profound impression,
but the gratitude which was felt was converted into amazed thankful-
ness when the donor announced to the large audience which filled the
auditorium that it was his intention to supplement his gift by the

Andrew Carnegie.

bestowal of an additional million of dollars as a permanent endowment,
the annual income to be used in promoting the interests of the Art
Gallery and the Museum. The custodianship of the endowment fund
w^s committed to a Board of Trustees, consisting of the gentlemen who
were already vested with the care of the building, and eighteen others,
who were named bv the donor because of their interest in those things

6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

which tend to promote scientific and aesthetic culture. The formal title
assumed by this body was 'The Board of Trustees of the Carnegie Fine
Arts and Museum Collection Fund/ subsequently changed to 'The
Trustees of the Carnegie Institute/

The announcement of this gift and the conditions which were to
govern the trust necessitated a change in the administration of the
affairs of the Museum. The control of the Museum and the collections
contained in it was transferred from the Academy of Science and Art to
the newly appointed Trustees of the Endowment Fund, the Academy of
Science and Art engaging to cooperate with the Trustees and to apply
the revenues in their possession, derived from the annual dues of the
membership, to the maintenance of courses of popular lectures in the
hall of the Museum.

i

GUSTAVE GUTTENBEEG.

The immediate oversight of the Museum was vested by the action of
the Trustees in a committee of eight, including ex officio the President
of the Board. The committee as at first constituted consisted of the
following gentlemen: C. C. Mellor, Chairman; Samuel Harden
Church, Litt. D., Secretary; W. N. Frew, Esq., President of the Board;
Rev. A. A. Lambing, President of the Western Pennsylvania Historical
Society; Hon. H. P. Ford, Mayor of Pittsburgh; John A. Brashear,
Sc. D.; Josiah Cohen, Esq., and W. J. Holland, LL. D., Chancellor of
the Western University of Pennsylvania.

Unfortunately, the hand of death removed the man wno would have
been the first choice of the Trustees for the important position of
Director of the new Museum. Professor Gustave Guttenberg died in

THE CARNEGIE MUSEUM. 7

Vienna before a full organization of the committee on the affairs of the
Museum had been effected. The first act of the Board was to pur-
chase from his widow the beautiful collection of minerals which he
had made, and which had been one of the attractive features of the
opening exhibition of the Museum,

W. N. FiiEw, President of the Boaed of Trustees.

C. C. Mellor, A.m., Chairman of the
Committee on the Museum.

H. Church, Litt. D., Secretary of the
Board of Trustees.

After several experiments in administrative arrangement, which
were not wholly satisfactory, in the spring of 1898 Dr. W. J. Holland
was elected as the Director of the Museum. This relationship still
continues.

The Museum at present occupies six halls, which are devoted to

8

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

.X. .»

^' z

-M -

uS= lU

-K

O

<

o

w

w

fc.

o

o

m

Q
w

w

z

o

w

O

c
a:

->!

O

en
W

a:

a,

a

H

O

z

a
z

o

CSL:

■]'

«::■

'\»

\SLr

>

THE CARNEGIE MUSEUM. 9

purposes of display, and seven rooms which are used as laboratories
and offices. Three of the exhibition halls are situated on the second
lloor of the building and three upon the third. Two of the laboratories
are situated on either side of the lecture-hall on the first floor, and the
three remaining laboratories are in the basement of the building. The
floor space available for the display of the collections amounts, at the
present time, to a little more than twelve thousand square feet. The
floor space devoted to laboratories is" five thousand square feet. The
lecture-hall will comfortably accommodate about six hundred persons.

OiROUXD PLAX of the PROPOSED ADDITION TO THE CARNEGIE INSTITUTE.

The walls of a museum are to its contents what the frame is to a
picture. The generosity of the founder provided at the outset a beau-
tiful edifice under the roof of which to assemble the collections which
it was destined to contain, but he did not forget to provide for what
after all is the museum itself, and has from year to year supplemented
the income derived from his original gift of a million of dollars by
the purchase of collections, Avhich he has himself selected, or by
placing at the disposal of the Director of the Museum funds with which
to make special collections.

10 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The growth of the Museum and the related departments of the
Institute has been so rapid, and the usefulness and popularity of the
entire undertaking has been so great, that the founder has found him-
self constrained to again provide for further enlargement, and in the
fall of the year 1899 and the spring of 1900 preliminary plans for
extension were prepared, which subsequently were approved by Mr.
Carnegie. These plans contemplate the ultimate expenditure of
$3,600,000, in new construction, greatly enlarging and perfecting the
facilities of the Museum, the Library and the Art Gallery. When
these plans are executed the city of Pittsburgh will have an institution
second in its importance to no other of like character in the New World,
and surpassing many of the famous institutions of Europe in the pro-
vision made within its walls for promoting a knowledge of literature,
science and art.

Inasmuch as Pittsburgh is located in the very heart of the Appa-
lachian region, it was in the beginning determined among other things
to make the collections acquired by the institution as thoroughly
illustrative of this region as possible. Accordingly much effort has
been expended in endeavoring to obtain specimens illustrating the
geology, the mineral resources, and the flora and fauna of the region
of which Pittsburgh may be said to be the metropolis. By the gift
of the large herbarium of the Western Pennsylvania Botanical So-
ciety, to which extensive additions have been made, the flora of the
region is already well represented. The fauna. is also represented by
collections which are extensive and rapidly growing. Almost all the
mammals and birds known to exist in Western Pennsylvania are con-
tained in the collection, and through the diligence of those in charge
of the department of ornithology several species not heretofore known
to occur within the limits of Pennsylvania have been added to the
faunal list. The collections representing the insect life of the region
are great. Extensive research is going on in every direction, and it
is hoped ultimately to amass and bring together representatives of
every form of life, whether animal or vegetable, known to occur in the
upper valley of the Ohio. Collectors have been sent out who have
extended their labors over the whole western half of the State, from
Erie to the southern boundary, and westward into eastern Ohio, and
southward into West Virginia. It no doubt will require many years
finally to complete the biological survey of this extensive region, but
a very satisfactory beginning has already been made. Side by side
with the work done in the department of biology much work has
been done in gathering together ethnological and historical material,
the former throwing light upon the aboriginal inhabitants of the ter-
ritory, the latter serving to illustrate its development since occupied
by civilized man. The industries of the region likewise have claimed

TEE CARNEGIE MUSEUM. ii

attention, and important industrial exhibits have been formed, show-
ing the development of commerce and manufactures in western Penn-
sylvania.

It is far, however, from the purpose of the Trustees to restrict
the Museum to the work which has just been outlined. The whole
field of research is before them, and already very large accumulations
of material from distant parts of our own continent and from foreign
lands have been brought together. The collections already in the
possession of the Museum may be approximately classified as follows:

Species and

Varieties. Specimens.

Minerals 400 4,000

Geological Specimens 1,000

Botany (recent species) 17,000 100,000

Botany (fossil) 150 1,200

Paleontology (invertebrate 500 2,400

Paleontology (vertebrate) 160 3,500

Porifera, Echinoderms, etc 500 1,250

Mollusca 9,500 100,000

Crustacea 100 2,000

Arachnida 300 1,200

Myriapoda 50 1,200

Hymenoptera 1250 4,000

Lepidopte. a 20,000 300,000

Diptera 1,000 5,000

Coleoptera 20,000 275,000

Hemiptera 750 4,000

Orthoptera 400 1,600

Neuroptera 300 1,200

Fishes 500 1,800

Eeptilia and Batrachia 150 1 ,750

Birds 1,200 9,000

Mammals 300 1,050

Total 74,510 822,150

The foregoing table shows that the collections representing the
various classes in the vegetable and animal kingdom are somewhat un-
equal in the matter of extent. The assemblage of shells is already large
because of the acquisition by the Museum of several considerable col-
lections, one of them made in South America by Mr. Herbert H. Smith;
the other by the late F. E. Holland, which contains a large number of
species represented by cotypes and specimens autographically labeled
by Adams, Anthony, Bland and other early American conchologists.
This collection at the time of its acquisition by the Carnegie Museum
contained over six thousand species and is especially rich in West
Indian terrestrial mollusca. The collection of Lepidoptera is also
exceedingly rich in species, as well as specimens, containing as it does,
the entire collection of Mr. W. H. Edwards, the author of the 'Butterflies

12

POPULAR SCIENCE MOXTHLY.

of Xorth America,' with almost all his types, as well as many types
and paratypes obtained from Boisduval, Tryon, Eeakirt, Henry Ed-
wards, S. H. Scudder, and Dr. Herman Behr. The collection also
inclndes the entire collection made by Theodore L. Mead, the types of
all species described by the present Director of the Miisenm, nnmeroiis
types of species described by Lord Walsingham, E. L. Ragonot, Arthur
G. Bntler, Sir George Hampson, William Doherty, Dr. Henry Skinner
and others, and cotypes of a multitude of species obtained from various
authors in different parts of the world. There are over three thousand
types and cotypes in the collection of Lepidoptera. The collection is
particularly rich in North American, Japanese, Indian and African
species. The Knyvett collection of Indian Lepidoptera was purchased

y

S^""

Henry Ulke.

Frederick S. Webster.

by Mr. Carnegie some years ago. It contains over three thousand
species of Indian Lepidoptera, mostly represented by large series of
specimens. Large portions of the collections made by Doherty in India
and in the Malay Archipelago are also here. The micro-lepidoptera
of Japan, collected by the late Henry Pryer, of Yokohama, are also
incorporated in the collection, having been purchased in 1887, a year
before the lamented death of Pryer. Latterly extensive additions have
been made in the form of material secured from various localities in
Africa, Mexico and Central America, and from the continent of South
America, the latter principally through the labors of Herbert H. Smith.
The assemblage of colcoptera, comprising among other things the
collections of the late Dr. Hamilton, of Allegheny, and of Henry

THE CARNEGIE MUSEUM. 13

Ulke, of Washington, D. C, is one of the largest and most perfect
collections of the beetles of North America in existence. It is rich
in types -and cotypes, several thousand species being thus represented.
In addition to the North American collections of coleoptera, there are
vast accnnmlations of material from other parts of the world, especially
from Africa, tropical America and Japan. The collections in other
orders of insects represent mostly North American material, though
in every order there is more or less exotic material.

In the ornithological collections North American species prepon-
derate. There are about nine thousand specimens of birds in the pos-

A Peep into the Taxidermic Laboratory.

session of the Museum, as the result of the accumulations made during
the last three years. Fully three-fourths of these belong to the native
series. Of the species of birds known to occur within the State of
Pennsylvania almost all are represented. Great skill and taste have
been displayed by Mr. Frederick S. Webster, the chief preparator in the
department of zoology, in the composition of a number of very life-like
and attractive groups representing some of the more remarkable as
well as the commoner forms of bird-life found in America. The groups
of flamingoes, Californian condors and brown pelicans are large and
effective. One of the most striking compositions is that of the famous
setter-dog, 'Count Noble,' flushing a covey of quails. 'Count Noble,'

14

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the progenitor of many of the finest dogs of his race in America,
breathed his last in Pittsburgh, and by happy fortune his skin was pre-
served and came into the possession of the Museum. Many of the
smaller groups of birds delineate accurately the habits of the more
familiar species and are accepted as masterpieces of the taxidermic art.
The mammals are represented by small, but important, collections.
One of the recent acquisitions is that of a specimen of Rhinoceros simus.
This large mammal, which is, with the exception of the elephant, the
largest of terrestrial quadrupeds, is believed to be on the verge of extinc-
tion. A few years ago the Hon. Cecil Rhodes secured a specimen by
purchase, which he presented to the South African Museum at Cape
Town. Another was secured by the British Museum, a third specimen
was acquired by the Hon. Walter Rothschild for his private collection at
Tring, and a fourth was purchased by the Imperial Academy of Sci-

Rhinoceros Simus Buechell.

ences at St. Petersburg. The specimen just acquired by the Carnegie
Museum is the fifth to be preserved as a memorial of its rapidly vanish-
ing race, and is the only specimen known to exist in the New World.

One of the most fruitful departments of activity in connection with
the Museum is presided over by Prof. J. B. Hatcher, the famous
explorer and paleontologist. Mr. Carnegie has long realized the im-
portance of paleontology as throwing light upon the evolution of species,
and in the spring of 1899 provided a special fund for research in this
direction. The results have been most satisfactory, when regard is
had alike to the number of the important discoveries which have been
made and the beauty and perfection of the specimens which have been
obtained. It is well known that the evolution of the horse took place
in North America. The discoveries of Professor Hatcher made in
1900 show that in all probability in like manner the rhinoceros was

THE CARNEGIE MUSEUM.

IS

evolved from a primitive form upon the same theater of zoogenic energy.
The most striking objects in the paleontological section, from a popular
standpoint, are the huge dinosaurs from the Jurassic beds of Wyoming
and Colorado. The most perfect specimen of Diplodocus longus Marsh
known to exist anywhere was secured in the summer of 1899. This
huge, lizard-like quadruped was about seventy feet in length from the
tip of the nose to the end of the tail, and stood fully fifteen feet in
height at the hips. Six skeletons of Brontosaurus, a still huger mon-

GoRiLLA, Specimen Collected by

Rev. a. C. Good. Ph. D., at Kangwe,

Ogove River, West Africa.

In the Paleontological Laboratory: Setting
UP THE Hind Leg of a Brontosaur.

ster, have also been discovered and collected. In no instance were
these skeletons complete, but enough material has been secured, it is
believed, to admit of the restoration of a composite skeleton of Bronto-
saurus as well as that of Diplodocus. "Within the limits of a brief
sketch it is impossible to speak at length of the collections brought
together in the section of paleontology, but it is worthy of note that
the Museum contains the largest specimen of the Mastodon known
to exist, and with the single exception of the 'Warren Mastodon,' which

i6

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

A Corner in the Hall of Paleontology.

A Glimpse into the Hall of Ethnology. North American Indians.

THE CMlXEfUE MUSEUM.

17

is now hidden away in Jioston and invisible to the public, probably the
most perfect specimen in any Museum.

A good foundaiioii lias been laid for tlie development of the section
of archeology. 'J'lie aboriginal races of America as represented by the
mound-builders of tlio Ohio Valley, the cliff-dwellers of Arizona and
the ancient populations of Mexico are in evidence in many ways. One
of the latest acquisitions has been a series of reproductions of the
carvings in stone preserved in the National Museum of ]\[exico. These

The Moki Snake Dancers. Group Modeled by T. a. Mills.

reproductions were made at the expense of Mr. Carnegie and are a
duplication to the city of Pittsburgh of the gift made recently to the
city of New York by the Due de Loubat, and preserved in the Ameri-
can Museum of Natural History in Central Park.

The surviving Indian races of North America are represented by
an extensive series of models and groups made by Mr. T. A. Mills, the
well-known sculptor, all being clothed in characteristic costumes, se-
lected with great care to represent the manners and customs which
prevail among them. Besides, there are extensive collections of imple-

VOL. LTX.— 2

i8

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ments and utensils in use among these various tribes. The same remark
holds good of the Esquimaux of Alaska.

The archeology of the old world has not been forgotten, and
already, partly by gift and partly by purchase, considerable assemblages
of specimens throwing light upon the ancient civilizations of southern
Europe, Egypt and Asia Minor have been secured. The collection of
reproductions of the famous Neapolitan bronzes, presented by Mr.
Carnegie, duplicates for Pittsburgh the same series now in the Metro-
politan Museum of Art in New York. The collections annually ob-
tained through the Pittsburgh Branch of the Egypt Exploration Fund
constitute an ever-growing series of high valuable and important objects.

The development of the domestic and industrial arts in America
from the first colonization to the present is illustrated by a series of

Jg4j_ ''''ILA0tLPHl»TOpm58UMa«<5-

Model of Conestog.'V Wagon, made ky Wilson Banks and T. A. Mills.

collections to which additions are being rapidly made. The evolution
of methods of transportation is shown by a long series of models con-
structed by Mr. Wilson Banks, Mr. T. A. Mills and others. This series
is in part a reduplication of specimens now in the U. S. National
Museum at Washington.

The end for which museums exist is not simply the acquisition and
preservation of curious and instructive specimens. The great object
which such an institution should ever keep in view is the diffusion of
knowledge. The management of the Carnegie Museum has realized
this from the very inception of its work. Care has been devoted to the
proper arrangement, dis])]ay and labeling of those parts of the collec-
tions placed on view. The late C Brown Goode once said in substance,

THE CARNEGIE MUSEUM.

'9

'A good museum is a collection of good labels, illustrated by care-
fully selected specimens.' Much time and thought has been expended
in tbe endeavor to tell to the observer in simple and intelligible lan-
guage the truth which the collections are intended to illustrate. In
order to enlist the interest of children a series of prizes has been
annually offered to the pupils in the high-schools and the upper classes
in the grammar-schools of the city of Pittsburgli. The prizes are
awarded to those who shall write the best essay upon some subject illus-
trated by the collections contained in the Museum. Thirty-eight prizes,

A Section of the Andrew (Carnegie Naturalists' Club in Session.

ranging in value from $35 to $2, were offered in 1900. Eight hundred
and forty-three essays were submitted in competition. The decision
of the awards is made by a committee of judges consisting of thirty of
the most cultivated ladies and gentlemen of the city, among them a
number of eminent clergymen, lawyers, editors and authors. The plan
requires on the part of the contestants a personal visit to the Museum
and the study of the collections. During the month preceding the
close of the contest the Museum was at times crowded by eager throngs
of intelligent boys and girls armed with note-books and pencils. The
delicious compliment of imitation has been paid to the Carnegie Mu-

20 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

seiim since this plan was adopted by several kindred institutions in
America and in Jiurope.

A further effort to interest and instruct the youth oi: the com-
munity has led to the formation of a society known as the Andrew
Carnegie Naturalists' Club, which consists of between two and three
hundred young people who meet every other week on the afternoon of
Saturday in the lecture-hall of the Museum and hear lectures, often
illustrated by specimens and the stereopticon, and who read papers
upon subjects of interest. During the summer months the club
makes excursions in the neighborhood, and the various subdivisions
receive practical instruction from the staff of the Museum in the art of
collecting and preserving specimens of plants and animals.

The wider diffusion of knowledge among scientific men and insti-
tutions is provided for by the publication of the '^Annals' and ^^lemoirs'
of the Museum. The former appear in octavo form, the latter in
quarto. This series of publications began with the first month of the
twentieth century, and it is hoped will not end so long as the centuries
run their course.

77//-; m-t;o]!.\ .\rsT]:.\Lfs. 21

THE AURORA AUSTEALIS, AS OBSERVED FROM THE

'BELGICA.'

Ky Dr. FliKDKKKK A. COOK.

IN the literature of the still unknown phenomena of polar auroras,
deductions have been based almost entirely upon observations
of the aurora borealis. So little has been known of the south pole and
of its terrestrial and celestial surroundings that the aurora australis has
been omitted in the upbuilding of auroral science. From the observa-
tions of the Belgian expedition and from the reports of forgotten pre-
vious explorers, it would seem that the auroras of the south are not so
brilliant or so varied in foi'm and character as those reported from the
north. Auroras in brilliant colors and in fantastic heavenly drapery
are indeed rare in the regions invaded by the 'Belgica.' It should,
however, be reiuembered that the austral phenomenon is but vaguely
known. The 'Belgica's' drift covers but a small space in the great
unknown area about the south pole. Nearly eight million square miles,
a region as large as all North America, is still a blank under the South-
ern Ci'oss. At other points within this area the aurora may appear
differently. Such a condition obtains in the arctic. Nordenskiold,
viewing the northern lights from the sea north of Siberia, saw displays
almost exactly like those seen from the 'Belgica' south of the Pacific,
but Pearv and all the explorers who wintered on the Greenland side of
the geographical pole have described auroras in vivid colors and fan-
tastic forms.

The antarctic continent, which is just the region from which the
southern lights can best be studied, is still imexplored, and most of
it is inaccessible. If we can judge from similar latitudes in the north,
the edge of this gTcat continent of ice is an ideal latitude for effective
observatories, and no doubt future explorers will seek favorable loca-
tions from wliicli to observe this curious phenomenon.

The inhabited parts of Australasia, southern South America and
Africa are too far north to offer a good station to study these phe-
nomena. There are no convenient land projections in the antarctic,
like Siberia, Norway and Greenland in the arctic, where comfortable
stations could be established. From this it results that few careful
studies of the austral aurora have been made. The great restless, ice-
encumbered sea which sweeps around the south polar area is not favor-
able for such observations. Captain Cook, who, during three years,
circumnavigated the globe in high latitudes, barely mentions the aurora.
Ross, "Wilkes and d'Urville were in the ice regions only during the
days of summer, when auroras were seldom visible.

22

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The early sealers, who in the first quarter of the last century invaded
the lonely southern seas, rarely mention the aurora. From the ob-
servations of the sealers and the early explorers it would seem as if
we should have a fair idea of the austral auroras, but all antarctic voy-
agers have devoted most of their time to skirting the edge of the pack-
ice, where the sky is almost constantly veiled by a haze of either fog
or snow. The fact that the pioneers in the far south have seen so little
of the aurora has led to the impression that the phenomenon there is
feeble, but such an impression should not be favored until we have a
more thorough series of observations.

Eoss and Wilkes saw a few vivid displays of draped auroras, tinged
with prismatic colors, but from the 'Belgica,' which was the first vessel
to spend a winter in the antarctic, we saw few colors, seldom draped, and
only rarely fleeting rays which spread over a large part of the sky.
Below is a table of the observations recorded by Henryk Arctowski,
the meteorologist of the Belgian expedition:

TABLE OF AURORAS OBSERVED ON BOARD THE 'BELGICA'
DURING THE WINTER OF 1898.

March.

April.

May.

June.

July.

August.

September.

1

_

_

_

_

L.

2

:

—

—

—

—

Ad.S.R.V.P.

3

4

L.

A. V.

—

—

—

—

5
6

7
8

Ad. R.

—

—

—

A.

z

.

L.

L.

9

— ■

—

L.

—

S.A.R. Ad.

10

—

A.S. Ad.

—

A.

L.

—

R.S.A. Ad.

11

A.

L.

—

—

L.

—

—

12

A.

—

—

—

L.

--

—

13

—

L.

— ■

S.A.F.

L.A.S.O.

—

—

14

A.P.W.C.

A.S.O.V.R.P.

L.

—

—

—

15

—

A.S.Ad.R.

—

L.

L.

—

—

16

—

—

L.

—

—

L.

—

17

—

—

—

—

L.

—

—

18

— .

—

—

—

—

L.

—

19

Am. V.P.

—

—

—

—

Ad.S.

—

20

A.R.V.

—

A S.

—

—

L.

—

21

—

L.

L.

—

L.S A.

—

—

22

L.A.

L.

A.S.R.

A.S.

—

—

23

L.

—

—

L.S.

A.

—

—

24

L.

L.

—

S. Ad.

L.

—

—

25

AS.

S.A.R.

—

—

—

—

26

S.L.R.V.O.

—

—

—

—

A.

—

27

—

—

—

—

—

A.

—

28

L.

L.

—

—

—

—

—

29
30
31

A.S.

—

Ad.

—

—

—

—

A.

—

—

—

—

—

—

A.=IIomoKeneous arc.
Ad .= Double arc.
Am.=Multiple arc.

EXPLANATION OF SIGNS EMPLOYED.

(•.=(;rown. ().=Obseure rays.

F. ^Flames. l'.=.Streamers. '

L.=Luminousglow. R.=Rays.

S.=Dark se§;ment.
V.=Wavy ribbons.
W.=Curtain.

THE AURORA AUSTRALIS. 23

In the 'Belgica/ we had been sailing among icebergs and along
the ice-sheeted coast of newly discovered lands for nearly two months
before we saw the first aurora. During most of this time we were above
the polar circle, where the sun, during the hours of midnight and mid-
summer, sank but a few degrees behind the icy crust of the earth,
leaving a twilight so brilliant that no stars were visible. The glancing
rays of the nocturnal sun, which were thrown from peak to peak and
from the mirror-like slopes into the heavens, made the night a scene
of dazzling splendor, too bright to permit the display of the auroral
light.

In the first days of March we found ourselves surrounded by a
hopeless sea of ice from whose ensnaring influence we were unable
to extricate ourselves. The long winter and the polar night, which no
man had as yet experienced, now came over us rapidly. The sun daily
sank lower on the sky and swept less of the horizon. The rose color
of the snow, which made the summer nights charming, now changed
into lilac. The open spaces of water between the restless ice-fields were
being hidden lender a weight of rapidly forming new ice, and the winds
were moaning in prophetic despair of the coming blackness. We knew
only too well that we were in the relentless grasp of a new monster, the
Antarctic Ice King, and in his grasp we must remain until the thaw
of another summer should release us. In this spirit of despondency and
with considerable anxiety we searched the skies nightly for the heavenly
glow of the aurora australis, which we hoped might relieve the awful
monotony and soul-despairing darkness of the coming winter.

While skirting the edge of the pack-ice late in February we saw a
star, the first since leaving the Cape Horn waters, and this little speck,
though a sign of the long, gloomy night and of the polar winter, was
hailed as a messenger from a new world. During the days which fol-
lowed we watched with joy the increasing number of stars from night
to night, but there was so much storm and the atmosphere was so
thoroughly charged by humidity that a clear sky was rarely observed.

On the evening of March 12, 1898, we saw the first distinctive
aurora. A faint arc was seen the night previous, but the light was so
feeble that many of us doubted that the phenomenon was auroral. The
few days which preceded were clear, sharp and cold. We had been so
constantly showered with snow and sleet, so persistently held in banks
of fog and so often driven to the verge of desperation by the violent
storms which ever swept the pack-edge that this calm and silence was,
indeed, a treat to us. On the evening of the 14th the sun sank out of a
cloudless sky below the crackling, quivering ice of the sea. The tem-
perature was — 15 C. A light wind, which came out of the south,
pierced the skin like needles. We were many hundred miles from the

24 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

nearest land; our horizon was everywhere lined by the towering heights
of icebergs which were separated by level fields of sea-ice.

Over this sheen of hard ice and soft snow there rested a haze of
ice crystals which was curiously suspended in the air. As the sun
sank through this haze it lost its luminous character, and before it
vanished into its bed of snow it appeared as a great, distorted, rayless
ball of crimson. The play of light in this icy haze is a Joy experienced
in no other part of the globe. Over the departing sun there remained
a band of orange running into rose at the sky line and into gold at
its upper edge. At the same time there rose in the east an arc of
dark purple-blue, edged with orange. This is the twilight curve which
is here strikingly noticeable. As the purple of twilight ascended
towards the zenith, the snow westward had a delicate lilac hue, and
eastward there was a bright purple-blue over everything, which finally
deepened into a gobelin-blue.

At about eight o'clock the Southern Cross was clearly visible over
the masts. The purple twilight curve was absorbed into the homoge-
neous blue of the, sky. At the zenith there were a few waves of light
which had the appearance of high cirrus clouds. These darted across
the heavens with lightning swiftness, fading, vanishing and reappearing
with augmented force each time, until at ten o'clock the phenomenon
settled into a waving, luminous arc Avith a fringe, causing it to look
like a curtain hanging low on the southern sky. Still later the fringe
work gave place to a steady luminous arc, whose highest altitude was
about 30°.

The evening of the 14th was also clear and calm. There was a fas-
cinating sunset, followed by a long purple twilight. The temperature
had fallen to — 20 C. The glassy character of the air, the paleness
of the sky and the absence of wind were to us indications of a very
cold night. Such nights are always favorable to auroral displays, and
we were early on a lookout for them. At about nine o'clock there
appeared a bank of luminous fog in the southwest. Soon after, there
rose an arc over this which was at first imperfect. Now the eastern
portion was illuminated, then the western portion, and, again, only
a fragment of the center was visible. So rapid were these changes
that we found ourselves unable to record the fleeting forms.

Everybody was on deck or pacing the ice about the 'Belgica,'
making notes and sketches of the phenomenon. The scene was such
as would delight the heart of any lover of nature. The good old
'Belgica,' the home of the only speck of human life within the icy
under-surface of the globe, was buried in a bed of snow which so
completely covered her body that only the rigging projected. Even
the masts and the ropes were encased in a heavy plating of hoar-frost
and hard ice, Aihich glittered like gems in the silvery light of the

THE AURORA AUSTRALIS.

25

..mWll\»ll»™»l"""!!»ll(ll(rap,«„^..

..^^,„v;i^^i*»'««/r{«^^^,,

"^OHOT.tMMsmiidW"-"'""*""''""""-

Successive Displays of a Typical Austral Avkop.a seen fkom the 'Belgioa,' Map.ch 19,
1898. Above the Arcs on this Evening there were Occasional Ban'ds of '
Wavy Ribbons and Streamers.

26 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

night. As we walked around the bark in an unsuccessful effort to
keep warm we saw beyond the glittering spars the glow of a great
arc. This, for a time, hung steadily between the masts and then
suddenly, as if the fetters which had held it together had burst, the
entire southerji heavens were swept by aimless bands of fleeting
luminous patches.

After a violent storm which lasted for three days the sky cleared
again on the evening of the 19th; the wind then came in puffs with
doleful wails like the moans of a dying soul. This we knew indicated
that the tempest was nearly spent. At five o'clock I wrote in my log:

"5 P. M. — The storm has at last abated. It has left us so suddenly
that the calm is as imexpected as it is appreciated. The barometer is
steady and the temperature is falling fast. It is already 9°C., and is
still falling. The scene now before us is full of new delights. The
ice is spread out again, bright, soft and tinted with delicate colors.
Every time the thick air and the gloomy storm clouds are brushed
away, the pack, white and sparkling, has a new story to tell. It brings
to us moods like a cheerful page in a sad story. Under the influence
of this spell everybody is singing, whistling and humming familiar
tunes; all are planning new work and nursing big ambitions. In the
cabin the music-boxes are grinding out favorite music, which rings
over the pack with a new joy. In the forecastle the men are dancing
and playing the accordeon with telling effect. From some invisible
point of the pack there combes a weird response to every discord of the
music. It is the 'gha-a-ah, gha-a-aha' of the penguins. We have had
a peep at the sun, and this has brought about an intoxication akin to
alcoholic stimulation, and well it might, for the brief period of its
visibility has been a dream of charms. The great twilight zone of
purple, fringed with violet and orange and rose is rising over the east.
The zenith is pale blue, studded with a few scarlet and lavender clouds,
and the sun, a great ball of old gold, is sinking under the pearly rose-
tinged line of ihe endless expanse of ice."

"8 P. M. — The ice shows signs of strong pressure from the north.
Along the crevasses, running easterly and westerly, there are great
lines of hummocks from four to eight feet in height. The colors of
the pack are nov/ far from the despairing monotone of yesterday. The
yellow sea algae have already fixed themselves in the new ice and make
it appear ocherous. The twilight on clear nights is extended by the
latent luminosity of the snow. The blueness of the pack in this
twilight, separated by the ebony lanes of open water and decorated
by the algae-strewn yellow and green lines in the hummocks, makes
the scenes curiously attractive. Added to this we have the bergs, tall,
sharp and imposing, standing out against the soft blue of the sky and
the hard blue of the pack as if cut from huge masses of alabaster. The

THE AURORA AUSTRALIS.

27

whole scene is one of lively contrasts, pleasing to the eye and stimu-
lating to the mind, having quite the reverse of the effect of the days of
darkness and depressing storms which have preceded."

At about ten o'clock we saw an aurora. It began as a ragged
arc, spread easterly and westerly across the southern sky, with a straight
line running under it close to the horizon. The space under the
arc was noticeably darker than the surrounding sky, and in this space,
also a straight line, were four luminous spots. The color of the
aurora was a bright cream with an occasional suggestion of pink.

Early Exhibit, March 20, 1898. Arc with Rays Converging to a Common Center.

March 23. Fragments of Multiple Arcs.

March 24. Luminous Glow.

There was no noticeable reflection of light on the snow, A quick
and constant transformation took place in the form of the phenomenon.
A wave of light ran through the luminous bands and spots from east
to west. Some parts brightened and enlarged, others darkened and
faded away. The arcs were generally of a steady rayless brightness;
the apparent movement and wavy effect of light were in a series of
sharp rays on a film-like display before the arc.

I found it difficult in the low temperature to remain outside for
periods sufficiently prolonged to catch the minute changes in force

28

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

and character, but I made a series of eight sketches at intervals of
about twent}' minutes apart, which illustrate the most striking changes.
The second form was a homogeneous arc with a fragment of a second
arc under it. This hung for some time, with a steady nebulous glow
between it and the one pi-evious, as ^yell as between the intervening
periods of all. The following typical forms then were rapid and almost
imperceptible gradations. The third sketch represents the same posi-
tion on the heavens; but under it are portions of two other arcs and a
suggestion of a luminous horizontal line. At times a wave of rays,
converging to the pole of the circle described, ran over the main arc.
In the fourth sketch there are two arcs and a portion of a third which
were seen persistently in all the exhibits to be present. In the fifth
there is a second arc crossing the first. This was suggested by the

March 26. Early Display. This was Followed by IDarting Rays and Wavy Ribbons

WHICH Ended in a Brilliant Arc with Moving Ray's Drawn Over it Convkrging

TO A Common Center, as Shown Below.

March liiJ. Later.

third, and it reappeared in the seventh. The sixth form was an arc
with three ribbons of luminous beams waving from side to side. The
exhibit ended with a plain arc aglow with a steady light.

For a week following we had faint auroral displays every night,
but we seldom saw a brilliant or extensive exhibit. The usual form it
took at this time was that of a fragment of one or several arches. On
the night of the 26th we saw the usual auroral patches in the southeast
which we had seen so often before. These disappeared entirely at ten
o'clock, but reappeared shortly after in a manner and vividness worthy
of note. There was a steady luminous bow somewhat brighter than
the Magellanic clouds, and over this there were bunches of brighter
rays with a rapid motion from east to west. These rays centered to
a point below the horizon. Under this main arc there was from time
to time a suggestion of a second and also a continuation of the same

THE AURORA AU STRAUS. 29

rays \\liich played over the main are; above there were al^u occasional
fragments of an arc and a prolongation of horizontal rays. This dis-
play continued until about three o'clock in the morning.

The color of this aurora, as of all those which preceded and followed,
with but one exception, was a faint flesh color edged with a pale green-
ish-3'ellow. "\\^e saw no prismatic colors. The exception was a frag-
ment of an arc in the southeast early in the evening of April 10.
Tliis was for a few moments noticeably green, but it quickly faded
and vanished. Later in the evening it reappeared in tlie same form
and place, but the color was nearly white.

In the latter part of April we saw a few auroras, especially after
storms, on clear nights, but instead of increasing in number and
in brilliancy, whieli we expected, as the veil of winter darkness was
spread over us, they diminished steadily as the long night advanced.
On May 17 we saw the autumnal sun for the last time. Its cold,
distorted and seemingly wrinkled face lingered for a few moments on
the northern ice and then sank into the frozen sea, from which it did
not ascend for about seventy days. It is curious that we must say about
seventy days, but this uncertainty is due to the fact that for several
days before sunset the sky was obscured by storm clouds, and our con-
stant drift with the pack-ice made our latitude uncertain.

During this long night auroras were but rarely seen, but the weather
was clearer and steadier than before and after. On May 21 and 22 there
were faint auroral bands in the south, on the 20th there was a feeble
arc in the southeast, and on the 29th there was a feeble double arc.
On the 22d, 23d and 24th of June there was a similar phenomenon in
the same position, and this curiously enough reappeared one month
later, in July, on the same dates. The long antarctic night, then, as
experienced by the observers of the 'Belgica' was not apparently lighted
by the Aurora Australis.

During August we saw but one bright display, which was a double
arc, on the 20th, for most of the month was so stormy that the clear sky
was seldom visil/le. The last week in August, however, was a remark-
able period of clear weather. Bright sunlight, charming moonlight
and fascinating halos were among our delights in these life-giving
days of the south polar spring. The sea of ice was made doubly
interesting by the increasing number of penguins and seals, crying
and grunting and making manifest in various ways the contentment and
satisfaction of the new sunny splendor of their usually cold and cheer-
less abodes. From the 'Belgica' the budding passions of a new life
were bursting forth; songs and laughter and a noisy commotion were
audible and visible during the evening hours.

The moon often so illuminated the skies that it was difficult to
distinguish between ordinary cirrus clouds and bands of auroras. On

30

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the evening of September 2, however, there was an exhibit which
could not be mistaken, I give it as written down at the time.

"Low down on the southern sky there stands a faint arc of light,
and under it there is a distinct segment, darker than the sky above.
This segment has been noticed in several previous auroras, but it was

Successive Displays op^ an Avstkai, Aukoka (in the Evening of September 2, 1898.

not before so clearly defined. On board there is considerable difference
of opinion about this segment. Some have previously doubted its
existence, but to-night it is indisputable. I have taken the ground
that it is produced by the haze of ice crystals which always rests over
the ice, and I believe that its darkness depends upon the amount of
humidity or the thickness of the suspended icy haze. The stars shine

THE AURORA AUSTRALIS.

31

thro\igh this dark segment, apparently as bright as those above, but the
light is changed in color and there is frequently a kind of halo about
them. The arc gradually grows in intensity and in breadth, and it
also rises a little towards the zenith. The upper edge of the segment
pales as its height increases. The arc has remained perfectly regular;
its two ends almost touch the horizon, and they advance to the east
and to the west, widening the distance between them and showing more
and more the contour of a circle as the bow of light rises."

For the first hour no beams were discernible, but the whole display
consisted of <in almost uniform light of a delightfully soft, cream color.

Successive Displays of an Alstkal Aurora. Evening of September 10, 1898.

At ten o'clock this arc was about 15° above the sea; it was about thrice
the breadth of an ordinary rainbow, and its edges were clearly defined
against the dark blue of the heavens. Up to this time an air of rest-
fulness and repose was about the phenomenon, but now this began
to change to an atmosphere of mysterious excitement. A wave of light
rolled slowly from one side to the other. This wave soon took on the
texture of torn lacework and was drawn to and fro, while the arc,
which was less brilliant, remained as it had been before. At about
eleven o'clock a second arc, somewhat narrower and less brilliant,
appeared below the first. The play of drapery now vanished, but in

32 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the dark segment there appeared many glowing elongated spots all
pointing toward a common circle below the horizon. These came and
went with such marvelous swiftness that it was difficult to follow their
forms with the eye. Still later, all signs of the aurora disappeared,
except the primary arc, which had for a time at its lower edge a faint
suggestion of prismatic colors. This rested motionless on the midnight
heavens until about two o'clock, when it slowly faded, but before it
disappeared it was replaced by a bewildering display of a rayed arc.

From September 1 to the 9th the temperature steadily fell. On the
8th the thermometer registered — 43.1 C. This was the coldest spell of
the yeai-, and it was folloAved on tlie 9th and 10th by the most vivid and
impressive auroral displays that we saw. The exhibit of the evening of
the 10th began in quite the usual way, with a cloudless brightness in
the south. Soon there appeared an arc with its ends about 10° above
the ice. Under this arc there appeared three fragmental arcs. In the
course of an hour the first arc nearly disappeared, leaving only a
crescent strip, but under it there were bows more or less elliptical.
These vied with each other, alternately brightening and fading, and

HoBizoNTAL Streamers and Parts of Multiple Arcs. Evening of September 20, 1898.

vanishing altogether or in parts, until after midnight. At about one
o'clock they disappeared suddenly and in their place came', with an
electric glow and swiftness, a bewitching array of ragged patches de-
scribing four arcs. One hour later these spread over the entire heavens,
making a system of quivering, moving streamers, sweeping the skies
and illuminating the snows with an effect perfectly bewildering.

This was the last great aurora that we saw, and it was followed
by only one other, on September 20. The night at this time was so
bright that the phenomenon was barely visible, but its form was differ-
ent from any wliich we had seen. There were two horizontal bands;
between these was an imperfect arc, and on l)()tli sides were crescent-
shaped patches. The whole display came and went within an hour.

It is a curioup fact that the auroras usually a])peared about the 20th
day of the month. During the long polar night, when the boreal
display is at its best, we saw very few exhibits. The phenomenon had
little or no effect upon the compass, but it seemed to have some con-
nection with tlic storms, for it Avas invariably either preceded or suc-
ceeded by violent atmospheric agitation. We did not hear any sounds,

THE AURORA AUSTRALIS. 33

nor conld we at any time perceive an odor, both of which have been
reported in connection with the northern lights.

A phenomenon which displays its glories in skies so remote and
under conditions so mysterious cannot fail to excite popular interest.
This interest generally suggests the question, 'What is the aurora?'
This was the inquiry of ancient, as it is still the query of modern
students, and oui answer is the repetition of the old question, 'What is
it?' We are still far from a solution of the problem. We have, how-
ever, advanced far enough to put aside many old theories, and we hope
that we are now on the train of inquiries which will eventually solve
the mystery.

The similarity of auroral light to that generated in a vacuum bulb
by the passage of electricity, it is now believed, lends support to the
proposition, suggested long ago, that the aurora is of electrical origin.
It was expected that that great mystery-solver, the spectroscope, would
help us in this matter, but it has only served to add further mystery to
the subject. For the line which it sifts from the aurora is not matched
by any other known substance. A similar line is found in the zodiac
light, but this does not elucidate the matter. The zodiac light, though
better studied, is still as mysterious as the aurora. When electricity
passes through rarefied air it exhibits a luminous stream which seems to
have the characteristics of the aurora, hence it is quite probable that
this natural phenomenon is the result of currents of electricity passing
through the upper regions of the atmosphere, particularly by an ex-
change of celestial and terrestrial electricity.

The question is, however, one of the problems of the future.
Though many exploring expeditions have penetrated the icy polar
solitudes, very few men have given the time and patience necessary
for a systematic study of the aurora. No travelers should enter the
realms of the polar lights without being prepared to record, with the
accuracy required by science, the plays of this heavenly mystery. I
believe that, when men shall have penetrated a little farther south-
ward into the unexplored area about the south pole, the aurora australis
will be found just as brilliant, as varied and as frequent as the aurora
borealis. With our present marvelous strides in uncovering the accu-
mulating mysteries of past centuries, we ought, ere long, to look with
pride and understanding into the dark vault of the polar night and
read the flaming letters which must there reveal a thrilling tale of
Nature's most cherished secrets.

VOL. MX.— 3

34 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

PROGEESS AND TENDENCY OF MECHANICAL ENGINEER-
ING IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.*

By ROBERT H. THURSTON, LL. D., Dr. Eng'g,

DIRKCTOK OF SIBLEY COLLEGE, CORNELL UNIVERSITY.

THE progress and tendency of mechanical engineering in the nine-
teenth century comprehends the progress and the tendency of
almost all that has distinguished the nineteenth century from all the
centuries of time, historic and prehistoric, that have preceded.

The progress of the human race includes advancement in all the
languages, all the literatures, all the arts and all the sciences of all
times. But the progress of past time in language is the evolution of the
employment of the tongue in the conveyance of ideas, and it is the idea
that is important, rather than the language. Progress in literature is
the perfection of our methods of permanent preservation of ideas, and,
again, it is the ideas, not the systems of preservation, that count.
Progress in the sciences, in a proper acceptation of the term, is the
progress of the race in knowledge of the laws of nature and the phe-
nomena of nature, the progress of reduction of such exact knowledge
to system, the construction of a code of natural law in all departments
of science. Progress in the arts is advancement in the utilization of
Nature's laws in the construction of a system of application of the
materials and forces of nature to the enrichment and elevation of human
life from its crudest and simplest forms to the highest and noblest
phases of civilization. Progress in mechanical engineering is the evolu-
tion of the methods and machinery of production, transportation and
utilization of the material forms of wealth. In all other directions, the
progress of the world has been more or less steady, continuous and evo-
lutionary from the beginning of the life of the race; in the sciences and
the arts, it has been an evolution mainly of the later times, though hav-
ing an origin prehistoric.

Progress in mechanical engineering, the production of permanent
wealth in most part, could only come after language should have sup-
plied a satisfactory vehicle for ideas; it could only begin after literature
should be competent to furnish a means of storage of ideas and of
knowledge in safe and accessible treasuries; it could only progress
rapidly after science had accumulated sufficient store of knowledge of
facts, of phenomena and of natural law to permit complete reliance upon

• An address delivered before the Washin^on Academy of Sciences, Columbian
University, February 19, 1901.

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING. 35

that stock of substantial learning in the effort to develop the resources
of nature for use; and such advances could only go on, unimpeded, after
the nature of the great sources of power in the world should have been
discovered and their availability for the purposes of the engineer recog-
nized. Mechanical engineering, as we understand it, could only fairly
start in its wonderful progress after the mechanic had found ways of
utilizing natural forces and energies, and of making the tools with
which to produce these prime motors, through the operation of which
all the arts could be given application in the production of wealth, mul-
tiplying the power of the unaided hand by making it in the perform-
ance of work the guide of greater powers, rather than the tool itself.
It was only when mighty powers could be thus developed and guided
and directed that mighty tasks could be performed by so weak and in-
significant an organism as man. Man as a prime mover is feeble and
helpless before the great powers of nature; man as the master and guide
of nature's powers is only less than omnipotent.

Mechanical engineering, to achieve its highest tasks, must have con-
trol of the grandest powers of nature and of all her energies; it must
avail itself of prime movers transforming all actual and potential en-
ergies into available, transformable, useful work; it must be capable of
making for itself tools and machines and apparatus, scientific and other,
competent to direct those energies in definite and helpful ways to the
performance of every useful task. Progress must wait for the power
and power must be guided, divided, applied, through invention and the
mechanic arts, to defined and precisely related productive operations.
The natural order is: first, sources of available energies; second, prime
movers applying while developing those energies; third, tools and ma-
chines devised and constructed to perform detailed tasks, exactly and
perfectly. Invention is the first necessity, and necessity has been found
to be the mother of invention; but invention is helpless without tools,
and invention began with the first crude tools; the motors followed, and
better tools followed motors, and better motors followed the invention
of better tools. It was only a century ago, or a little more, when the
inventor had reached a certain stage in the production of tools, that
Watt could produce the steam engine of the nineteenth century, that a
system of manufactures could come into being as the fruit of invention
and that the Golden Age of the centuries could begin.

The Golden Age of the World, in all good senses, had its origin with
the birth of the nineteenth century, and when mechanical engineering
began uniting all the sciences and all the arts into one great system
of adaptation of nature's powers to the work of the promotion of civil-
ization. This fairly begun, the steam-engine, the gas-engine, the elec-
tric motors and generators, telegraphs and telephones, the steamboat,
the locomotive, the automobile, textile manufactures, iron and steel

36 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

making, shortened workiag hours for the people came and leisure for
the enjoyment of the best that life affords, for thought, for contrivance,
for self-communing, for self-exaltation in spiritual realms, became a
birthright with mankind.

Mechanical engineering is the highest illustration of applied science;
and applied science is the fruition of pure science. A fundamental basis
for mechanical engineering could not be secured until physical science
could find safe development, and this could only be when, the age
of martyrdom past and perfect freedom of thought and research as-
sured, later Brahes and Galileos could work in peace and Gilbert and
Lavoisier and Faraday and Davy and their successors could devote
themselves to their labors in all the fields of science without molesta-
tion. Invention could not freely develop the arts until after these
master-minds had assured freedom to the more modest but none the
less glorious workers in science and the arts, and to the mechanics and
the inventors, and had secured that political and social freedom to work
in any and all fields, irrespective of birth and caste and creed, which has
only, even now, been witnessed in America. When absolute liberty of
mind and body and freedom of choice of vocation had become possible
without dictation by church or state or convention; when any man could
pursue research and publish results, and could follow any art and could
give vent to his highest and best aspirations and impulses — only then
could steady progress become possible.

It was only in the nineteenth century that a Darwin could safely
pronounce his judgment, that a Spencer could formulate a system of
philosophy, that a Huxley could declare his conviction and a Haeckel
could face the dogmatist and that warfare between science and dogma
could no longer effectively repress honest work and sincere conviction.
It was only in the century lately closed that the mechanic could take up
any trade, without regard to the caste of his fathers, that progress be-
came easy for the scientific Papin, the clerical Cartwright and the
physicist Black, or that the instrument-maker Watt could proceed with
the evolution of the heat-engines. Only in the nineteenth century came
it to pass that the inventor, impelled into any line of study and experi-
ment and labor, could unite with every other man in the same field to
perfect the machinery of the world, and that invention could build up
nations like Great Britain and the United States, and give wealth to
Germany and to France. Only in the century just closed did it become
possible to gain freedom in the competition of brain with brain for all
men.

The political freedom of the United States and its admirable policy
and its practice of encouraging invention by wise patent laws have now
made our country the leader among nations in all fundamental modern
industries.

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING. 3;

At the opening of the twentieth century we have far better occasion
than had at any time the great cynic, Carlyle, to exclaim:

"The Present Time, youngest-bom of eternity, child and heir of all the Past
Times, with their good and evil, and parent of all the Future, is ever a 'New Era'
to the thinking man; and comes with new questions and significance; however
commonplace it looks: to know it and what it bids us do is ever the sum of
knowledge for all of us. This new Day, sent us out of Heaven, this also has its
heavenly omens — amid the bustling trivialities and loud empty noises, its silent
monitions; which, if we can not read and obey, it will not be well with us! . .
. . But, in the days that are now passing over us, even fools are arrested to
ask the meaning of them; few of the generations of men have seen more im-
pressive days. . . . There must be a new world if there is to be any world
at all! . . . One thing I do know," he adds, . . . "That the few Wise
will have, by one method or another, to take command of the innumerable fool-
ish; that they must be got to take it; and that, in fact, since Wisdom, which
means also Valor and heroic Nobleness, is alone strong in this world, and one
wise man is stronger than all unwise, they can be got."

How shall the wise men and the wisest men accomplish their tasks?
I take it that Carlyle was also right when he prescribed the two great
tasks lying before us:

"Huge-looming through the dim tumult of the always incommensurable Pres-
ent Time, outlines of two tasks disclose themselves: the grand Industrial of con-
quering some half or more of this Terraqueous Planet, for the use of man; then,
secondly, the grand constitutional task of sharing, in some pacific, endurable
manner, the fruit of said conquest and showing all people how it might be done."

"Moreover," he goes on, "there are spiritual budding-times, and then also
there are physical appointed to Nations.

"Thus, in the middle of that poor calumniated Eighteenth Century, see once
more! Long Winter again past, the dead-seeming tree proves to be living, to have
been always living, after motionless times, every bough shoots forth, on the
sudden, very strangely — it now turns out that this favored England was not only
to have had her Shakespeares, Bacons, Sydneys, but to have had her Watts, Ark-
wrights, Brindleys ! We honor greatness in all kinds. . . . Prospero can send
his Fire-demons panting across all oceans; shooting with the speed of meteors,
on cunning highways, from end to end of all kingdoms; and make Iron his mis-
sionary, preaching its evangel to the brute Primeval Powers, which listen and
obey. . . . Advancing always, through all centuries, in the middle of the
eighteenth they arrived. The Saxon kindred burst forth into cotton-spinning,
cloth-dropping, iron-forging, steam-engining, railwaying, commercing and career-
ing towards all the winds of Heaven."

Carlyle saw more clearly than perhaps any other man of his time
that, as others have since said, the world owes absolutely nothing, in its
conquest of the forces and powers of nature, to the kings and princes or
to the aristocracy of the worlds, past or present; they, with their battles
and contentions and their subordination to their own insignificant af-
fairs of every element of real progress, have been the great impediments
to progr.ess. The world owes all rather to the inventor, to the mechanic,
to the man of science and the man of mind. All progress has been
effected irrespective of, if not in spite of, the acts and famous deeds of

38 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

kings and warriors, and through the arts of times of peace, or through
revolutions which have been effective protests against the infringement
of liberty and the restriction of the worker. Science, applied science,
invention and the industrial army have done the work.

With the opening of the twentieth century we are indeed arrived at
a Day of Great Things, the fruition of all those forces and movements
and evolutions which have been the characteristic features of the his-
tory of the nineteenth century. All great works are performed on
a mighty scale, and the advances of the industrial army are now
made through wide-spread and far-reaching movements of army corps,
instead of, as but two or three generations ago, in a thin and straggling
line of individual skirmishers. All the world is falling into line, and
the whole world-wide army is moving in concert if not under a single
generalship. In the industries, the captains of industry, once com-
manding squads and companies, now are become majors with their bat-
talions, colonels with their regiments, generals with their brigades, their
army corps, with mighty armies overspreading all the fields of produc-
tion of a whole country, even of many countries. Where the single
worker labored hour bv hour through the long day, ^from sun to sun,'
in the days of our grandparents, companies of workers now cooperate,
by subdivided and wonderfully trained tactile talent, in a single multi-
plex task; the squad of workers in the little factory or mill has grown
into an organized body numbering regiments. A whole industry is
organized and supplies an enormously expanding market with continu-
ally improving product, at steadily declining costs and prices, while, at
the same time, giving its armies of workmen and workwomen steadier
work, at better wages, under more reasonable and comfortable condi-
tions, day by day and year by year. The higher the wages paid and the
shorter the working hours, the less the cost and the lower the price of
the product, the greater is the purchasing power of the day's work
and of the dollar paid the worker. This is the nineteenth century state-
ment of the Law of Supply and Demand.*

Goethe, poet, man of science and seer, prophesied that the nine-
teenth century would solve the problems of organization of the indus-
tries and the great social and economic problems of an industrial epoch.
Carlyle saw the same problems in progress of solution, and his disquisi-
tion on the organization of labor as the problem of the coming days
shows that great men here thought alike. Hitze defines the standing
problem of our time, the problem of the nineteenth century, particu-
larly— already partly, yet not wholly, solved — to be that of finding a
social organization corresponding to the modern conditions of produc-

* The Modern Version of the Law of Supply and Demand. — R. H. T. — Science,
1898.

MECHANICAL ENGINEEIUNG. 39

tion; Just as the social organization of the Middle Ages was adapted to
the simple industrial conditions of that time.* Henry Dyer's 'Evolu-
tion of Industry'! traces this process of solution of these problems, so
far as solved to date, in a most interesting way. ITis conclusion, that the
mechanical development of the past century is a necessary element of
the evolution of society, as well as of the industries, is as sound as is
his deduction that the problems of the twentieth century should be
solved in such manner as to insure a final evolution of an ideal, discreet,
wise, prudent, pleasant and righteous life, which shall conform to the
ideals of the scholar, the gentleman, the seer and the poet. On the
organization of the mechanical industries largely depends the future of
the world, and in this evolution of a finer and better life, through indus-
trial and social evolution, the influence of one such man as Dolge, at
Little Falls, N. Y., and of one such firm as the famous Patterson's at
Dayton, Ohio, tells more powerfully than all polemic discussion.

Thus the organization of the workshop and the humanizing of the
workman, as Ashbee denominates it, may be expected to proceed to-
gether. J

The noble view of the Bishop of Durham, as expressed a few years
ago, may well be taken as the enunciation of the problem and the pur-
pose of the coming centuries :§

"Manufactures, trade, commerce, agriculture, if once the thought of personal
gain can be subordinated to the thought of public service, offer scope for the most
chivalrous and enterprising and courageous. It can only be through some misap-
prehension that it seems nobler to lead a regiment to the battlefield than to
inspire the workers in a factory "ivith the enthusiasm of labor."

He anticipates, nevertheless, that the time is coming, surely if
slowly, but possibly quickly, when the Great Industry will be "made to
contribute to the material and moral elevation of all who are engaged
in it, not as separate or conflicting units, but as parts of the social or-
ganism."

In his remarkable little book, ^Our Country,' Dr. Strong, fifteen
years before its close, affirmed that the later years of the nineteenth
century constitute a 'focal point' in history, and are second only in im-
portance to "that which always must remain first, viz., the birth of
Christ." He goes on to say in his introduction:

"Many are not aware that we live in extraordinary times. Few suppose that
these years of peaceful prosperity, in which we are quietly developing a conti-
nent, are the pivot on which is turning the nation's future. And fewer still

* 'Die Quintessenz der Socialen Fragen.'

t 'The Evolution of Industry' -. By Henry Dyer, C.E., M.A., D.Sc, New York
and London, Macmillan & Co., 1895.

i 'Workshop Reconstruction and Citizenship.'
§ Economic Review, October, 1894.

40 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

imagine that the destinies of mankind, for centuries to come, can be seriously
affected, much less determined, by the men of this generation in the United
States."

The nineteenth century has been the first distinctively machine-
using period. Until heat-motors could be found, it was impracticable to
employ machinery in any very great extent in the performance of the
work of the world. Until entire freedom of the worker could be as-
sured, enabling him to devise and to find means of constructing machin-
ery, inventions could not find general use. Until the machines for ma-
chine-making could be had, the general use of machinery could not be
secured, simply because the finer classes of machinery could not be ac-
curately and satisfactorily made. Until the modern system of manu-
facturing and of working to gauge, and of interchangeable parts, could
be adopted, the production of an industrial system for mechanical pro-
duction was not practicable. Thus all kinds of mechanisms and every
department of invention waited upon every other until, nearing the be-
ginning of the nineteenth century, the long-delayed conjunction was
attained, the beginning of the machine-using age introduced a new era,
and the world took a sudden leap forward; thenceforward advancing
with a continuous acceleration. Then came a machine-using world.
Then one man became equal, in productive power, to two or five, or
sometimes to ten, or even to a hundred, lacking the aid of the machine.
For the first time in the history of mankind, a real, permanent, rapid
and rapidly increasing progress began. One man then became able to
do the work of four of his predecessors in making agricultural ma-
chinery, and he made it incomparably better; one man could do the
work of fifty in making gun-stocks, after the Blanchard lathe for turn-
ing irregular forms had been adapted to the task of aiding him. One
man does the work of six in boot and shoe making; in some departments
of textile manufacture one man with his machinery does the work of a
hundred of earlier generations. In fact, the earlier generations from
prehistoric days have no record of any very important progress. Each
man, with his modern newspaper-printing press, taking its paper from
its miles of rolls, printing, cutting into sheets, pasting together, folding
and piling ready for the carrier, does the work that five hundred men
would have been employed to do a century earlier, and then it would
have been a work very badly done, as gauged by our standards. Mr.
Wright reckons that the machinery of the United States gives the
power of doing work that, without it, would require the labor of a
hundred millions of workers; thus multiplying the average work of the
average individual worker by about six.* In a very large proportion of
the later developments, especially in the application of steam-power,

* 'Industrial History of the United States'; Chautauqua-Century Press, 1895.

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING. 41

the task of the machine could not be performed at all; as, for example,
the haulage of the railway train at the rate of a mile a minute or more,
or the driving of a transoceanic liner across three thousand miles of
stormy seas at the speed of fifteen to twenty-five miles an hour. A large
fleet would be required to carry the labor and provisions for a single
craft, equivalent in total power, driven by animal force.

It has been the use of machinery that has permitted the people of
our country to use twenty pounds of cotton per capita where they for-
merly used but five; to increase their consumption of iron and steel
from a few pounds to four hundred per capita, and the consumption of
steel from an insignificant amount up to two hundred and fifty pounds
and over. This use of machinery and universal extension of mechanical
engineering has even permitted the doubling of our population in the
last generation and the increase in the number of people employed in
productive vocations one hundred and seventy-five per cent., according
to Mr. Wright's statistics. One-sixteenth of the whole population of
the country is supported by labor in railway transportation, and the
once minute proportion engaged in coach and other transportation by
means of horses has been multiplied many times over; yet these people
M'ere the most vigorous and powerful of all opponents of this advance.

The sewing machine, giving the power of multiplying many times
the productivity of the needle, instead of displacing the sewing girl, as
once anticipated by many ignorant persons, proves to be not properly a
labor-saving machine, but a machine assisting labor and multiplying
not only the efficiency of the worker, but also many times increasing the
quantity of work to be done and the numbers needed for the work, as
occurs in all such cases. In a thousand instances the invention of a
machine or the introduction of a new method in some department of
mechanical engineering has brought into use an entirely new form of
industry and made effective and productive the highest powers of thou-
sands of people who otherwise would probably be compelled to drudge
on in old ways and to content themselves with old rates of compensa-
tion. The reduction of costs of product and the increase in the wages
of labor are the two most striking results of the revolution of the cen-
tury; while the accession of value conferred upon material is sometimes
quite as impressive, if not actually as important — as when the often-
recounted fact is noted of the increase of the value of iron from one
dollar in the ore to five or six in the shape of iron bar, to $10 in any one
of many finished machine-made forms, to $200 and upward in fine cut-
lery, to $5,000 and $10,000 in needles, to $200,000 and more in common
watch-springs, and to perhaps half a million dollars in the shape of
hair-springs, the most refined condition of the metal yet attained, or
even up to $2,500,000, according to Mr. Woods, in the form of pallet-
arbors.

42 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The earlier days of the factory system, while an improvement upon
what had preceded, were not particularly promising, as viewed from this
latter-day standpoint. The manners and morals of the time were neces-
sarily imported into the factory, and, while the working men and women
and children soon gained a higher plane of comfort, that level would
seem to us an exceedingly small advance upon the conditions of the
Middle Ages. The hours were long, the wages low, the social conditions
in all respects still unsatisfactory. Women and children were flogged
for actual or imputed idleness, for incompetence, or even for lack of
endurance and of strength. But the output soon filled the markets of a
then poor and moneyless people, and wages and prices began to readjust
themselves, as always, to the new commercial conditions, and the end
of the century has found the operatives organized and powerful, know-
ing and compelling fair treatment, sometimes even tyrannizing over
the employer, indeed, but usually simply securing by force what is fairly
theirs and can not be otherwise obtained. "Wages have risen and prices
fallen, until the day's "work earns several times as much as a century
ago. Moral tone has improved as social conditions have thus been im-
proved, and comfortable houses, plenty of good food and many of the
luxuries of the beginning of the century are taken as ordinary comforts
by the operatives of to-day. Then the wealth of the country was $320
per capita, to-day $1,350; then it aggregated seven and a half millions,
to-day its total is about a hundred billions, increasing thirteen times,
while the per capita account has risen to four times its initial figure.
In a half-century these workers have increased their per capita account
as depositors in the savings banks from about $175 to about $400; the
total deposits growing from something over forty millions to about
twenty-five hundred millions. The factory system is also the source
of all labor legislation, and this, on the whole, splendidly beneficent
code is thus due to the perfection of the methods of mechanical en-
gineering. Society is advantaged from top to bottom and in every
class, most of all in the humblest.

While it is true, as I have sometimes asserted, that "great move-
ments, whether of mind or matter, of nations or of plants, of civiliza-
tion or of comets, have definable rate and path," and while it is the fact
that, as I have put it, 'Nature turns no sharp corners' in such mighty
fluxes of energies, it is nevertheless true that some of her movements
have paths of considerable deviation from the right line, and some of
the motions illustrated are occasionally almost as tremendous accelera-
tions as is the irruption of the volcano after its long period of prelim-
inary development and storage of energy. The process of evolution is
continuous; but its action involves every variety of acceleration and
visible change, even though the evolution is itself a steady operation.
We see only portions of its action and lose sight of its continuity and

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING. 43

its steadiness. So it has happened that the nineteenth century has illus-
trated such an apparent, though not real, exception to the law. The
forces of civilization had been cumulative; the resultant forces gather-
ing through the earlier ages, partly stored and latent, but none the less
potential, and partly as the actual and kinetic energies of phenomena of
visible evolution. All energies seem to have become kinetic and visible
in their aggregate results in this Victorian Era. The outcome has been
described as a 'tidal wave' of upward and onward movement on the sea
of universal progress, a climax of an evolution of which the earlier
periods have been quiet and silent and simply those of preparation. It
has been like the action of the seas beating upon a yielding shore.
Slowly and steadily through the ages it cuts farther and farther into
the obstruction, unobserved and unrealized as a great natural move-
ment, until, at last, the dike is cut through and the ocean rushes in and
overflows the land. This flood, beneficent as the other might be de-
structive, has had a somewhat similar history. The nineteenth century
is the period of uprush and inrush of the flood of efiiciently applied
human intellect, making effective al those powers which have been till
now frittered away, the magnificent potentialities of which have never
been before realized.

This volcanic development of previously latent, but gathering and
cumulative, energy has been effective in every department of human
activity, but most of all, perhaps, in the field of invention, of the me-
chanic arts, of what we have come to-day to designate 'mechanical en-
gineering.' The acceleration has been one beside which that of the fall-
ing stone or a dropping shot or the meteor precipitated into the field
of attraction of our globe seems insignificant in resultant effects. In
the year 1800 we had not a locomotive or a railroad for public service in
the world. To-day the United States alone, with half the mileage of
the world, possess 200,000 miles, nearly, of rail and about 40,000 loco-
motives. Then we had no telegraph; to-day its wires span the conti-
nents and carry messages along the bed of every ocean, binding the
continents as with ties of steel. Over three millions of miles of wire
transmit three hundred to four hundred millions of messages annually,
and nations are brought within speaking distance and bound heart to
heart. The events of the antipodes are signalled to us, hour by hour,
as they occur, and we read at the breakfast table of battles, coronations,
deaths and births of individuals and of nations, of all the great phe-
nomena of a world, from Atlantic to Pacific and to Atlantic again, and
almost from pole to pole.

(To be concluded.)

44 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

PRIMITIVE COLOR VISION.*

By Dr. W. H. R. rivers,
st. john's college, cambridge university.

THE importance of language as an instrument of anthropological en-
quiry lias been the subject of much difference of opinion. On the
one hand, there are those who believe that the relation between language
and thought is so close that the former has always been an almost exact
mirror of the latter, and that every increase in intellectual development
has been accompanied by, if not conditioned by, a corresponding in-
crease in the development of language. On the other hand, the tend-
ency which perhaps now prevails among anthropologists is to attach
too little importance to language as an indication of the mental develop-
ment of a race. The subject of the color sense of primitive races is one
which is especially useful in studying how far the capacity for appre-
ciating differences goes with the power of expressing those differences in
language. We are able to put to the test how far the ideas of a people
may be deduced from their language. We can collect the epithets used
for color in various races, both of the present and of the past, and from
a study of these epithets we can draw conclusions as to the nature of the
color sense in these races. In the case of still existing races, we can
then examine the color sense objectively and ascertain how far the
conclusions derived from the study of language are verified by the result
of the objective examination.

Historically, this is more or less what has been done. In 1858, in his
'Studies on Homer and the Homeric Age,' Gladstone called attention to
the great vagueness of the color terminology of Homer; he showed that
Homer used terms for color which indicated that his ideas of color must
have been different from our own, and he was inclined to go as far as to
suppose that Homer had no idea of color as we imderstand it, but
distinguished little beyond differences of lightness and darkness.

Ten years later, Geiger, t from a more extended investigation of
ancient writings, also came to the conclusion that the color sense of the
ancients must have been very defective. He found, not only in Greek
literature, but in the Vedic hymns of India, in the Zendavesta, in the
Norse Edda, and in ancient Chinese and Semitic writings that there
was evidence of great imperfection, especially in the names for green
and blue. In hardly any of these ancient writings is any word used from

* A lecture delivered at the Royal Institution, January 25, 1900.

t 'Contributions to the History of the Development of the Human Race,' p. 48.

PRIMITIVE COLOR VISION. 45

which we may gather that the people who wrote them had any idea of
blue. Geiger advanced the view that there -had been an evolution of
the color sense in historical times; and he supposed that this evolution
had been of such a kind that red had been distinguished first, followed
by yellow and green, and that the sense for blue had developed much
later than that for the other colors. Magnus* came to the same con-
clusions on the basis of a still more extended examination of ancient
writings, and Gladstone, in 1877, again called the attention of English
scholars to the subject in the pages of the 'Nineteenth Century.' t

The subject was taken up both from the literary and scientific
points of view. On the literary side it was objected that the special
peculiarities of the color terminology of Homer were due to a char-
acteristic of epic style, according to which attention is paid to form
rather than to color. It was also pointed out that the language of some
modern poets presents the same peculiarities as those of ancient litera-
ture. Grant Allen t counted the color-epithets used in Swinburne's
Toems and Ballads' and found that red occurred much more frequently
than blue, and a similar preponderance of red was found to be a feature
of Tennyson's 'Princes.' Instances were also given of individual pecul-
iarity in the use of color by many modem poets, one instance being
La Fontaine, who, according to Javal, § only used an epithet for blue
once in the whole of his poems.

On the scientific side, also, objections were raised. It so happened
that about 1877 there were in Germany two parties of Nubians going
from town to town in traveling caravans. These Nubians were exam-
ined by Virchow and others, and it was found that they exhibited the
same peculiarity of color language as ancient writers; they had no word
for blue, or, rather, they used the same word for blue as for black or for
dark colors generally. On examination, it was found, however, that
they were not color blind, and that they sorted colored papers and
wools correctly. It was, therefore, concluded that the ideas of Glad-
stone and Geiger were altogether erroneous, and that there was no nec-
essary connection between color sense and color language.

In this country the views of Gladstone and Geiger were submitted
to a comprehensive criticism by Grant Allen in the book, 'The Color
Sense,' already cited. The strongest objection raised by this author
was based on the existence of a well-developed color sense in many of
the lower animals, and it was argued that this sense could not therefore
be defective in primitive man. He also brought forward evidence that
many existing primitive races made large use of color, and cited the

* 'Die gesohichtliche Entwickelung des Farbensinnes,' Leipzig, 1877.

t Vol. n., p. 366 ; 1877.

J 'The Ck)lor Sense.' London, 1879: p. 264.

§ 'Bull, de la See. d'Anthropologie de Paris.' T. XII., p. 480; 1877.

46 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

opinions of travelers that savages were able to distinguish colors per-
fectly. He also pointed out that the decorations of the early Egyptians
and of other ancient races showed the existence of a well-developed
sense long before the time of Homer.

The controversy was carried on for some years, especially in Germany.
Magnus* showed that the same defect of terminology for green and
blue, which characterizes ancient writings, still exists among many
primitive races at the present day, and argued that this wide-spread
peculiarity must have had some definite cause, probably of a physio-
logical nature. Nevertheless, the general trend of opinion was strongly
against the views of Gladstone and Geiger, and the idea of the evolu-
^tion of the color sense in man has been almost universally rejected.

As a member of the anthropological expedition which went out from
Cambridge to Torres Strait and New Guinea in 1898, under the leader-
ship of Prof. A. C. Haddon, I had an opportunity of re-investigating
this question. In addition to a full examination of the color vision of
two tribes of Papuans inhabiting one the eastern and the other the
western islands of Torres Strait, I was able to make observations on
natives of the Island of Kiwai, at the mouth of the Fly River, and on
members of several Australian tribes. The languages of these people
showed different stages in the evolution of color terminology, which
correspond in a striking manner with the course of evolution deduced
by Geiger from ancient writings. In an Australian tribe, from the
district of Seven Eivers, on the eastern shore of the Gulf of Carpen-
taria, several natives only used three color epithets; red, purple and
orange were called by the same name, 'oti'; white, yellow and green
were called 'yopa,' while black, blue, indigo and violet were all called
'manara.' Other natives from an adjoining tribe used the names 'owang,'
Svapok' and 'unma' in the same sense; some natives applied other names
to green and yellow, but those given appeared to be the only terms
which were used with any definiteness and constancy.

The next stage in the evolution of a color vocabulary was found in
Kiwai. In the language of this island there was a very definite name
for red, 'd6g6-d6g6,'f and a less definite name for yellow, 'ago-ago ago-
ago.' Greens were called by most individuals, 'emasoro' and 'tigiro,'
which were also used for white and black respectively, and may prob-
ably be translated 'light' and 'dark.' A few used a special word for
green, 'poroporona.' Blue and violet were usually called 'wibu-wibuna,'
the word for black, others calling these colors 'tigiro' or 'poroporona.'
The brilliant blue of the sky received from these people the same name
as the deepest black.

* 'Untersuchungen iiber den Farbensinn der Naturvolker, Jena, 1880,' and
'Ueber ethnologische Untersiichungen des Farbensinnes,' Breslau, 1883.
t '0' stands for the sound of 'aw' in the word 'law.'

PRIMITIVE COLOR VISION. 47

In Murray Island, in the eastern part of Torres Strait, where we
stayed for four months, I was able to investigate the language used
for color very completely. In this island there was a very definite
name for red, 'mamamamam,' while several other names, such as 'kiami-
kiam,' 'eroko, mamamamam' and *somer-mamamamam,' were used for
purples and pinks. There were two definite names used for both
orange and yellow, 'bambam' and 'siusiu,' and one definite word for
green, 'soskepusoskep,' while several other words were occasionally
used. There was, however, no native name for blue, apart from that
used for black, 'golegole.' This word was used by many of the older
men, and, as in Kiwai, the brilliant blue of the sky and the deep blue
of the sea would often be called by the same name as the darkest
black. Many of the natives had, however, adopted the English word,
which, by re-duplication and separation of contiguous consonants, had
become 'bulu-biilu,' and many of the younger men believed that this
word belonged to their own language.

The color language of the western tribe of Papuans in Torres
Strait was fully investigated in the Island of Mabuiag. Here the
vocabulary was more definite. There were a limited number of terms
which were used by nearly all for the chief colors. Red and yellow
were called 'kulkadgamulnga' and 'murdgamulnga' respectively. There
was a fairly definite term for green, 'ildagamulnga,' which was, how-
ever, sometimes used for blue, and there was a term for blue, 'malud-
gamulnga,' which was also used not infrequently for green. In addi-
tion to these four more or less definite color names, other terms were
used for different shades, and a few natives showed extraordinary in-
genuity in devising special names, apparently on the spur of the mo-
ment, for different shades of color. I have a list of over thirty such
names from one individual, all derived from a comparison with natural
objects.

In these four languages of Seven Rivers, Kiwai, Murray Island and
Mabuiag, we have progressive stages in the evolution of color language;
in the lowest there appears only to be a definite term for red apart
from white and black; in the next stage there are definite terms for
red and yellow, and an indefinite term for green; in the next stage there
are definite terras for red, yellow and green, and a term for blue has
been borrowed from another language; while in the highest stage there
are terms for both green and blue, but these tend to be confused with
one another. It is interesting to note that the order in which these
four tribes are thus placed, on the ground of the development of their
color language, corresponds with the order in which they would be
placed on the ground of their general intellectual and cultural de-
velopment.

It is said that there are other races, such as the Todas of Southern

48 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

India, who have only three definite terms in their color vocabulary,
viz., those for red, white and black, while others have also a term for
yellow. The absence of a definite term for blue, on the other hand, is
very common. The languages which have this characteristic appear
to fall into two main classes; those which, as in Kiwai, have the same
word for blue and black, and those which have the same word for blue
and green. The former class includes the languages of Hovas and
Bushmen, as well as of many Australian and Melanesian tribes. The
second group comprises a very large number of languages, including
one so near home as Welsh, in which there is only one word, 'glas,' for
both green and blue.

By many races a word for blue has been borrowed from some other
language, as was the case in Murray Island; thus many African races
are said to use the term ^Dru,' obviously a corruption of the English
word; in South America the Spanish word 'azul' has been borrowed,
and the Battas of Sumatra have borrowed words both from Dutch and
Malay. The word used by the Ga people of the Gold Coast for blue
and for indigo is said to mean literally '^something that must be learnt,'
these people having been taught the use of indigo either by Europeans
or by other Africans.*

When in Ceylon I obtained color vocabularies from a number of
Singhalese and Tamils, and, though the two languages differed in other
respects, both Singhalese and Tamils used the word 'nil' or "nilam' for
blue, and this word, which is said to be the same as the name of the
river Nile, is found widely distributed among Asiatic languages. The
river Nile has another interest in connection with this peculiarity of
color language. We are in the habit of speaking of the White Nile
and the Blue Nile. The Arabic name for blue is 'azrag,' a word used
by the modern Egyptian for blue and for dark colors generally. 'El
Bahr azrag' probably originally meant the dark Nile, and, when we
speak of the Blue Nile, we are using an expression which is based upon
the primitive confusion between blue and black.

Magnus has shown that these defects in color nomenclature eannot
be referred to the poverty of language. Some races, such as the Kaf-
firs and Basutos of South Africa, who have no word for blue, have,
nevertheless, a very long vocabulary for the various colors of oxen.
Similarly, the Kirghises,t of Central Asia, have many different names

* For many other instances of defective color terminology among savage and
semi-civilized races, see the papers of Magnus already quoted, and also .^jidree,
'Zeitsch f. Bthnologie,' Bd. X., p. 328; 1878.

fRadloflF, 'Zischr. f. Ethnol.' Bd. III., p. 285; 1871.

PRIMITIVE COLOR VISION. 49

for the colors of horses,* though they tend to confuse the designations
for green and blue.

I have had an opportunity of examining the color vision of the
Eskimos who have lately been in London, and have found that their
language presents a very striking contrast to that of the tropical people,
to whom my previous work had been limited. The terminology for
color appears to be extremely well developed; there are definite names
for red, yellow, green and blue, and modifications of these colors are
expressed by means of sufi&xes or by compounding two names; thus, by
more than one individual a purple was called 'aupaluktaktungalangai-
juk,' t which means bluish-red, while a violet was called 'tungajuktaka-
upalangaijuk,' which means reddish-blue. This recognition of the fact
that violet and purple are mixtures of red and blue shows a high degree
of definiteness in the nomenclature of both colors. I have only met
with one other individual who behaved in a similar way, viz., a Tamil,
who called purple 'sikapu-nilam,' red-blue.

Another peculiarity which appears to characterize a very large num-
ber of languages is the absence of a word for brown. In Torres Strait
a native would call one brown by a name meaning 'reddish'; another
brown by the same name as yellow, while others would be called dark or
gray. It was quite clear that they had no generic name for brown. In
the Australian and Melanesian languages, I have had the opportunity of
studying, as well as in Tamil, Singhalese and Eskimo, I have failed to
find any definite term for brown, and the same defect is found in
Welsh and in many other languages. The word given for brown in
many vocabularies is obviously the same word as that used for red or
dark or gray. There is always a danger that one may accept, as a
generic name for brown, a word which is only a name for a special
brown. This was very well shown in Mabuiag, where brown wools were
by some natives called by such names as 'wamauwibadgamulnga' (honey-
comb colored), or Vabadgamulnga (Dracsena colored), but it was quite
certain that these were names used by certain individuals for special
browns and were in no sense names for brown in general. Similarly,
in other languages in which there is no word for brown there may be
names for special browns, such as names for the colors of horses or
cattle, but such terms are limited to those objects. We have in our
own language similar examples in the words 'bay' and 'dun.'

The idea of brown is so definite with us that it is surprising that a
word for brown, and apparently the generic idea of brown, should be

* Strictly speaking, these names and those of the Kaffirs are not names of
colors, but rather names for distribution of color and marking; thus among the
Kirghises a brown horse with a black mane and tail would have one name, and
a brown horse with a white mane and tail, another name.

t 'Au' stands for the sound of 'ou' in 'house,' and 'ai' for that of 'i' in 'ice.'

vol.. i-ix. — 1

50 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

absent from so many languages. The fact is perhaps the more strange
in that the word 'brown' bears evidence of having arisen in an early
stage of our language, and is not, like violet or orange, obviously of
recent origin.

The special characteristics of primitive color language appear, then,
to be the following: The existence of a definite name for red, some-
times with subsidiary names for shades of red; a definite name for
orange and yellow; indefinite nomenclature for green; absence of a
word for blue, or confusion of the terms for blue and green, and absence
of a word for brown, a brown object being called red, yellow or dark,
according to its prevailing character.

These features closely resemble those of Homers color terminology,
Homer uses several words for red, (poivi$, (poiviog, /aiXtos, epvS-
po5 and Tioptpvpeos; he has a definite word for yellow, ^avdog, an in-
definite word for green, jA-typog; and no word for blue. Two words
which later came to mean blue, yXavKog and Kvareo?; were used by
Homer, but it can not be said that the terms mean more than 'light'
and 'dark' respectively. There seems now to be little doubt thai Kva-
'yos, the substance, was 'lapis lazuli" and also an imitation of
this substance made by coloring a glass paste with salts of copper, but
Kvaveoz is not used by Homer as an epithet for any distinctively blue
object (except Kvavoz), while it is used for a perfectly black garment.*
The substance, Kvavoz is also qualified in one place, t as pieXag.

There appears, also, to be no word for brown in Homer, but brown
or brownish objects are qualified by the same adjectives which are used
for red, thus (poivi^X is used for the color of a horse, and ^aqjoivog
is applied to jackals § and the skin of a lion. II

The resemblance is so striking that the conclusion seems irresistible
that we have to do in Homer with a color vocabulary in the same early
stage of development which is found among many primitive races at the
present day. Indeed, one might almost go so far as to say that Homei-'s
terminology for color is in a stage of development which is on much
the same level as that of Kiwai, and distinctly less developed than those
of Murray Island and Mabuiag.

From the nature of the defects of language, it has been concluded
that the color sense of both ancient and existing primitive races is in
some way defective. The next stage in the inquiry is to investigate the
color sense of some existing people, and this I have been able to do
most satisfactorily in Mun-ay Island. I tested about 150 natives of
this island with Holmgren's wools for color-blindness, and failed to find
one case in which there was any confusion between red and green, the

* 11., XXIV., 93. §11., XI., 474.

fll., XL, 24. ill., X., 23.

\ II., XXIII., 454.

PRIMITIVE COLOR VISION. 51

common form of the defect in civilized countries. Since red-green
blindness exists in about 4 per cent, of the male population of Europe,
one may conclude that this form of defective color sense was either
absent or was much rarer than with us. I also failed to find a case of
color-blindness in Kiwai and Mabuiag and among the Australian
aborigines, although I met with three well-marked cases of red-green
blindness among eight natives of the Island of Lifu, in the Loyalty
Group.

As regards other colors, liowever, the case was different; blue and
green were constantly confused, and also blue and violet. Either owing
to lack of interest or to some actual deficiency in color sense, there was
a distinct tendency to confuse those colors for which their terminology
M'as deficient. I have also found this tendency to confuse green and blue
in several other races.

The behavior of the people in giving names to colors also pointed
frequently in the same direction. I have already mentioned that in
Mabuiag there was a great tendency to invent names for special colors;
on one occasion a man, who seemed to have a special faculty in this
direction,- gave me as the name for a bright blue wool 'idiiridgamulnga,'
which meant the color of the water in which mangrove shoots had
been washed to make 'biiu,' an article of food. In this case there was a
deliberate comparison of a bright blue with dirty water, and I fre-
quently came across other instances of the kind, which seemed almost
inexplicable, if blue were not to these natives a duller and a darker
color than it is to us.

This view was confirmed by quantitative observations, made with
Lovibond's Tintometer, which had been kindly lent to the expedition
by Mr. Lovibond. When the native looked into this apparatus he saw-
two square patches of light, either of which could be colored in any
intensity of red, yellow or blue by means of a delicately-graded series
of glasses of those colors. The 'threshold' for each color was then de-
termined by finding the most faintly colored glass which the native
could recognize and name correctly. The results showed that the na-
tives recognized a very faint red, a more pronounced yellow, and only
recognized blue when of a considerable intensity. Similar observations
made on a series of Englishmen showed greatest sensitiveness to yellow
and somewhat less to red and blue. The results may be given more
definitely in Mr. Lovibond's units of color; in Murray Island, red was
perceived on the average at .18 units, yellow at .27 and blue at .60^
while the average results for the English observers were .31, .30 and
.36 respectively. These figures do not show anything approaching blue
blindness, but they do show a relative insensitiveness to blue in the
Murray Islander, as compared with the European. The former appears
nlso to be relatively more sensitive to red.

52 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Another method of investigating the subject quantitatively which
I employed was to determine the distance at which small spots of dif-
ferent colors could be recognized. I found in Murray Island that
natives could see a red spot 2 mm. square at over 20 meters, while a
blue spot of the same size was confused with black at even 2 or 3
meters. Europeans, however, also recognized red at a much greater
distance than blue, and I have not at present sufficient comparative
data to enable me to say that there is any marked difference between
the Murray Islander and the European in this respect.

These results do not show that these islanders are blue blind, but
they do show fairly conclusively that they have a certain degree of
insensitiveness to this color, as compared with a European. We have,
in fact, a case in which deficiency in color language is associated with
a corresponding defect in color sense.

On the question of the cause of this insensitiveness there is room
for differences of opinion. It is, of course, possible that the insensi-
tiveness may be apparent only and may be merely due to lack of in-
terest, but there is, I think, little doubt that it depends on physiological
conditions of some kind.

The Murray Islander differs from the Englishman in two important
respects; he is more primitive and he is more pigmented, and his insen-
sitiveness to blue may either be a function of his primitiveness or of
his pigmentation. In other words, it is possible that his insensitiveness
may depend on the lack of development of some physiological substance
or mechanism, which acts as the basis of the sensation blue in our-
selves, or it may only depend on the fact that the retina of the Papuan
is more strongly pigmented than that of the European. There is some
reason to think that this latter factor is the more important. We know
that the macula lutea in the retina, which contains the region of most
distinct vision, is pigmented, and that as a consequence of the reddish-
yellow color of its pigment, blue and green rays are more strongly ab-
sorbed than red and yellow; we have reason to believe further that the
macula of dark races is more pigmented than that of ourselves.

The consequence would be that, in dark races, blue and green would
be more strongly absorbed, and consequently there would be a certain
degree of insensitiveness to these colors, as compared with red and
yellow. In the observations made with the tintometer, the patches of
color were so small that only the macula would have been stimulated.
The probability that the insensitiveness to blue depended, at any rate
partially, on the pigmentation of the macula lutea is increased by the
fact that the natives were able to recognize blue readily on the peri-
pheral retina.

It would, of course, be wrong to make any wide generalization on
the basis of these observations. One would not be justified in directly

PRIMITIVE COLOR VISION. 53

applying the conclusions arrived at in the case of Murray Island to
all existing races whose color nomenclature is defective, and still less
so in applying them directly to the races of the past. ISTeverthelesSj
the fact remains that, in the only race which has been investigated with
any degree of completeness,* the characteristic defect in color language
has been found to be associated with a corresponding defect in color
sense.

There are other sources from which evidence on the evolution of
the color sense in man may be derived. It has already been mentioned
that at an early stage in the controversy the evidence of ancient monu-
ments was brought forward against the views of Gladstone and Geiger.
It was pointed out that, long before the time of Homer, green and
blue pigments were used in Egjrptian sculpture and decorations. In the
Berlin Museum there is a palette with seven depressions, which appear
to have been used for seven colors, white, black, red, yellow, green, a
bright blue and a dark color which may have been either blue or
brown. Indeed, blue appears to have been the predominant color of
Egyptian pottery, and blue and green beads have been found in the
graves of the prehistoric Egyptian race. Green and blue appear also
to have been used in the decoration of the ancient Assyrians and
Chaldeans. Greek architecture has also been foimd in Thera, Tiryns
and Mycenae of a date earlier than that of Homer, in which the colors
used include blue.

Mr. Benaky, of Smyrna, has recently collectedt the evidence de-
rived from the coloration of ancient monuments, and believes that it
decisively disproves the existence of any defect of color vision of the
ancient Egyptians and Greeks. Two considerations must, however, be
borne in mind when dealing with evidence of this kind. In the first
place, it may be conceded that the monuments of the Egyptians show
that these people had a perfectly developed color sense, and yet the color
sense of the Greeks one thousand years or more later may have been
defective. Just as we find different races at the present day in different
stages of evolution as regards color, so it may have been three or four
thousand years ago. The state of the color sense of the Egyptians has
no direct bearing on that of the Greeks. It is a point of interest that
the high development of the color sense in the ancient Egyptians, as
shown by their decorations, appears to have been accompanied by a
corresponding development of language, for it is statedt that in the
ancient Egyptian language there were two words for green and one for
blue.

• A full account of these investigations will be given in the reports of the Cam-
bridge Expedition.

1 'Du sens chromatique dans I'antiquite.' Paris, 1897.
t See 'Kosmos,' Bd. I., s. 430; 1877.

54 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The other consideration, to which, in my opinion, sufficient atten-
tion has not been paid, is whether the various colors are used appro-
priately. To prove the existence of a well-developed color sense from
monuments, it is not enough to show that certain colors were used;
it must be shown that they were used appropriately. Even in the
case of Egyptian art, one reads of statues of human figures with blue
hair, and in the case of early Greek art, the inappropriate use of one
color, blue appears to have been very common.

I am informed by Mr. E. E. Sikes, to whom I am glad of this
opportunity of expressing my thanks for much kind advice, that in
the Acropolis at Athens, such examples of coloration are to be seen as
a blue bull, a blue horse, a man with blue hair, beard and mustache,
these probably dating from 600 B. C, certainly later than the time of
Homer.* When such examples of eccentric coloration in blue are found
associated with the defect in nomenclature for the same color, it is
difficult to believe that the sense for this color can have been as highly
developed in those times as it is among civilized races at the present
day. The whole subject of the use of color in ancient monuments, in its
bearing on color vision, requires a more thorough investigation than it
has hitherto received.

Another line of objection to the views of Gladstone and Geiger,
which has already been mentioned as having been taken up by Grant
Allen, is derived from the high degree of development of the color
sense in many of the lower animals, and especially in insects and birds.
To many of those who have taken part in the controversy, this ob-
jection appears to have been regarded as conclusive. A well-developed
color sense in any one branch of the animal kingdom does not, how-
ever, necessarily imply the existence of the same in other, even if higher,
forms. We have many instances of the independent development of
closely similar mechanisms in very widely separated branches of the
animal kingdom, and there is nothing improbable in the view that this
may have been so in the case of the color sense. If the color sense were
found to be highly developed in mammals, the fact would naturally have
a closer bearing on the color sense of man than has the presence of a
similar development in birds. The evidence, however, of such develop-
ment in mammals is very defective. Graber,t who has carried out the
most comprehensive investigations of the color sense in different
branches of the animal kingdom, obtained much less definite evidence
from mammals than from other animals, and altogether failed to obtain
evidence in the case of some species. Again, if the anthropoid apes
were found to have a well-developed color sense, the fact would have

* See also Gardner, 'Handbook of Greek Sculpture,' p. 28.

f 'Grundlinien zur Erforsehung des Helligkeits ixnd Farbensinnes der Tiere.'
Prag., 1884.

PRIMITIVE COLOR VISION. 55

a still closer bearing on the condition of primitive man, but here again
the scanty evidence is negative. The only experimental investigation
with which I am acquainted is that made by Romanes* on the chim-
panzee 'Saliy in the Zoological Gardens. After having successfully
taught this animal to recognize numbers, Romanes proceeded to apply a
similar method to teach her colors, but wholly without success, and he
was obliged to conclude that the animal was probably color-blind. It
may be objected that the brilliant coloration of the mandrill and
other species points to the existence of a color sense in the primates,
but little weight can be attached to such indirect evidence in the ab-
sence of experimental investigation.

Another subject which has some bearing on the question is that
of the color sense of the human child. It is now a more or less ac-
cepted principle in biology that the history of the individual presents
the same stages of development as have occurred in the history of
the race. Darwin t was the first to point out that the power of dis-
tinguishing colors is a very late accomplishment in childhood; he found
that his children were unable to name colors correctly at an age in
which they knew the names of all familiar objects. This subject has
since been the subject of much investigation, the most important work
having been done by the late Professor Preyer t and by GarMui. § Preyer
made a very large number of investigations on one child, while Garbini
has based his results upon the observations of no less than 600 children.
Both agree in the conclusion that the child is unable to distinguish
colors at all till towards the end of the second year, and they also agree
that red is distinguished and named correctly at an earlier age than blue,
although there is some difference of opinion as to the exact order of
development of other colors. Garbini points out further that the
power of distinguishing colors develops earlier than the power of naming
colors, language appearing to lag behind sense. If any importance is
to be attached to the bearing of the history of the child on the history
of the race, the evidence from childhood is in favor of the view that
the color sense of man is a comparatively recent acquirement.

Whatever room for difference of opinion there may be on the ques-
tion of the evolution of the color sense, there can be no doubt that
there has been an evolution of color language. The possibility that the
course of this evolution has been determined by physiological conditions
has been considered, but there can, I think, be little doubt that these
have not been the only factors upon which the characteristic defects of
language have depended. The deficiency in the sense for blue, which

* Troc. Zoolog. Soe.,' 1889; p. 316.

t 'Kosmos,' Bd. I., s. 376; 1877.

t i Die Seele des Kindes.' Leipzig, 1884.

§ 'Arch, per I'Anthropologia e la Ethnologia,' Vol. XXIV., pp. 1l and 193; 1894.

56 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

I found in Torres Strait, is only partial and can not wholly account
for the absence of a word for that color. Even to those with normal
sensitiveness to blue, I think, there is no doubt that there is a closer
resemblance between blue and black and between green and black than
between red and black, and this difference in the degree of similarity
between the different sensations of color and that of blackness may
account in some measure for the difference in the definiteness of nomen-
clature.

It is a characteristic of the language of primitive races to have
special names for every natural object, and often for very many indi-
vidual parts of a natural object. If the savage has one name for one
blue flower and another name for another, and so on, he will not require
a name for the abstract quality of blueness. It is possible that he
only begins to require names for colors when he begins to use pig-
ments. If this be the case, it may help to explain the earlier develop-
ment of names for red and yellow, for in many parts of the world pig-
ments of these colors are by far the most common. In Torres Strait
there were both red and yellow pigments, but no green pigment, and
the nearest approach to a blue pigment was a slate-colored shale, and
there appear to be many parts of the world where a blue pigment is
wholly absent. Probably the most widely distributed blue pigment is
indigo, and I have endeavored to ascertain whether those races which
are familiar with indigo have a word for blue, but the evidence I
have at present is too scanty to allow me to express an opinion on this
point. It is probable, however, that the distribution of pigments has
helped to determine the characteristic features of primitive color nomen-
clature, the greater frequency of red and yellow pigments being prob-
ably one of the factors which account for the more definite nomen-
clature for those colors.

Another factor, which may have been of importance, is the ab-
sence in the savage of an aesthetic interest in nature. The blue of the
sky, the green and blue of the sea and the general green color of
vegetation do not appear to interest him. It is, however, possible
that the sky and sea do not interest the savage, or interest him less
than the civilized man, because their colors are less brilliant than they
are to us, and consequently this factor is not one on which much
stress can be laid.

The widespread defect in the nomenclature for blue is rendered
more striking by the fact that a name for red is universally present in
primitive languages, while in many languages, as in that of Murray
Island, various shades of red are not only discriminated, but also re-
ceive special names. In the experiments made in Torres Strait it
seemed to me -that this definiteness in the nomenclature for red was
associated with a high degree of sensitiveness to this color, apparently

PRIMITIVE COLOR VISION. 57

greater than that of the average European. I also found, both by
observation of their clothing and by direct questioning, that red was
the favorite color of these people. In reading accounts of primitive
man, one can not help being struck by the great predominance of red
in the decoration of their houses, weapons and implements. This
predominance may partly be due to the striking nature of the color
and also to the prevalence of red pigments, but it seems possible that
it may also be connected with the fact that red is the color of
blood. Many savage races appear to be in a state of constant warfare,
and in the religious rites and ceremonies of nearly all primitive races
blood pays a great part.

The suggestion may even be hazarded that the earliest use to which
red pigments were put was to smear the body in the war-dance, to
imitate the blood-stained victor,* or to replace blood in the various
ceremonies of which it so often forms an essential feature. In his
'Legend of Perseus/ 1 Mr. Hartland has collected a number of instances
in which it is perfectly obvious that vermilion or other red pigment
has been used in the place of blood. Both in Murray Island and
Mabuiag the chief words for red were derived from the name for
blood, and this derivation is found in many languages, including our
own. To whatever cause it may be due, there is no doubt that red is
the most important color in the life of the savage, and it is natural
that the predominant color should also be that which has the most
definite name. X

The main conclusions may be summed up as follows: The language
used for color in ancient writings shows a characteristic defect, from
which it has been concluded that the color sense of ancient races was
also defective.

Existing primitive races agree in showing the same defect of color
language as is found in ancient writings, and, in at least one such race,
there has been found to be a corresponding defect in color sense, con-
sisting in a certain degree of insensitiveness to those colors for which the
nomenclature is defective.

Evidence, derived from ancient monuments and from the color
vision of animals, which has been held to disprove the existence of
any defect in the color senses of the ancients, appears to be incon-
clusive, and iQight, indeed, be held to support the views which have
been derived from the study of language.

• This custom appears to have persisted down to Roman times, in which the
conqueror painted his body red when taking part in the triumphal procession.

fVol. II., pp. 242, 264; notes, 342, 354-5.

X Since the above was written, the question of the predominance of red haa
been fully discussed by Havelock Ellis. (Popxtlar Science Monthly, August
and September, 1900.)

58 rOPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The observations made on the color vision of childhood may be
regarded as indirect evidence that color vision has been a comparatively
recent acquirement of the human race.

In addition to possible physiological conditions^ there are certain
other factors which may have taken part in the production of the
characteristic features of primitive color language.

On the more special question of the color sense of Homer, I believe
that Gladstone and Geiger went too far. The evidence seems to me to
suggest one of two possibilities. It is possible that to the Greeks of
the time of Homer green and blue were less definite, possibly duller
and darker colors than they are to us. It is, however, possible that the
language used by Homer was only a relic of an earlier defect of this
kind, the defect of nomenclature persisting after the color sense had
become completely developed, language lagging behind sense in the
race, as it appears to do in the child. According to the latter view,
the defective terminology of Homer would be a phenomenon of the
same order as the absence of a word for blue in such languages as
Welsh, Chinese and Hebrew at the present day. It would not nec-
essarily show the actual existence of a defective color sense, but would
suggest that at some earlier stage of culture there had been defective
sensitiveness for certain colors.

The evidence derived from poetry and art must always be in some
degree unsatisfactory, owing to the great part which convention plays
in these productions of the human mind. Still, every convention must
have had a starting point, and though, in some cases, it is possible that
considerations of technique* may have originated the conventional use
of color, it seems more probable that the predominance of red and
deficiency of blue, both in the color language and in the decoration of
the ancient Greeks, however conventional they may have become, never-
theless owe their origin to the special nature of the development of
the color sense.

The subject of the evolution of the color sense in man is one which
can only be settled by the convergence to one point of lines of investi-
gation which are usually widely separated. The sciences of archceology,
philology, psychology and physiology must all be called upon to con-
tribute to the elucidation of this problem. I do not wish to do more
than reopen the subject, and shall be contented if I have shown that
the views of Gladstone and Geiger cannot be contemptuously dismissed
as they were twenty years ago.

* As an instance of the origin of a convention in technique, Mr. Sikes has
suggested to me the red figures on Greek vases. Early Greek vases were made
of a reddish material, on which the figures were designed in black. At a
later time, the vessels were black and the figures red, the conventional per-
sistence of red decoration in this case having had its starting-point in the special
nature of the makrial originally used in the manufacture of the vases.

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 59

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS.

By HAVELOCK ELLIS.

CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.

IF we consider the time of birth of our group of British persons of
preeminent ability we find that April shows the largest number
of births and January the fewest number. In passing from January
to February there is a marked and sudden rise, so that when we
consider the lotal births, according to the quarter of the year, the
first, second and fourth quarters are fairly equal, but there is a de-
cided deficiency in the third quarter. This is not quite the result which
we find on considering the birth-rate among the ordinary population
of England and Wales during the nineteenth century. Here the
birth-rate during the first and second quarters agrees in being very
high, while the third and fourth quarters invariably show a low rate.
The discrepancy is in the fourth quarter, persons of preeminent
ability being born during that quarter in unduly high proportion. In
order to reach the time of conception, and so consider the possible
significance of these facts, we must, of course, push these periods three
months forward.*

The first significant fact we encounter in studying the life-histories
of these eminent persons is the frequency with which they have shown
marked constitutional delicacy in infancy and early life.f A group
of at least five — Joanna Baillie, Hobbes, Keats, Newton, Charles Wesley
— were seven months children, or, at all events, notably premature
in birth; it is a group of very varied and preeminent ability. Not
including the above (who were necessarily weakly), at least eight are
noted as having been very weak at birth, and not expected to live;
in several cases they were, on this account, baptized on the same day.
In addition to these, fifty-five are described as being of very delicate
health in infancy or childhood. Further, we are told of sixty-nine

* For a discussion of the normal phenomena, see H. Ellis, 'Studies in the Psy-
chology of Sex,' 'The Phenomena of Sexual Periodicity.'

tMr. A. H. Yoder ('Pedagogical Seminary,' October, 1894) stumbled across this
fact in the course of his interesting study of the early life of a group of men of
genius, but failed to realize its significance. He put it aside as due to a desire on
the part of biographers to niagnify the mental at the expense of the physical
qualities of their subjects. There is no evidence whatever for this gratuitous
assumption.

6o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

others that throughout life they suffered more or less from chronic
ill-health, so that we may assume that in most eases their feeble con-
stitutions were congenital and existed at birth. Thus, at the lowest
estimate — for we may be certain that the national biographer has very
frequently overlooked the point — 137 of the 902 British men and
women of preeminent intellectual ability (or 15 per cent.) were con-
genitally of notably feeble physical constitution.

Although it may fairly be assumed that this proportion, at least, of
our eminent persons showed signs of physical inferiority at the be-
ginning of life, it must not be assumed that in all cases such infe-
riority was marked throughout life. The reverse of this is notably
the case in many instances. This is not indeed absolutely proved by
longevity, frequently noted in such cases, for men of genius have
sometimes lived to an advanced age, though all their lives suffering
from feeble health. But there is a large group of cases (probably
much larger than actually appears), in which the delicate infant de-
velops into a youth or a man of quite exceptional physical health and
vigor. Bruce, the traveler, is a typical example. Very delicate in
early life, he developed into a man of huge proportions, athletic power
and iron constitution. Jeremy Bentham, very weak and delicate in
childhood, became healthy and robust and lived to eighty-four; Burke,
weak and always ailing in early life, was tall and vigorous at twenty-
seven; Constable, not expected to live at birth, became a strong and
healthy boy; Dickens, a puny and sickly child, was full of strength and
energy by the age of twelve; Gait, a delicate, sensitive child, developed
Herculean proportions and energy; Hobbes, very weak in early life,
went on gaining strength throughout life and died at eighty-one;
Lord Stowell, with a very feeble constitution in early life, became
robust and died at ninety-one. It would be easy to multiply examples,
though the early feebleness of the future man of robust constitution
must often have been forgotten or ignored, but it is probable that this
course of development is not without significance. I have noted those
cases in which one or both parents have died soon after the birth of their
eminent child. One small, but eminent, group — Blackstone, Chatter-
ton, Cowley, Newton, Adam Smith, Swift — had lost their fathers
before birth. By the age of five at least fifty-five of these eminent
persons had lost their fathers and thirty-one their mothers. By the
age of ten at least eighty-eight had lost their fathers and fifty their
mothers. In fourteen of these cases both parents were dead. So that
over 14 per cent, had lost one or both parents by the age of ten. It
is diflBcult to estimate the real extent of this tendency on account of
the imperfect nature of the data, nor have I any data at hand for
normal families. In New Zealand a useful enactment requires the
ages of living children to be inserted in the parent's death certificate.

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 6i

Full particulars are not given by the Eegistrar-General of New Zealand
in any report in my possession, but it appears that at least 45 per cent,
of New Zealand children whose fathers died under the age of sixty-
five were under fifteen at the time. This, of course, does not tell us
what proportion these children bear to the children of the same age
whose fathers are living. In English reformatories, Douglas Morrison
notes, as a very high proportion, that 33 per cent, of the children ad-
mitted under the age of sixteen had lost one or both parents.

The chief feature in the childhood of persons of eminent intellectual
ability brought out by the present data is their precocity. This has
indeed been emphasized by previous inquirers into the psychology of
genius, but its prevalence is very clearly shown by the present investi-
gation. It has certainly to be said that the definition of 'precocity'
requires a little more careful consideration than it has sometimes
received at the hands of those who have inquired into it, and that
when we have carefully defined what we mean by 'precocitj* it is its
absence rather than its presence which ought to astonish us in men
of genius.* Judging from the data before us, there are at least three
courses open to a child who is destined eventually to display preemi-
nent intellectual ability. He may (1) show extraordinary aptitude for
acquiring the ordinary subjects of school study; he may (2), on the
other hand, show only average, and even much less than average,
aptitude for ordinary school studies, but be at the same time engrossed
in following up his own preferred lines of study or thinking; he
may, once more (3), be marked in early life solely by physical energy,
by his activity in games or mischief, or even by his brutality, the
physical energy being sooner or later transformed into intellectual
energy. It is those of the first group, those who display an extraordi-
nary aptitude for ordinary school learning, who create most astonish-
ment and are chiefly referred to as proving the 'precocitjr' of genius.
There can be no doubt whatever that even in the very highest genius
such extraordinary aptitude at a very early age is not infrequently
observed. It must also be said that it occurs in children who, after
school or college life is over, or even earlier, display no independent
intellectual energy whatever. It is probable that here we really have
two classes of cases simulating uniformity. In one class we have an
exquisitely organized and sensitive mental mechanism which assimilates
whatever is presented to it, and with development ever seeks more com-
plicated problems to grapple with. In the other class we merely have
a sponge-Uke mental receptivity, without any corresponding degree of
aptitude for intellectual organization, so that when the period of

* For a summary of investigations into the precocity of genius, se* A. F. Cham-
berlain, 'The Child,' pp. 42-6.

62 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

mental receptivity is over no further development takes place. The
second group, comprising those children who are mostly indifferent to
ordinary school learning but are absorbed in their own lines of thought,
certainly contains a very large number of individuals destined to attain
intellectual eminence. They by no means impress people by their
'precocity'; Scott, occupied in building up romances, was a 'dunce';
Hume, the youthful thinker, was described by his mother as 'un-
common weak-minded.' Yet the individuals of this group are often
in reality far more 'precocious,' further advanced along the line of
their future activities, than the children of the first group. It is
true that they may be divided into two classes, those who from the
first have divined the line of their later advance, and those who, like
the youthful Diderot, are only restlessly searching and exploring; but
both alike have really entered on the path of their future progress.
The third group, including those children who are only noted for
their physical energy, is the smallest. In these cases some powerful
external impression — a severe illness, an emotional shock, contact
with some person of intellectual eminence — serves to divert the physi-
cal energy into mental channels. In those fields of eminence in
which moral qualities and force of character count for much, such as
statesmanship and generalship, this course of development seems to
be a favorable one, but in more purely intellectual fields it scarcely
seems to lead very often to the finest results. On the whole, it is
evident that 'precocity' is not a very valuable or precise conception as
applied to persons of intellectual eminence. The conception of physi-
cal precocity is fairly exact and definite. It indicates an earlier than
average attainment of the ultimate growth and maturity. But we are
by no means warranted in asserting that the man of intellectual ability
reaches his full growth and maturity earlier than the average man.
And even when as a child he is compared with other children, his
marked superiority along certain lines may be apparently more than
balanced by his apparent inferiority along other lines. It is no doubt
true that, in a vague use of the word, genius is very often indeed
'precocious'; but it is evident that this statement is almost meaning-
less unless we use the word 'precocity' in a carefully defined manner.
It would be better if we asserted that genius is in a large number
of eases mentally abnormal from the first, and if we were to seek to
inquire precisely wherein that mental abnormality consisted. With
these preliminary remarks we may proceed to note the prevalence
among British persons of genius of the undefined conditions com-
monly termed '|)reeocity.'

rt is certainly very considerable. Although we have to make allowance
for ignorance in a large proportion of cases, and for neglect to mention
llu' fnct ill iiinny more cases, the national ])iographers note that

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 63

223 of the 902 eminent persons in our list may in one sense or another
be termed precocious, and only thirty-seven are mentioned as not pre-
cocious. Many of the latter belong to the second group, as defined
above — those who are already absorbed in their own lines of mental
activity — and are really just as 'precocious' as the others; thus Car-
dinal Wiseman as a boy was 'dull and stupid, always reading and think-
ing;' Byron showed no aptitude for school work, but was absorbed in
romance, and Landor, thougli not regarded as precocious, was already
preparing for his future literary career. In a small but interesting
group of cases, which must be mentioned separately, the mental de-
velopment is first retarded and then accelerated; thus Chatterton up
to the age of 6^ was, said his mother, 'little better than an absolute
fool,' then he fell in love with the illuminated capitals of an old folio,
at seven was remarkable for brightness and at ten was writing poems;
Goldsmith, again, was a stupid child, but before he could write legibly
he was fond of poetry and rhyming, and a little later he was regarded
as a clever boy, while Fanny Burney did not know her letters at eight,
but at ten was writing stories and poems.

Probably the greatest prodigies of infant precocity among these
eminent persons were Cowley, Sir W. E. Hamilton, Wren and Thomas
Young, three of these, it will seem, being men of the first order of
genius. Barry and Thirlwall were also notable prodigies, and it would
be easy to name a large number of others whose youthful proficiency
in learning was of extremely unusual character. While, however, this
is undoubtedly the case, it scarcely appears that any actual achieve-
ments of note date from early youth. It is only in mathematics, and
to some extent in poetry, that originality may be attained at an early
age, but even then it is very rare (Newton and Keats are examples), and
is not notable until adolescence is completed.

The very marked prevalence of an early bent towards those lines
of achievement in which success is eventually to be won is indicated
by the fact that in those fields in which such bent is most easily per-
ceived it is most frequently found. It is marked among the musicians,
and would doubtless be still more evident if it were not that our
knowledge concerning British composers is very incomplete. It is
specially notable in the case of artists. It is reported of not less than
thirty-five (or in the proportion of over 50 per cent.) that in art they
were 'precocious.'

A certain proportion of the eminent persons on our list have fol-
lowed the third course of early development as defined above, that is
to say, they have been merely noted for physical energy in youth.
Sir Joseph Banks was very fond of play till fourteen, when he was
suddenly struck by the beauty of a lane; Isaac Barrow was chiefly
noted for fighting at school; Chalmers was full of physical activity.

64 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

but his intellect awoke late; Thomas Cromwell was a ruffian in youth;
Thurlow, even at college, was idle and insubordinate; Murchison was a
mischievous boy, full of animal spirits, and was not interested in sci-
ence till the age of thirty-two; Perkins was reckless and drunken till
his conversion. It can scarcely be said that any of these remarkable
men, not even Barrow, achieved very great original distinction in
purely intellectual fields. In order to go far, it is evidently desirable
to start early.

The influence of education on men of genius is an interesting sub-
ject for investigation. It is, however, best studied by considering in
detail the history of individual cases; generalized statements cannot
be expected to throw much light on it. I have made no exact notes
concerning the school education of the eminent persons at present
under consideration; it is evident that as a rule they received the
ordinary school education of children of their class, and very few
were, on account of poverty or social class, shut out from school educa-
tion. A small but notable proportion were educated at home, being
debarred from school-life by feeble health; a few, also (like J. S. Mill),
were specially educated by an intellectual father or mother.

The fact of university education has been very carefully noted by
the national biographers, and it is possible to form a fairly exact notion
of the proportion of eminent British men who have enjoyed this ad-
vantage. This proportion is decidedly large. The majority (53 per
cent.) have, in fact, been at some university. Oxford stands easily
at the head; 40 per cent, of those who have had a university education
received it at Oxford, and only 33 per cent, at Cambridge. An inter-
esting point is observed here; the respective influences of Oxford and
Cambridge are due to geographical considerations; there is a kind of
educational watershed between Oxford and Cambridge, running north
and south, and so placed that Northamptonshire is on the eastern
side. Cambridge drains the east coast, including the highly important
East Anglian district and the greater part of Yorkshire, whilst Oxford
drains the whole of the rest of England as well as Wales. This at
once accounts both for the greater number of eminent men who have
been at Oxford and for the special characteristics of the two univer-
sities, due to the districts that have fed them, the more literary char-
acter of Oxford, the more scientific character of Cambridge. The
Scotch universities are responsible for 15 per cent, of our eminent
men, Edinburgh being at the head, Glasgow and St. Andrews follow-
ing at some little distance. Trinity College, Dublin, shows 3 per cent.
The remaining S per cent, have studied at one or more foreign univer-
sities, sometimes in addition to study at a British university, Paris
(the Sorbonno) stands at the head of the foreign universities, having
attracted as many English students as all the other European univer-

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 6$

gities put togetlier. This is doubtless mainly due to the fact that Paris
was the unquestioned intellectual center of Europe throughout the
long period of the Middle Ages, though the intimate relations between
England and France may also have liad their influence. With tlie
revival of learning Italian universities became attractive, and Padua
long retained its preeminence as a center of medical study. During the
seventeenth century the Dutch universities, Leyden and Utrecht, be-
gan to attract English students, and continued to do so to some extent
throughout the greater part of the eighteenth century. It was not until
the nineteenth century that English students sought out the German
universities. Douai might perhaps have been included in the list as the
chief substitute for university education for the eminent English
Catholics who have appeared since the Reformation.*

While the fact of university education is easily ascertained, it is
less easy to define its precise significance. The majority of our men
of preeminent intellectual ability have been at a university; but it
would be surprising were it otherwise, considering that the majority
of these men belong to the class which in ordinary course receives a
university education. It would be more to the point if we knew exactly
what influence the universities had exerted, but on this our present
investigation throws little light. In a considerable number of cases,
at least, the university exerted no favorable influence whatever, the
eminent man subsequently declaring that the years he spent there were
the most unprofitable of his life; this was so even in the case of Gibbon,
whose residence at Oxford might have been supposed to be very bene-
ficial, for at the age of fourteen he had already been drawn toward the
subject of his life-task. In a large number of cases, again, the eminent
man left the university without a degree, and in not a few cases he
was expelled. It is evident, however, on the whole, that university
life has not been unfavorable to the development of intellectual ability,
and that while our eminent men do not appear to have been usually
subjected to any severe educational discipline, they have been in a good
position to enjoy the best educational advantages of their land and time.

• It may be interesting to compare these results with those obtained by Mr..
Maclean in his study of nineteenth century British men of ability. He found,
that among some 3,000 eminent men, 1,132, or 37 per cent., are recorded as having
had an English, Scotch or Irish university education. Of these 1,132, 37 per cent,
were at Oxford, 33 per cent, at Cambridge, 21 per cent, at Scotch universities, 7
per cent, at Dublin, and the small remainder were scattered among various
modern institutions. It will be seen that university education plays a com-
paratively small part in this group. This may be in part due to the lower
standard of eminence, but it may also be due to the wide dissemination of the-
sources of knowledge. In no previous century would so encyclopaedic a thinker:-
as Herbert Spencer have been able to ignore absolutely the advantages of uni-
versity centers.

VOL. i.ix.— 5

66 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

If this is not a very decisive result to reach, there is another less
recognized method of educational develo]3ment which occurs so fre-
quently that I am disposed to attach very decided significance to it.
I refer to residence in a foreign country during early life. The emi-
nent persons under consideration have indeed spent a very large por-
tion of their whole lives ahroad, whether from inclination, duty or
necessity (persecution or exile), and it might he interesting to note the
average period of life spent by a British man of genius in his own
country. I have not attempted to do this, but I have invariably noted
the eases in which a lengthened stay abroad has occurred during the
formative years of childhood or youth. I have seldom knowingly in-
cluded any period of less than a year; in a few cases I have included
lengthened stays abroad which were made about the age of thirty, but
in these cases those periods of foreign residence exerted an unques-
tionable formative influence. I have excluded soldiers and sailors alto-
gether, for in their case absence from England at a very early age has
been an almost invariable and inevitable incident of their lives, and has
not always been of a kind conducive to intellectual development. Nor
have I included the very numerous cases in which transference from
one part of the British Islands to another has sufficed to exert a stimu-
lating influence of the greatest importance. With these exceptions, we
find that as many as 322 of the eminent persons on our list (or about
40 per cent.) during early life, and in all but a few cases before the
age of thirty, have spent abroad periods which range from about a year,
and in very many cases have extended over seven years, up to extreme
cases, like that of Caxton, who went to Bruges in early life and stayed
there for thirty years; or Buchanan, who went to France at the age of
fourteen and was abroad for nearly forty years. It is natural that
France should be the country most frequently mentioned as the place
of residence, but France is closely followed by other countries, and a
familiarity with many lands, including even very remote and scarcely
accessible countries, is often indicated. It may further be noted that
this tendency to an association between high intellectual ability and
early familiarity with foreign lands is by no means a comparatively re-
cent tendency. It exists from the first; the earliest personage on our
list, St. Patrick, was kidnapped in Scotland at the age of sixteen, and
conveyed over to Ireland; it seems, indeed, that in the nineteenth cen-
tury the tendency became less marked, in face of the average modern
Englishman's hasty and unprofitable method of traveling. In any case,
however, it is evident that there has been a very marked tendency
among these men of preeminent ability to familiarize themselves in the
most serious spirit with every aspect of nature and life. It is equally
marked among the men of every group, among poets and statesmen,
artists and divines. It is not least marked in the case of men of sci-

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 67

ence from the days of Eay onwards; if it had not been for the five
years on the Beagle we should scarcely have had a Darwin, and Lyell's
work was avowedly founded on his constant foreign tours. In a notable
number of cases this element comes in at the earliest period of life, the
eminent person having been born abroad and spent his childhood there.
The presence of so large a number of our eminent men at a university
may be in considerable measure merely the accident of their social posi-
tion. The persistence with which men of the first order of intellect
have sought out and studied unfamiliar aspects of life and nature, or
have profited by such aspects when presented by circumstances, indi-
cates a more active and personal factor in the evolution of genius.

68 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE FEOG AS PAKENT.

By Pkofessok E. A. ANDREWS,

JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVEKSITY.

IN the life of a common frog or toad we seem to find none ef that
altruistic solicitude for the welfare of the helpless younger mem-
bers of society, that we so fondly attribute as guide in many of our own
actions. In clamorous spring reunions these cold-blooded creatures
deposit their eggs in the water and go their way in search of food — not
knowing whether some or many of the eggs will run a normal course
through tadpole or pollywog states to tailless adults, or fall a prey to
hungry ducks, or more insatiable naturalists in search of 'material' for
study.

The naturalists' belief that these Amphibia are closely akin to fish in
many ways is borne out in their breeding habits; for, like fish, they have
more or less complex 'instincts' that lead the males and females together
at the laying season, and then, like fish, they separate till the next
period of egg-laying. The eggs, discharged in the water, are fertilized
outside the body, and undergo a process of cleavage or cell-multiplica-
tion, thus gradually differentiating into active larvas or tadpole? without
any care from the parents. The tadpole leads its own independent fish-
like life for months or years, till — if not destroyed — the critical period
of transformation arrives. This passed, the young frog or toad has
only its instincts to guide it in learning the new life and nothing to
learn from its parents — unless perchance they may be near enough to
endeavor to swallow it alive.

Yet even here we might fancy some thought for the morrow of the
species — the eggs are generally laid in the right place — according to
the kind of frog or toad — to have enough water and not too many ene-
mies for the young, while the protecting jelly mass about the eggs is
often rather carefully fastened to plants or sticks, thus keeping them
near the surface of the water and in optimum conditions for hatching.

But this is not clear until we see some of the extremes to which
such prevision for the next generation is carried in certain members
of this group. Just as amongst fish there are a few with most remark-
able habits — the male stickleback watching and protecting the eggs in
his carefully made nest — so, if we look far enough, we find frogs and
toads that show most exemplary solicitude for the young. In Europe,
Asia, Africa and in South America such curious life-histories are more
or less common.

THE FBOG AS PARENT. 69

In most such cases the peculiar habit of the parent seems to be asso-
ciated with an unusual character and development of the eggs. In the
common species that have many small eggs, these are left by the parent
to develop slowly in the water, where they gi-adually assume a frog-
like character. Wliereas species having few and large eggs protect
these in some manner until they rapidly turn into frogs with little or
none of the aquatic youth we are so used to regard as a sine qua non
for a frog.

We need go no further than the island of Jamaica for examples of
the protected eggs. For there, where everything has to compete stren-
uously for light and air, the trees themselves support dense popula-
tions of plants and these harbor animals of various sorts — amongst
them, frogs. One kind of frog in Jamaica lays its eggs in the water
that accumulates at the bases of the leaves of Bromelias growing high
up on tree trunks, and here the tadpoles have their brief existence.

Fig. 1. Fig. 2.

Another frog abandons even this semblance of aquatic life, laying a
few very large eggs under stones and 'trash' on the ground, where they
may even be many miles distant from the water — and the young develop
into small frogs that hatch from the egg without having known what
it is to be a tadpole. Stevenson's fable admits of literal application here.

'Be ashamed of yourself,' said the frog. 'When I was a tadpole I
had no tail.' 'Just what I thought,' said the tadpole; 'you never were
a tadpole.'

In this frog, however, there is within the egg a stage when the young
is active and has a tadpole form, lacking chiefly the medium in which
to express its tadpole possibilities. Not being able to swim with its
tail, it yet puts this to good use, for it is richly supplied with blood-
vessels and can serve as a breathing organ.

In the Solomon Islands there is another frog (Rana opisthodon)
which lays large eggs, 6-10 nun. thick, on moist ground and not in

70 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the water; and the young remain within the egg until they are com-
plete frogs in shape. While passing through so much of their life-
history within the egg shell, the young manage to breathe, not by their
tails, but by special folds of skin that grow out on either side of the
belly, in rows, as shown in Fig. 1. The young frog also makes a tem-
porary contrivance for breaking through the egg shell, something like
the horn on the beak of a hatching chick or the protuberance used by
many reptiles for the same purpose. This peculiar little organ in the
frog is shown in Fig. 1 and again in Fig. 2, where it adds a decided
retrousse element to a not too intellectual countenance.

"We might place frogs in three groups: those that are simply layers,
those that are nest-makers, and those that are nurses.*

As a nest builder we may reckon the Cystignathus mystaceus of
Brazil. This frog makes a hole about as big as a teacup under stones
or decayed logs near enough to puddles of water to be covered by
water when the pond rises after heavy rains. In this nest the yellow
eggs are laid in a mass of thick, white foam, very like beaten white of
egg in appearance. The eggs hatch into tailed tadpoles, and, when the
water rises over the nest, these young swim off like our common tad-
poles. They differ, however, in being able to overtide dr}' seasons.
When the pond dries up and common tadpoles would die, these pecul-
iar creatures gather under boards or logs and there keep moist —
apparently by the aid of an imusual amount of material secreted by
their skins. Evidently the habits of this frog are nicely adjusted to
the climatic conditions under which it lives.

A tree-frog of West Africa (Chiromantis rufescens) lays its eggs in
leaves of trees in a mass of foamy material that, on drying, hardens
on the outside, but becomes liquid within, and so lets the tadpoles swim
about for a while till a rain washes them off the tree into the water.
While living the short part of its tadpole stage in the nest made by the
mother for it, the tadpole has gills such as our common tadpoles
breathe with, as well as a tail to swim with. In this aerial existence
the young have the protection not only of the surrounding foam, but
often of leaves that are sometimes stuck to it. This perfecting of the
nest by the use of leaves to envelop the foam mass becomes the rule
in two sorts of frog in Brazil (Phyllomedusa Jheringii and Hyla neh-
ulosa). The former puts its big white eggs into a mass 40-50 mm.
long and 15-20 wide, enveloped by two or three leaves, sometimes
willow tree leaves, in such a way that they make a tight case open at
one end. The young seem to be so fitted for this peculiar wet-hara-

* The remarkable life histories not in the first group have recently been brought
together by R. Wiedersheim, from whose papers in the 'Biologisches Central-
blatt' most of the facts and illustrations used in this article are taken.

THE FROG AS PARENT.

71

mock existence that it is doubtful if they need to fall off into the
water; at all events, some tadpoles of Ilyla nehulosa taken out of this
nest and put into water, died in a few hours from lack of breath, being
unable to live without the peculiar air supply they were used to. How-
ever, the larvae of another frog ( Phyllomedusa hypochondrialis) are set
loose from the nest when the rain softens it and do fall into the water
to continue their tadpole life. This species occurs in Paraguay, and
makes use of the leaves of trees near the water. The male rides on
the back of the female, while both bend in the edges of a single leaf
till it makes a funnel. In this the eggs are laid and fertilized. The
jelly surrounding them holds the leaf in place till the tadpoles hatch
and are ready for the rain to forward them to their new destination.

Fig. 3.

In Japan there is also a nest-making frog (Rhacoporus Schlegeli)
which is said to lay its eggs sometimes amongst leaves on bushes or
trees. However, its usual habit is to make a nest in the ground as
indicated in Fig. 3. Awakening from their winter sleep, the frogs
crawl along the edges of rice fields and swamps and dig out holes
above the water level. The female carries the much smaller male, and
both become buried in a hole 6-9 cm. wide and 10-15 cm. above the
surface of the water. This nest cavity is smoothed inside by the
movements of the female and is then, in the night, supplied with a
ball of white matter full of air-bubbles. This is tough and elastic and
6-7 cm. thick. This mass is to supply moisture and air for the young.
It emerges from the cloaca along with the eggs, and is then kneaded
thoroughly by remarkable movements of the feet of the female.

n

rOPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Stretching out and closing the toes, she mixes the sticky mass with
air and breaks the big bubbles up into smaller and smaller foam. Sim-
ilar movements of the feet of the male drive the mass backward and
leave the eggs more free for the fertilization that follows. When the
eggs have been fertilized and provided with a protecting and aerating
mass, the parents break out from the nest and take up their life
amongst the trees. The foam mass meanwhile gradually becomes
liquid, and flowing out through the hole the parents left on leaving the
nest, carries the young into the outside water.

Very different is the nest made by another tree-frog in Brazil, The
quaint, beaver-like activities of this creature (Hyla faher) are described
by one who observed them in his own garden. On a moonlight night
one may see a slight movement of the water as if something were moving
under it. Then a little mud rises, shoved up by a tree-frog — but only
the hands of this are visible. It dives down and again brings up mud;

Fig. 4.

gradually the accumulated mud seems a little wall, and eventually it
rises 10 cm. above the water and extends as a ring a foot in diameter.
Such atolls of mud are shown in Fig. 4. They form little circular
dikes of mud elevated above the general expanse of water. The making
of them is by no means a matter of chance. The frog — and it is the
female that labors, in full enjoyment of her 'rights,' while the male
rides passively — uses lier liands to compress and to smooth the inside
of the wall in a most remarkable way. The top also of the miniature
fortress is carefully vianipulated, the frog crawling out of the water
to make all the structure solid and smooth, all but the outer escarp-
ment, which is left rough.

The frog makes the bottom of the crater-like cavity, under water,
pmooth by gliding along it on its belly, and also by spreading out its
hands over it. During all this work the frogs make no sound, though
near at hand isolated males may be heard calling their mates.

In this circular nest the spawn is deposited, but not till four or

THE FBOG AS FAEENT.

71

five days, as a rule, after the nest is completed; there is a period of rest
between the nest-making (which in one case required two successive
nights) and the egg-laying. The young hatch out as tadpoles and
continue to live in the narrow circle of home till the wall be broken
down by time and weather to set them free in the world.

It is the habit of all these nest-makers to put their eggs into more
or less imperfect nests and then go off and leave them to their fate,
the nest, no doubt, increasing the chances of the young passing safely
through the earliest stages of infancy — which we all know is a critical
period for man or fish. Some other frogs have quite a different habit;
carrying their eggs about with them, and so giving them the benefit,
if not of actual defense against enemies, at least of passive protection,
in that the eggs thus have the same conditions of moisture and con-
cealment which they, the adults, need and obtain for themselves. Such
frogs we have called 'nurses.'

Fig. 5.

Fig. 6.

Of these nurses the most often mentioned is the so-called 'obstet-
rical toad' found in Switzerland, France and western parts of Germany.
As shown in Fig. 5, the eggs are carried about attached to a band,
which is wrapped about the legs of its parent, but the parent who thua
carries the offspring about in the moist grass as it seeks food in the
evening is not, as one might expect, the mother, but the father toad.

When the eggs are laid and fertilized, the male takes up his burden
and carries it till the young are ready to hatch, when he goes to the
water and lets the brood escape into the proper element. What leads
him there at the right time remains still to be found out. How he
comes to assume this care is also not clear; according to some accounts
the male, when upon the back of the female, seizes the egg-string first
with the right, then with the left foot, and wraps it in figure of eight
loops about its own legs. Others say that the male sits behind the
female, "with its back turned toward her, and as the eggs emerge, the
male seizes them between his ankles and, throwing himself now on his
back and now on his belly, turns over and over until the egg-string is
all drawn out and wrapped about his legs; hence the name Alytes obstet-

74 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ricans. Having taken the eggs, however this may be done, the frog
emits a clear musical sound and goes hunting its own food, thinking,
we may suppose, as little of its offspring as do our own common toads
and frogs. The young require a long time to bring them to the
hatching stage, and have also an unusually large and peculiar gill on
each side.

The tree-frogs of the tropics furnish examples of egg-carrying
habit as well as of nest-building. Thus in Ceylon a tree-frog (Rhacoph-
orus reticulatus) carries its eggs in a cake-shaped cluster of about
twenty firmly fixed to its belly, as indicated in Fig. 6. This time
it is not the male, but the female, that aids the coming race by giving
it transportation and protection. Probably, however, it is the male and
not the female of a frog of the Seychell Islands ( Anthroleptes Seychel-
lensis) that carries about its young on its back. This is a most complex
case, for the eggs are laid upon moist earth or rotten logs and kept
moist by the body of the frog until they hatch; they have large tails.

Fig. 7. Fig. 8.

and even the beginning of hind legs. Then the youngsters get up on
the back of their parent and stick there till their development is com-
plete. The peculiar little tadpoles have great power of adhesion, and
can stick to the sides of a glass dish as they do to their parent's back
(Fig. 7). Another such case occurs in Trinidad and in Venezuela.
When the ponds dry up the young tadpoles of the frog Phyllohates
trinitates, which are as yet without legs, though they have tails, stick
themselves firmly to the back of the male frog (whether it is their
father or the father of some other tadpoles does not appear), and in
this way are carried 'pick-a-back' to some larger pond. Similar habits
have been observed in the frogs Dendrohates Irivittatus and Dendro-
hates hraccatus.

Again, a frog (Hylodes liniatus) of Dutch Guiana is found with
its tadpoles attached to its back, as seen in Fig. 8. The young,
from a dozen to twenty, are attached, as shown, with their heads
turned towards the middle of the mother's back and do not fall off,
even when she leaps rapidly away. Thus the mother, and not the

THE FROG AS PARENT.

75

father, carries the young with her. In the Brazilian tree-frog (Hyla
Goeldii), it is again the mother who bears the young with her. The
eggs are very large and whitish and crowded together into a rounded
mass on the back of the female, as represented in Fig. 9. While all the
other frogs as yet mentioned seem to have no special organ or apparatus
for holding the eggs or tadpoles as they carry them about with them,
this Brazilian frog is provided with a growth of skin on its back to
form a wall all around the eggs so that they lie in a spoon-like depres-
sion. The knowledge of such a change in the skin of the back for egg-
carrying may make us more ready to receive the accounts of the Sur-
rinam toad described by Mile. Merrain in 1705. When, in 1725, the
Dutchman Euysch described the remarkable pits for carrying yoimg
which this creature has upon its back, the account met with nat-
ural skepticism, but at the present day reiterated observations place

Fig. 9.

t'lo. 10.

the main facts beyond doubt. The female of this toad (Pipa dor-
sigera), as seen in Fig. 10, bears its young upon its back, each in a sep-
arate case, like so many papooses.

The cases are made at the breeding season, and before that the two
sexes look alike. How the eggs get into these special receptacles is still
an unanswered question, though the male may be a factor in the case;
at all events, when the male goes away after being some twenty-four
hours on the back of the female, the spawn is found on the back of
the female, where the eggs gradually sink down into circular pits, that
are hollowed out in the skin, and are 10-15 mm. deep. When an egg
has sunk down into one of these pits, a thick, leathery or homy roof
forms over it, and thus shuts it out from the external world.

These roofs are 5-6 mm. thick, and have a dark color unlike the
rest of the back. Whether they, like the rest of the chamber about the
egg, are formed from the skin, or whether they may be modified rem-

■^6

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

nants of the mass laid with the egg, is as yet undecided. The part of
the skin of the back not taken np by these pits rises up in small
papillge, and thus each pit is closely surrounded by a ring of papillae.
From 40-114 pits are formed, and 60-70 young are developed.

Each egg thus develops inside a diminutive womb-like chamber,
on the back of the mother, but as yet we do not know whether the
mother supplies any nutriment to the young while it is in this pro-
tecting chamber; the arrangement of lymph and blood vessels in the
skin of the mother and the organization of the young, however, raise
the question whether this may not be the case. In each pit the young
tadpole lies with its back toward the roof and its belly downwards. For
awhile it has a large yolk-bag, or enlargement of its belly, full of nutri-
ment and richly supplied with blood vessels; also a tail. This tail is
very large, and seems to be of no use, unless it may function as a
breathing organ, as in the frog of Guadaloupe, mentioned above.
Another peculiarity of these favored tadpoles is that they obtain their

Fig. 11.

Fig. 12.

front legs at a very early period, before their gills grow out; and thufl,
for a long time, appear as four-legged creatures, with most imposing
tails, as represented in Fig. 11.

In this condition they break off the roofs of their little houses and
each, like a baby kangaroo from its mother's pouch, peers out into the
world with goggle eyes and ready hands. For nearly three months
(eighty-two days) the mother is burdened like Sindbad, till the young
toads jump out of their cradles and go free to shift for themselves.

Every Surrinam toad is thus launched upon its individual voyage
of contest for food as a complete but small toad, and, though it had
the outward symbols of tadpole life — gills and a tail — it never lived a
tadpole life, with its dangers from the drying of ponds, and the chances
of being swallowed alive as so many tadpoles are. Our common tad-
poles may, from one point of view, be regarded as chiefly feeding
phases, like the caterpillar that eats and eats to pass through the inac-
tive chr}'salis stage to the complete butterfly life. Tadpoles are phases
of the frogs' lives, when almost anything can be eaten, and when there

THE FROG AS PARENT. 77

is but little perfection of the senses as compared with the future adult
stage. The experience gained as tadpole would seem to be of very
little direct use to the frog when it begins its new life; it is chiefly the
gain in material, the results of feeding, that makes the frog the better
for its tadpole life. In the Surrinam toad this gain in size is provided
for by the mother, who takes all labor off the shoulders of her offspring
till they are toads like herself. Is there not an analogy between such
habits and our own attitude towards the next generation? The child
of the savage, or of the more unfortunate classes in 'civilized' com-
munities, is put to getting its own livelihood at the earliest possible
age; the favored child of the few is protected by the parental roof and
fed with even university pabulum till nearly arrived at adult structure.

But the Surrinam toad is not the only one that is built mammal-
like, to carry its young within its own body; the group of pouched or
marsujnal frogs of Venezuela have an even stranger contrivance for
this purpose. Those who are fortunate enough to have access to a
copy of Professor Davenport's profusely illustrated little volume, 'Intro-
duction to Zoology,' will find a very attractive figure of one of these
'brooding tree-frogs,' taken from a water-color painting at Harvard
College. On the middle of its back, above the loins, is a very large
opening leading into the interior of the animal. This is the opening of
a large brood-chamber. In one frog (Nototrema oviferum) this cham-
ber continues forward on each side as two, even larger, chambers that
reach almost to the head. The middle chamber is on the back, while
the side chambers extend not only over the back, but down on the side,
so as almost to meet one another across the belly. All these chambers
lie just beneath the skin and are not deep, but flat, though they dis-
place the viscera.

The walls of the chambers are very thick and vascular, except near
the external opening, where the wall is of the same nature as the skin.
The skin, in fact, seems to have grown in to line these chambers, but
has been much changed in its character in those parts of the chambers
that are remote from the openings. It is not known how this big bag
grows over the body, nor whether it is always there, or only developed
at the breeding season. These chambers are found in the female, and
in some unknown way the eggs are transferred from the ovary into the
pouches. As there is no internal opening to the pouch, the eggs must
be laid as usual and then put upon the back, and so into the external
opening of the brood pouch. Possibly the male aids in this function.

The eggs of this species are exceedingly large, being 1 cm. in diam-
eter, more than eight times the bulk of a common frog's egg, and are
also but few in number. In one case there were only four eggs in the
outer, middle, chamber and eleven others m the two side chambers —
fifteen eggs in all.

78 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The young that develop from these comparatively large eggs inside
this peculiar skin-bag are remarkable enough to satisfy the ideals of
so bizarre a parent. Like the young Surxinam toad, these get their
front legs at a very early period, and at an early period are also found
without the adhesive organs and horny jaws that seem so essential to
all common tadpoles. But their chief departure from received tad-
pole style is the phenomenal character of the gills. These are large,
bell-shaped, flower-like membranes that envelop the tadpole like a
mantle and, coming between it and the walls of the mother's pouch,
may serve as a means of getting oxygen and possibly food from the
mother, for the gills are richly supplied with blood-vessels, and the
walls of the mother's pouch are also vascular, giving the anatomical
conditions for interchange such as takes place in a mammal's placenta.
Each of these two gills seems to have been made by the fusing of two
specialized gills, and each retains two stalks. Eventually these big
gills are probably lost and replaced by inside gills, just as in common
tadpoles the outside gills are always followed by inside gills. Whether
the mother goes into the water and lets the young escape where they
can use their gills, or whether she keeps them at home till they have
lost these youthful structures and can 'come out' in budding maturity,
is not known, in this case. But in Nonotrema marsupiatum and Noto-
trema plumheum the young are set free into the water when they are
still tadpoles.

The way in which such a capacious pocket on the back can have
come about is perhaps indicated by the state of things in Nototrema
pygmcBum. The brood pouch is here small and slit-like, and when the
young are ready to leave it they press and wriggle till the pouch is torn
open, from the external opening forwards. There are only four to seven
young that can come forth in this partially Caesarian way, and their
appearance seems to have been prearranged by the way in which the
pouch is made. Two folds of the skin grow up to meet one another
along the back, and when they fuse they leave a sort of seam, which
is also the line along which the pouch ruptures to let the young out.
The pouch of this tree-frog is thus to some degree intermediate
between the simple cup on the back of Hyla Goeldii, not well shown in
Fig. 9, and the more perfect sac of the other pouched frogs described
above, and may indicate the lines along which structures and habits
like those of Hyla Goeldii could have been evolved in those of Noto-
trema oviferum. On the other hand, the small size of this frog and the
large size of its eggs make it both impossible to get the eggs into the
usual external opening of the pouch and impossible for the big larvae
to escape through it; hence it may be that the pouch grows up as
folds after the eggs are laid on the mother's back, and that these folds
remain easy of separation to allow the young to escape, all independent

THE FROG AS PARENT. 79

of any mode of development of the pouches of other marsupial frogs.
These strange skin pits and bags of the Surrinam toads and the Ven-
ezuelan frogs are both an aid to the young and an inconvenience to the
parent, and it seems in keeping with our general experience that it is
the female that has these special organs and the female that suffers
the dangers that go with the prolonged care of the offspring. In both
respects, however, with regard both to the phenomenal nature of the
breeding organs and in the amount of personal sacrifice, this female is
outdone by the male of a little frog of Chili.

This frog is not much more than an inch long, and was first found
by Darwin on the voyage of the 'Beagle.' In some unknown way the
large eggs get into the mouth of the male and are carried a long time
inside a huge sac that opens only into the front part of the mouth. In
this pouch the young develop their legs and small tails. It is probable
that they remain protected within the male till they are complete lung-
breathing frogs and then get out of his mouth and escape. Why he
does not eat them is a question that might naturally occur to one know-
ing only our common frogs.

The brood-sac of this male extends over the throat and belly, back
to the loins and up on each side nearly to the backbone. The eggs and
young that are found in it are from five to fifteen in number, and lie
scattered about in the capacious chamber. The general anatomical
relations of this sac are shown in the rude diagram. Fig. 12. This
represents some of the organs that would be seen on cutting the frog
into halves, lengthwise. The brain and spinal cord along the back are
shown in black. Below this are the mouth, stomach and intestines.
On the floor of the mouth is an elevated region, the tongue; behind
this is the opening to an irregular cavity, one of the lungs. In front
of the tongue is the opening to a very large sac, the brood-sac, in which
the eggs are represented as large balls.

A bag of this size necessarily causes the skin of the throat to bulge
out and also presses upon the internal organs. It is found that even
the bones of the shoulder girdle and chest are modified in connection
with this remarkable organ, and that the stomach, liver and intestines
may be pressed out of place, so that feeding must be difficult. In some
cases the digestive organs are said to be so impaired as to be of no use,
while in other cases the brood-sac is of much less extent and would
seem not to interfere seriously with feeding and digestion.

The brood-sac lies free under the skin, except in certain regions of
the throat, where it is fastened to the skin. The lining of this sac is
a continuation of the lining of the mouth, in fact, the sac is but an
enormous side pouch from the mouth. In looking for any similar
organ in common frogs, we find the single or paired resonance chambers
that open into the mouth and serve to give volume to the voice. These

8o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

chambers are specially large in the male and most used in the breeding
season. This Venezuelan frog, Rliinoderma Darwinii, seems to have only
an enormous development of this resonance chamber converted to the
singular purpose of harboring the young. As far as yet known, this frog
leads the van of progress from the selfishness of the common frog to the
altruism of the few; but there may remain to be discovered in tropical
regions other frogs with structures and habits even more advantageous
to the race and inconvenient to the individual.

Granting that all the above accounts of the breeding habits of
frogs are reliable, they yet leave many details unknown. Very much
remains to be found out before we can know the complete life histories
of these remarkable creatures. Till we have a fuller knowledge, any
attempt at explanation of the breeding habits and structures of these
frogs would seem to be necessarily of a provisional nature.

Though it is difficult to describe these frogs without ascribing to
them a far-seeing intelligence, the zoologist of to-day knows little
ground for such assumption. Still less does he see in such examples
of protection for the good of the race any direct acts of the Deity.
He commonly interprets them as the results of the working of natural
selection; and granting the potency of this means of evolution, the
application to the above life-histories seems not difficult.

But it has been said that science is not concerned with the why,
but only with the question, 'What is it precisely that does happen'"
Shall we not work for more complete knowledge of the facts in the
hope of a clearer view of the interconnection of organisms and environ-
ment?

May not our present attempts to understand such problems seem,
in the future, as unscientific as does at present the fancy of the Jap-
anese poet, who, centuries since, wrote:

'' With hands resting on the ground, reverentially you repeat your poem,
O Frog."

RECENT PHYSIOLOGY. 8i

EECENT PHYSIOLOGY.

By Professor G. N. STEWART.

EVERY year a mass of original work in physiology, covering from
ten to fil'teen thousand pages, for the most part of formidable size
and closeness of print, is collected in the various special journals of the
science, or mingled with kindred, though miscellaneous, dust in the
transactions of learned societies, or decently buried at the public
expense in government bulletins and official reports. Those four hun-
dred square yards of printed matter embrace, on the average, more
than five hundred papers in German, English, French and Italian,
without reckoning stray messages in less familiar tongues, such as
Russian, Polish, Dutch, Spanish, the Scandinavian languages, the dog
Latin of graduation theses, and even, it may be Japanese, Arabic and
modern Greek. The great majority of these communications either con-
tain new facts or are directed, often with notable acuteness, to the
unfolding of new relations between facts previously established. It is
obvious that no survey of recent physiology which is possible within
the space at our disposal could pretend to exhaust the contents of its
crowded archives even for a single year. I shall try rather to trace
the main tendencies, while incidentally mentioning some of the out-
standing achievements of recent physiological discussion and research,
than to enter in any detail into the results of particular investigations.
Foremost among these tendencies is the study of the structure and
functions, and especially the chemical and physico-chemical relations
of the individual cell, in which, as has been well said by Bunge, in
his brilliant Lectures on Physiological Chemistry, lies ever the riddle
of life. While the mode of action of the complex physiological mech-
anisms, built up by the grouping and chaining together of cells of the
same or of different kinds, deserves and has attracted the most assid-
uous attention, it has become more and more apparent that, as we push
our enquiries back, we are ahvays, sooner or later, arrested at the
boundary of the cell. We attempt, for example, to explain the mech-
anism by which the circulation of the blood is maintained and regu-
lated, and up to a certain point we succeed tolerably well. We recog-
nize as the central factor the rhythmically contracting heart which
forces the blood through the branching arteries into the netted laby-
rinth of the capillaries, whence it is again conveyed to the heart by the
veins, and thus completes its destined round. We know that the rate
and force of the heart-beat and the caliber of the blood vessels are con-
trolled by efferent nerves carrying impulses down to them from centers
situated in the medulla oblongata, the portion of the central nervous

VOL. LIX.— 6

S2 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

system that serves to join the spinal cord to the brain. We are further
aware that those centers are in touch with all parts of the body by
afferent nerves, along which impulses are continually streaming to the
centers. It is thoroughly established that the activity with which the
centers discharge impulses along the efferent nerves to the heart and
the vessels is modified by the arrival of afferent impulses. And it is
fairly well understood how, by the action of this craftily balanced
apparatus of nerve-fibers and nerve-centers, the supply of blood to the
various tissues is adjusted to their ever-changing needs. But when
we ask ourselves what happens in one of the nerve-cells which
compose the nervous centers when it discharges an impulse?
what that impulse which flies at the rate of a hundred miles an hour
along the nerve-fiber really is? M'hat is the precise nature of the actions
which it arouses or represses in the muscular fibers of the heart or of
the arteries when, in the twinkling of an eye, it impinges upon them?
we have to answer that we do not know. We are in exactly the same
position with regard to the voluntary contraction of the striped or
skeletal muscles by means of which the ordinary movements of the
body are executed. The nerve cells in which the impulses originate
have been located with considerable precision in the so-called motor
region of the brain, which comprises the middle portion of the super-
ficial gray matter of each hemisphere. The tracts of nerve-fibers along
which those impulses pass to the muscles have been mapped out. The
influence of temperature, tension and other conditions on the muscTilar
contraction has been investigated in great detail. But we are again
almost completely in the dark as to the actual nature and course of the
events that take place within the envelopes of the nerve-cell, the nerve-
fiber and the muscular fiber when a muscle contracts in obedience to the
will.

One or two promising clues there are, and these are being vigor-
ously followed. \\Tienever a nerve or a muscle (or, indeed, for that
part, a gland, although the phenomena are best seen in muscle and
nerve) enters into a condition of physiological activity, an electrical
change is set up in the excited part. In muscle, although not as yet in
nerve, certain chemical, thermal and optical clianges can also be dem-
onstrated. It is obvious that the study of such phenomena, and espe-
cially their quantitative study, under as many different conditions as
possible, is essential to the solution of our problem. Accordingly, data
of this kind, which, it may be hoped, will some day become the basis
of a great generalization, are being diligently gathered. Among tlie
most important of recent contributions to the subject is an elaborate
investigation of the electrical changes which accompany muscular con-
traction by Sir Jolm Burdon Sanderson. By photographing the move-
ments of the mercuiT in a capillar}' electrometer connected witJi the

RECENT PHYSIOLOGY. 83

muscle he has obtained a great series of marveloiisly beautiful records.
Gotch and his pupils, using a similar arrangement, have been able to
record the electrical changes in active nerves, even when stimulated by
rapidly recurring shocks from an induction coil. It may surprise those
who have not followed the progress of technique in the biological sci-
ences to learn the extent to which photography is now applied in physi-
ological research. Pictm-es of even such feeble vil)rations as those
which give rise to the sounds of the heart may be obtained by con-
necting a microphone placed near the chest and the primary coil of an
induction machine in the same circuit, and photographing the move-
ments of a capillary electrometer connected with the secondary.
Exquisite photographs of the electrical variations occun-ing in the
human heart at each beat, first demonstrated by Waller, have been
recently published by Eiuthoven and Lint.

Loeb, working from another direction, has studied the effect
of the ions contained in solutions of certain simple salts
on rhythmical contraction in general, and particularly on the
rhythmical contraction of the heart. He starts with the observation
that a striped muscle in a solution of sodium chloride of a certain
strength carries out rhythmical contractions which may last 24 to 48
hours. Salts of lime and of potassium hinder the contractions.
N'evertheless the muscle remains longer alive when a small amount of
calcium or potassium chloride is added to the sodium chloride solution.
He explains the seeming paradox by the hypothesis that the sodium
ions are the real stimulus for the rhythmical contractions, but yet
exert on the muscle a poisonous influence, which, is counteracted by
the calcium and potassium ions. He finds support for the idea that
the sodium ions are actually poisonous to the living substance in the
fact that Fundulus heteroclitus — a small marine fish with so marvel-
ous a range of adaptation to its environment that it will live, on the
one hand, in sea-water to which sodium chloride has been added to the
amount of five per cent., and, on the other hand, in fresh and even
in distilled water — -wall not live in pure sodium chloride solutions of
about the same strength as sea-water, but will survive in sodium chlo-
ride solutions even twice as strong if a little chloride of calcium or of
potassium be added. According to Lingle, one of the pupils of Loeb,
sodium ions, while acting as the normal stimulus to the discharge ©f
rhythmical contractions by the heart muscle of the turtle, exert upon
it, in the absence of calcium and potassium ions, the same deleterious
influence as upon striped muscle, a fact also demonstrated by
Ringer and others for the heart of the frog. These are the experi-
ments which that eminent contributor to the gayety of nations, the
scientific newspaper reporter, has recently travestied under the caption,
'Discovery of the Elixir of Life in Chicago.' They have yielded fresh

84 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

evidence that the differences between muscular fibers, such as those of
the heart, which contract normally with what we call a spontaneous
beat, and the fibers of the skeletal muscles, which only, under ordinary
circumstances, contract when excited through their motor nerves, are
not so deep-seated as was at one time supposed, since the addition of
simple inorganic bodies to the living muscular substance, or their sub-
traction from it, can alter its behavior in this regard. The experi-
ments of Langendorff, Porter and others on the action of the isolated
hearts of warm-blooded animals, which, after being cut out of the
body, can be kept alive for several hours by feeding them through
their arteries with warm blood from a reservoir, have strengthened the
belief that the essential cause of the heart-beat is to be sought in the
muscular fibers and not in the nerve-cells present in certain portions of
the organ.

With respect to the nerve-cell, research is at present largely con-
centrated upon the study of its minute structure. Among the numer-
ous methods of staining employed for this purpose two deserve espe-
cial mention: the method of Golgi, which is peculiarly useful for bring-
ing out the processes or branches of nerve-cells, and the method of
Nissl, which is of great service in the investigation of the body of the
cell. A typical nerve-cell when impregnated with a salt of silver,
according to Golgi's method, exhibits a wonderful profusion of bifur-
cating processes, picked out in black like the sharply shadowed branches
of a leafless tree under an electric light. But, however intricately the
branches of neighboring cells may mingle and intertwine, they do not
in general run into, or fuse with, each other, any more than the inter-
locking boughs of neighboring trees in a forest. By demonstrating this
important fact the method of Golgi has revolutionized our ideas of the
architecture of the nervous system.

The significance of the peculiar angular or spindle-shaped bodies
in the protoplasm of the nerve-cell, which have been revealed by Nissl's
method of staining with methylene-blue, is at present arousing the
greatest interest. That they have some important relation to the nutri-
tion of the cell seems evident. For when the latter is severed from that
one of its processes (the axone) which constitutes the essential part of
the nerve-fiber that springs from the cell, the Nissl bodies break up,
and either disappear or are dispersed in the form of very minute
granules of stainable material in the protoplasm. At the same time
the cell becomes swollen, its nucleus is displaced to one side, and
it may even atrophy entirely and disappear. As a rule, however, after
several months it recovers its normal structure. The administration of
considerable quantities of alcohol and other drugs causes a similar
effect on the Nissl bodies. It has been known for half a century that
the axone degenerates when cut off from the cell of which it is a process.

BE CENT PHYSIOLOGY. 85

The fact that the cell suffers also is a striking illustration of the essen-
tial unity of the nerve-cell and all its branches, whether they are long
or short — three feet in length, as the axones that run from the lower
part of the spinal cord to the foot may be, or a thousandth of an inch,
like some which arise and terminate within the gray matter of the
cord and brain.

Simpler, at first sight, in their action and organization than nerve-
cells or muscular fibers are the gland-cells which secrete the digestive
juices. The cells of the kidney which separate from the blood the con-
stituents of the urine, and the cells wliich line the intestine and are
engaged in the absorption of the food appear to be simpler still. And
simplest of all are the flat, scale-like cells that line the lungs and have
to do with the taking in of oxygen and the elimination of carbonic acid
and the similar cells which form the walls of the capillasies and are
concerned in the production of lymph. Accordingly we have seen of
late years, in connection with researches on the functions of such cells,
a revival of formal discussion of the general problem of physiology:
whether the vital processes can be completely explained in terms of the
laws of unorganized matter. This is a question which has had a singular
fate. Answered at certain epochs by an almost unanimous negative, it
has emerged again with exery fresh advance in mechanical, physical
or chemical knowledge, and for a time has seemed about to be settled
in the affirmative. It was so in the seventeenth century when the dis-
coveries of the new geometry and the new mechanics were hailed by
Descartes and the iatro-mathematical school who were his lineal descend-
ants, although they denied their parentage, as the key which was
to unlock all the secrets of that cunningly devised automaton, the
animal body, and particularly to explain its movements. At a later
date, the determination of the laws of the diffusion of gases appeared
to solve the problem of the passage of gases through the lungs, and
the determination of the laws of diffusion of dissolved substances and
of endosmosis, the problem of absorption from the intestines. With
Ludwig's researches on the formation of urine, secretion seemed about
to pass out of the group of mysterious 'vital' phenomena, and to become
a mere process of filtration. But always as renewed investigation has
brought into clearer light the peculiarities, the wizard tricks, one might
almost say, of those rare mechanisms that ply so deftly even in the
common business of the bodily machine, the gulf that separates the
inorganic from the organized world has opened wide as ever, and physi-
ology has still had to wait for a new Curtius to close it.

Quite recently the experiments of de Vries, Van't Hoff and others
on osmosis have supplied further physical data for the solution of this
perennial problem, and have, therefore, become the starting point of
numerous physiological researches. Among these may be mentioned

86 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

a series of studies on absorption from the intestine by Waymouth Reid,
which have just been published, in collected form, in the Thilosophical
Transactions of the Eoyal Society/ Starting with the idea of studying
the behavior of the intestinal wall when as many as possible of the
physical factors which may be supposed to be concerned in absorption
have been eliminated, he endeavored to realize this condition by intro-
ducing into the intestine of an animal some of its own blood-serum.
When this is done the cells that line the alimentary tube are in contact
on one side Avith blood-serum and on the other with capillary vessels
containing blood, the liquid portion of which has the same composition
as the serum in the intestine. Under these circumstances there could be
no passage of material from the intestines to the blood by diffusion or
osmosis, if the intestinal wall acted like an ordinary dead membrane.
Reid found, as a matter of fact, that the serum was rapidly absorbed.
That this was not due to ordinary filtration, that is, to the squeezing
of the liquid through the walls of the tube, follows from the fact that
in these observations the pressure in the intestines was less than in the
capillaries. He comes to the conclusion that while known physical
forces play a certain part in absorption, there remains an unexplained
residuum. But he refuses to speculate as to the cause of the peculiar
endowments of the intestinal epithelium, and is very careful to point
out that what seems so inexplicable now may later on become suscep-
tible of explanation.

Friedenthal, in a suggestive paper occupied mainly by a critique
of previous work and contemporary speculation, has lately taken
up his parable in favor of a complete physico-chemical explanation of
absorption. According to him, what we call the selective power of the
intestinal epithelium is simply the expression of the fact that there
exist in those cells substances which have a greater ^affinity' for certain
constituents of the intestinal contents than for others, just as plates of
gelatine do not take up the same quantities of different salts and other
compounds from solutions containing them. Such hypotheses, of course,
while they have the merit of directing attention to the possibility of a
complete chemical or physical solution of the problem being some day
found, do not give us any information as to the peculiarities of physical
structure or chemical composition which confer on the lining of the
intestine, as on all living cells, powers so remarkable that when we
endeavor to describe them the terms which spring spontaneously to our
lips are such as we should apply to the behavior of an entire organism
in relation to its environment: ^selection,' 'discrimination,' 'affinity'
for substances that are useful, 'antagonism' to those which are injurious.

The study of the permeability to various substances of what we may
perhaps consider as the most simply organized cells in the whole body,
the colored corpuscles of the blood, promises to throw a flood of light

RECENT PHYSIOLOGY. 87

on absorption in creneral. It has been lately shown that they are prac-
tically non-conductors of electricity in comparison with the liquid
portion of the blood, or plasma, in which they float. This is due to
the fact that the salts of the plasma, whose ions carry the electricity,
penetrate the corpuscles with difficulty, sodium chloride, for example,
scarcely passing into them at all. On tlie other hand, they are freely
permeable to ammonium chloride, urea and other bodies. The condi-
tions governing the passage of substances into the corpuscles are evi-
d(>ntly very different from those which determine the permeability of
an ordinary membrane. This is further shown by the fact that by cer-
tain methods of treatment the colossal molecules of the red coloring mat-
ter of the blood may be caused to escape from the corpuscles, while the
much smaller molecules of the inorganic salts remain still pent within
them. Such results are of great interest, for they show that cells which,
as regards their main physiological office, the conveyance of oxygen to
the tissues, seem to be governed strictly by the physical laws of diffu-
sion of gases, appear to exercise a kind of 'selection' in the taking up
of many substances which have nothing to do with their particular func-
tion. The suggestion is scarcely to be avoided that in this case a purely
chemical or physical 'attraction' underlies the apparently selective
power. And this idea is strengthened by the fact that all those charac-
teristic reactions of the colored corpuscles can be obtained many hours
after the blood has been removed from the body, and, therefore, at a
time when their 'vital' activity may be supposed either to have been
extinguished or to have undergone a serious diminution.

The absorption of oxygen and excretion of carbonic acid by the
lungs have long been considered conspicuous examples of the passage
of substances through a living animal membrane by ordinary physical
diffusion. But, according to the recent observations of Bohr, oxygen may,
within certain limits, be absorbed, when its partial pressure or tension
in the blood is greater than that in the air contained in the lungs, and
carbonic acid may be excreted when its pressure in the blood is less than
that in the air of the lungs. Haldane and Smith have indeed shown that
in man the pressure of the oxygen in the arterial blood is actually higher
than in the outside air. These results are, of course, incompatible with
a simple theory of diffusion, and show that the cells of the pulmonary
membrane have the power of forcing ox3^gen to move in one direction
and carbonic acid in the other even against the slope of pressure.

As regards the physiology of particular organs, attention has been,
in recent years, attracted in a marked degree to two subjects: the so-
called internal secretions of certain glands and the arrangement and
actions of the nerve-cells and fibers which make up the central nervous
system.

By an internal secretion we mean a substance or substances

88 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

formed by a gland and taken up from it by the blood or lymph. An
ordinary external secretion is discharged by a special duct into the
proper receptacle, bile, for example, into the gall-bladder, and ulti-
mately into the intestine; urine into the urinary bladder, and so on.
Some of the glands which produce important internal secretions have
no ducts. Such are the thyroid glands, two insignificant looking reddish
bodies situated in the neck, one at each side of the windpipe, a little
below the larynx. It had been long known that disease of these glands,
commencing in childhood and leading to the enlargement which we call
goitre, was often associated with a condition of idiocy (cretinism).
Interest in their functions was greatly stimulated by the discovery that
excision of the thyroids was followed by grave changes resembling those
found in a disease called myxoedema, and that the symptoms produced
by excision, as well as those present in the natural disease, could be
removed, and health restored, by feeding the patient with the raw or
slightly cooked thyroids of animals or with certain extracts prepared
from them. Much work has been devoted to the isolation in a pure
form of the active substances, one of which contains iodine as an impor-
tant constituent. It appears to be the office of the thyroid to manu-
facture for the use of the body a constant supply of these substances,
which are necessary for the due maintenance of certain of its functions.
In the absence of the natural supply, similar materials produced by the
corresponding glands in animals can be utilized.

The suprarenal or adrenal bodies, situated just above the kidneys,
are another pair of ductless glands whose function is of extraordinary
importance in proportion to their size. It has been shown that they con-
tain a substance which when injected into the blood in animals, or
painted, say, on an inflamed eye in man, causes a marked narrowing
of the small arteries; and it has been surmised that this substance, oozing
slowly from the glands into the blood, exerts a bracing or 'tonic' influ-
ence on the muscular fibers of the heart and blood vessels, and helps to
keep them in proper condition for their work. Certain it is that death
follows their removal in animals, while their disorganization in man is
associated with the peculiar and fatal condition termed Addison's
disease.

Jhe pituitary gland, a small body attached to the base of the brain,
is in the same category. It seems to be of great importance, if not
absolutely indispensable to life. Extracts of the gland, as Howell and
Schafer have shown, produce decided effects upon the pressure of the
blood when injected into the vessels.

One of the most interesting examples of an internal secretion which
is not necessary to life but which yet profoundly affects the chemical
chano-es occurring in the body, is that of the ovaries. It has long been
familiar to stock farmers that the removal of these organs greatly

RECENT PHYSIOLOGY. 89

increases tlie rapidity with which fat is laid on. According to the
recent researches of Loewy and Richter at the Agricultural College
in Berlin, the explanation is that the ovaries produce a substance which
hastens the oxidation of the tissues and the food. When this sub-
stance is injected below the skin of animals whose ovaries have been
removed, the tissue waste is markedly increased.

In the domain of nervous physiology our knowledge is growing
apace. The doctrine of the localization of function on the surface of
the brain may now be considered as well established. The motor region
has been subdivided into areas, each of which is related to a particular
movement, because the nerve-fibers springing from the large pyramidal
cells contained in it, are connected with nerve-cells in the gray matter
of the spinal cord which send nerve-fibers only to the muscles con-
cerned in that movement. But while each motor center is thus con-
nected by motor or efferent fibers with the muscles, recent work by
Sherrington and Mott and by other observers has shown that it is also
connected by sensory or afl'erent fibers with the muscles, the skin over-
lying them, the joints in their neighborhood, and the bones which they
move. The 'motor area,' in fact, is not purely motor, but has sensory
functions as well.

No convincing proof has yet been given that any particular portion
of the brain is exclusively concerned in intellectual operations. Goltz,
the most prominent representative of the dwindling band who still
refuse to believe in the localization even of the motor functions, has
lately published an interesting paper containing the results of observa-
tions on a monkey which was carefully watched for eleven years after
the removal of the greater part of the gray matter of the middle and
anterior portions of the left hemisphere of the brain. The character of
the animal, whose little tricks and peculiarities had been studied
for months before the operation, was entirely unaffected. All its traits
remained unaltered. On the other hand, disturbances of movement on
the right side were very noticeable up to the time of its death. It
learned again to use the right limbs, but there was always a certain
clumsiness in their movements. In actions requiring only one hand,
the right was never willingly employed, and it evidently cost the animal
a great effort to use it. Before the operation it would give either the
right or the left hand when asked for it. After the operation it always
gave the left, till by a long course of training, in which fruit or lumps
of sugar served as the rewards of virtue, it learned again to give the
right. Evidently, although this is not the interpretation placed by
Goltz upon his observations, the motor centers of the right side of the
brain, which normally preside over the movements of the left side of
the body, had to be laboriously educated before they became able to
carry out such movements of the right hand.

90 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE BLOOD OF THE NATION.

A STUDY OF THE DECAY OF BACES THROUGH THE SURVIYAL OF THE

UXFIT.

Part I — In Peace.

By DAVID STARR JORDAN,

PRESIDENT OF LELAND STANFORD JR. UNIVERSITY.

"Over trench and clod
Where we left the brave.st of us,
There's a deeper green of the sod."

— Brown«ll.

I. In this paper I shall set forth two propositions, the one self-
evident, the other not apparent at first sight, but equally demonstrable.
The Hood of a nation determines its history. This is the first proposition.
The second is: The history of a nation determines its Hood. As for the
first, no one doubts that the character of men controls their deeds. In
the long run and with masses of mankind this must be true, however
great the emphasis we may lay on individual initiative or on individual
variation.

Equally true is it that the present character of a nation is made by
its past history. Those who are alive to-day are the resultants of the
stream of heredity as modified by the vicissitudes through which the
nation has passed. The blood of the nation flows in the veins of those
who survive. Those who die without descendants can not color the
stream of heredity. It must take its traits from the actual parentage.

II. The word 'blood' in this sense is figurative only, an expression
formed to cover the qualities of heredity. Such traits, as the phrase
goes, *run in the blood.' In the earlier philosophy, it was held that
blood was the actual physical vehicle of heredity, that the traits be-
queathed from sire to son as the characteristics of families or races ran
literally in the literal blood. We know now that this is not the case.
We know that the actual 'blood' in the actual veins plays no part in
heredity, that the transfusion of blood means no more than the trans-
position of food, and that the physical basis of the phenomena of inher-
itance is found in the structure of the germ cell and its contained germ-
plasm.

III. But the old word well serves our purposes. The blood which
is 'thicker than water* is the symbol of race unity. In this sense the

TU[': BLOOD OF THE NATION. 91

blood of the people concerned is, at once, the cause and the result of the
deeds recorded in their history. For example, wherever an Englishman
goes, he carries with him the elements of English history. It is a
British deed which he does, British history that he makes. Thus, too, a
Jew is a Jew in all ages and climes, and his deeds everywhere bear the
stamp of Jewish individuality. A Greek is a Greek; a Chinaman re-
mains a Chinaman. In like fashion, the race traits color all history
made by Tartars, or negroes, or Malays.

The climate which surrounds a tribe of men may affect the activities
of these men as individuals or as an aggregate; education may intensify
their powers or mellow their prejudices; oppression may make them
servile or dominion make them overbearing, but these traits and their
resultants, so far as science knows, do not 'run in the blood.' They are
not 'bred in the bone.' Older than climate or training or experience
are the traits of heredity, and in the long run it is always 'blood which
tells.'

IV. On the other hand, the deeds of a race of men must in turn
determine its blood. Could we with full knowledge sum up the events
of the past history of any body of men, we could indicate the kinds of
men destroyed in these events. The others would be left to write the
history of the future. It is the 'man who is left' in the march of history
who gives to history its future trend. By the 'man who is left' we mean
simply the man who remains at home to become the father of the fam-
ily— as distinguished from the man who in one way or another is sacri-
ficed for the nation's weal or woe. If any class of men be destroyed
by political or social forces, or by the action of institutions, they leave
no offspring, and their like will cease to appear.

V. 'Send forth the best ye breed.' This is Kipling-'s cynical advice
to a nation which happily can never follow it. But could it be accepted
literally and completely, the nation in time would breed only second-
rate men. By the sacrifice of their best, or the emigration of the best,
and by such influences alone, have races fallen from first-rate to second-
rate in the march of history.

VI. For a race of men or a herd of cattle are governed bv the same
laws of selection. Those who survive inherit the traits of their own
actual ancestry. In the herd of cattle, to destroy the strongest bulls,
the fairest cows, the most promising calves, is to allow those not strong,
nor fair, nor promising, to become the parents of the coming herd.
Under this influence the herd will deteriorate, although the individuals
of the inferior herd are no worse than their own actual parents. Such
a process is called race-degeneration, and it is the only race-degeneration
known in the history of cattle or men. The scrawny, lean, infertile
herd is the natural offspring of the same type of parents. On the other
hand, if we sell or destroy the rough, lean, or feeble calves we shall have

92 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

a herd descended from the best. It is said that when the short-homed
Durham cattle first attracted attention in England, the long-horns,
which preceded them, inferior for beef or milk, vanished ^as if smitten
by a pestilence.' The fact was that, being less valuable, their owners
chose to destroy them rather than the finer Durhams. Thus the new
stock came from the better Durham parentage. If conditions should
ever be reversed, and the Durhams were chosen for destruction, then
the long-horns might again appear, swelling in numbers as if by magic,
unless all traces of the breed had in the meantime been annihilated.

VII. In selective breeding with any domesticated animal or plant,
it is possible, with a little attention, to produce wonderful changes for
the better. Almost anything may be accomplished with time and pa-
tience. To select for posterity those individuals which best meet our
needs or please our fancy, and to destroy those with unfavorable qual-
ities, is the function of artificial selection. Add to this the occasional
crossing of unlike forms to promote new and desirable variations, and
we have the whole secret of selective breeding. This process Youatt
calls the 'magician's wand' by which man may summon up and bring
into existence any form of animal or plant useful to him or pleasing to
his fancy.

VIII. In the animal world progress comes mainly through selec-
tion, natural or artificial, the survival of the fittest to become the parent
of the new generation. In the world of man similar causes produce
similar results. The word progress is, however, used with a double
meaning, including the advance of civilization, as well as race improve-
ment. The first of these meanings is entirely distinct from the other.
The results of training and education lie outside the scope of the pres-
ent discussion. By training the force of the individual man is increased.
Education gives him access to the accumulated stores of wisdom built
up from the experience of ages. The trained man is placed in a class
relatively higher than the one to which he would belong on the score
of heredity alone. Heredity carries with it possibilities for effective-
ness. Training makes these possibilities actual. Civilization has been
defined as 'the sum total of those agencies and conditions by which a
race may advance independently of heredity.' But while education and
civilization may greatly change the life of individuals, and through
them that of the nation, these influences are spent on the individual and
the social system of which he is a part. So far as science knows, edu-
cation and training play no part in heredity. The change in the blood
which is the essence of race-progress, as distinguished from progress in
civilization, finds its cause in selection only.

IX. To apply to nations the principles known to be valid in cattle-
breeding, we may take a concrete example — that of the alleged de-
cadence of France. It is claimed that the birth-rate is falling off in

TEE BLOOD OF THE NATION. 93

France, that the stature is lower, and the physical force less among the
French peasantry than it was a century ago. If all this is true, then
the cause for it must be in some feature of the life of France which
has changed the normal processes of selection.

X. In the present paper I shall not attempt to prove these state-
ments. They rest, so far as I know, entirely on assertions of French
writers, and statistics are not easily obtained. It suffices that an official
commission has investigated the causes of reduced fertility, with chiefly
negative results. It is not due primarily to intemperance nor vice nor
prudence nor misdirected education, the rush to 'ready-made careers,'
but to inherited deficiencies of the people themselves. It is not a matter
of the cities alone, but of the whole body of French peasantry. Legoyt,
in his study of 'the alleged degeneration of the French people,' tells us
that "it will take long periods of peace and plenty before France can
recover the tall statures mowed down in the wars of the republic and
the First Empire," though how plenty can provide for the survival of
the tallest this writer does not explain. Peace and plenty may preserve,
but they can not restore.

It is claimed, on authority which I have failed to verify, that the
French soldier of to-day is nearly two inches shorter than the soldier
of a century ago. One of the most important of recent French books,
by Edmond Demolins, asks, "in what consists the superiority of the
Anglo-Saxon?" The answer is found in defects of training and of civic
and personal ideals, but the real cause lies deeper than all this. Low
ideals in education are developed by inferior men. Dr. Nordau
and his school of exponents of 'hand-painted science' find France
a nation of decadents, a condition due to the inherited strain of
an overwrought civilization. With them the word 'degenerate' is found
adequate to explain all eccentricities of French literature, art, politics,
or jurisprudence.

XI. But science knows no such things as nerve-stress inheritance.
If it did, the peasantry of France have not been subjected to it. Their
life is hard, no doubt, but not stressful, and they suffer more from
nerve-sluggishness than from any form of enforced psychical activity.
The kind of degeneration Nordau pictures is not a matter of heredity.
Wlien not simply personal eccentricity, it is a phase of personal decay.
It finds its causes in bad habits, bad training, bad morals, or in the
desire to catch public attention for personal advantage. It has no per-
manence in the blood of the race. The presence on the Paris boulevards
of a mob of crazy painters, maudlin musicians, drunken poets, and
sensation-mongers proves nothing as to race degeneracy. When the
fashion changes they will change also. Already the fad of 'strenuous
life' is blowing them away. Any man of any race withers in an at-
mosphere of vice, absinthe and opium. The presence of such an at-

94 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

mosphere may be an effect of race decadence, but it is not a cause of the
lowered tone of the nation.

Evil influences may kill the individual, but they can not tarnish the
stream of heredity. The child of each generation is free-born so far
as heredity goes, and the sins of the fathers are not visited upon him.
If vice strikes deeply enough to wreck the man, it is likely to wreck or
kill the child as well, not through heredity, but through lack of nutri-
tion. The child depends on its parents for its early vitality, its con-
stitutional strength, the momentum of its life, if we may use the term.
For this a sound parentage demands a sound body. The unsound
parentage yields the withered branches, the lineage which speedily
comes to the end. But this class of influences, affecting not the germ-
plasm, but general vitality, has no relation to hereditary qualities, so
far as we know.

In heredity there can be no tendency downward or upward. Nature
repeats, and that is all. From the actual parents actual qualities are
received, the traits of the man or woman as they might have been,
without regard, so far as we know, to the way in which these qualities
have been actually developed.

XII. The evolution of a race is selective only, never collective.
Collective evolution, the movement upward or downward of a people as
a whole, irrespective of education or of selection, is, as Lepouge has
pointed out, a thing unknown. 'It exists in rhetoric, not in truth nor
in history.'

No race as a whole can be made up of 'degenerate sons of noble sires.'
Where decadence exists, the noble sires have perished, either through
evil influences, as in the slums of great cities, or else through the move-
ments of history or the growth of institutions. If a nation sends forth
the best it breeds to destruction, the second best will take their vacant
places. The weak, the vicious, the unthrifty will propagate, and in
default of better, will have the land to themselves.

XIII. We may now see the true significance of the 'Man of the
Hoe,' as painted by Millet and as pictured in Edwin Markham's verse.
This is the Norman peasant, low-browed, heavy-jawed, 'the brother of
the ox,' gazing with lack-lustre eye on the things about him. To a
certain extent, he is typical of the French peasantry. Every one who
has traveled in France knows well his kind. If it should be that his
kind is increasing, it is because his betters are not. It is not that his
back is bent by centuries of toil. He was not born oppressed. Heredity
carries over not oppression, but those qualities of mind and heart which
invite or which defy oppression. The tyrant harms those only that he
can reach. Tlie new generation is free-born and slips from his hands,
unless its traits be of the kind which demand new tyrants.

Millet's Man of the Hoe is not the product of oppression. He is

THE BLOOD OF THE NATION. 95

primitive, aboriginal. His lineage has always been that of the clown
and swineherd. The heavy jaw and slanting forehead can be found in
the oldest mounds and tombs of France. Tlie skulls of Engis and Ne-
anderthal were typical men of the hoe, and through the days of the
Gauls and Bomans the race was not extinct. The 'lords and masters
of the earth' can prove an alibi when accused of the fashioning of the
ten-ible shape of this primitive man. And men of this shape persist
to-day in regions never invaded by our social or political tyranny, aiid
their kind is older than any existing social order.

That he is 'chained to the wheel of labor' is the result, not the
cause, of his impotence. In dealing with him, therefore, Ave are far
from the 'labor problem' of to-day, far from the workman brutalized by
machinery, and from all the wrongs of the poor set forth in the con-
ventional literature of sympathy.

XIV. In our discussion of decadence we turn to France first sim-
ply as a convenient illustration. Her sins have not been greater than
those of other lands, nor is the penalty more significant. Her case
rises to our hand to illustrate a principle which applies to all human
history and to all history of groups of animals and plants as well. Our
picture, such as it is, we must paint with a broad brush, for we have no
space for exceptions and qualifications, which, at the most, could only
prove the rule. To weigh statistics is impossible, for the statistics we
need have never been collected. The evil effects of 'military selection"
and allied causes have been long recognized by students of social science,
but their ideas have not penetrated into the common literature of com-
mon life.

The survival of the fittest in the struggle for existence is the primal
cause of race progress and race changes. But in the red field of human
history the natural process of selection is often reversed. The survival
of the unfittest is the primal cause of the downfall of nations. Let us
see in what ways this cause has operated in the history of France.

XV. First, we may consider the relation of the nobility to the
peasantry, the second to the third estate.

The feudal nobility of each nation was in the beginning made up
of the fair, the brave and the strong. By their courage and strength
their men became the rulers of the people, and by the same token they
chose the beauty of the realm to be their own.

In the polity of England this superiority was emphasized by the law
of primogeniture. On 'inequality before the law' British polity has
always rested. Men have tried to take a certain few to feed these on
'royal jelly,' as the young queen bee is fed, and thus to raise them to a
higher class — distinct from all the workers. To take this leisure class
out of the struggle and competition of life, so goes the theory', is to
make of the first-born and his kind harmonious and perfect men and

96 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

women, fit to lead and control the social and political life of the state.
In England, the eldest son is chosen for this purpose, a good arrange-
ment, according to Samuel Johnson, 'because it ensures only one fool in
the family/ For the theory of the leisure class forgets that men are
made virile by effort and resistance, and the lord developed by the use
of 'royal jelly' has rarely been distinguished by perfection of manhood.

The gain of primogeniture came in the fact that the younger sons
and the daughters' sons were forced constantly back into the mass of
the people. Among the people at large this stronger blood became the
dominant strain. The Englishmen of to-day are the sons of the old
nobility, and in the stress of natural selection they have crowded out
the children of the swineherd and the slave. The evil of primogeniture
has furnished its own antidote. It has begotten democracy. The
younger sons in Cromwell's ranks asked on their battle-flags why the
eldest should receive all and they nothing. Richard Eumbold, whom
they slew in the Bloody Assizes, "could never believe that Providence
had sent into the world a few men already booted and spurred, with
countless millions already saddled and bridled for these few to ride."
Thus these younger sons became the Roundhead, the Puritan, the Pil-
grim. They swelled Cromwell's Army, they knelt at Marston Moor,
they manned the Mayflower, and in each generation they have fought
for liberty in England and in the United States. Studies in genealogy
show that all this is literally true. All the old families in New England
and Virginia trace their lines back to nobility, and thence to royalty.
Almost every Anglo-American has, if he knew it, noble and royal blood
in his veins. The Massachusetts farmer, whose fathers came from Ply-
mouth in Devon, has as much of the blood of the Plantagenets, of Wil-
liam and of Alfred as flows in any royal veins in Europe. But his an-
cestral line passes through the working and fighting younger son, not
through him who was first born to the purple. The persistence of the
strong shows itself in the prevalence of the leading qualities of her
dominant strains of blood, and it is well for England that her gentle
blood flows in all her ranks and in all her classes. When we consider
with Demolins 'what constitutes the superiority of the Anglo-Saxon,' we
shall find his descent from the old nobility, 'Saxon and Norman and
Dane,' not the least of its factors.

XVI. On the continent of Europe the law of primogeniture existed
in less force, and the results were very distinct. All of noble blood
were continuously noble. All belonged to the leisure class. All were
held on the backs of a third estate, men of weaker heredity, beaten
lower into the dust by the weight of an ever-increasing body of nobility.
The blood of the strong rarely mingled with that of the clown. The
noblemen were brought up in indolence and ineffectiveness. The evils
of dissipation wasted their individual lives, while casting an ever-in-

THE BLOOD OF THE NATION. 97

creasing burden on the villager and on the 'farmer who must pay for
all.'

XVII. Hence in France the burden of taxation led to the Revolu-
tion and its Eeign of Terror. I need not go over the details of dissipa-
tion, intrigue, extortion and vengeance which brought to sacrifice the
'best that the nation could bring.' In spite of their lust and cruelty,
the victims of the Eeign of Terror were literally the best from the
standpoint of race development. Their weaknesses were those of train-
ing in luxury and irresponsible power. These effects were individual
only, and their children were free-born, with the capacity to grow up
truly noble if removed from the evil surroundings of the palace.

XVIII. In Thackeray's 'Chronicle of the Drum,' the old drummer,

Pierre, tells us that

"Those glorious days of September '

Saw many aristocrats fall,
'Twas then that our pikes drank the blood
In the beautiful breast of Lamballe.

"Pardi, 'twas a beautiful lady,

I seldom have looked on her like.
And I drummed for a gallant procession
That marched with her head on a pike."

Then they showed her pale face to the Queen, who fell fainting, and
the mob called for her head and the head of the King. And the slaugh-
ter went on until the man on horseback came, and the mob, 'alive but
most reluctant,' was itself forced into the graves it had dug for others.

And since that day the 'best that the nation could bring' have been
without descendants, the men less manly than the sons of the Girondins
would have been, the women less beautiful than the daughters of Lam-
balle. The political changes which arose may have been for the better;
the change in the blood was all for the worse.

XIX. Other influences which destroyed the best were social re-
pression, religious intolerance and the intolerance of irreligion and
imscience. It was the atheist mob of Paris which destroyed Lavoisier,
with the sneer that the new republic of reason had no use for savants.
The old conservatism burned the heretic at the stake, banished the
Huguenot, destroyed the lover of freedom, silenced the agitator. Its
intolerance gave Cuvier and Agassiz to Switzerland, sent the Le Contes
to America, the Jouberts to Holland, and furnished the backbone
of the fierce democracy of the Transvaal. While not all agitators
are sane, and not all heretics right-minded, yet no nation can spare
from its numbers those men who think for themselves and those who
act for themselves. It cannot afford to drive away or destroy those
who are filled with religious zeal, nor those whose religious zeal takes
a form not approved by tradition nor by consent of the masses. All

VOL. LIX.— 7.

98 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

movements toward social and religions reform are signs of individual
initiative and individual force. The country which stamps out indi-
viduality will soon live in the mass alone.

XX. A Frencli writer has claimed that the decay of religious spirit
in France is connected with the growth of religious orders of which
celibacy is a prominent feature. If religious men and women leave no
descendants, their own spirit, at least, will fail of inheritance. A peo-
ple careless of religion inherit this trait from equally careless ancestors.

XXI. Indiscriminate cliarity has been a fruitful cause of the sur-
^ ival of the unfit. To kill the strong and to feed the weak is to provide
for a progeny of weakness. It is a French writer again, who says that
"Charity creates the misery she tries to relieve; she can never relieve
half the misery she creates.''

There is to-day in Aosta, in Northern Italy, an asylum for the care
and culture of idiots. The cretin and the goitre are assembled there,
and the marriage of those who can not take care of themselves ensures
the preservation of their strains of unfitness. By caring devotedly for
those who in the stress of life could not live alone for a week and by
caring for their children, generation after generation, the good people
of Aosta have produced a new breed of men, who can not even feed
themselves. These are incompetent through selection of degradation,
while the 'man of the hoe' is primitively ineffective.

The growth of the goitre in the valleys of Savoy, Piedmont and
A^alais is itself in large part a matter of selection. The boy with the
goitre is exempt from military service. He remains at home to become
the father of the family. It is said that at one time the government of
Savoy furnished the children of that region with lozenges of iodine,
which were supposed to check the abnormal swelling or the thyroid
gland, known as the goiti'e. This disease is a frequent cause of idiocy
or cretinism, as well as its almost constant accompaniment. It is said
the mothers gave the lozenges only to the girls, preferring that the boys
should grow up to the goitre rather than to the army. The causes of
goitre are obscure, perhaps depending on poor nutrition, or on mineral
substances in the water. The disease itself is not hereditary so far as
known, ])ut susce])tibility to it certainly is. V>y taking away for outside
service those who are resistant, the heredity of tendency to goitrous
swelling is fastened on those who remain.

Like these mothers in Savoy was a mother in Germany. Not long
since, a friend of the writer, passing through a Franconian forest, found
a young man lying senseless by the way. It was a young recruit for the
army who had got into some trouble with his comrades. They had
beaten him and left him lying with a broken head. Carried to his home,
his mother fell on lier knees and thanked God, for this injury had saved
him from the army.

THE BLOOD OF THE NATION. 99

XXII. The effect of alcoholic drink on race progress should be
considered in this collection. Authorities do not agree as to the final
result of alcohol in race selection. Doubtless, in the long run, the
drunkard will be eliminated, and perhaps certain authors are right in
regarding this as a gain to the race. On the other hand, there is great
force in Dr. Amos G. Warner's remark, that of all caustics gangrene is
the most expensi\ e. The people of southern Europe are relatively tem-
perate. They have used wine for centuries, and it is thought by Arch-
dall Reid and others that the cause of their temperance is to be found
in this long use of alcoholic beverages. All those with vitiated or un-
controllable appetites have been destroyed in the long experience with
wine, leaving only those with normal tastes and normal ability of re-
sistance. The free use of wine is, therefore, in this view, a cause of
final temperance, while intemperance rages only among those races
which have not long known alcohol, and have not become by selection
resistant to it. The savage races which have never know^n alcohol are
even less resistant, and are soonest destroyed by it.

In all this there must be a certain element of truth. The view, how-
ever, ignores the evil effect on the nervous system of long-continued
poisoning, even if the poison be only in moderate amounts. The tem-
perate Italian, wdth his daily semi-saturation is no more a normal man
than the Scotch farmer M'ith his occasional sprees. The nerve disturb-
ance which Avine effects is an evil, whether carried to excess in regu-
larity or irregularity. We know too little of its final result on the race
to give certainty to our speculations. It is moreover true that most
excess in the use of alcohol is not due to primitive appetite. It is drink
w^hich causes appetite, and not appetite which seeks for drink. In a
given number of drunkards but a very few become such through inborn
appetite. It is influence of bad example, lack of courage, false idea of
manliness, or some defect in character or misfortune in environment
which leads to the first steps in drunkenness. The taste once estab-
lished takes care of itself. In earlier times, when the nature of alcohol
was unknown and total abstinence was undreamed of, it w^as the strong,
the boisterous, the energetic, the apostle of 'the strenuous life,' who
carried all these things to excess. The wassail bowl, the bumper of ale,
the flagon of wine, all these were the attribute of the strong. We can
not say that those who sank in alcoholism thereby illustrated the sur-
vival of the fittest. Who can say that as the Latin races became tem-
perate they did not also become docile and weak? In other words, con-
sidering the influence of alcohol alone, unchecked by an educated
conscience, we must admit that it is the strong and vigorous, not the
weak and perverted, that are destroyed by it. At the best, w^e can only
say that alcoholic selection is a complex force, which makes for tem-
perance— if at all, at a fearful cost of life wdiich without alcoholic temp-

100 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tation would be well worth saving. We cannot easily, with Mr. Reid,
regard alcohol as an instrument of race-purification, nor believe that
the growth of abstinence and prohibition only prepares the race for a
future deeper plunge into dissipation. If France, through wine, has
grown temperate, she has grown tame. "New Mirabeaus," Carlyle tells
us, "one hears not of; the wild kindred has gone out with this, its
greatest." This fact, whatever the cause, is typical of great, strong,
turbulent men who led the wild life of Mirabeau because they knew
nothing better.

XXIII. The concentration of the energies of France in the one
great city of Paris is again a potent agency in the impoverishment of
the blood of the rural districts. All great cities are destroyers of life.
Scarcely one would hold its own in population or power were it not for
the young men of the farms. In such destruction Paris has ever taken
the lead. The education of the middle classes in France is almost ex-
clusively a preparation for public life. To be an official in a great city
is an almost universal ideal. This ideal but few attain, and the lives of
the rest are largely wasted. Not only the would-be official, but artist,
poet, musician, physician or journalist seeks his career in Paris. A few
may find it. The others, discouraged by hopeless effort or vitiated by
corrosion, faint and fall. Every night some few of these cast themselves
into the Seine. Every morning they are brought to the morgue behind
the old Church of Notre Dame. It is a long procession and a sad one
from the provincial village to the strife and pitfalls of the great city,
from hope and joy to absinthe and the morgue. With all its pitiful
aspects the one which concerns us is the steady drain on the life-blood of
the nation : its steady lowering of the average of the parent stock of the
future.

XXIV. But far more potent for evil to the race than all these in-
fluences, large and small, is the one great destroyer — War. War for
glory, war for gain, war for dominion, its effect is the same whatever
its alleged purpose.

SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE.

lOI

SCIENTIFIC LITEEATUEE.

ETHICS AS A SCIENCE.
Thanks to such writers as Spencer,
Stephen and Sutherland, we have been
long familiar with ethics treated
from a scientific standpoint. Yet the
science of ethics, as pursued by these
thinkers, betrayed one evident defect —
it proceeded by analogy from the physi-
cal sciences. In the new work, entitled
'Ethics, Descriptive and Explanatory'
(Macmillan), by Professor Mezes, of the
University of Texas, an effort is made
to remove this reproach. His aim "is
to give as adequate critical and method-
ical an account as possible of what
morality and immorality are . . .
to construct a positive or purely scien-
tific theory of Ethics, and to give a
naturalistic account of all the aspects
of morality and immorality." Mr.
Mezes does not forget that this is a vast
undertaking, one not to be compassed
within the limits of a text-book such
as this professes to be. But, remem-
bering these restrictions. Me may say
that he has produced an excellent work;
indeed, so excellent, that it were well
worth his while to consider whether it
might not be wise for him to view it
as the prospectus of a far more ambi-
tious undertaking, in which some, if not
all, the major problems could be
MTOught out with fullness. The plan
pursued by Mr. Mezes is as follows:
In the Introduction, he defines ethics,
shows its scope and method, and dis-
tinguishes between moral and non-moral
phenomena. The body of the book con-
sists of two parts, the first dealing with
subjective morality and the individual
conscience; the second discussing objec-
tive morality, and embracing, among
other inquiiies, an admirable analysis of
justice. A conclusion treats the nature
and value of morality. As the work is
undoubtedly of considerable importance,

several interesting features deserve men-
tion. Mr. Mezes is thoroughly object-
ive in his method, and so approaches,
within his chosen sphere, the stand-
point which a biologist might occupy
in his. Significant in this connection
is his shrewd suggestion that ethics is
not to be treated as a teleological
science till you come to the end of it.
He is to be commended greatly, fur-
ther, for the even-handed way in which
he grapples with the ticklish questions
of conscience and the like. He shows
clearly that Moralitat, while by no
means of the importance assigned it by
the ti-aditional English and theologi-
cal moralists, cannot be overlooked. In
particular, he contrives to put the re-
sults of psychological research to good
use in his analysis. This is one of sev-
eral pleasing and hopeful features.
Similarly, in this connection, he rids
himself of the time-honored static con-
ception of conscience, and, by adopting
a dynamic theory, actually vindicates
a concrete place in moral life for this
hoary abstraction. So, too, when he
passes to objective morality (Sittlich-
keit), and makes contact with the car-
dinal virtues. Under his sober hand,
these cease to be vague entities float-
ing in mid-air, and come to take their
places as vital results of objective mo-
rality—results shot out, as it were, by
the interaction of man with man. The
chapter on justice deserves to rank with
the best discussions of the subject.
Mr. Mezes, in short, has managed to
free himself from many of the stulti-
fications that have beset scientific mor-
alists in the past. Whether he has
emancipated himself from all need not
be discussed now. It is suflScient to
note that he has produced a fresh, sug-
gestive and most careful work; that he
has adopted and held fast to a scientific

102

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

standpoint in ethics — not in biology or
psychology or any other science, and
that, therefore, he has advanced the
cause of objective research in this most
baffling field. A few books of this char-
acter and the present inextricable
tangle in ethical theory might be in a
fair way toward ravelling up.

BOTANICAL BOOKS.
Dh. D. H. Scott has rewritten a
series of lectures given at the University
College, London, 1896, and published
them under the title of 'Studies in Fossil
Botany' (A. & C. Black). This book will
be a most useful one to the botanist,
since it presupposes no knowledge of
paleontology', and discusses only the
portions of a subject of major impor-
tance to the student of plants. A
perusal of this work will impress the
reader with the enormous amount of
light thrown on the natural affinities of
plants by the results of paleobotanical
inA'estigations during the last ten or
twelve years.

'Elements de paleobotanique'
(Carre & Naud), by R. Zeiller, is
a comprehensive text-book, in which
the entire subject receives a thorough
and systematic treatment. The preserva-
tion of fossils, classification and nomen-
clature, systematic examination of the
principal types of fossil vegetation, floral
succession, climate, etc., are among the
principal topics taken up at length. The
bibliographic list in the appendix covers
eighteen pages and is inclusive of the
greater number of important titles.

Professor Percival, of Southeast-
ern Agricultural College, Kent, England,
has written a text-book of 'Agricultural
Botany' (Duckworth & Co.), which will
meet the needs of students interested in
pliints from a cultural point of view
more nearly than any similar text-
book hitherto published. The eight chief
divisions of the book are concerned with
the general external morjjhology of the
plant, internal morphology, piiysiology,
classification, and special botany of
farm cro])s, weeds, farm seeds and fungi.

considered chiefly in relation to some of
the common diseases of plants and bac-
teria. The matter is arranged in two
portions; a didactic discussion of the
principles of the subject, which has been
kept as free as might be from technicali-
ties, and a series of demonstrations and
experiments, by which all the more
important points are actually seen in
the plant. The point of view through-
out the entire book is entirely different
from that of the lecturer on pure bot-
any, and the perspective of the entire
subject is rearranged to meet the new
conditions. It is impossible, of course,
that all the more important recent dis-
coveries, even in such a basal portion of
the work as the nutrition of plants,
should be put into practise immediately,
but it is to be said that Professor Per-
cival's book is fairly abreast of the
times, although adhering to some an-
achronisms. The introduction and use of
the book in America would be followed
by a notable improvement of the in-
struction in botany in most agricultural
schools.

'The New Forestry' (Pawson &
Brailsford, Sheffield), by Mr. John Simp-
son, is a manual adapted to British
woodlands and game preservation. One
chapter is devoted to the management
of a woodland as a place for sheltering
and rearing pheasants and other game
birds and animals. The remaining chap-
ters are devoted to practical directions
as to rotation, allotment, cultural
methods and general administration of
forests, with a consideration of the nu-
merous factors that must be taken into
account in forestry operations on an
English estate. The practical Talue of
the book is enhanced by estimates of
expenses and selling values.

THE BKKT SCO All INDUSTRY.
The report on the 'Progress of the
Beet-Sugar Industry in the United
States in 1899' presents a very hopeful
outlook for the success of this industry
over a quite wide range of territory. The
report was prepared by the Department

SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE.

103

of Agriculture on the basis of extensive
observations in the fiehl and at beet-
sugar factories, and chemical examina-
tion of beets grown at a large number
of places in forty-one States and Terri-
lories. Experiments to determine the
regions best adapted to profitable beet
culture have been in progress for several
years past, and in connection with simi-
lar work conducted by the State experi-
ment stations, have in large measure
settled this question. On the basis of
the results, over 30 beet-sugar factories
have been established and are in success-
ful operation. A number of others are
now building, and still others are in con-
templation, if contracts can be made
with farmers for growing the beets.
California has eight factories, including
the largest factory in the world, with a
capacity for working 3,000 tons of sugar
beets per day, which is an indication of
the energy with which this new indus-
try is starting in America. It was ex-
pected that 35,000 acres of beets would
be grown for this factory in 1900. Nine
factories were in operation in Michigan,
Avhere for several reasons the conditions
are considered particularly favorable to
the industry, and the greatest interest
has been manifested in its development.
An interesting featm-e of the factory at
Lehi, Utah, is the establishment of a
slicing station or subfactory at a point
thirty miles away, where the juice is
extracted from the beets, limed and
piped to the main factory. Another sub-
factory in an opposite direction is
planned, increasing the capacity of the
combined plant to 1.200 tons of beets a
day. This plan of having 'slicing sta-
tions' connected with the main factory
by pipe lines is a novel one, and is be-
lieved to be a distinct advancement. It
saves expense in hauling the beets and

brings a larger radius of farming coun-
try into close contact with the sugar
factory. The factory at Carlsbad, New
Mexico, is said to be the only factory in
the world where sugar beets are grown
entirely with irrigation. Its demonstra-
tion of tlie feasibility of this is consid-
ered a valuable lesson for the arid
regions. The average cost of raising an
acre of sugar beets, under conditions
similar to those in Iowa, for example, is
given as $30, and the yield at from
twelve to fifteen tons, although under
extraordinary conditions it may reach
twenty-five tons. The price paid for
beets by the factories depends in many
cases on the sugar content, but averages
about $4 to $4.50 per ton. In many lo-
calities where the conditions are favor-
able it has been demonstrated to the
satisfaction of the farmer that a larger
profit can be realized from growing
sugar beets than any other crop, and in
addition the land is improved by the
superior cultivation given this crop.
P\irthermore, the value of the extracted
sugar-beet pulp as a feeding stuff for
animals is urged as an additional advan-
tage to the agriculture in the vicinity of
beet-sugar factories, which is being ap-
preciated. This pulp is usually given
away for the hauling, but in some cases
the factories themselves have erected
feeding pens, where large numbers of
cattle and sheep have been fattened.
Time and effort have been required to
induce farmers to take up the growing of
beets on account of the large amount of
labor and the expense involved, and
many expensive lessons have had to be
learned in the operation of factories ; but
the industry is now believed to be well
on its feet, with a good prospect of
steady growth.

104

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE PEOGEESS OF SCIENCE.

There appears to be no abatement
In expeditions for polar discovery and
adventure. Lieutenant Peary remains
in the far north, seeking to reach a
point nearer to the Pole than did Dr.
Nansen and the Duke of Abruzzi's
party, while with the same object in
view Mr. Baldwin is preparing an expe-
dition, liberally equipped by Mr. Zieg-
ler, of New York City, and Captain
Bernier is making efforts to secure a
similar outfit in Canada. These expe-
ditions are perhaps not primarily for
scientific research, though they should
add to knowledge in many directions.
The expeditions being fitted out with
the assistance of the German and Brit-
ish Governments for antarctic explora-
tion are, however, strictly scientific in
character. Exploration in the north has
never relaxed, but since Sir James Ross
returned, in 1843, efforts to explore the
south polar region have been sporadic
and comparatively unimportant, until
the recent expeditions under Captain de
Gerlache and Mr. Borchgrevink. The
scientific results of these expeditions
have not yet been published, though de-
scriptive volumes by Mr. Borchgrevink
and Dr. Cook have recently been issued,
and the latter has contributed to the
present number of this Journal an in-
teresting account of the unknown
southern aurora. The 'Belgica,' from
which Dr. Cook made his observations,
was not, however, altogether fortunate
in its course, and possibly the dramatic
interest of the first antarctic night is
greater than the scientific interest of
the results. Mr. Borchgrevink followed
pretty closely in the track of Sir James
Ross, and his own book contrib-
utes little or nothing to scientific
knowledge. He reached by a day's
expedition a point furthest to the
south, but it is not even obvious

how he determined this, when he esti-
mates the semi-diameter of the sun as
16° 17' 1". However valuable the sci- •
entific results of the voyages of the
'Belgica' and of the 'Southern Cross'
may prove when published, there is
certainly room for the great expedi-
tions now being made ready in Eng-
land and in Germany.

The 'Discovery,' which will carry
the British Antarctic Expedition, was
launched on March 21 from the yard
of the Dundee Shipbuilders' Company.
No fewer than six ships with this name
have been engaged in British explora-
tion, and the present vessel is some-
what similar to its namesake, which
took part in Sir George Nares's expe-
dition in 1875. But it, of course, con-
tains all modern improvements, and is
of unusual strength. The oak ribs are
placed as close together as possible.
These are covered on the outside with
oak and greenheart and on the inside
with asbestos, while the bow is cased
with steel plates. The tonnage is 1,750,
the length at the water line 172 feet,
and the extreme breadth 33 feet. The
engines are of 450 horse power, giving a
speed of about eight knots an hour, but
to save coal they will be sparingly used,
the vessel being rigged as a bark with
three masts. Great care has been
taken with the interior fittings to se-
cure the greatest possible efficiency of
scientific work, with due regard to the
comfort of the company. The vessel is
under the command of Capt. Robert
Scott, and Prof. J. W. Gregory, who
has recently gone from the British Mu-
seum to Melbourne University, is in
charge of the scientific work. The ex-
pedition will begin its work at Victoria
Tiand, facing New Zealand, where Ross
and, recently, Mr. Borchgrevink, have

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

105

explored furthest to the south. The
German expedition, under Dr. von Dry-
galski, is also making active prepara-
tion, and its vessel— which lias been
named 'Gauss,' in honor of the great
mathematician — was launched on April
1. Expeditions to cooperate with those
from England and Germany are also
planned in Scotland and Sweden.
Jt seems unfortunate that the United
States, which sixty years ago, at the
time of the great antarctic expeditions
by Ross, d'Urville and Balleny, sent
Wilkes with five vessels, should not be
represented in the present movement to
make a thorough exploration of the ant-
arctic regions.

While Great Britain is sending out
its antarctic exj^edition at a cost of
$500,000, a less pretentious, but perhaps
equally interesting expedition is being
planned. In view of the enormous im-
portance attached to the recent discov-
eries of the relation of mosquitoes to
malaria, and perhaps to yellow fever,
Dr. Patrick Manson has urged the send-
ing of a party to the islands of the
Pacific, and, in the first instance, to
Samoa, to study the life history of the
mosquito and the conditions on which
its existence and development depend.
In certain of the islands of the Pacific,
elephantiasis, a disease also due to the
mosquito, is so prevalent that it occurs
in half or more of the population, while
in other islands it is entirely absent.
It is hoped that the study of the distri-
bution of mosquitoes, and, perhaps, ex-
periments on their introduction, may
show what is antagonistic to their de-
velopment, thus making it possible to
find a means of destroying them when
they are present. Towards this plan
the sum of $2,500 has been subscribed
anonymously, and it is hoped that the
British Government will assist in pro-
viding the $10,000 necessary to carry it
into effect. It seems evident that the
Department of Agriculture should at
once undertake the study of the distri-
bution of the malaria-bearing mosqui-
toes in the United States. The annual

money loss to the country through the
prevalence of malaria may be as little
as $10,000,000 or as much as $100,000,-
000, but it is in any case so enormous
that a thorough investigation, at what-
ever cost, would be in the direction of
the strictest economy. There are, for
example, no Anopheles on Manhattan
Island, but within a mile of it they are
abundant and malaria is prevalent. It
may be supposed that the value of real
estate, at the seashore and mountain
resorts, for example, will be doubled
or halved, according as Anopheles are
absent or present.

The plague has now been so long
prevalent in India that the newspapers
no longer regard it as necessary to re-
port on it, and probably very few think
of its ravages, yet the deaths in Bengal
alone during the last week, of which
reports are at hand, were 4,000, and the
recent census of India shows that the
population of Bombay is 50,0(X) less
than before the epidemic. The occur-
rence of the plague at Cape Town has,
however, attracted notice, in view of
the possibility of its spreading in the
British Army, and attention has re-
cently been called to the existence of
the disease in San Francisco. It has
for a long time been known in medical
circles that there have been cases of
plague in the Chinese quarters, but the
State authorities have denied their ex-
istence and have attempted to suppress
any information in regard to the epi-
demic. It appears that Secretary Gage
appointed some time since, in spite of
the protest of the Governor of Califor-
nia, a commission to investigate the
matter. This commission, consisting of
Prof. Simon Flexner, of the University
of Pennsylvania; Prof. F. G. Novy, of
the University of Michigan, and Prof.
L. F. Barker, of the University of Chi-
cago, has made a thorough investiga-
tion and has presented a report, from
which it appears that thirty-two fatal
cases have occurred in San Francisco
during the past year; and this prob-
ably is incomplete, as six deaths were

io6

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

discovered by the commission refeiTed
to above in the course of a single week,
and no cases have been reported that
were not fatal. The State has now
been aroused, and has appropriated
$100,000 for the Board of Health to use
in the suppiession of the epidemic.
One branch of the Legislature passed a
most extraordinary bill, making it
a felony to publish, by writing or print-
ing, that Asiatic cholera or bubonic
plague exists within the State, unless
the fact has been determined by the
State Board of Health and entered
upon its minutes, but this measure ap-
pears now to have been dropped. The
San Francisco papers have apparently
been only too ready to suppress infor-
mation in regard to the plague in that
city. It appears that the epidemic is
slight, but it will naturally be exagger-
ated by attempts to deny its existence
for commercial reasons.

Within the past six months the at-
tention of the English public has been
attracted in an unwonted degree to the
question of the purity of alcoholic liq-
uors. There occurred last fall, in Lan-
cashire, and especially in Manchester
and its vicinity, large numbers of cases
of arsenical poisoning, which were
finally traced to the consumption of a
particular brand of beer. Further in-
vestigation revealed the fact that the
manufacturers of this beer usedj in
brewing, glucose of a certain make, and
that the manufacturers of this glucose
had recently begun to use in its prep-
aration a sulfuric acid which was made
from pyrites containing, as is almost
invariably the case, arsenic. Prior to
this time it appears that the sulfuric
acid used had been that made from sul-
fur. It was a long chain of evidence,
but was complete, for arsenic was found
in the beer, in the glucose, in the acid
and in the pyrites, and the amount
found in the beer corresponded to that
in the ingredients used in its manu-
facture. The quantity was amply suffi-
cient to occasion all the symptoms of
poisoning whidi were noticed. Several

points of interest have been brought out
in the voluminous discussions which
have followed this incident, or tragedy,
as it would be better to call it. In the
first place, attention has been called
to the difficulty of detecting arsenic in
beer and similar liquids by methods
\A'hich had been commonly used. In
this way several analysts were led to
pronounce beer to be free from arsenic,
which was afterwards shown by other
methods to contain notable quantities
of the poison. It now appears that
the test most to be relied on in such
cases is that of Reinsch, which consists
essentially in boiling the beer, strongly
acidified with pure hydrochloric acid,
with clean copper foil, and then sublim-
ing the black deposit obtained on the
copper, if arsenic is present, in a glass
tube. The presence of a sublimate of
bright octahedral crystals of arsenious
oxid is certain evidence of arsenic in the
beer. Difficulties in carrying out the
ordinary tests for arsenic with many
beers^ which were examined in large
numbers when the public had been
aroused to the danger of contaminated
beer, led to the discovery of substances
added to the beer, which had no legiti-
mate place in brewing, and which bid
fair to occasion a much closer super-
vision of this industry in the future.
Attention has been called also to other
industries where sulfuric acid is used,
and where arsenic which may be present
would be carried over into products
destined for general consumption. This
is especially true in the case of many
substances used in pharmacy. It has
also been shown that inasmuch as sulfur
is always accompanied by small quan-
tities of the rare element selenium, it
is not impossible that its compounds,
which are very poisonous, may often be
present in sufficient quantity to exert
a deleterious influence.

This subject has been given a some-
\\hat different turn by the work of Sir
Lauder Brunton and Dr. Tunnicliffe
upon the injurious constituents of dis-
tilled liquors. It is now nearly a scoi-e

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

107

of years siiuo tlic remarkable experi-
ruents of Uujardin-Beaunietz on the
toxic action of the dilTerent alcohols.
He found that the toxic action of pure
ethyl alcohol (common alcohol) was in
a certain sense nil, that is to say, hogs
which were kept in a condition of in-
toxication most of the time for nearly
three years, on being allowed to sober
up, appeared to be in perfect health, and
presented after slaughtering no visible
lesions of any organ. This was the case
when absolutely pure liquor was used,
but when ordinary spirits were fed to
hogs they quickly succumbed, showing
."symptoms and lesions, especially of the
liver, similar to those only too familiar
in the ease of human inebriates. The
conclusion, drawn by Dujardin-Beau-
metz from a long series of experiments,
was that the toxic quality of alcoholic
liquors is due chiefly to the presence
of higher alcohols, especially amyl alco-
hol, the principal ingredient of fusel
oil, though methyl alcohol and aldehyde
may play a subordinate part. Under
any circumstances no distilled liquor is
safe to use till it has been 'aged' for
several years in the wood. Brunton's
researches, on the other hand, seem to
show that the presence of fusel oil, in
such quantities as it usually occurs in
potable liquors, is not a menace to pub-
lic health, but that the greatest danger
is from the presence of furfural and
other similar aldehydes, Mhich are de-
rived from the husk of the grain under
the influence of heat and acids. Fur-
fural is present to a greater or less ex-
tent in all whiskies, but is especially
abundant in those made by modern pro-
cesses, where it is sought to obtain as
much liquor as possible per bushel of
grain. According to this, the superi-
ority of the liquors of 'ye olden time'
was due not so much to the fact that
they were better 'aged,' but because
they originally contained less of the fur-
fural, having been made more carefully.
Brunton's physiological experiments
were exceedingly interesting, especially
in 'comparing the after eflFects of intoxi-
cation from ordinary spirits with those

of spirits from wliich the furfural had
been removed. In the latter ca.se as soon
as the animal was sober it appeared' to
be in a perfectly normal condition, and
showed none of the after effects, whicli
in the former case lasted for a consider-
able time. It is also worthy of note
that those substances pojiularly used as
'bracers' after intoxication generally
contain ammonia or some allied com-
pound, which, from a chemical stand-
point, is capable of comliining with the
furfural and neutralizing its effects.

Since the comparatively recent con-
densation of hydrogen to a liquid, mucli
study has been devoted to its physical
properties, and especially to the deter-
mination of its boiling-point, since this
is not far above the absolute zero. The
difficulty regarding the former determi-
nations, which gave the boiling point as
— 238.4° C, is that being obtained by
means of a platinum resistance ther-
mometer, they depended upon extrapo-
hition, which might prove faulty at such
low temperatures, as has now indeed
been shown to be the case. More re-
cently Dewar has made use of a con-
stant-volume gas thermometer, employ-
ing for the gas hydrogen from difTerent
sources, and also helium, contaminated
with only slight traces of neon. The
results obtained show that the boiling-
point of hydrogen is — 2.52.5°, or 20''
above the absolute zero. Investigations
as to the temperature of solid hydrogen
are now being carried out, and show a
still closer approach to the absolute
zero. For some years the researches of
Gautier in Paris have indicated that
hydrogen is a normal constituent of the
atmosphere, and the question may now
be considered as settled. Not only has
Dewar condensed hydrogen directly
from the atmosphere, but Gautier has
made quantitative determinations of
the amount in different localities. In
the air of Paris hydrogen does not seem
to be an invariable constituent, though
methane (marsh gas) is always present
and traces of carbon monoxid, while the
unsaturated hydrocarbons are generally

io8

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

absent. In forest air traces of hydrogen
were present, and about half as much
methane as in the air of Paris. At a
mountain station in the Pyrenees at an
elevation of 2,785 meters only two vol-
umes of methane per 100,000 were
found, but seventeen volumes of hydro-
gen. At a sea station, 40 kilometers
from the coast of Brittany, only traces
of methane were found, but nearly two
volumes of hydrogen in 10,000, an
amount two-thirds as great as that of
carbon dioxid. The source and fate of
atmospheric hydrogen is a problem
which now awaits solution. Liveing
and Dewar seem of the opinion that
there is a continual accession of hydro-
gen to the atmosphere from interplanet-
ary space, and Stoney holds that the
earth's gravitational attraction is in-
sufficient to retain hydrogen in the at-
mosphere. Experiments of Gautier
show that when certain crystalline
rocks are heated with water a consider-
able quantity of hydrogen is evolved,
which might cause a constant accession
of the gas to the atmosphere. The
problem must be considered for the
present unsolved.

Professor Nipher, of Washington
University, St. Louis, has discovered
that the most sensitive photographic
plates may be manipulated in open day-
light, and perfect pictures may be de-
veloped upon them in sunlight instead
of in the dark room. The pictures are
separately wrapped in black paper in
the dark room, and boxed. They may
then be separately unwrapped, in the
open fields if necessary, and placed in
the plate holders. The camera exposure
must be very much greater than in the
dark room methods. After the exposure,
the plate is taken out into the light
and placed in the developing solution.
Even if direct sunlight falls upon the
plate for a moment during these
changes, fine pictures may be developed.
There is, however, no advantage in un-
necessarily exposing the plate. The de-
veloping bath may always be in shadow,
but beautiful pictures have been de-

veloped in direct sunlight. The pictures
produced in this way are positives, while
those produced in the dark room by or-
dinary methods are negatives. The posi-
tive is the picture ordinarily obtained
by printing off from the negative. The
shadows show light on the negative and
dark on the positive. The positives
produced in this way are greatly su-
perior to those produced in the dark
room on over-exposed plates, and the
exposure time is very much less, but
may be very great. Such pictvires of a
crowded street show the street wth per-
fect clearness, every moving thing being
eliminated. In one exposure lasting for
several hours, a team which had stood
in one position for half an hour showed
no trace upon the plate when developed.

Every one who has had experience
in photography has lost valuable
plates by over-exposure. But Professor
Nipher shows that all exposures may
be successfully developed. Exposures
ranging fi'om a snapshot to an over-
exposure of about 2.000 may be devel-
oped in the dark room as negatives. The
fogging in over-exposed plates is an ap-
proach to a zero condition, where the
plate is blank. For such exposures
bromide is freely used, and a few drops
of saturated hypo are added. In ordi-
nary dark room work hypo is carefully
avoided. But as the zero condition is
approached, it is very useful in keeping
the plate clear. As soon as the expo-
sure is so great that the plate cannot
be controlled in the dark room, it may
be developed in the light. Plates a
million times over-exposed can be thus
developed. The amount of illumination
of the plate while being developed de-
pends upon the amount of exposure in
the camera. Instead of using the cam-
era, the plate can be exposed in a print-
ing frame, where it takes the place of
the sensitive paper. An exposure of
two or three minutes, just out of direct
sunlight at a south window, may be de-
veloped in the same light. The best
results are obtained with a hydrochi-
none developer. Some photographic

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

109

plates have piven poor results in day-
light, and Professor Niplier recommends
Cramer's 'oro\\n' plate.

The new star in Perseus, Avhich has
now waned in the sky, and in the mem-
ory of most people, is still an object of
discussion among astronomers. Our
readers will remember Professor New-
eomb's recent article on variable stars
and the difliculties in the way of ac-
counting for their periodicity. In the
extreme case of new stars the difficulty
is greatest. The theories of an out-
burst from the molten interior and of
collision might account for the appear-
ance of the star, but do not explain its
rapid waning, nor are they in accord
with spectroscopic determinations. Pro-
fessor Seeliger's theory tliat a dark star
passes through a swarm of meteors is
I lie most satisfactory form of hypoth-
eses, but leaves room for the ingenious
suggestion, recently made by the great
astronomer, M. Janssen, before the
Paris Academy of Sciences. He points
out that the apparent absence of oxy-
gen from tlie sun may be due to its
existence in some dissociated condi-
tion that the spectroscope would not
reveal. This condition may be owing
to a very high temperature, and when
this becomes low enough to allow oxy-
gen to assume its common form, and
so to unite with hydrogen, there would
ensue, as a result of the combustion, a
great increase in heat and light, wliich
would account for the brilliancy of a
new star. The rapid decrease in bril-
liancy which follows would be accounted
for by the formation of an atmosphere
of vapor, which would serve as a grad-
ually increasing obstacle to radiation
from the star. A corollary of M. Jans-
sen's supposition is that our own sun
may at any time reach this transition
point for oxygen and blaze out into a
fury of heat and light that would scorch
all life off the face of the earth. It is,
however, a pleasant feature of solar ca-
tastrophes that astronomical time is
measured by millions of years.

One of the most interesting total

eclipses of the sun, wliich tlie present
century furnishes, will occur on May
18, 1001. The maximum duration of
totality, which will be about six and
a half minutes, is rarely surpassed.
This will give exceptional opportunity,
provided the sky is clear, for work of
any kind, photographic or visual. The
region of totality is, liowever, incon-
veniently remote, and the weather con-
ditions, which usually prevail at the
stations which will be occupied, are not
of the best. The shadow begins off the
east coast of Africa, a short distance to
the southwest of Madagascar, sweeps
northeasterly over the Indian Ocean,
and crosses Central Sumatra, Southern
Borneo and New Guinea, and a few
smaller islands. To visit the track of
the eclipse from New York, therefore,
one must journey half way around the
earth, and it matters little, so far as
distance is concerned, whether one
starts east or west. In spite of the dis-
tance, observations will be undertaken
by a number of American and European
astronomers. In this country, the
Yerkes, Lick, Columbia, Amherst and
Naval Observatories and the Massachu-
setts Institute of Technology will be
represented by skilled observers. Un-
der the auspices of the Pioyal and Royal
Astronomical Societies, English observ-
ers will be stationed at Mauiitius, and
Padang, on the west coast of Sumatra.
At Padang the eclipsed sun will be only
21° from the zenith, and the duration
of totality about six and a half minutes.
At Mauritius, the chances for a clear
feky are much greater than at any other
station, but the duration of the total
phase is only three and a half minutes.
On this account, nearly all the Amer-
ican and European observers are plan-
ning to visit Sumatra. The observations
may have an added value from the
fact that the eclipse occurs near the
time of minimum sun-spot activity.

The chief part of the work in this,
as in other recent eclipses, will doubt-
less be photographic. Owing to the
enormous advantages which photo-

I 10

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

graphic methods of research give, they
should undoubtedly be extensively em-
ployed, but it may be hoped that visual
observations by skilled observers \\\\\
not be neglected. There is a tendency
in certain directions to regard solar
eclipses as of less importance than for-
merly. This may be due, in part, to
the fact that investigations, which in
the past could only be carried on at
times of total eclipse, can noM' be stud-
ied throughout the year, and, in part, to
the very large number of observations
which have already been )nade. Eclipse
expeditions, also^ are very expensive,
and often end in total failure, owing
to clouds. Photography has multiplied
the results many times in recent years,
but for the solution of many problems
in solar physics, as complete records as
pos.sible for a long time are necessary.
In spectroscopic lines it seems hardly
possible to obtain too much material
for some time to come. Perhaps more
of mystery and interest attaches to the
corona than to any other feature, and
the present eclipse gives an excellent op-
portunity for several lines of investiga-
tion, in addition to photographs show-
ing its structure and extent. An at-
tempt will again be made to investigate
the rotations of the corona, by photo-
graphs of its spectrum, which must be
sufficiently good to show the slight dis-
placement of the lines cau.sed by the
motion of rotation. It is to be hoped,
also, that further bolometric observa-
tions will be made on the heat radia-
tions of the corona, as well as a study
of the polarization of the coronal light.
Aside from the sun itself, the existence
or non-existence of an intra-mercurial
planet has not been clearly demon-
strated, since investigations in that line
up to the present time have not been
conclusive. Certainly no amount of time
and labor can be regarded too great,
which may be necessary to give us as
complete a mastery as possible of the
problems which relate to our great
parent, the sun.

Yale and Princeton, the two most

conservative of our larger universities,
have recently taken action that will
bring their college courses more into
harmony with those of other leading
institutions, by giving greater oppor-
tunitj' to elect scientific in the place of
classical studies. At Yale, Greek and
Latin are still required through the
freshman year, but later these studies
are elective. In the sophomore year
five or six courses must be elected from
twelve that are off'ered, making it pos-
sible for a student to specialize in sci-
ence. In the junior and senior years,
the chief work of the student may also
lie in the sciences, unhampered by re-
strictions other than that he must take
two courses in languages and litera-
ture and two courses in philosophy, his-
tory and social science. Courses can
also be elected, as at Columbia and
Pennsylvania, which count as part of
the medical course. At Princeton,
President Patton has made somewhat
similar proposals looking towards of-
fering courses in physiology and human
anatomy, so that students may begin
their medical education in the senior
year. He, at the same time, suggested
adding to the electives in the sophomore
year. At present Princeton University
requires Latin, Greek and the Bible
through the freshman and sophomore
years, while about one-third of the .stu-
dent's time is occupied with required
studies in the junior year.

Cornell now admits students to its
B. A. course without Latin, and Har-
vard requires no Latin at the Univer-
sity, but still maintains an entrance ex-
amination. Columbia requires Latin in
the freshman year, but has recently
made it possible for a student to enter
witliout Latin, thougli he cannot grad-
uate until he has studied this language.
The great universities of the Middle
and Western States have in most cases
established three degrees — A. B. for
those who pass entrance examinations
in Latin and Greek and study these
languages to a greater or less degree in
their college course; B. Ph. for those

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

1 1 1

who do not study Greek, and V>. S. for
those who study neither Latin nor
Greek. It has resulted that only a small
jiroportion of students lias taken the

A. B. deforce, yet tlie other degrees
referred to have no definite and well-
established meaning. Tlie bachelor of
science degree, for example, does not
mean tliat a st\ulent has had a scientific
education, but simply that he has not
studied Latin and Greek. Under these
circumstances it appears that the Uni-
versities of Michigan and Minnesota
have during the past month taken a
forward step in abolishing all college
degrees except the A. B., giving this for
all courses of liberal studies. It is
obvious that the A. B. no longer means
a classical education when both in Eng-
land and the United States its only con-
dition is 'small Latin' in the prepara-
tory school. Scientific students might
like to see a degree established that
definitely signifies a scientific education
— as the B. So. of the University of
London. The authorities of Columbia
University recently considered the de-
sirability of oflfering such a degree, but
it was thought impossible to give the

B. S. a definite signification.

Db. George Davidson, professor of
geography in the University of Califor-
nia, has been elected a correspondent of
the Paris Academy of Sciences. — St. An-
drews University has conferred its
LL. D. on Mr. Alexander Agassiz, of
Harvard University, and Aberdeen Uni-
versity has conferred the same honor
on Professor Rudolf Virchow, of Ber-
lin.—]Mr. J. J. H. Teall, F. R. S., has
been appointed director-general of the
Geological Survey of Great Britain and
Ireland, in succession to Sir Archibald
Geikie. who retired on February 28.
Sir Archibald has been in the service of
the Survey for forty-six years and has
reached the age limit. — Prof. S. M.
Babcock, of the University of Wiscon-
sin, inventor of the Babcock milk test,
was, on March 27, presented with a
medal, voted him by the State for giving
his invention free to the world. Ex-

ercises were held in the .Assembly Cham-
ber of the Capitol in the presence of
both Houses of the Legislature, the
university faculty and regents and
many prominent citizens of the State.
Governor Lafollete presided, and ad-
dresses were made by him, by ex-Gov-
ernor W. D. Hoard and others.— A com-
mittee has been formed to erect at
Heidelberg a monument in memory of
three of its great scientific men, Bun-
sen, Kirchoff and von Helmholtz. — A
memorial marble bust of Robert Brown,
the eminent botanist, formerly a stu-
dent at Aberdeen, presented to the uni-
veisity by Miss Hope Paton. has been
unveiled in the picture gallery of Mar-
ischal College. — Three expert geologists
from the United States Geological Sur-
vey (Dr. C. Willard Hayes, Mr. T. Way-
land Vaughan and Mr. A. C. Spencer)
have been detailed to make a geologic
and mineral reconnais.sance of the Isl-
and of Cuba. — The Coast and Geodetic
Survey steamships. Pathfinder and Mc-
Arthur, at San Francisco, and the Pat-
terson and Gedney, at Seattle, are now
fitting up, under orders to proceed to
Alaska to survey important passages
among the islands along the Alaskan
cost. — Dr. Patrick Geddes, who was re-
sponsible for the formation of the In-
ternational As.sociation for the Advance-
ment of Science, Arts and Education,
and the holding of an International As-
sembly at the Paris Exposition, last
year, proposes a similar assembly, in
connection with the exposition and con-
gresses to be held at Glasgow this year.
— The second Latin-American Scientific
Congress opened its two-weeks' session
at Montevideo on March 20, with over
200 delegates in attendance. Dr. Rob-
ert Wernicke, professor of pathology in
the University of Buenos Aires, Argen-
tine Republic, was elected president of
the Congress. — In order to make the
free distribution of seeds by the United
States Department of Agriculture as
useful as possible. Secretary Wilson has
secured authority to send out young
trees as well as seeds.

112

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The death of Dr. William Jay Youmans is a personal loss not only to his
many friends, but also to the thousands of those who knew him only as editor
of this journal. Youmans was born near Saratoga on October 14, 1838, and the
boyhood on his father's farm gave him the training which has so often led
to the elevation of public and professional life in this country. He was de-
scended, as his name witnesses, from the British Yeomanry, and the sterling
stock that settled in New England was typified in his person and character.
He loved his home in the country, and had purchased a farm nearby, to which
it was his intention to retire to pass the years of rest that he had so well
earned. After leaving the home farm at the age of seventeen, Youmans studied
under his brother, the late Dr. E. L. Youmans, and later at Yale, Columbia and
New York Universities, and in London under Huxlej'. He practised medicine
for several years in Minnesota, and in 1872 joined his brother in New York
to establish the Popular Science Monthly. For twenty-eight years his life
was devoted to this journal, first in association with his brother — who was
seventeen years the older, and died in 1887 — and afterwards as editor-in-chief.
The two brothers not only edited the journal, but as advisers of the house of
Appleton, gave them their high standing as publishers of scientific books in
the renaissance of science based on the doctrine of evolution. The teachings of
Spencer, Darwin and other great leaders were for them a religion to which their
lives were consecrated. Their influence through this journal and other publica-
tions of the Appletons was great and permanent. Youmans died at Mount
Vernon on April 10 from typhoid fever, after a ten days' illness. His life was
devoted with rare singleness of purpose to the diffusion of science; it was a
privilege to know him; he was gentle, kind and noble.

VOL. LIX.— 8

STANISLAUS KESERVATION.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY.

JUNE, 1901.
QUE FOREST RESERVATIONS.

By Professor J. \V. TOUMEY,

YALE FOREST SCHOOL.

IT is highly probable that the future will chronicle the act of March
3, 1891, under which the Chief Executive of the United States is
given power to segregate forest reservations from the public domain, as
a law most fruitful in results of vast import to the future welfare
of the coimtry. Armed with the power conferred by this act, the
successive Presidents ha^•e in the past ten years established no less
ihan thirtv-nine national forest reservations.

As the act provides that the reservations are to be segregated from
the public domain, they are for the most part in the Rocky Mountain
region and in the Pacific Coast States where large areas of public forest
lands were available.

The thirty-nine reservations in the aggregate contain more than
46,800,000 acres, an area more than fifteen times as large as the State
of Connecticut, or about one-fortieth of the total area of the country
exclusive of Alaska.

Much controversy has arisen as to the wisdom of withdrawing such*
large areas of the public lands from sale or from other disposition
under the laws of the land office. Much of the opposition has disap-
peared during the past few years, and public sentiment in favor of forest
reservations is rapidly increasing. In fact, so rapid has been this change
in public sentiment that a movement is now on foot, with prospect
of success, to establish a national forest reservation in the southern
Appalachian Mountains, where it will be necessary for the Govern-
ment to purchase the land at an expense of several million dollars.
There is also an effort being made on the part of a good many public-

ii6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

spirited citizens to establish a national reservation in Minnesota, at the
head of the Mississippi River. Unfortunately, however, the latter effort
is at present checked by the lumber interests of the region, although
these interests would profit in the long run by the establishment of
the reservation.

Forest reservations are not entirely national affairs. Stae reserva-
tions are already an established fact in a few States and the indications
are that they will be formed in many others during the next decade.
The State forests in the Adirondack Mountains in the State of New
York are splendid examples of such reservations. These lands
were purchased at State expense that they might remain forever in
forest, a great heritage for both pleasure and profit for all time.

Similar reservations have been established during the past few years
in Pennsylvania, and others are likely to be set aside in Michigan
before the close of the present year.

Going hand in hand with the making of the State and National
reservations, there has been a rapid development in public sentiment as
to the importance of practical forestry and its application to the man-
agement of the wooded areas of the country, both public and private.

This change in public sentiment is well illustrated in the volume
and character of the investigations in forestry by the Government,
when compared with what they were a few years ago. In the Division of
Forestry of the Department of Agriculture alone, the appropriations
have increased more than six-fold in three years, thus making it
possible to extend the study of important problems in American
forestry to many of the varied sections of the country. It is well
illustrated in the rapidly increasing facilities for instruction in
technical forestry in our recently established forest schools and
the courses in forestry offered in many of our colleges and
universities. It is shown in the fact that owners of private woodlands
are in some instances employing trained foresters to superintend their
lumbering operations, so that their methods of cutting will not in-
terfere with the perpetuation of the forest. It is shown in the yearly
increasing appropriations for forestry investigations by the legislatures
of the several States, but most of all it is shown in the rapidly increas-
ing number of applications coming to the trained foresters of the
Government from the owners of private woodlands for assistance and
advice in the management of their forests and in establishing plan-
tations of forest trees.

I desire to make clear that this changing sentiment regarding our
forests is most fortunate for our future welfare. American prosperity
has been largely due to the productiveness of American soil, i. e.,
to her agricultural and forest products, the value of the latter ap-
proximating $1,000,000,000 per year at the present time. The effect

OUR FOREST RESERVATIONS.

117

upon the soil of these two classes of products is very different. Agri-
cultural crops being removed when mature, practically in their entirety,
impoverish the soil, while forest crops, being removed only in part
and then at long intervals of time, have an opposite effect, as they
for the most part enrich the soil.

For many reasons it is highly important that even in agricultural
regions a varying proportion of the land should remain in forest, not
only for the direct value of the products which it affords and its
value in enriching the soil, but for its beneficial influence upon the
adjacent cultivated fields which it is not necessary for me to recount
here.

The Forest Reservations are still the Haunts op the Rarest and

Largest Game that the Country affords. Stanislaus

Reservation, California.

If it be desirable that a certain proportion of our agricultural
lands be kept as woodland, it is important that they be made to pro-
duce desirable products in the largest degree consistent with economy.
This can only be brought about by a rational system of management,
where skill and foresight is exercised to as great a degree as in the
successful production of agricultural crops.

Although much might be said regarding the importance of well-
managed woodland in agricultural regions, it is to the vast area of
non-agricultural land in this country that the application of practical
forestry will be of incalculable value. It is highly important that
our non-agricultural lands be made to contribute toward our national

ii8

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

wealtli. There is no other contribution which they are cajjable of
making that will compare, both directly and indirectly, with their
forest growth.

Experience has abundantly shown that the natural selfishness of
man leads him to excesses in the utilization of forest products. His
tendency is not only to consume a j)roduct equal to the growth of his
own time, but to make large inroads upon the future. He is profli-
gate in the use of wood, often leaving all but the very best to decay
upon the ground or to become fuel for forest fires.

The justification for our forest reservations should not, however,
be based entirely upon their value in conserving timber. They have,

Excessive, Unrestricted and Indiscriminate (irazinci has invariably

LED to the Destruction of the Younu Growth on the Forestj ,

Floor. Black Mesa Reservatk^n, Arizona.

for the most part, been wisely selected to fulfil a threefold fimction,
viz.: that of protection and luxury, as well as that represented in the
direct value of forest products. Indeed, at the present time their
direct value is in many instances of minor importance. On the other
hand, as the reserved lands are almost entirely mountainous in char-
acter and located at the headwaters of many of our important streams,
their value as conservators of moisture is very great, and it is to
their maintenance in many instances that the farmers and ranchmen
in the adjacent valleys must look for a perennial supply of water for
their crops and stock.

In the selection of the reservations, consideration has also been
given to their value from the standpoint of recreation and sport.

OUR FOREST RESERVATIONS.

119

They contaiji a large part of the wiklest, grandest and most pic-
tiiresqne portions of the x\-merican continent, and many of them are
still the haimts of the rarest and largest game that the country
affords.

The segregation of the forest reservations from the public lands,
without the establishment and execution of regulations for their
protection and management, would have but little effect in itself upon
the preservation of their forests as shown in the present condition of
the forests on our unreserved lands. Excessive, unrestricted and in-
discriminate grazing has invariably led to the destruction of the
young growth on the floor of the forest.

Where such grazing is continued for a number of years, the forest

Young Pine Seedlings— The Future Forest — Where Uninjured by Fire
AND Grazing. Olympic Reservation, Washington.

rapidly deteriorates, for there are not a sufficient number of young
trees to form a proper leaf canopy when the old ones are removed or
when they mature and decay. We appear to lack a realizing sense
that it is the young growth and not the old trees that insure the
perpetuation of the forest.

As the reservations could not be treated in similar manner as the
unreserved lands, with any expectation of preserving or improving
the forest growth, provision was made by the U. S. Land Office, u'hich
was responsible for the management of the reservations, for the appoint-
ment of certain forest officials, viz.: superintendents, supervisors and
forest rangers, these officers having immediate control of the reserved
lands as to management and protection. Largely from their lack of both

120

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The Coyer of the Southwestern Reservation is mostly Chaparral,

EITHER MIXED WITH A SCATTERED GrOWTH OF SiNGL E TrEES OR WhOLLY

OF Shrubby Plants. San Jacinto Eeservatiox, California.

The Altitude is often too (;reat fok the (ikowth op Desirable Timber.

Sierra Reservation, California.

OUR FOREST RESERVATIONS. 121

a practical and technical knowledge of forestry, and, in most cases,
even of woodcraft, their work has been necessarily limited. From
lack of training and experience they have been unable to create and
put into execution a practical system of forest management for the
lands under their control. Although unable to cope with the prob-
lems of management, they have been able in many instances to afford
the reservations a fair degree of protection from fire and grazing.

As the forests of the reservations must eventually be utilized for
their timber and other forest products, in order to make direct contri-
butions to the national wealth, the work of management must go
beyond that of simply protecting them from fire and grazing, even
if this were afforded to the fullest degree possible.

They should be so managed that wherever the mature timber
has material value it can be harvested and sold. The utilization of the
forest products, however, must not interfere with the perpetuation of
the forest. The cutting must be so conducted that the forest be
maintained in the best possible condition as to reproduction and growth
consistent with economy. In order to do this it is necessary that the
reservations be under the control of practical and trained foresters.

It is extremely gratifying to know that within the past few months
the direct management of the national reservations, so far as it relates
to questions of practical and economic forestry, has been transferred
to the Division of Forestry of the Department of Agriculture,
where they will receive attention from trained foresters. Working
plans will be made for all the reservations, and the prospects are ex-
tremely flattering that on these 46,800,000 acres of reserved forest
lands there will develop a system of American forestry that will
have far-reaching influence on our future prosperity.

At first thought it may appear that it is not necessary to make
forest reservations for the purpose of conserving the timber and lesser
forest products in a country so splendidly wooded as the United States.
When we consider, however, that, from the most reliable sources of
information that we have, the amount of timber consumed exceeds the
amount normally produced by the forests, we must know that the
excess of consumption is at the expense of the main wood capital.
In many instances this decrease is not so much on account of decrease
in area as on account of decrease in productive capacity of the forests
themselves.

Having such a splendid and large original supply to draw upon,
we consume much more wood per capita than any other nation. At
our present rate of consumption the most reliable authority that we
have places the present supply as sufficient for our requirements for
about fifty years, without taking into consideration the annual incre-
ment of the forests during this period.

122

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

It is difficult for ns to comprehend our present yearly consump-
tion of wood in all its varied iises. Conservative and accepted authorities
place the present yearly hmiber cut in this country at 40,000,000,000
feet (B. M.), while this is estimated to be but one-seventh of the
total wood consumption. If it were possible to cut the entire amount
yearly consumed into boards an inch thick, they would cover a walk
six feet wide that would extend more than 354 times around the earth
at its greatest diameter.

Although the amount of wood produced each year by the growth
of the forests of the entire country is very great, it is a long way from
what it might be both in quantity and quality were our forests ade-

TlMBEE GROWS BUT TO BE UTILIZED. LUMBEKING ON PkIVATE HoLDIN(iS WITHIN THE

Boundaries of the San Jacinto Reservation, California.

quately protected and managed. It will certainly not be sufficient
to supply our requirements, after the virgin timber is exhausted, with-
out the organization of a system of management which will keep the
lands assigned to forest growth properly protected and in a desirable
condition as to reproduction and growth.

This is well illustrated in the present unsatisfactory condition of
much of the woodland in tlio Eastern States that has been cut over
at various times without consideration for a future crop and left
without protection and to chance reproduction. In the oldest part
of the Union, viz.: the original tliirteen States, the latest report, based
upon trustworthy figures, places the wooded area at a little over
fifty-five per cent., yet without systematic forest management, how

OUR FOREST RESERVATIONS.

123

utterly inadequate this comparatively large area is to provide those
States with their present wood requirements, more particularly
timber of desirable dimensions for first-class lumber.

As one would naturally expect from the great variations in climate
and topography, there are marked differences in the reservations in the
quality and quantity of timber per acre. Indeed, such reservations as
the San Jacinto and San Gabriel in Southern California, reserved pri-
marily for the protection which they afford the adjacent cultivated
lands, bear merchantable timber, but on a small percentage of their
total area.

The large part of the vegetation is brush or chaparral, either mixed

The Hemit Resekvoir, San Jacinto Eeseevation, Califoenia.

with a scattered stand of single trees or wholly composed of shrubby
plants. It should hardly be dignified by the term forest.

From these Southwestern reservations of the arid and semi-arid
regions, with little timber of commercial importance, to the rich
stands of splendid timber, covering large areas of the Washington
and Mount Eanier reservations in the State of Washington, our
thirty-nine reservations show all variations in the density of their
forests. On the whole, however, but few of them have a large per-
centage of their total area covered with first-class commercial trees.
In some instances the altitude is too great for the growth of desirable
timber, while in others the lack of moisture will not permit its growth
at low elevations. It is in the intermediate zones that tree growth is
at its best.

124

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Althongli a large number of species make up the forests of the
reservations, they are for the most part composed of pines and other
conifers, with the yellow pine and red fir a long way in the lead in
commercial importance. The former of these two species is found in
every one of the thirty-nine reservations, with the exception of the
x\pognak Eeservation, in Alaska, and in many of them forms the major
part of the forest, while the latter has nearly as wide a distribution.

In the Washington reservation pure stands of red fir may be classed
among the finest forests in the world. Not infrequently single trees
reach a height of from 250 to 300 feet, and contain 35,000 feet (B.M.)
of merchantable lumber. The trees stand close together, their long,
straight boles shooting upward like so many shafts from the dimly-
lighted bed of moss and ferns forming the floor of the forest. This

OuE Resekvations must be protected from Fire, so far as an Efficient Forest
Service can protect them. Olympic Reservation, Washington.

same tree, of a more stunted and shorter growth, forms a considerable
part of the forests of the more southern reservations, even growing in
the forests of Arizona. Here, however, the forest is open and the
drooping limbs cover the boles nearly to the ground, rendering them
of .little value for commercial purposes, but of vast importance in
shading the ground and thus aiding in the conservation of moisture.

No greater mistake can be made than to consider the timber supply
of the reservations as confined to the mature trees that we find growing
there at the present time. We should look into the future and ask
what are these 46,800,000 acres of reserved lands capable of producing
as an annual increment when properly protected and managed. What
kind of forests are they capable of producing in the future, long after
the trees now living shall have been harvested or have gone to decay?

OUR FOREST RESERVATIONS.

125

The value of this vast inheritance, which is placed in our
keeping for future generations, will depend upon how well we manage
it. By this is not meant how well we protect the mature trees from
the woodman's axe, but how well we protect the tender seedlings, that
are to form the future forest, from being destroyed from outside
influences.

Timber is grown but to be utilized, hence it is the duty of those
having the reservations in charge to see that it is utilized at the proper
time wherever accessible and of sufficient value to pay for the cutting.

■^v.

^V^

Forests of same Region as shown tn previous Illustration where ttninjueed by
Fire. Olympic Reservation, Washington.

It is far more important, however, at the present time, to preserve and
improve every factor that leads toward the perpetuation of the forest
and in keeping it at its best in reproduction and growth.

It is worth while to consider briefly the indirect value of the forest
reservations from the standpoint of water conservation. Although
this is a factor to be taken into account in considering the value to the
nation of each of the reservations, nowhere is it more apparent than in
Arizona and Southern California, where the scarcity of water and its
utilization for purposes of irrigation give it enormous value. It is to

126

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The conducting of Logging Opkrations on Private Lands within the Eeseeva-

TIONS CAUSES MANY FlEES, SOME OF WHICH ESCAPE TO THE EeSERVED

Lands. San Bernardino Reservation, California.

Where the Streams abound in Trout. San Bernardino Reservation,

California.

OUR FOREST RESERVATIONS. 127

a large measure the reservations of these regions and the preservation of
their forest cover that give such great value to the adjacent cultivated
lields. It is the water and not the land that has value. It is the per-
ennial supply, flowing from the reserved and unreserved forests of
East and Central Arizona, that has in the past two decades rescued
the Salt River Valley from its former barrenness, with its scattered
growth of creosote brush and cacti, and transformed it into one of the
most fertile and productive areas in America. It is the forest cover
of the San Jacinto and San Barnardino reservations in Southern Cali-
fornia that gave Riverside and Redlands her splendid orange groves
and made possible the development of a productive and thriving
community.

When in our Western forests one is constantly impressed by the
change in relative humidity wrought wherever the forest has been
removed. Springs have disappeared and caiions and ravines are now
dry, where there were formerly perennial streams. Under the leaf
mold and other debris of the forest, the soil is always moist, while on
denuded areas in the same locality it is parched and dry. Everywhere
the deep mulch forming the floor of the forest grasps the descending
rains and melting snows and guides them into the deeper recesses of
the earth. Where the forests have been destroyed, or even the mulch
and litter forming the forest floor, as it so often is by fire or the
excessive grazing of sheep, the rains for the most part, instead of
sinking into the soil, pass ovir the surface, carrying silt and other
debris into the streams and reservoirs, causing vital injury to irrigation
enterprises.

So also in ' the semi-arid regions, where there are no forests, or
where they have been destroyed, the wind has a free sweep, resulting
in an enormous increase in evaporation. In some instances the evap-
oration from a water surface exposed to the free sweep of the wind
reaches a maximum of thirteen inches in a single month. In exposed
situations, snows a foot in depth are frequently lapped up in a single
day without even moistening the soil beneath. We do not appreciate
how great the necessity for the preservation of the forests is to the
irrigable West.

Reservoirs for the purpose of impounding water to be used in
irrigation have been constructed by private enterprise in many parts
of the West, and the possibility of governmental construction of such
reservoirs is by no means improbable. Effective reservoirs are not
possible in our irrigable regions without due regard for the forests that
feed the streams which fill them. Forests everywhere are the great
preventors of erosion, and nowhere is this more evident than in our
Western mountains. The utility of reservoirs, and, to a lesser extent,
of distributing canals and laterals, becomes destroyed as they fill with

128 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

silt. To prevent this filling, the forests must be preserved; they must
be protected from fire, in so far as an efficient forest service can protect
them, and also from grazing, vi^herever it seriously interferes with the
effectiveness of the forest floor as a water absorbent. In some of the
Southwestern reservations, notably in Arizona, sheep-grazing has been
carried so far that natural reproduction is at a standstill, and the
forest floor has been made in some places almost as bare and compact as
a road-bed. It is reasonable to expect that overgrazing will continue,
until every hoof that enters the reservations is there under a permit
based upon the judgment of a competent forester, who shall have
absolute decision as to the portions of the forests that can be safely
grazed and those that cannot.

One of the most fertile causes of injury to the forest cover of the
resers^ations arises from the numerous private holdings of non-agri-
cultural lands within their boundaries. From personal experience I
know that the harvesting of the timber on these small areas of private
lands in the San Bernardino reservation and the leasing of them for
grazing purposes have been harmful to the reservation to a marked
degree. The conducting of logging operations during the dry season
by means of traction engines or by donkey engines and cables have
caused numerous fires, some of which have escaped and burned over
large areas of the reservation.

In driving sheep to the leased lands within the boundaries of the
reservation, they have been grazed for months on the reserved lands,
the leasing of the private holdings being primarily an excuse to get
the stock within the reservation. It would seem desirable, therefore,
that all such holdings be acquired by the Government, in order to
eliminate the constant danger arising from them.

We should not overlook the value of the forest reservations as
great national parks for recreation and sport, where those so inclined
can go and get in touch with nature at her best; where the streams
abound in trout, and wild animals are not confined behind iron bars;
where there are no signs, 'Keep off the grass,' and, best of all, where
one can build himself anew from wholesome mountain air and water,
vigorous exercise and plain food.

With so much to commend both State and National reservations
and with such vast areas of public lands at the command of the
Government, it is somewhat surprising that their realization remained
until the last decade of the nineteenth century. At last the forest
lias gained the resepct due it as a great economic and civilizing factor
and is taking its true place in the esteem of all classes of public-spirited
citizens.

THE BLOOD OF TEE NATION. 129

THE BLOOD OF THE NATION.

A STUDY OF THE DECAY OF RACES THROUGH THE SURVIVAL OF

THE UNFIT.— II. IN WAR

By DAVID STARR JORDAN,

PRESIDENT OF LELAND STANTOKD JUNIOR UNIVERSITY.

XXV. Not long ago I visited the town of Novara, in northern
Italy. There, in a wheatfield, the farmers have plowed up
skulls of men till they have piled up a pyramid ten or twelve feet
high. Over this pyramid some one has built a canopy to keep
off the rain. These were the skulls of young men of Savoy,
Sardinia and Austria — men of eighteen to thirty-five years of age,
without physical blemish so far as may be, peasants from the
farms and workmen from the shops, who met at Novara to kill
each other over a matter in which they had very little concern.
Should the Prince of Savoy sit on his unstable throne or yield it to
some one else, this was the question. It matters not the decision.
History doubtless records it, as she does many matters of less moment.
But this fact concerns us — here in thousands they died. Farther on.
Frenchmen, Austrians and Italians fell together at Magenta, in the
same cause. You know the color that we call Magenta, the hue of the
blood that flowed out under the olive trees. Go over Italy as you will,
there is scarcely a spot not crimsoned by the blood of France, scarcely
a railway station without its pile of French skulls. You can trace them
across to Egypt, to the foot of the Pyramids. You will find them in
Germany — at Jena and Leipzig, at Liitzen and Bautzen and Austerlitz.
You will find them in Kussia, at Moscow; in Belgium, at Waterloo. 'A
boy can stop a bullet, as well as a man,' said Napoleon; and with the
rest are the skulls and bones of boys, 'ere evening to be trodden like
the grass.' 'Born to be food for powder' was the grim epigram of the
day, summing up the life of the French peasant. Eead the dreary
record of the glory of France, the slaughter at Waterloo, the wretched
failure of Moscow, the miserable deeds of Sedan, the waste of Algiers,
the poison of Madagascar, the crimes of Indo-China, the hideous results
of barrack vice and its entail of disease and sterility, and you will
understand the 'Man with the Hoe.' The man who is left, the man
whom glory cannot use, becomes the father of the future men of France.
As the long-horn cattle reappear in a neglected or abused herd of
Durhams, so comes forth the aboriginal man, 'the man of the hoe,' in a
wasted race of men.

VOL. LIX.— 9

130 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

XXVI. A recent French cartoon pictures the peasant of a hun-
dred years ago plowing in a field, a gilded marquis on his back, tapping
his gilded snuff-box. Another cartoon shows the French peasant of
to-day, still at the plow. On his back is an armed soldier who should
be at another plow, while on the back of the soldier rides the second
burden of Shylock the money-lender, more cruel and more heavy even
than the dainty marquis of the old regime. So long as war remains,
the burden of France cannot be shifted.

XXVII. In the loss of war we count not alone the man who
falls or wdiose life is tainted with disease. There is more than one
in the man's life. The bullet that pierces his heart goes to the heart
of at least one other. For each soldier has a sweetheart, and the beat
of these die, too — so far as the race is concerned — if they remain single
for his sake.

In the old Scottish ballad of the Tlower of the Forest' this thought
is set forth:

"I've heard the lilting at each ewe-milking
Lassies a-lilting before the dawn of day.
But now they are moaning, on ilka green loaning,
For the 'Flower of the Forest' is a' wed away."

Euskin once said that 'War is the foundation of all high virtues
and faculties of men.' As well might the maker of phrases say that
fire is the builder of the forest, for only in the flame of destruction do
we realize the warmth and strength that lie in the heart of oak. An-
other writer, Ilardwick, declares that 'War is essential to the life of a
nation; war strengthens a nation morally, mentally and physically.'
Such statements as these set all history at defiance. War can only
waste and corrupt. 'All war is bad,' says Benjamin Franklin, 'some
only worse than others.' 'War has its origin in the evil passions of
men,' and even when unavoidable or righteous, its effects are most
forlorn. The final effect of each strife for empire has been the degrada-
tion or extinction of the nation which led in the struggle.

XXIX. Greece died because the men who made her glory had
all passed away and left none of their kin, and therefore none of their
kind. ' 'Tis Greece, but living Greece no more,' for the Greek of to-
day, for the most part, never came from the loins of Leonidas or Mil-
tiades. He is the son of the stable-boys and scullions and slaves of the
day of her glory, those of whom imperial Greece could make no use
in her conquest of Asia. "Most of the old Greek race," says Mr. W. H.
Ireland, has been swept away, and the country is now inhabited by
persons of Slavonic descent. Indeed, there is strong ground for tbe
statement that tliere was nu^re of the old heroic blood of Hellas in the
Turkish army of Fdhcm Pasha than in the soldiers of King George,
who fled before them three years ago." King George himself is only

THE BLOOD OF THE NATION. 131

an alien placed on the Grecian throne to suit the convenience of the
outside powers, which to the ancient Greeks were merely factions of
harharians. In the late war some poet, addressing the spirit of ancient
(Jreece, appealed to her

"Of all thy thousands grant us three
To make a new Thermopylae."

But there were not even three — not even one — Ho make another
Marathon,' and the Turkish troops swept over the historic country
with no other hindrance than the effortless deprecation of Christendom.

XXX. Why did Eome fall? It was not because untrained hordes
were stronger than disciplined legions. It was not that she grew
proud, luxurious, corrupt, and thereby gained a legacy of physical
weakness. We read of her wealth, her extravagance, her indolence and
vice, but all this caused only the downfall of the enervated, the vicious
and the indolent. The Eoman legions did not riot in wealth. The
Roman generals were not all entangled in the wiles of Cleopatra.

XXXI. 'The Eoman Empire,' says Seeley, 'perished for want of
men.' You will find this fact on the pages of every history, though
few have pointed out war as the final and necessar}' cause of the Eoman
downfall. In his recent noble history of the 'Downfall of the An-
cient World' ('Der Untergang der Antiken Welt,' 1897), Prof. Otto
Seeck,* of Greifeswald, makes this fact very apparent. The cause of
the fall of Rome is found in the 'Extinction of the Best' ('Die Aus-
rottung der Besten'), and all that remains to the historian is to give the
details of this extermination. He says 'In Greece a wealth of spiritual
power went down in the suicidal wars.' In Eome "Marius and Cinna
slew the aristocrats by hundreds and thousands. Sulla destroyed
no less thoroughly the democrats, and whatever of noble blood sur-
vived fell as an offering to the proscription of the triumvirate."
"The Eomans had less of spontaneous power to lose than the
Greeks, and so desolation came to them all the sooner. He who was
bold enough to rise politically was almost without exception thrown to
the ground. Only coivards remained, and from their brood came forward
the new generations. Cowardice showed itself in lack of originality and
slavish following of masters and traditions." Had the Eomans been
still alive, the Eomans of the old republic, neither inside nor outside
forces could have worked the fall of Eome. But the true Eomans
passed away early. Even Csesar notes the 'dire scarcity of men.' "Sei-
VTjV oXiyavOpoTTiav.") Still there were always men in plenty, such
as they were. Of this there is abundant testimony. Slaves and camp
followers were always in evidence. It was the men of strength and

* I am indebted to Prof. E. A. Ross for the reference to this excellent work.

132 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

character, 'the small farmers/ the 'hardy dwellers on the flanks of the
Apennines/ who were gone.

"The period of the Antonines was a period of sterility and barren-
ness. The human harvest was bad." Augustus offered bounties on
marriage until 'Celibacy became the most comfortable and most ex-
pensive condition of life.' "Marriage/' says Metellus, "is a duty which,
however painful, every citizen ought manfully to discharge."

"The mainspring of the Roman army," says Hodgkin, "for centuries
had been the patient strength and courage, capacity for enduring hard-
ships, instinctive submission to military discipline of the population
which lined the ranges of the Apennines."

Berry states that an "effect of the wars was that the ranks of the
small farmers were decimated, while the number of slaves who did not
serve in the army multiplied." Thus 'Yir gave place to Homo,' real
men to mere human beings.

With the failure of men grew the strength of the mob, and of the
emperor, its exponent. "The little finger of Constantino was stronger
than the loins of Augustus." At the end "the barbarians settled and
peopled the Eoman Empire rather than conquered it." "The Roman
world would not have yielded to the barbaric were it not decidedly in-
ferior in force." Through the weakness of men, the Emperor assumed
divine right. Dr. Zumpt says, "Government having assumed godhead,
took at the same time the appurtenances of it. Officials multiplied.
Subjects lost their rights. Abject fear paralyzed the people, and those
that ruled were intoxicated with insolence and cruelty."

"The Emperor/' says Professor Seeley, "possessed in the army an
overwhelming force over which citizens had no influence, which was
totally deaf to reason or eloquence, which had no patriotism, because
it had no country, which had no humanity, because it had no domestic
ties." "There runs through Roman literature a brigand's and a bar-
barian's contempt for honest industry." "The worst government is
that which is most worshipped as divine."

So runs the word of the historian. The elements are not hard
to find. Extinction of manly blood; extinction of freedom of thought
and action; increase of wealth gained by plunder; loss of national ex-
istence.

XXXII. So fell Greece and Rome, Carthage and Egypt, the Arabs
and the Moors, because, their warriors dying, the nation bred real
men no more. The man of the strong arm and the quick eye gave place
to the slave, the pariah, the man with the hoe, whose lot changes not
with the change of dynasties.

XXXIII. Other nations of Europe may furnish illustrations in
greater or less degree. Germany guards her men, and reduces the waste
of war to a minimum. She is 'military, but not warlike/ and this dis-

THE BLOOD OF THE NATION. 133

tinction means a grea.t deal from the point of view of this discussion.
In modem times the greatest loss of Germany has been not from war,
hilt from emigration. If the men who have left Germany are of
higher type than those who remain at home, then the blood of the
nation is impoverished. That this is the case the Germans in Germany
are nsnally not willing to admit. On the other hand, those competent
to judge the German-American find no type of men in the Old World
his mental or physical superior.

The tendency of emigration, whether to cities or to other countries,
is to weaken the rural population. An illustration of the results of
checking this form of selection is seen in the Bavarian town of Oberam-
mergau. This little village, with a population not exceeding fifteen
hundred, has a surprisingly large number of men possessing talent,
mental and physical qualities far above the average even in Germany.
The cause of this lies in the Passion Play, for which for nearly three
centuries Oberammergau has been noted. The best intellects and
the noblest talents that arise in the town find full scope for their
exercise in this play. Those who are idle, vicious or stupid are excluded
from it. Thus, in the long run, the operation of selection is to retain
those whom the play can use and to exclude all others. To weigh
the force of this selected heredity we have only to compare the quality
of Oberammergau with that of other Bavarian towns, as, for example,
her sister village of Unterammergau, some two miles lower down, in
the same valley.

XXXIV. Switzerland is the land of freedom — the land of peace.
But in earlier times some of the thrifty cantons sent forth their men
as hireling soldiers to serve for pay under the flag of whomsoever might
pay their cost. There was once a proverb in the French Court, 'pas
d'argent; pas de Suisses,' no money; no Swiss, for the agents of the
free republic drove a close bargain.

In Luzerne stands one of the noblest monuments in all the world, the
memorial of the Swiss guard of Louis XVI., killed by the mob at the
palace of Versailles. It is carved in the solid rock of a vertical cliff
above a great spring in the outskirts of the city. A lion of heroic size,
a spear thrust through its body, guarding in its dying paws the Bour-
bon Ulies and the shield of France. And the traveler, Carlyle tells us,
should visit Luzerne and her monimient, "Not for Thorwaldsen's sake
alone, but for the sake of the German Biederkeit and Tapferkeit, the
valor which is worth and truth, be it Saxon, be it Swiss."

Beneath the lion are the names of those whose devotion it com-
memorates. And with the thought of their courage comes the thought
of the pity of it, the waste of brave life in a world that has none too
much. It may be fancy, but it seems to me that as I go about in Switzer-
land I can distinguish by the character of the men who remain those

134 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

cantons who sent forth mercenary troops from those who kept their own
for their own upbuilding. Perhaps for other reasons than this Lucerne
is weaker than Graubiinden, and Unterwalden less virile than little
Appenzell. In any event, the matter is worthy of consideration, for
this is absolutely certain: just in proportion to its extent and thor-
oughness is military selection a cause of decline.

XXXV. Holland has become a nation of old men, rich, comfort-
able and unprogressive. Her sons have died in the fields of Java, the
swamps of Achin, wherever Holland's thrifty spirit has built up nations
of slaves. It is said that Batavia alone has a million of Dutch graves.
The armies of Holland to-day are recruited in every port. Dutch
blood is too precious to be longer spilled in her enterprises.

XXXVI. Spain died of empire centuries ago. She has never
crossed our path. It was only her ghost which walked at Manila and
Santiago. In 1630, the Augustinian friar La Puente thus wrote of
the fate of Spain: "Against the credit for redeemed souls I set the
cost of Armadas and the sacrifice of soldiers and friars sent to the
Philippines. And this I count the chief loss, for mines give silver, and
forests give timber, but only Spain gives Spaniards, and she may give
so many that she may be left desolate and constrained to bring up
strangers' children instead of her own." ''This is Castile," said a Spanish
knight; "she makes men and wastes them." "This sublime and ter-
rible phrase," says Lieutenant Carlos Gilman Calkins, from whom I
have received both these quotations, "sums up Spanish history."

The warlike nation of to-day is the decadent nation of to-morrow.
It has ever been so, and in the nature of things it must ever be.

XXXVII. In his charming studies of 'Feudal and Modern Japan,'
Mr. Arthur Knapp returns again and again to the great marvel of
Japan's military prowess after more than two hundred years of peace.
It is astonishing to him that after more than six generations in which
physical courage has not been demanded, these virile virtues should
be found imimpaired. We can readily see that this is just what we
should expect. In times of peace there is no slaughter of the strong,
no sacrifice of the courageous. In the peaceful struggle for existence
there is a premium placed on these virtues. The virile and the brave
survive. The idle, weak and dissipated go to the wall. If after two
hundred years of incessant battle Japan still remained virile and war-
like, that would indeed be the marvel. But that marvel no nation has
ever seen. It is doubtless true that warlike traditions are most persistent
with nations most frequently engaged in war. But the traditions of
war and the physical strength to gain victories are very different things.
Other things being equal, the nation which has known least of war is the
one most likely to develop the 'strong battalions' with whom victory
must rest.

THE BLOOD OF THE NATION. 135

XXXVIII. What shall we say of England and her hundred petty
wars 'sinonlderingf in every part of the globe?

Statistics we have none, and no evidence of tangible decline that
Knglishnien will not indignantly repudiate. Besides, in the struggle
for national influences, England has had many advantages which must
liide or neutralize the waste of war. In default of facts unquestioned,
we may appeal to the poets, letting their testimony as to the reversal
of selection stand for what it is worth. Kipling tells us of the cost
of the rule of the sea:

"We have fed our sea for a thousand years.
And she calls us, still unfed;
Though there's never a wave of all her waves
But marks our English dead."

"If blood be the price of admiralty,
Lord God, we have paid it in full."

Again, referring to dominion on land, he says:

"Walk wide of the widow of Windsor,
For half of creation she owns.
We've bought her the same with the swoid and the flame,
And we've salted it down with our bones.
Poor beggars, it's blue with our bones."

Finer than this are the lines in the 'Eevelry of the Dying,' written
by a British officer, Bartholomew Dowling, it is said, who died in the
plague in India:

"Cut off from the land that bore us.

Betrayed by the land we find;
When the brightest are gone before us

And the dullest are left behind.
So stand to your glasses steady,

Tho' a moment the color flies,
Here's a cup to the. dead already

And huzza for the next that dies!"

The stately "Ave Imperatrix' of Oscar Wilde, the last flicker of
dying genius in his wretched life, contains lines that ought not to be
forgotten:

"0 thou whose wounds are never healed.

Whose weary race is never run;
O Cromwell's England, must thou yield
For every foot of ground a son?

"What matter if our galleys ride
Pine forest-like on every main ;
Ruin and wreck are at our side.
Stem warders of the house of pain.

136 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

"Where are the brave, the strong, the fleet,
The flower of England's chivalry?
Wild grasses are their Minding sheet,
' And sobbing waves their threnody.

"Peace, peace, we wrong our noble dead
To vex their solemn slumber so;
But childless and with thorn-crowned head,
Up the steep road must England go!"

"We have here the same motive, the same lesson which Byron applies

to Eome:

"The Niobe of Nations — there she stands,

Crownless and childless in her voiceless woe,

An empty urn within her withered hands,

Whose sacred dust was scattered long ago!"

XXXIX. It suggests the inevitable end of all empire, of all do-
minion of man over man by force of arms. More than all who fall
in battle or are wasted in the camps, the nation misses the 'fair women
and brave men' who should have been the descendants of the strong
and the manly. If we may personify the spirit of the nation, it grieves
most not over its 'unreturning brave,' but over those who might have
been, but never were, and who, so long as history lasts, can never be.

XL. Against this view is urged the statement that the soldier
is not the best, but the worst, product of the blood of the English
nation. Tommy Atkins comes from the streets, the wharves, the
graduate of the London slums, and if the empire is 'blue with his
bones,' it is, after all, to the gain of England that her better blood
is saved for home consumption, and that, as matters are, the wars of
England make no real drain of English blood.

In so far as this is true, of course the present argument fails. If
war in England is a means of race improvement, the lesson I would read
does not apply to her. If England's best do not fall on the field of
battle, then we may not accuse war of their destruction. The fact
could be shown by statistics. If the men who have fallen in England's
wars, officers and soldiers, rank and file, are not on the whole fairly
representative of 'the flower of England's chivalry,' then fame has been
singularly given to deception. We have been told that the glories of
Blenheim, Trafalgar, Waterloo, Majuba Hill, were won by real Eng-
lishmen. And this in fact is the truth. In every nation of Europe the
men chosen for the army are above the average of their fellows. The
absolute best doubtless they are not; but still less are they the worst.
Doubtless, too, physical excellence is more considered than moral or
mental strength, and certainly again the more noble the cause, the
more worthy the class of men who will risk their lives for it.

Not to confuse the point by modern instances, it is doubtless true

THE BLOOD OF TEE NATION. 137

that better men fell on both sides when 'Kentish Sir Byng stood for the
King' than when the British arms forced the opium trade on China.
Ko doubt, in our own country, better men fell at Bunker Hill or Cow-
]iens than at Cerro Gordo or Chapultepec. The lofty cause demands
the lofty sacrifice.

It is the shame of England that most of her many wars in our day
have cost her very little. They have been scrambles of the mob or
with the mob, not triumphs of democracy.

There was once a time when the struggles of armies resulted in a
survival of the fittest, when the race was indeed to the swift and the
battle to the strong. The invention of 'villainous gunpowder' has
changed all this. Except the kind of warfare called guerrilla, the
quality of the individual has ceased to be much of a factor. The clown
can shoot down the hero and 'doesn't have to look the hero in the face
as he does so.' The shell destroys the clown and hero alike, and the
machine gun mows down whole ranks impartially. There is little play
for selection in modern war save what is shown in the process of en-
listment.

XLI. America has grown strong with the strength of peace, the
spirit of democracy. Her wars have been few. Were it not for the
mob spirit, they would have been still fewer, but in most of them
she could not choose but fight. Volunteer soldiers have swelled her
armies, men who went forth of their own free will, knowing whither
they were going, believing their acts to be right, and taking patiently
whatever the fates may hold in store.

The feeling for the righteousness of the cause, ''with the flavor of
religion in it," says Charles Ferguson, "has made the volunteer the
mighty soldier he has always been since the days of Naseby and Mars-
ton Moor." Only with volunteer soldiers can democracy go into war.
When America fights with professional troops, she will be no longer
America. We shall then be, with the rest of the militant world, under
mob rule. "It is the mission of democracy," says Ferguson again, "to
put down the rule of the mob. In monarchies and aristocracies it is the
mob that rules. It is puerile to suppose that kingdoms are made by
kings. The king could do nothing if the mob did not throw up its cap
when the king rides by. The king is consented to by the mob because of
that which in him is mob-like. The mob loves glory and prizes. So
does the king. If he loved beauty and justice, the mob would shout
for him while the fine words were sounding in the air; but he could
never celebrate a jubilee or establish a dynasty. When the crowd gets
ready to demand justice and beauty, it becomes a democracy, and has
done with kings."

It was at Lexington that the embattled farmers 'fired the shot that
was heard around the world.' To them life was of less value than a

138 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

principle, the principle written by Cromwell on the statute book of
Pariiament: 'All just powers under God are derived from the consent
of the people.' Since this war many patriotic societies have arisen,
tinding their inspiration in personal descent from those who fought
for American independence. The assumption, well justified by facts,
is that these were a superior type of men, and that to have had such
names in our personal ancestry is of itself a cause for thinking more
highly of ourselves. In our little private round of peaceful duties, we
feel that we might have wrought the deeds of Putnam and Allen, of
Marion and Greene, of our revolutionary ancestors, whoever they may
have been. But if those who survived Avere nobler than the mass, so
also were those who fell. If we go over the record of brave men and
wise women whose fathers fought at Lexington, we must think also of
the men and women who shall never be, whose right to exist was cut
short at this same battle. It is a costly thing to kill off men, for in
men alone can national greatness consist.

XLII. But sometimes there is no other alternative. It happened
once that for 'every drop of blood drawn by the lash another must be
drawn by the sword.' It cost us a million of lives to get rid of slavery.
And this million, North and South, was the 'best that the nation could
bring.' North and South, the nation was impoverished by the loss.
The gaps they left are filled to all appearance. There are relatively
few of us left to-day in whose hearts the scars of forty years ago are
still unhealing. But a new generation has grown up of men and women
born since the war. They have taken the nation's problems into their
hands, but theirs are hands not so strong or so clean as though the
men that are stood shoulder to shoulder with the men that might have
been. The men that died in 'the weary time' had better stuff in them
than the father of the average man of to-day.

Read again Brownell's rhymed roll of honor, and we shall see its

deeper meaning: .„ ^ a- a t tx.
^ ^ Allen, who died for others,

Bryan of gentle fame,
And the brave New England brothers

Who have left us Lowell's name;
Bayard, who knew not fear.

True as the knight of yore.
And Putnam and Paul Pevere,

Worthy the names they bore.
Wainwright, steadfast and true,

Rodgers of brave sea-blood.
And Craven, with ship and orew,

Sunk in the salt-sea flood.
Terrill, dead where he fought,

Wallace, that would not yield;
Sumner, who vainly bought

A grave on the foughten field,

THE BLOOD OF THE NATION. 139

Rut died cic the end he saw.

With years and battles outworn;
Tliere was Harmon of Kennesaw,
And Uhic Dahlgren, and Shaw

That slept with his Hope Forlorn.
< Lytle, soldier and bard,

And the Ellets, sire and son.
Ransom, all grandly scarred.
And Rcdfield, no more on guard;

But Alatoona is won !

So runs the record, page after page:

"All such, and many another,
Ah, list, how long to name!"

And these were the names of the officers only. Not less worthy
were the men in the ranks. It is the paradox of democracy that its
greatness is chiefly in the ranks. "Are all the common men so grand,
and all the titled ones so mean?"

XLIII. North or South, it was the same. 'Send forth the best ye
breed' was the call on both sides alike, and to this call both sides alike
responded. As it will take 'centuries of peace and prosperity to make
good the tall statures mowed down in the Napoleonic wars,' so like
centuries of wisdom and virtue are needed to restore to our nation its
lost inheritance of patriotism. Not the capacity for patriotic talk, for
of that there has been no abatement, but of that faith and truth which
'on war's red touchstone rang true metal.' With all this we can never
know how great is our real misfortune, nor see how much the men that
are fall short of the men that ought to have been.

It will be said that all this is exaggeration, that war is but one
influence among many, and that each and all of these forms of de-
structive selection may find its antidote. This is very true. The anti-
dote is found in the spirit of democracy, and the spirit of democracy
is the spirit of peace. Doubtless these pages constitute an exaggeration.
They were written for that purpose. I would show the 'ugly, old and
wrinkled truth stripped clean of all the vesture that beguiles.' To see
anything clearly and separately is to exaggerate it. The naked truth is
always a caricature unless clothed in conventions, fragments taken from
lesser truths. The moral law is an exaggeration, 'The soul that sinneth
it shall die.' Doubtless one war will not ruin a nation; doubtless it will
not destroy its virility or impair its blood. Doubtless a dozen wars may
do all this. The difference is one of degree alone; I wish only to point
out the tendency. That the death of the strong is a true cause of the
decline of nations is a fact beyond cavil or question. The 'man who
is left' holds always the future in his gi-asp. One of the great books of
our new century will be some day written on the selection of men, the
screening of human life through the actions of man and the operation

140 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of the institutions men have built up. It will be a survey of the stream
of social history, its whirls and eddies, rapids and still waters, and the
effect of each and all of its condtions on the heredity of men. The
survival of the fit and the unfit in all degrees and conditions will be
its subject matter. This book will be written, not roughly and hastily,
like the present fragmentary essay, still less will it be a brilliant effort
of some analytical imagination. It will set down soberly and statis-
tically the array of facts which as yet no one possesses, and the new
Darwin whose work it shall be must, like his predecessor, spend twenty-
five years in the gathering of 'all facts that can possibly bear on the
question.' When such a book is written, we shall know for the first
time the real significance of war.

XLIV. If any war is good, civil war must be best. The virtues of
victory and the lessons of defeat would be kept within the nation. This
would protect the nation from the temptation to fight for gold or
trade. Civil war under proper limitations could remedy this. A time
limit could be adopted, as in football, and every device known to the
arena could be used to get the good of war and to escape its evils.

For example, of all our States New York and Illinois have doubtless
suffered most from the evils of peace, if peace has evils which dis-
appear with war. They could be pitted against each other, while the
other States looked on. The 'dark and bloody ground' of Kentucky
could be made the arena. This would not interfere with trade in
Chicago, nor soil the streets in Baltimore. The armies could be filled
up from the ranks of the unemployed, while the pasteboard heroes of
the national guard could act as officers. All could be done in decency
and order, with no recriminations and no oppression of an alien foe.
We should have all that is good in war, its pomp and circumstance, the
'grim resolution of the London clubs,' without wars long train of mur-
derous evils. Who could deny this? And yet who could defend it?

If war is good, we should have it regardless of its cost, regardless of
its horrors, its sorrows, its anguish, havoc and waste.

But it is bad, only to be justified as the last resort of 'mangled,
murdered liberty,' a terrible agency to be evoked only when all other
arts of self-defense shall fail. The remedy for most ills of men is not
to be sought in 'whirlwinds of rebellion that shake the world,' but in
peace and justice, equality among men, and the cultivation of those
virtues we call Christian, because they have been virtues ever since
man and society began, and will be virtues still when the era of strife
is past, and the 'redcoat bully in his boots' no longer 'hides the march
of man from us.'

It is the voice of political wisdom which falls from the bells of
Christmas-tide: "Peace on earth; good will towards men!"

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING. 141

PEOGRESS AND TENDENCY OF MECHANICAL ENGINEER-
ING IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.— II.

By Pkofessor ROBERT H. THURSTON,

DIRECTOR OF SIBLEY COLLEGE, CORNELL UNIVERSITY.

IN 1800, Galvani and Volta had sewed the seed, and since has sprung
up the whole science and art of electrical physics. Ten years ago we
had about 700 miles of electric railway; to-day about 15,000 miles are
in operation in the United States alone; a thousand millions of dollars
are invested in the stock, and an army of two hundred thousand men
is employed by them, mainly in the great cities, but with steady growth
towards all sections and into all aggregations of population. Two thou-
sand millions of dollars are reported to be now invested in apparatus of
electrical distributions of energy, converted ultimately into light and
power. About two-thirds of a hillion of dollars are invested in the
property of the electric light companies. We have between one and
two million miles of telephone wire, and can talk from Boston to Chi-
cago; from Chicago to San Francisco will soon be found an easy con-
versational distance. The Bell Company alone owns a million miles of
wire, a million and a half instruments, and receives six millions of
dollars a year from its business. The world, outside the United States,
utilizes not quite as much capital in this most wonderful of the inven-
tions of the century as does our own country, having about a half-
million exchanges to our six hundred thousand and over on the Bell
system alone.

Of steam power, about twenty millions of the engineers' Tiorse-
power,' the equivalent of perhaps seventy-five, or even possibly more
nearly a hundred, millions of horse-power developed by animal forces,
move the fleets of the world, merchant and naval, and drive our ships
across every sea. It even has been found practicable to apply steam-
power to the sewing machine, and of the million or more manufactured
in the United States and the fifty per cent, added to the total by other
nations, a very considerable fraction are operated by steam-power, and of
the hundred thousand people engaged in its manufacture and the mil-
lions engaged in its use, a corresponding proportion are aided by this
mighty engine of civilization. Steam supplies the power for dri^dng the
machinery which produces a quarter of a million mowers and reapers in
the United States — an unknown industry a century ago — and thus, with
the help of the steam-plow and other machinery of agriculture, all
inventions of the century, secures for the nation a foreign market for

142 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

two hundred millions of dollars' worth of grain and flour, a surplus left
us after feeding our own population as the people of no other country
are, or ever were, fed. Farms of tens of thousands of acres in area can
now be thus cheaply cultivated.

Electrical engineering is to-day one of the most impressive of all
modern developments in mechanical engineering, and the whole world
is coming to be served by the installation of the machinery of our light
and power distribution 'plants.' While it is true, as often remarked,
that electrical engineering is not only a department of mechanical en-
gineering, but one which involves, in large proportion, design, con-
struction and operation in the more familiar departments of mechanical
engineering as fundamental bases, it is none the less true that electrical
engineering is most closely approximate to pure science and most dis-
tinctive in its own character among all specialties taken up by the en-
gineer as individual vocations. The machinery of the business involves
all the principles of design and construction taught the mechanical
engineer, and the scientific side, once almost purely such, now attaches
itself to the mechanical as a lesser to a greater. The whole of this enor-
mous accession to the world's industries has come in within the last half-
eentury, practically, and the telegraph, the telephone, the electric light
and the electric railway have succeeded one another since that date.
The last is the outcome of the last quarter-centur}'.

The energy which carries the telegram along the wires to-day comes
from the steam-engine, which is now a principal and most absolutely
essential element; telephones, like telegraph instruments, are the output
of most extensive and important manufacturing establishments; electric
light and power distributions are all systems of distribution of the power
of the steam-engine. To-day there are probably $3,000,000,000 in-
vested, in our country alone, in telegraphs, telephones and electric dis-
tributions, of which the larger part by far is invested in the latter. In
fact, Mr. T. C. Martin reckons a still larger total, and computes these
figures: telegraph, $250,000,000; telephones, $300,000,000; electric
lighting, $1,300,000,000; electric railways, $1,800,000,000; other uses
of electric power, $250,000,000; manufacturing, $150,000,000; storage
batteries, etc., $25,000,000; total, $3,975,000,000, about four thousand
millions, nearly four hillions, of dollars.

More seductive even than the problems of the electrical engineer,
more deceitfully promising than any one of the great problems of the
age, seemingly more completely solved in its subsidiary elements and
almost on the very verge of solution, completely and perfectly, is the
task assigned the inventor from the earliest days of the world, from the
day when the first man saw the first bird rise from under his feet and
wing its way toward the heavens, safe, free and joyous: the problem of
aerodromies, of aviation and aeronautics. Inventors attacked this prob-

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING. 143

lem in prehistoric times, and have never ceased their endeavors; for
there is no invention, and never has been imagined an invention more
attractive to the mind of man; nor is there any invention the perfection
of which would have more interest for mankind or illustrate more splen-
didly the triumph of the mind of man over the conditions which hem
him in. Yet the century which has seen such marvelous, almost catas-
trophic, evolutions in all other fields has seen its end without final
success here.

Yet some important advances have been made. The dirigible bal-
loon has become capable of contending wdth moderate winds, and of
traversing still air in any direction at moderate speed and for small
distances; the balloon itself and its motors are taking definite form and
standard proportions, especially in the hands of the military staff of the
armies of European nations. Our own army officers have not, so far as
knowm, entered upon this task, though having at hand the most royal
inventors of the world. Count Zeppelin probably illustrates the furthest
advance in this department.

In aerodromics. Professor Langley has completely developed the
fundamental principles of self-sustaining flight, and has revealed the
fact that there are far fewer and far less formidable obstacles to be
overcome in this direction than had been previously supposed. Hia
researches are the classics of this division of applied science, and his
experimental investigations of the laws of this science will permanently
stand as the first important steps in the development of the rational
basis of all future work, and as the foundations of aerodromic science;
while his extraordinary work in the practical evolution of the aerodrome
— the more wonderful as the work of a scientific man whose vocations,
and until recently whose avocations, have been in quite other depart-
ments than those of mechanical construction — will always remain
famous as the first deliberate and successful attempt to carry into prac-
tice principles thus revealed. In the nineteenth century, we may at
least claim, these first advances on firm grounds have been effected, and
we need not be at all surprised if, in the earlier years of the new cen-
tury, complete success, so far as the mechanical engineering of the case
is concerned, shall be attained. There is some reason to doubt whether
commercial success will follow — not that it is in itself inherently im-
possible, but that it is a question whether, in the presence of the com-
petition of the more advantageous methods of transportation on solid
land and with the buoyant and hardly less effective support of the ocean
wave, conveyance of passengers and of merchandise can not always be
generally effected vastly more safely and cheaply. Yet that there will
be found a place and purpose for aviation, in time of war if not in time
of peace, and even probably for profitable employment, we may not
doubt.

144 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Steam is apparently coming, as the various other motor-fluids are,
into use on the highway, and, after an interregnum of a half -century or
more, due to the stupidity of legislators mainly, the automobile, in in-
numerable forms and on innumerable 'systems,' is once again displacing
the horse in city streets and, in less degree, perhaps, on country roads,
and is promising ere long to do a large part of our transportation of
merchandise over short routes and off the line of the railway. Thou-
sands are now in use in this country and abroad, and tens — hundreds,
nominally — of millions of dollars are invested in their manufacture.

In infinite variety the progress of invention thus reveals itself. In-
dividuals, nations, even continents and worlds have courses like that of
the rocket : rising with rapid acceleration, upward and onward, to a cul-
mination, when a sudden development of energy from latent form
occurs, and a brilliant illumination for the moment surprises and en-
lightens us; then the limit is attained, the path curves over and down-
ward, and after a brief period, downward acceleration begins and its
career presently comes to an end. This is not the history of invention,
which is never self -limited; a step made is never retraced. The progress
of the day is not only recorded in written and printed history and per-
manently preserved, but is given a still more permanent record in the
life and habits and traditions of the people, and each invention and each
new advance is the basis of a later and still higher progress. The only
limit to be expected to this advancement of civilization, through inven-
tion and the mechanic arts, is that set by some catastrophe which shall
ultimately involve the life of the race, having its source in natural evo-
lutions of a physical character, and bringing to an end all the activities
of mankind in some probably far-distant generation.

The extent to which the specialization consequent upon the changes
in the mechanism and methods of manufactures have progressed during
the century just past, may be realized more fully when it is understood
that, for example, in the making of a watch, there may be fifteen or
sixteen hundred operations conducted with the help of five or six hun-
dred machines by as many operatives, each of whom necessarily acquires
wonderful expertness in tasks thus repeated constantly, hour by hour,
day by day, throughout the working day and the calendar year. These
movements become intuitive and automatic; their accuracy and rapidity
become almost incredible, and the human machine, through its internal
automatism, thus relieves the mind and gives it freedom from stress
and fatigue in a manner unknown to the worker of earlier days. The
labor-assisting machinery also thus enables the operative to produce,
without serious toil and fatigue, from ten to a hundred times as much
of his special product as could his unaided predecessor in the vocation
with, however, more concentrated attention giving far less skill and ac-
curacy. The inventor and the mechanic thus illustrate the immense

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING. 145

difference in value and efficiency to be observed between work of brain
and work of muscle alone.

Meantime the worker receives larger wages; each dollar will buy
more of the necessaries of life, vastly more of its comforts. Clothing is
better, cheaper and more plentiful; food is better, of greater variety and
is easier obtained; w^ages have gone np and prices have gone down; the
average citizen finds it easier to secure employment at remunerative
wages; he secures a larger and a larger proportion of the earnings of
capital and labor, and he obtains more opportunities for incidental
profit and for paying investments of his more easily acquired savings.
The savings banks of the country are now finding difficulty in caring
for his accumulations, while the larger capitalist is finding no less dif-
ficulty in securing a fair return on invested capital in large amounts.

Twenty years ago, when preparing the second annual address of the
then President of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, I
wrote:*

"I have sometimes said that the world was waiting for the appearance of three
great inventors, yet unknown, for whom it has in store honors and emoluments
far exceeding all ever yet accorded to any one of their predecessors.

"The first is the man who is to show how, by the consumption of coal, we may
directly produce electricity, and thus, perhaps, evade that now inevitable and
enormous loss that comes of the utilization of energy in all heat-engines driven
by substances of variable volume. Our electrical engineers have this great step
still to take, and are apparently not likely soon to gain the prize that may yet
reward some genius yet to be born.

"The second of these greatest inventors is he who will teach us the source of
the beautiful soft-beaming light of the firefly and the glow-worm, and will show
us how to produce this singular illuminant, and to apply it -with success prac-
tically and commercially. This wonderful light, free from heat and from conse-
quent loss of energy, is nature's substitute for the crude and extravagantly waste-
ful lights of which we have, through so many years, been foolishly boasting. The
dynamo-electrical engineer has nearly solved this problem. Let us hope that it
may be soon fully solved, and by one of those among our own colleagues who are
now so earnestly working in this field, and that we may all live to see him steal
the glow-worm's light, and to see the approaching days of Vril predicted so long
ago by Lord Lytton.

"The third great genius is the man who is to fulfil Darwin's prophecy (1759),
closing the stanza:

"Soon shall thy arm, unconquered steam, afar
Drag the slow barge or drive the rapid car,
Or, on wide-waving wings expanded bear
The flying chariot through the fields of air."
Of these three inventors none has yet appeared, and their coming
may prove to be the great events of the twentieth century. The task
set for the first has been often attacked by later men of science, and
especially the chemists; but, while some real progress has been made,
the purpose of this inventor is not accomplished and seems little, if any,

*Trans. Am. Soc. M. E.— 1881.

VOL. TJX.— 10

146 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

nearer accomplishment than at the end of the last quarter-century.
But the time will yet come, we at least may reasonably hope, if not pre-
dict, when a way will be found thus to increase the availability of the
stored energy of our fuel deposits, until they shall furnish ten times the
power and energy now obtainable from each ton of fuel; thus cor-
respondingly lengthening the period of human life and work in the
temperate regions of the earth. Were this to-day possible, the endur-
ance of the Pennsylvania coal-beds as sources of power would be length-
ened from the present anticipated century to a millennium, and the thir-
tieth century, instead of only the twentieth, would profit by them. Great
Britain might hope to continue a manufacturing nation for five cen-
turies to come, and the world might gain ten times as much permanent
wealth, by its use of the latent energy of fuel, as now seems possible.

The mechanical engineer, the electrician and the chemist have here
an incentive to a most magnificent task and a noble rivalry.

The second of our great triumvirate of inventors or discoverers is
more certainly coming. His advent is indicated by the electrical en-
gineer and the physicist in their use of electrical energy of enormously
high tension; while the biological chemist is now a close second in the
race, through his researches in the field of low-temperature combustion
and amongst the animal forms producing light and electricity without
heat — the animal machines in which the processes of nature are seen
already accomplishing the task. This being done, the engineer will be
able to reduce the cost of lighting, as measured in power, to one-twen-
tieth its present amount, and as measured in fuel, if he can combine
these two improvements effectively, to one-two-hundredth its amount
to-day, proportionally reducing the intimidating waste now going on in
our deposits of irreplaceable natural stores of power.

The third inventor is also here with a crude beginning of his task,
and while, at the commencement of the nineteenth century, he was a
subject of unsparing ridicule, and even sometimes by able men within
the last decade, he would be a bold man who should to-day dare to
assert the improbability of the coming century seeing the problem
solved, so far as its engineering is concerned. The commercial problem
must be left to take care of itself — as it always has done hitherto.

All these are evidently problems affecting vitally all progress in the
future of energy-production in the field of mechanical engineering.
AVhen complete conversion of energy is effected by any mechanism em-
ploying our natural sources of energy, the task of the builder of the
air-ship is rendered less diflficult, the cost of light-production is made
easier and the utilization of the latent energy of fuel through the heat-
engine is made comparatively insignificant in cost.

This much is revealed to us through 'The Great Discovery of the
Age,' as some one has riglitly called it: the discovery and experimentally

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING. 147

confirmed 'Law of Substance,' as Haeckel denominates it, the principle
in nature which I enunciated a quarter of a century ago thus:

"All that exists, whether matter or force, or their product, energy,
and in whatever form, is indestructible except by the infinite power
which has created it."*

This principle, probably as old as Aristotle, or older, enunciated by
Cicero when he declared, " One eternal and immutable law embraces
all things and all times;" experimentally proved, at least qualitatively,
by Kumford in the latter part of the eighteenth century, confirmed by
Davy, proved and quantitatively illustrated by Mayer, by Joule and by
Eowland and numerous contemporary investigators, the Law of Sub-
stance of Haeckel, is itself a nineteenth century product and the basis
of our whole system of energy production, transmutation and trans-
mission, the foundation of the whole superstructure in mechanical en-
gineering and of its wealth-production, and of human progress and
higher human life.

Education in applied science and in the principles directly under-
lying the work of the engineer, in common schools, secondary schools
and professional schools and colleges, an education which has seen as
much improvement as have the arts and sciences themselves, has had
much to do with the later progress of mechanical engineering, especially
in the United States. Systematic instruction in the departments of me-
chanical engineering, such as is now obtainable by almost any young
man determined to secure it, not only has much to do with our progress
at the moment, but it is this phase of education, in our state colleges
particularly, which is settling the tendency of the flow of the rising
tide for the immediate future, and probably for all coming time. Al-
though it has been a force of recognized importance and influence for
less than a single generation, and has had a distinct and special position
among 'the educations' for a very brief period, it has already done much
to correct the defects of the industrial system of our country — still
more that of France and that of Germany, hardly less that of Great
Britain — and also to systematize our industries. The discoveries of
science and the inventions of our mechanics ""furnish material to be
utilized by the alumni of our technical and professional schools and
colleges as they can be by no other class in the community; the scien-
tific method of the schools and the scientific knowledge of their gradu-
ates, and the hands and brains of the new leaders of the industrial
army give perfected organization and improved administration to every
branch of the great economical, machine-like, modern industrial sys-

* Proceedings of Am. Assoc, for Advancement of Science, 1878; Vice-Presiden-
tial Address: 'The Scientific Method of Advancement of Science.' — R. H. T.

Also 'Manual of the Steam-Engine,' Vol. 1, Chap. IV, §75, p. 299, The
Popular Science Monthly, March, 1901.

148 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tern. Even where these well-trained officers are not in command, their
influence is felt, and every member of the organization works in ac-
cordance with their more efficient systems. The whole nation is rapidly
learning how to make the most and best of its powers, as well as how to
profit by growing opportunities and acquisitions.

Thomas Huxley, admittedly an authority on the subject of scientific
training, said, in his Mason College address:

"Neither the discipline nor the subject-matter of classical education is of
such direct value to the student of physical science as to justify the expenditure
of valuable time on either." . . . "For the purpose of attaining real culture,
an exclusively scientific education is at least as effectual as an exclusively lit-
erary education."

Huxley was a member of nearly all the royal commissions on educa-
tion of his time, and had large opportunities for observation and in-
vestigation in this field. His views were founded on extensive and rare
experience and sound knowledge; none could speak with greater author-
ity. He says in one of his addresses on this subject:

"The great mass of mankind have neither the liking nor the aptitude for
either literary or scientific or artistic pursuits; nor, indeed, for excellence of any
sort. Their ambition is to go through life with moderate exertion and a fair
share of ease, doing common things in a common way. And a great blessing and
a comfort it is that the majority of men are of this mind; for the majority of
things to be done are common things, and are quite well enough done when com-
monly done. The great end of life is not knowledge, but action. What men
need is as much knowledge as they can assimilate and organize into a basis for
action; give them more and it may become injurious. One knows people who
are heavy and stupid from undigested learning, as others are from over-fulness of
meat and drink. But a small percentage of the population is born with that most
excellent quality, the desire for excellence, or with special aptitude of some sort
or other. . . . Now, the most important object of all educational schemes is
to catch those exceptional people and turn them to account for the good of so-
ciety. No man can say where they will crop up; like their opposites, the fools
and the knaves, they appear sometimes in the palace, sometimes in the hovel ;
but the great thing aimed at, I was almost going to say the important end of all
social arrangements, is to keep these glorious sports of Nature from being cor-
rupted by luxury or starved by poverty, and to put them into the positions in
which they can do the work for which they are specially fitted. ... I weigh
my words well when I say that if the nation could purchase a potential Watt or
Davy or Faraday at the cost of a hundred thousand pounds down, he would be
dirt cheap at the money." *

But our modern educations are producing many Watts and Davys
and Faradays, and as progress continues and research becomes more and
more the privilege of these 'glorious sports of Nature,' and as more and
more men of genius become revealed by systematic, scientific education,
the outcome must inevitably be a vastly more complete exploration of

•Mitchell's sketch of The Life and Work of Huxley; Leaders in Science
Series; Putnams; 1900; Chap. XI.

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING. 149

the hidden mysteries of natural phenomena and continually more and
more rapid development of these as yet unexplored mines. Our Watts
and Davys and Faradays are already gradually discovering the secrets
of Nature's production of light without heat, of heat without wastes,
of electricity within minimum weight and space, making all elements
subservient with at least similar, if not equal, effectiveness with that
measured by them in the animal machine — the animal machine, still
concealing from them many a secret, must soon reveal all, and permit
many later Watts and Davys and Faradays to make our stores of natural
energies of multifold value and efficiency in the performance of the
tasks of the future.

The outcome of the century, so far as our methods of education
are concerned, has been the recognition and the introduction of those
ideals of intellectual, technical and practical training which were the
ideals of Milton and of many another great mind in earlier days, but
which had never before been adopted by educators and statesmen. We
have at last, however, come to see that

"The type of education and training most effective in rendering the individual
most helpful to his fellows is that which gives ability to be helpful. Given the
power of effectively aiding others, the sympathies will be found always present;
given the means of utilizing generous impulses, they will be found always fruit-
fuUv active.

"Teach habits of physical and mental activity, and a healthy body and mind
will be prolific of wholesome and noble thought; cultivate skill in fruitful indus-
tries, and the inclination to employ that skill in helpful ways will not be lack-
ing; feed the soul with the harvests of thought of all ages, with the gleanings
of tTie wisdom of the centuries — in whatever language, however given verbal ex-
pression— and all sympathies, latent or active, vdll find their destined place and
work. Breed 'the soul of the sage in the body of the athlete,' and give the per-
fected soul, within its perfected body, ability to do for itself and others what life
may demand of it, and trust that what may be done most effectively for the
world will be done best by this perfected humanity, through the exercise of
broadest sympathies and most efficient powers of aiding fellow men.

"It is thus that the Miltonian training, reinforced by Miltonian learning, per-
fected by Miltonian culture, doing most for the humblest, much for the highest,
whether ranked by place or by mind, giving health to the body, skill to eye
and hand, stimulus to the intellect, and greatness to the soul, will, always and
everywhere, most effectively broaden the sympathies and render the individual
most helpful to his fellow men." *

With such education of the people, a nation is assured of permanence
and progress. Demagoguism may still poison its legislatures; hysteria
may continue to affect its press and here and there a community; ama-
teurism is likely to reduce for a time the efficiency of its public services;
but its youth, growing up with a true Miltonian training, with not only
learning, but wisdom, not only culture, but directly practical training,

* Miltonian Teaching : an address delivered at Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, De-
cember 11, 1894.— R. H. T.

ISO POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

will steadily improve governmental, industrial and educational meth-
ods and raise the nation to higher than Platonian levels.

Thus, the Progress and Tendency of Mechanical Engineering have
been like that of human life, in many ways. As the outcome of an evo-
lution extending back into an infinite, or at least indefinite, past, its
birth, the first sensible evidence of existence, occurred a century ago.
]ts growth involved the development of many and different phenomena,
tlie perfection of all, in the adult, depending ultimately upon the per-
fection of each in the process of development. This mighty giant of
modern civilization was conceived in liberty, nourished by law. Inven-
tion and protecting legislation, assuring to every man the fruit of his
brain as of his hand, gave the child health and early and sturdy devel-
opment. The introduction of new and great inventions in the early
part of the century; the formulation in legal terms of our Constitution,
of the patent-law and of a system of universal common-school educa-
tion; the systematization of manufactures, and their care and support,
until the advantages of foreign competitors were neutralized; the sub-
stitution in all departments of production of automatic and of labor-
assisting machinery; the reduction of all productive vocations to scien-
tific departments of mechanical engineering; legal provision for the
cooperation of individuals, the invention of the corporation, the later
cooperation of corporations in reduction of non-productive labor and
the resultant decrease of costs and prices; the introduction of science
and of practically applied science into the curriculum of the schools
and colleges; the provision of technical and professional schools for the
constructive arts and professions; the gravitation of the management of
the productive, and of all industrial, operations into the hands of scien-
tifically and practically expert men, who supplement the learning of
schools by the perliaps higher learning of the arts and of the profes-
sions— all these have illustrated the progress and tendency of mechan-
ical engineering during the nineteenth century and the plainly dis-
tinguishable tendency of the time points the way in which the twentieth
century is to further illustrate this progress aod tendency, in even more
marked degree.

In the future, as in the recent past, the progress of invention and
of the mechanic arts will undoubtedly be still onward and upward, with
a still accelerated motion; the discoveries of the century may be ex-
pected to be more important and more imposing than ever before; the
work of the world will be performed with a more complete system, and
industrial operations of every sort will be carried on on a still larger
scale. The now familiar motors, developing the energies of Nature and
supplying the ))owcr needed to do tlie work of the world, will be, un-
doubtedly, still further improved and developed, and it may be hoped,
if not fairly expected, that a new method of utilizing the latent powerB

MECHANICAL ENGINEERING. 151

of Nature may be discovered, and the reqviisite mechanism invented, by
which to evade the inevitable loss of the larger part of that energy when
developed by our present thermo-dynamic machines, and thus to secure
the greater part as actually utilized, as useful power. The perfection
of our machinery by improvement of details by our later inventors and
the production of new and still more wonderfully productive machines,
automatic and labor-multiplying, will as certainly continue, and in some
fields is likely to astonish us, callous as we have become to these mar-
vels, quite as much as were our parents surprised by the inventions of
the last generations. Cooperation of labor, of capital, of manufacturing
organizations, will necessarily go on, and the 'captains of industry' will
have continually larger and larger armies and greater and greater tasks,
and we shall have generals, as well as colonels and captains and subordi-
nates, in the vast armies of united workers of the coming century.

We shall secure a liberal supply of this world's good things by a
reasonable day's labor on the part of the humblest, wealth in abundance
in repayment for superior talent, industry and forethought, and com-
fort and a healthful and wholesome life, a happy life, will be assured to
all who choose to make the most and best of opportunity, including the
wealthy, whose opportunities will be readily found in the promotion
of higher learning, of nobler charities and of more generous care of the
physically and intellectually lame and halt and blind. We shall in-
crease the speed of our fast trains, cross the Atlantic in less time, trans-
port the food and clothing and wealth of the world more cheaply, and
very possibly add to the fields of invention and the practically available
means of transportation the long-looked-for department of aeronautics
and aerodromics. We have conquered the land and the water; who
shall say that Man is less equal than albatross or sparrow to the task of
subduing the elements of the atmospheric world?

With further evolution in these departments, and consequent im-
provement in the condition of the people, all intellectual and moral
conditions may be hopefully expected to improve, and the people will
grow in character as they acquire knowledge, gaining intelligence as
they secure ease of life, and will rise to a higher plane of rectitude and
happiness as they are relieved of the grinding pressure of the poverty
of earlier times.

Progress has come to be enormously rapid, and the advance of a
generation is much greater than was formerly that of centuries. We
may reasonably hope to see something of this multiplied progress of the
coming generation; our children will see the still larger multiplication
of gain of the twentieth century, and help carry the world a long way
toward that ideal which has been but feebly described in Plato's Re-
public and More's Utopia, and has been the aspiration of all good men.

152 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE PEEIODIC LAW.

By Professor JAS. LEWIS HOWE,

WASHINGTON AND LEE UNIVERSITY.

BEFOEE the time of Lavoisier ideas concerning the nature of mat-
ter were mere speculations. Following the introduction, at the
close of the eighteenth century, of the conception of the indestructi-
bility of matter, and more especially with the introduction of the atomic
theory a decade or so later, the idea of some sixty or seventy absolutely
different kinds of matter received general acceptance. The unity of
these different elements was, indeed, held by some, but as a pure specu-
lation, while the evidence was all against it. It remained for the
Periodic Law to show that there is a connection between these different
elements. It is true, we are as far as ever from any knowledge of what
that connection is, or from any knowledge of the nature of that primal
substance out of which all matter is shaped, unless, indeed, the recent
work of J. J. Thomson and others on the electric condition of gases
is pointing us thitherward.

The early attempts to classify substances from a chemical, or rather
alchemistical standpoint, were wholly superficial. Pliny, for example,
describes two forms of lead, plumbum nigrum and plumbum candidum.
The former term was used for lead proper, the latter for tin, though
these two metals have little resemblance, except in their low melting
points. Sulfuric acid was classed with the oils, as oil of vitriol, and
the name has popularly and technically remained to the present, al-
though the only resemblance of sulfuric acid to an oil is in its appear-
ance. The chlorids of antimony and of tin were known respectively as
butter of antimony and butter of tin, from the fact that they are semi-
solid substances, of much the same consistency as butter from milk.
Even to-day we speak familiarly of milk of lime and milk of sulfur,
though but for the fact that they are whitish liquids, they have nothing
in common with the product from the cow. Perhaps to us one of the
most remarkable instances of classification was the association of the
black oxid of manganese with the white oxid of magnesium, commonly
known as calcined magnesia. The only property common to these two,
magnesia nigra and magnesia alba, as they were early called, is that
both are fine powders. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the
discovery of the different gases began, and to the workers of that day
all were but different kinds of air. Thus we find 'inflammable air* as
the name for hydrogen, 'fixed air* for carbonic acid gas, and 'dephlo-
gisticated marine acid air" for chlorin. That no better principle of

THE FE RIO Die LAW. iS3

classification of substances from a chemical standpoint than that of
superficial outward appearance was demanded is not strange, when we
recollect that at this period and, indeed, down to the close of the
eighteenth century, the transmutation of metals was a popular belief
of the common people and was not disproved by the chemist. There
was no underlying, unchangeable principle at the basis of the different
substances with which the chemist had to deal.

Lavoisier — government medallist at twenty-one, adjunct member
of the French Academy at twenty-five, chemist, geologist, mineralogist
and mathematician, man of business and amasser of wealth, financier,
reformer, fermier general, imprisoned by Kobespierre on the trumped-
up charge of having adulterated tobacco with water, guillotined in 1794,
when only just past fifty years old — this is the man whom the French,
with much justice, call the 'Father of Chemistry,' the man who made
chemistr}^ possible as a science by furnishing it with a foundation,
the doctrine of the indestructibility of matter. This he accomplished
by the use of the balance. A familiar experiment had often been used
to support the old idea of transmutation. When water has been boiled
for a long time in a glass vessel, on evaporating the water an earthy
residue is obtained, and this, said the chemists of that day, is conclu-
sive evidence that water can be transmuted into earth by boiling; and,
if water into earth, why not other substances; and why not, if we
only knew the method, even the base metals into gold? Wlien less
than thirty years old, Lavoisier repeated this experiment, but he took
the precaution of weighing his glass vessel with its contained water.
After a hundred days' boiling, he found that there was no change in
weight. On then evaporating the water he found, indeed, an earthy
residue, but the glass vessel had lost an amount exactly equal in weight
to that recovered from the w^ater. In other words, the water, so far
from being changed into earth, had merely dissolved out a small por-
tion of the glass container. This and many other similar experiments
the keen-witted Frenchman used to prove the indestructibility of mat-
ter, and on this fundamental doctrine the superstructure of scientific
chemistry began to rise.

With this doctrine established, it became possible to consider the
nature of matter from a new standpoint, and to define with some ac-
curacy a chemical element. Back in the days of Greek philosophers,
elements were very variously conceived of. To Pherekides earth was
the primal element; to Anaximenes, air; to Herakleitos, fire; while
Thales found in water the first principle of all things, and the followers
of the Milesian philosopher were not a few for more than two mil-
lenniums. Empedokles accepted all four of these elements, and to them
Aristotle added a fifth, ether, the quintessence, subtler and more divine
than the other foxir. With these the alchemists placed a number of

154 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

substances, approaching somewhat our present idea of elements, but
even down to Lavoisier's time the old Greek conceptions were not
abandoned. Lavoisier's definition of an element deserves to be quoted,
since more than a century of chemical progress has failed to improve
or in any essential way change it. "An element," says he, in his 'Traite
de Chimie,' "is a substance from which no simpler body has as yet been
obtained; a body in which no change causes a diminution of weight.
Every substance is to be regarded as an element until it is proved to
be otherwise." With his conception of an element, Lavoisier intro-
duced a new and scientific nomenclature into chemistry, which is to a
very considerable extent in use to-day. The views of Lavoisier did not
gain immediate recognition, but a decade after his untimely death the
new ideas had been very generally adopted.

With the opening of a new century came the rehabilitation of a
theory which had originated back in the misty days of early Greek
philosophy, but which was now to be given a new value, because no
longer a vague guess, but founded upon experimental evidence. This
was the theory of the atomic constitution of matter. According to the
Greek conception, if matter were divided into smaller and ever smaller
portions, at last a point would be reached where the particles are in-
divisible, and such particles are the atoms. Dalton seems first to have
hazarded the idea of atoms, almost as a speculation, to account (wrongly)
for the various different degrees of solubility of different gases in
water, and at this early stage he published a table of familiar sub-
f^tances, with the atomic weight of each. A decided confirmation was
given to this guess by Dalton's discovery that when different gases
combine, it is always in proportions expressed by whole numbers. This
could most readily be explained by the theory that these gases were
made up of indivisible particles called atoms, Avhose union conditioned
the proportion between the uniting masses of gases. This atomic
theory was somewhat combated by a few chemists, even Sir Humphry
Davy and Mr. Wollaston for a brief time opposing it. It soon, how-
ever, made its way, and its general principles have been received by all
chemists; for nearly a century it has dominated, or rather has been
the foundation of, chemical theory.

According to this theory, all matter is composed of some seventy
different kinds of atoms, each possessed of independent and permanent
properties. Lists of the atomic weights of the commoner elements were
rapidly published, the most notable being that of Berzclius, in 1815.

The fact of so many different kinds of ultimate particles of matter
was naturally a great blow to those who believed in its unity. Very
early there was speculation as to whether any connection existed be-
tween the different kinds of atoms. The first step in this direction
was what is known as Front's hypothesis, which was first enunciated

TEE PERIODIC LA\Y. i55

in 1815, with no author's signature, in Thomson's 'Annals of Philoso-
phy.' Prout had noticed that the 'atomic weights of many of the
lighter elements seemed to be exact multiples of that of hydrogen;
hence he made the suggestion that all the different atoms may be
merely aggregations of the simple hydrogen atom, and that this hydro-
gen atom is really the primitive element from which all other sub-
stances are made.

This was the first attempt to determine a relation between the
apparently different kinds of matter, and it was more than eighty
years before the advocates of the theory were finally forced to abandon
it. There have been few laws in chemistry, and certainly no false
hypotheses, which have given rise to so much investigation as that
which has been occasioned by Prout's hypothesis. That it could have
60 long retained adherents among chemists, many of them men of
great prominence, is due to the fact that it seems on its face to be true.
When it was first published, a very considerable number of the atomic
weights were approximately multiples of the weight of the hydrogen
atom, far more than could be accounted for by chance. It seemed rea-
sonable to believe that, with the meager facilities for accurate work at
that day, the atoms of the few other elements would prove, when they
should be accurately determined, to be also exact multiples of the
hydrogen atom. This view Avas held by many chemists until a Belgian
chemist, Jean Servais Stas, undertook to determine the atomic weight
of a few of the elements with an accuracy far greater than had been
known up to that time. Prout's hypothesis had been sustained by
rounding off the decimals to whole numbers; Stas, before he began this
work an earnest believer in the hypothesis, endeavored to determine
at least one place of decimals so accurately that it could not hereafter
be neglected, and his work is one of the classics of chemistry. He
proved clearly that the atoms of several elements, at least, could not
be multiples of that of hydrogen. Some of the supporters of the
hypothesis then assumed that it was not the hydrogen atom, but a half
of it, or some other fraction, which is the original matter, from which
all other atoms are derived. The hypothesis may be said to have finally
ended its long career when Professor Morley, of Adelbert College,
showed that there is no simple ratio between the atomic weights of
oxygen and hydrogen; that, instead of being 16:1, it is 15.879:1. For
accuracy Professor Morley's work may be justly compared with that of
Stas, but in conception of experiment and in difficulty of execution it
far surpasses that of the Belgian chemist.

But while it may be considered as absolutely proved that a large
share of the atoms have weights which are not exact multiples of that
of hydrogen, yet it remains true that many of those which have been
determined with the greatest degree of certainty do approach with

IS6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

wonderful closeness to exact multiples. This is shown by the following
table, taken from the report of the Committee on Atomic Weights of
the American Chemical Society for 1899:

Arsenic 75.0 Lead 206.92 Phosphorus 31.0

Boron 11.0 Lithium 7-03 Rhodium 103.0

Bromin 79.95 Manganese 55.0 Silver 107.92

Carbon 12.0 Mercury 200.0 Sodium 23.05

Cerium 139.0 Nitrogen 14.04 Sulfur.... 32.07

Cobalt 59.00 Osmium 191.0 Tin 119.0

Gallium 70.0 Oxygen 16.00 Yttrium 89.0

Iron 56.0 Palladium 107.0

In addition to these at least nine others have atomic weights differ-
ing not more than 0.1 from whole numbers. By the law of probabilities
this close approach to whole numbers cannot be the result of chance,
but no satisfactory explanation has as yet been offered.

Prout's hypothesis was not unique in concerning itself with an
effort to show a unity of matter. Very early there was noticed a con-
nection between the atomic weights and the properties of certain
groups of elements. Attention was first called to this by Professor
Dobereiner, of Jena, and an account was given of it in print in 1816,
just after the first enunciation of Prout's hypothesis. Dobereiner
noticed that the equivalent weight of strontium was 50, while the
values then accepted for calcium and barium were respectively 27.5 and
72.5. Fifty is the mean of 27.5 and 72.5, and the properties of stron-
tium may be looked upon as being an average of those of calcium and
barium. It was soon clear, however, that strontium was as much en-
titled to recognition as an element as calcium or barium. Hence it
appeared that there was a numerical relation between the weights of
the atoms of these three elements, barium, strontium and calcium,
which corresponded to both the chemical and the physical properties
of the elements. Several other similar groups of three were discovered
by Dobereiner, and this, which was really the earliest germ of the
Periodic Law, became known as Dobereiner's law of triads. It is of
especial interest, as having enabled its author to predict the atomic
weight of bromin, which was later confirmed by experimental investiga-
tion. In this respect it anticipated the Periodic Law, and may be said
to represent a phase of this later and greater generalization.

Little attention was attracted by the speculations of Dobereiner,
and a quarter of a century or so later the subject was taken up anew
by the great French chemist, Dumas. He developed to some extent
the law of triads, though he made little actual advance beyond the
point attained by Dobereiner. Dumas's work was, however, widely
noticed, and proved very stimulating to the chemists of his day. It

THE PERIODIC LA^Y. 157

is interesting to read the comments of Faraday: "Tliis circumstance
(the numerical relations between chlorin, bromin and iodin) has been
made the basis of some beautiful speculations by M. Dumas, specula-
tions which have scarcely yet assumed the consistence of a theory,
and which are at the present time to be ranged among the poetic day-
dreams of a philosopher; to be regarded as some of the poetic ilhimina-
tions of the mental horizon, which possibly may be the harbinger of a
new law. . . , We seem here to have the dawning of a new light,
indicative of the mutual convertibility of certain groups of elements,
although under conditions which as yet are hidden from our scrutiny."
In the succeeding decade we find many chemists speculating in a
similar way upon the connection which seemed to subsist between the
different elements.

The two chemists whose names are associated with the dawn of the
Periodic Law are De Chancourtois and ISTewlands. De Chancourtois
arranged the elements in the order of their atomic weights in a helix
inscribed upon a vertical cylinder; this he called a 'telluric screw,' and
although there were many inaccuracies, as a whole it approached a
form in which the Periodic Law is to-day sometimes represented. The
ideas of De Chancourtois were by no means free from considerable haze,
as, for example, when he states that 'the properties of bodies are the
properties of numbers.' This may well be interpreted in the light of
the Periodic Law, which affirms that the properties of elements are
functions of their atomic weights. Even the important idea of perio-
dicity is not overlooked by De Chancourtois, but the speculations of
this ingenious French engineer and geologist had practically no effect
upon the chemical thought of that day; indeed, his articles were almost
unnoticed and were resurrected only after they had slumbered for
nearly tliirty years in obscurity.

Somewhat otherwise was it with the work of Newlands, which be-
gan to appear in 1863, just a year later than that of his French con-
temporary. His work was, however, wholly independent of that of
De Chancourtois. His first paper was chiefly concerned with the de-
velopment of numerical relations between the atomic weights, follow-
ing out the ideas early expressed in Dobereiner's triads. He enlarged
this so as to include more than three elements in a group. For example,
not only was sodium the middle member, with mean properties, of the
triad, lithium, sodium, potassium; but rubidium also belonged to this
group, because two of potassium plus one of lithium gives the atomic
weight of rubidium. A year later he announced his law of octaves,
which is generally looked upon as a forerunner of the Periodic Law.
Here he arranged the elements in the order of their atomic weights
and showed that "elements having consecutive numbers frequently
either belong to the same group or occupy similar positions in different

158 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

groups." "The difference between the number of the lowest member
of a group and that immediately above it is seven; in other words, the
eighth element starting from a given one, is a kind of repetition of
the first, like the eighth note of an octave in music." While this
regularity appeared in the case of the elements of low atomic weight,
it failed when applied to many of those elements which have a higher
weight, and also in the case of iron, cobalt and nickel. These three
metals seem to break in upon the octaves, and must be left out of
account before the law of octaves can be used. This irregularity New-
lands noticed, enunciating his law in the words: "The numbers of
analogous elements, ichen not consecutive, differ by seven, or by some
multiple of seven." By 'number' he means merely the number of the
element when all are arranged in a series in the order of their atomic
weight. There was thus here, as in the work of De Chancourtois, the
vision of a certain periodicity in the actual arrangement of the elements,
and the recognition of the fact that in some way there is a connection
between the properties of an element and its atomic weight. But there
seemed to be no suspicion that all the properties of an element are a
function, much less that they are a periodic function of its atomic
weight.

It may seem strange ■ to us that the work of these two pioneers
should have been received with almost complete indifference by chem-
ists. This results in part, at least, as has been pointed out by Men-
deleefl', from the too-limited application of Newlands's law. Relations
were brought out between little groups of elements, like Dobereiner's
triads, but comparisons were not made between dissimilar elements,
and even the groups made up by taking the seventh elements often
contained those which were far from being similar in their properties.
Thus we find the first, and hence analogous, elements of his eight
octaves as follows: Hydrogen, fluorin, chlorin, cobalt-nickel, bromin,
palladium, tellurium, platinum-iridium. Such a grouping as this could
hardly be expected to appeal strongly to chemists, especially as iodin,
an element which obviously belongs with fluorin, chlorin and bromin,
is relegated to the seventh group of elements. The lack of enthusiasm
on the part of chemists at the reception of Newlands's work may be
judged from an incident. When his paper was read at the meeting
of the Chemical Society, one of the members present asked of Professor
Newlands whether he had ever tried arranging the elements according
to the order of their initial letters.

The Periodic Law in its present form was first enunciated by Pro-
fessor Dmitri IMendeleeff, in 1869, in a paper read before the Russian
Physico-Chemical Society. It is true that five years earlier Lothair
Meyer had published in the first edition of his ']\Iodern Theory of
Chemistry' a list of tlie elements arranged according to atomic weights.

THE PEUIODW LAW. i59

somewhat after the method of Newlands, but this table could be con-
sidered in no sense an advance upon the table of his English contem-
porary. It was not so much a periodic table as a summary of the
groiiping of the elements in more or less natural groups. Meyer,
indeed, made his earlier table the basis of his later work, but these
subsequent amendments to the table were made after the publication
of Mendeleeff's first table and show clearly the influence of his work.

In his first paper, Mendeleefl; gives several different arrangements
of the elements, all, however, embodying the same principles. The
principal table, of which the others are variants, shows many errors
and crudities, but the underlying principles of the Periodic Law, as
to-day recognized, are clearly apparent. This table is as follows:

MENDELEKFF'S FIRST TABLE. 1809.

Ti 50 Zr.... 90 ? ... .180

V 51 Nb... 94 Ta...l82

Or 52 Mo.. 96 W....188

Mn 65 Rh.. .104.4 Pt....l97.4

Fe 56 RU..104.4 Ir....l98

Ni,Co..59 Pd...l06.6 03... 199

H 1 Cu 634 Ag...l08 Hg..200

Be... 9.4 Mg...24 Zn......65.2 Cd...ll2

B 11 Al 27.4 ? 68 Ur...ll6 Au..l97

C 12 Si 28 ? 70 Sn ...118

N 14 P 31 As 75 Sb...l22 Bi....210

0 16 S 32 Se 79.4 Te....l28?

F 19 01. ...35.5 Br 80 1 127

Na 23 K 39 Kb 85.4 C3...133 T1....204

Ca....40 Sr 87.6 Ba...l37 Pb...207

? 45 Ce 92

?Er..56 La 94

?Y .. 60 Di 95

?In...75.6 Th 118

The resemblance to the modern tables comes out yet more strongly
when we examine Mendeleefli's horizontal table, which was published
in the same paper, and in which the doubtful elements and those whose
position was not clear were omitted:

MENDELEEFF'S HORIZONTAL TABLE. 1868.

Li

Na

K

Cu

Rb

Ag

Ca

TI

Be

Mg

Ca

Zn

Sr

Cd

Ba

Pb

B

Al

Ur

, ,

B

0

Si

Ti

Zr

Sn

, ,

. .

N

P

V

As

Nb

Sb

, ,

Ta

• •

0

s

, ,

Se

Te

. .

W

F

CI

Br

I

In the first table the elements are arranged in vertical columns, in
the order of their atomic weights. They fall in a way into groups of
seven, as in Newlands's octaves, but after the first two octaves there

i6o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

are quite a number of elements before the next group of seven is
reached, and the same is true in each succeeding column. The next
year, 1870, Meyer published a table in which he brought these outside
elements into something of order by pointing out the existence of a
double periodicity after the first two octaves have been passed, and
showing that the alternate periods resemble each other closely. This
was brought out with greater clearness in the revised table which Men-
deleetf published in 1871. The skill of the author of this table is
apparent when we consider that it is, with few additions, the generally
.accepted table in use at the present day. This table, which is given on
the following page, when compared with that of two years before,
shows how great had been the development.

One well-recognized test of the truth of any theory is its use in
prediction. In this table Mendeleeff did not hesitate to make certain
changes in the generally received atomic weights, in order to bring
facts into conformity with his table. His was not the position of the
ancient philosopher who would have all phenomena bend to his precon-
ceived theory, and if the facts failed to yield, so much the worse for
the facts. Mendeleefi: had confidence that this Periodic Law was the
expression of a gTeat truth of nature, and so firm was his confidence
that he could not but believe that when the phenomena did not agree,
it was from imperfect observation and interpretation of the facts. A
good instance of this is seen in the case of the metals of the platinum
group. As far as observation had gone, osmium had the largest atomic
weight of these metals, followed by iridium and platinum, of equal
weight, and all these metals were lighter than gold. According to the
Periodic Law the reverse should be the case. Mendeleeff affirmed that
the discrepancy in this case was probably due to the fact that the
atomic weights of these metals had not been determined with an accu-
racy commensurate with the work of the table. It is an interesting
confirmation that some years later, Seubert took up this atomic weight
problem, and found that the views of Mendeleeff were correct. Gold
has the highest atomic weight of these elements, platinimi the next
highest, iridium follows and osmium comes lowest of all, its previously
determined weight having been seven or eight units too high.

Along the line of predictions a still more remarkable use of the
table appeared in connection with the vacant spaces. There were many
places in the table where elements might be expected, which were,
however, then unknown. Could the table stand the test of actually
predicting the existence of an unknown element? Mendeleeff did not
think this too great a strain to put upon his work, and he ventured
not merely to predict that elements might be expected with atomic
weights of 44, 68 and 72, but he was even bold enough to describe
these elements under the names of eka-boron, eka-aluminum and eka-

THE PERIODIC LA^Y.

i6i

o
w

H
02

W
W

w

Q
W

00

OS

o

OS

CO

•^ -H

y—t

> i

II o

2 II

11^

: II -<

6. O

P 0^

o .

0 05

"^.s

1— (00
.OS

ira

11;^

STi
IIS

Pi

,§11

• II p^
■ o

iCi

S

l-H

lO

II

ro

^H

II

lO

s ai

OS

II

o

II

II

(M

00

lO

CO

r^

(N

II

11

II

Group
RH
RO

CO

II

CJ

li

W

CO ©

OS H
II

o

eo
T]

5
CI

II

O

Q

f

,

lO

M

^

CO

t^

(M

> . .

II

II

II

II

^KC

Ph

00

S

o

■^

t— 1

CXi OQ

1-H

11

U3

II

II

X3

II

Iz;

>

^

H

00

o\

€C

1^

Ol

v-~

1-H

II

Ph

oB5a5

M

II

CO

II

11
g eg

o

II

-H

CO

CI

K

11

II

a>

rt

II

o

II

O

I-;

J3

^

H

N

■r.

5^.

H

CO

OO

to

CO

3

1^

II

1

-H

C^

1— t

II

II

»— (

II

00
CO

II

00
II

jl

m

1

C^'

c^.

^,

M*

lO

(M

(-,

CI

in

T— (

c5

OUP II.

RO.

06

II

o

II
c

II

S5 O

CO

II

be

II

II
O

II

l-l

w

II

eS

^H

^

CO

00

TO

II

to

o

<x

ROUP I

R,0.

II

OS
CO

II

3

o

II ■^

CO '

CO

II

cs

11

II

J3

II

(-:;

W

Pi

o

i

j \

1

.'

•

It

• •

•

•

CO

•

•

•

•

^ O)

CO

■^

lO

CO t-

00 a

O

T— 1

Cl

i—t

-H

i-H

TOL. UI.— 11.

i62 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

silicon, in several cases going into considerable detail as to the proper-
ties of the elements and their compounds. It was in 1875 that the
first of these predictions was fulfilled in the discovery of gallium by
Lecoq de Boisbaudran. This metal fell in the place which Mendeleeff
had given to eka-aluminum, and its specific gravity is 5.9, while 5.8 was
the figure which had been foretold. Four years later Nilson discovered
eka-boron, and gave to it the name scandium. In 1885 a new silver
mineral, argyrodite, was found in the Freiberg mines, and every an-
alysis made of it showed a discrepancy of six or seven per cent. This
soon led to the recognition by the analyst, Clemens Winkler, of the
presence of a new element, and it further appeared that this new ele-
ment was Mendeleeff's eka-silicon. Not to be outdone by the French
and Swedish chemists, Winkler patriotically called the new metal ger-
manium. It is worth while to show side by side, a few of the predic-
tions of the properties of eka-silicon, published by Mendeleeff in 1872,
and the actual properties of germanium, as experimentally determined
by Winkler in 1886:

Eka-Silicon. Symbol, Es. Germanium. Symbol, Ge.

ELEMENT.

Atomic weight, 72. Atomic weight, 72.3.

Specific gravity, 5.5. Specific gravity, 5.469 at 20'.

OXID.

Formula, EsOz. Formula, GeOj-

Specific gravity, 4.7. Specific gravity, 4. 703 at 18°.

CHLOBID.

Formula, ESCI4. Formula, GeCl^.

Liquid, boiling a little below 100°. Liquid, boiling at 86°.

Specific gravity, 1.9 at 0°. Specific gravity, 1.887 at 18°.

MKTALLO-ORGANIC COMPOUND.

Formula, Es (C2Hb)4. Formula, Ge (CisHb)4.

Liquid, boiling point, 160°. Liquid, boiling point, 160°.

Specific gravity, 0.96. Specific gravity, slightly leas than

water (which is 1.0).

So close is this agreement that it is difficult to realize that Men-
deleeff's forecasts were put in print more than a decade before the
element had ever been handled by man.

Since the corrected form of Mendeleeff's table was published in
1871, there has been no end to the speculation upon the subject, and
dozens of tables, emphasizing different relations of the elements, have
been proposed. Few of these have equaled that of tlic Russian chemist
in simplicity or have as few obscure points. One of these tables, sug-
gested a few years ago by Dr. F. P. Venable, of the University of North
Carolina, may be noticed as presenting some decided advantages over
that of Mendeleeff:

THE PERIODIC LAW.

VRNABLE'S TABLE. 1895. (SLIGHTLY MODIFIED.)

163

H

He?

Li

Gl

Na

Cu

B

Mg

Rb

Cs

/

Al

Sr

Ag

Ba

Au

zA

Cd

La

Hg

ok

In

C

Ce

Tl

Th

Pb

N

O

F

Ne?

Cb

Ta

Sb

A

Mo

W

Bi

U

Se
Te

CI

Ar?

Mn

Br

Fe

Ru

Os

Co
Rh

Ir

Ni

Pd

Pt

* t Possible elements, now unknown.

Eka-Manganese .

Most tables present a difficulty in that they place sodium in the
group or sub-group with copper, silver and gold, while it would most
naturally fall in the group with lithium, potassium, rubidium and
cesium. So magnesium would be placed according to its properties,
not so closely with zinc and cadmium, as with glucinum, calcium, stron-
tium and barium. Fluorin belongs rather with chlorin, bromin and
iodin than with manganese, the metal with which it is associated in
most tables. So oxygen belongs with sulfur, selenium and tellurium,
rather than with chromium and molybdenum. This is remedied in
Yenable's table. The first element in any group the author calls
the group element or bridge element; for it often possesses properties
which ally it to the elements of the next groups. The second element
he calls the type element, and in this is, as it were, shadowed forth
the character of the succeeding elements of the same group. From this
point on, the group is divided into two series, one more and the other
less electro-positive or negative, as the case may be. The first three
groups are for the most part made up of electro-positive elements, while
those of the fifth, sixth and seventh groups are relatively electro-
negative. Now in the former the elements of the more positive series
resemble the type element of their group more strongly than those of
the less positive series. In the relatively negative fifth, sixth and
seventh groups, the reverse is the case. This grouping thus places
sodium with potassium and chlorin with bromin. In the fourth group,

i64 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

which lies between the extremes, the type element, silicon, foreshadows
the members of its two series to an approximately equal extent.

As the tables which graphically portray the Periodic Law stand
to-day, there is much which still remains to be cleared up. At the very
outset we are met by the fact that we cannot tell in which group as
familiar an element as hydrogen ought to be placed. It generally re-
ceives the first place in group one, but to some extent at least this
position is based upon a misapprehension. Some years ago Pictet, of
Geneva, was engaged in that work on the condensation and liquefaction
of gases, which has rendered his name famous. On compressing hydro-
gen at a very low temperature, he obtained, on suddenly reducing the
pressure, some heavy, steel-blue drops, much resembling mercury. This
was erroneously supposed to be hydrogen in the liquid form. As a
result, it seemed only natural to classify hydrogen with the metallic
elements of the first group. Not only have later investigations shown
that these drops were not liquid hydrogen, but quite recently Dewar
has actually obtained this substance, which proves to be a colorless,
limpid liquid, with the extraordinarily low specific gravity of about 0.07.
As far then as physical properties go, there is no justification in classify-
ing hydrogen with the metals of group one. Chemically, however,
hydrogen is like the metals, electro-positive, though very weakly so,
and it is possible that its position in the first group is less awkward than
would be any other.

Of the other elements in the table with atomic weight below 100,
all seem fairly well placed, though we have not as much knowledge of
scandium as we could wish, and there is a difficulty that we shall soon
notice in the eighth group. The first apparent blank space in the table
is for an element with atomic weight of about 100. Such an element
would be known as eka-manganese, and would possess properties which
would to a considerable extent resemble those of manganese, but per-
haps more closely those of ruthenium. Beyond this in the table we find
many gaps, partly from the inadequacy of our chemical knowledge and
partly from the likelihood that there exist rare elements which have
not yet been discovered. Such elements probably occur in extremely
small quantities, and may, for many years, perhaps forever, elude
chemists. It seems improbable that there are undiscovered elements
which exist in more than very small quantities; this is the testimony,
not only of the chemical laboratory, but also of the spectroscope, that in-
strument which reveals to us the composition, not merely of substances
in the laboratory, but also that of the sun and of the distant stars.
From barium to tantalum few elements are known to which a definite
place can be assigned, but here there is an indefinitely large number
of what Crookes has called meta-clements, the rare earths. Their rela-

THE PERIODIC LAW. 165

tioii to the table is as yet hardly more than speculative, and they have
been likened to the asteroids of the solar system.

From tantalum to bismuth the table is very regular, except that the
element of the manganese series, which would have an atomic weight
of about 188, is unknown, as we have already seen is the case with eka-
manganese. Above bismuth, with its weight of 208, we know but two
elements, thorium, 831, and uranium, 240. Since the discovery of the
Rontgen rays, great interest has been excited by different kinds of ray3
which, though they may not be visible to the naked eye, are neverthe-
less capable of affecting the photogTaphic plate. The only elements,
as far as yet known, which yield such rays are these two of extraor-
dinarily high atomic weight, thorium and uranium. Closely connected
with this phenomenon is that of giving off luminous rays when not
exposed to light. It has recently been discovered that while uranium
can give off comparatively feeble rays, there is contained in the prin-
cipal uranium mineral, pitchblende, matter which is much more active
than uranium. Further investigation seems to show that there are at
least tliree such substances present in pitchblende; which have been
named radium (from the rays it gives off), polonium (from its dis-
coverer's native land), and actinium (from its ratio-activity). Of these
radium alone has been studied at all extensively, and even its claim to
be called a chemical element is by no means established. It strongly
resembles barium, but it gives off rays easily visible in the dark, con-
tinuing to shine indefinitely. There is much dou])t as to whether it be
not really a peculiar form of barium, but recent determinations of its
atomic weight, in a condition only partially purified, indicate that it has
a higher atomic weight than barium, and that it may in this respect
resemble thorium and uranium.

It may seem rather remarkable that, inasmuch as Dobereiner had
brought out the resemblances between elements of the same group in
his triads, nearly half a century should have elapsed before the essential
features of the Periodic Law were discovered. This is due, chiefly at
least, to three causes. First, there would have been many more gaps
in the table then than now, so many new elements having been dis-
covered since that day; second, the atomic weights of the elements were
then so imperfectly known that, using the weights then accepted, it is
impossible to construct a periodic table; the third great difficulty lay in
the fact that nine very important elements refused to be reduced to
order, and finally were excluded and relegated to an outlying group
of unique properties. These nine elements are iron, cobalt, nickel and
the so-called platinum metals, platinum, palladium, iridium, rhodium,
osmium and ruthenium. As a matter of fact, these nine metals cannot
be brought into any of the seven regular groups, but must be placed
by themselves in a single group of three series, or in three groups. Thia

i66 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

eighth group proves to be transitional between group seven and group
one; iron, cobalt and nickel make a direct gradation from manganeee
to copper; ruthenium, rhodium and palladium, from molybdenum to
silver; osmium, iridium and platinum, from tungsten to gold. Not
only do these three triplets stand between these other elements in
atomic weight, but their properties also show a similar gradation.

While now we have these transitional elements, the question might
very naturally arise whether there are similar transitional elements
from fluorin to sodium and from chlorin to potassium. The case here
is, however, somewhat different from the former one. Manganese and
copper are both metals, and not so widely separated in properties; the
transitional elements, iron, cobalt and nickel, partake of the nature of
both extremes, and the transition seems a natural one. Hardly any
elements can be more unlike than fluorin and sodium, or chlorin and
potassium. Chlorin is very electro-negative, potassium as strongly
electro-positive. A transitional element would thus probably be inert,
that is, lacking in both electro-positiveness and in electro-negativeness,
and up to a few years ago such an element could hardly have been
conceived of. At that time Lord Ea)^leigh was engaged in determining
with all possible accuracy the density of nitrogen. In this work he
prepared nitrogen by several different methods. Some specimens were
obtained by the decomposition of chemical compounds, such as urea
and ammonium nitrite, others from the air by removing the oxygen.
To his surprise. Lord Eayleigh found that in every case the nitrogen
obtained from the atmosphere was slightly heavier than that prepared
from chemical compounds. In searching for the cause of this differ-
ence. Lord Eayleigh and Professor Eamsay, who had been associated
with him in this work, found that there is present in the atmosphere
a new gas, much like nitrogen in its properties, whose existence,
although it is present to the extent of nearly one per cent, had been
unsuspected. This gas, christened argon from its inertness, is nearly
three times as heavy as nitrogen, and it is this that increases the weight
of atmospheric nitrogen slightly above the weight of pure nitrogen,
obtained from chemical compounds. Stimulated by this discovery it
was not long before Eamsay had isolated from the atmosphere at least
two other gases, both characterized by an inertness similar to that of
argon. These are helium, whose spectrum had long been known from
the fact that this gas is plentiful in the corona of the sun, and neon. It
is probable that there are several other similar gases in the atmosphere,
and one, xenon, has been recently isolated by Eamsay. It is not
uninteresting to note that argon had been in the hands of chemists
from the time of Cavendish down, but all had supposed it to be nitro-
gen. Under the influence of the electric spark oxygen and nitrogen
may be made to combine with each other. In Cavendish's experiment

THE PEEIODIC LAW. 167

the spark was passed through the air, which consists chiefly of a mix-
ture of nitrogen and oxygen, and the resultant oxid of nitrogen was
absorbed in caustic potash. More oxygen was added from time to time
until the last of the nitrogen was used up. Now Cavendish noticed,
as have many chemists since his day, that it was always impossible to re-
move all the nitrogen; in every case about one per cent, of gas remained.
There is no record that any one ever suspected that this residue was
not nitrogen; such is, however, the fact, and the gases, argon, helium
and, perhaps, others are present. These can be best recognized by
passing an electric spark through the rarefied gas and examining the
spectrum. It seems now very strange to us that an element so abundant
that an ordinary sized room contains no less than a thousand liters
should have so long escaped discovery. The reason is not far to seek.
Argon and its congeners are distinguished by a most remarkable ex-
hibition of properties, in that they have apparently no chemical affinity,
and no compounds of them are known. From this fact it has been
argued by some that these gases cannot be considered chemical ele-
ments, for all elements hitherto known do form compounds with other
elements. It is, however, a curious fact that in the periodic table we
find, in the eighth group, place for several just such elements, as we
have seen, without affinity, and neither positive nor negative in electro-
chemical character. It may well be that helium, neon, argon and
xenon belong in these vacant spaces.

If this be the case, there is still a difficulty which confronts us, and
this is that argon possesses an atomic weight slightly higher than the
next element in order, potassium, instead of lower. This would not,
however, be a unique instance of such a difficulty in the table. It was
formerly thought that the two metals, nickel and cobalt, had identical
atomic weights, and though the salts of nickel are generally green, and
those of cobalt red, in other respects these metals and their com-
pounds are very much alike. After the discovery of the Periodic Law,
when it was seen that cobalt belonged in the second series of the
eighth group and nickel in the third, it was supposed that further study
would necessarily show nickel to have an appreciably higher atomic
weight than cobalt. We have already seen that in this same group,
before the appearance of the periodic table, the accepted atomic weights
of osmium, iridium and platinum were incorrect, and it was the
fact of their mis-arrangement in the table which caused Seubert to
revise their weights. Very much labor has been spent upon the re-
vision of the atomic Aveights of nickel and cobalt. Gerhardt Kriiss
supposed he had found a new and heavier metal, hitherto unknown,
in ordinary cobalt, and that this caused the atomic weight to be esti-
mated too high. He called the new metal gnomium, but it was soon
shown that gnomium has no real existence. The more accurate the

i68 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

determinations, the more probable it seemed that in reality cobalt, and
not nickel, as demanded by theory, has the greater weight. The whole
subject has been very carefully investigated in the last few years by
Prof. Theodore W. Eichards at Harvard University, and there seems
now to be no doubt but that Nature has unexpectedly and inexplicably
reversed the position of these elements.

Another instance that seems to be of the same nature is that as far
as the most accurate determinations go, tellurium has an atomic weight
greater than that of iodin, instead of less. At present it is impossible
to explain these abnormalities, but they assure us of the possibility that
argon may have a higher atomic weight than potassium, and yet belong
to the eighth group.

What now is the present position of the philosophy of matter from
the light thrown upon it by the Periodic Law? In the first place, draw-
ing our deduction from the marvelously accurate determinations of.
the relative weights of the atoms of the different elements, to which
chemists have been incited by the Periodic Law, it may be considered
as absolutely settled that the elements are not groups of hydrogen
atoms, nor are they composed of half or quarter hydrogen atoms. As
enunciated by Prout, the hypothesis which goes by his name may be
considered as finally proved untenable; the atomic weights are not
multiples of the weight of the hydrogen atom, nor any simple fraction
thereof. But while this is the case, it is perfectly clear from the
Periodic Law that the properties of an atom are a periodic function of
its atomic weight. It would seem that this can be true only if the
material of which all atoms are made is the same. This does not
necessarily mean that there is but one kind of matter, and that all
atoms are merely different quantities of this 'urstoff.' There may be
several kinds of matter, and different kinds of atoms may represent
varying proportions of a few constituents.

There have been many attempts to reduce the Periodic Law to
mathematics, in order to find a numerical value for the function which
expresses the relation between atomic weight and an element's place
in the series. Such efforts have been thus far wholly unsuccessful. It
is by no means impossible that such relations will be found in the
future, but at present the atomic weights of comparatively few ele-
ments have been determined with great accuracy. When this work
has been extended to a greater number of elements, and when the
position of the rare elements and of the inert atmospheric gases haa
been definitely settled, we may hope for more light upon the principles
underlying the Periodic Law.

At present this law occupies much the same position as two other
great generalizations of natural science. The fact of gravitation was
long ago discovered. The laws by which it acts are well known, and

THE PERIODIC LAW. 169

yet the cause of gravitation is even to-day a mere speculation, and no
link has yet been discovered to connect the three phases of attraction,
gravitation between masses, cohesion and adhesion between molecules,
and chemical affinity between atoms. The fact of evolution is univer-
sally recognized, much is known and more is a matter of speculation as
to how and why evolution has taken place, but why an organism tends
to resemble its progenitor and why it tends to vary are as unknown as
before the days of Darwin and \Yallace. So the Periodic Law is, after
all, a mere statement of fact. But it is a statement which has already
exerted vipon chemistry an influence as great as that of gravitation
and evolution in their respective fields, and is destined more and more
to become the very foundation of chemistry. We may hope and con-
fidently expect that it will eventually lead us to the real constitution
of matter.

170 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

A PLEA FOE PUEE SCIENCE.*

By the late Pkofessor HENRY A. ROWLAND,

JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY.

^f^HE question is sometimes asked us as to the time of year we like
-L the best. To my mind, the spring is the most delightful; for
nature then recovers from the apathy of winter, and stirs herself to
renewed life. The leaves grow, and the buds open, with ^ suggestion
of vigor delightful to behold; and we revel in this ever-renewed life of
nature. But this cannot always last. The leaves reach their limit; the
buds open to the full, and pass away. Then we begin to ask ourselves
whether all this display has been in vain, or whether it has led to a
bountiful harvest.

So this magnificent country of ours has rivalled the vigor of spring
in its growth. Forests have been levelled, and cities built, and a large
and powerful nation has been created on the face of the earth. We
are proud of our advancement. We are proud of such cities as this,
founded in a day upon a spot over which, but a few years since, the red
man hunted the buffalo. But Ave must remember that this is only the
spring of our country. Our glance must not be backward; for how-
ever beautiful leaves and blossoms are, and however marvelous their
rapid increase, they are but leaves and blossoms after all. Eather
should we look forward to discover what will be the outcome of all
this, and what the chance of harvest. For if we do this in time, we
may discover the worm which threatens the ripe fruit, or the barren
spot where the harvest is withering for want of water.

I am required to address the so-called physical section of this
association. Fain w^ould I speak pleasant words to you on this subject;
fain would I recount to you the progress made in this subject by my
countrymen and their noble efforts to understand the order of the
universe. But I go out to gather the grain ripe to the harvest, and I
find only tares. Here and there a noble head of gi-ain rises above the
weeds; but so few are they, that I find the majority of my countrymen

* This address by Prof. H. A. Eowland, whose recent death all men of science
deplore, Avas given before the .Section of Physics of the American Asso-
ciation for the Advancement of Science in 1883. It is here republished as a
tribute to his memory, demonstrating as it does his keen intellect and strong
personality. While tlie state of American science in 1883 was scarcely as back-
ward as might be supposed from reading this address, there has certainly been
a remarkable advance in the past eighteen years. In this advance Rowland
was one of the great leaders. — Editor.

A PLEA FOR PURE SCIENCE. 171

know them not, but think that they have a waving harvest, vvliile it is
only one of weeds after all. American science* is a thing of the future,
and not of the present or past; and the proper course of one in my
position is to consider what must be done to create a science of physics
in this country rather than to call telegraphs, electric lights and such
conveniences by the name of science. I do not wish to underrate the
value of all these things: the progress of the world de])ends on them,
and he is to be honored who cultivates them successfully. So also the
cook who invents a new and palatable dish for the table benefits the
world to a certain degree; yet we do not dignify him by the name of a
chemist. And yet it is not an uncommon thing, especially in American
newspapers, to have the applications of science confounded with pure
science; and some obscure American wiio steals the ideas of some great
mind of the past, and enriches himself by the application of the same
to domestic uses, is often lauded above the great originator of the idea,
who might have worked out hundreds of such applications, had his
mind possessed the necessary element of vulgarity. I have often been
asked, which w^as the more important to the world, pure or applied
science. To have the applications of a science, the science itself must
exist. Should we stop its progress, and attend only to its applications,
we should soon degenerate into a people like the Chinese, who have
made no progress for generations, because they have been satisfied with
the applications of science, and have never sought for reasons in what
they have done. The reasons constitute pure science. They have
known the application of gunpowder for centuries; and yet the reasons
for its peculiar action, if sought in the proper manner, would have
developed the science of chemistry, and even of physics, with all their
numerous applications. By contenting themselves with the fact that
gunpowder will explode, and seeking no farther, they have fallen be-
hind in the progress of the world; and we now regard this oldest and
most numerous of nations as only barbarians. And yet our own country
is in this same state. But we have done better; for we have taken the
science of the old world, and applied it to all our uses, accepting it like
the rain of heaven, without asking whence it came, or even acknowl-
edging the debt of gratitude we owe to the great and unselfish workers
who have given it to us. And, like the rain of heaven, this pure
science has fallen upon our country, and made it great and rich and
strong.

To a civilized nation of the present day, the applications of science
are a necessity; and our country has hitherto succeeded in this line,
only for the reason that there are certain countries in the world where

* In using the word 'science,' I refer to physical science, as I know nothing
of natural science. Probably my remarks will, however, apply to both, but I do
not know.

172 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

pure science has been and is cultivated, and where the study of nature
is considered a noble pursuit. But such countries are rare, and those
who wish to pursue pure science in our own country must be prepared
to face public opinion in a manner which requires much moral courage.
They must be prepared to be looked down upon by every successful
inventor whose shallow mind imagines that the only pursuit of man-
kind is wealth, and that he who obtains most has best succeeded in
this world. Everybody can comprehend a million of money; but how
few can comprehend any advance in scientific theory, especially in its
more abstruse portions! And this, I believe, is one of the causes of the
smnll number of persons who have ever devoted themselves to work of
the higher order in any human pursuit. Man is a gregarious animal,
and depends very much, for his happiness, on the sympathy of those
around him; and it is rare to find one with the courage to pursue his
own ideals in spite of his surroundings. In times past, men were more
isolated than at present, and each came in contact with a fewer number
of people. Hence that time constitutes the period when the great
sculptures, paintings and poems were produced. Each man's mind was
comparatively free to follow its own ideals, and the results were the
great and unique works of the ancient masters. To-day the railroad
and the telegraph, the books and newspapers, have imited each indi-
vidual man with the rest of the world: instead of his mind being an
individual, a thing apart by itself, and unique, it has become so influ-
enced by the outer world, and so dependent upon it, that it has lost
its originality to a great extent. The man who in times past would
naturally have been in the lowest depths of poverty, mentally and phys-
ically, to-day measures tape behind a counter, and with lordly air
advises the naturally born genius how he may best bring his outward
appearance down to a level with his own. A new idea he never had,
but he can at least cover his mental nakedness with ideas imbibed
from others. So the genius of the past soon perceives that his higher
ideas are too high to be appreciated by the world: his mind is clipped
down to the standard form; every natural ofl'shoot upward is repressed,
until the man is no higher than his fellows. Hence the world, through
the abundance of its intercourse, is reduced to a level. What was
formerly a grand and magnificent landscape, with mountains ascending
above the clouds, and depths whose gloom we cannot now appreciate,
has become serene and peaceful. The depths have been filled, and
the heights levelled, and the wavy harvests and smoky factories cover
the landscape.

As far as the average man is concerned, the change is for the better.
The. average life of man is far pleasantcr, and his mental condition
better than before. But we miss the vigor imparted by the mountains,
We are tired of mediocrity, the curse of our country. We are tired of

A PLEA FOR PURE SCIENCE. 173

Bccing our artists reduced to hirelings, and imploring Congress to
protect them against foreign competition. We are tired of seeing our
countrymen take their science from abroad, and boast that they Jicre
convert it into wealth. We are tired of seeing our professors degrading
their chairs by the pursuit of applied science instead of pure science;
or sitting inactive while the whole world is oj3en to investigation; linger-
ing by the wayside while the problem of the universe remains unsolved.
We wish for something higher and nobler in this country of mediocrity,
for a mountain to relieve the landscape of its monotony. We are
surrounded with mysteries, and have been created with minds to enjoy
and reason to aid in the unfolding of such mysteries. Nature calls to
us to study her, and our better feelings urge iis in the same direction.

For generations there have been some few students of science who
have esteemed the study of nature the most noble of pursuits. Some have
been wealthy, and some poor; but they have all had one thing in com-
mon— the love of nature and its laws. To these few men the world
owes all the progress due to applied science, and yet very few ever
received any payment in this world for their labors.

Faraday, the great discoverer of the principle on which all machines
for electric lighting, electric railways and the transmission of p«wer
must rest, died a poor man, although others and the whole world liave
been enriched by his discoveries. And such must be the fate of the
followers in his footsteps for some time to come.

But there will be those in the future who will study nature from
pure love, and for them higher prizes than any yet obtained are waiting.
We have but yet commenced our pursuit of science, and stand upon the
threshold wondering what there is within. We explain the motion of
th€ planets by the law of gravitation; but who will explain how two
bodies, millions of miles apart, tend to go toward each other with a
certain force?

We now weigh and measure electricity and electric currents with
as much ease as ordinary matter, yet have we made any approach to an
explanation of the phenomenon of electricity? Light is an undulatory
motion, and yet do we know what it is that undulates? Heat is mo-
tion, yet do we know what it is that moves? Ordinary matter is a
common substance, and yet who shall fathom the mystery of its internal
constitution?

There is room for all in the work, and the race has but commenced.
The problems are not to be solved in a moment, but need the best work
of the best minds, for an indefinite time.

Shall our country be contented to stand by, while other countries
lead in the race? Shall we always grovel in the dust, and pick up the
crumbs which fall from the rich man's table, considering ourselves
richer than he because we have more crunabs, while we forget that he

174 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

has the cake, which is the source of all crumbs? Shall we be swine,
to whom the corn and husks are of more value than the pearls? If I
read, aright, the signs of the times, I think we shall not always be con-
tented with our inferior position. From looking down we have become
almost blind, but may recover. In a new country, the necessities of life
must be attended to first. The curse of Adam is upon us all, and we
must earn our bread.

But it is the mission of applied science to render this easier for the
whole world. There is a story which I once read that will illustrate
the true position of applied science in the world. A boy, more fond
of reading than of work, was employed, in the early days of the steam
engine, to turn the valve at every stroke. Necessity was the mother
of invention in his case: his reading was disturbed by his work, and
he soon discovered that he might become free from his work by so
tying the valve to some movable portion of the engine, as to make it
move its own valve. So I consider that the true pursuit of mankind
is intellectual. The scientific study of nature in all its branches, of
mathematics, of mankind in its past and present, the pursuit of art,
and the cultivation of all that is great and noble in the world — these
are the highest occupation of mankind. Commerce, the applications
of science, the accumulation of wealth, are necessities which are a curse
to those with high ideals, but a blessing to that portion of the world
which has neither the ability nor the taste for higher pursuits.

As the applications of science multiply, living becomes easier, the
wealth necessary for the purchase of apparatus can better be obtained,
and the pursuit of other things beside the necessities of life becomes
possible.

But the moral qualities must also be cultivated in proportion to the
wealth of the country, before much can be done in pure science. The
successful sculptor or painter naturally attains to wealth through the
legitimate work of his profession. The novelist, the poet, the musician,
all have wealth before them as the end of a successful career. But the
scientist and the mathematician have no such incentive to work, they
must earn their living by other pursuits, usually teaching, and only
devote their surplus time to the true pursuit of their science. And
frequently, by the small salary which they receive, by the lack of instru-
mental and literary facilities, by the mental atmosphere in which they
exist, and, most of all, by their low ideals of life, they are led to devote
their surplus time to applied science or to other means of increasing
their fortime. How shall we, then, honor the few, the very few, who,
in spite of all difficulties, have kept tlieir eyes fixed on the goal, and
have steadily worked for pure science, giving to the world a most
precious donation, which has borne fruit in our greater knowledge of
the universe and in the applications to our physical life which have

A PLEA FOR PURE SCIENCE. 175

enriched thousands and benefited each one of us? There arc also
those who have every facility for the pursuit of science, who have
an ample salary and every appliance for work, yet who devote them-
selves to commercial work, to testifying in courts of law, and to any
other work to increase their present large income. Such men would be
respectable if they gave up the name of professor, and took that of
consulting chemists or physicists. And such men are needed in the
community. But for a man to occupy the professor's chair in a promi-
nent college, and, by his energy and ability in the commercial applica-
tions of his science, stand before the local community in a prominent
manner, and become the newspaper exponent of his science, is a dis-
grace both to him and his college. It is the death-blow to science in
that region. Call him by his proper name, and he becomes at once a
useful member of the community. Put in his place a man who shall
by precept and example cultivate his science, and how different is the
result! Young men, looking forward into the world for something
to do, see before them this high and noble life, and they see that there
is something more honorable than the accumulation of wealth. They
are thus led to devote their lives to similar pursuits, and they honor
the professor who has drawn them to something higher than they might
otherwise have aspired to reach.

I do not wish to be misunderstood in this matter. It is no dis-
grace to make money by an invention, or otherwise, or to do com-
mercial scientific work under some circumstances. But let pure science
be the aim of those in the chairs of professors, and so prominently
the aim that there can be no mistake. If our aim in life is wealth, let
us honestly engage in commercial pursuits, and compete with others
for its possession. But if we choose a life which we consider higher,
let us live up to it, taking wealth or poverty as it may chance to come
to us, but letting neither turn us aside from our pursuit.

The work of teaching may absorb the energies of many; and, indeed,
this is the excuse given by most for not doing any scientific work. But
there is an old saying, that where there is a will there is a way. Few
professors do as much teaching or lecturing as the German professors,
who are also noted for their elaborate papers in the scientific Journals.
I myself have been burdened down with work, and know what it is;
and yet I here assert that all can find time for scientific research if they
desire it. But here, again, that curse of our country, mediocrity, is
upon us. Our colleges and universities seldom call for first-class men
of reputation, and I have even heard the trustee of a well-lcno^Ti col-
lege assert that no professor should engage in research because of the
time wasted! I was glad to see, soon after, by the call of a prominent
scientist to that college, that the majority of the trustees did not
agree with him.

176 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

That teaching is important, goes without saying. A successful
teacher is to be respected; but if he does not lead his scholars to that
which is highest, is he not blameworthy? We are, then, to look to the
colleges and universities of the land for most of the work in pure
science which is done. Let us, therefore, examine these latter and see
what the prospect is.

One, whom perhaps we may here style a practical follower of Ruskin,
has stated that while in this country he was variously designated by
the title of captain, colonel and professor. The story may or may not
be true, but we all know enough of the customs of our countrymen not
to dispute it on general principles. All men are born equal: some men
are captains, colonels and professors, and, therefore, all men are such.
The logic is conclusive; and the same kind of logic seems to have been
applied to our schools, colleges and universities. I have before me
the report of the Commissioner of Education for 1880. According to
that report, there were 389,* or say, in round numbers, 400 institutions,
calling themselves colleges or universities, in our country! We may
well exclaim that ours is a great country, having more than the whole
werld beside. The fact is sufficient. The whole earth would hardly
support such a number of first-class institutions. The curse of medi-
ocrity must be upon them, to swarm in such numbers. They must be
a cloud of mosquitoes, instead of eagles as they profess. And this
becomes evident on further analysis. About one-third aspire to the
name of university; and I note one called by that name which has
two professors and eighteen students, and another having three teach-
ers and twelve students! And these instances are not unique, for the
number of small institutions and schools which call themselves uni-
versities is very great. It is difficult to decide from the statistics alone
the exact standing of these institutions. The extremes are easy to
manage. Who can doubt that an institution with over 800 students,
and a faculty of seventy, is of a higher grade than those above cited
having ten or twenty students and two or three in the faculty? Yet
this is not always true; for I note one institution with over 500 students
which is known to me personally as of the grade of a high school. The
statistics are more or less defective, and it would much weaken the
force of my remarks if I went too much into detail. I append the
following tables, however, of 330 so-called colleges and universities:

218 had from 0 to 100 students.

88 " " 100 " 200

12 " " 200 " 300

6 " " 300 " 50O
6 over 500

• Three hundred and sixty-four reported on, and twenty-five not reported.

A PLEA FOR PURE SCIENCE. !77

' ■ Of 322 so-called colleges and universities:

206 liad 0 to 10 in llie faculty.
99 " 10 " 20
17 " 20 or over "

If <he statistics were fortliconiing — and possibly they may exist —
■we might also get an idea of the standing of these institutions and
tlieir approach to the true university idea, by the average age of the
scholars. Possibly also the ratio of number of scholars to teachers
might be of some help. All these methods give an approximation to
the present standing of the institutions. But there is another method
of attacking the problem, which is very exact, but it only gives us the
possibilities of which the institution is capable. I refer to the wealth
of the institution. In estimating the wealth, I have not included the
value of grounds and buildings, for this is of little importance, either
to the present or future standing of the institution. As good work
can be done in a hovel as in a palace. I have taken the productive
funds of the institution as the basis of estimate. I find:

234 have below $500,000

8 " between $500,000 and $1,000,000
8 " over $1,000,000

There is no fact more tirmly established, all over the world, than
that the higher education can never be made to pay for itself. Usually
the cost to a college, of educating a young man, very much exceeds
what he pays for it, and is often three or four times as much. The
higher the education, the greater this proportion will be; and a uni-
versity of the highest class should anticipate only a small accession to
its income from the fees of students. Hence the test I have applied
must give a true representation of the possibilities in every case. Ac-
cording to the figures, only sixteen colleges and universities have
$500,000 or over of invested funds, and only one-half of these have
$1,000,000 and over. Now, even the latter sum is a very small endow-
ment for a college; and to call any institution a university which has
less than $1,000,000, is to render it absurd in the face of the world.
And yet more than 100 of our institutions, many of them very respect-
able colleges, have abused the word 'university' in this manner. It is
to be hoped that the endowment of the more respectable of these
institutions may be increased, as many of them deserve it; and their
unfortunate appellation has probably been repented of long since.

But what shall we think of a community that gives the charter of a
university to an institution with a total of $20,000 endowment, tAvo
eo-called professors, and eighteen students! or another with three pro-
fessors, twelve students, and a total of $27,000 endowment, mostly

vol. LIX.— 12.

178 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

invested in bnildiugs! And yet there are ver}' many similar institu-
tions; there being sixteen with three professors or less, and very many
indeed with only four or five.

Such facts as these could only exist in a democratic country, where
pride is taken in reducing everything to a level. And I may also say
that it can only exist in the early days of such a democracy; for an
intelligent public will soon perceive that calling a thing by a wrong
name does not change its character, and that truth, above all things,
should be taught to the youth of the nation.

It may be urged that all these institutions are doing good work
in education; and that many young men are thus taught who could
not afford to go to a true college or university. But I do not object
to the education — though I have no doubt an investigation would dis-
close equal absurdities here — for it is aside from my object. But I
do object to lowering the ideals of the youth of the country. Let
them know that they are attending a school, and not a university;
and let them know that above them comes the college, and above that
the university. Let them be taught that they are only half-educated,
and that there are persons in the world by whose side they are but
atoms. Li other words, let them be taught the truth.

It may be that some small institutions are of high grade, especially
those which are new; but who can doubt that more than two-thirds
of our institutions calling themselves colleges and universities are
unworthy of the name? Each one of these institutions has so-called
professors, but it is evident that they can be onl}^ of the grade of
teachers. Why should they not be so called? The position of teacher
is an honored one, but is not made more honorable by the assumption
of a false title. Furthermore, the multiplication of the title, and the
ease with which it can be obtained, render it scarcely worth striving for.
When the man of energy, ability and perhaps genius is rewarded by
the same title and emokmients as the commonplace man with the
modicum of knowledge, who takes to teaching, not because of any
aptitude for his work, but possibly because he has not the energy to
compete with his fellow-men in business, then I say one of the induce-
ments for first-class men to become professors is gone.

When work and ability are required for the position, and when the
professor is expected to keep up M'^ith the progress of his subject, and
to do all in his power to advance it, and when he is selected for these
reasons, then the position will be worth working for, and the success-
ful competitor will be honored accordingly. The chivalric spirit which
prompted Faraday to devote his life to the study of nature may actuate
a few noble men to give their life to scientific work; but, if we wish to
cultivate this highest class of men in science, we must open a career
for them worthy of their efl'orts.

A PLEA FOR PURE SCIENCE. 179

Jenny Lind, with her beautiful voice, would have cultivated it
to some extent in her native village; yet who would expect her to travel
over the world, and give concerts for nothing? and how would she have
been able to do so if she had wished? And so the scientific man,
whatever his natural talents, must have instruments and a library, and
a suitable and respectable salary to live upon, before he is able to
exert himself to his full capacity. This is true of advance in all the
higher departments of human learning, and yet something more is
necessary. It is not those in this country who receive the largest
salary, and have positions in the richest colleges, who have advanced
their subject the most: men receiving the highest salaries, and occupy-
ing the professors chair, are to-day doing absolutely nothing in pure
science, but are striving by the commercial applications of their science
to increase their already large salary. Such pursuits, as I have said
before, are honorable in their proper place; but the duty of a professor
is to advance his science, and to set an example of pure and true devo-
tion to it which shall demonstrate to his students and the world that
there is something high and noble worth living for. Money-changers
are often respectable men, and yet they were once severely rebuked for
carrying on their trade in the court of the temple.

Wealth does not constitute a university, buildings do not: it is the
men who constitute its faculty, and the students who learn from them.
It is the last and highest step which the mere student takes. He
goes forth into the world, and the height to which he rises has been
influenced by the ideals which he has consciously or unconsciously im-
bibed in his university. If the professors under whom he has studied
have been high in their profession, and have themselves had high
ideals; if they have considered the advance of their particular subject
their highest work in life, and are themselves honored for their intellect
throughout the world — the student is drawn toward that which is
highest, and ever after in life has high ideals. But if the student is
taught by what are sometimes called good teachers, and teachers only,
who know little more than the student, and who are often surpassed
and even despised by him, no one can doubt the lowered tone of his
mind. He finds that by his feeble efforts he can surpass one to whom
a university has given its highest honor and he begins to think that he
himself is a born genius, and the incentive to work is gone. He is
great by the side of the molehill, and does not know any mountain
to compare himself with.

A university should not only have great men in its faculty, but have
nimierous minor professors and assistants of all kinds, and should
encourage the highest work, if for no other reason than to encourage
the student to his highest efforts.

But, assuming that the professor has high ideals, wealth such as

i8o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

only a lai'ge and high university can command, is necessary to allow
him the fullest development.

And this is specially so in our science of physics. In the early days
of physics and chemistry, many of the fundamental experiments could
be performed with the simplest apparatus. And so we often find the
names of Wollaston and Faraday mentioned as needing scarcely any-
thing for their researches. Much can even now he done with the sim-
plest apparatus; and nobody, except the utterly incompetent, need
stop for want of it. But the fact remains that one can only be free
to investigate in all departments of chemistry and physics, when he
not only has a complete laboratory at his command, but a friend to
draw on for the expenses of each experiment. That simplest of the
departments of physics, namely, astronomy, has now reached such per-
fection that nobody can expect to do much more in it without a per-
fectly equipped observatory; and even this would be useless without an
income sufficient to employ a corps of assistants to make the observa-
tions and computations. But even in this simplest of physical sub-
jects, there is great misunderstanding. Our country has very many
excellent observatories: and yet little work is done in comparison,
because no provision has been made for maintaining the work of the
observatory; and the wealth which, if concentrated, might have made
one effective observatory which would prove a benefit to astronomical
science, when scattered among a half-dozen, merely furnishes tele-
scopes for the people in the surrounding region to view the moon with.
And here I strike the keynote of at least one need of our country, if
she would stand well in science; and the following item which I clip
from a newspaper will illustrate the matter:

"The eccentric old Canadian, Arunah Huntington, who left $300,-
000 to be divided among the public schools of Vermont, has done some-
thing which will be of little practical value to the schools. Each dis-
trict will be entitled to the insignificant sum of $10, which will not
advance much the cause of education."

Nobody will dispute the folly of such a bequest, or the folly of
filling the country with telescopes to look at the moon, and calling
them observatories. How much better to concentrate the wealth into a
few parcels, and make first-class observatories and institutions with it!

Is it possible that any of our four hundred colleges and universities
have love enough of learning to unite with each other and form larger
institutions? Is it possible that any have such a love of truth that
they are willing to be called by their right name? I fear not; for the
epirit of expectation, which is analogous to the spirit of gambling, is
strong in the American breast, and each institution which now, except
in name, slumbers in obscurity, expects in time to bloom out into full
prosperity. Although many of them are under religious influence,

A PLEA FOR PURE SCIENCE. i8r

where truth is inculcated, and where men are taught to take a low seat
at the table in order that they may be honored by being called up
higher, and not dishonored by being thrust down lower, yet these insti-
tutions have thrust themselves into the highest seats, and cannot prob-
ably be dislodged.

But would it not be possible to so change public opinion that no
college could be founded with a less endowment than say $1,000,000,
or no university with less than three or four times that amount? From
the report of the Commissioner of Education I learn that such a change
is taking place; that the tendency towards large institutions is increas-
ing, and that it is principally in the West and Southwest that the
multiplication of small institutions with big names is to be feared
most, and that the East is almost ready for the great coming university.

The total wealth of the four hundred colleges and universities in
1880 was about $40,000,000 in buildings and $43,000,000 in produc-
tive funds. This would be sufficient for one great university of $10,-
000,000, four of $5,000,000, and twenty-six colleges of $2,000,000 each.
But such an idea can of course never be carried out. Government
appropriations are out of the question, because no political trickery
must be allowed around the ideal institution.

In the year 1880 the private bequests to all schools and colleges
amounted to about $5,500,000; and, although there was one bequest
of $1,250,000, yet the amount does not appear to be phenomenal. It
would thus seem that the total amount was about five million dollars
in one year, of which more than half is given to so-called colleges and
universities. It would be very difficult to regulate these bequests so
that they might be concentrated sufficiently to produce an immediate
result. But the figures show that generosity is a prominent feature of
the American people, and that the needs of the country only have to
be appreciated to have the funds forthcoming. We must make the
need of research and of pure science felt in the country. We must live
such lives of pure devotion to our science, that all shall see that we
ask for money, not that we may live in indolent ease at the expense
of charity, but that we may work for that which has advanced and
will advance the world more than any other subject, both intellectually
and physically. We must live such lives as to neutralize the influence
of those who in high places have degraded their profession, or have
given themselves over to ease, and do nothing for the science which
they represent. Let us do what we can with the present means at
our disposal. There is not one of us who is situated in the position
best adapted to bring out all his powers, and to allow him to do most
for his science. All have their difficulties, and I do not think that
circumstances will ever radically change a man. If a man has the
instinct of research in him, it will always show itself in some form.

1 82 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

But ciremnstanees may direct it into new paths, or may foster it so
that what would otherwise have died as a bud now blossoms and ripens
into the perfect fruit.

Americans have shown no lack of invention in small things; and
the same spirit, when united to knowledge and love of science, becomes
the spirit of research. The telegraph-operator, with his limited knowl-
edge of electricity and its laws, naturally turns his attention to the
improvement of the only electrical instrument he knows anything
about; and his researches would be confined to the limited sphere of
his knowledge, and to the simple laws with which he is acquainted.
But as his knowledge increases, and the field broadens before him, as
he studies the mathematical theory of the subject, and the electro-
magnetic theory of light loses the dim haze due to distance, and be-
comes his constant companion, the telegraph-instrument becomes to
him a toy, and his efl^ort to discover something new becomes research
in pure science.

It is useless to attempt to advance science until one has mastered
the science: he must step to the front before his blows can tell in the
strife. Furthermore, I do not believe anybody can be thorough in any
department of science, without wishing to advance it. In the study
of what is known, in the reading of the scientific journals, and the
discussions therein contained of the current scientific questions, one
would obtain an impulse to work, even though it did not before exist.
And the same spirit which prompted him to seek what was already
known, would make him wish to know the unknown. And I may say
that I never met a case of thorough knowledge in my own science,
except in the case of well-known investigators. I have met men who
talked well, and I have sometimes asked myself why they did not do
something; but further knowledge of their character has shown me
the superficiality of their knowledge. I am no longer a believer in men
v/ho coidd do something if they would, or would do something if they
had a chance. They are impostors. If the true spirit is there, it will
show itself in spite of circumstances.

As I remarked before, the investigator in pure science is usually
a professor. He must teach as well as investigate. It is a question
which has been discussed in late years, as to whether these two func-
tions would better be combined in the same individual, or separated.
It seems to be the opinion of most that a certain amount of teaching
is conducive, rather than otherwise, to the spirit of research. I myself
think that this is true, and I should myself not like to give up my
daily lecture. But one must not be overburdened. I suppose that the
true solution, in many cases, would be found in the multiplication of
assistants, not only for the work of teaching but of research. Some
men are gifted with more ideas than they can work out with their own

.1 PLEA FOR PURE SCIENCE. 183

hands, and the workl is losing much hy not sup})lying them with extra
hands. Life is short: okl age comes quickly, and the amount one pair
of hands can do is very limited. What sort of shop would that he, or
what sort of factory, where one man had to do all the work .with his
own hands? It is a fact in nature, which no democracy can change,
that men are not equal — that some have hrains and some hands. And
no idle talk ahout equality can ever suhvert the order of the universe.

I know of no institution in this country where assistants are sup-
plied to aid directly in research. Yet why should it not be so? And
even the absence of assistant professors and assistants of all kinds, to
aid in teaching, is very noticeable, and nuist be remedied before we
can ex])ect much.

There are many physical problems, especially those requiring exact
measurements, which cannot be carried out by one man, and can only
be successfully attacked by the most elaborate apparatus, and with a
full corps of assistants. Such are Eegnault's experiments on the funda-
mental laws of gases and vapors, made thirty or forty years ago by aid
from the French Government, and which are the standards to this day.
Although these experiments were made with a view to the practical
calculation of the steam engine, yet they were carried out in such a
broad spirit that they have been of the greatest theoretical use. Again,
what woidd astronomy have done without the endowments of observa-
tories? By their means, that science has become the most perfect of all
branches of physics, as it should be from its simplicity. There is no
doubt, in my mind, that similar institutions for other branches of
physics, or, better, to include the wdiole of physics, would be equally
successful. A large and perfectly equipped physical laboratory with its
large revenues, its corps of professors and assistants, and its machine
sJiop for the construction of new apparatus, would be able to advance
our science quite as much as endowed observatories have astronomy.
But such a laboratory should not be founded rashly. The value will
depend entirely on the physicist at its head, who has to devise the plan,
and to start it into practical working. Such a man will always be rare,
and cannot always be obtained. After one had been successfully
started, others could follow; for imitation requires little brains.

One could not be certain of getting the proper man every time, but
the means of appointment should be most carefully studied so as to
secure a good average. There can be no doubt that the appointment
should rest with a scientific body capable of judging the highest work
of each candidate.

Should any popular element enter, the person chosen would be
either of the literary-scientific order, or the dabbler on the outskirts
who presents his small discoveries in the most theatrical manner. What

1 84 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

is required is a man of depth, who has such an insight into physical
science that he can tell when blows will best tell for its advancement.

Such a grand laboratory as I describe does not exist in the world,
at present, for the study of physics. But no trouble has ever been
found in obtaining means to endow astronomical science. Everybody
can appreciate, to some extent, the value of an observatory; as astron-
omy is the simplest of scientific subjects, and has very quickly reached
a position where elaborate instruments and costly computations are
necessary to further advance. The whole domain of physics is so wide
that workers have hitherto found enough to do. But it cannot always
be so, and the time has even now arrived when such a grand laboratory
should be founded. Shall our country take the lead in this matter,
or shall we wait for foreign countries to go before? They will be built
in the future, but when and how is the question.

Several institutions are now putting up laboratories for physics.
They are mostly for teaching, and we can expect only a comparatively
small amount of work from most of them. But they show progress;
and, if the progress be as quick in this direction as in others, we should
be able to see a great change before the end of our lives.

As stated before, men are influenced by the sympathy of those with
whom they come in contact. It is impossible to immediately change
public opinion in our favor; and, indeed, we must always seek to lead
it, and not be guided by it. For pure science is the pioneer that must
not hover about cities and civilized countries, but must strike into
unknown forests, and climb the hitherto inaccessible mountains which
lead to and command a view of the promised land — the land that
science promises us in the future; which shall not only flow with milk
and honey, but shall give us a better and more glorious idea of this
wonderful universe. We must create a public opinion in our favor,
but it need not be at first the general public. We must be contented
to stand aside, and see the honors of the world for a time given to our
inferiors; and must be better contented with the approval of our own
consciences, and of the very few who are capable of judging our work,
than of the whole world beside. Let us look to the other physicists,
not in our own town, not in our own country, but in the whole world,
for the words of praise which are to encourage us, or the words of
blame which are to stimulate us to renewed efi'ort. For what io us is
the praise of the ignorant? Let us join together in the bonds of our
scientific societies, and encourage each other, as we are now doing, in
the pursuit of our favorite study; knowing that the world will some time
recognize our services, and knowing, also, that we constitute the most
important element in human progress.

But danger is also near, even in our societies. When the average
tone of the society is low, when the highest honors are given to the

A PLEA FOR PURE SCIENCE. 185

mediocre, when third-class men are held up as examples, and when
trifling inventions are magnified into scientific discoveries, then the
influence of such societies is prejudicial. A young scientist attending
the meetings of such a society soon gets perverted ideas. To his mind,
a molehill is a mountain, and the mountain a molehill. The small
inventor or the local celehrity rises to a greater height, in his mind,
tliau the great leader of science in some foreign land. lie gauges
himself by the molehill, and is satisfied with his stature; not knowing
that he is but an atom in comparison with the mountain, until, perhaps,
in old age, when it is too late. But, if the size of the mountain had
been seen at first, the young scientist would at least haA''e been stimu-
lated in his endeavor to grow.

We cannot all be men of genius; but we can, at least, point them out
to tliose around us. We may not be able to benefit science much our-
selves; but we can have high ideals on the subject, and instil them into
those with whom we come in contact. For the good of ourselves, for
the good of our country, for the good to the world, it is incumbent on
us to form a true estimate of the worth and standing of persons and
things, and to set before our own minds all that is great and good and
noble, all that is most important for scientific advance, above the
mean and low and unimportant.

Tt is very often said that a man has a right to his opinion. This
might be true for a man on a desert island, wdiose error would influence
only himself. J^ut when he opens his lips to instruct others, or even
when he signifies his opinions by his daily life, then he is directly
responsible for all his errors of judgment or fact. He has no right
to think a molehill as big as a mountain, nor to teach it, any more
than he has to think the world flat, and teach that it is so. The facts
and laws of our science have not equal importance, neither have the
men who cultivate the science achieved equal results. One thing is
greater than another, and we have no right to neglect the order. Thus
shall our minds be guided aright, and our efforts be toward that which
is the highest.

Then shall we see that no physicist of the first class has ever existed
in this country, that we must look to other coimtries for our leaders in
that subject, and that the few excellent workers in our country must
receive many accessions from w'ithout before they can constitute an
American science, or do their share in the world's work.

But let me return to the subject of scientific societies. Plere Ameri-
can science has its hardest problem to contend with. There are very
many local societies dignified by high-sounding names, each having its
local celebrity, to whom the privilege of describing some crab with an
extra claw, which he found in his morning ramble, is inestimable.
And there are some academies of science, situated at our seats of learn-

1 86 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ing, which are doing good work in their locality. But distances are
so great that it is difficult to collect men together at any one point.
The American Association, which we are now attending, is not a sci-
entific academy, and does not profess to be more than a gathering of
all who are interested in science, to read papers and enjoy social inter-
course. The National Academy of Sciences contains eminent men
from the whole country, hut then it is only for the purpose of advising
the government freely on scientific matters. It has no building, it
has no library; and it publishes nothing except the information which
it freely gives to the government, which does nothing for it in return.
It has not had much effect directly on American science; but the
liberality of the government in the way of scientific expeditions, publi-
cations, etc., is at least partly due to its influence, and in this way it
has done much good. But it in no way takes the place of the great
Eoyal Society, or the great academies of science at Paris, Berlin,
Vienna, St. Petersburg, Munich, and, indeed, all the European capi-
tals and large cities. These, by their publications, give to the young
student, as well as the more advanced physicist, models of all that is
considered excellent; and to become a member is one of the highest
honors to which he can aspire, while to write a memoir which the
academy considers worthy to be published in its transactions excites
each one to his highest effort.

The American Academy of Sciences in Boston is perhaps our near-
est representation of this class of academies, but its limitation of mem-
bership to the State deprives it of its national character.

But there is another matter which influences the gi'owth of our
science.

As it is necessary for us still to look abroad for our highest inspira-
tion in pure science, and as science is not an affair of one town or one
country, but of the whole world, it becomes us all to read the current
journals of science and the great transactions of foreign societies, as
well as those of our own countries. These great transactions and
journals should be in the library of every institution of learning in the
country, where science is taught. IIow can teachers and professors
be expected to know what has been discovered in the past, or is being
discovered now, if these are not provided? Has any institution a right
to mentally starve the teachers whom it employs, or the students
who come to it? There can be but one answer to this; and an institution
calling itself a university, and not having the current scientific jour-
nals upon its table or the transactions of societies upon its library
shelves, is certainly not doing its best to cultivate all that is best in
this world.

We call this a free country, and yet it is the only one where there
is a direct tax upon the pursuit of science. The low state of pure

A PLEA FOR PURE SCIENCE. iS;

science in our country may possibly be attributed to the youth of the
country; but a direct tax, to prevent the growth of our country in
that subject, cannot be looked upon as other than a deep disgrace. I
refer to the duty upon foreign books and periodicals. In our science,
no books above elementary ones have ever been published, or are likely
to be published, in this country; and yet every teacher in physics
must have them, not only in the college library, but on his own shelves,
and must pay the government of this country to allow him to use a
portion of his small salary to buy that which is to do good to the
whole country. All freedom of intercourse which is necessary to foster
our growing science is thus broken off; and that which might, in time,
relieve our country of its mediocrity, is nipped in the bud by our
government, which is most liberal when appealed to directly on sci-
entific subjects.

One would think that books in foreign languages might be ad-
mitted free; but to please the half-dozen or so workmen w^ho reprint
German books, not scientific, our free intercourse with that country is
cut off. Our scientific associations and societies must make themselves
heard in this matter, and show those in authority how the matter
stands.

In conclusion, let me say once more, that I do not believe that our
country is to remain long in its present position. The science of
physics, in whose applications our country glories, is to arise among
us, and make us respected by the nations of the world. Such a
prophecy may seem rash with regard to a nation which does not yet do
enough physical work to support a physical journal. But we do know
the speed with which we advance in this country: we see cities spring-
ing up in a night, and other wonders performed at an unprecedented
rate. And now we see physical laboratories being built, we see a great
demand for thoroughly trained physicists, who have not shirked their
mathematics, both as professors and in so-called practical life; and
perhaps we have the feeling, common to all true Americans, that our
country is going forward to a glorious future, when we shall lead the
world in the strife for intellectual prizes as we now do in the strife for
w^ealth.

But if this is to be so, we must not aim low. The problems of the
universe cannot be solved without labor: they cannot be attacked with-
out the proper intellectual as well as physical tools; and no physicist
need expect to go far without his mathematics. No one expects a horse
to win in a great and long race who has not been properly trained ; and
it would be folly to attempt to win with one, however pure his blood
and high his pedigree, without it. The problems we solve are more
difficult than any race: the highest intellect cannot hope to succeed
without proper preparation. The great prizes are reserved for the

1 88 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

greatest efforts of the greatest intellects, that have kept their mental
eye bright and flesh hard by constant exercise. Apparatus can be
bought with money, talents may come to ns at birth; but our mental
tools, our mathematics, our experimental ability, our knowledge of
what others have done before us, all have to be obtained by work.
The time is almost past, even in our own country, when third-rate
men can find a place as teachers, because they are unfit for everything
else. We wish to see brains and learning, combined with energy and
immense working-power, in the professor's chair; but, above all, we
wish to see that high and chivalrous spirit which causes one to pursue
his idea in spite of all difficulties, to work at the problems of nature
with the approval of his own conscience, and not of men before him.
Let him fit himself for the struggle with all the weapons which mathe-
matics and the experience of those gone before him can furnish, and let
him enter the arena with the fixed and stem purpose to conquer. Let
him not be contented to stand back with the crowd of mediocrity,
but let him press forward for a front place in the strife.

The whole universe is before us to study. The greatest labor of
the greatest minds has given us only a few pearls; and yet the limitless
ocean, with its hidden depths filled with diamonds and precious stones,
is before us. The problem of the universe is yet unsolved, and the
mystery involved in one single atom yet eludes us. The field of re-
search only opens wider and wider as we advance, and our minds are
lost in wonder and astonishment at the grandeur and beauty unfolded
before us. Shall we help in this grand work, or not? Shall our coun-
try do its share, or shall it still live in the almshouse of the world?

THE MALARIA-GERM. 189

THE MALARIA-GERM AND ALLIED FORMS OF SPOROZOA.

By Dr. GARY N. CALKINS,

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY.

THE group of animal parasites to which the malaria-causing organism
belongs is relativeh' unimportant when compared with the bacte-
ria, a group of plant parasites, including the causes of most zymotic dis-
eases in man — typlioid, cholera, diphtheria, scarlet fever, tuberculosis
and the like, as well as beneficial forms which aid man in various
ways. Nevertheless, it is a group of considerable economic importance,
about which little is known outside of scientific circles. The name
Sporozoa suggests, to the average reader, no disquieting apprehension
of physical pain or of financial loss, yet this class of primitive,
unicellular animals includes, besides the malaria-causing blood para-
sites, forms which, like the silkworm parasite (Glugea hombycis), have
cost communities untold millions of dollars. In connection with the
losses due to one of these silkworm epidemics, Huxley writes in 18.0:

" In the years following 1853 this malady broke out with such extreme
violence that, in 1853, the silk crop was reduced to a third of the amount
which it had reached in 1853; and up till within the last year or two it lias
never attained half the yield of 1853. This means not only that the great
number of people engaged in silk growing are some thirty millions sterling
poorer than they might have been; it means not only that high prices have had
to be paid for imported silkworm eggs, and that, after investing his money in
them, in paying for mulberry leaves and for attendance, the cultivator has con-
stantly seen his silkworms perish and himself plunged in ruin; but it means
that the looms of Lyons have lacked employment, and that, for years, enforced
idleness and misery have been the portion of a vast population which, in
former days, was industrious and well to do."

Analogous epidemics, which may be traced to Sporozoa, are liable
to break out at any time among other animals having commercial value.
Thus 'Texas fever,' a cattle disease due to a sporozoan blood parasite
(Piroplasma higeminiim), occasions great loss to cattle breeders. Muscle
parasites, belonging to the same class, cause trichinosis-like diseases in
hogs, cows, cats, dogs and other domestic animals; while in fish they
occasion great loss to fish-culturists through epidemics. Other par-
asites in the same class are the causes of disease in horses, sheep, goats,
etc.

The Sporozoa are comparatively harmless to man personally, but,
unlike some bacteria, they are never beneficial in any sense. Invariably
parasites, the diseases which they induce are confined mainly to the
lower animals, but so widely are they distributed that no type of ani-
mals is free from them altogether. One significant feature about the

1 90 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Sporozoa is that, notwithstanding the many kinds and the wide distri-
bution in all sorts of hosts, the life history of the parasites invariably
conforms to the same type, a fact which has recently been used to
good advantage in working out the development of the malaria or-
ganism.

Like all the unicellular animals, or Protozoa, the Sporozoa are
minute bits of protoplasm provided with a membrane and a specialized
spherical portion of the inner protoplasm called the nucleus. Unlike
the other Protozoa, they are entirely devoid of motile organs and are,
in consequence, quiescent. In classifying them, advantage has been
taken of the different modes in which they form spores, or germs, by
which they are reproduced. In some, known as the Telosporidia, all
the protopla-sm of the parasite is used to form the spores, and the parent
cell dies or disappears with each sporulation, which thus represents
the end of the individual parasite. The individuals of the second
group, known as the Neosporidia, form spores, without using all the pro-
toplasm, and continue to live after each sporulation. This group
comprises the less-known forms of Sporozoa, and is of considerable
economic importance as the cause of epidemics among silkworms,
brook trout and other fish, etc.

The Telosporidia are further divided according to the mode of
life. Some of them, known as the Gregarinida, live in cavities of the
body of many forms of invertebrates, but rarely in vertebrates; others,
the Coccidia, live in epithelial cells lining the cavities of both inver-
tebrate and vertebrate hosts. It may be remarked, parenthetically,
that the cause of cancerous growths in man is claimed by many to be
organisms belonging to this group of Sporozoa. The question remains
in considerable doubt, however, and, despite the great mass of litera-
ture, no positive results have appeared. The last group finally of the
Telosporidia is the Hcemosporidia, comprising parasites which, like the
malaria-organism — Plasmodium malarice — live in blood corpuscles of
vertebrates.

All these different types of Telosporidia begin life as minute germs
called sporozoites, which make their way into the new host through the
intestine, being taken in with the food. The life history, after this
ingestion, follows slightly modified paths in the different types, and,
for purposes of comparison, I will describe these processes in the greg-
arine, the coccidium and in the hsemosporc Plasmodium malarias, thus
representing each of the subdivisions of the Telosporidia.

The sea-squirt, or Tunicate, Ciona intestinalis, is the host of a
gregarine Monocystis ascidiw, which is so widely distributed that it is
almost impossible to find a Ciona without them. The complete life his-
tory of the parasite has been fully worked out by Prof. M. Siedlecki,

THE MALMllA-UERM. 191

of Cracow University, Eussia, whose results form the basis of tlie
following account*:

The description of the life cycle may begin with the sporozoite,
or youngest form, of the gregarine parasite. This is a small, elongate
germ which makes its way through the fluids of the digestive tract of
Ciona to the epithelial cells which line that canal, (l^'ig. 1, A.) The
sporozoite penetrates one of these cells and begins to grow at the ex-
pense of the cell contents, until, finally, too large for the cell host,
it breaks the cell wall and falls into the lumen of the digestive tract,
where it soon attains its full size. (Fig. 1, B. C. D.) It is now a com-
paratively large, sac-like cell, swollen at one end, and with a distinct
nucleus. (Fig. 1, C.) After a longer or shorter period, not definitely
determined, two adult forms come together and pour out a sticky, fluid
substance, which soon hardens to form a common, firm covering, or
cyst. (Fig. 1, E.) Each nucleus then begins to divide, and, after a
multitude of daughter-nuclei have arisen, the protoplasm of the cell
breaks np into as many parts as there are nuclei (Fig. 1, F. G. H.).
These small protoplasmic parts (gametes) then wander out of the parent
membranes and ultimately fuse, two by two, while still remaining in
the original cj'st wall (Fig. 1, I. J.). After the fusion, the nucleus
and protoplasm in each double mass divides into eight parts, and a
firm, enveloping membrane is secreted about them. This spore-mem-
brane ultimately becomes impregnated with calcareous material, which
thus forms a firm and resisting capsule for the eight germs within.
Each germ is a sporozoite similar to the one which began the life cycle.

During the process of sporozoite-formation, the parasite is passed
out with the fseces to the exterior. Here the original cyst ultimately
bursts and liberates the multitude of spores A\ith their contained
sporozoites. The latter are well protected, however, by their calcareous
shells, and do not suffer from the sea water or from drying. The
spores may be finally taken into the digestive tract with food, and with
this the opportunity for a renewed cycle is presented. The acids of
the digestive fluids dissolve the calcareous coverings, and the eight
sporozoites in each spore are liberated. The sporozoites again penetrate
the epithelial cells, grow to maturity and repeat the process indefinitely.

In Coccidium, a parasite of some of the insects, the life history as
worked out by Dr. F. Schaudinn differs in one or two important points
from that of the gregarine.

Sporozoites are formed as in the previous case, and these work their
way in a similar manner into the cells lining the digestive tract (Fig 3,
a). Unlike the gregarine, the main period of their life is passed in these
cells, and they drop into the lumen of the intestine only when they

* Siedlicki. Uebei- die geschlechliche Vcrmehriing der ]\Ionocystis ascidiae
E. Lank. Bull. d. I'Acad. d. Sci. d. Cracovie, December, 1899.

192 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

are ready to form spores. The nucleus divides repeatedly, and a
great number of buds are formed around the daughter nuclei (Fig.
2, l, c). These buds elongate from the periphery of the parent organ-
ism and radiate from it, like the spines of a sea urchin. When
fully developed, the spores, or, as they are technically known, the
merozoites, drop off the parent cell and work their way through the
fluids of the digestive tract until they come to the cells lining it, and
then, like the sporozoites, they penetrate the cells, grow at their
expense, and again reproduce spores as before (Fig 2, a to c). This
process thus tends to spread the disease among the cells of the digestive
tract in the one host, and it will be observed that the reproductive
process is not accompanied by the union of two gametes, as in the case
of Monocystis. Coccidium is thus distinguished from the latter in
having a method of asexiial multiplication leading to auto-infection.
This process, however, cannot continue indefinitely, and, after five or
six days, a method of sexual multiplication supervenes. The prelim-
inary stages of this process do not differ from the formation of the
merozoites, and similar buds are formed which break off' and penetrate
the epithelial cells as before. The further history, however, differs
markedly from that of the merozoite. Some of the resulting parasites
give rise to immense numbers of minute, active, thread-like buds, the
microgametes, which radiate from the parent cell like the merozoites
(h — j). Others do not form buds at all, but merely enlarge until they
are as large, or larger than, the ordinary full-grown parasites (d — f).
One of the small forms then fuses with a large form, in conjunction;
and the result, or copula, secretes a firm cyst about itself, and then
divides into spores (2, g). Each spore then secretes about itself a second
coating which becomes impregnated with calcareous matter, and, Avithin
this cyst, the cell divides into a small n,umber of sporozoites (1-).
In this condition the primary cysts are emptied to the outside, Avhere
they are ultimately taken up by some new host in whose digestive tract
the cysts are dissolved and the sj)orozoitcs liberated to renew the
cycle (Fig. 2, 0-

It thus appears that, in Coccidium, the life cycle is more complicated
than in the gregarine, in having a period of asexual reproduction by
which auto-infection is accomplished, alternating with a period of
sexual multiplication during which the parasite is carried from one host
to another. Coccidium differs further from Monocystis in that
the conjugating gametes are sexually differentiated, the small, active
one, or microgamete, functions as the male cell, and the larger, quiescent
one, or macrogamete, as the female or egg cell, while in the gTCgarine,
on the other hand, the conjugating gaiuetes are of equal size.

We may now consider the somewhat more complicated life cycle
of the malaria organism. The process of spore-formation of this para-

THE MALARIA-GERM,

■95

site, in the blood cells of the human host, was correctly made out in
1888 by two Italian naturalists, Marchiafava and Celli, who showed
that the yoimg parasite, in a red blood corpuscle, is a minute granule
in which no structure could be made out. The granule grows, how-
ever, at the expense of the hsemaglobin of the corpuscle, and ultimately
forms spores (Fig. 3, a — /). During the life of the parent organism, the
products of growth are stored up in the parasite in the form of fine gran-

:^^^

W3'

M

o

Fig. 1. Life Cycle of a Gregarine. [Mainly After Siedlecki.]

Minute germs, sporozoites (A), enter epithelial cells lining the digestive tract
of a tunicate. Here they grow to a large size (B, C), ultimately breaking
through a cell-membrane and falling into the lumen of the digestive tract (D).
After some time in this adult condition, two individuals come together (E).
The nuclei divide repeatedly (F, G), and minute gametes are ultimately formed
(H, I). The gametes then fuse, two by two (I, J), forming the spores. The
two nuclei also fuse (K), and the joint nucleus then divides three times in
succession (L, M, N), forming right daughter-nuclei, which become the nuclei
of eight germs or sporozoites (0). The sporozoites are inclosed in small cal-
careous capsules which, in a new host, are dissolved by the acids of the digestive
fluids, thus setting free the sporozoites (A).

ules. These, known as melanin granules, are left in the center of the par-
ent organism when the spores are formed, but at this period the blood
corpuscle, in which the sporulation occurs, disintegrates, and so liber-
ates the spores and the melanin in the blood plasm. Like the merozoites
of Coccidia, these spores make their way to new corpuscles, which they
VOL. Lix.— i:;;

194

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

enter, and in which they repeat the cycle, thus bringing about auto-
infection.

Another Italian naturalist, Golgi, in 1889, showed that the spore-
formation of the parasites and the well-known pyrexial attacks on the
part of the patient occur at the same time, and the phenomena were
interpreted as cause and effect. The direct cause of the attack was
then found to be the liberation into the blood plasm of the melanin

Fig. 2. Life Cycle of Coccidium. [Schaudinn.]

The sporozoites penetrate epithelial cells {«) and grow to adult size. When
ready to sporulate, they are free in the lumen of the organ. The nucleus divides
repeatedly (&) and each of the ultimate sub-divisions becomes the nucleus of a
merozoite (c). These re-enter epithelial cells (a) and repeat the cycle. After
five or six days the merozoites have a different fate. Some (d — g) enlarge and
form egg-cells; others (h — ;) form minute flagellated male cells, or microgametes.
One of these fuses with one egg cell, (g — k), and the copula then forms spores
(fc), each of which form, in turn, two sporozoites (/). In this condition the
organism is taken into a new host and the process is tlicn repeated.

granules, which, acting like a poison, throw the entire system into
disorder. In different types of malaria, the attacks sometimes occur
every 72 hours, sometimes every 48 hours, and in some cases at
irregular intervals. These different effects are produced by slightly
different forms of the malaria organism. One form, known as
Plasmodium malarice, sporulates every 72 hours; another, Plasmodium

THE MALARIA-GERM.

195

■m'«a', every 48 hours. Amitlici- form, giviiii;' risi; to a more malignant
type of malaria, is Laverania m.alarice, which prohably sporulates every
4S hours. Tn some types of tlu' disease it is supposed that two or more

Fig. o. LiFK Cycle of the Malaria-Organism. [Partly After Koss and Fielding-Ould.]

The young sporozoites {(i) penetrate red blood corpuscles and grow at the
expense of the hsemaglobin (b — (/). Spores (c — f) are finally formed and the
growth products (melanin) are liberated. These spores, or merozoites, enter new
blood cells and repeat the process (auto-infection). When taken into the stomach
of the mosquito Anopheles, the parasites become much larger, some develop
]nale gametes (0, j), q) on the Polymitus form {p) ; others, female gametes
(r — u). These conjugate (v) in the stomach of Anopheles, and the copula (ic)
penetrates the epithelial lining of the stomach and ultimatel}' lies suspended in
tlip body cavity (x — zz). When mature, the parasite forms spores (A), which
f<iriii. in turn, naked sporozoites (B). The sporozoites are liberated into the body
cavity, and finally penetrate the salivary gland of the mosquito (C), from
which they are emptied out witli tlie fiuid from the gland into the blood of a
human host.

species may be present at the same time, and, sporulating at different
intervals, may give rise to irregular attacks.

Until 1896, the life history of the parasite, as outlined above, was
regarded as incomplete because of the perplexing form discovered in

196 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the blood of malaria patients by Professor Danilewsky, in 1891. This
form differed from the ordinary parasites in having many fine, flagelli-
form appendages, which, breaking away from the parent, would swim
about freely in the surrounding fluid (Fig. 3, p). Danilewsky regarded
this form as an independent blood parasite, and gave to it the name
Polymitus. In a sense, Polymitus has been the key to the life history
of the malaria organism, and its history has been the history of the
further discoveries upon malaria. In France, Laveran regarded Dan-
ilewsky's discovery as indicating some stage in the cycle of Plasmodium
malarice, and not as an independent organism, while Labbe considered
Polymitus a degenerate condition of the ordinary parasites and without
further significance. The English specialist on tropical diseases. Dr.
Manson, found that the malaria parasites, when exposed with the
blood to the cooler air, very soon assume the Polymihis form, which
he regarded as the extra-corporeal form assumed by the malaria-'
organism, for, he argued, the wide distribution of malaria, the spread
from individual to individual, can be explained, since the disease is not
contagious, only by the assumption of germs outside of the body. Fur-
thermore, he suggested that these germs might be carried from person
to person, by insects, such as the mosquito. In the same year, Laveran
made an identical suggestion quite independently of Manson. It was
not altogether novel, however, with either of these investigators; thus
a certain mosquito in central Africa is known to the natives as the
fever organism, while the same idea was represented in Theobald
Smith's discovery (1893) of the tick as the agent in the transmission of
the 'Texas fever' of cattle.

The first positive results on the significance of the Polymitus form
were obtained by MacCallum, in Washington, in 189T-'98. A similar
Polymitus form is developed by the malaria-organism of birds (Halter-
idium), and, in the blood of diseased crows, MacCallum observed the
filamentous motile bodies of the Polymitus form, break away from the
central mass, and unite with an ordinary parasite. The result of the
conjugation was a copula Avith an independent motion, by which it
made its way through the surrounding fluids. The later history of
the copula was not followed; similar observations were made, by the
same observer, upon living malaria-organisms of man, and the Polymitus
'flagella' were seen to unite with larger forms of the parasite.

In the meantime, Major Ross, in India, was working out the mos-
quito hypothesis of Manson and Laveran, and succeeded in placing
that theory upon a very substantial basis. He found black pigment
granules, in the intestine and epithelial cells of the mosquito, which
were identified as melanin granules of the blood parasite. It was also
found, by Eoss, that only certain kinds of mosquitoes were selected
by the inalaria parasites, viz.: various species of the genus Anopheles

THE MALARIA-GERM. I97

by the human parasite, while species of the genus Culex were selected
by the malaria parasites of birds. The full history, finally, has been
worked out in complete detail during the last two years, by Ross again,
and by Grassi, in Italy, and both observers reached quite independent,
but identical, results. Briefly summarizing these results, the full life
history of Plasmodium malarice may be given as follows:

The early form of the parasite, which corresponds with the sporo-
zoites of the gregarine and of Coccidium, penetrates a red blood
corpuscle, grows to adult size, and then forms spores (Fig. 3, a — &).
These correspond exactly with the merozoites of the Coccidia, and, like
them, lead to auto-infection. At this point there is a gap in the
evidence, for it is not known how long this asexual method of increase
may continue; as shown above in the case of Coccidium, the spore-
forming period continues for five or six days, when a period of con-
jugation supervenes. It may be stated here, parenthetically, that in
all Protozoa, so far as known, a period of conjugation is necessary at
some time during the life cycle, and Avithout such conjugation, the
organisms, which are reproduced asexually, finally decrease in size and
show other signs of degeneration, ultimately resulting in death of the
race (see results of Biitschli, Maupas, Hertwig, etc., upon degener-
ating Protozoa).

This is of considerable moment in the question of malaria, for, if
the malaria-organism conforms to other Protozoa, there must come
a time when this asexual sporulation will cease in any given set of
individuals, and a period of conjugation must supei^vene to give
renewed vigor to the parasites. So far as known at the present time,
this conjugation takes place only in the digestive tract of the mos-
quito. That it does actually take place, is undeniable from the
observations of MaeCallum, Ross, Grassi and others, and the con-
jugants again as in Coccidium, are: a small, motile, microgamete, or
inale cell (one of the '^flagella' of the Polymitus form); and a larger
macrogamete, or female, cell (Fig. 3, p — v). Their union, observed by
Ross and Grassi, takes place in the stomach of Anopheles, and the
copula then makes its way into, and through, the epithelial cells lining
the stomach, and finally rests against the tissue which lines the body
cavity. Here it grows to a relatively large size (Fig. 3, w — zz), and,
when mature, its nucleus divides as in the gregarine or in Coccidium, to
form a number of spores. Each of these develops a number of
germs, or sporozoites, but, unlike the sporozoites of the previously
described Sporozoa, these germs have no protective capsule about them,
and, when the parent cyst ultimately bursts, they are liberated directly
into the body cavity of the mosquito (Fig. 3, A, B). Here, in the
fluids of the body cavity, they are carried to all parts of the organ-
ism, and finally reach the anterior region of the thorax, where the

198 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

salivary glands of the insect are located. They work their way through
the cell wall of this gland, into the gland cells, from which they are
drawn with the secretion and are finally poured into the lumen of the
gland (Fig. 3, C). When the proboscis of the mosquito is inserted into a
human host, and the salivary secretion is poured out, the sporozoites
pass with it into the blood, and thus effect infection of a new host.
Provided with their new potential of vitality resulting from conju-
gation, the young sporozoites grow and multi])ly in the blood cor-
puscles until they are numerous enough to cause the well-known
symptoms of malaria. Coming from the same brood, so to speak, they
have a similar rate of growth and multiplication, and so liberate their
melanin granules throughout the blood system of their human host, at
approximately the same time.

The question is frequently asked: Is the mosquito the only agent
in the transmission of malaria? and when this is answered by the
somewhat modified affirmative, 'Yes, so far as we know,' it is usually
followed by the query: 'Why does malaria follow bad drainage, the
digging of sewers, laying of gas pipes, etc.?' This question may be
answered in two ways: First, it must be shown that these so-called
malarial fevers, which accompany such conditions, are in reality true
malaria; it is quite possible that hasty diagnosis in many cases gives
a wrong impression of the pretalence of this disease. Second, it is
conceivable that sporozoites may be carried in the blood, as typhoid
is said to be frequently carried in the digestive tract, without causing
symptoms of the disease until the natural resistance of the host is
weakened by decreased vitality, which may be brought about by bad
air, or by other means.

It is quite possible that some other means of transmission than the
mosquito exists. The flea, for example, and other insects that prey on
man must be examined with this end in view. There is no reason to
believe that the sporozoites can be liberated in water, or suspended
in the dust of the air, and live, for, of all Sporozoa, the blood-infesting
forms are not protected against an external life. Thus we have seen
that the sporozoites of the gregarine or of Coccidium are incased in a
firm, calcareous shell, which protects them from drying and from other
dangers that might be encountered. With the malaria-organism there
is no such coating; the sporozoites are at all times naked bits of pro-
toplasm, which soon dry up and die, when exposed to the air or placed
in water. This fact also refutes the argument made by Bignami and
others that the })arasites are transferred directly from one individual
to another by sticking to the proboscis. It is probable that the mos-
quito is the original, or primary, host of the malaria-organism, and that
man and birds are secondary hosts, from whicli the parasites return
to the primary one for the vital function of conjugation.

THE WILD llllU) AT ARM'S LENGTH. 199

THE WILD I'.IKl) AT AEM'S LENGTH: A NEW METHOD

OF BIRD STUDY.*

By Professor FRANCIS H. HERRICK,

ADELBERT COLLEGE.

X N the study of wild birds the problem of approach has always been
-*- diflRciilt to master. The land birds of every continent are, as a
rnle, shy and difficult to study with that minuteness of detail which
alone can satisfy the naturalist and careful observer of their habits.

Birds have enemies to fear and shun, and their discrimination does
not exclude their most ardent or curious admirers from their bitterest
foes. With them the battle is not always to the strong. Timidity,
agility, protective colors and the instinct of concealment are as impor-
tant in the struggle for life as the bill-hook and mailed foot. We
speak of icild birds or of wild animals generally in contrast to the
comparatively few which are tame, and if the wilderness does not
always howl, it is often because its inhabitants have found it better
policy to remain silent.

Wildness is due to fear which may be inherited or acquired by
experience with this wicked world. Tameness on the other hand
comes only through the casting out of fear, and may be effected by
the formation of new habits, which are either spontaneous or forced.
In order to tame a wild animal we must therefore teach it new lessons,
and in doing this it is a common practice to literally chain it to a fixed
spot, where its conditions of life are uniform and under control, and
Avhere no other teachers are allowed to interfere. The moment,
however, the wild bird is placed in a cage its behavior is no longer
perfectly spontaneous or free, at least not until all fear has been
subdued. What is needed, therefore, is an invisible chain to hold the
animals to some fixed and chosen spot, which may be approached in
disguise.

Fortunately for the student of birds all these conditions are fulfilled
for a very important period — that of life at the nest. The nest with its
young is the given fixed point, and parental instinct is the invisible
chain.

* Messrs. G. P. Putnam's Sons will shortly publish a book by Professor Her-
rick, in which the original method described in this paper will be given in
greater detail, and the interesting results obtained will be more fully set forth.
The book will be entitled 'The Home-Life of Wild Birds: A New Method
of Bird Study and Bird Photography," and will contain upwards of 140 illustra-
tions from nature. — Editoe.

200

POPULAR SCIENCE 2WXTHLY.

II.

The method of the study and photography of birds now to be de-
scribed consists in first bringing the birds to you and then camping be-
side them. They can thus be watched and photographed at arm's
length, or even as near as one would hold a book to read, and under the
most perfect conditions of light and position, for hours or days at a time,
while quite unconscious of being observed.

Fig. 1. Female Chestnut-sided Warbler, Brooding her>)Young on a Warm Day.

To be more explicit the method depends mainly upon two condi-
tions: (1) The control of the nest or nesting site, and (2) the conceal-
ment of the observer.

If the nest like that of an Oriole, L'obin, Flycatcher, Waxwing or
Vireo is fastened to any leafy branch, the nesting ])ough or twig is cut
off, carefully taken down, carried to a convenient spot where there is

THE WILD BIRD AT ARM'S LENGTH.

201

good light, and firmly fastened to stakes driven into the ground. The
change is one of space relations which may change with every passing
breeze, and though it may be of little significance to the birds it is of

Fig. ■!■ <'EDAR-BiRD, Approaching Nest with Gullet stuffed with Cherries prepared to

FEED Young by Regurgitation.

the utmost importance to the observer, since the nest now is but four
instead of forty or more feet from the ground, and the screen of
foliage which hid it from view has been witiidrawn.

For an observatory I have adopted a green tent which conceals
the student with his camera. The tent is pitched beside the nest, and
when in use is open only at one point, marked by a small square window
in line with the photographic lens and the nest.

By taking such liberties with wild birds, one might suppose we
should bring destruction upon their homes and all that they contain,

202

POPULAR SCIENCE MOXTHLY

but happily tliis ii= not the case. No harm need befall either old or
young. The former nesting site is soon forgotten, and the new quickly
adopted and defended with all the boldness and persistence of which
the birds are capable.

This method of studying birds thus depends mainly upon the
strength of the parental instincts, and upon the readiness with which a
bird learns to adapt itself to new conditions. Upon more complete
analysis we recogiiize the following psychological principles, of which
the following are the most important: (a) The strength of an instinct
increases through its exercise, and may be reinforced by habit; (b) An

-^

k

«^'

V

/€

M

S^^S^^m

HQ^^^^^^JD^ rt

i^

^

wKm

r'l^^sBj^^E^

- ^^bI

Bb

wSKf^BHi

^'-^5otaH|

n^

pi

«^^B> ^ ^^^^^^^^^^1

xVH

^ft^^l

Bh

^hmHH

Bh

V

Kl^i

^Hl

Wl,

5V

H^^l

Fig. 3. FiMALE Kingbird, astride Nest, shiei.dixg her Young from the Heat.

instinctive impulse may be blocked or suppressed by any contrary im-
pulse; (c) The instinct of fear is often quickly suppressed by repetition,
or the formation of new habits. One might also add that: (d) New
habits are readily formed and may replace the old ones; (e) Abstract
ideas, if they form any part of the furniture of the average bird-mind,
are extremely hazy and fleeting; (f) Still further we must recall the
physiological fact that birds are guided in most of their operations
by sight and hearing, not by scent. Their olfactory organ is very
rudimentary at best, and avails them neither in finding food nor in
avoiding enemies.

THE ^yTLD BIRD AT ARM'S LENGTH.

203

Let ns sec how these principles are a})})lied to the i)i'ol»h'iii of ap-
proaching wild birds in the way described. The parental instincts
begin to control the life of the adult with the ])eriodic revival of the
reproductive functions, and may vary greatly in their scope and inten-
sity. As a rule this instinct, reinforced by habit, gradually increases
until the young are reared. It is, therefore, safest to change the nesting
surroundings when the ])arental instincts are approaching their cidmi-
nation.

The general feeling of fear is gradually or quickly suppressed

Fig. 4. Kingbirds, bruising a Dragon-fly between their Bills, and preparing to serve

IT TO THE Young. The Female, who was brooding when the Prey was

cai'ght, stands at the Front.

according to the value of the different factors in the equation, by the
parental instinct, which impels a bird at all hazards to go to its young
wherever placed.

After a bird once visits the nest in its new position it returns again
and again, and in proportion as its visits to the old nesting ]ilace dinun-
ish and finally cease, its a])proaches to the new position become more
frequent, until a new habit has been formed, or, if yon will, until the
old habit is reinstated.

When the birds ai)proach the nest any strange object, like the
stakes which support the bough or the tent which is |)itched beside it,

204

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

arouses their sense of fear and suspicion, and they may keep away for
a time or advance with caution. If very shy, like most catbirds, they
will sometimes skirmish about the tent for two hours or more before
touching the nest. The ice is usually broken, however, in from twenty
minutes to an hour, and I have known a chipping sparrow and red-
eyed vireo to feed their young in three minutes after the tent was in
place.

At every approach the birds see the same objects which work them

Fig. 5. Female Kohin cleaning the Nest.

no ill. The tent stands silent and motionless, but the young are close
by, and fear of the new objects gradually wears away. Parental instinct,
or in this case maternal love, for the instinct to cherish the young is
usually stronger in the mother, wins the day. The mother bird comes
to the nest and feeds her clamoring brood. The spell is broken; she
comes again. The male also approaches, and their visits are thereafter
repeated.

Possibly the fears of the old bird? are renewed at sight of the

rilE WILD BIRD AT ARM'S LENGTH.

205

window, whicli is now ojjfn in tlio tent-front, and of the glass eye of
the camera gleaming through it, but the lens is also silent and motion-
less, and soon becomes a familiar object to be finally disregarded.
Again there is the fear which the sound of the shutter, a sharp metallic
cliclc, at first inspires, unless you are the fortunate possessor of an abso-
lutely silent and rapid shutter. At its first report, when two feet away,
many birds will jump as if shot, give an angry scream, and even fly
at the tent as if to exorcise an evil spirit, while after a few hours they
will only wince; finally they will not budge a feather at this or any

Fig. 6. The Brown Thrush, standing on his Nest, has heard an Unusual Sound and is

listening intently.

other often repeated sound, whether from shutter, steam whistle,
locomotive or the human voice.

It is the young, the young, always the young in whom the interest
of the old birds is centered, and about whom their lives revolve. They

2o6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

are the strong lure, the talisman, the magnet to which the parent is
irresistibly drawn. The tree, the branch, the nest itself, what are
these in comparison with the yoimg for whom only they exist? This
is true notwithstanding the fact that birds will sometimes leave their
young to perish while they start on their migrations. As a rule they
follow one line of conduct until their instinct in this direction has
been satisfied.

With some species it is possil)le to make the necessary change with-
out evil consequences when there are eggs in the nest: with others we
must wait until the j^oung are from four to nine days old. It is all a
question of the strength of the parental instinct, and this varies
between wide limits in different species, and very considerably between
different individuals. From the nature of the case there can be no
infallible rule. If we know little of the habits of the bird in question,
it is safest to wait until the seventh to the ninth day after hatching,
or when, as in many of the common passerine birds, the feather-shafts
of the wing-quills begin to appear, or, better, when they project from
one-quarter to one-half inch beyond the feather-tubes. At this period
the parental instinct is reaching its maximum, and, what is equally
important, the sense of fear has not appeared in the young.

Young birds from one to five days old as a rule cannot stand exces-
sive heat. Even when fed and brooded they will sometimes succumb,
and here lies the serious danger to be guarded against. A nest of
very young birds well shaded by foliage cannot be safely carried into
the direct sunshine of a hot summer's day, hence the importance of
beginning operations at the proper time when the weather is suitable,
and further of not allowing your enthusiasm to get the better of your
judgment.

The young may be handled or fed as much as one wishes, provided
they have not acquired the instinct of fear. If you are uncertain as
to this, and your aim is to study the nesting habits, it is better to avoid
approaching, touching or in any way disturbing the young after the
flight-feathers have appeared. The cutting of leaves or twigs which
obstruct the light or cast undesirable shadows should be done before
this time.

Young birds eight or nine days old stand the lieat well, provided
they are fed, but on very hot days they should not be allowed to go
without food for more than two hours at the longest. Should the
parents bring no food during this time, it is better to feed the young
in the nest, and to suspend operations until the next day.

The old birds may be expected to come to the nest in from twenty
minutes to an hour, when the tent is brought into use immediately
after the removal of the nesting bough. It is naturally impossible to
predict exactly what will happen until the experiment is tried, since

THE WILD BIRD AT ARM'S LENGTH. 207

the personal equation or individuality of the birds themselves is an
unknown factor. One thing only is certain: that the parental instinct,
reinforced by habit, will win in tlie end, that it will cast out fear and
draw the birds to their young.

III.

I have no desire to anticipate every objection which might be raised
against the method, were it possible to do so, but after testing it to the
best of my ability with the opportunities of two summers, I am con-
fident of its value and am ready to stand sponsor for it in judicious
hands. It is hardly necessary to insist that it is not designed for
exliibition purposes, and that its successful practice requires some
knowledge, with more patience and time.

An apparently serious objection is likely to occur to the ornitholo-
gist, namely, the liabihty of exposing the birds to new enemies. I feared
lest prowling cats should discover the young whose nest and branch
had been brought down from the tree-top and set up again in plain
sight within easy reach from the ground, but I was happily mistaken.
Predacious animals of all kinds seem to avoid such nests, as if they were
new devices to entrap or slay them.

As for the weather, barring heat, which must be guarded against
in the way described, the nesting bough is more secure when fixed
firmly to supports than it could possibly have been before.

The tent not only conceals the observer, but protects his camera,
an important consideration, since the prolonged action of the sun is
liable to spring a leak in the bellows.

ly.

With note-book in hand you can sit in your tent and see and record
everything which transpires at the nest, the mode of approach, the kind
of food brought, the varied activities of the old and young, the visits
of intruders, their combats with the owners of the nest, the capture
of prey which sometimes goes on under your eye. No better position
could be chosen for hearing the songs, responsive calls and alarm
notes of the birds. You can thus gather materials for an exact and
minute history of life at the nest, and of the behavior of birds during
this important period. More than this, you can photograph the birds
at will, under the most perfect conditions, recording what no naturalist
has ever seen, and what no artist could ever hope to portray. The
birds come and go close to your eye, but unconscious of being observed.

I have watched the night hawk feed her chick with fireflies when
barely fifteen inches from my hand, the kingfisher carrying live fish
to its brood whose muffled rattles issued from their subterranean gal-
lery a few feet away. When near enough to count her respirations
accurately, I have seen the redwing blackbird leave her nest on a hot

2o8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

day, hop down to the cool water of the swamp, and after taking a sip,
bathe in full view, within reach of the hand; then, shaking the water
from her plumage, she would return refreshed to her nest. I have seen
the male kingbird come to his nesting bough with feathers drenched
from his mid-day bath in the river, the orioles flash their brilliant
colors all day long before the eye, and chestnut-sided warblers become
so tame after several days that the female would allow you to approach
and stroke her back with the hand.

It is difiicult to describe the fascination which this method of study
affords the student of animal life. New discoveries, or unexpected
sights wait on the minutes, for while there is a well-ordered routine in
the actions of many birds, the most charming pictures occur at odd
moments, and there is an endless variety of detail. It is like a succes-
sion of scenes in a drama, only this is real life, not an imitation, and
there is no need of introducing tragedy.

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 209

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS.

By HAVELOCK EI,LIS.
VI. MAEEIAGE AND FAMILY.

THE tendency to celibacy among men of preeminent intellectual
ability has frequently been emphasized by Lombroso and others.
It is well illustrated by British men of genius. We may probably
assume that by the age of fifty scarcely more than 10 per cent, of the
male population remain bachelors, if we take the whole population
into consideration. (This is the case in Hungary, and it can not be
very far from the truth, so far as Great Britain is concerned.) It is
true that, as Korosi and others have shown, among the well-to-do
classes men marry both later and seldomer, and that the subjects under
jconsideration largely belong to those classes. We can, however, well
afford to leave a margin on this account. We have information con-
cerning the status as regards marriage of 819 of the preeminent men
in our list; of these, seventy-two, being Catholic priests or monks (ten
of them since the Eeformation), were vowed celibates, and 160 others
never married. We thus find that 28 per cent, never married, and
even if we exclude the vowed celibates, 21 per cent. It must, of
course, be remembered that a certain, though not considerable, pro-
portion of the unmarried were under fifty at death, and some of these
would certainly have married had they survived. It may be added
that about two-thirds of the women were married, though several of
those (especially actresses) belonging to the immarried third formed
liaisons of a more or less public character, and in a few cases had several
children.

It must not be supposed that all these eminent men who lived
long lives in celibacy were always so absorbed in intellectual pursuits
that the idea of matrimony never occurred to them. This was not
always the case. Thus we are told of Dalton, that the idea had
crossed his mind, but he put it aside because, he said, he "^never had
time.' In several cases, as in that of Cowley, the eminent man appears
really to have been in love, but was too shy to avow this fact to the
object of his affections. Reynolds is supposed only once to have been
in love, with Angelica Kauffmann; the lady waited long and patiently
for a declaration, but none arrived, and she finally married another;
Reynolds does not appear to have been overmuch distressed, and they
remained good friends. These cases seem to be fairly typical of a
certain group of the celibates in our list; a passionate devotion to in-
tellectual pursuits seems often to be associated with a lack of passion

TOL. LIX.— 14

210 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

in the ordinary relationships of life, while excessive shyness really be-
trays also a feebleness of the emotional impulse. Even in many cases
in which marriage occurs, it is often easy to see that the relationship
was rooted in the man's intellectual passion.*

The average age of marriage among the men in our list, taking one
hundred cases, is found to be thirty-one years, the most frequent age
being from twenty-eight to thirty-two inclusive. Of these, four were
under twenty, and thirteen over forty at the date of their first mar-
riage. This proportion of late marriages is abnormally high, espe-
cially when we remember that the marriages of widowers are here
excluded. The proportion of early marriages is somewhat low, as
compared with the general population in England to-day. The, average
age, thirty-one years, is distinctly late, more especially when we re-
member that it only includes first marriages. The average age of
marriage for all males during recent years in England is between
twenty-eight and twenty-nine years, and at the other side of the world,
in ISTew Zealand, though later, it is still below thirty. The most fre-
quent age of marriage also falls much earlier. In estimating the sig-
nificance of these figures as regards men of genius, we have to remem-
ber, on the one hand, that the well-to-do classes, to which men of pre-
eminent intellectual ability largely belong, marry later than the general
population, and, on the other hand, that the general tendency to marry
late is of recent growth. If we are entitled to believe that these con-
flicting tendencies balance each other, the data still indicate that
British men of genius have shown a tendency not only to marry seldom,
but to marry late.

The married women on our list form too small a group to gen-
eralize about vath safety. One notable fact, however, emerges. They
show a tendency to marry either before or after the period at which
the majority of married women marry, but not during that period.
In England during recent years the average age at which women marry
has been about twenty-six years. But among British women of genius
very few marriages take place during the period of gi-eat reproductive
energy; the large majority of such marriages fall outside the period
between twenty-three and thirty-four years of age. In the majority
of cases marriage took place before this period, the relationship, from
one reason or another, being very often dissolved not long afterwards;
but in a very considerable proportion of cases, marriage never took

* Dr. P. Garnier ('Celibat et Celibataires,' pp. 72-.5) has some interesting re-
marks on this point. He considers that genius is, or should be, celibate, and that
a man of genius is not usually able to make a woman's life happy. He mentions
that among the eighty-four professors at the medical faculties of Paris, Lyons
and Bordeaux — the three chief medical centers of France — fifteen are celibates,
and of the sixty-nine who are married eleven are childless.

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 211

place until after this period. Thus, Fanny Burney married at forty-
one, Mrs. Browning at forty, Charlotte Bronte at thirty-eight, while
George Eliot's relationship with Lewes was formed at about the age of
thirty-six; these names include the most eminent English women of let-
ters. It would thus appear that there is a tendency for the years of great-
est reproductive activity to be reserved for intellectual development, by
accelerating or retarding the disturbing emotional and practical influ-
ences of real life. This tendency might still be beneficial, even when
the best work vras not actually accomplished until after a late marriage.
We have now to consider the fertility of the marriages formed by
men of preeminent intellectual ability. Lombroso and others have
insisted on the tendency to sterility among men of genius, but have
always been content merely to cite a few cases in proof. This method
can at the most raise merely a presumption in favor of the dictum laid
down. The present investigation, covering a very large group of men
of the highest intellectual eminence, furnishes more conclusive evidence
as to the actual facts. It confirms only to a limited extent the belief
in the relative sterility of men of genius, though we have to remember
the very high mean age of the individuals we are considering. The
married men of intellectual ability in our list number 587; of these, 448
had children; seventy-six are definitely stated by the national biog-
rapher not to have had children; sixty-three cases remain in which
the point is passed without mention, or in which it is stated that the
marriage was not fruitful, but that there were illegitimate children.
It appears, so far as I can judge, that in the majority of the sixty-
three doubtful cases, there were really no legitimate children; this has
most often been found to be the case when I have checked the national
biographer by other sources of information. In a certain proportion
of cases, however, the facts regarding children are not known, and in
others the children have apparently been ignored. We may probably
conclude that nearly two-thirds of these sixty-three doubtful cases
were really unfruitful. (I may add that, even if we exclude the doubt-
ful cases altogether, the proportion of unfruitful marriages remains
very abnormally large.) We then find that about 20 per cent, of the
marriages of British men of genius have been unfruitful. In this
case we have not much difficulty in obtaining a normal standard of
comparison. Karl Pearson, manipulating the data furnished by Howard
Collins, has foimd that during the past century among the middle and
upper classes chiefly of British race, or belonging to the United States
— a class fairly comparable to those in the present group — the total
sterility is about 12 or 13 per cent., rather less than half of this (t. e.,
about 6 per cent.) being due to what is termed 'natural sterility'; while
the remainder (t. e., 6 or 7 per cent.) must be set down to artificial
restraints on reproduction. If, again, we turn to New Zealand, where

212 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the methods of death registration enable ns to form an approximate
estimate of the proportion of childless marriages among the whole pop-
ulation of somewhat mixed British race, with a high standard of living,
we find that the proportion of marriages in which there are no sur-
viving children at the father's death is about 16 per cent. With due
allowance for the earlier death of the children and for the ignorance,
in a certain proportion of cases, of those who filled in the death cer-
tificate, it is probable enough that this result is not really larger than
the other. In any case there is an excess of sterility among the grouj)
of intellectually eminent men, this excess being the more marked when
we remember that in very large majority they belong to a period when
the artificial restraint of reproduction had scarcely begun to be widely
practiced.

It is somewhat remarkable that, although the number of infertile
marriages is so large, the average fertility of those marriages which
were not barren is by no means small. We have fairly adequate in-
formation in the case of the marriages of 214 of these eminent men.
I have not included those cases in which the national biographer is
only able to say that there were 'at least' so many children, nor have
I knowingly included any cases in which there were two or more mar-
riages. Whethe]" the number of children represents gross or net fer-
tility, it is, unfortunately, in a very large proportion of instances,
quite impossible to say. It is probable that in a large proportion of
cases only the net fertility, i. e., the number of children who sur-
vived infancy and childhood, has been recorded. It is, therefore, the
more remarkable that the average number of children in these 214
fertile families is 5.45. Thus, although our data are probably imper-
fect, they show that the fertile marriages of British men of genius have
produced families which contain on the average one child more than
the fertile marriages of ordinary people of the same race during the
nineteenth century; in New Zealand the average number of chil-
dren left by fathers of families (whether as the result of one or
more marriages) dying between the ages of twenty-five and sixty-five,
is 4.81, which indicates a much larger gross fertility. It must,
of course, be remembered, on the other hand, that the emi-
nent men in our group lived to a very high average age, and it is
obvious that .men who live to an advanced age will have a better
chance of leaving large families than those who die young.* This
consideration somewhat diminishes our estimate of the fertility shown
by British men of genius, while, if we take barren marriages into

* Even apart from this, tliere appears to be a connection between longevity
and fecundity; see M. Beeton and Karl Pearson, 'On the Correlation between
Duration of Life and the Number of Oflfspring,' a paper presented to the Royal
Society of London^ June 14.. 1000.

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS.

213

account, the fertility is greatly pulled down, but still remains well up to
the average. This normal average is thus attained by a conjunction
of an abnormal proportion of sterile marriages, together with an ab-
normally high proportion of children among the fertile marriages.

There would appear to be a considerable resemblance between the
fertility of genius families and of insane families. We have seen
previously that our eminent British persons belonged to families of
probably more than average fertility; we now see that they themselves
produced families of probably not more than average size, owing to a
greater prevalence of sterility. In France, Ball and Regis, confirmed
by Marandon de Montyel, appear to have found reason for a similar
conclusion regarding the insane. They state that natality is greater
among the ascendants of the insane than in normal families, but after-
wards it is the same as in normal families, while they also note the
prevalence of sterility in the families of the insane.* The question,
however, needs further investigation.

With regard to the distribution of families of different sizes, the
results, as compared with the figures already given, are as follows:

Size of Family.. .
Normal Families.

Genius-producing Families.
Families of Men of Genius..

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

12.2

14.7

15.3

14.1

11.1

8.6

7.8

6.2

6.2

11.0

8.4

10.6

10.2

11.7

12.6

14.5

10.3

13.6

8.8

6.5

10.3

6.3

6.9

4.7

Size of Family. . .
Normal Families.

Genius-producing Families.
Families of Men of Genius. .

9

10

11

12

13

14

over 14

3.9
5.5
5.1

2.7

1.4

1.0

.5

.2

.1

4.4

5.8

4.0

2.9

1.8

4.0

2.8

3.2

.9

2.3

1.4

2.3

Allowing for certain irregularities due to the insufficient number
of cases, the interesting point that emerges is the return towards the
proportions that prevail in normal families; it \vill be seen that in all
but a few cases the families of men of genius differ from genius-pro-
ducing families by approximating to normal families. It must be re-
membered that in neither of our groups are the data absolutely per-
fect, but as they stand they confirm the conclusion already suggested
that men of genius belong to families in which there is a high birth-
rate, a flaring up of procreative activity, which in the men of genius
themselves subsides towards normal proportions. The slightly larger
average size of the families of men of genius as compared with normal
families is merely due to the presence of a few families of excessively
large size.

* See, for a summary of these results, Toulouse, 'Les Causes de la Folie,' p. 91;
1896.

214 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

It will be noticed that the families of sizes ranging between three
and six, both inclusive, are tindnly few. It might be supposed that
this is due to the artificial limitation of families, more especially since,
as Karl Pearson has pointed out, in the normal families themselves
there is already a deficiency in those groups, probably due to this
cause. I am, however, inclined to doubt whether that is so in the case
of families of men of genius, although to some extent it may be so.
There seems some reason to suppose that from the present point of
view the group may not be homogeneous, but made up in part of men
with feeble vitality and a tendency to sterility, and in part of men
with a tendency towards unusual fecundity, thus leading to a deficiency
of medium-sized families.

In the case of 147 families of men of genius, it has been possible
to ascertain the number of children of each sex. This is found to be
100 girls to nearly 103 boys. This is almost the normal proportion of
the sexes at birth at the present time in England. If, however, I am
right in supposing that in a certain proportion of our cases the biog-
raphers have stated not the gross fertility, but only the net fertility (or
the surviving children), we are not entitled to expect so close an ap-
proximation to the proportions at birth, since the preponderance of
boys begins to vanish immediately after birth. The figures thus sug-
gest that the families of men of genius show the same tendency to
excess of boys, which we have already seen to be clearly marked in
the case of the families producing men of genius. The data are too
few to indicate whether there is any corresponding excess of girls in
the families of women of genius.

VII. DUEATION OF LIFE.

IT has long been a favorite occupation of popular writers on genius
to estimate the ages at which famous men have died, to dilate on
their tendency to longevity, and to conclude, or assume, that longevity
is the natural result of a life devoted to intellectual avocations. The
average age for different groups, found by a number of different in-
quirers, varies between sixty-four and seventy-one years. One writer,
who finds this highest age for certain groups of eminent men of the
nineteenth century, argues that here we have a test from which there
is no appeal, proving the preeminence of the nineteenth century over
previous centuries, and its freedom from 'degeneration.' It did not
occur to this inquirer to ask at what age the famous men of earlier
centuries died. I have done so in the case of a small group of ten
eminent men on my list, dying between the fourth and the end of the
thirteenth centuries — including, I believe, nearly all those in my list
of whose dates we have fairly definite information during this period
— and I find that their average age is exactly seventy-four years. So

A STUDY OF BBITISII GENIUS. 215

that, if this test means anything at all, the freedom of the nineteenth
century from 'degeneration' is by no means proved.

In reality, however, it means nothing. If genius were recognizable
at birth there would be some interest in tracing the course of its death-
rate. But it must always be remembered that when we are dealing
with men of genius, we are really dealing with famous men of
genius, and that though genius may be born, fame is made — in most
fields very slowly made. Among poets, it has generally been found,
longevity is less marked than among other groups of eminent men, and
the reason is simple. The qualities that the poet requires often de-
velop early; his art is a comparatively easy one to acquire and exercise,
while its products are imperishable and of so widely appreciated a char-
acter that even a few lines may serve to gain immortality. The case of
the poet is, therefore, somewhat exceptional, though even among poets
only a few attain perfection at an early age. In nearly every other
field the man of genius must necessarily take a long period to acquire
the full possession of his powers, and a still longer period to impress
his fellowmen with tlie sense of his powers, thus attaining eminence.
In the case of the lawyer, for instance, the path of success is hemmed
in by tradition and routine, every triumph is only witnessed by a small
number of persons, and passes away without adequate record; only by
a long succession of achievements through many years can the lawyer
hope to acquire the fame necessary for supreme eminence, and it is
not surprising that of the thirty-four preeminent lawyers on my list
only four were under sixty at death. Much the same is true, though
in a slightly less marked degree, of statesmen, divines and actors.

It is, therefore, somewhat an idle task to pile up records of the
longevity of eminent men of genius. They live a long time for the
excellent reason that they must live a long time or they will never be-
come eminent. It is doubtless true that men of genius — mostly be-
longing to the well-to-do classes, and possessing the energy and usually
the opportunities necessary to follow intellectual ends of a compara-
tively impersonal and disinterested character — are in a far more favor-
able position for living to an advanced age than the crowds who strug-
gle more or less desperately for the gratification of personal greeds and
ambitions, which neither in the pursuit nor the attainment are con-
ducive to peaceful and wholesome living. This may well be believed,
but it is hardly demonstrated by the longevity of eminent men.

At the same time it is of some interest to note the ages of the emi-
nent persons on our list at death. Though the facts may have little
significance in themselves, they have a bearing on many of the other
data here recorded. Excluding women, and including only those men
whose dates are considered by the national biographers to be unques-
tionable, the ages of eminent British men at death range from Chatter-

2l6

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ton, the poet, at seventeen, to Bishop Morton, the scholar (bom in the
seventeenth oenlury), and Sir Edward Sabine, the man of science (born
in the eighteenth century), at ninety-five. They are distributed as
follows in five-year age-periods:

Age at Death. ..
Men of Genius..
Age at Death .
Men of Genius

Under 20
1

55-59 I 60-64
66 84

20-24
2

65-69
108

25-29
5

70-74
116

30-34
13

75-79
86

35-39
13

80-84
49

40-44
29

I 85-89
35

45-49
48

50-54
51

90 and over
14

If we consider the number for each year separately, certain points
emerge which are disguised by the five-year age-period, though the
irregularities become frequently marked and inexplicable. A certain
order, however, seems to be maintained. There is scarcely any rise
from twenty-seven to thirty-eight, and even at forty-five only three indi-
viduals died; but, on the whole, there is a slow rise after thirty-eight,
leading to the first climax at forty-nine, when sixteen individuals died;
this climax is maintained at a lower level to fifty-four, when there is a
marked fall to a level scarcely higher than that which prevailed be-
tween the ages of forty-one and forty-three. This lasts for three years;
then there is a sudden rise from seven deaths at fifty-six, to twenty-five
deaths at fifty-seven, and this second climax is again maintained at a
somewhat lower level to the age of sixty-seven, when the highest climax
is attained, with thirty-one deaths. Thereafter the decline is slow but
steady, with a final climax of twenty deaths at seventy-eight. It is
curious that each climax is sudden, and preceded by a fall.

A noteworthy point here seems to be the very low mortality be-
tween the ages of fifty-three and fifty-seven. It seems to confirm
Galton's conclusion, based on somewhat similar data, that a group of
men of genius is in part made up of persons of unusually feeble con-
stitutions and in part of persons of unusually vigorous constitutions.
After the first climax at forty-nine the feeble have mostly died out.
The vigorous are then in possession of their best powers and working
at full pressure; fifty-seven appears to be a critical age at which ex-
haustion and collapse are specially liable to occur. The presence of
these two classes — the abnormally weak and the abnormally vigorous
— would be in harmony with the explanation I have already ventured
to offer of the deficiency of medium-sized families left by our men of
genius.

The age of the women is ascertainable in thirty-nine cases. The
average is extremely high; four died before forty, but nine lived to
over eighty, and two of these were over ninety.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

217

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

THE NATIONAL ACADEMY AND
OTHER SCIENTIFIC SOCIETIES.
The annual stated meeting of the
National Academy of Sciences was held
in Washington in the third week in
April. Professor Woleott Gibbs, one of
the two surviving founders of the Acad-
emy and the distinguished dean of
American men of science, having re-
signed the presidency a year ago, Mr.
Alexander Agassiz, of Cambridge, was
elected to the office. It may almost be
said that Mr. Agassiz assumed the pres-
idency by right, as he exactly repre-
sents the hereditary distinction and
aristocratic preeminence of a small
and select National Academy. It is
possible that such an institution be-
longs to the past rather than to the
democracy of the twentieth century, but
there is perhaps less danger in America
from the preservation of precedents than
from their abolition. Mr. Asaph Hall
remains vice-president and Mr. Charles
D. Walcott treasurer of the Academy,
while the vacancy in the foreign sec-
retaryship, caused by Mr. Agassiz's ele-
vation to the presidency, was filled by
the election of Prof. Ira Remsen,
whose former office of home secretary
is now occupied by Mr. Arnold Hague.
Five new members were elected: George
F. Becker, U. S. Geological Survey,
Washington, D. C; J. McKeen Cattell,
professor of psychology, Columbia Uni-
versity, New York City; Eliakim H.
Moore, professor of mathematics. Uni-
versity of Chicago, Chicago, 111.; Ed-
ward L. Nichols, professor of physics,
Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y., and
T. Mitchell Prudden, professor of pa-
thology, College of Physicians and Sur-
geons, Columbia University. An im-
provement has recently been made in
the manner of election to the Academy.
The members have been divided into
six standing committees, and a nomi-

nee must be endorsed by the committee
having an expert knowledge of his qual-
having an expert knowledge of his qual-
1899 only thirteen new members were
elected, althougli twenty-seven vacan-
cies occurred through death, whereas
during the past three years fourteen
new members have been elected. Eight
foreign associates were elected: MM.
Janssen, Loewy, Bornet and Cornu, of
France; Professors Kohlrausch and
van't Hoff, of Germany; Professor
Kronecker, of Switzerland, and Sir
Archibald Geikie, of Great Britain. The
Henry Draper medal was awarded to
Sir William Huggins, president of the
Royal Society, for his investigations in
astronomical physics. In the scientific
sessions of the Academy eleven papers
were presented, as follows:

'The Climatology of the Isthmus of
Panama': Henry L. Abbot.

'The Effects of Secular Cooling and
Meteoric Dust on the Length of the
Terrestrial Day': R. S. Woodward.

'The Use of Formulae in demonstra-
ting Relations of the Life History of an
Individual to the Evolution of its
Group': Alpheus Hyatt.

'Artificial Parthenogenesis and its
Relation to Normal Fertilization': E. B.
Wilson.

'Simultaneous Volumetric and Elec-
tric Graduation of the Condensation
Tube': Carl Barus.

'Table of Results of an Experimental
Enquiry regarding the Nutritive Action
of Alcohol, prepared by Prof. W. O.
Atwater, of Middletown, Conn.': Pre-
sented by J. S. Billings.

'The Significance of the Dissimilar
Limbs of the Ornithopodous Dinosaurs':
Theo. Gill.

'The Place of Mind in Nature,' 'The
Foundation of Mind': J. W. Powell.

'Conditions Affecting the Fertility
of Sheep and the Sex of their Offspring' :
Alexander Graham Bell.

'The New Spectrum': S. P. Langley.

DuEiNG the same week that our Na-
tional Academy was meeting at Wash-
ington, the recently established Interna-

2l8

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tional Association of Academies was
holding its first regular session at Paris.
This association was organized at Wies-
baden two years ago and held a prelimi-
nary meeting at Paris last year. It is
composed of representatives of the great
academies of the world — eighteen in all
— and includes in its scope literature as
well as science. The object of the As-
sociation is to promote international co-
operation in scientific work; it repre-
sents a movement the importance of
which is very great and the accomplish-
ment of which is very difficult. It is
probable that a more representative
congress would better forward the ends
in view, but it may be that such a con-
gress can best be developed by begin-
ning with a small meeting of eminent
men. There seems, however, to be good
reason to protest against the star cham-
ber methods which the Association
seems inclined to adopt. We are told
of a dinner given by the municipal coun-
cil of Paris, a reception by the presi-
dent of the French Kepublic and a theat-
rical performance at the Comedie Fran-
gaise, but not the slightest information
can be obtained regarding the secret
sessions of the Academy, at which scien-
tific plans were presumably considered.
Questions to be taken up should be
announced well in advance, and they
should be carefully considered by scien-
tific men and discussed in the scientific
press. M. Darboux was acting-president
for the meeting, and the honorary presi-
dents were Dr. Mommsen, Dr. de Goeje,
Sir Michael Foster, M. Berthelot and M.
Gaston Boissier. We regret to learn
that the delegate from the National
Academy of Sciences, Prof. G. L. Good-
ale, was detained by illness at Ge-
neva; otherwise all the academies were
represented. The next meeting will be
in London in 1904.

The Council of the American As-
sociation for the Advancement of
Science held its spring meeting at Wash-
ington at the time of the sessions of
the National Academy of Sciences. The
report made by the permanent secretary

was very gratifying. Over seven hun-
dred new members have been elected
within the past year; the membership is
now larger than ever before and includes
almost the whole body of scientific
workers in this country. The sum of
$1,300 has been saved from current re-
ceipts and turned over to the permanent
fund for the encouragement of research.
The arrangement by which the weekly
journal 'Science' is sent free of charge to
members is apparently giving perfect
satisfaction and is helping the Associa-
tion in many ways. Progress has been
made towards securing an agreement
among universities and other institu-
tions to set aside a week after the
Christmas holidays for the meetings of
scientific and learned societies. The
plan was unanimously approved by the
Association of American Universities,
and Columbia and Cornell have already
taken action lengthening their vacations
for this purpose. Progress was reported
in the arrangements for the Denver
meeting, a single fare on the railways
west of Chicago having been secured.
The meeting, the first to be held so
far toward the West, promises to be of
unusual importance. Readers of this
journal who are not members of the
Association may obtain information as
to the conditions of membership by ad-
dressing the permanent secretary. Dr.
L. O. Howard, the Cosmos Club, Wash-
ington, D. C.

THE HARVARD COLLEGE
OBSERVATORY.

The fifty-fourth annual report of the
director of the Harvard College Observ-
atory gives a clear idea of the activity
which prevails at that institution. As
the present year marks the beginning
of a new century. Professor Pickering
finds the time opportune for describing
the present condition and needs of the
Observatory. As stated in the previous
annual report, the invested funds
amount to something over $800,000.
The annual income is about $50,000,
but, oAving to the continued diminution

THE rnoGEESs of science.

219

in the rate of interest on invested prop-
erty, the income will steadily decrease
unless an additional sum is obtained.
Two hundred thousand dollars more are
needed to place the institution in such
a condition that its standing among
the great observatories of the world
shall be secure. The buildings at Cam-
bridge are old and to provide new ones,
suited to modern requirements, will
cost at least $100,000. The present
buildings at Cambridge are valued at
$52,000 and at Arequipa $12,000. The
instruments at Cambridge are valued at
$20,000 and at Arequipa $50,000. The
great need of the Observatory in the
instrumental way is a great telescope
for the southern heniisphere, the cost
of whichj for construction and main-
tenance, would be about $200,000. Al-
together, half a million dollars are de-
sired to make the Observatory worthy
of the great future which opens before
it. More money is also needed for pub-
lication. Already there have been is-
sued by the Observatory about forty
quarto volumes of the 'Annals,' em-
bracing researches in many lines of as-
tronomy and meteorology. An enormous
amount of material, however, is still
awaiting publication, sufficient to make
about twenty-eight additional volumes.
Some of these will be issued soon, and
all as rapidly as the nature of the M^ork
and the funds available for publication
will permit.

During the last year several lines of
investigation have been pursued. Pho-
tometric and photographic determina-
tions were made of the brightness of a
great number of stars, including several
hundred variables. The reduction of the
observations of the zones made in for-
mer years with the meridian circle has
been carried forward. As usual, the
whole sky was photographed several
times on a small scale. These photo-
graphic charts have proved of the great-
est value in tracing the past history of
new stars, variable stars and special
new objects, such as the little planet
Eros. Also a veiy large number of pho-
tographs have been made of special ob-

jects with instruments of greater power.
Progress was made in the study of the
spectra of the stars and several objects
of special interest were discovered, in-
cluding one nova. Intimately associated
Avith the institution is the Blue Hill
Meteorological Observatory — where dur-
ing the year some striking experiments
were carried on in kiteflying. A meteor-
graph, suspended under the kite, gave
records at heights as great as 15,800
feet above sea level. In Peru, the line
of meteorological stations extending
from the Pacific across the Andes, with
one on the summit of El Misti, at an
elevation of 19,200 feet, has been main-
tained. The Harvard Observatory acts
as the distributing center in this coun-
try for all telegraphic announcements
of astronomical discoveries. During the
year twenty messages were sent out to
American and European astronomers.

TEE I^EW YORK BOTANICAL
GARDEN.

The advance sheets of the 'Bulletin'
of the New York Botanical Garden for
1901, and the pages of the 'Journal,'
show most gratifying progress in that
institution since the preparation of the
article dealing with it published in this
magazine in June of last year. About
seven thousand species of plants are
now successfully cultivated in the open
air and under glass. The large conserv-
atories, which were completed in 1900,
have been filled by plants received as
gifts and as exchanges. Many dona-
tions of great value have been received
from various persons, and notable ex-
changes have been made with the Buf-
falo Botanic Garden and Fairmount
Park. A collection of succulents, num-
bering about five hundred species, pur-
chased by Dr. N. L. Britton during his
recent European tour in attendance at
the International Congi-ess of Botanists
in Paris, has been recently received and
is now installed in the conservatories.
Mr. Samuel Henshaw resigned from the
position of head gardener on January 1,
1901, and was sent on a collecting tour
in the West Indies. He has recently re-

220

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

turned with valuable material from
Trinidad and Jamaica. Mr. George V.
Nash, who was promoted from the po-
sition of curator of the plantations to
the place of head gardener, spent Feb-
ruary and March at the Royal Gardens,
Kew, by special invitation, for the pur-
pose of selecting from the duplicates of
the immense collections of living
plants. About two thousand species
were secured, the greater number of
which promise to thrive, and form the
most valuable single addition yet made
to the flora of the Garden. Mr. Percy
Wilson, museum aid, was sent with the
Amherst Astronomical Expedition to
Sumatra in March and will spend about
six months in that region securing
specimens for the economic museum
and living plants for the horticultural
houses. Other explorations are pro-
jected for the present season.

A set of propagating houses was
erected at a cost of $16,000 in the latter
part of 1900, some new road and path-
ways built to it, and other ground im-
provements made. The New York Cen-
tral and Hudson River Railroad has
completed a station on the margin of
the grounds, which enhances the beauty
of one of the principal approaches to
the Museum. Contracts aggregating
nearly $200,000 have been let for the
present season, embracing the comple-
tion of the main horticultural houses,
main approaches and grounds in front
of the Museum, fountains, roadways
and areas round and near both build-
ings. The income of the Garden from
all sources amounts to over $75,000 for
1901. The library was increased by
over fifteen hundred volumes and a
large number of separates during the
year 1900. The herbarium received ad-
ditions amounting to about seventy
thousand specimens, inclusive of the
Morong Herbarium of Barnard College,
which is deposited under the same con-
ditions as that of Columbia College.
Dr. T. F. Allen, the noted s])ocialist on
the Characeaj, has recently given his
collection of that group to the Garden
A\ithout reserve, and it is now in process

of aiTangement under Dr. Allen's super-
vision. The economic museums have
been filled out in many important par-
ticulars, but remain in a skeleton state,
as a number of years will be necessary
to make an adequate representation of
many of the subjects taken up. The
exhibition microscopes installed a year
ago have been objects of great interest
and profit to visitors.

The laboratories have accommodated
twenty-eight investigators during the
year, and the results of some of their
researches have been published as con-
tributions, or are being offered as theses,
by candidates for degrees at various
universities. These investigations ex-
tend over the entire range of botany.
Tlie equipment has been steadily in-
creased to meet the varied needs of
these workers, and the experimental
greenhouses afford valuable supple-
mental facilities in such work. In ad-
dition to these original researches. Dr.
N. L. Britton has finished a 'Manual of
the Plants of Eastern United States,'
which is being published by the Henry
Holt Company, and Dr. D. T. MacDou-
gal has written an advanced text-book
of 'Practical Plant Physiology,' pub-
lished by Longmans, Green & Co. Sev-
enteen popular lectures were given in
the lecture hall of the Museum in the
winter of 1900-1901, wliich were at-
tended by one to five hundred people.
The annual meeting of the Horticul-
tural Society of New York was held at
the Garden, May 8 and 9, 1901, and the
exhibition was notably successful.

TEE PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS
OF ELECTRICITY.

In the Electrical World and Engineer
for January 5, 1901, the first number of
the twentieth century, appeared a series
of articles on the past progress of ap-
plied electricity and upon its prospects
for the future. Among the authors are
some of the most prominent of Ameri-
can electricians, such as Elihu Thomson,

A. E. Kennelly, Louis Bell, Kerapster

B. Miller, Carl Hering, H. Ward Leon-
ard, Patrick B. Delany, and some of the

THE PEOGBESS OF SCIENCE.

221

more prominent men in science. The
various papers are quite largely devoted
to statements of the unsolved practical
and theoretical problems, in so far as
they are capable of statement.

In the line of theory and research
the most promising field seems to be
the development of the electron theory
which has been in the past mainly built
up on experimental studies of the elec-
trical discharge in gases. This theory is
an attempt to represent all electrical
phenomena in terms of the conception of
the electron, an excessively minute
charged particle, a thousand times
smaller than an atom. This theory has
already given a remarkably clear in-
sight into the electrical properties of
gases, and tentative explanations of the
most promising kind of the ultimate
constitution of matter, and of tlie na-
ture of gravitation, two of the most
stupendous problems of the present day
in physics.

Among the purely practical prob-
lems, purely practical because the scien-
tist has, one might almost say, given it
up in despair, is the production of elec-
trical energy direct from coal. One can
say almost to a certainty that if one
is to transform a large percentage of the
latent energy of coal into electrical en-
ergy the coal must not be burned. The
mischievous waste at present endured
seems to be inherent in the burning
process, but the wildest dreamer has
never imagined that coal can be of any
use other than for feeding a fire! There
does seem to be a difficulty here, and per-
haps the example of the scientist who
revels in thermodynamics might just as
well be followed by the inventive prac-
tical man. One thing, however, is cer-
tain and that is that the solution of this
problem depends upon the invention of
a new kind of fire which can be stopped
in mid air, as it were, by a turn of the
hand, each atom of carbon and each
atom of oxygen stopping its mad whirl
to begin it again at our pleasure, stand-
ing in the meantime in a state of quiet
expectancy. Such a fire the physicist
would call a reversible fire. The burn-

ing of zinc in a voltaic cell is indeed
such a fire, and most of the attempts to
transform the latent energy of coal into
electrical energy efficiently liave been
attempts to construct a voltaic cell
which will burn coal. Another kind of
reversible fire might be realized in the
gas engine if we had materials, to build
a gas engine of, which would stand ex-
cessively high temperatures and exces-
sively high pressures. In such a gas
engine a mixture of gas and air could
be enormously compressed and made so
hot that it could not burn, then by ex-
panding the mixture combustion would
slowly take place and in such a way
that to stop expanding would be to
stop the combustion. Such combustion
would be reversible, for to recompress
the mixture would literally unburn it.
Such a gas engine would have a very
high efficiency if one could keep the
cylinder from being cooled by the sur-
rounding air.

The burning of food in the body of
a Avork horse is a case in which an un-
usually large percentage of the latent
energy of the fuel, or food, is converted
into useful work, and thermodynamics
tells us beyond peradventure that this
high efficiency must be due to a state of
affairs something like the following:
Let us imagine the muscles built up of
enormously complicated molecules, like
the molecules of albumin for example,
and let us imagine that as a muscle con-
tracts these complicated molecules are
distorted slowly, and that as they be-
come distorted some of the atoms of
carbon and hydrogen are slowly bulged
out of the molecular structure and gin-
gerly allowed to approach the atoms of
oxygen in the blood in such a way that
the process would be arrested at any
moment by a cessation of the contrac-
tion. If such a process could be com-
pletely realized and if the atoms of
oxygen could also be kept at bay by
being themselves involved in some
fashion in the bulging process of the
muscular structure, then the efficiency
of muscular action would be one hun-
dred per cent. It is in fact much less

222

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

than one hundred per cent., on account,
perhaps, of the oxygen molecules being

unbridled.

TEE WISCONSIN AGRICULTURAL
EXPERIMENT STATION.

The seventh annual report of the
Wisconsin Agricultural Experiment Sta-
tion is a notable example of a class of
literature which is rapidly increasing
in extent and in popular interest. The
reports of this station have become
widely known for the important con-
tributions which they contain and for
their interest to those who follow the
progress of science, as well as to the
progressive farmer, whose needs are
kept constantly in view. The last re-
port, which is for the year ending June
30, 1900, is fully up to the standard
of previous reports. It adds another
chapter to the interesting studies on
the process of cheese ripening or curing
which Dr. Babcock and Dr. Russell have
been conducting for a number of years.
In the past their studies have led to the
discovery of a natural enzym in milk
which has been shown to be an active
agent in the digestion of the proteids
of cheese, rendering them soluble and
digestible. This discovery, which was
contrary to the prevalent bacterial the-
ory and was opposed by many bacte-
riologists, has stood the test, and the
theory is now generally believed in, the
main point at issue being the extent
and the exact character of the changes
which the ferment induces. The pres-
ent report takes up the action of an-
other ferment in cheese, namely, rennet^
which is added during the process of
manufacture. There has been much di-
versity of opinion as to whether the
rennet had any part in the ripening
process, but very little real investiga-
tion. The most recent writings on the
subject have disclaimed any action due
to rennet. Babcock and Russell now
show that rennet undoubtedly assists
in peptonizing the casein of cheese, the
active agent being the peptic enzj^ms
contained in tlie rennet extracts. The
investigation is a quite comprehensive

one, involving a study of the action
of pure pepsin as compared with rennet,
the conditions of the acidity most fa-
vorable to the action, and the nature of
the products. The matter is of consid-
erable importance, since it is found that
the amount of rennet used influences
the rapidity and the thoroughness of
the ripening process. The wonder is
that a point upon which there has been
such marked discrepancy of opinion has
not been given a thorough investigation
before this.

Of equal interest is the investiga-
tion of the cause and character of the
changes in green fodder when preserved
as silage in the silo, also by Drs. Bab-
cock and Russell. The generally ac-
cepted theory of silage formation as fer-
mentation changes, due to the action of
bacteria and molds, is found to be er-
roneous, inasumuch as good silage was
made under conditions which positively
precluded bacterial activity, i. e., in the
presence of anaesthetics. With the aid
of an ingeniously-devised closed-circuit
respiration apparatus, the authors were
able to study the gaseous products and
to maintain the conditions entirely un-
der their control. The unavoidable
losses in ensiling green fodder were
found to be due to the formation of
water, carbon dioxid and volatile or-
ganic acids, which are produced, not as
a result of the bacterial action, but as
a result of the intromolecular respira-
tory processes of the plant tissues. The
avoidable losses, on the other hand, are
found to be due mainly to the decom-
position of organic matter induced by
the development of bacteria and molds,
whose growth is greatly facilitated -by
the admission of air, as a result of im-
proper construction of the silo. The
bacteria are, therefore, instead of being
essential to good silage, only delete-
rious. In view of the extent to which
silage is now prepared in this country,
and the fact that the spoiled or partly
spoiled silage is not only a loss but is
lilvoly to be injurious to stock, these
; results, which furnish a clearer under-

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

223

standing of the factors which enter into
the process, cannot fail to be of much
practical importance. A study of the
thermal death point of tubercle bacilli
in milk confirmed the results of the pre-
vious year, showing that by using a
closed pasteurizer tubercle bacilli can be
destroyed by heating milk for twenty
minutes at 140° F., instead of at 150-
155°, as formerly. This lowering of the
necessary temperature removes the ob-
jection formerly made that cream does
not rise readily on pasteurized milk and
that the consistency or body of pas-
teurized cream is much lessened.

The soil investigations of the Wis-
consin Experiment Station have come
to be regarded as one of its most prom-
inent features. In addition to investi-
gations on the soluble salts of culti-
vated soils, the influence of potash salts
on the black marsh soils of the State,
which have been exceedingly difficult to
manage, Professor King reports studies
of the influence of the right amount
and the right distribution of water in
crop production — a subject upon which
information is quite meager and which
points directly to the application of ir-
rigation, even in humid climates, to cor-
rect insufficient or inadvantageously
distributed rainfall. In the horticultu-
ral line. Professor Goff has for several
years been studying the injury to the
buds and roots of fruit trees from cold,
and in the present report he gives an il-
lustrated account of his investigations
on the time of formation and the devel-
opment of the flower buds, and also on
the resumption of root growth of fruit
trees in the spring; and his assistant
gives the results of systematic obser-
vations on the duration of the growth
period in fruit trees. These subjects are
closely connected with the management
of fruit orchards and will furnish a ra-
tional basis for practice. In addition
to these lines of investigation, the re-
port also contains accounts of feeding
experiments with pigs, sheep and dairy
cows, to answer more immediately prac-
tical questions; studies of various fac-

tors influencing the Babcock milk test,
a rapid method for the estimation of
salt in butter, a trial of a new kind of
churn, operated by forcing a steady
stream of air into the cream, for which
great claims liave been made; studies
of the effect of the continued use of
immature seeds; studies relating to tan-
nery refuse and hides as causes of the
disease in animals known as anthrax;
experience with sugar beet culture in
Wisconsin, and several other lines.

Altogether, the report is one of sur-
passing interest, and the results of quite
a part of the experiments and investiga-
tion will not be confined in their appli-
cation within the borders of the State.
If any indication is needed of the im-
portance of tlie work being done by
the agricultural experiment stations of
this country and the wisdom of Con-
gress in continuing liberal appropria-
tions for their work, this report should
go a long way in the direction of fur-
nishing such indication.

SCIENTIFIC NEWS.

Science in America could have suf-
fered no more severe loss than the death
of Henry Augustus Rowland, professor
of physics in the Johns Hopkins Uni-
versity. Dying at the age of fifty-two
years, he was one of the world's most
eminent men of genius and one of the
two great physicists that America has
produced. An account of Rowland's life
and work, with a portrait, was pub-
lished in the Popular Science
Monthly for May, 1896, and we repro-
duce in the current number an address
given by him some years ago befoi'e the
American Association for the Advance-
ment of Science.

We note with regret a number of
other recent deaths among men of
science, including: Thomas Conrad
Porter, the botanist, for the past thirty-
four years professor at Lafayette Col-
lege; John Thomas Duffield, for more
than forty years professor of mathe-
matics at Princeton University: Rich-
ard T. Roth well, editor of the 'Engineer-

224

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ing and Mining Journal'; Frederick J.
Brockway, assistant demonstrator of
anatomy at the College of Physicians
and Surgeons of Columbia University;
F. M. Raoult, the eminent chemist, pro-
fessor at Grenoble ; Paul Chaix, profess-
or of geography at Geneva; Josef von
Fedor, professor of hygiene at Buda
Pesth, and Adolph Hirsch, professor of
astronomy at Neuchatel. Two men of
science lost their lives in the direct pur-
suit of knowledge: Dr. P. Kohlstock
died at Tien-Tsin, while making re-
searches on tropical diseases, and Dr.
Menke was murdered by natives while
on an exploring expedition to Macquari
Island.

The erection of a memorial to Hux-
ley in Ealing, near London, where he
was born and received his early educa-
tion, is contemplated. A bronze medal-
lion portrait has been advocated for the
central feature of the design, which may
take the form of a simple mural tablet
or of a more worthy monument as funds
are obtainable. Subscriptions are not
confined to the neighborhood or land of
Huxley's birth, and those who may be
desirous of assisting should communi-
cate with the secretary to the fund,
Mr. B. B. Woodward, 120 The Grove,
Ealing, London, W.

A MEETING was held at Cambridge
University on April 27 to arrange for
some acknowledgment of the services to
science and the University of Prof. G.
D. Liveing. Professor Liveing is now
seventy-three years of age. Ii> 1852 he
organized the chemical laboratory at
Cambridge, which was the first scientific
laboratory in the University. — Mr. Her-
bert Spencer celebrated his eighty-first
birthday on April 27. Mr. Spencer lives
quietly at Brighton. His health is fair,
but he is unable to undertake much
literary work. — A silver loving cup was
presented by a number of teacliers to
Mr. Thomas Meehan, the veteran horti-
culturist and botanist, of Philadelpliia,
on the occasion of liis seventy-fifth
birthday.

Dr. Edmund Arthur Engle, pro-
fessor of mathematics at Washington
University, St. Louis, and dean of the
College of Engineering, has been elected
president of the Worcester Polytechnic
Institute. — Mr. J. H. H. Teall has suc-
ceeded Sir Archibald Geikie as director-
general of the British Geological Survey.

Several important scientific posi-
tions under the government will be
filled by civil service examination on
June 3. These include the positions of
plant physiologist and plant pathologist
in the Department of Agriculture, with
salaries of $1,800 per annum, and the
position of ethnologist in the Bureau of
American Ethnology, with a salary of
$1,500. Further particulars can be ob-
tained by addressing the Civil Service
Commission at Washington, D. C.

At the last meeting of the Eumford
Committee of the American Academy of
Arts and Sciences a grant of $300 was
awarded to Prof. Arthur A. Noyes
in aid of a research on the eff'ect of high
temperatures upon the relative conduc-
tivity of aqueous salt solutions. — Dr.
Edmund B. Wilson, professor of zoology
at Columbia University, and Dr. J.
Playfair McMurrieh, professor of anat-
omy at the University of Michigan, are
among the Americans who will attend
the International Zoological Congress to
be held in Berlin from the 12th to the
19th of August.

The arrangements for the celebra-
tion of the bicentennial of the Yale
University in October next have now
been made pviblic. The addresses in-
clude one by President Gilman, of the
Johns Hopkins University, on 'Yale in
its Relation to Science and Letters,' and
one by Prof. W. H. Welch, of the same
University, on 'Yale in its Relation to
Medicine.'

The United States Department of
Agiiculture lias established an agricul-
tural experiment station in Porto Rico,
which will be under the direction of
Mr. Frank D. Gardner, now of the Di-
vision of Soils.

^^

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MOKTHLY.

JULY, 1901.

THE TEAXSMISSIOX OF YELLOW EEVEE BY MOSQUITOES.

By GEORGE M. STERNBERG, M.D., LL.D.,

SURGEON-GENERAL U. S. ARMY.

THE discoveries which have been made during the past twenty-five
years with reference to the etiolog}^ of infectious diseases consti-
tute the greatest achievement of scientific medicine and afford a substan-
tial basis for the application of intelligent measures of prophylaxis. We
now know the specific cause ('germ') of typhoid fever, of pulmonary
consumption, of cholera, of diphtheria, of erysipelas, of croupous pneu-
monia, of the malarial fevers and of various other infectious diseases of
man and of the domestic animals, but, up to the present time, all efforts
to discover the germ of yellow fever have been without success. The
present writer, as a member of the Havana Yellow Fever Commission,
in 1879, made the first systematic attempt to solve the unsettled ques-
tions relating to yellow fever etiology by modern methods of research.
jSTaturally the first and most important question to engage my attention
was that relating to the specific infectious agent, or 'germ,' which there
was every reason to believe must be found in the bodies of infected in-
dividuals. Was this germ j)resent in the blood, as in the case of re-
lapsing fever; or was it to be found in the organs and tissues which
upon post mortem examination give evidence of pathological changes,
as in typhoid fever, pneumonia and diphtheria ; or was it to be found in
the alimentary canal, as in cholera and dysentery. The clinical history
of the disease indicated a general blood infection. As my equipment in-
cluded the best microscopical apparatus made, I had strong hopes that
in properly stained preparations of blood taken from the circulation of
yellow fever patients my Zeiss 1-18 oil immersion objective would re-
veal to me the germ I was in search of. But I was doomed to disap-

VOL. LIX. — 15

2 26 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

pointment. Eepeated examinations of blood from patients in every
stage of the disease failed to demonstrate the presence of micro-
organisms of any kind. My subsequent investigations in Havana, Vera
Cruz and Eio de Janeiro, made in 1887, 1888 and 1889, were equally
unsuccessful. And numerous competent microscopists of various na-
tions have since searched in vain for this elusive germ. Another method
of attacking this problem consists in introducing blood from yellow
fever patients or recent cadavers into various ^culture media' for the
purpose of cultivating any germ that might be present. Extended re-
searches of this kind also gave a negative result, which in my final re-
port I stated as follows :

The specific cause of yellow fever has not yet been demonstrated.

It is demonstrated that micro-organisms, capable of development in the cul-
ture-media usually employed by bacteriologists, are only found in the blood and
tissues of yellow fever cadavers in exceptional cases, when cultures are made
very soon after death.

Since this report was made various investigators have attacked the
question of yellow fever etiology, and one of them has made very posi-
tive claims to the discovery of the specific germ, I refer to the Italian
bacteriologist, Sanarelli. His researches were made in Brazil, and,
singularly enough, he found in the blood of the first case examined by
him a bacillus. It was present in large numbers, but this case proved to
be unique, for neither Sanarelli nor any one else has since found it in
such abundance. It has been found in small numbers in the blood and
tissues of yellow fever cadavers in a certain number of the cases ex-
amined. But carefully conducted researches by competent bacteriolo-
gists have failed to demonstrate its presence in a considerable propor-
tion of the cases, and the recent researches of Eeed, Carroll and Agra-
monte, to which I shall shortly refer, demonstrate conclusively that the
bacillus of Sanarelli has nothing to do with the etiology of yellow fever.

So far as I am aware. Dr. Carlos Finlay, of Havana, Cuba, was the
first to suggest the transmission of yellow fever by mosquitoes. In a
communication made to the Academy of Sciences of Havana, in Oc-
tober, 1881, he gave an account of his first attempts to demonstrate the
truth of his theory. In a paper contributed to the 'Edinburgh Medical
Journal' in 1894 Dr. Finlay gives a summary of his experimental inocu-
lations up to that date as follows :

A summary account of the experiments performed by myself (and some
also by my friend. Dr. Delgado), during tlie last twelve years, will enable the
reader to judge for himself. The experiment has consisted in first applying a
captive mosquito to a yellow fever patient, allowing it to introduce its lance and
to fill itself with blood; next, after the lapse of two or more days, applying the
same mosquito to the skin of a person who is considered susceptible to yellow
fever; and, finally, observing the effects, not only during the first few weeks, but
during periods of several years, so as to appreciate the amount of immunity
that should follow.

YELLOW FEVER AND MOSQUITOES. 227

Between the 30tli of June, 1881, and the 2d of December, 1893, eighty-eight
persons have been so inoculated. All were white adults, uniting the conditions
which justify the assumption that they were susceptible to yellow fever. Only
three were women. Tlie chronological distribution of the inoculations was as
follows: Seven in 1881, ten in 1883, nine in 1885, three in 1886, twelve in 1887,
nine in 1888, seven in 1889, ten in 1890, eight in 1891, three in 1892, and ten in
1893.

The yellow fever patients upon whom the mosquitoes were contaminated
were, almost in every instance, well-marked cases of the albuminuric or melano-
albuminuric forms, in the second, third, fourth, fifth, or sixth day of the disease.
In some of the susceptible subjects, the inoculation was repeated when the
source of the contamination appeared uncertain.

Among the eighty-seven who have been under observation, the following re-
sults have been recorded :

Within a term of days, varying between five and twenty-five after the inocu-
lation, one presented a mild albuminuric attack, and thirteen only 'acclimation
fevers.'

While Finlay's theory appeared to be plausible and to explain many
of the facts relating to the etiology of yellow fever, his experimental
inoculations not only failed to give it substantial support, but the nega-
tive results, as reported by himself, seemed to be opposed to the view
that yellow fever is transmitted by the mosquito. It is true that he
reports one case which ^presented a mild albuminuric attack' which we
may accept as an attack of yellow fever. But in view of the fact that
this case occurred in the city of Havana, where yellow fever is endemic,
and of the eighty-six negative results from similar inoculations, the in-
ference seemed justified that in this case the disease was contracted in
some other way than as a result of the so-called 'mosquito inoculation.'
The thirteen cases in which 'only acclimation fevers' occurred 'within a
term of days varying between five and twenty-five after the inoculation'
appeared to me to have no value as giving support to Finla/s theory;
first, because these 'acclimation fevers' could not be identified as mild
cases of yellow fever ; second, because the ordinary period of incubation
in yellow fever, is less than five days; and, third, because these in-
dividuals, having recently arrived in Havana, were liable to attacks of
yellow fever, or of 'acclimation fever' as a result of their residence in
this city and quite independently of Dr. Finlay's mosquito inoculations.
For these reasons Dr. Finlay's experiments failed to convince the med-
ical profession generally of the truth of his theory relating to the trans-
mission of yellow fever, and this important question remained in doubt
and a subject of controversy. One party regarded the disease as per-
sonally contagious and supposed it to be communicated directly from
the sick to the well, as in the case of other contagious diseases, such as
smallpox, scarlet fever, etc. Opposed to this theory was the fact that
in innumerable instances non-immune persons had been known to care
for yellow fever patients as nurses, or physicians, without contracting the

228 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

disease ; also the fact that the epidemic extension of the disease depends
upon external conditions relating to temperature, altitude, rainfall, etc.
It was a well-establislied fact that the disease is arrested by cold weather
and does not prevail in northern latitudes or at considerable altitudes.
But diseases which are directly transmitted from man to man by per-
sonal contact have no such limitations. The alternate theory took ac-
count of the above-mentioned facts and assumed that the disease was
indirectly transmitted from the sick to the well, as is the case in typhoid
fever and cholera, and that its germ was capable of development ex-
ternal to the human body when conditions were favorable. These con-
ditions were believed to be a certain elevation of temj)erature, the pres-
ence of moisture and suitable organic pabulum (filth) for the develop-
ment of the germ. The two first-mentioned conditions were known to
be essential, the third was a subject of controversy.

Yellow fever epidemics do not occur in the winter months in the
temperate zone and they do not occur in arid regions. As epidemics
have frequently prevailed in sea-coast cities known to be in an insani-
tary condition, it has been generally assumed that the presence of de-
composing organic material is favorable for the development of an epi-
demic and that, like typhoid fever and cholera, yellow fever is a 'filth
disease.' Opposed to this view, however, is the fact that epidemics have
frequently occurred in localities {e. g., at military posts) where no local
insanitary conditions were to be found. Moreover, there are marked
differences in regard to the transmission of the recognized filth diseases
— typhoid fever and cholera — and yellow fever. The first-mentioned
diseases are largely propagated by means of a contaminated water
supply, whereas there is no evidence that yellow fever is ever communi-
cated in this way. Typhoid fever and cholera prevail in all parts of the
world and may prevail at any season of the year, although cholera, as a
rule, is a disease of the summer months. On the other hand, yellow
fever has a very restricted area of prevalence and is essentially a disease
of seaboard cities and of warm climates. Evidently neither of the
theories referred to accounts for all of the observed facts with reference
to the endemic prevalence and epidemic extension of the disease under
consideration.

Having for years given much thought to this subject, I became some
time since impressed with the view that probably in yellow fever, as in
the malarial fevers, there is an 'intermediate host.' I therefore sug-
gested to Dr. Eeed, president of the board* appointed upon my recom-
mendation for the study of this disease in the Island of Cuba, that he
should give special attention to the possibility of transmission by some

* The members of the board were : Major Walter Reed, Surgeon U. S. A. ;
Dr. James Carroll, Contract Surgeon U. S. A. ; Dr. A. Agramonte, Contract Sur-
geon U. S. A., and Dr. Jesse W. Lazear, Contract Surgeon U. S. A.

YELLOW FEVER AND MOSQUITOES. 229

insect, although the experiments of Finlay seemed to show that this in-
sect was not a mosquito of the genus Culcx, such as he had used in
his inoculation experiments. I also urged that efforts should be made to
ascertain definitely whether the disease can be communicated from man
to man by blood inoculations. Evidently if this is the case the blood
must contain the living infectious agent upon which the propagation of
the disease depends, notwithstanding the fact that all attempts to dem-
onstrate the presence of such a germ in the blood, by means of the micro-
scope and culture methods, had proved unavailing. I had previously
demonstrated by repeated experiments that inoculations of yellow fever
blood into lower animals — dogs, rabbits, guinea-pigs — give a negative
result, but this negative result might well be because these animals were
not susceptible to the disease and could not be accepted as showing that
the germ of yellow fever was not present in the blood. A single inocula-
tion experiment on man had been made in my presence in the city of
Vera Cruz, in 1887, by Dr. Daniel Euiz, who was in charge of the civil
hosi)ital in that city. But this experiment was inconclusive for the
reason that the patient from whom the blood was obtained was in the
eighth day of the disease, and it was quite possible that the specific germ
might have been present at an earlier period and that after a certain
number of days the natural resources of the body are sufficient to efEect
its destruction, or in some way to cause its disappearance from the cir-
culation.

This was the status of the question of yellow fever etiology when Dr.
Eeed and his associates commenced their investigations in Cuba during
the summer of 1900. In a 'Preliminary Xote,' read at the meeting of
the American Public Healtli Association, October 22, 1900, the board
gave a report of three cases of yellow fever which they believed to be the
direct result of mosquito inoculations. Two of these were members of
the board, viz. : Dr. Jesse W. Lazear and Dr. James Carroll, who volun-
tarily submitted themselves to the experiment. Dr. Carroll suffered a
severe attack of the disease and recovered, but Dr. Lazear fell a victim
to his enthusiasm in the cause of science and humanity. His death oc-
curred on September 25th, after an illness of six days' duration. About
the same time nine other individuals who volunteered for the experiment
were bitten by infected mosquitoes — i. e., by mosquitoes which had pre-
viously been allowed to fill themselves with blood from yellow fever
cases — and in these cases the result was negative. In considering the
experimental evidence thus far obtained the attention of the members
of the board was attracted by the fact that in the nine inoculations with
a negative result "the time elapsing between the biting of the mosquito
and the inoculation of the healthy subject varied in seven cases from
two to eight days and in the remaining two from ten to thirteen days,
whereas in two of the three successful cases the mosquito had been kept

2 30 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

for twelve days or longer." In the third ease, that of Dr. Lazear, the
facts are stated in the report of the board as follows :

Case 3. Dr. Jesse W. Lazear, Acting Assistant Surgeon U. S. Army, a mem-
ber of this board, was bitten on August 16, 1900 (Case 3, Table III) by a mos-
quito (Culex fasciatus) which ten days previously had been contaminated by
biting a very mild case of yellow fever (fifth day). No appreciable disturbance
of health followed this inoculation.

On September 13, 1900 (forenoon). Dr. Lazear, while on a visit to Las
Animas Hospital, and while collecting blood from yellow fever patients for
study, was bitten by a Culex mosquito (variety undetermined). As Dr. Lazear
had been previously bitten by a contaminated insect without after effects, he
deliberately allowed this particular mosquito, which had settled on the back
of his hand, to remain until it had satisfied its hunger.

On the evening of September 18, 5 days after the bite. Dr. Lazear com-
plained of feeling 'out of sorts,' and had a chill at 8 p. m.

On September 19, 12 o'clock noon, his temperature was 102.4°, pulse 112;
his eyes were injected and his face suffused; at 3 p. m. temperature was 103.4°,
pulse 104; 6 p. m., temperature 103.8° and pulse 106; albumin appeared in the
urine. Jaundice appeared on the third day. The subsequent history of this case
was one of progressive and fatal yellow fever, the death of our much-lamented
colleague having occurred on the evening of September 25, 1900.

Evidently in this case the evidence is not satisfactory as to the fatal
attack being a result of the bite by a mosquito 'while on a visit to Las
Animas Hospital/ although Dr. Lazear himself was thoroughly con-
vinced that this was the direct cause of his attack.

The inference drawn by Dr. Eeed and his associates, from the ex-
periments thus far made, was that yellow fever may be transmitted by
mosquitoes of the genus Culex, but that in order to convey the infection
to a non-immune individual the insect must be kept for 12 days or
longer after it has filled itself with blood from a j^ellow fever patient in
the earlier stages of the disease. In other words, that a certain period
of incubation is required in the body of the insect before the germ
reaches its salivary glands and consequently before it is able to inoculate
an individual with the germs of yellow fever. This inference, based
upon experimental data, received support from other observations,
which have been repeatedly made, with reference to the introduction and
spread of yellow fever in localities favorable to its propagation. When
a case is imported to one of our southern seaport cities, from Havana,
Vera Cruz or some other endemic focus of the disease, an interval of
two weeks or more occurs before secondary cases are developed as a re-
sult of such importation. In the light of our present knowledge this is
readily understood. A certain number of mosquitoes having filled
themselves with blood from this first case after an interval of twelve days
or more bite non-immune individuals living in the vicinity, and these
individuals after a brief period of incubation fall sick with the disease ;
being bitten by other mosquitoes they serve to transmit the disease

YELLOW FEVER AND MOSQUITOES. 231

through the 'intermediate host' to still others. Thus the epidemic ex-
tends, at first slowly as from house to house, then more rapidly, as by
geometrical progression.

It will be seen that the essential difference between the successful ex-
periments of the board of which Dr. Eeed is president and the unsuc-
cessful experiments of Finlay consists of the length of time during which
the mosquitoes were kept after filling themselves with blood from a yel-
low-fever patient. In Finlay's experiments the interval was usually
short — from two to five or six days, and it will be noted that in the ex-
periments of Eeed and his associates the result was invariably negative
when the insect had been kept for less than eight days (7 cases).

Having obtained what they considered satisfactory evidence that
yellow fever is transmitted by mosquitoes, Dr. Eeed and his associates
proceeded to extend their experiments for the purpose of establishing
the fact in such a positive manner that the medical profession and the
scientific world generally might be convinced of the reliability of the
experimental evidence upon which their conclusions were based. These
conclusions, which have been fully justified by their subsequent experi-
ments were stated in their 'Preliminary Note' as follows:

1. Bacillus icteroides (Sanarelli) stands in no causative relation to yellow
fever, but, when present, should be considered as a secondary invader in this
disease.

2. The mosquito serves as the intermediate host for the parasite of yellow
fever.

In 'An Additional Kote' read at the Pan-American Medical Con-
gress held in Havana, Cuba, February 4-7, 1901, a report is made of the
further experiments made up to that date. In order that the absolute
scientific value of these experiments may be fully appreciated I shall
quote quite freely from this report with reference to the methods
adopted for the purpose of excluding all sources of infection other than
the mosquito inoculation :

In order to exercise perfect control over the movements of those individuals
who were to be subjected to experimentation, and to avoid any other possible
source of infection, a location was selected in an open and uncultivated field,
about one mile from the tovvTi of Quemados, Cuba. Here an experimental sani-
tary station was established under the complete control of the senior member of
this Board. This station was named Camp Lazear, in honor of our late col-
league. Dr. Jesse W. Lazear, Acting Assistant Surgeon U. S. A., who died of
yellow fever, while courageously investigating the causation of this disease.
The site selected was well drained, freely exposed to sunlight and winds, and
from every point of view satisfactory for the purposes intended.

The personnel of this camp consisted of two medical officers. Dr. Roger P.
Ames, Acting Assistant Surgeon U. S. A., an immune,' in immediate charge; Dr.
R. P. Cooke, Acting Assistant Surgeon U. S. A., non-immune; one acting hos-
pital steward, an immune; nine privates of the hospital corps, one of whom was
immune, and one immune ambulance driver.

232 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

For the quartering of this detachment, and of such non-immune individuals
as should be received for experimentation, hospital tents, properly floored, were
provided. These Avere placed at a distance of about twenty feet from each other,
and were numbered 1 to 7 respectively.

Camp Lazear was established Xov. 20, 1900, and from this date was strictly
quarantined, no one being permitted to leave or enter camp except the three
immune members of the detachment and the members of the board. Supplies
were drawn chiefly from Columbia Barracks, and for this purpose a conveyance
under the control of an immune acting hospital steward, and having an immune
driver, was used.

A few Spanish immigrants recently arrived at the port of Havana were
received at Camp Lazear, from time to time, while these observations were being
carried out. A non-immune person, having once left this camp, was not per-
mitted to return to it under any circumstances whatever.

The temperature and pulse of all non-immune residents were carefully
recorded three time a day. Under these circumstances any infected individual
entering the camp could be promptly detected and removed. As a matter of
fact, only two persons, not the subject of experimentation, developed any rise of
temperature; one, a Spanish immigrant, with probable commencing pulmonary
tuberculosis, who was discharged at the end of three days; and the other, a
Spanish immigrant, who developed a temperature of 102.6° F. on the afternoon
of his fourth day in camp. He was at once removed with his entire bedding and
baggage and placed in the receiving ward at Columbia Barracks. His fever,
which was marked by daily intermissions for three days, subsided upon the
administration of cathartics and enemata. His attack was considered to be due
to intestinal irritation. He was not permitted, however, to return to the camp.

No non-immune resident was subjected to inoculation who had not passed
in this camp the full period of incubation of yellow fever, with one exception, to
be hereinafter mentioned.

For the purpose of experimentation subjects were selected as follows : From
Tent No. 2, 2 non-immunes, and from Tent No. 5, 3 non-immunes. Later, 1 non-
immune in Tent No. 6 was also designated for inoculation.

It should be borne in mind that at the time when these inoculations were
begun, there were only 12 non-immune residents at Camp Lazear, and that 5 of
these were selected for experiment, viz., 2 in Tent No. 2, and 3 in Tent No. 5. Of
these we succeeded in infecting 4, viz., 1 in Tent No. 2 and 3 in Tent No. 5, each
of whom developed an attack of yellow fever within the period of incubation of
this disease. The one negative result, therefore, was in Case 2 — ISIoran — inocu-
lated with a mosquito on the fifteenth day after the insect had bitten a case of
yellow fever on the third day. Since this mosquito failed to infect Case 4, three
days after it had bitten Moran, it follows that the result could not have been
otherwise than negative in the latter case. We now know, as the result of our
observations, that in the dase of an insect kept at room temperature during the
cool weather of November, fifteen or even eighteen days would, in all probability,
be too short a time to render it capable of producing the disease.

As bearing upon the source of infection, we invite attention to the period of
time during which the subjects liad been kept under rigid quarantine, j^rior to
successful inoculation, which was as follows: Case 1, fifteen days; Case 3, nine
days; Case 4, nineteen days; Case 5, twenty-one days. We further desire to
emphasize the fact that this epidemic of yellow fever, which aff'ected 33.33 per
cent, of the non-immune residents of Camp Lazear, did not concern the 7 non-
immunes occupying Tents Nos. 1, 4, 6 and 7, hut was strictly limited to those
individuals who had been bitten by contaminated mosquitoes.

YELLOW FEVER AND MOSQUITOES. 233

Nothing could point more forcibly to tlie source of this infection than the
order of the occurrence of events at this camp. Tlie precision with which the
infection of the individual followed the bite of the mosquito left nothing to be
desired in order to fuUlll the requirements of a scientific experiment.

In summing up their results at the conclusion of this report the fol-
lowing statement is made :

Out of a total of 18 non-immunes whom we have inoculated with contami-
nated mosquitoes, since we began this line of investigation, 8, or 44.4 per cent.,
have contracted yellow fever. If we exclude those individuals bitten by mos-
quitoes that had been kept less than twelve days after contamination, and which
were therefore probably incapable of conveying the disease, we have to record
eight positive and two negative results — 80 per cent.

In a still later report (May, 1901) Dr. Reed says: "We have thus far suc-
ceeded in conveying yellow fever to twelve individuals by means of the bites of
contaminated mosquitoes."

The non-immune individuals experimented upon were all fully in-
formed as to the nature of the experiment and its probable results and
all gave their full consent. Fortunately no one of these brave volun-
teers in the cause of science and humanity suffered a fatal attack of the
disease, although several were very ill and gave great anxiety to the
members of the board, who fully appreciated the grave responsibility
which rested upon them. That these experiments were justifiable under
the circumstances mentioned is, I believe, beyond question. In no other
way could the fact established have been demonstrated and the knowl-
edge gained is of inestimable value as a guide to reliable measures of
prevention. Already it is being applied in Cuba and without doubt
innumerable lives will be saved as a result of these experiments showing
the precise method by which yellow fever is contracted by those exposed
in an 'infected locality.' Some of these volunteers were enlisted men of
the United States Army and some were Spanish immigrants who had
recently arrived in Cuba. When taken sick they received the best pos-
sible care and after their recovery they had the advantage of being 'im-
munes' who had nothing further to fear from the disease which has
caused the death of thousands and tens of thoiisands of Spanish soldiers
and immigrants who have come to Cuba under the orders of their Gov-
ernment or to seek their fortunes.

The experiments already referred to show in the most conclusive
manner that the blood of yellow-fever patients contains the infectious
agent, or germ, to which the disease is due, and this has been further
demonstrated by direct inoculations from man to man. This experi-
ment was made by Dr. Eeed at 'Camp Lazear' upon four individuals,
who freely consented to it ; and in three of the four a typical attack of
yellow fever resulted from the blood injection. The blood was taken
from a vein at the bend of the elbow on the first or second day of sick-
ness and was injected subcutaneously into the four non-immune in-

2 34 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

dividuals, the amount being in one positive case 2 c. c, in one 1.5 c. c,
and in one 0.5 c. e. In the case attended with a negative result, a Span-
ish immigrant, a mosquito inoculation also proved to be without effect,
and Dr. Eeed supposes that this individual 'probably possesses a natural
immunity to yellow fever.' Dr. Eeed says with reference to these ex-
periments :

It is important to note that in the three cases in which the injection of the
blood brought about an attack of yellow fever, careful culture from the same
blood, taken immediately after injection, failed to show the presence of
Sanarelli's bacillus.

Having demonstrated the fact that 5'ellow fever is propagated by
mosquitoes Dr. Eeed and his associates have endeavored to ascertain
whether it may also be propagated, as has been commonly supposed, by
clothing, bedding and other articles which have been in use by those sick
with this disease. With reference to the experiments made for the solu-
tion of this question I cannot do better than to quote in extenso from
Dr. Eeed's paper read at the Pan-American Medical Congress in Ha-
vana. He says :

We believe that the general consensus of opinion both of the medical pro-
fession and of the laity is strongly in favor of the conveyance of yellow fever by
fomites. The origin of epidemics, devastating in their course, has been fre-
quently attributed to the unpacking of trunks and boxes that contained sup-
posedly infected clothing; and hence the efforts of health authorities, both state
and national, are being constantly directed to the thorough disinfection of all
clothing and bedding shipped from ports where yellow fever prevails. To such
extremes have efforts at disinfection been carried, in order to prevent the im-
portation of this disease into the United States, that, during the epidemic
season, all articles of personal apparel and bedding have been subjected to
disinfection, sometimes both at the port of departure and at the port of arrival;
and this has been done whether the articles have previously been contaminated
by contact with yellow-fever patients or not. The mere fact that the individual
has resided, even for a day, in a city where yellow fever is present, has been
sufficient cause to subject his baggage to rigid disinfection by the sanitary au-
thorities.

To determine, therefore, whether clothing and bedding which have been
contaminated by contact with yellow fever patients and their discharges can
convey this disease is a matter of the utmost importance. Although the litera-
ture contains many references to the failure of such contaminated articles to
cause the disease, we have considered it ad\'i sable to test, by actual experiment
on non-immune human beings, the theory of the conveyance of yellow fever by
fomites, since we know of no other way in which this question can ever be
finally determined.

For this purpose there was erected at Camp Lazear a small frame house
consisting of one room 14x20 feet and known as 'Building No. 1,' or the 'In-
fected Clothing and Bedding Building.' The cubic capacity of this house was
2,800 feet. It was tightly ceiled within with 'tongue-and-grooved' boards, and
was well battened on the outside. It faced to the south and was provided with
two small windows, each 26 x 34 inches in size. These windows were both placed
on the south side of the building, the purpose being to prevent, as much as pos-

YELLO^Y FEVER AND MOSQUITOES. 235

sible, any thorough circulation of the air within the house. They were closed
by permanent wire screens of .5 mm. mesh. In addition sliding glass sash were
provided within and hea\-y wooden shutters without; the latter intended to
prevent the entrance of sunlight into the building, as it was not deemed de-
sirable that the disinfecting qualities of sunlight, direct or diffused, should at
any time be exerted on the articles of clothing contained within this room. En-
trance was effected through a small vestibule, 3x5 feet, also placed on the
southern side of the house. This vestibule was protected without by a solid
door and was divided in its middle by a wire screen door, svmng on spring
hinges. The inner entrance was also closed by a second wire screen door. In
this way the passage of mosquitoes into this room was effectually excluded.
During the day, and until after sunset, the house was kept securely closed, while
by means of a suitable heating apparatus the temperature was raised to 92° to
95° F. Precaution was taken at the same time to maintain a sufficient humidity
of the atmosphere. The average temperature of this house was thus kept at
76.2° F. for a period of sixty-three days.

Nov. 30, 1900, the building now being ready for occupancy, three large
boxes filled with sheets, pillow-slips, blankets, etc., contaminated by contact
with cases of yellow fever and their discharges were received and placed therein.
The majority of the articles had been taken from the beds of patients sick with
yellow fever at Las Animas Hospital, Havana, or at Columbia Barracks. Many
of them had been purposely soiled with a liberal quantity of black vomit, urine,
and fecal matter. A dirty 'comfortable' and a much-soiled pair of blankets, re-
moved from the bed of a patient sick with yellow fever in the town of Quemados,
were contained in one of these boxes. The same day, at 6 p. m., Dr. R. P. Cooke,
Acting Assistant-Surgeon U. S. A., and two privates of the hospital corps, all
non-immune young Americans, entered this building and deliberately unpacked
these boxes, which had been tightly closed and locked for a period of two weeks.
They were careful at the same time to give each article a thorough handling and
shaking, in order to disseminate through the air of the room the specific agent
of yellow fever, if contained in these fomites. These soiled sheets, pillow-cases,
and blankets were used in preparing the beds in which the members of the hos-
pital corps slept. Various soiled articles were hung around the room and placed
about the bed occupied by Dr. Cooke.

From this date until Dec. 19, 1900, a period of twenty days, this room was
occupied each night by these three non-immunes. Each morning the various
soiled articles were carefully packed in the aforesaid boxes, and at night again
unpacked and distributed about the room. During the day the residents of this
house were permitted to occupy a tent pitched in the immediate vicinity, but
were kept in strict quarantine.

December 12, a fourth box of clothing and bedding was received from Las
Animas Hospital. These articles had been used on the beds of yellow- fever
patients, but in addition had been purposely soiled with the bloody stools of a
fatal case of this disease. As this box had been packed for a number of days,
when opened and impacked by Dr. Cooke and his assistants, on December 12th,
the odor was so offensive as to compel them to retreat from the house. They
pluckily returned, however, within a short time and spent the night as usual.

December 19 these three non-immimes were placed in quarantine for five
days and then given the liberty of the camp. All had remained in perfect
health, notwithstanding their stay of twenty nights amid such unwholesome sur-
roundings.

During the week, December 20-27, the following articles were also placed in
this house, viz.: pajamas suits, 1; undershirts, 2; night-shirts, 4; pillow-slips,

236 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

4; sheets, 6; blankets, 5; pillows, 2; mattresses, 1. These articles had been re-
moved from the persons and beds of four patients sick with yellow fever and
were very much soiled, as any change of clothing or bed-linen during their
attacks had been purposely avoided, the object being to obtain articles as thor-
oughly contaminated as possible.

From Dec. 21, 1900, till Jan. 10, 1901, this building was again occupied by
two non-immune young Americans, under the same conditions as the preceding
occupants, except that these men slept every night in the very garments worn
by yellow fever patients throughout their entire attacks, besides making use ex-
clusively of their much-soiled pillow-slips, sheets, and blankets. At the end of
twenty-one nights of such intimate contact with these fomites, they also went
into quarantine, from which they were released five days later in perfect health.

From January 11 till January 31, a period of twenty days, 'Building No. 1'
continued to be occupied by two other non-immune Americans, who, like those
who preceded them, have slept every night in the beds formerly occupied by
yellow fever patients and in the night-shirts used by these patients throughout
the attack, AWthout change. In addition, during the last fourteen nights of
their occupancy of this house they have slept, each night, with their pillows
covered with towels that had been thoroughly soiled with the blood drawn from
both the general and cajiillary circulation, on the first day of the disease, in the
case of a well-marked attack of yellow fever. Notwithstanding this trying
ordeal, these men have continued to remain in perfect health.

The attempt which we have therefore made to infect 'Building No. 1,' and
its seven non-immune occupants, dui-ing a period of sixty-three days, has proved
an absolute failure. We think we cannot do better here than to quote from the
classic work of La Roche.* This author says: "In relation to the yellow fever,
we find so many instances establishing the fact of the non-transmissibility of
the disease through the agency of articles of the kind mentioned, and of mer-
chandise generally, that we cannot but discredit the accounts of a contrary
character assigned in medical writings, and still more to those presented on the
strength of popular report solely. For if, in a large number of well-authen-
ticated cases, such articles have been handled and used with perfect impunity
— and that, too, often under circumstances best calculated to insure the effect in
question — we have every reason to conclude that a contrary result will not be
obtained in other instances of a similar kind; and that consequently the effect
said to have been produced by exposure to those articles, must — unless estab-
lished beyond the possibility of dovibt — be referred to some other agency."

The question here naturally arises: How does a house become infected with
yellow fever? This we have attempted to solve by the erection at Camp Lazear of
a second house, known as 'Building No. 2,' or the 'Infected Mosquito Building.'
This was in all respects similar to 'Building No. 1,' except that the door and win-
dows were placed on opposite sides of the building so as to give through-and-
through ventilation. It was divided, also, by a wire- screen partition, extending
from floor to ceiling, into two rooms, 12 x 14 feet and 8 x 14 feet respectively.
Whereas, all articles admitted to 'Building No. 1' had been soiled by contact
with yellow fever patients, all articles admitted to 'Building No. 2' Avere first
carefully disinfected by steam before being placed therein.

On Dec. 21, 1900, at 11.45 a. m., there were set free in the larger room of
this building fifteen mosquitoes — C. fasciatus — which had previously been con-
taminated by biting yellow fever patients, as follows: 1, a severe case, on the
second day, Nov. 27, 1900, twenty-four days; 3, a well-marked case, on the first

* R. La Roche: Yellow Fever, Vol. IT, p. 51G, Philadelphia.

YELLOW FEVER AND MOSQUITOES. 237

day, Dec. 9, 1900, twelve days; 4, a mild ease, on the first day, Dec. 13, 1900,
eight days; 7, a woll-markcd case, on the first day, Dec. IG, 1900, five days —
total, 15.

Only one of these insects was considered capable of conveying the infec-
tion, \dz., the mosquito that had bitten a severe case twenty-four days before;
Avhile three others — the twelve-day insects — had possibly reached the dangerous
stage, as they had been kept at an average temperature of 82° F.

At 12, noon, of the same day, John J. Moran — already referred to as Case 2
iu this report — a non-immune American, entered the room where the mosquitoes
had been freed, and remained thirty minutes. During this time he was bitten
about the face and hands by several insects. At 4.30 p. m., the same day, he
again entered and remained twenty minutes, and was again bitten. The follow-
ing day, at 4.30 p. m., he, for the third time, entered the room, and was again
bitten.

Case 7. — On Dec. 25, 1900, at 6 a. m., the fourth day, Moran complained of
slight dizziness and frontal headache. At 11 a. m. he went to bed, complaining
of increased headache and malaise, with a temperature of 99.6° F., pulse 88 ; at
noon the temperature was 100.4° F., the pulse 98; at 1 p. m., 101.2° F., the pulse
90, and his eyes were much injected and face suffused. He was removed to the
yellow fever wards. He was seen on several occasions by the board of experts
and the diagnosis of yellow fever confirmed.

The period of incubation in this case, dating from the first visit to 'Build-
ing No. 2,' was three days and twenty-three hours. If reckoned from his last
visit it was two days and eighteen hours. There was no other possible source
for his infection, as he had been strictly quarantined at Camp Lazear for a
period of thirty-two days prior to his exposure in the mosquito building.

During each of Moran's visits, two non-immunes remained in this same
building, only protected by the wire-screen partition. From Dec. 21, 1900, till
Jan. 8, 1901, inclusive — eighteen nights — these non-immunes have slept in this
house, only protected by the wire-screen partition. These men have remained
in perfect health to the present time.

Thus at Camp Lazear, of 7 non-immunes whom we attempted to infect by
means of the bites of contaminated mosquitoes, we have succeeded in conveying
the disease to 6, or 85.71 per cent. On the other hand, of 7 non-immunes whom
we tried to infect by means of fomites, under particularly favorable circum-
stances, we did not succeed in a single instance.

It is evident that in view of our present knowledge relating to the
mode of transmission of yellow fever, the preventive measures which
have heretofore been considered most important, i. e., isolation of the
sick, disinfection of clothing and bedding, and municipal sanitation —
are either of no avail or of comparatively little value. It is true that
yellow fever epidemics have resulted, as a rule, from the introduction to
a previously healthy locality of one or more persons suffering from the
disease. But we now know that its extension did not depend upon the
direct contact of the sick with the non-immune individuals and that
isolation of the sick from such contact is unnecessary and without avail.
On the other hand complete isolation from the agent which is respon-
sible for the propagation of the disease is all-important. In the absence
of a yellow-fever patient from which to draw blood the mosquito is
harmless, and in the absence of the mosquito the yellow-fever patient is

238 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

harmless — as the experimental evidence now stands. Yellow fever epi-
demics are terminated by cold weather because then the mosquitoes die
or become torpid. The sanitary condition of our southern seaport
cities is no better in winter than in summer and if the infection
attached to clothing and bedding it is difficult to understand why the
first frosts of autumn should arrest the progress of an epidemic. But
all this is explained now that the mode of transmission has been demon-
strated.

Insanitary local conditions may, however, have a certain influence in
the propagation of the disease, for it has been ascertained that the
species of mosquito which serves as an intermediate host for the yellow
fever germ may breed in cesspools and sewers, as well as in stagnant
pools of water. If, therefore, the streets of a city^are unpaved and un-
graded and there are open spaces where water may accumulate in pools,
as well as open cesspools to serve as breeding places for Culex fasciatus,
that city will present conditions more favorable for the propagation of
yellow fever than it would if well paved and drained and sewered.

The question whether yellow fever may be transmitted by any other
species of mosquito than Culex fasciatus has not been determined.
Facts relating to the propagation of the disease indicate that the mos-
quito which serves as an intermediate host for the yellow- fever germ has
a somewhat restricted geographical range and is to be found especially
upon the sea-coast and the margins of rivers in the so-called ^yellow
fever zone.' While occasional epidemics have occurred upon the south-
west coast of the Iberian peninsula, the disease, as an epidemic, is un-
known elsewhere in Europe, and there is no evidence that it has ever
invaded the great and populous continent of Asia. In Africa it is
limited to the west coast. In North America, although it has occa-
sionally prevailed as an epidemic in every one of our seaport cities as
far north as Boston, and in the Mississippi Valley as far north as St.
Louis, it has never established itself as an endemic disease within the
limits of the United States. Vera Cruz, and probably other points on
the Gulf coast of Mexico, are, however, at the present time endemic
foci of the disease. In South America it has prevailed as an epidemic
at all of the seaports on the Gulf and Atlantic Coasts, as far south as
Montevideo and Buenos Ayres, and on the Pacific along the coast of
Peru.

The region in which the disease has had the greatest and most fre-
quent prevalence is bounded by the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, and
includes the West India islands. Within the past few years yellow
fever has been carried to the west coast of North American, and has pre-
vailed as an epidemic as far north as the Mexican port of Guaymas, on
the Gulf of California.

It must not be supposed that Culex fasciatus is only found where

YELLOW FEVER AND MOSQUITOES. 239

yellow fever prevails. The propagation of the disease depends upon the
introduction of an infected individual to a locality where this mos-
quito is found, at a season of the year when it is active. Owing to the
short period of incubation (five days or less), the brief duration of the
disease and especially of the period during which the infectious agent
(germ) is found in the blood, it is evident that ships sailing from in-
fected ports, upon which cases of yellow fever develop, are not likely to
introduce the disease to distant seaports. The continuance of an
epidemic on ship-board, as on the land, must depend upon the presence
of infected mosquitoes and of non-immune individuals. Under these
conditions we can readily understand why the disease should not be car-
ried from the West Indies or from South America to the Mediterranean,
to the east coast of Africa or to Asiatic seaport cities. On the other
hand, if the disease could be transmitted by infected clothing, bedding,
etc., there seems no good reason why it should not have been carried to
these distant localities long ago.

The restriction as regards altitude, however, probably depends upon
the fact that the mosquito which serves as an intermediate host is a coast
species, which does not live in elevated regions. It is a well-established
fact that yellow fever has never prevailed in the City of Mexico, although
this city has constant and unrestricted intercourse with the infected sea-
port. Vera Cruz. Persons who have been exposed in Vera Cruz during
the epidemic season frequently fall sick after their arrival in the City
of Mexico, but they do not communicate the disease to those in attend-
ance upon them or to others in the vicinity. Evidently some factor
essential for the propagation of the disease is absent, although we have
the sick man, his clothing and bedding and the insanitary local condi-
tions which have been supposed to constitute an essential factor. I am
not aware that any observations have been made with reference to the
presence or absence of Culex fasciatus in high altitudes, but the infer-
ence that it is not to be foimd in such localities as the City of Mexico
seems justified by the established facts already referred to.

As pointed out by Hirsch, "the disease stops short at many points in
the West Indies where the climate is still in the highest degree tropical."
In the Antilles it has rarely appeared at a height of more than 700 feet.
In the United States the most elevated locality in which the disease has
prevailed as an epidemic is Chattanooga, Tenn., which is 745 feet above
sea level.

It will be remembered that the malarial fevers are contracted as a
result of inoculation by mosquitoes of the genus Anoplieles, and that
the malarial parasite has been demonstrated not only in the blood of
those suffering from malarial infection, but also in the stomach and
salivary glands of the mosquito. If the yellow fever parasite resembled
that of the malarial fevers it would no doubt have been discovered long

240 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ago. But, as a matter of fact, this parasite, which we now know is
present in the blood of those sick with the disease, has thus far eluded
all researches. Possibly it is ultra-microscopic. However this may be,
it is not the only infectious disease germ which remains to be discovered.
There is without doubt a living germ in vaccine lymph and in the virus
from smallpox pustules, but it has not been demonstrated by the micro-
scope. The same is true of foot and mouth disease and of infectious
pleuro-pneumonia of cattle, although we know that a living element of
some kind is present in the infectious material by which these diseases
are propagated. In Texas fever, of cattle, which is transmitted by in-
fected ticks, the parasite is ver}'- minute, but by proper staining methods
and a good microscope it may be detected in the interior of the red
blood corpuscles. Drs. Eeed and Carroll are at present engaged in a
search for the yellow fever germ in the blood and in the bodies of in-
fected mosquitoes. What success may attend their efforts remains to be
seen, but at all events the fundamental facts have been demonstrated
that this germ is present in the blood and that the disease is trans-
mitted by a certain species of mosquito — C. fasciatus.

The proper measures of prophylaxis in view of this demonstration
are given in the following circular, which was submitted for my approval
by the Chief Surgeon, Department of Cuba, and has recently been pub-
lished by the Commanding General of that Department, who, until
quite recently, was a member of the Medical Corps of the Army :

CiRCULAK, HeADQUARTEKS DEPARTMENT OF CtJBA,

No. 5. Havana, Ajrril 21, 1901.

Upon the recommendation of the Chief Surgeon of the Department, the fol-
lowing instructions are published and will be strictly enforced at all military
posts in this Department :

The recent experiments made in Havana by the Medical Department of the
Army having proved that yellow fever, like malarial fever, is conveyed chiefly,
and probably exclusively, by the bite of infected mosquitoes, important changes
in the measures used for the prevention and treatment of this disease have be-
come necessary.

1. In order to prevent the breeding of mosquitoes and protect ofGcers and
men against their bites, the provisions of General Orders No. 6, Department of
Cuba, December 21, 1900, shall be carefully carried out, especially during the
summer and fall.

2. So far as yellow fever is concerned, infection of a room or building
simply means that it contains infected mosquitoes, that is, mosquitoes which
have fed on yellow-fever patients. Disinfection, therefore, means the employ-
ment of measures aimed at the destruction of these mosquitoes. The most effect-
ive of these measures is fumigation, either with sulphur, formaldehyde or in-
sect powder. The fumes of sulphur are the quickest and most effective insec-
ticide but are otherwise objectionable. Formaldehyde gas is quite effective if
the infected rooms are kept closed and sealed for two or three hours. The smoke
of insect powder has also been proved very useful; it readily stupefies mos-
quitoes, which drop to the floor and can then be easily destroyed.

YELLOW FEVER AND MOSQUITOES. 241

Tlie washing of walls, lloors, ceilings and furniture with disinfectants is
unnecessary.

3. As it has been demonstrated that yellow fever cannot be conveyed by
fomites, such as bedding, clothing, effects and baggage, they need not be sub-
jected to any special disinfection. Care should be taken, however, not to remove
them from the infected rooms until after formaldehyde fumigation, so that they
may not harbor infected mosquitoes.

Medical officers taking care of yellow-fever patients need not be isolated;
they can attend other patients and associate with non-immunes with perfect
safety to the garrison. Nurses and attendants taking care of yellow fever
patients shall remain isolated, so as to avoid any possible danger of their con-
veying mosquitoes from patients to non-immunes.

4. The infection of mosquitoes is most likely to occur during the first two or
three days of the disease. Ambulant cases, that is, patients not ill enough to
take to their beds and remaining unsuspected and vmprotected, are probably
those most responsible for the spread of the disease. It is therefore essential
that all fever cases should be at once isolated and so protected that no mos-
quitoes can possibly get access to them until the nature of the fever is positively
determined.

Each post shall have a 'reception ward' for the admission of all fever cases
and an 'isolation ward' for the treatment of cases which prove to be yellow
fever. Each ward shall be made mosquito-proof by ware netting over doors and
windows, a ceiling of wire netting at a height of seven feet above the floor, and
mosquito bars over the beds. There should be no place in it where mosquitoes
can seek refuge, not readily accessible to the nurse. Both wards can be in the
same building, provided they are separated by a mosquito-tight partition.

5. All persons coming from an infected locality to a post shall be kept
under careful observation until the completion of five days from the time of
possible infection, either in a special detention camp or in their own quarters;
in either case, their temperature should be taken twice a day during this period
of observation so that those who develop yellow-fever may be placed under treat-
ment at the very inception of the disease.

6. Malarial fever, like yellow fever, is communicated by mosquito bites and
therefore is just as much of an infectious disease and requires the same meas-
ures of protection against mosquitoes. On the assirmption that mosquitoes re-
main in the vicinity of their breeding places, or never travel far, the prevalence
of malarial fever at a post would indicate want of proper care and diligence on
the part of the Surgeon and Commanding Officer in complying with General
Orders No. 6, Department of Cuba, 1900.

7. Surgeons are again reminded of the absolute necessity, in all fever cases,
to keep, from the very beginning, a complete chart of pulse and temperature,
since such a chart is their best guide to a correct diagnosis and the proper treat-
ment.

By Command of Major General Wood:

H. L. SCOTT,

Adjutant General.

vol. lix. — 16

242 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

CLIMATE AND CAEBONIC ACID.*

By bailey WILLIS,

U. S. GEOLOGICAL SUKVEY.

npHE fact that a very extensive and massive ice sheet covered coun-
-L tries of the northern hemisphere which now enjoy a mild climate
is generally known and accepted, although it is little more than fifty
years since Agassiz (1840-47) made the then novel suggestion to ex-
plain the occurrence of glacial deposits where no glaciers remain. It
is not so generally known that the great ice age was characterized by
the development of several ice sheets in succession, each of them
separated from its forerunner by an interval of mild climate during
which the ice retreated far toward its source, and but few realize that
these intervals of mildness were longer than the time which has elapsed
since the latest glaciers withdrew from JSTew England and the northern
Central States.

Since the fact of a glacial period was established, several hypotheses
have been framed to account for the phenomena of climatic change.
As the sun warms the earth, variations in its condition and distance
were postulated. As the poles are now regions of glacial accumulation,
it was thought that the earth's axis of rotation might have shifted in
such a way as to bring the once glaciated regions into polar relations.
Or as heights of land are often mantled in snow and ice under latitudes
where lowlands are free, glaciation was connected theoretically with
a general elevation of continents and mountains. There are facts to
sustain most of the speculations thus suggested. Each contains a
possible cause. But no one is free from serious question of its suffi-
ciency, while there is little evidence to show that any was definitely
related in time to a glacial epoch, except that one which is based on a
general elevation of the land.

Professor Chamberlin, of the University of Chicago, long ago advo-
cated a method of investigation known as the method of multiple hy-
potheses. It calls upon the student to lay aside a natural preference for
the theory which seems plausible and to conside? as sincerely that
which holds out small promise of development. As an earnest student
of the causes of the glacial period, he has thus considered every sug-
gestion that might solva that enigma. The astronomical causes, the
shifting of the pole, the variations in altitude of the continent, have all
been passed in review,

•A review of Chamberlin's 'Working Hypothesis of a Cause of Glacial
Epochs.'

CLIMATE AND CARBONIC ACID. 243

In considering the climatic conditions which gave to the coast of
southern New England the aspect of Greenland at the present time,
thought naturally turned to the antithetic phase when Greenland pos-
sessed the climate of Florida. And seemingly linked with these were
other climatic variations, such as the great humidity of the Coal
Measure period and the great aridity of epochs when salt and gypsum
deposits accumulated; while the cause of that redness, which in several
continents is characteristic of strata of certain geologic ages, might be
traced to world-wide atmospheric conditions. The problem was thus
greatly broadened in the scope of related phenomena, and the demands
to be met by an adequate hypothesis became correspondingly complex.

The investigation upon which the hypothesis under review rests
considers the physics and chemistry of the atmosphere in relation to
temperature, the physics and chemistry of the ocean, the interaction of
the ocean and the air, and those events of geologic history which as
cause or effect may be related to the constitution of the atmosphere. It
is not here proposed to review critically the several articles in which
Professor Chamberlin and his associates have presented the results of
profound researches. Suffice it to endeavor clearly to present an out-
line of their reasoning and conclusions.

The constitution of the atmosphere has long been known, and in a
general way is stated for dry air as 21 parts of oxygen and 79 parts of
nitrogen by volume. Argon, a newly discovered component, was for-
merly measured as nitrogen, and frequently there are impurities,
though in small amount. There are 3 to 4 parts of carbonic acid in
10,000, and under natural conditions moisture is present in greater or
less proportion. It is with these last, the carbonic acid and moisture,
that the student of climatic changes has to deal chiefly.

The functions of carbonic acid and moisture in the atmosphere are
threefold. They both absorb radiant heat in an unusual degree. By
thus raising the temperature of the air, they both increase its capacity
for moisture. And they both are chemically active.

Radiant light and heat penetrate the atmosphere to reach the solid
earth, and are in part radiated back through the air into space. As
the air is transparent toward light, so is it also toward heat, allowing
both forms of energy to pass with moderate absorption. A photog-
rapher who compares the exposure of his plate at a considerable altitude
with that near sea level roughly measures the relative strength of light
at the two places and finds it less beneath the greater depth of atmos-
phere. The direct heat of the sun's rays is correspondingly less by the
sea. The energy which the heated earth radiates back toward space is
in part also absorbed by the air, which is thus warmed by the passage
of rays to and from the earth.

In this absorption the mass of nitrogen and oxygen has but an

244 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

insignificant part. They are nearly perfectly transparent to heat. Car-
bonic acid and moisture are the effective constituents, which thicken,
as it were, the atmospheric blanket, and being warmed in turn keep
warm the earth. If they are decreased the blanket becomes thin and
the surface grows cool.

Tyndall first suggested that a lessening of the proportion of car-
bonic acid might suffice to bring on the cold climate of a glacial
epoch. He was followed by several investigators who determined more
accurately the parts played by carbonic acid and by moisture, Austrian,
German and American scientists competing in the study. In 1896,
Dr. Arrhenius, a Swedish physicist, reached definite quantitative esti-
mates of the effects. Employing values for the radiant heat of the
full moon at different heights above the horizon, measured by Langley,
he computed the heat absorbed by the atmosphere. By elaborate
calculations he determined that a decrease of carbonic acid in the
atmosphere to an amount ranging from 55 to 67 per cent, of the
present content would reduce the average temperature 4 or 5 degrees
C, which would bring on a glacial epoch, whereas an increase of car-
bonic acid to an amount two or three times the present content would
elevate the average temperature 8 or 9 degrees C, and bring on a mild
climate in high latitudes.

The effects of relatively absorbent or transparent atmospheres are
not direct and uniform. They vary with the angle of incidence of the
sun's rays and, therefore, with latitude, with seasons, and with day
and night. They differ with altitude above the earth's surface; they
are unlike on land and sea. But in general result the effect of greater
absorptive power is to equalize all differences due to geographical
and astronomical relations, whereas that of a relatively transparent
condition is to accentuate them.

The physicist having thus indicated a possible solution, the further
task of framing a working hypothesis was the geologist's. Chamberlin
says: "There are hypotheses and working hypotheses. . . . Gen-
eral suggestions of a possible cause do not reach the dignity of work-
ing hypotheses until they are given concrete form, are fitted in detail
to the specific phenomena and are made the agents of calling into play
effective lines of research." In his attempt to frame a working
hypothesis of the cause of glacial periods on an atmospheric basis, he
has nobly met the requirements of his own definition under the diffi-
cult conditions imposed by the phenomena of glaciation. However
the resulting working hypothesis may hereafter be modified by further
research, its presentation must always stand as an example of the
highest scientific effort.

Let us briefly review the requirements of the task. The funda-
mental postulate of the hypothesis is that variations of the atmospheric

CLIMATE AND CARBONIC ACID. 245

content of carbonic acid have been the direct cause of variations of
climate. It is necessary, therefore, to assign agencies adequate to bring
about such alternations of poverty and wealth of carbonic acid. The
agencies must operate to produce great cycles of climatic change which
are recognized through study of the geologic record. Among others,
these comprise an ancient event of extensive glaciation in India,
Australia and South Africa, closely following the period of mild
climate during which the Coal Measure flora flourished. The agencies
must further promote subsidiary action by which minor oscillations of
climate may be explained, since within the latest, the Pleistocene,
period of glaciation, at least five, and probably more, advances of the
ice occurred in alternation with intervals of comparative mildness, dur-
ing which the ice retreated notably. Depletion and enrichment of the
atmosphere must furthermore occur within reasonable limits of geologic
periods. And cause must be shown why the atmospheric changes pro-
moted glaciation about peculiarly local centers. In searching the
sources of carbonic acid, Chamberlin has been led to reconsider the
original constitution of the atmosphere, and thus also theories of the
origin of the earth, including the nebular hypothesis. Thither this
review may not follow him, but it will be of interest to advert to his
views as to the conditions affecting biologic evolution, which are also
causally related to variations of the carbonic acid contained in the air.

Carbonic acid, or as it is more accurately called, carbon dioxide,
COo, occurs in many relations and plays many parts in the economy
of the world. In some of these activities it enters into permanent com-
binations and is lost to the atmosphere. In others it passes through
cycles of combination and release by which it is temporarily with-
drawn from and subsequently returned to the air. If the atmosphere's
resources in CO2 be compared with a bank account, we may suppose
that the balance follows one or the other of two familiar cases. In the
one example there may have been originally a definite though possibly
large deposit, which has not since been added to, but upon which many
drafts have been and are being drawn. Under this assumption, how-
ever rich the atmosphere once was, it is now by comparison poverty
stricken. On the other hand, there is reason to believe that the original
capital in CO2 was not materially greater than it is now, but that
losses have been nearly balanced by gains. The first example represents
a view held by geologists who believe that the atmosphere was exceed-
ingly dense, moist and charged with carbon dioxide in early ages of the
earth's history; the second illustrates the conceptions based on modern
advances of biology and geology, and its acceptance is essential to the
hypothesis of glaciation here discussed.

The sources from which fresh contributions may be made to the
atmosphere are suggested by the occurrence of carbon dioxide among

246 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the gases projected by the sun beyond its gravitative control, in inter-
stellar spaces, in meteorites and in the terrestrial mass. The first three
possible sources are too indefinite both in amount and in distribution
through the ages to be of any present value to the hypothesis, but the
last is important. Crystalline rocks of the superficial crust of the earth
are shown by anal3^sis to contain four and one-half times their own
volume of gases, of which carbon dioxide, CO2, and monoxide, CO,
form a large percentage. During volcanic eruptions gases and vapors
are ejected in indefinitely large volumes. What part of these was
once of the atmosphere and is returned to it after an underground
journey we do not know, but it is believed that a large part may come
from the interior. The escape of these internal gases may also occur
in some degree continuously by diffusion, and in influential amounts
during episodes of mountain growth, when rock masses are strained
and riven and upraised. We shall see presently that in the wasting of
a mountain range there is serious consumption of carbon dioxide,
which in greater or less degree temporarily affects the gain. The
Pleistocene glaciation is attributed to a very notable offset of this char-
acter, but the exceptional nature of that event as compared with the
relatively frequent episodes of mountain growth indicates that the gain
of carbon dioxide has commonly equaled or exceeded the resulting tem-
porary loss.

Among the cycles of combination and release, through which car-
bon dioxide runs, there are two which are both important, though
not equally so. The first and less important is the cycle of organic
change, involving plant and animal tissues. When grass grows, carbon
dioxide is taken from the air. Grass becomes beef, and beef, through,
various changes', is resolved into new compounds, yielding back the
carbon dioxide to the air. In its brief phases this cycle has no import
for the hypothesis, but there are occasions where it is prolonged, as in
the accumulations of vegetal substances fossilized as coal. The total
amount of carbon dioxide thus abstracted, and now withheld, is very
large, and is believed to have been an important factor in promoting
at least one instance of glaciation, that which followed closely upon the
Coal Measure period.

The more important cycle of combination and release involves the
decomposition of rocks by weathering, the solution of certain products
and their transportation to the sea, and the reactions through physical,
chemical and organic agencies, by which carbon dioxide is either per-
manently locked up in limestones or is returned to the air.

For the purposes of this statement, the common minerals of rocks
may be classified as silicates and carbonates, that is as compounds with
silicic acid and compounds with carbonic acid. The former may be
typified by the familiar minerals of granite, the latter by limestone.

CLIMATE AND CARBONIC ACID. 247

Granite and all similar crystalline aggregates of silicates disintegrate,
and the separate minerals are decomposed chemically by the action of
carbon dioxide and moisture. Of the various compounds which result,
those of carbon dioxide with lime and magnesia are of most direct
interest in this connection, and those with lime may be discussed as
representative.

The common combinations of lime and carbon dioxide are two : the
carbonate of lime, more specifically called the normal or monocarbonate,
and the bicarbonate of lime. The carbonate consists of one ion,
or chemical unit, of lime, CaO, combined with one ion of carbon
dioxide, COj. The bicarbonate consists of one ion of lime combined
with two ions of carbon dioxide. The carbonate is but slightly soluble
in water, the bicarbonate is easily dissolved. The carbonate is pro-
duced in the decomposition of silicates, and great amounts of it which
have been derived from this source in past ages are now contained in
limestones and other calcareous sedimentary rocks. Whether it exists
for a brief time in the weathering of silicates or is, as limestone,
exposed to atmospheric waters, the carbonate very readily combines
with carbon dioxide, and the bicarbonate is formed in solution. All
surface and underground waters contain bicarbonate of lime in greater
or less quantity, and enormous volumes are annually conveyed to the
sea. It is estimated roughly that the weight of the carbonate of lime
thus dissolved and contributed to the sea annually is 2,700,000,000
tons. This is about one-half of the total saline matter dissolved in
surface waters annually, and a portion of the remainder consists of
carbonates of magnesia, potash and soda.

It has been computed by Professor Chamberlin and his associates
that the present supply of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would be
exhausted by the decomposition of silicates in 5,000 to 18,000 years
at the present rate of consumption if there were no source of replenish-
ment. It is evident that the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmos-
phere at any time is the balance between supply and draft, and that it
may be more or less as one or the other preponderates. The next step
in forming the hypothesis, therefore, is to consider conditions which
may produce fluctuations of consumption and contribution.

The consumption of carbon dioxide in weathering of rocks is an
effect of erosion, the familiar process which tends to reduce heights of
land to a low slope, declining to sea level. This tendency is opposed
by those internal forces of the earth's mass which depress sea bottoms
and relatively uplift continents and mountain ranges. The persistent
attacks of the sun's energy are directed against .the earthworks raised
by terrestrial forces. It is the fabled fight of the powers of light and
air against the powers of the dark underworld; and the former never
pause, whereas the latter sleep for ages, and, awaking, exert themselves

248 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

mightily for a brief time only. While they rest, mountains waste to
hills and hills to plains, and the sea spreads over the margins of sink-
ing continents. When they put forth their strength, mountains grow
and continents rise from the waters. Their intermittent activity
exerts a potent influence on the constitution of the atmosphere, and
is so important to the hypothesis of glaciation that a more definite
account of the evidence of its periodic nature is necessary.

Sediments laid beneath the sea are waste of continents. By their
characters and volume they may indicate their derivation from far-
stretching lands or from near mountains. They often occur spread
across the bases of ranges which have been planed away by air and
waves. By evidences such as these the physical history of any province
may be made out; by comparison of provinces the major events in the
history of a continent are ascertained; and by comparison of con-
tinental histories the sequence of world stages is studied. For any
province the limits of knowledge depend only on the completeness of
the record in the local rock series ; for each continent the inferences are
qualified by difficulties of correlating successive steps from province to
province; and world-wide conclusions must necessarily be restricted to
the broadest effects.

In the present condition of geologic investigation we know but
incompletely the rhythm of continental and marine oscillation, but cer-
tain marked epochs are recognized. Seas were extensive, while lands
were low and restricted, during epochs known to geologists as the
middle Ordovician, the middle Silurian, the early Carboniferous, the
late Jurassic and the upper Cretaceous. At these times the consump-
tion of carbon dioxide by rock weathering was comparatively slight,
according to hypothesis. On the other hand, lands were wide and
seas confined to their basins during the close of the Silurian and begin-
ning of Devonian time, during the Permian and early Triassic periods,
and during the Pliocene and Pleistocene. These were epochs of
unusual consumption of carbon dioxide.

The climatic effect of depletion of carbon dioxide depends upon
the rate at which it is taken from the atmosphere. If it were abstracted
slowly a large loss might be compensated by moderate supply, whereas
if it were rapidly removed the effect on the atmospheric content might
be decided. In this relation the growth of mountains has an important
accelerating influence. Although the rate of weathering is conditioned
by many factors, elevation is so important that Chamberlin's estimate
is probably near the truth. It is that for continental areas the rate of
carbonation varies probably more nearly as the square than as the
simple ratio of altitudes.

Modern studies of mountain growth have materially changed the
views held within a decade by geologists as to the ages of ranges.

CLIMATE AND CARBONIC ACID. 249

Among the rocks of any range there are youngest strata that mark a
date earlier than the most remote at which the uplift may have
occurred. Impressed with the magnitude and grandeur of mountains,
geologists assigned them an antiquity limited only by the age of their
component strata, but through the interpretation of landscape forms
evidence is now accumulating to show that existing ranges are, as a
rule, comparatively young. One interesting conclusion is that we live
at a time near the culmination of an epoch of mountain growth, that
mountains are now widely distributed and high as compared with
those of many preceding periods, and the earth's activity as thus
manifested is not materially less now than formerly within known
geologic history. The crustal adjustment which produced existing
mountain ranges and expanded continents appears to have culminated
just before or very early in the Glacial epoch, and the recognition of
this fact was the principal basis for the hypothesis that glaciation was
related directly to elevation of the land areas. Chamberlin interprets
the relation through the influence of rock-weathering upon the carbon
dioxide of the air, and attributes the cold period to the resulting
thermal transparency of the atmosphere.

The carbon dioxide abstracted from the air by weathering passes
into the aqueous circulation of the globe, one-half of it in combination
as monocarbonates, the other half superadded to form bicarbonates. A
further step in framing the hypothesis is to follow this second part
until it shall be returned to the air, which shall thus be reenriched
and may promote a period of mild climate.

The ocean is a great reservoir holding carbon dioxide in combina-
tion with various bases as bicarbonate. It contains also many other
salts. Assuming that all the solids dissolved in sea-water have been
derived from the land at a rate of solution equal to that now deter-
mined by analyses of river waters, it is possible to make a curious calcu-
lation, which shows that the carbonate of lime now in the sea would
have accumulated in 60,000 years, whereas the common salt, chloride
of sodium, would have required 166,000,000 years. The common salt
is not removed from solution, nor is there reason to suppose that there
is any special source from which it is concentrated, but which does
not supply lime; it may, therefore, be taken as a standard of com-
parison, which shows that there is much less lime in the sea than we
should expect. The deficit is accounted for by the great beds of lime-
stone deposited from the sea at various periods from the long past to
the present.

In the ocean, bicarbonate of lime is dissolved in a proportion less
than that which the waters can hold in solution, and, according to the
principles of the older chemistry, it is under these conditions a fixed
combination, which remains dissolved. Should, however, the mono-

2 50 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

carbonate of lime separate from the water as a solid precipitate, the
second part of the carbon dioxide would be free to pass from the
water into the atmosphere. We are thus led to consider the agencies
which have caused the deposition of lime from dilute solution.

Modern views of chemical combinations regard compounds in solu-
tion as going through a constant interchange of reactions, by which
ions pass continuously from one association to another, as in the grand
chain the dancers weave in and out with touch of hands. The dance
of the ions, more technically called dissociation, is most active in dilute
solutions, and is promoted by higher, retarded by lower temperatures.
It has been shown by experiment that bicarbonate of lime may be dis-
sociated by agitating the solution, and there are occurrences of calcare-
ous formations which indicate that the monocarbonate is deposited as
a result of such action. Thus it is probable that, through tliis process,
warm seas surrender to the air a notable amount of carbon dioxide, but
that the contribution becomes insignificant or ceases when the waters
are chilled.

Under favorable conditions the ocean abounds in organisms which
secrete normal carbonate of lime as parts of their structures. They
swarm in the warm waters of tropical oceanic currents, they exist in
multitudes on the warm shallows where the sea spreads over the mar-
gins of continental masses with a depth not exceeding 100 fathoms, but
they are rare or are replaced by species without hard parts in cold
waters. The physiological reactions by which these organisms obtain
the normal carbonate from the water are not definitely known. They
may take it from bicarbonate in solution, or by reaction on sulphate of
lime setting free sulphuric acid, which attacks the bicarbonate. In any
case, the effect is to fix one ion of carbon dioxide in the solid normal
carbonate, and to free the second ion, which may pass into the air. The
enormous volume of organic calcareous deposits now forming, and the
massive limestone strata of past ages, largely or wholly of organic
origin, attest the importance of the process. Life may be considered
the most important of those agencies which restore carbon dioxide to
the atmosphere, but it is narrowly conditioned by limitations of habitat
and warmth.

Carbon dioxide absorbed in sea-water is yielded to the atmosphere
and returned by it under varying conditions of tension of the gas, of
barometric pressure, and of temperature. At moderate temperature the
sea gives up the gas freely, and would supply a deficiency gradually
brought about in the atmosphere. But colder waters hold it faster, and
may even take carbon dioxide from an already depleted atmosphere.

Thus the processes of dissociation by chemical and organic agencies
and of absorption depend upon temperature, and through this depend-
ence promote the prevailing tendency of climatic changes. If the

CLIMATE AND CARBONIC ACID. 251

change be from warm to cold, cooling waters tighten their grasp on the
precious gas that might offset the atmospheric depletion. If they be
warmed beneath an air growing rich in carbon dioxide, they become
generous of their hoard. The processes are, therefore, auxiliary and
intensifying, not initiative.

For the initiative process, which may start the train of effects lead-
ing to atmospheric enrichment and a warm epoch, we must refer again
to the periodic rest and unrest of the earth's forces.

When, through adjustment of the relations between continental
masses and masses beneath the oceans, the internal stresses of the globe
have been balanced, the average elevation of lands above sea level is a
maximum. The highest rate of consumption of carbon dioxide by
weathering may be assumed to follow after a brief but appreciable in-
terval, and from that time forth to diminish. As heights waste and
slopes sink low, they become mantled with the residual product of
weathering, soil, and efficient contact of carbon dioxide with unaltered
rock is limited. When the average height of land is become that of
a low plain, carbonation is reduced to a very small part of its maximum
activity, and the rate of consumption is slow. At some stage of this
change the diminishing rate of depletion may equal and thereafter sink
below the rate of supply. Thus the initial condition of a return of
milder climate inheres in the transient nature of the cause of a cold
epoch. The result might, however, be long delayed, but for the acceler-
ating influence of auxiliary processes, of which, as already stated, life is
believed to be the most potent.

It is a recorded fact of geologic history that periods of minimum
continental elevation have been periods of extensive marine expansion.
These conditions have been associated with remarkable development
of marine faunas and with general mildness. Chamberlin was the first
to point out a causal relation between these conditions and effects. He
entertains the idea that at the climax of an epoch of crustal adjustment,
the elevation of continents may be somewhat greater than that required
by radial equilibrium. If so, they should in time exhibit a tendency to
settle back. In so far as this period of readjustment of balance might
suffice for deep general denudation, the subsiding lands would present
low plain surfaces to the sea. These conditions would be most favor-
able for wide migration of the shore from the continental margins far
inland, and would result in extensive areas of relatively shallow water.
A fauna, which had existed on the narrow slope between the original
position of the shore and an oceanic basin, would find its habitat
immensely enlarged and favorably conditioned. Eesponding, it would
develop varieties, species and genera until, as sometimes was the case,
exuberance ran into unfitness and decadence.

The lowland aspect of continents would be favorable to other

252 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ameliorating influences, as well as to life. Before it could have attained
its later phases, the acute thermal transparency of the atmosphere must
have given place to moderate absorption, and temperate conditions must
have succeeded cold. From waters warmed on widening shallows, car-
bon dioxide would pass into the air by simple diffusion and by chemical
dissociation. But the principal contribution, upon which generally pre-
vailing mildness would attend, would be associated with the active
development of lime-secreting life, and this relation is firmly estab-
lished by observation.

Grand seasons of the eras are thus interpreted by Chamberlin as
effects of periodic adjustments of the earth's superficial form to stresses
developed within its mass. The causes of these stresses are sought by
physicists and geologists in the most profound researches, and for the
present, at least, they elude discovery, because the physical and chemical
conditions of matter within the earth transcend conditions of observa-
tion. But geologic investigation is competent to trace their influence
upon aspects of the earth, and not the least valuable result of Cham-
berlin's thought is the impulse it imparts to studies into the geography
and life of the past.

The general hypothesis being thus promisingly developed, some
would have been satisfied there to rest the suggestion, and the general
reader may be content with the splendidly panoramic view of effects and
causes which it embraces. But its author pursues its analysis and appli-
cation with rigorous questioning, limited only by the bounds of existing
knowledge, and where knowledge fails he points out the need of
research. We shall touch only upon the principal points of his thorough
discussion, the competency of the causes, the oscillations of glaciation,
the time limits set by the probable duration of glacial and interglacial
epochs and the localization of glaciation in Pleistocene and in Car-
boniferous times.

As already stated, the Pleistocene glaciation is attributed to deple-
tion of the atmospheric carbon dioxide occasioned by the notable expan-
sion and elevation of lands late in the Pliocene period. It is estimated
that in the preceding warm age the land area was 44,000,000 square
miles. That of the succeeding expansion at its maximum is computed
at 65,000,000 square miles, and the present extent is taken at 54,000,-
000 square miles. That is to say, the areas are related nearly as
1 :1% :li/4- Elevation, which is more important than extent, was at the
time of greatest expansion at least two or three times what it shortly
before had been when continents were smaller. In the earlier time of
mildness the margins of continents were generally submerged, as the
eastern portion of North America now is, affording a roomy habitat for
lime-secreting marine life. But with the uplift of continents these sea-
shelves were reduced to narrow zones along the steeps which descend

CLIMATE AND CARBONIC ACID. 253

into oceanic depths. Low, limited lands and wide, warm seas had pro-
moted the flow of carbon dioxide from the waters to the air. Lands
elevated and expanded and seas shrunk within their basins reversed the
course, and the earth took from the air to give to the waters.

The rate of depletion is capable of reasonable calculation. If the
amount of carbon dioxide taken from the atmosphere exceeded by 10
per cent, that supplied to it from all possible sources, 50,000 years
would suffice to reduce the content from .18 per cent, to .03 per cent,
by weight. And this change would bring on glaciation. There are few
students of the earth's history who would be willing to admit that the
associated effects of topographic development could have occurred in
less, if, indeed, in so short a time, and the causes assigned are thus seen
to be fully equal to the task imposed.

The climates of the Glacial period were marked by rhythm recorded
in advance and retreat, and re-advance and withdrawal, of the ice front
several times repeated. The major changes were as great as that which
has intervened between the severest glaciation and the present, and
occurred early in the series. The later oscillations declined in both
Europe and jSTorth America. Such rhythmic rebound from one phase
to another and back again is characteristic of phenomena which,
though they swing to extremes, themselves set up the action that
reverses the movement. The ice sheet itself set the bounds of its pos-
sible spread.

Assuming glaciation to be inaugurated and the cold to be intensified
by consequent accelerating influences, which need not be detailed here,
the depleting process of weathering must be checked by the mantling
ice and refrigeration. It is estimated that frost and ice at their maxi-
mum eifect protected 20 per cent, of the Pleistocene land area. Con-
tinued depletion depended on the balance between contribution and
abstraction, and it is suggested that 20 per cent, (or whatever may
have been the proportion of land area sealed against carbonation) rep-
resented the initial preponderance of draft over supply. Whenever the
effects of glaciation reduced the consumption of carbon dioxide below
the inflow from all sources, the glacial epoch would end and the reaction
would begin. Once initiated, it would be accelerated by diffusion and
dissociation in the richly stored seas, and by renewed development of
life in the warmer waters. The mildness might increase till the great
glaciers had vanished, but it could have come to stay only in case the
height and area of land had adequately diminished.

Lands remained extensive and elevations great during the Pleisto-
cene period. They were even wider and higher than they are now.
As an early ice mantle shrunk it bared rock masses and glacial deposits,
which were to a great extent favorably conditioned for chemical attack.
The renewed consumption of carbon dioxide in time overbalanced the
supply, and glaciation went on again.

2 54 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

What was the period of this climatic pendulum ? The answer comes
to us vaguely in echoes of Niagara's voices. The cataract began its
existence at Lewiston during the retreat of the latest ice sheet. Since
that time the gorge has been cut back from Lewiston to the present site
of the falls, and it is possible to estimate roughly what time the task
has consumed. This episode is one-half or less than one-half of the
time elapsed since the beginning of the retreat of the ice from its most
advanced position. Thus indefinitely, we may count that something
like 40,000 years sped while the climate changed from those Greenland
conditions to these which we now enjoy. By similar conservative
studies of the effects of deposition and erosion accomplished before the
latest glaciation, the duration of the interglacial epoch is found to be
several times that of the post-glacial interval; that is, in numbers,
80,000 or 120,000 years or more.

The significance of these figures does not depend upon their pre-
cision. They confessedly do but indicate the general magnitude of
the times. But they serve to show that those times were more than
sufficient for the operation of the causes assigned to produce the
observed effects, and thus they sustain the hypothesis. Furthermore,
they serve to bring glaciation near to us. In earth history, whose eras
are measured by millions of years, events which occurred a hundred
thousand years ago are of recent date. We live within the operation of
the causes which may hinder or promote glaciation, and, though the
present is an age of comparative mildness, we cannot be sure whether
this be the spring of a great era or midsuromer of an epoch. Are the
gnomes of the under-world wearied of mountain building, and have
they sunk to rest? Are the shafts of the sun's heat as they traverse
the air effectively caught and stored? Does man, consuming fossil
carbon in his manifold activities, unconsciously postpone the return of
winter ?

The cause of a glacial epoch may be found when an adequate cause
of cold is linked with the occurrence of glaciation, but the spread of
an ice mantle is dependent on snowfall as well as on temperature, and
it is through this relation that the peculiar distribution of Pleistocene
glaciers may be explained. It will suffice here to state the meteor-
ological conditions which, according to Chamberlin, determined the
most striking centers of accumulation, those which were situated in
the plains of north-northeastern America.

Studies of polar currents, which free the northern coast of Siberia
of ice and crowd it upon the American Arctic Archipelago, combined
with the partial data available as to the barometric conditions of the
Arctic zone, lead him to the conclusion that in the northern hemisphere
the grand movement of the atmosphere from west to east about the
globe is oblique to parallels of latitude, and is upon an axis which has

CLIMATE AND CARBONIC ACID. 255

its pole at a point located somewhere north of Hudson Bay. One effect
of this oblique rotation is to establish in northern latitudes between 50
and GO degrees two areas of low barometer and one of high barometer,
a disposition which is in strong contrast to the condition in the south-
ern hemisphere, there being a zone of high pressure along the parallel
of 35 degrees, south latitude, with decreasing pressure thence toward
the Antarctic. These lows and highs differ from those which are
familiar as features of daily weather maps, in that they are nearly sta-
tionary. The well-kno^vn migrant centers converge toward and run
into the great fixed centers. The two permanent lows are situated
one across the North Atlantic, from Hudson Bay to Scandinavia, the
other in the North Pacific, from Japan to southern Alaska. They are
centers of inflowing ascending air currents, and are, therefore, char-
acterized by great precipitation. The region of maximum glaciation
at the present time lies between them; one conspicuous development
occurring in Greenland in the northwest quarter of the Atlantic low,
another lying in Alaska in the northeast quarter of the Pacific low.
By an analysis of the winds, it is shown that both Greenland and
Alaska lie to leeward of the prevailing currents wl^ere they pass ashore.
They are not necessarily the provinces of maximum precipitation, rain
and snow both considered, but they are areas of copious snowfall, with
low annual mean temperatures.

The northern high lies nearly midway between the two lows over
Siberia. In contrast to them, it is a center of descending outward-
flowing currents, marked by slight precipitation, and it is not now, nor
was it in Pleistocene time, a scene of glacial development.

The centers of Pleistocene glaciation were so arranged with refer-
ence to the glacial regions of to-day that they would be determined by
the oblique circulation and distribution of areas of low pressure, if
existing conditions were intensified. An adequate occasion of intensifi-
cation is found in the thermal transparency of the atmosphere, resulting
from depletion of carbon dioxide, and thus the localization of Pleisto-
cene ice sheets is explained in a manner consistent with the major
hypothesis of the cause of glaciation.

Chamberlin's hypothesis is framed on an atmospheric basis, but the
efficiency of the agencies which it postulates depends upon geographic
conditions, upon distribution of land and sea and average heights of
continents. The geography of the earth in the closing epochs of the
Paleozoic era is known only in its broadest outlines, and they are but
vaguely traced. With such imperfect data it is impracticable to explain
satisfactorily the extraordinary phenomena of glaciation at that date
in intimate association with the development of coal beds and extend-
ing within the tropics. Nevertheless, to carry out his purpose of
developing a working hypothesis, the author feels obliged to arrange

256 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the known facts and to discuss them along the lines so successfully fol-
lowed in reference to Pleistocene glaciation. An important difference
in the argument as applied to the two cases lies in the cause assigned
for depletion of the atmospheric carbon dioxide. The postulate of an
appropriate time relation between Paleozoic land movements and the
epoch of glaciation being conservatively assigned a minor position, the
storage of carbon as coal is given major rank in accordance with known
relations. This process is not attended by the accelerating and react-
ing influences, which are due to the equivalent of carbon dioxide con-
tained in bicarbonates, and glaciation would, therefore, result only after
depletion had continued longer. In this suggestion is found a possible
reason for the wide extension of cool climate and the occurrence of
glaciation in remarkably low latitudes.

The broad scope of philosophic thought upon which this working
hypothesis rests is indicated by the titles of articles which have
flowed from Chamberlin's pen in the last four years.* Fortifying his
own general researches where needed by those of specialists, he, with
reason, challenges fundamental and generally accepted views. He gives
the geologist and biologist new clues with which to thread the labyrinth
of knowledge, and develops important relations between djmamical
geology, stratigraphy, climate and evolution.

* A Group of Hypotheses bearing on Climatic Changes, Jour. Geol., Vol. V.,
No. 7, 1897. The Ulterior Basis of Time Divisions and the Classification of
Geologic History, ibid.. Vol. VI., No. 5, 1898. A Systematic Source of Evolution
of Provincial Faunas, ibid.. No. 6, 1898. The Influence of Great Epochs of
Limestone Formation upon the Constitution of the Atmosphere, ibid. Lord
Kelvin's Address on the Age of the Earth as an Abode Fitted for Life, Science,
N. S., Vol. IX., No. 235, pp. 889-901, Jime 30, 1899, and Vol. X., No. 236, pp.
11-18, July 7, 1899.

THE PEOPLING OF THE PHILIPPINES. 257

THE PEOPLING OF THE PHILIPPINES.*

By professor rud. virchow,

UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN.

SINCE the days when the first European navigators entered the
South Sea, the dispute over the source and ethnic affiliations of
the inhabitants of that extended and scattered island world has been
unsettled. The most superficial glance points out a contrariety in
external appearances, which leaves little doubt that here peoples of
entirely different blood live near and among one another. And this
is so apparent that the pathfinder in this region, Magellan, gave expres-
sion to the contrariety in his names for tribes and islands. Since
dark complexion was observed on individuals in certain tribes and in
defined areas, and light complexion on others, here abundantly, there
quite exceptional, writers applied Old World names to the new phe-
nomena without further thought. The Philippines set the decisive
example in this. Fernando Magellan first discovered the islands of
this great archipelago in 1521, March 16. After his death the Span-
iards completed the circle of his discoveries. At this time the name of
Negros was fixed, f which even now is called Islad de los Pintados.
For years the Spaniards called the entire archipelago Islas de
Poniente ; gradually, after the expedition of Don Fray Garcia Jof re de
Loaisa (1526), the new title of the Philippines prevailed, through
Salazar. The people were divided into two groups, the Little Negroes
or Negritos and the Indies. It is quite conceivable that involuntarily
the opinion prevailed that the Negritos had close relationship with the
African blacks, and the Indios| with the lighter-complexioned inhabit-
ants of India, or at least of Indonesia.

However, it must be said here that the theory of a truly African
origin of the Negritos has been advanced but seldom, and then in a
very hesitating manner. The idea that with the present configuration

* Sitzungsberichte der Koniglich Preussischen Akademie der Wissenscliaften
zu Berlin. Berlin, 1897, January-June, 279-289.' Translated with notes by
Professor 0. T. Mason for the annual report of the Smithsonian Institution, and
printed from an advance copy supplied by Professor Samuel P. Langley, secre-
tary of the Institution.

t Note. — The island of Negros received its name because it was peopled
chiefly by a dark, woolly-haired race, while in other islands these were confined
to the interior. Cf. A. B. Meyer, Negritos, 1899, p. 16. — Translator.

t This word, except in an historical sense, should never be used for non-
Negrito Filipinos.

VOL. LLS. — 17

258 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of the eastern island world, especially with their great distances apart,
a variety of mankind that had never manifested any aptitude for
maritime enterprises should have spread themselves over this vast
ocean area, in order to settle down on this island and on that, is so
unreasonable that it has found scarcely a defender worth naming.
More and more the blacks are coming to be considered the original
peoples, the 'Indios' to be the intruders. For this there is a quite
reasonable ground, in that on many islands the blacks dwell in the
interior, difficult of access, especially in the dense and unwholesome
mountain forests, while the lighter complexioned tribes have settled
the coasts. To this are added linguistic proofs, which place the lighter
races, of homogeneous speech, in linguistic relations with the higher
races, especially the Malays. Dogmatically it has been said that
originally these islands had been occupied entirely by the primitive
black population, but afterwards, through intrusions from the sea,
these blacks were gradually pressed away from the coast and shoved
back into the interior.

The problem, though it appears simple enough, has become com-
plicated more and more through the progress of discovery, especially
since Cook enlarged our knowledge of the oriental island world. A
new and still more pregnant contrast then thrust itself to the front in
the fact that the blacks and the lighter-colored peoples are each sep-
arated into widely differing groups. While the former hold especially
the immense, almost continental, regions of Australia (New Holland)
and New Guinea, and also the larger archipelagos, such as New Heb-
rides, Solomon Islands, Fiji (Viti) Archipelago — that is, the western
areas — the north and east, Micronesia and Polynesia, were occupied by
lighter-colored peoples. So the first divison into Melanesia and Poly-
nesia has in latest times come to be of value and the dogma once fixed
has remained. For the Polynesians are by many allied to the Malays,
while the blacks are put together as a special ethnological race.

For practical ethnology this division may suffice. But the scientific
man will seek also for the blacks a genetic explanation. The answer
has been furnished by one of the greatest ethnologists, Theodor Waitz,*
who, after he had exposed the insufficiency of the accepted formulas,
came to the conclusion that the differentiation of the blacks from the
lighter peoples might be an error. He denied that there had been a
primitive black race in Micronesia and Polynesia; in his opinion we
have here to do with a single race. The color of the Polynesians may
be out and out from natural causes different; indeed, 'their entire
physical appearance indicates the greatest variability.' Herein the

* Anthropologie der Naturvolker, Vol. V; The South Sea Islanders, Part
II; The Micronesians and Northwestern Polynesians. Leipzig, 1870, pp. 33-36.
Finsch, Verh. d. Berliner Anthrop. Ges., 1882, p. 164.

THE PEOPLING OF THE PHILIPPINES. 259

whole question of the domain of variation is sprung with imperfect
satisfaction on the part of those travelers who give their attention
more to transitions than to types. Among these are not a few who
have returned from the South Sea with the conviction that all criteria
for the diagnosis of men and of races are valueless.

Analytical anthropology has led to other and often unexpected
results. It has proved that just that portion of South Sea population
which can apparently lay the strongest claim to be considered a
homogeneous race must be separated into a collection of subvarieties.
Nothing appears more likely than that the Negritos of the Philippines
are the nearest relatives to the Melanesians, the Australians, the
Papuans; and yet it has been proved that all these are separated one
from another by well-marked characters. Whether these characters
place the peoples under the head of varieties, or whether, indeed, the
black tribes of the South Sea, spite of all differences, are to be traced
back to one single primitive stock, that is a question of prehistory
for whose answer the material is lacking.* Were it possible to furnish
the proof that the black populations of the South Sea were already
settled in their present homes when land bridges existed between their
territory and Africa, or when the much-sought Lemuria still existed,
it would not be worth the trouble to hunt for the missing material.
In our present knowledge we can not fill the gaps, so we must yet hold
the blacks of the Orient to be separate races. f

The hair furnished the strongest character for diagnosis, in which,
not alone that of the head is under consideration; the hair, therefore,
occupies the foreground of interest. Its color is of the least importance,
since all peoples of the South Sea have black hair. It is more the
structure and appearance which furnish the observer convenient start-
ing points for the primary classification. Generally a twofold division
satisfies. The blacks, it is said, have crisped hair, the Polynesians and
light-colored peoples have smooth hair. But this declaration is erro-
neous in its generality. It is in no way easy to declare absolutely
what hair is to be called crisp, and it is still more difficult to define in
what respects the so-called crisp varieties differ one from another.
For a long time the Australian hair was denominated crisp, until it was
evident that it could be classed neither with that of the Africans nor
with that of the Philippine blacks. Semper, one of the first travelers
to furnish a somewhat complete description of the physical characters
of the Negritos, describes it as an "extremely thick, brown-black,

* Note. — The reader must consult, on the identity of Negritos with
Papuans, A. B. Meyer in Zeitschrift fiir Ethnologie, Verhandl., Berlin, 1875,
p. 47, and the Distribution of the Negritos, Dresden, 1899, pp. 76-87. — Tk.

t On Lemuria cf. A. R. Wallace, Geog. Distrib. of Animals, 1876, I, p. 272,
and Island Life, 1880, p. 394.— Tr.

26o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

lack-luster, and crisp-woolly crown of hair."* Among these peculiari-
ties the lack-luster is unimportant, since it is due to want of care and
uncleanliness. On the contrary, the other data furnish true characters
of the hair, and among them the crisp-woolly peculiarity is most
valuable.

On the terms Vool' and Voolly' severe controversies, which have
not 5^et closed, have taken place among ethnologists during the last
ten years. Also the lack of care, especially the absence of the comb,
has here acted as a disturbing cause in the decision. But there is yet
a set of peoples, which were formerly included, that are now being
gradually disassociated, especially the Australians and the Veddahs,
whose hair, by means of special care, appears quite wavy if not
entirely sleek and smooth. Generally it is frowzy and matted, so
that its natural form is difficult to recognize. To it is wanting the
chief peculiarity, which obtrudes itself in the African blacks so char-
acteristically that the compact spiral form which it assumes from its
root, the so-called ^pepper-corn,' is selected as the preferable mark
of the race. The peculiar nappy head has its origin in the spiral
'rollchen.' As to the Asiatic blacks this has been for a long time
known among the Andamanese; it has lately been noticed upon the
Sakai of Malacca, and it is to be found also among the Negritos of the
Philippines, as can be shown by specimens. Therefore, if we seek
ethnic relationships for the Negritos of the Philippines, or as they are
named, the Aetas (Etas, Itas), such connections obtrude themselves
with the stocks named, and the more strongly since they all have
brachy cephalic, relatively small (nannocephalic) heads and through
their small size attach themselves to the peculiar dwarf tribes.

1 might here comment on the singular facts that the Andaman
Islands are situated near the Nicobars in the Indian Ocean, but that
the populations on both sides of them are entirely different. In my
own detailed descriptions which treat of the skulls and the hair
specially,! it is affirmed that the typical skull shape of the Nicobarese
is dolichocephalic and that "their hair stands between the straight
hair of the Mongoloid and the sleek, though slightly curved or wavy,
hair of the Malayan and Indian peoples" ; their skin color is relatively
dark, but only so much so as is peculiar to the tribes of India. With
the little blacks of the Andamans there is not the slightest agreement.
In this we have one of the best evidences against the theory of
Waitz-Gerland that the differences in physical appearance are to be
attributed to variation merely. I will, however, so as not to be
misunderstood, expressly emphasize that I am not willing to declare

* Die Philippine!! ui!d ihre Bcwohi!er, Wiirzbiirg, 1869, p. 49.
fVerhandl. der Berliner Antlirop. Gesellschaft, 1885, pp. 104, 109.

THE PEOPLING OF THE PHILIPPINES. 261

that the two peoples have been at all times so constituted; I am now
speaking of actual conditions.

In the same sense I wish also my remarks concerning the Negritos
to be taken. Not one fact is in evidence from which we may conclude
that a single neighboring people known to us has been Negritized.
AVe are therefore justified when we see in the Negritos a truly prim-
itive people. As they are now, they were more than three hundred
and fifty years ago when the first European navigators visited these
islands. About older relationships nothing is known. All the graves
from which the bones of Negritos now in possession were taken belong
to recent times, and also the oldest descriptions which have been
received, so far as phylogeny is concerned, must be characterized as
modern. * * *

Whoever would picture the present ethnic affiliations of the light-
colored peoples of the Philippines will soon land in confusion on
account of the great number of tribes. One of the ablest observers,
Ferd. Blumentritt,* mentions, besides the Negritos, the Chinese and
the whites, not less than 51 such tribes. He classifies them in one
group as Malays, according to the plan now customary. This division
rests primarily on a linguistic foundation. But when it is noted that
the identity of language among all the tribes is not established and
among many not at all proved, it is sufficiently shown that speech is a
character of little constancy, and that a language may be imposed upon
a people to the annihilation of their own by those who belong to a
different linguistic stock. The Malay Sea is filled with islands on
which tarry the remnants of peoples not Malay.

For a long time, especially since the Dutch occupation, these old
populations have received the special name of Alfuros.f But this
ambiguous term has been used in such an arbitrary and promiscuous
fashion that latterly it has been well-nigh banished from ethnological
literature. It is not long ago that the Negritos were so called. But
if the black peoples are eliminated, there remains on many islands at
least an element to be differentiated from the Malay, chiefly through
the darker skin color, greater orthocephaly, and more wavy, quite
crimped hair. I have, for the different islands, furnished proof, and
Avill here only refer to the assertion that "a broad belt of wavy and
curly hair has pressed itself in between the Papuan and the Malay, a
belt which in the north seems to terminate with the Veddah, in the
south with the Australian." One can not read the accounts of travelers
without the increasing conviction of the existence of several different,

* Versuch einer Ethnographie der Philippinen, Petermann's Mittheilungen,
Gotha, 1882, No. 67. '■

t A. Lesson. Les Polynesians, Paris, 1880, Vol. I, pp. 267, 283. [On this
objectionable word see A. B. Meyer, Tlie Distribution of the Negritos, Dresden,
1899, Stengel, p. 7.— Tr.]

262 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

if not perhaps related, varieties of peoples thrust on the same island.

From this results the natural and entirely unprejudiced conclusion,
which has repeatedly been stated, that either a primitive people by
later intrusions has been pressed back into the interior or that in
course of time several immigrations have followed one another. At
the same time it is not unreasonable to think that both processes went
on at the same time, and indeed this conception is strongly brought
forward.* So Blumentritt assumes that there is there a primitive black
people and that three separate Malay invasions have taken place.
The oldest, whose branches have many traits in accord with the Dayaks
of Borneo, especially the practice of head-hunting; a second, which
also took place before the arrival of the Spaniards, to which the Tagals,
Visayas, Vicols, Ilocanes, and other tribes belong; the third, Islamitic,
which emigrated from Borneo and might have been interrupted by the
arrival of the Spaniards, and with which a contemporaneous immigra-
tion from the Moluccas went on. It must be said, however, that
Blumentritt admits two periods for the first invasion. In the earliest
he places the immigration of the Igorrotes, Apayos, Zambales — in short,
all the tribes that dwelt in the interior of the country later and were
pressed away from the coast, therefore, actually, the mountain tribes.
To the second half he assigns the Tinguianes, Catalanganes, and Irayas,
who are not head-hunters, but Semper says they appear to have a
mixture of Chinese and Japanese blood, f

Against this scheme many things may be said in detail, especially
that, according to the apparently well-grounded assertions of Muller-
Beeck, the going of the Chinese to the Philippines was developed
about the end of the fourteenth century, and chiefly after the Span-
iards had gotten a foothold and were using the Mexican silver in trade.
At any rate, the apprehension of Semper, which rests on somewhat
superficial physiognomic ground, is not confirmed by searching investi-
gations. So the head-hunting of the mountain tribes, so far as it
hints at relations with Borneo, gives no sure chronological result, since
it might have been contemporaneous in them and could have come here
through invasion from other islands.

The chief inquiry is this : Whether there took place other and older
invasions. For this we are not only to draw upon the present tribes.

»

R. VirchoWj Alfiiren-Schadel von Ceram und von den Molucken. Ver-
handl. Berl. Anthrop. Gesellschaft, 1882, p. 78; 1889, pp. 159, 170. [Whether
this be a new type or mixture cf. J. G. F. Riedel, Kroesharige Rassen tuesschen
Selebes en Papua, 1886. — Translator.]

t Note. — The dates for these several migrations are given as follows: First
migration, 200 B. C; second migration 100-500, A. D., bringing the alphabet;
third migration, fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, Islamitic. But these dates
represent only opinions up to date, from which more thorough inquiry must set
out. — Translator.

TEE PEOPLING OF TEE PEILIPPINE8. 263

but if possible upon the remains of earlier and perhaps now extinct
tribes. This possibility has been brought nearer for the Philippines
through certain cave deposits. We have to thank, for the first infor-
mation, the traveler Jagor, whose exceptional talent as collector has
placed us in the possession of rich material, especially crania. To his
excellent report of his journey I have already dedicated a special
chapter, in which I have presented and partially illustrated not
only the cave crania, but also a series of other sloills. An extended
conference upon them has been held in the Anthropological Society.*

The old Spanish chroniclers describe accurately the mortuary cus-
toms which were in vogue in their time. The dead were laid in coffins
made from excavated tree trunks and covered with a well-fitting lid.
They were then deposited on some elevated place, or mountain, or
river bank, or seashore. Caves in the mountains were also utilized
for this purpose. Jagor describes such caves on the island of Samar,
west of Luzon, whose contents have recently been annihilated, f

The few crania from there which have been intrusted to me bear
the marks of recent pedigree, as also do the additional objects. Unfor-
tunately, Dr. Jagor did not himself visit these interesting caves, but
he has brought crania thence which are of the highest interest, and
which I must now mention.

The cave in question lies near Lanang,J on the east coast of Samar,
on the bank of a river, it is said. It is, as the traveler reports, cele-
brated in the locality "on account of its depressed gigantic crania,
without sutures." The singular statement is made clear by means of
a well-preserved example, which I lay before you. The entire cranium,
including the face, is covered with a thick layer of sinter, which
gives it the appearance of belonging to the class of skulls with Leon-
tiasis ossea. It is, in fact, of good size, but through the incrustation
it is increased to gigantic proportions. It is true, likewise, that it has
a much flattened, broad and compressed form. The cleaning of another
skull has shown that artificial deformation has taken place, which
obviously was completed before the incrustation was laid on by the
mineral water of the cave. I will here add that on the testimony of
travelers no Negritos were on Samar. The island lies in the neighbor-
hood of the Visayas. Although no description of the position of the
slmll is at hand and of the skeleton to which it apparently belonged, it

* Note. — In the matter of e\ddence for high antiquity and separate race
furnished by incrusted cave crania, Prof. William H. Holmes's paper on the
Calaveras skull (printed in this volume), should be studied, in which serious
doubts are thrown upon the value of such relies as Avitnesses. — Translator.

t F. Jagor, Grabstiitten zu Xipa-Nipa. Zeitschrift fiir Ethnologic, 1869,
I, p. 80.

+ Die Philippinen und ihre Bewohner. Verb, der Berliner Anthrop.
Gesellsch., 1870, session of 25th of January.

264 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

must be assumed that the dead man was not laid away in a coffin, but
placed on the ground; that, in fact, he belonged to an earlier "^period.'
How long ago that was can not be known, unfortunately, since no data
are at handj however, the bones are in a nearly fossilized condition,
which allows the conclusion that they were deposited long ago.

The deformation itself furnishes no clue to a chronological conclu-
sion. In Thevenot* is found the statement that, according to the
account of a priest, probably in the 16th century, the custom prevails
in some of the islands to press the heads of new-born babes between
two boards, also to flatten the forehead, 'since they believed that this
form was a special mark of beauty.^ A similar deformation, with
more pronounced flattening and backward pressure of the forehead, is
shown on the crania which Jagor produced from a cave at Caramuan
in Luzon, There are modes of flattening which remind one of Peru.
When they came into our hands it was indeed an immense surprise,
since no knowledge of such deformation in the South Sea was at hand.
First our information led to more thorough investigations; so we are
aware of several examples of it from Indonesia and, indeed, from the
South Sea (Mallicolo). However, this deformation furnishes no clue
to the antiquity of the graves, f

I have sawed one of these skulls in two along the sagittal suture.
The specimen gives a good idea of the amount of compression and
of the violence which this skull endured when quite young. The
cranial cavity is inclined backward and lengthened, and curves out
above, while the occiput is pressed downward and the region of the
front fontanelle is correspondingly lacking. Likewise, a considerable
thickness of the bone is to be noted, especially of the vertex. The
upper jaw is slightly prognathous and the roof of the mouth unusually
arched.

For the purpose of the present study, it is unnecessary to go further
into particulars. It might be mentioned that all Lanang skulls are
characterized by their size and the firmness of bone, so that they depart
widely from the characteristics of the other Philippine examples
known to me. Similar skulls have been received only from caves,
which exist in one of the little rocky islands east from Luzon. They
suggest most Kanaka crania from Hawaii, and Maiori crania from
Chatham islands, and they raise the question whether they do not
belong to a migration period long before the time of the Malays. I

* Pi61ations des diverses voyages curieux. Paris, 1591 (1663).

[t Chinese and Korean pottery are said to have been found with the de-
formed crania. Similar deformations exist in the Celebes, New Britain, etc.
Head-shaping has been universal, cf. A. B. Meyer, Uber kunstliche deformirte
Schadel von Borneo und Mindanao and liber die Verbreitung der Sitte der
kunstlichen Schudeldeformirung, 1881, 36 pp., 4°. — Translatok.]

THE PEOPLING OF TEE PHILIPPINES. ^63

have, on various occasions, mentioned this probable pre-Malayan, or
at least proto-Malayan, population which stands in nearest relation to
the settling of Polynesia. Here I will merely mention that the Poly-
nesian sagas bring the progenitor from the west, and that the passage
between Halmahera (Gilolo) and the Philippines is pointed out as the
course of invasion.

At any rate, it is quite probable that the skulls from Lanang, Cra-
garay and other Philippine islands are the remains of a very old, if
not autochthonous, prehistoric layer of population. The present
mountain tribes have furnished no close analogies. As to the Igor-
rotes, which Blumentritt attributes to the first invasion, I refer to my
description* given on the ground of chronological investigations;
according to the account given by Hans Meyer f the disposal of the
dead in log coffins and in caves still goes on. Of the skulls themselves,
none were brachycephalous ; on the contrary, they exhibit platyrrhine
and in part decidedly pithecoid noses. On the whele, I came to the
conclusion, as did earlier Quatrefages and Hamy, that 'they stand
next in comparison with the Dayaks of Borneo,' but I hold yet the
impression that they belong to a very old, probably pre-Malay, immi-
gration. J

* Schadel der Igorroten. Verhl. der Berliner Anthrop. Gesellsch., 1883, pp.
300, 399. [On the Igorrotes see A. B. Meyer, Negritos, 1899, p. 12, note 2.
— Translator.]

t Die Igorroten von Luzon, p. 386.

t With this study of crania should be read Dr. A. B. Meyer, on craniological
data and their value, in The Distribution of the Negritos, Dresden, 1899, in
which he says : "The form of the skull in general is variable and can not be
regarded as a permanent character in the development of the races." The
reader must not neglect Dr. Meyer's publications, since in them he has the
results of careful studies on the spot: Volume VIII, of the folio publications
of the Dresden Royal Ethnographic Museum, 1890, on the tribes of Northern
Luzon; Volume IX, of the same, on the Negritos, 1893; Album of Philippine
Types, 1885, 32 plates, 4°; ditto, 1891, 50 plates; and The Distribution of the
Negritos in the Philippine Islands and Elsewhere, Dresden. The last three
are published by Stengel & Co., Dresden. The little book on distribution is
in English, and contains, in addition to most useful information, a list of
Blumentritt's publications. — Translator.

2 66 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

A STUDY OF BEITISH GENIUS.

By HAVELOCK ELLIS.
VIII.— PATHOLOGY.

"FN a large proportion of cases no reference is made by the national
-*- biographers to the diseases from which their subjects suffered, nor
to the general state of health. This, however, we could scarcely expect
to find, except in those cases in which the state of health had an obvious
influence on the life and work of the eminent person. In most of these
exceptional cases it is probable that the biographers have duly called at-
tention to the facts, and though the information thus attained is not
always precise — in part owing to the imperfection of the knowledge
transmitted, in part to the medical ignorance of the biographers, and in
part to the deliberate vagueness of their reference to 'a painful malady,'
etc. — it enables us to reach some very instructive conclusions concern-
ing the pathological conditions to which men of genius are most liable.

Putting aside the cases of delicate health in childhood, with which
I have already dealt in a previous section, the national biographers state
the cause of death, or mention serious diseased conditions during life, in
322 cases.

It is natural to find that certain diseased conditions which are very
common among the ordinary population are also very common among
men of preeminent intellectual ability. Thus, a lesion of the vessels
in the brain (the condition commonly described as paralysis, apoplexy,
effusion on the brain, etc.) is a very common cause of death among the
general population, and we also find that it is mentioned thirty-five
times by the national biographers. Consumption, also, so prevalent
among the general population, occurred in at least thirty cases. "While
many of the consumptive men of genius lived to past middle age, or
even reached a fairly advanced age, the disease is responsible for the
early death of most of the more eminent of those men of genius who
died young — of Keats in poetry, of Bonington and Girtin in art, of
Purcell (probably) in music. Some appear to have struggled with con-
sumptive tendencies during a fairly long life; these have usually been
men of letters, and have sometimes shown a feverish literary activity,
their intellectual output being perhaps more remarkable for quantity
than quality. But Sterne in literature, and Black, Priestley, Clifford
and other eminent men of science are to be found among the con-
sumptives. It is evident that the disease by no means stands in the way
of all but the very highest intellectual attainments, even if it is not in-
deed actually favorable to mental activity.

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 267

Other forms of lung diseases are only mentioned fifteen times.
The striking point here is the remarkable frequency of asthma in so
small a group. It occurs nine times. It is fairly evident that in nearly
all these cases we are concerned with true spasmodic asthma, a malady
of the nervous system, and apt to arise, often in early life, on the basis
of a somewhat neurotic organism.

Another malady to which we may judge that men of intellectual
eminence are specially liable, since it is so often referred to, is angina
pectoris. Heart disease — doubtless because its exact diagnosis is of
comparatively recent date — is only referred to eighteen times, but in as
many as eight or nine of these cases the disease is either distinctly stated
to be, or may reasonably be inferred to be, angina pectoris. None of
these cases are purely literary men, but four of them are artists.

There is, however, a pathological condition which occurs so often, in
such extreme forms, and in men of such preeminent intellectual
ability, that it is impossible not to regard it as having a real association
with such ability. I refer to gout. This is by no means a common
disease, at all events at the present day. In ordinary English medical
practice at the present day, it may safely be said that cases of gout sel-
dom form more than one per cent, of the chronic disorders met with.
Yet gout is of all diseases that most commonly mentioned by the na-
tional biographers; it is noted as occurring in thirty-eight cases, often
in very severe forms. We have, indeed, to bear in mind that gout has
been recognized for a very long time, and that it is moreover a disease
of good reputation. Yet, even if we assume that it has been noted in
every case in which it occurs among our 902 eminent persons (an
altogether absurd assumption to make), we should still have to recog-
nize that it occurs in over four per cent. Moreover, the eminence of
these gouty subjects is as notable as their number. They include
Milton, Harvey, Sydenham, Newton, Gibbon, Fielding, Johnson,
Wesley, Landor, W. E. Hamilton and Darwin, while Bacon was of gouty
heredity.* It would probably be impossible to match the group of
gouty men of genius, for varied and preeminent intellectual ability, by
any combination of non-gouty individuals on our list. It may be added
that these gouty men of genius have frequently been eccentric, often
very irascible — 'choleric' is the term applied by their contemporaries —

* Sydenham, the greatest of English physicians, who suffered from gout for
thirty-four years, and wrote an unsurpassed description of its symptoms, said in
his treatise, 'De Podagra,' that "it may he some consolation to those sufferers
from the disease who, like myself and others, are only modestly endowed with
fortune and intellectual gifts, to know that great kings, princes, generals,
admirals, philosophers and many more of like eminence have suffered from the
same complaint, and ultimately died of it. In a word, gout, unlike any other
disease, kills more rich men than poor, more wise than simple." And another
ancient (Father Balde) called gout Dominus morborum et morbus dominorum.

268 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

and occasionally insane. As a group, they are certainly very unlike the
group of eminent consumptives. These latter, with their febrile activi-
ties, their restless versatility, their quick sensitiveness to impressions,
often appear the very type of genius, but it is a somewhat feminine
order of genius. The genius of the gouty group is emphatically mascu-
line, profoundly original ; these men show a massive and patient energy
which proceeds not only Vithout rest,' but Vithout haste,' until it has
dominated its task and solved its problem.

This association of genius and gout cannot be a fortuitous coin-
cidence. The secret of the association probably lies in the special patho-
logical peculiarities of gout. It is liable to occur in robust, well-
nourished individuals. It acts in such a way that the poison is some-
times in the blood, and sometimes in the joints. Thus not only is the
poison itself probably an irritant and stimulant to the nervous system,
but even its fluctuations may be mentally beneficial. 'When it is in
the victim's blood his brain becomes abnormally overclouded; when it
is in his joints his mind becomes abnormally clear and vigorous. There
is thus a well-marked mental periodicity; the man liable to attacks of
gout is able to view the world from two entirely different points of
view; he has, as it were, two brains at his disposal; in the transition
from one state to another he is constantly receiving new inspirations,
and constantly forced to gloomy and severe self-criticism. His mind
thus attains a greater mental vigor and acuteness than the more equable
mind of the non-gouty subject, though the latter is doubtless much more
useful for the ordinary purposes of life.

It must not be supposed that in thus stating a connection between
gout and genius it is thereby assumed that the latter is in any sense a
product of the former. All the uric acid in the world will never suffice of
itself to produce genius, and it is easy enough to find severe gout in in-
dividuals who are neither rich nor wise, but merely hard-working man-
ual laborers of the most ordinary intelligence. It may well be, however,
that, given a highly endowed and robust organism, the gouty poison acts
as a real stimulus to intellectual energy and a real aid to intellectual
achievement. Gout is thus merely one of perhaps many exciting causes
acting on a fundamental predisposition. If the man of genius is all the
better for a slight ferment of disease, we must not forget that if he is to
accomplish much hard work he also requires a robust constitution.

It may be added that the other diseases of the uric acid group are
common among our men of genius. Rheumatism, indeed, is not men-
tioned a very large number of times, considering its prevalence among
the ordinary population. But stone, and closely allied conditions, are
mentioned seventeen times (five times in association with gout), and
as we may be quite sure that this is a very decided underestimate, we
must certainly conclude that the condition has been remarkably common.

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 269

One other grave pathological state remains to be noticed in this
connection — insanity. To the relationship of insanity with genius great
importance has by some writers been attached. That such a relation-
ship is apt to occur cannot be doubted, but it is far from being either so
frequent or so significant as is assumed by some writers, who rake to-
gether cases of insane men of genius without considering what propor-
tion they bear to sane men of genius, nor what relation their insanity
bears to their genius. The interest felt in this question is so general
that we may be fairly certain that the national biographers have rarely
failed to record the facts bearing on it, although in some cases these
facts are dubious and obscure. They may often have passed over gout
without mention, but they have seldom failed to mention insanity when-
ever they knew of its occurrence. It is, therefore, possible to ascertain
the prevalence of insanity among the persons on our list with a fair
degree of approximation to the truth as it was known to the eminent
man's contemporaries. We thus find that twenty-one were certainly in-
sane at some period during the prime of their lives ; that thirteen others
were probably, but not certainly, insane at some period earlier than old
age, and that in eleven further cases mental decay set in before death
took place in old age. It may be added that at least nine committed sui-
cide, and that at least fifteen were to a very high degree eccentric,
although there is no clear reason to suppose that they were actually
insane. It also appears that in seven cases (two fathers and five
mothers) one of the parents became insane, and that in eight cases one
or more of the children were insane. So that the insanity of the ascend-
ants and descendants, so far as can be seen, was about equal and by no
means excessive. If we include every possible case of insanity which
may be inferred from the data supplied by the national biographers, and
even if we include that decay of the mental faculties which is naturally
liable to occur before death in extreme old age, we find that the ascer-
tainable incidence of insanity among our 902 eminent persons is nearly
5 per cent.

It is certainly a high proportion. I do not know what is the num-
ber of cases among persons of the educated classes living to a high
average age in which it can be said that insanity has occurred at least
once during life. It is doubtless lower, but at the same time it can
scarcely be so very much lower that we are entitled to say that there is
a special and peculiar connection between genius and insanity. The
association of genius with insanity is not, I believe, without significance,
but in face of the fact that its occurrence is only demonstrable in 5
per cent, cases, and that it is only in 1 per cent, cases demonstrable in
the parents puts out of court any theory as to genius being a form of
insanity.

While I cannot compare with any precision the liability of these

2 70 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

persons of genius to insanity with the similar liability of correspond-
ing normal classes, there is one comparison which it is interesting to
make. We may compare the liability of persons of genius to insanity
with the similar liability of their wives or husbands. It is noted by the
national biographers that in fourteen cases the wives or husband (there
is only one case of the latter) became insane. We may be fairly cer-
tain that this is a decided underestimate, for while the biographers
would hold themselves bound to report the insanity of their subjects,
they would not consider themselves equally bound to give similar in-
formation concerning the wives, while in other cases it may well be that
the record of the fact has been lost. If now, in order to make the com-
parison reasonably fair, we omit the cases of senile decay, and only
admit two-thirds of the doubtful cases of insanity, we find that the pro-
portion of cases of insanity among the persons of genius is 3.3 per cent.
Among the conjugal partners, on the other hand (I have not made any
allowance for second marriages), it is 2.4. Thus we see that on a
roughly fair estimate the difference between the incidence of insanity on
British persons of genius and on their wives or husbands is less than one
per cent. When we bear in mind that the data on which one of our
groups is based are much more complete than those on which the other
is based, it is not hazardous to assert that British men of genius have
probably not been more liable to insanity than their wives.

At the first glance it might seem that this may be taken to indicate
that the liability of genius to insanity is exactly the normal liability.
That, liowever, would be a very rash conclusion. If the wives of men
of genius were chosen at random from the general population it would
hold good. But there is a well-recognized tendency — observed among
all the mentally abnormal classes — for abnormal persons to be sexually
attracted to each other. That this tendency prevails largely among
persons of eminent intellectual ability many of us may have had occa-
sion to observe. What we see, therefore, is not so much the conjunc-
tion of an abnormal and a normal class of persons, but the presence
of two abnormal classes.

With regard to the significance of insanity, it must be pointed out
that, although there may be an unusual liability to insanity among men
of genius, there is no general tendency for genius and insanity, even
when occurring in the same individual, to be concomitant. Just as it is
rare to find anything truly resembling genius in an asylum, so it is rare
to find any true insanity in a man of genius when engaged on his best
work. The simulation of it may occur — the ^divine mania' of the
artistic creator, or a very high degree of eccentricity — but not true and
definite insanity. There seem to be only two certain (and two or three
possible) cases — mostly poets — in which the best work was done during
the actual period of insanity. Periods of insanity may alternate with

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 271

periods of high intellectual achievement, just as gout may alternate
with various neurotic conditions, but the two states are not concomitant,
and genius cannot be accurately defined as a disease.

It must also be pointed out, in estimating the significance of the
relationship between genius and insanity, that the insane group is on
the whole not one of commanding intellectual preeminence. It cannot
compare in this respect with the gouty group, which is about the same
size, and the individuals of greatest eminence are contained in the 'prob-
able and doubtful' sections of the insane group. Among poets and men
of letters, of an order below the highest, insanity has been somewhat apt
to occur; it has been especially prevalent among antiquarians, but the
intellectual eminence of antiquarians is often so dubious that the ques-
tion of their inclusion in my list has been a frequent source of embar-
rassment.

If we turn from insanity to other grave nervous diseases, we are
struck by their rarity. It is true that many serious nervous diseases
have only been accurately distinguished during the past century, and
that we could not expect to find much trace of them in the dictionary.
But that cannot be said of epilepsy, which has always been recognized,
and in a well-developed form cannot easily be ignored. Yet epilepsy
or an epileptoid affection is only mentioned twice by the national biog-
raphers— once as occurring in early life (Lord Herbert of Cherbury),
once in old age (Sir W. E. Hamilton), never during the working life.
Although some of the most famous men in the world's history have been
epileptics, it cannot be said that the lives of British men of genius favor
the belief in any connection between genius and epilepsy, nor, so far
as can be seen, do they furnish a single shred of evidence in support of
the theory that genius is an epileptoid neurosis.

While, however, grave nervous diseases of definite type seem to be
rare rather than common among the eminent persons with whom we
are dealing, there is ample evidence to show that nervous s}TQptoms
of vaguer and more atypical character are extremely common. The
prevalence of eccentricity I have already mentioned. That irritable
condition of the nervous system which, in its Protean forms, is now
commonly called neurasthenia, is evidently very widespread among
them, and probably a large majority have been subject to it. Various
definite forms of minor nervous derangement are also common, espe-
cially stammering or stuttering; this is noted as occurring in nine
cases.* In seventeen other cases we are told that the voice was shrill,

* Even this means a higher proportion than is found among the general
population, and it must be remembered that the real occurrence must be
reckoned as at least double that which may be ascertained from the 'Dictionary.'
The normal occurrence of stuttering and stammering among adults is much be-
low one per cent., and even among children it is under one per cent.

2 72 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

weak or small. Short-sight, another condition occurring on a basis of
hereditary nervous defect, is noted as occurring in an extreme degree
thirteen times; and in a certain number of cases the other senses are
defective or absent. Convulsive or twitching movements of the face,
etc., are unusually frequent, and are noted in nine cases.

A condition to which I am inclined to attribute considerable sig-
nificance from the present point of view is clumsiness in the use of
the hands and awkwardness in walking. A singular degree of clum-
siness or awkwardness is noted many times by the national biographers,
although they have certainly regarded it merely as a curious trait, and
can scarcely have realized its profound significance as an index to the
unbalanced make-up of the nervous system. This peculiarity is very
frequently noted as occurring in persons who are tall, healthy, robust,
full of energy. As boys they are sometimes not attracted to games,
and cannot, if they try, succeed in acquiring skill in games; as they
grow up all sorts of physical exercise present unusual difficulties to
them; they cannot, for instance, learn to ride; even if fond of shoot-
ing, they may be unable to hit anything; they cannot write legibly;
in walking they totter and shuffle unsteadily; they are always meeting
with accidents. Priestley, though great in experiment, was too awk-
ward to handle a tool ; Macaulay could not wield a razor or even tie his
own neckcloth; Shelley, though lithe and active, was always tumbling
upstairs or tripping on smooth lawns. It would be easy to fill many
pages with similar examples. It is noted of thirty-four eminent men
on our list that they displayed one or more such inaptitudes to acquire
properly the muscular coordinations needed for various simple actions
of life. In numerous cases this clumsiness was combined with voice
defect.

The existence of all these nervous incoordinations and defects is
not evidence of disease, but it is yet in harmony with the evidence that
we have obtained regarding the diseases most prevalent among British
persons of genius. We have seen that the national biographers have
revealed the special frequency of consumption, of spasmodic asthma,
of angina pectoris, of gout, among persons of high intellectual aptitude.
To a large extent these pathological conditions are closely related, and
even interchangeable among themselves; they are all closely related to
various neurotic conditions. A man of genius may indeed be, as it
were, highly charged with nervous energy, but that energy is apt to be
ill-balanced, and by no means always equably and harmoniously dis-
tributed throughout the organism.

THE INTELLIGENCE OF MONKEYS. 273

THE INTELLIGENCE OF MONKEYS.

By professor EDWARD L. THORNDIKE,

TEACHERS COLLEGE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY.

AGOOD test of the intelligence of any animal is its ability to learn
to do a thing by being shown it or by being put through the
requisite movements. Human adults would learn readily in either of
these ways, because we thus get ideas of what to do and how to do it
and modify our actions in accordance with these ideas. If the reader
had never seen a glass or a faucet, he would nevertheless learn how to
get a drink by turning a faucet and holding the glass beneath it, if he
saw some one else do it, or if some one took his hands and put them
through the movements. The intelligence required in such cases is not
of a very advanced sort; it is not the power of abstract reasoning or of
seeing the relationships of facts, but is simply the capacity to have ideas
and to progress from the idea of doing a thing to the act itself.

A study which I made four years ago of the mental powers of dogs,
cats and chicks showed that these animals did not, at least not habitu-
ally, learn from this sort of tuition. They learned only in the following
manner: If in any situation their own impulses led them to do some-
thing which brought desirable results, they would, when put in that
situation again, do that particular thing rather than anything else. If
for instance a kitten was shut up in a box from which it could escape
only by turning around a button which held the door, it would claw
and bite and pull and squeeze at random as its instinctive impulses led
it to do. If by chance it made a pull at the button and so secured free-
dom and food, it would, the next time it was put in that box, be likely
to make that particular movement earlier than in its first trial. After
enough trials it would pull the button around as soon as put into the
box. It had learned by the selection of one of its own impulses. If
you showed it how to get out by putting it in the box and turning the
button for it, thus letting it out, it learned no more quickly than
when by itself. So also if you took its paw and with it pulled the
button round. And any acts which it failed to learn by means of the
selection of chance successes from its own impulsive activities, it could
never be taught by example or by being put through the movements,
scores of times.

During 1900 I was engaged in investigating the mental capacities
of monkeys and included in my experiments a number bearing upon
this question. The monkeys are quicker to learn and learn more

VOL. LIX. — 18

2 74 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

things than do the dogs and cats. Considering this and also their close
relationship physically to man, it seemed of special interest to discover
whether they could learn from example or from being put through
certain movements, whether they would manifest the capacity so evi-
dent in man and so lacking in the lower animals in general.

I had one monkey for over a year and two others for about four
months. All three were of the genus Cebus. The general method of the
experiments was as follows : Boxes about a foot square were made with
small doors held by all sorts of contrivances. For instance, one was
held by a hook, another by a bar, another by a bolt, another by a wire
fastened firmly at one side and wound round a nail at the other. A bit
of food was put inside such a box and the door of the box left open.
The box was then put inside one of the large cages containing a monkey.
It would come down, reach into the box and get the food. After this
had been repeated a few times the box would be put into the cage, with
its door shut. The monkey would try to get in as before. He might
chance to operate the simple mechanism that held the door. If, how-
ever, he did not succeed of his own impulsive activity I would show
him or put him through the movement a few times and then leave him
to himself again to see if he had profited by the tuition.

The general result was that they did not profit by the tuition, that
they did not gain and use ideas of how to open the doors, but learned
only by a process of selection from their own impulses. The meaning
and value of this general fact will aj^pear in the details of the experi-
ments.

In order that such experiments shall be valid tests of the workings
of an animal's mind it is necessary that he surely desire to get into the
box, that he be not disturbed by the surroundings in any way that will
alter his mental efficiency, and that the experimenter be able to handle
him easily without frightening him or taking his attention away from
the box. In all cases it is further necessary to make sure that the
monkey sees you perform the acts you expect him to imitate, and sees
and feels himself make the movements you put him through. These
desiderata were obtained by testing the monkeys when hungry and
using bits of food of which they were especially fond as the attraction ;
by experimenting with them after they were quite used to their habitat
and to my presence ; by getting them into the habit of coming to me and
enjoying being handled, having their paws taken, etc.; by showing
them the act or putting them through it only when they were attend-
ing to the box.

A sample of one of the experiments on the influence of example is
the following : The box used was arranged so that the door opened when
a brass lover was depressed about an eighth of an inch. The monkey
could reach this lever by putting his hand through a hole about an inch

THE INTELLIGENCE OF MONKEYS. 275

square at the right side of the front of the box. The door was at the
left side of the front. On Janviary 12th I put this box in No. 3's cage,
the door of the box being open. I put a bit of food in the box. No. 3
reached in and took it. This was repeated three times. I then put in a
bit of food and closed the door. No. 3 pulled and bit the box, turned it
over, fingered and bit at the hole where the lever was, but did not suc-
ceed in getting the door open. After ten minutes I took the box out.
The monkey having failed by his own impulsive efforts to depress the
lever, I began the tuition. I took No. 3 out and let him sit on my knees
(I sitting on the floor with the box in front of us). I would then put
my hand out toward the box and when he was looking at it would insert
my finger and depress the lever with as evident a movement as I could.
The door, of course, opened, and No. 3 put his arm in and took the bit
of food. I then put in another, closed the door and depressed the lever
as before. No. 3 watched my hand pretty constantly, as all his ex-
periences with me had made such watching profitable. After ten such
trials he was put back in the cage and the box put in with a large piece
of food in it and its door closed. No. 3 failed in the course of five
minutes to get the door open. His behavior was just the same as it had
been before he had seen me open the door ten times. He had not
profited at all by my example. Later I showed him 15 times more and
then tried him by himself. He failed as before.

The two monkeys. No. 1 and No. 3, were given a number of such
chances to learn acts from seeing me. Other, boxes were used, the
doors of which could be opened by pulling up a bolt, pulling out a plug,
pushing a bar back into a slot, unwinding a wire and pulling a loop
off from a nail. I had also certain pieces of apparatus arranged which
Avould throw a bit of food down a chute into the cage when some
simple mechanisms were operated; when for instance a nail was pulled
out of a hole or a loop pulled off a nail or a bar pushed in. These could
be set up outside the cages so that the monkeys could reach them
through the wire netting and could easily see me operate them.

No. 1 had in all eight chances to learn from seeing me. In seven
of the cases he failed utterly after seeing me operate the mechanisms 21,
5, 10, 4, 15, 40 and 15 times respectively. He did succeed in one case
where the act required was to pull a wire loop off a nail. This must, I
think, have been an accident. The other monkey failed utterly to learn
to do the same thing though he had continued tuition.

No. 3 had seven chances to learn from seeing me. In five out of the
seven he failed after seeing me operate the mechanisms 40, 30, 25, 5 and
30 times respectively. In the case of the other two, although he suc-
ceeded in getting the door open, it was not by doing as I had shown
him. I opened a door 25 times by pulling a bolt up, but he opened it by
pulling and pushing at the door itself until he worked the bolt up out

2 76 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of place. In the other ease I pulled a hook out from a catch but he
yanked at the bar to which the hook was attached and so jerked the
latter free.

It might be that although the monkeys did not succeed after tuition
where they had previously failed, yet they attempted acts which they
had not previously attempted. This is not the case, however. There
were no signs that the monkeys tried more after tuition to do the
things they saw me do than they did before. Their behavior was un-
modified by the tuition save that in general they tried less.

It may be objected that the acts I failed to teach the monkeys were
not consistent with their make-up, that a monlcey might be very intelli-
gent and still not manifest his intelligence by depressing levers, unwind-
ing wires or pulling off loops, that monkeys might be able to learn to do
certain things from seeing them done and still be unable to learn the
particular acts needed in these experiments. But as a matter of fact,
these particular acts were quite natural for the monkeys, quite in accord
with their interests and propensities. They learned by the typical
animal method acts of the same general sort, e. g., to open boxes and
operate the mechanisms throwing food into their cages by pulling bars
around, unliooking hooks and pulling at strings. And often the very
same act with which I tested one monkey in the experiments just
described had been learned by another through the repetition and selec-
tion of a chance success. Thus No. 1 learned of himself to unwind a
wire though No. 3 failed to do so after seeing me do it 30 times.

The systematic experiments designed to detect the presence of abil-
ity to learn from human beings are thus practically unanimous against
it. So too was the general behavior of the monkeys, though I do not
consider the failure of the animals to imitate common human acts as of
much importance save as a rebuke to the story-tellers and casual
observers. The following facts are samples: The door of No. I's cage
was closed by an iron hoop with a slit in it through which a staple
passed, the door being held by a stick of wood thrust through the staple.
No. 1 saw me open the door of his and other cages by taking out sticks
hundreds of times, but though he escaped from his cage a dozen times
in other ways he never took the stick out and to my knowledge never
tried to. I myself and visitors smoked a good deal in the monkeys'
presence but a cigar given to them was always treated like anything
else.

The following is a sample of the tests of the monkey's ability to
learn to do a thing from being made to do it : A box was arranged with
its door held closed by a bar of wood held in position in a slot. When
it was pushed back an inch and a half further into this slot the door
could be opened. It was fastened so that it could not be pulled out
from the slot altogether. The only way to get the door open was

TEE INTELLIGENCE 'OF MONKEYS. 277

thus to push or pull the bar back. It worked very easily, a pressure of
perhaps 15 grams being sufficient. On January 4, 1901, this box was
put in No. I's cage. He failed to get in in 5 minutes, though he was
active in trying to get in for about 4 minutes of the time and pulled
and pushed the bar a gi'cat deal, though up and down and out instead of
back. In his aimless pushings and pullings he nearly succeeded. He
failed in 5 minutes in a second trial also. I then opened the door of
the cage, sat down beside it, held out my hand, and when he came to me
took his right paw and with it (he being held in front of the box)
pushed the bar back (and pulled the door open in those cases when it
did not fall open of itself). He reached in and took the food and
went back to the top of his cage and ate it. I put him through the act
thus 10 times. I then let him try alone. He failed to get in. In this
and the two following days No. 1 was put through the act 80 times and
given frequent opportunities to open the box himself. He never derived
the slightest profit from the tuition.

jSTo. 1 had eight such tests and No. 3 had six. Their behavior was in
some cases ambiguous but the verdict would surely be that they had no
general capacity to acquire these simple habits by seeing and feeling
themselves make the movements and get food thereby.

The theoretical importance of the failure of the monkeys to learn
from example or from being put through movements consists in the
testimony it bears to their lack of a general fund of ideas. Adult
human beings learn to do things by getting ideas of the circumstances
and of the acts required and then proceeding to act upon these ideas.
We think of where we are going, and so go ; we have an idea of what we
wish to do and so do it. Earely if ever do monkeys learn in this way.

The behavior of the monkeys apart from these specific experiments
seemed also to show their inability to acquire and use ideas of objects
or acts. In getting them so that they would let themselves be handled,
it was of almost no service to take them and feed them while holding
them or otherwise make that state pleasant for them. By far the best
way is to wait patiently till they do come near, then feed them; wait
patiently till they do take hold of your arm, then feed them. If you do
take them and hold them partly by force you must feed them only when
they are comparatively still. In short in taming them one comes uncon-
sciously to adopt the method of rewarding certain of their impulses
rather than certain conditions which might be associated in their minds
with ideas, had they such.

Monkey No. 1 apparently enjoyed scratching himself. Among the
stimuli which served to set off this act of scratching was the irritation
from tobacco smoke. If anyone blew smoke in No. I's face he would
blink his eyes and scratch himself, principally in the back. After a
time he got in the habit of coming to the front of his cage when anyone

2 78 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

was smoking and making such movements and sounds as in his experi-
ence had attracted attention and caused the smoker to blow in his face.
He was often given a lighted cigar or cigarette to test him for imitation.
He formed the habit of rubbing it on his back. After doing so he would
scratch himself with great vigor and zest. He came to do this always
when the proper object was given him. I have recounted all this to
show that the monkey enjoyed scratching himself. Yet Jie apparently
never scratched himself except in response to some sensory stimulus.
He did not with all his experiences of scratching ever get the idea of
that act and use it to arouse the delightful act. He was apparently
incapable of thinking 'scratch' and so doing. Yet the act was quite
capable of association with circumstances with which as a matter of
hereditary organization it had no connection. For by taking a certain
well-defined position in front of his cage and feeding him whenever he
did scratch himself I got him to scratch always within a few seconds
after I took that position.

The fact that monkeys do not possess the human type of ideas must
not be taken as evidence that they are no nearer relatives to us mentally
than are the other lower animals. On the contrary they occupy an
intermediate position in every main psychological feature between
mammals in general and the human species.

The essentials in an inventory of an animal's mental capacities are
its sense powers, the kinds of movements it can make and their delicacy,
complexity and number, its instincts or the sum of those tendencies to
feel and act which it has apart from experience or learning, and its
methods of learning or of modifying its behavior to suit the multitudi-
nous circumstances of life. In each of these respects the monkeys show
kinship with man.

In point of sense powers they rely little on smell and much on
vision. They possess the power of clear, detailed vision which is absent,
for instance, in dogs and cats and is so important a possession of man.
A monkey will notice a hair on your hand or a pin six feet off. He
thus resembles man in what has been universally recognized as the most
intellectual of the senses.

In their motor equipment monkeys possess first of all the muscular
coordinations necessary to sustain an upright position and consequently
the free use of the fore-limbs. The movements of these fore-limbs are
more in number and suited to more complex and varied tasks than are
those of lower animals. The attractiveness of the monkey cage in a
zoological garden is largely due to the similarity of the monkeys' move-
ments and our own. The monkey not only has a body like a man's, but
he also uses it like a man.

Our native tendencies are so metamorphosed by the education of a
civilized environment that in adult age they seldom appear in recogniz-

THE INTELLIGENCE OF MONKEYS. 279

able form. But if wc take human beings at from 6 months to 3 years of
iige or later, we find plenty of traits that appear in the monkeys. In
fact the human instinct which is perhaps of prime importance in
human mentality, the instinct which perhaps is the real cause of many
of our most boasted powers, has its clear prototype and homologue in
the monkey. I refer to the instinctive enjoyment of physical and men-
tal activity in general, to the tendencies to act and feel as much as pos-
sible, regardless of any ulterior practical considerations, which we some-
times call destructiveness or constructiveness and curiosity.

Even the casual observer, if he has any psychological insight, will
be struck by the general, aimless, intrinsically valuable (to the animal's
feelings) physical activities of a monkey compared with the specialized,
definitely aroused, utilitarian activities of a dog or cat. Watch
the latter and he does but few things, does them in response to
obvious sense presentations, does them with practical consequences of
food, sex-indulgence, preparation for adult battles, etc. If nothing
that appeals to his special organization comes up, he does nothing.
Watch a monkey and you cannot enumerate the things he does, cannot
discover the stimuli to which he reacts, cannot conceive the raison
d'etre of his pursuits. Everything appeals to him. He likes to be
active for the sake of activity.

The observer who has proper opportunities and takes proper pains
will find this intrinsic interest to hold true of mental activity as well.
No. 1 happened to hit a projecting wire so as to make it vibrate. He
repeated this act hundreds of times in the few days following. He
could not eat, make love to or get preliminary practise for the serious
battles of life out of that sound. But it did give him mental food,
mental exercise. Monkeys seem to enjoy strange places; they revel, if I
may be permitted an anthropomorphism, in novel objects. They like to
have feelings as they do to make movements. The fact of mental life
is to them its own reward.

Finally in their method of learning, although monkeys do not reach
the human stage of a rich life of ideas, yet they carry the animal method
of learning by the selection of impulses and association of them with
different sense impressions, to a point beyond that reached by any other
of the lower animals. In this, too,they resemble man ; for he differs from
the lower animals not only in the possession of a new sort of intelligence
but also in the tremendous extension of that sort which he has in com-
mon with them. A fish learns slowly a few simple habits. Man learns
quickly an infinitude of habits that may be highly complex. Dogs and
cats learn more than the fish, while monkeys learn more than they. In
the number of things he learns, the complex habits he can form, the
variety of lines along which he can learn them, and in their permanence
when once formed, the monkey justifies his inclusion with man in a
separate mental genus.

28o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

COCAINE ANALGESIA OF THE SPINAL COED.

By smith ELY JELLIFFE, M.D., Ph.D.

THEEE are surgeons living to-day who remember the fascination
and horrors of necessary operations, when speed was as great a
requisite as skill to shorten the mortal agony, and when a famous sur-
geon would remove a limb in eleven minutes. There are many who
remember how slowly the boon of chloroform worked its way against
prejudice. To give it to ease the pain of childbirth was not only unsafe,
according to the family doctor, but sacrilegious, according to the
preacher, for did not the Holy Writ say, 'In sorrow shalt thou bring
forth children,' and who of Adam's daughters should presume to
escape the curse? Had it not been for the wit of Dr. Simpson, who
insisted that the Lord performed the first surgical operation under
anaesthesia when He caused Adam to fall into a deep sleep and took a
rib from his side, and the courage of Queen Victoria, who set the
example to the women of her empire by trusting her physician to give
her chloroform at the birth of one of her children, it is quite possible
that the ease from pain of all kinds might have been longer delayed.

Soon after chloroform came ether, the safer anaesthetic, and the
one more frequently used, to produce unconsciousness in pain; and
then cocaine, that peculiar drug that, injected into the tissues, benumbs
the nerves and abolishes sensation of pain, and that gives the last
word of the century on anaesthesia.

When the anaesthetic properties of this alkaloid of coca were dis-
covered, and it had been demonstrated that abscesses could be opened
and slight, but otherwise very painful, operations could be per-
formed without pain, under its influence, it was considered the one
thing necessary to complete the series of anaesthetics. The nerves,
however, quickly recovered from the effects of the drug, and hence
operations had to be accomplished in a comparatively short time.
Until recently, only minor operations of the external parts of the
body could be performed, and cocaine has been classed merely as a
local anaesthetic; but its future has suddenly opened along new and
startling lines in the discovery that when it is injected into the spinal
cord it causes a total loss of sensation to pain below the point of
puncture, so that most elaborate and difficult operations may be carried
on while the patient chats pleasantly with the surgeon and attendants.

This discovery, like so many in medical science, did not flash into
existence like a new star in the firmament, but was the result of

COCAINE ANALGESIA. 281

researches of different men of various nationalities, which finally
culminated in a practical result.

It was to an American, a well-known physician in New York, that
we owe the first suggestion of the idea. Dr. J. Leonard Corning, in
1885, discovered that frogs, those benefactors to the human race on
whom so many of the experiments for the good of man have been
tried, could get the characteristic reaction of strychnine from very
small solutions of the drug if it were injected into the spinal cord.
He then bethought him to try the effect of cocaine; he accordingly
experimented on dogs, injecting the anaesthetic between the superior
processes of the vertebrae, where the numerous minute vessels would
carry it to the cord. After a few minutes the dog lost all sensation in
its hind legs; it could be pinched and pricked and touched with an
electric bn^sh without knowing it, but the same treatment applied to its
fore legs brought forth yelps and howls.

As there were no evil effects seen in the various dogs on which
Dr. Corning experimented, he tried the effect upon one of his
patients who had for some time suffered from spinal weakness; inject-
ing sixty drops of a 3 per cent, solution of cocaine into the tissues
about the spine, between the eleventh and twelfth dorsal vertebrae.
For the space of half an hour the man had absolutely no sensations
of pain in his lower limbs ; electricity and pin pricks were alike unno-
ticed, and Dr. Corning might have amputated a leg had his patient
needed to lose one of those members, and at one stroke have taken
all the fame of the discovery of a new form of anaesthesia; but in
an hour or more the patient arose and walked home, with no unpleas-
ant after-eft'ects, except for a slight headache and dizziness. Dr.
Corning reported on the frog, and dog, and man, to his medical col-
leagues, and threw out a general hint as to the possibility of extending
the usefulness of cocaine in operations; but there the matter dropped.
His experiments were, however, the germ of a new idea.

Some years later, the German investigator, Quincke, devised a
method of puncturing the membrane surrounding the cord, so that
he might draw out a few drops of the spinal fluid, to see whether, in
such a disease as spinal meningitis, for instance, there were any bacteria
present, or whether he could discover any characteristics that would
help to diagnose certain obscure cases of disease by observing the
pressure of the fluid of the spinal cord.

To penetrate to the very marrow of one's backbone would have

seemed, fifteen years ago, to toy with the seat of life. Dr. Corning

did not go nearer than the nerve tissues near the cord; but, once

Quincke had shown that the needle of a hypodermic syringe could be

thrust easily and painlessly and accurately into the space surrounding

the spinal cord, and that a few drops of the cerebro-spinal fluid might
VOL. Lrx. — 18*

282 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

be drawn out, it occurred to Dr. Bier, of Kiel, who was the true
genius of the discovery, that a few drops of a cocaine solution might
be put in, to produce local anaesthesia on a large scale. He worked out
the technique of the injection, operated on conscious patients, and
reported his success. Although the operations and experiments per-
formed by Bier were published and commented on with interest, they
aroused no special excitement beyond a small circle of investigators, and
might have remained merely scientific experiments, had it not been
for the International Medical Congress, which met at the Paris Expo-
sition. The benefit of the interchange of thought of the ablest scien-
tific men of all countries that is offered by these congresses, which have
come into fashion in the last twenty-five years, is incalculable. Every
medical journal in every language tells the physician and surgeon of
something new, but every day's experience teaches him that it is
better to pay attention to the workings of old laws, instead of
trying to apply every new remedy; therefore, it was not surprising
that even so great a discovery should meet tardy recognition, and
should need the dramatic setting of a world exposition to place it
prominently before the medical profession. This it obtained at the
Paris clinics held by M. Tuffier, where, with all nations for eye-wit-
nesses, he performed one operation after another on patients who were
perfectly conscious and yet who were absolutely insensible to pain
below the nipple line. His feats were the talk of the Congress; many
of the most famous surgeons of the world were present and saw
how comparatively simple it was, after first rendering the point of
puncture insensible Avith a little cocaine, to cause the patient to lean
forward, as if scorching on a bicycle, thus straining the vertebrse
slightly apart, when it was easy to insert the hypodermic needle
until the appearance of a few drops of the spinal fluid showed that
the cord had been tapped, and then to attach the syringe and inject
the cocaine solution.

The surgeons soon dispersed to their own parts of the planet,
glorifying the deeds of Tuffier, almost forgetting Bier, who was Tuffier's
authority, and never mentioning Corning, from whom came the
original idea. But the question of homage was insignificant in com-
parison with the test of the idea, and, within a few months, the
members of the Congress had, in their own clinics and practice, co-
cainized the spinal cord for laparotomies, amputations and child-
bearing, with a varying amount of success.

But, in spite of the fact that in some operations the patients
left the operating table with almost no unpleasant sensations, yet in the
majority there was dizziness, nausea and frightful headache, which in
some cases lasted as long as eight days, in spite of everything to bring
relief.

COCAINE ANALGESIA. 283

None of the surgeons who have attempted spinal cocainization
seem to be able to agree upon the smallest quantity that will ensure
anesthesia, and they are between the horns of the dilemma, that too
strong a solution produces violent poisonous effects on the body, and
one too weak gives out before the operation is ended, causing the pre-
dicament in which one surgeon found himself, when the anassthetic
effects wore off when he was half through, and, having opened the
abdomen, he did not dare to permit the patient to sit up and lean over
for a second injection.

In all cases, surgeons feel safer to have chloroform or ether at
hand in chance of failure, and, when all is said, they do not see any
very great advantage in performing the operation under cocaine over
the old method. Moreover, many of them say that there is some-
thing rather uncanny in the feeling that the patient is conscious of
and perhaps watching every stroke of the knife, for, strange to say^
sensations of heat and cold, touch and pressure, are still present, and
only pain is absent. The older surgeons, before the days of any
anaesthetic, mentioned this eerie feeling, and welcomed the patient's
unconsciousness of what was being done to him as much as the patient
did himself. ■ ,v: 1

There is not enough yet known of the structure of that most
wonderful detail of the human organism, the ganglionic nerve cell, to
say what may be the effects of certain drugs upon it. Cocaine cer-
tainly has a sufficiently anaesthetic effect to make it valuable in those
cases where an operation cannot be performed under ether or chloro-
form on account of a weak heart, or tendencies to asthma, kidney dis-
ease, or other complication. Where death would occur either with or
without such an operation, it affords a comparatively safe loophole of
escape; and at present it will perhaps be confined to such cases.

But, though cocaine anaesthesia cannot at present take the place
of the other anaesthetics, it has given a hint of what may be developed ;
experiments will be continued, to render the lumbar puncture perfectly
harmless, to determine the exact amount and strength of cocaine or
any other drug that will produce a definite length of anaesthesia, to
administer it in such a way as to lessen the unpleasant after-effects,
and, if possible, to discover how the upper part of the body may also
be rendered anaesthetic. The ideal, absolutely safe and universally
applicable general anaesthetic is not yet discovered; but unquestionably
a new way has been pointed out, and within a few years the results
of scientific experiment will justify the hope that has sprung up
at this method of cocainizing the spinal cord, the hope that anaes-
thesia is still in its infancy, and that when more is known about the
effect of drugs on the nerve cells, it will be possible to banish pain,
sensation and consciousness at will, and without danger to life.

284 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE EVIDENCE OF SNAILS ON CHANGES OF LAND

AND SEA.

By henry a. PILSBRY, Sc.D.,
philadelphia academy of natural sciences.

TF we wish to learn the history of any land area, we turn to its
-■- geology for a record of changes in the past. The time of its
emergence from ocean, the age of its mountains and the details of its
growth by successive increments of land elevated from the sea, all this
we may expect to learn with reasonable accuracy, besides gaining a
knowledge of the plants and animals which lived from time to time
upon the coasts.

But we may push our inquiry beyond the shore, and ask. Over
this expanse of sea did land once extend ? Did an arm of the land reach
to this island in the old time, or are the islands of that archipelago
but the mountain tops of a sunken continent? To such questions
geology gives no definite answer. In some cases, to be sure fjords
tell their tale of sunken gorges, or soundings give evidence of a sub-
sided coast, with river valleys and former coast-line indicated by sub-
marine topography, as in the continuation of the Hudson Eiver valley
outward from New York Harbor, and the old shore-line, now at the
hundred fathom contour. But these are exceptional cases; and the
ocean bed, blanketed with modern deposits, usually gives but scant
information to the geologist.

For the solution of the questions we must address ourselves to
another and wholly different inquiry: the geographic distribution of
living animals and plants.

To the pre-Darwinian naturalist, the relationships of animals
among themselves and their distribution over the earth's surface were
enigmas, quite insoluble upon the hypothesis of special creation. But
the doctrine of descent, of the blood relationship of all the members of
a genus and family, fills these problems with meaning. If we find that
an island, such as England, has the same species of snails, earth-
worms, reptiles and fresh water Crustacea and fishes as the neighboring
continent, it becomes obvious that there has been a land connection in
the past, for there is no other means by which any extensive fauna of
these animals could have reached an island. If we take another island,
and find that while it has different species from the mainland, yet they
belong to the same genera, we must conclude that there has been actual
land connection here also, though of more ancient date, across which
the ancestors of these transformed species emigrated.

THE EVIDENCE OF SNAILS.

285

It is obvious that animals with feeble powers of travel are of the
greatest value in these researches, because they indicate more ancient
and more enduring changes of sea and land than freely mobile crea-
tures, such as birds and quadrujDeds, which may spread, conditions
favoring, with great rapidity. Moreover, the invertebrates have changed
much more slowly than higher animals; their evolution has been slow.
Almost the whole great drama of mammalian evolution has been acted
during Tertiary time, while there has scarcely been generic change in
the mollusks ! Mammals and birds reflect in their distribution the later
earth movements, the invertebrates and fishes the earlier.

The Helix snails are particularly well adapted to show ancient
faunal relationships, as they occur under one or another form in almost
all lands. But it is only in the present decade that their anatomy has
been understood, and the true relationships of the various groups of
the family recognized. One of the most interesting developments of
the anatomical study of land snails has been the demonstration of a
close relationship existing between Helices of the Philippine Islands
and eastern Asia and those of California, Mexico and the Greater
Antilles.

Years ago Dr. Karl, Semper, in his Travels in the Philippine Archi-
pelago, showed that the arboreal Helices of the Philippines are pro-
vided with a muscular sack containing a calcareous needle — the so-
called ^dart' — and surmounted by a mucous gland, the whole being

\ TYiucoasglondL
clartyiack

1. Dart Apparatus of Epiphragmophora mormonum, a Californian Snail.

2. The Dart, Enlarged. 3. Do. of Chlor^a benguetensis, Phillippines. The Position

OF the Dart in its Sack is shown by Dotted Lines.

an appendage of the reproductive organs. In species of both China
and Japan the same peculiarities are found in these organs. It was
already known that the Helices of Europe have a similar sack and dart,
but the associated mucous gland is split into finger-like tubes and re-
moved from the sack to an adjacent duct. The function of the dart
apparatus is not well understood. The snails thrust their darts into
one another during the mating time, and hence the dart is believed to
be an excitation organ.

VOL. LIX. 19

286

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Now, when the Helices of California, Mexico and a part of those
of the West Indies were examined, it was found that they have the dart
apparatus, agreeing with species of Japan, China and the Philippines,
not with those of Europe or of eastern North America ; for, to empha-
size this resemblance, the Helices of the middle and eastern United
States are anatomically totally unlike the Californian, Mexican and
Antillean, having no dart-sack or mucous gland.

We are, therefore, confronted with a group of snails inhabiting
both borders of the greatest ocean, but agreeing so closely in anatomy
that no hypothesis but that of a common origin, descent from com-
mon ancestors, is conceivable. Our American dart-bearing Helices
must surely look to distant shores in far-off times for their ancestry.

In the South the Oriental and Occidental members of the great
group of dart-bearers are separated by the breadth of the Pacific,
the islands of which are barren of related snails. In the North they
are parted by many miles of barren coast; for in America the dart-
bearers go no further north than Sitka, and in Asia they are not
known much to the northward of the Japanese Empire.

Map showing distribution of Dart-bearing Helices in Vertical Lines. Cretaceous
Sea in Broken Horizontal Lines. Being on Mercator's Projection, the North-
ern Ranges of the Dart-bearers in America and Asia appear much

MORE separated THAN THEY REALLY ARE.

We know, however, that in Upper Cretaceous times the Arctic
lands were not, as now, clad in the scanty green of mosses, lichens
and herbs, with few deciduous trees, except stunted willows and the
like, but they bore noble forests of magnolia, beech and birch, with
red-woods and pines — such forests as snails love and thrive in, doubtless

THE EVIDENCE OF SNAILS. 287

with abundance of sheltering windfalls and rotting boles to give them
refuge, and decaying leaves to feed the fungi and tender herbage, which
are the food of snails.

It is not unlikely, then, that, in the distant past, when a kinder
climate allowed the forests of the temperate zone to extend to the
Arctic shores in Alaska and Siberia, the snails went with them; and,
if we assume a very moderate elevation in the region of Bering Strait,
connecting Alaska and Asia by a land bridge, there would be no bar
whatever to the spread of forest trees and the emigration of snails
from one continent to the other.

The distribution southward of the snails and other inhabitants of
the forest would be merely a question of time in the absence of
barriers in the form of lofty mountains, deserts or arms of the sea,
running across their path.

There are good reasons for believing that the dart-bearing snails
originated in the Orient, and, if so, their migration was eastward
to America. In all probability, the slowly upbuilding land mass in
western America had none of the higher land snails before the advent
of the Asiatic snails in the later Cretaceous, as it was profoundly
isolated in earlier mesozoic and preceding time, so far as existing geo-
logical data show. On reaching America, the snails spread south-
ward. Why, then, it may be asked, do we not have the descendants of
the Asiatic dart-bearers in eastern North America? There are several
reasons. During the Cretaceous period an inland sea extended from
the Gulf of Mexico, through the Dakotas and northward to the Arctic
Ocean, in the neighborhood of the Mackenzie Eiver.* This would pre-
vent the eastward spread of the snail emigrants from Asia. Since that
time, the increasing height of the Rocky Mountains, and the arid condi-
tions of much of the mountain region, with its poverty in deciduous
trees, would be, and is to-day, an effectual bar to the eastward dis-
tribution of the Pacific slope snails.

In the Far West, however, no barriers prevented the southward
spread of the dart-bearing Helices. They pushed south to Mexico,
and, perhaps later, to the Andean region of South America. Ther^
was also undoubtedly a land bridge connecting an Antillean continent
or archipelago with Central America, over which the dart-bearers
passed to the Antilles. This connection is shown by many other
groups of land snails also, the distribution of which can be explained
in no other manner.

* Dawson maps the Cretaceous inland sea as extending to the Arctic Ocean.
During the earlier Cretaceous it also reached the Pacific, though an archipelago
probably extended north to Alaska ; but in the Laramie there was a broad
belt of land to the westward of the Cretaceous sea or lakes. See map, which
represents the probable extent of the sea at the beginning of the Laramie.

2 88 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The Helices of the West Indies lend no aid to those who advocate
the hypothesis of an 'Atlantis' bridging or partially bridging the
Atlantic, for they are not allied to species of Madeira, the Azores, Cape
Verde or Canary Islands. Their anatomy is vastly nearer Mexican,
Californian and East Asiatic groups.

N"o generalization based upon the distribution of snails, or of any
one group of animals, can be satisfactory unless it is supported by the
evidence of animals of other groups, and by that of plants. In extend-
ing the data relative to the zoogeography of America and Asia, it may
be said that the evidence of the naked snails or slugs fully supports
that of the Helices. The West American slugs have their cousins in
China and the Himalayas, not in eastern Xorth America. The fresh-
water crayfish of our Pacific slope belong to the Old World genus
Astacus, not to the East American genus Canibarus. The evidence of
fishes seems to strongly favor a former connection of Asia and
America. Thus. Gunther* deduces a Central Asian origin for the

'^^^'r

Dart-Bearing Helices. Upper Figures Two Species of Eulota from Japan; Lower
Figures Epiphragmophora fAom California.

Cyprinoids, or Carp family, which is also very numerously represented
in America. Moreover, he regards the Chinese species of Catostomus,
or 'sucker,' as a return emigrant from America to Asia. The North
American catfishes belong to an East Asian group of the family; and
our garpike has a representative in Chinese waters.

Such evidence as the higher vertebrates afford do not strengthen
the case stated for the snails, because their evolution has been vastly
more recent and rapid, and their means of distribution are far less
restricted. Thus the horses have attained their present distribution
since the Pliocene, but they are capable of spreading rapidly wherever

* The Study of Fishes, p. 244.

TEE EVIDENCE OF SNAILS. 289

pasturage is to be found. The wide range of such groups as this, and
the birds, is limited only by markedly unfavorable physical conditions,
and their presence in both the Old and New Worlds merely indicates
that up to quite recent times there has been a land bridge over Bering
Strait.

The identical species of plants in Japan and the United States,
elaborately discussed by Dr. Asa Gray, are also, in many cases, it would
seem, comparatively recent emigrants into one continent or the other,
not old enough to have become changed by new surroundings; or
they are plants which lived in the Tertiary forests of Greenland and
British America, which Heer and others have made known. Through
stress of climate, this circumboreal flora has been driven southward,
many of its species to be changed by the vicissitudes of the march,
while others still flourish unchanged in the two continents.

290 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

THE BLUE HILL METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATORY.

By frank WALDO.

nVyTETEOROLOGY becaine established on an independent basis
-^*-«- about fifty years ago. With the beginning of a systematic study
of the atmospheric conditions there arose a demand for more frequent
observations than could be made directly, and, as a result, self-regis-
tering meteorological instruments came into use. It was speedily found
that the exceedingly sensitive and complicated apparatus necessary for
furnishing accurate records of the atmospheric conditions required the
services of thoroughly trained and skilful persons in its manipulation.
N'ot only this, but proper exposure of the instruments and careful
reduction of their records were necessary. In other words, the generally
recognized requirements of a good astronomical observatory must be
fulfilled in carrying on the work of a meteorological observatory.

It had long been supposed (and unfortunately is still by many) that
any one is competent to make meteorological observations who is able
to read a barometer scale or hold a measuring stick in a rainfall basin.
The importance of having the instruments automatically record their
indications became very generally recognized, if we may judge by the
number of self-registering instruments constructed and set in opera-
tion, although the considerable cost prevented their general introduc-
tion. Then it was that the need for this work of well-trained observers
began to be felt. Where meteorology was associated with one of the
older physical sciences, such as astronomy, the necessary care was given
to the meteorograph; but in most cases, after a brief and generally
unsatisfactory trial, the self-recording instruments were kept going in
only a perfunctory manner or alloM^ed to fall entirely into disuse.
While the necessity for meteorological observations continued, and con-
tinuous records became more and more imperatively demanded, yet it
was not until the true conditions were fully realized and meteorological
observatories comparable with those devoted to astronomical research
were built, equipped and manned, that anything like satisfactory atmos-
pheric observations were obtained. Nor was it longer deemed sufficient
only to keep up the observation of the meteorological elements; the
fact was emphasized that the results must be properly worked up and
put into such a form as would best serve the purposes for which they
were desired.

Observatories of various degrees of excellence and fitness were estab-
lished at a number of places, but it was reserved for Professor Heinrich

THE BLUE HILL OBSERVATORY. 291

Wild, then director of the Russian Meteorological Service (but now of
Zurich), to set us a pattern of what a meteorological observatory should
be, in the Pawlowsk Observatory near St. Petersburg.

It has been found by experience that the services of three thoroughly
trained and skilled persons are necessary to properly conduct a meteoro-
logical observatory. It is the verbal testimony of Dr. Wild that it is
better to do entirely without the records of self-registering instruments
than to have the records made under the care of untrained and incom-
petent persons.

A. Lawkenxe Rotch.

In the United States there long existed an apparent indifference to
the demand for numerous continuous atmosjDheric records, the winds
alone receiving the merited attention (except in an experimental way)
from our Signal Service organization. A single exception to this
indifference was the Central Park Observatory, which was operating
unobtrusively along the right lines, but after the stereotyped manner of
the older European observatories. For the rest we were mainly content
with the observations made at fixed intervals during the day.

292 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Such was the condition of observational meteorology in America at
the time when Mr. A. Lawrence Eotch conceived the idea of establishing
a meteorological observatory on the Great Blue Hill, near Boston. At
first Mr. Kotch intended to use this observatory for special investiga-
tions, leaving the regular work to Signal Service observers. As no plan
of cooperation with the Signal Service was found feasible, he deter-
mined to carry on the entire work under his own direction and at his
own expense.

Mr. Eotch was particularly fortunate in his choice of a site for his
observatory. Although the summit of the Great Blue Hill is but 635
feet above sea level, yet it possesses many of the characteristics of a
mountain. It is the highest point of land in eastern Massachusetts, and
offers an unobstructed view for many miles in all directions. This
feature has been particularly valuable in prosecuting cloud studies.

The Valley Station ok Blue Hill Observatory.

The location is so near the coast that the characteristic water and land
influences on the atmospheric conditions can be perceived. Moreover
the summit of the hill is near that critical altitude at which the diurnal
variation of the wind changes from the low level type to the high alti-
tude type. We had meteorological records from the Signal Sei'vice sta-
tions on Mt. Washington (altitude about 0,000 feet) and on Pikes Peak
(altitude about 14,000 feet), but we had none from the lower altitude
at which the powerful local influence of the ground surface ceases to
be overpoweringly effective. Thus this observatory fitted into a vacancy
which it was desirable to fill. Nor is this all. The wonderful success
attending the recent extension of the work of the observatory to the
exploration of the upper air by means of- kites has been in no small
part due to the perfect adaptation of this locality for carrying on such

TEE BLUE HILL OBSERVATORY.

293

work. As regards location, the Blue Hill Observatory thus occupies a
unique position among the meteorological observatories of the world.

Two secondary stations, at altitudes above the sea of 50 and 200
feet, respectively, at the base of Blue Hill bear the same relation to the
main observatory that the base stations bear to the higher ones in the
most completely planned European mountain observatory systems;
while the Weather Bureau station at Boston and the neighboring
Harvard Observatory meteorological station offer the advantages of
representing the adjacent country.

Just as Dr. Wild set a pattern for Europeans to copy, so Mr. Eotch
has given the United States a model observatory which it will be no
mistake to use as a pattern in the future development of observational
meteorology in this country. It seems to me that every possible precau-

O

The Station for Cloud Measurements in Valley, 1896-1897.

tion has been taken in the placing of the apparatus and in its conven-
ient manipulation. The instruments and apparatus are of good con-
struction and well adapted to the work required. The personnel of
the staff could not be improved ; certainly not in this country and prob-
ably not abroad. The true scientific spirit prevails at the observatorj^
and I have found there the same distinctive atmosphere which marks
the Eussian observatory at Pawlowsk. There can. be no doubt but that
the Blue Hill Observatory is the most successfully conducted meteoro-
logical observatory in America, and its work will compare favorably
with that of European observatories of the highest class.

Some may wonder how it was possible for this observatory to have
such a good start, reach such a high state of development within a brief
space of time, and avoid those errors of organization and management

2 94

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

into which much more ambitious institutions had fallen. The reason is
very plain to those who are familiar with Mr. Eotch's numerous visits
to the best of the European central and mountain observatories. The
care that he has taken to inform himself thoroughly in regard to their
equipment, work and general effectiveness is clearly reflected in his
printed descriptions of these institutions. By this means the youthful
tlirector of this new American observatory was enabled to take wliat
might be termed a 'short cut' to leadership in our observational
meteorology.

The regular work of the Blue Hill Observatory is carried on by Mr.
Eotch with the assistance of Mr. H. H. Clayton, meteorologist, Mr.

: ^

The Pole Star recorder for Registered
Cloudiness at Night.

First Thermograph Lifted by a Kite Em-
ployed IN 1894

S. P. Fergusson, mechanician, and Mr. A. E. Sweetland, observer. Not
only did Mr. Eotch show excellent judgment in selecting a locality for
his observatory, but he has shown equally good judgment in the choice
of problems for investigation; he has taken up just those questions con-
cerning which we have been sadly in need of numerical data, and to
which every contribution is of distinct value. Moreover Mr. Eotch was
exceedingly fortunate in his selection of capable co-workers, for they
have responded in a notable manner to the demands which their
science has made on them.

THE BLUE HILL OBSERVATORY.

295

The investigations nndertaken at the observatory may be divided
into three classes: (1) The routine work of making observations of the
local atmospheric conditions both by automatic registration and direct
observation; and the reduction and publication of results. (2) The
exploration of upper air by means of kites, and (3) Special studies of
important topics by the observatory staff and visiting scientists.

The Blue Hill Observatory was established in 1885. Its report for
188G shows the institution still in its formation period. The annual
report for 1887, when it began to appear regularly in the 'Annals of
the Harvard College Observatory/ is almost complete, lacking only the
hourly values of the relative humidity of the atmosphere, but more
than making up for this by the very complete hourly record of cloud
observations (from 7 a. m. to 11 p. m.). In the report for 1888 all

KITE METEOROGRAPH,

BLUE HILL METEOROLOGICAL OBSER V 'TOR v, _ _

Record of a Kite Meteoeograph.

the usual meteorological elements are given; but thereafter hourly
values of the precipitation and cloud observations alone are given, the
other elements being recorded only in summary. The reason for this
long backward step, for it certainly is such, was probably the desire to
economize the time required for reducing the observations and the cost
of printing, although it may have been thought that the publication of
the hourly observations in extenso during two or three years was suffi-
cient. This latter is not the case, however, for what we most lack in the
study of the air conditions in this country is reliable hourly observa-
tions conveniently accessible through print. It is especially desirable
to have these records when they are as carefully made as those at the
Blue Hill Observatory. It must be remarked, however, that the proper
reduction of automatic records is a very laborious task.

296

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Starting a Kite Flight on Blue Hill.

1

Kite Meteorograph in Aik

TEE BLUE HILL OBSERVATORY. 297

The successive years of continuous or hourly observations have per-
mitted the determination of the diurnal and annual periods of the chief
meteorological elements at the Blue Hill Observatory, summaries of
which for several years' averages have been published. The main inter-
est in these results centers in the air movements. The constancy of
the local amount of wind from hour to hour has been found to be
remarkable, and this, in connection with the variability in the hours
of maximum and minimum wind, indicates the nearness to the transi-
tion altitude where the lower air conditions change to those of the upper
air. These observations of wind velocity, coming in as they do at an
intervening altitude between those of the ordinary high exposed surface
station and the more elevated mountain stations, permitted the dis-
covery of the gradual shifting towards noon of the hour of minimum
diurnal wind velocity, with the gradual increase in altitude. Thus the
least wind occurs at Boston at 5 a. m., at Blue Hill at 8 a. m., on the
Eiffel Tower at 10 a. m. and shortly after noon on Mt. Washington and
other similar high altitudes.

Much of the well-earned reputation of the Blue Hill Observatory
depends on the special investigations which have been conducted by its
scientific staff. Some of these are the natural concomitants of the
peculiar location of the observatory, while others have been taken up
on account of their intrinsic importance to meteorological science ; still
others combine these two features.

Among the questions taken up for the former reason, the following
deserve special mention: The investigation of the normal differences
of temperature between the base and the summit of the hill, and
between the latter and the neighboring Weather Bureau station in Bos-
ton ; the investigation of the marked inversions of temperature between
the base and the summit stations; experiments on the electrical condi-
tion of the atmosphere; and studies of the vertical component of the
wind as measured at the observatory.

The Blue Hill series of observations of visibility of more or less
distant hills and mountains is very important, although the positive
deductions as yet made from the data assembled in regard to this
phenomenon are very meager. In general, however, it was found that
the summer haze about balanced the winter fogs, so that an annual
periodicity is but slightly marked. The diurnal period is also not
clearly pronounced.

The location of the Blue Hill Observatory also made it a very desir-
able place at which to undertake open air experiments on the absolute
and relative accuracy of anemometers. These were very much needed
in view of the fact that the old errors of observed wind velocities could
no longer be neglected when the comparatively recent quantitative study
of the winds was widely taken up; and since much of the investiga-

298

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Modified Hargrave Kite.

Feruusson's Kite Meteukograpji.

THE BLUE HILL OBSERVATORY. 299

tion designed to remedy this defect has been performed under artificial
indoor conditions. These Blue Hill investigations showed plainly the
necessity for greater uniformity in anemometers both as regards shape
and size. The fan or bladed anemometers, with the use of ball bearings,
seem to have many advantages over the ordinary cup anemometers now
so generally used. There was found to be still much room for improve-
ment in the pressure wind gauges, as those at present in use are not
thoroughly satisfactory. The pressure tube anemometers, upon which
many hopes have been built, showed need of some further modifications
before it will be perfectly adapted to all conditions of wind and
weather. Concerning the standardizing and testing of anemometers
under artificial conditions, the opinion is advanced that a current of air
produced by a blower is more likely to give absolute results than the
whirling machine at present in use.

Among the important general meteorological questions taken up
are the following: (1) The investigation of the temperature indica-
tions of thermometers placed in different kinds of thermometer shelters
or screens. (2) The study of special phenomena exhibited by the
records of self -registering meteorological instruments; such, for
instance, as the dynamic effect of the wind on barograph records. (3)
The study of weather predictions, from both the central and local
points of view, and the demonstration that the combination of the two
methods gave the best results. (4) The study of sudden falls of tem-
perature and their relation to general atmospheric conditions. (5)
The study of wave-like oscillations shown in the records of barometric
pressures. (6) Studies concerning the periodicity of the weather. (7)
The discussion of cloud observations, especially those made at the Blue
Hill Observatory. (8) The improvement of meteorological apparatus,
especially in the self-registering devices, and adapting the existing
instruments to special needs. (9) The study of special cloud forms.
(10) Cooperative study of clouds during the International '^Cloud
year.'

That the movements of the atmosphere follow on certain laws we
all recognize. Some of these laws we know, others remain still to be
discovered. No work of the Blue Hill Observatory has exceeded in
importance its studies of the actually observed movements of the air,
and the so-called dynamic changes which these movements cause the air
to undergo. In nearly every phase of this many-sided question this
observatory has increased our stock of knowledge.

The study of the upper atmosphere was early begun by the staff
of the Blue Hill Observatory, At first it was mainly carried on by
means of cloud observations, but since 1894 by means of registering
meteorological instruments carried aloft by kites. To this observatory
belongs the honor of thus sending up into the air the first continuously

lOO

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

recording meteorological instruments used in this manner. Mr. Eddy,
of New Jersey, used his kites in making this first trial. The work has
been pushed with such success that records of atmospheric pressure,
temperature, relative luimidity and wind velocity have been secured by
means of kites up to a height of 15,800 feet above the sea.

In a pioneer work of this kind, it was found necessary not only to
modify old apparatus and methods so as to fit the novel applications,
but also to devise new ones as well; and many of the details of the sys-
tem as established at Blue Hill have been copied by meteorologists in
the prosecution of similar researches both in this country and in
Europe.

In this connection the Blue Hill studies of the clouds have led to
the consideration of many problems to which these phenomena either
directly or indirectly furnish a key. As in other studies carried on
there, this work has been undertaken in the light of what has been done
by other investigators; and in Mr. Clayton's report on the subject an
excellent summary of what has already been accomplished introduces
us to the more distinctively Blue Hill work. It has too frequently hap-

EVOLUTION OF THE KlTi-: REEL.

pened that the cloud work which has been done in different parts of
the world has had its value much decreased owing to uncertainties in
cloud nomenclature, and much of the recognized value of the Blue
Hill work is to be attributed to the great care exercised in this prelimi-
nary matter. A valuable contribution has been made to the revision
of cloud nomenclature, taking into account the elevations of the clouds.
The annual and diurnal periodicity of clouds has been carefully studied
on the basis of cloudiness at different levels.

TEE BLUE HILL OBSERVATORY. 301

In the study of the relation of clouds to rainfall are taken up : clouds
preceding rain, clouds between intervals of rain and clouds following
rain. The methods and cause of cloud formation were also carefully
considered. The most important part of this special investigation is
the use to which the cloud observations are put in the study of atmos-
pheric dynamics, taking up in succession the questions: the relation
of clouds to cyclones and anti-cyclones, having regard to the altitudes
of the cloud levels; the annual and diurnal periods in the winds in
general, at various levels as shown by direct observation near the ground
and extended upwards to high altitudes by means of the observed cloud
movements; the wind movements in cyclones and anti-cyclones from
the ground up to the altitude of the highest clouds ; the relation of the
direction of the cirrus clouds to the existing tem.perature gradient ; the
relation between the velocity of storms, and the consequent variability
of the w^eather, to the general movement of the atmosphere as shown
by surface wind and cloud observations; the use of cloud observations
in weather forecasts; and the frequency of winds from various direc-
tions at different heights above the ground, for different hours of the
day, shown by wind and cloud observations.

The work of making observations of the atmospheric conditions in
the free air by means of kites has been carried out with the success
achieved only by the persistent endeavors of the observatory staff, not
only in overcoming the difficulties in the mechanical construction of
the apparatus employed, but also in the actual work of kite flying.

Experiments were undertaken as to the best forms of kites to use,
the best materials for their construction, and the best lines to use for
flying them. Special forms of self-recording meteorological instru-
ments had to be so designed or so changed as to be adapted to the
demands of kite work. Great care was exercised in so exposing the
instruments that their possible errors would be reduced to a minimum.
During the year 1897 there were thirty-eight successful kite flights,
in 1898 thirty-five, in 1899 twenty-five, and in 1900 twenty- four; the
average height above sea level at which records were obtained during
the respective years being 7,350 feet, 7,400 feet and 8,450 feet, thus
showing constant improvement in the methods employed.

The discussion of the Blue Hill observations has added very materi-
ally to our still meager knowledge of the distribution of the meteoro-
logical elements in the free air, and their variation with change in alti-
tude. The average increase of wind velocities with increasing altitude
was determined chiefly for those altitudes for which we have the fewest
data because it is so difficult to make measurements there by means of
the clouds. The change in direction of air currents at different levels
was also clearly and accurately brought out by the changes in position
of the kites as they ascended and descended. Such data as these are

VOL. LIX. — 20

302 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

particularly valuable for determining the effects of the friction of the
ground on the winds, and for testing quantitatively the theories of the
air circulation which have heretofore depended mainly on qualitative
generalities.

The decrease (and in the abnormal cases, the increase) in tempera-
ture with height above the ground has been carefully studied, and
especially in the various phases which occur under different typical
atmospheric conditions. The diurnal changes of temperature at differ-
ent altitudes have been also carefully studied. The determination of
the numerical values of these elements is very important in helping
to complete the theories of the atmospheric circulation, solar insola-
tion, and the transference of heat from the earth to the air.

The rate of change of relative humidity with change of altitude,
due to vertical change of temperature, is very important in connection
with the calculation of the heights of clouds by computing the altitude
of the dew point temperature under known conditions near the ground ;
and the Blue Hill observations not only offer data for increasing the
accuracy of these calculations, but also a criterion for testing their abso-
lute accuracy.

Until 1886 the only weather map in the United States was printed
at the Chief Signal Office in Washington, but in May of that year Mr.
Eotch with the assistance of Mr. Cole, the government observer in Bos-
ton, began to chart the 7 a. m. reports that were received there, and
manifolded the map by the cyclostyle process. This was the origin of
the daily weather map that is now issued in great numbers from many
of the Weather Bureau Stations throughout the United States.

From 1887 until 1891 local weather forecasts were furnished by the
Blue Hill Observatory to the Boston press and announced from the
observatory by the display of weather signals. These weather predic-
tions were undoubtedly a considerable improvement over those made in
Washington, which depended on the weather map alone, especially for
the twenty-four hours immediately succeeding the time of observation,
and the demonstration of this, in direct competition with the Weather
Bureau predictions, probably had some effect in causing the government
service to appoint local forecast officials to supplement the general
predictions made at Washington. It must be borne in mind in this
connection, that this combined method of making weather predictions
has been, in a measure, practically carried out in European countries
ever since an international telegraphic exchange of weather observa-
tions went into effect. In this country, however, we had learned to rely
too much on the general predictions issued from Washington.

There can be no doubt that the work of the Blue Hill Observatory
has had a very great quickening influence in the recent developments
in observational meteorology in this country. Not only has its thor-

THE BLUE HILL OBSERVATORY. 303

oughly independent attitude and scientific spirit enabled it to make
usefulness and not policy its watchword, but it has also permitted it
to improve the older traditions of American meteorology, by adding to
them the best features of European meteorology.

So far as concerns the regular routine work of observation of the
purely local atmospheric conditions made at the Blue Hill Observatory,
it is impossible to realize its importance to American meteorology under
the light of present conditions alone. One must go back twenty years
to the conditions existing in the early eighties to properly appreciate its
innovating character. Concerning the extra routine work, such as the
studies of the upper air conditions and their application to atmospheric
mechanics, no comment seems necessary further than to mention the
fact that this work occupies a prominent position in the front line of
scientific advance in this direction. We have had a recent example of
this in the discoveries attending Mr. Clayton's studies of eclipse
meteorology, in which important extensions of Ferrels' cold centered
cyclone have in all likelihood been made which will greatly aid in the
solution of some hitherto unexplained meteorological problems.

The importance attached by scientists to the work of the Blue Hill
Observatory is plainly indicated by the numerous long and appreciative
reviews and notices of this work which have appeared in such general
scientific journals as 'Nature' and 'Science,' and such special journals as
the 'Meteorologische Zeitschrift' and the 'American Meteorological
Journal.' Probably not one of the long list of reports and other pub-
lications of the observatory has been passed by without printed com-
ment, and frequently a single paper has called forth several reviews.
Moreover the confidence with which this work has been received is
shown by the fact that the results have been freely used by subsequent
investigators.

It is a noteworthy fact that by taking the initiative in the
systematic sounding or exploration of the upper air by means of kites,
the Blue Hill Observatory has added one more feature to the already
long list of American pioneer contributions to meteorology, among
which may be mentioned, Loomis' storm and weather maps, Espy's
dynamical theories, Ferrels' theories of the atmospheric circulation,
and the more complete extension of the application of weather knowl-
edge to practical affairs by the Signal Service and Weather Bureau.

The official publications of the observatory are: the earlier annual
reports published separately and the later ones published since 1887
in the 'Annals of the Observatory of Harvard College,' special memoirs
and discussions forming an important feature of these reports ; monthly
and annual summaries of the climatic observations, which were mani-
folded and distributed locally up to 1896, and some of which the
'U. S. Monthly Weather Eeview' and the monthly report of the New

304 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

England section still publish; occasional Bulletins containing original
memoirs that it was desired to publish promptly, on special meteoro-
logical topics.

In addition to the preparation of these official reports, the members
of the observatory stafE have published a great number of letters, arti-
cles, and reports in the journals of general and technical science
both in Europe and America. This individually published material
has always been of that high character which bears internal evidence of
the earnestness and ability of the authors, and it has always received
from scientists both at home and abroad the careful consideration
due it.

The high character of the work undertaken and the great amount
accomplished by steady application during the fifteen years of its con-
tinuance have given the Blue Hill Observatory a position among the
best observatories of the world. There are certainly very few even of
the great national meteorological observatories which are better known
or are held in higher esteem than the private observatory established
and maintained by Mr. Eotch on the highest summit of the Blue Hills
of Milton.

In closing this article I venture to express the opinion that when the
history of meteorology during the latter part of the nineteenth cen-
tury is written, the Blue Hill Observatory will be assigned the fore-
most place in American observational meteorology, and this judgment
will be based not only on the observations which have been made, but
also on their proper discussion and correlation with allied branches of
this science of the atmosphere.

TEE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION. 305

THE AMEEICAN ASSOCIATION" FOE THE ADVANCEMENT

OF SCIENCE.*

A NATIONAL association for the advancement of science occupies
-^-^ at the beginning of the twentieth century a dominant position.
The greatest achievement of the nineteenth century v^as the progress
of science; its most definite tendency was towards the voluntary
organization of individuals for the accomplishment of certain ends.
The advance of science, the movement that is of the greatest impor-
tance for civilization, requires for its guidance the strongest association
of individuals. Such an association will certainly arise, and will
develop from existing institutions.

The organization of science in America has progressed parallel to
the advance of science. Local societies concerned with the whole field
of knowledge, and especially with its utilitarian aspects, were first
established in Philadelphia, in Boston and in other cities. These
societies were modeled on the similar institutions of Europe ; the Philo-
sophical Society of Philadelphia following the Eoyal Society of London,
and the Academy of Arts and Sciences of Boston, the Paris Academy
of Sciences. As centers of scientific activity increased in number, as
the postoffice and railways developed, as general scientific journals
were established — 'The American Journal of Science' began publication
in 1818 — the need of a national organization was felt, and here again
the older nations had established the precedent. The meetings of Ger-
man scientific men and physicians began in 1828, and the British Asso-
ciation for the Advancement of Science was established in 1831. An
Association of American Geologists and Naturalists was organized in
1840, and became the American Association for the Advancement of
Science in 1848.

Fifty years ago the sciences were comparatively undifferentiated.
Special societies and special journals were not required. It was pos-

* We reproduce this article from advance sheets of 'Science,' as all our
readers will be glad to have brought to their attention the question of the
organization of science in America. The American Association for the Ad-
vancement of Science meets this year in Denver, further to the west than ever
before, and its influence and membership should be greatly increased in the
states west of the Mississippi River. Nothing is more gratifying to the con-
ductors of this Journal than its large circulation in the middle and western
states, and we hope that many of those who read this article will become mem-
bers of the American Association. The conditions of membership can be
obtained from the permanent secretary. Dr. L. O. Howard, Cosmos Club,
Washington, D. C. — Editor.

3o6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

sible for students of science and friends of science to meet together
and take a eonunon and intelligent interest in the scientific progress
of the day. Somewhat later, however, the need became apparent for
a more select national society. The local academies in the European
capitals had become national institutions in a way that was not possible
for the similar societies in the United States, owing to the lack of
centralization. Our National Academy of Sciences was organized in
1863 with a membership at first limited to fifty, and still under one
hundred. The Academy was intended to be the adviser of the Govern-
ment in scientific matters, and has to a certain extent fulfilled this
function. At first, when there were but few scientific men in the
United States and their interests were more or less common, the
National Academy was an organization fitted to its environment. But
it has scarcely adjusted itself to the growth and specialization in
science of the past twenty-five years.

The organization of science that was adequate for the third
quarter of the century did not suffice for the fourth quarter. About
twenty-five years ago it became necessary to meet the specialization
becoming inevitable for scientific advance. Special societies and
special journals were organized. The American Society of Naturalists,
organized in 1883, and the 'American Naturalist,' established in 1867,
covered a limited, but still wide field. 'Science,' a weekly journal,
was established in 1883 to keep the sciences in touch with each other
and men of science in touch with the general public. The American
Chemical Society was organized in 1876, The American Ornithologists'
Union in 1883, The Geological Society of America and the present
American Mathematical Society in 1888, and there are now national
societies for almost every science. Special journals were established
during the same period — 'The Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club'
(1870), 'The Botanical Gazette' (1876), 'The American Journal of
Mathematics' (1878), 'The American Chemical Journal' (1887), 'The
American Journal of Morphology' (1887), 'The American Journal of
Psychology (1887), 'The American Geologist' (1888), 'The National
Geographic Magazine' (1888), 'The American Anthropologist' (1888)
and so on, in increasing numbers, to the present time. A similar
movement toward specialization is evident in the development of
elective courses in our colleges, of advanced work in our universities,
and in many other directions.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science did not
fail to adjust its organization to the growth and differentiation of
science. In 1875 a formal division was made into two sections, one for
the exact and one for the natural sciences, and in 1883 nine sections
were established. At this time, when the Association had fitted itself
to existing conditions, it enjoyed a most prosperous period in its his-

THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION. 307

tory, the meetings being large and fruitful. Thus the attendance at
Boston in 1880 was 997; at Montreal in 1882 it was 937, and at Phila-
delphia in 1884 it was 1,261. But with the organization and growth
of the special societies and journals referred to above, the Association
did not maintain its commanding position. The American Society of
Naturalists, with a more compact membership, chose midwinter as its
time of meeting, and other societies became affiliated with it. The spe-
cial societies, consisting of groups of experts, appealed to the loyalty of
their members more directly than did the larger and more amorphous
Association. There was even lack of sympathy between these societies
and the Association. The attendance at the meetings became smaller,
and the total membership decreased. The more eminent men of science
and the younger workers were not regularly in attendance at the meet-
ings and were perhaps not even members of the Association. The pro-
grams of the sections became heterogeneous and sometimes did not
reach a very high standard. The amateur and picnic elements were
rather prominent, while at the same time they were mediocre. Many
men of science regarded the Association as a survival that had outlived
its usefulness.

But to-day no one acquainted with the most recent work of the
Association will deny that it has entered on a new period of its history.
This began with a change of attitude toward the special societies,
replacing rivalry with cooperation. There was much opposition to the
plan of letting the American Chemical Society meet in affiliation with
the Association, but when this was accomplished chemistry at once
became its strongest section. So it has been in other cases, where spe-
cial societies have met in affiliation with the Association. At
the recent New York meeting there were sixteen such societies
including practically all national societies that hold summer meet-
ings. Other improvements in the organization of the Association
have been effected. The council has been strengthened and made a
truly legislative and executive body. The permanent funds have been
increased, and appropriations for research have been granted to com-
mittees. Care has been exercised in the election of fellows, and in
the admission of titles to the programs. 'Science' is sent free of
charge to all members, thus increasing and consolidating interest in
the Association and in the advancement of science, giving even those
unable to attend the annual meetings an adequate return for member-
ship, and tending to unite all men of science and those interested in
science in the Association and in the ends that it represents. The
last three meetings, held at Boston, Columbus and New York, were all
excellent, representing different types adjusted to the occasion and
place. The meeting at Denver this year will be equally typical and
equally successful. The membership of the Association is now larger

.3o8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

than it ever was before, over eight hundred new members having been
■elected within the past year.

There is every reason for satisfaction at the present condition and
outlook of the Association. But this does not mean that we need not
be on the alert to increase its usefulness under the circumstances con-
fronting us at the beginning of the twentieth century. Evolution
occurs by natural selection, but with boundless waste, regardless of
time and careless of the individual. Human development must hence-
forth be guided by forethought and reason. It is the object of this
article to make some definite suggestions regarding the organization of
science in America under the auspices of the Association. They have
been carefully considered by some of those most interested in the
Association and, though they may not meet with universal approval,
they are thought to be worth careful consideration.

The objects of the Association are said in its constitution to be "by
periodical and migratory meetings, to promote intercourse between
those who are cultivating science in different parts of America, to give
a stronger and more general impulse and more systematic direction
to scientific research, and to procure for the labors of scientific men,
increased facilities and a wider usefulness." This statement may be
somewhat systematized and amplified. The legitimate objects of the
Association may be said to be (1) the presentation and discussion of
research work in the different sciences and the publication of such
research. (2) The promotion of research by grants of money and by
providing the means for cooperation. (3) The encouragement of
addresses, reports and publications on the progress of different depart-
ments of science, sometimes of value to the specialist, but more espe-
cially important in keeping the sciences in touch with each other.
Joint meetings, discussions and publications should be arranged on sub-
jects common to different sciences, relating the pure and applied
sciences or concerned with science as a whole. (4) The presentation
of such addresses, reports, discussions and publications in a form that
will so far as possible keep the general public informed on the advances
of science, interest them in the opportunities of scientific work and its
needs, and impress on them the dignity and supreme importance of
science. Here should be included whatever will secure recruits to
scientific workers and the money and support that scientific work
requires. (5) Offering an opportunity for men of science in different
departments to become acquainted personally and by publication, and
encouraging their sympathy and loyalty to their common interests and
performing, so far as possible, the same function for scientific men and
the intelligent public. (6) The guidance of scientific organization
in America, which includes the coordination, establishment and
arrangements for the meetings, etc., of special scientific societies; the

THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION. 309

publication and circulation of scientific books and journals; the place
of science in education and all external means for the advancement and
diffusion of science; the direction of public opinion and legislation
on science, more especially when connected with the national govern-
ment, and the different states and municipalities; the promotion of
conditions required by science and of reforms recommended by science
— in general, whatever will promote the advancement, diffusion and
usefulness of science.

1. The first of these functions has in large measure been assumed
by the special societies and journals, and this is in accordance with
necessary conditions. Special research must be presented before, and
discussed by, small groups of experts and must be published in journals
that are of interest only to specialists. The special societies have com-
pact organizations; they are most competent to select their member-
ship, to arrange their programs and to conduct their publications. It
seems inevitable that the Association must relinquish its function
of providing sections for the presentation of special papers, except
in the rare case that a special society does not exist and may be
formed by the aid of the Association. In a joint meeting of a special
society and the corresponding section all the valuable papers will be
presented both before the society and the section, and only such papers
will be presented to the section alone as the society will not admit.
There is, however, no reason why the present general organization should
not be maintained, and the papers read before the affiliated societies
be made part of the proceedings of the Association. The Association
may, however, render important assistance to the special societies in
the ways indicated below.

2. The promotion of research by grants of money and by provid-
ing the means for cooperation is a function that should be undertaken
both by the special societies and by the general Association. The
latter is, as a matter of fact, more likely to secure funds for this pur-
pose by bequests and gifts, owing to its national character, its long
history and its permanence. It can to special advantage further re-
searches in which more than one science is concerned and in which
independent societies might fail to cooperate. Efforts should be made
to increase the number of patrons of the Association and to secure
bequests and gifts, in order that the American Association may not be
behind the British and French Associations, which appropriate
annually $5,000 or more for the direct encouragement of research.
Invested funds yielding an income for this purpose would add greatly
to the stability, influence and usefulness of the Association, and to the
interest of the meetings at which the grants are made and the reports
of the work accomplished are presented.

3. The special societies may with advantage present addresses and

3IO POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

reports on the progress of a science, and, when the societies meet at the
same time and place, their value is increased by the opportunity
afforded for a larger group to be present. In this direction the Associa-
tion has, however, an important work. The address of the president,
the most eminent man of science in America who has not yet held this
office, should be an event of national importance. It should be worth
publication, and should be published in full in all the important daily
newspapers, as actually happens in England in the case of the president
of the British Association. The addresses of the vice-presidents should
be as nearly as may be of the same importance and interest. These
should not be addresses such as are presented before the special socie-
ties, but should be intelligible and interesting to all men of science and
to the great mass of men and women who have had a college education
or an equivalent training in affairs. The afternoons through the week
might with advantage begin with these addresses, not more than two
being given simultaneously, and these might be followed with reports or
discussions of problems of general interest. The sectional committees
and the council should pay special attention well in advance to the
arrangement of a program. Care should be taken, if necessary, by invi-
tation to those not members of the Association, to secure the adequate
presentation of subjects in which the Association needs strengthening.
Thus applied science should be given more prominence than hitherto.
Those eminent in public life, in educational work and the like, and
distinguished foreign men of science might be invited to address the
Association or to take part in its discussions. Funds should be avail-
able to defray at least the traveling expenses of such invited guests.

4. The addresses, reports and discussions should, in part at least,
be of such interest as to attract the general public, securing a large local
attendance and being reported widely by the press. It is not possible,
least of all in a democratic country, for science to isolate itself from
common life. There must be special research that can be appreciated
only by the expert, but as quickly as possible the progress of science
should be made a part of the world's common stock of knowledge. The
American Association should be one of the chief factors in the diffusion
©f science, and its annual meetings should be looked forward to by the
general public as the occasion when for its benefit the year's progress
in science and the contemporary state of science are exhibited in their
outlines and in correct perspective. The meetings should typify the
dignity and weight of science, so as to impress these on the minds of
all. The sympathy and support of all the people are absolutely
essential for science. Only so can recruits for scientific work be
secured; only so can endowments and material support be obtained;
only so can scientific work under the government be placed on a
secure and permanent basis. We have in these needs not only the

TEE AMEBIC AN ASSOCIATION. 311

justification, but the absolute necessity of an Association with a large
membership — it should be at least ten thousand — drawn from the
intelligent people of the whole country.

5. The social intercourse and personal contact of scientific societies
and meetings are among their most important fvmctions. Men in
isolation become selfish and incompetent. Even a great genius does
not work in solitude, and certainly the ordinary man requires the
interest and enthusiasm that is only evoked in the give and take of
personal acquaintance and conversation. Eating together, drinking
together, smoking together, may have physiological drawbacks, but the
psychological stimulus has warranted the origin and survival of the
practices. Those studying similar problems, and those working in
diverse directions; the university professor, the school teacher and the
government officer; those who call their science pure and those who
seek to make it useful; the beginners and the old benchers, all should
be thrown together, ready to learn and help, to agree and differ. Each
should be prepared to profit much, and if need be to sacrifice a little
for the common good. The meetings of the Association do, of necessity,
accomplish a great deal in bringing men together, but perhaps not all
that could be desired. The cultivation of personal acquaintance
between professional men of science and the amateur and outsider is
also important, but more difficult to manage. The social features of
the British Association seem to be more successful than our own. A
thousand or more of the leading citizens of the place become temporary
members for each meeting, and freely offer entertainments of one
sort or another. The social conditions are, of course, different in
America, but it seems that the entertainments and excursions might be
made more pleasant and profitable in the future.

6. Of all the important functions of a national scientific associa-
tion, the most essential is the general organization of science. The
science of the country absolutely requires a central legislative body.
Such bodies exist in other nations, having varying degrees of useful-
ness, and there is more need of an active and efficient representation
of scientific interests in the United States than in any other country.
London, Paris and the other European capitals, with their societies,
clubs, etc., bring together all the scientific men of the country,
whereas here they are widely scattered, and will become still more so
as the East loses its intellectual precedence. Washington will doubtless
be our chief center for scientific research, but under our system of
State governments and with our privately endowed institutions, it is
not likely that it will occupy the position of European capitals. The
great development of scientific work under the national government,
the numerous smaller centers under the State governments at their
capitals and universities, the municipalities with their increasing

312 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tendency to support museums, libraries, etc., and to undertake func-
tions requiring scientific experts, the great incorporated universities
developing special research, the applications of science in industries,
transportation, etc. — all these represent an extraordinary activity,
and, at the same time, a dispersion of tendencies and interests that
require here more than in any country some unifying and centralizing
organization. The functions of such a body are only limited by its
eificiency. Our government recognizes a division into executive,
legislative and judicial functions, but does not recognize the coordinate
importance of expert opinion. As the judicatory interprets the laws
made by the legislature, so the legislature requires impartial advice
and scientific knowledge as the basis of its enactments.

The question now arises as to what body or bodies should perform
the functions thus outlined. In the first place, it is evident that we
need numerous and partly independent institutions. Each university,
museum, survey, observatory, botanical garden, laboratory and the like
is a unit, requiring its special organization. Each city should have
a local academy, or alliance of societies, which in its field should per-
form most of the functions that we have been considering. Similar
academies, or groups of societies, are needed for a State or region.
iSTational societies are required for each science. But what should be
the national organization that will bring all the local and special
societies together, and accomplish for the nation and for science as a
whole what these institutions and societies do for a locality or a single
science? We have at present the National Academy of Sciences and
the American Association for the Advancement of Science, both of
which have to a certain extent filled these requirements, but only in a
partial and imperfect way. The Academy is legally the adviser of the
government, the Association has brought into its organization a
majority of the scientific men and many of the scientific societies of the
country, but it seems probable that neither a small self -perpetuating
body of eminent men nor a plebiscite of all scientific men will perform
the duties required. Eepresentative government, in spite of its partial
failures, is the kind of government under which we should live and
must live. We find this most nearly embodied in the council of the
American Association. This council might be made the representative
body for science in America.

If it be asked what the American Association and its council should
do to assume the position assigned to them, the reply may fortunately
be made: let them continue the work that they have already begun.
The whole matter is one of attitude and spirit, rather than of con-
stitution and by-laws. Let all scientific men be fellows of the Asso-
ciation, make the members representative of the intelligence of the
country, unite all scientific societies and institutions in the organiza-

TEE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION. su

tion of the Association, make the meetings important and interesting,
let the council assume and deserve authority.

While the position of the Association must depend chiefly on
natural fitness and development and on the spirit and character of its
members, there are certain changes in organization that deserve con-
sideration. We shall suggest some modifications which appear to be
either desirable at present or objects to be kept in view.

Affiliated societies should be represented on the council, and all
scientific societies, whether national or local, should be affiliated with
the Association. The number of representatives allowed from each
society should be proportional to the number of members of the society
among the fellows of the Association. For example, each institution
having ten fellows might be allowed a representative and an additional
representative for each additional twenty-five fellows. This plan
includes the representation of local academies, universities, govern-
ment departments, etc., on the council, but might begin with the
societies meeting with the Association, in accordance with an amend-
ment to the constitution now pending. It might be well for the council
to elect each year three additional members to serve for a term of
three years. Those so elected would probably be among the most
efficient members of the council. The council would thus be con-
siderably enlarged, but its authority would be greatly increased. It is
of course understood that the real work of legislative bodies is done by
committees, and the committees of the council should be organized
with special care.

The executive officer of the Association is the permanent secretary,
and his influence should be very great. He should either be paid a
reasonable salary, say $5,000, and devote his whole time to the Associa-
tion and the organization of science in America, or should be, as our
present secretary, a man of unusual executive ability, having under
him one or two assistant secretaries who should devote themselves to
the work. The secretaries of the sections should be among the most
efficient members of the sections, and should be elected for a term of
three years and re-eligible.

The meetings should be more thoroughly organized in advance,
more authority being vested in the permanent secretary and council.
As suggested above, public lectures and discussions on the important
advances and current problems of general interest should be arranged.
For example, this year there should be reports on the relation of
mosquitoes to disease, on the newly established Bureau of Standards,
on the conduct of a national observatory, on the natural history and
resources of the West Indies and the Philippines, and, in view of the
place of meeting, on mining and irrigation.

The time of meeting has always interfered with success. Men of

314 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

science will not and cannot come together at midsummer. If a week
can be set aside at the beginning of the year, it is probable that the
scientific character and weight of the meetings will be greatly for-
warded. The importance of obtaining a convocation week in mid-
winter has been emphasized in a recent editorial ('Science/ April 26,
1901), and we are now able to report that, of the fourteen universities
composing the Association of American Universities, all but two
either already have no exercises at the time or have altered their
calendars in the direction of setting aside the week in which New
Year's Day falls for the meetings of scientific and learned societies. It
might, however, be well to have, say once in three years, a summer
meeting in which the social and excursion elements should be
emphasized. It must be remembered that the National Educational
Association can bring together 10,000 members in this way. Or per-
haps, it will be found with experience that the winter meeting is so
advantageous that the summer meetings can be omitted altogether.
Meanwhile there might be suggested a special meeting at Chicago next
year at Christmas time in conjunction with the Naturalists and
affiliated societies, the usual meeting at Pittsburg in midsummer, and
a meeting of unusual importance at Washington at the end of the year.

SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE.

315

SCIENTIFIC LITEEATURE.

A HISTORY OF THE THER-
MOMETER.
Dr. H. Cakrikgto^t Bolton is one of
the few Americans acquainted with the
history of science, and his little volume
on the evolution of the thermometer
(The Chemical Publishing Company)
represents a type of publication too
rare in this country. The scientific in-
formation is correct throughout and is
based on first hand knowledge, while at
the same time the contents are suSi-
ciently interesting to be read by any
one. It is probably not generally
known that the thermometer was in-
vented by Galileo. When we remember
that we owe to this one man not only
the foundations of physical science, but
also in large measure the pendulum, the
compass, the telescope and the micro-
scope, it may lead to a certain amount
of modesty in our appreciation of mod-
ern inventions. Galileo, probably in
1595, invented the open air ther-
moscope; he determined the relative
temperature at different places and at
different seasons of the year and made
experiments on freezing mixtures. In
1611 Sanctorius applied Galileo's in-
strument to the diagnosis of fevers.
Ferdinand II. of Tuscany, to whom we
owe the famous 'Accademia del
Cimento,' first sealed the glass, making
the instrument independent of atmos-
pheric pressure. Many improvements
were gradually made especially in the
endeavor to find fixed points on a defi-
nite scale, the freezing point of water
being first used by Robert Hooke in
1664. Of the three thermometers still
in use, Fahrenheit's thermometer was
invented in 1709, Reaumur's instru-
ment in 1730 and the scale of Celsius in
1742. None of these thermometers,
however, are now used in the form in

which they were originally devised, and
Dr. Bolton calls attention to the some-
what curious fact that the instrument
constructed by the German, Fahrenheit,
is used almost exclusively by English-
speaking peoples; that invented by the
Frenchman, Reaumur, is used chiefly in
the north of Europe, while that of the
Swede, Celsius, is used in the French-
speaking countries. Dr. Bolton does
not attempt to compare the useful-
ness of the three scales. The centi-
grade scale is, of course, the most
logical, but, as sometimes happens
in this world, it is not quite cer-
tain that it is the most convenient.
When the scale of temperature between
freezing and boiling water is divided
into one hundred parts, the degrees
seem to be somewhat too large for use
in daily life, whereas if it were divided
into one thousand parts they would be
obviously too small. It is possible, how-
ever, that this is Anglo-Saxon preju-
dice, and that the centigrade degree
measures temperature with sufficient
accuracy for ordinary purposes, while
its decimal subdivision must certainly
be used hereafter for scientific work.
Dr. Bolton's book is so small that it
seems a pity that he did not add a
chapter on the exact thermometric
methods of the nineteenth century.

EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY.

Professor E. B. Titchener, of Cor-
nell University, has given us our first
adequate laboratory manual of experi-
mental psychology and has thus marked
an epoch in the development of a
science. Experiment in psychology, like
much else, goes back to Aristotle, and
has never since been entirely lacking.
The great philosophers — ^Descartes,
Hobbs, Kant and the rest — advanced

3i6

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

p&ycliology as well as the other sciences.
When the separate sciences developed,
some part of psychology was taken with
them, and the physicist, the physiolo-
gist and the zoologist made experi-
ments and researches which are now
claimed by psychology. In the mean-
while philosophy continued to care for
psychology — we have, for example, in
England Locke, Berkeley and Hume,
and in Germany Herbart — but some-
times without sufficient attention to
observation and experiment. Then
about fifty years ago, in the hands of
those who cared both for philosophy
and science — Lotze, Fechner, Helmholtz,
Wundt and others — psychology took
definite shape as a natural and experi-
mental science. Wundt's 'Physiolo-
gische Psychologic,' published in 1874,
was the first comprehensive handbook.
James's 'Principles of Psychology,' pub-
lished in 1890, is equally important and
more readable. Apart from numerous
good text-books and treatises in vari-
ous languages, we had the first labo-
ratory manual in Sanford's 'Course in
Experimental Psychology' (1894), but
this only treated the senses which had
already been pretty well worked over
by physicists and physiologists. Now
in Titchener's 'Experimental Psychol-
ogy: a Manual of Laboratory Prac-
tice'— the work is published by the
Macmillans — we have the first complete
laboratory course in psychology. It is
a large work : Volume I, which has

alone been issued, includes two parts
treating qualitative experiments, one
intended for the student (xviii+
214 pp.) and the other for the in-
structor (xxxiii+456 pp.). Two fur-
ther volumes, treating quantitative ex-
periments, are promised. The experi-
ments are described in chapters en-
titled: Visual sensation, Auditory sen-
sation, Cutaneous sensation. Gusta-
tory sensation. Olfactory sensation,
Organic sensation. The affective quali-
ties, Attention and action, Visual
space perception. Auditory perception,
Tactual space perception. Ideational
type and the association of ideas, Ap-
pendices.

Detailed comment and criticism must
be relegated to the special journals.
There is no question but that the work
will greatly forward the teaching of ex-
perimental psychology and is invalu-
able to the teacher and advanced stu-
dent. There will be difference of opin-
ion as to how far the book can be put
to advantage in the hands of students
beginning laboratory work in psychol-
ogy, and the question can only be set-
tled by actual trial. There is naturally
less agreement as to what experiments
should be made and what methods
should be used than in the ease of
sciences, such as chemistry and physics,
where natural selection has long been
at work. But Professor Titchener has
laid the foundation on which future
workers must build.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

317

THE PEOGBESS OF SCIENCE.

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
AND PRESIDENT REMSEN.

The election of Professor Ira Remsen
to the presidency of the Johns Hop-
kins University has been received with
general approval, and will be particu-
larly gratifying to those who have been
connected with the University as stu-
dents or teachers and to men of science
throughout the country. The Johns
Hopkins University was incorporated
in 1867; the founder died in 1873, and
a year later Dr. D. C. Gilman was
elected to the presidency. When the
University opened its first session in
1876, Dr. Gilman had secured the ser-
vices of a small but notable group of
professors, of whom, since the lamented
death of Rowland, but two remain —
Professor Remsen and Professor Gilder-
sleeve. President Gilman and his asso-
ciates, freed somewhat from traditions
and from the need of conducting a
school for boys, erected at Baltimore a
true university, distinctly in advance
of any other American institution, ex-
cept possibly Harvard, then just becom-
ing subject to the influence of President
Eliot — like Remsen, a professor of
chemistry. In spite of the loss of a
great part of its endowment, due not to
carelessness on the part of the trustees
but to the dictates of the founder, the
Johns Hopkins University has main-
tained its position, and in the estab-
lishment of its medical school in 1893
has accomplished for medical education
what had been accomplished earlier for
university work. In the development
of the university. Professor Remsen has
always been President Gilman's chief
associate and adviser, and is his nat-
ural successor. Remsen was graduated
from the College of the City of New

VOL. LIX. — 21

York in 1865 and received his M.D.
from the College of Physicians and Sur-
geons, Columbia University, two years
later. Studying abroad, he was made
assistant in chemistry in Tubingen and
was afterwards professor in Williams
College, till his removal to the Johns
Hopkins University in 1876. He has
been given the LL.D. by Coliunbia and
Princeton; is the foreign secretary of
the National Academy of Sciences, and
a member of many scientific societies.
In his chemical laboratory and in 'The
American Chemical Journal,' Professor
Remsen has always upheld and for-
warded the best ideals of research. As
president of the Johns Hopkins Univer-
sity, he represents the highest type of
educational leadership.

ACADEMIC FREEDOM HERE AND
ABROAD.

Questions of academic freedom and
the relations of university professors to
authority are fully as troublesome
abroad as in this country. It might be
supposed that our system would work
badly. The faculties have very little
power, the authority being lodged in an
absentee board of trustees and a presi-
dent with almost absolute power; the
trustees being usually and the presi-
dents often men of affairs rather than
scholars. The state universities are
subject to political control, and the
private universities are generally de-
nominational and always dependent on
the charity of patrons. Yet thanks to
common sense and an appreciation of
the importance of individual freedom,
the university professor has in America
a reasonably satisfactory status. There
is little or no interference with the con-
duct of his department; his advance-

3i8

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ment depends chiefly on efficiency rather
than on favor; his position is perma-
nent; he has complete freedom of re-
search and reasonable freedom of speech
and conduct. Those who are dissatis-
fied with the conditions here should
make themselves familiar with what is
happening abroad. We have recently
had occasion to call attention to the
troubles in the Royal Engineering Col-
lege at Coopers Hill. Half the faculty
was dismissed without a hearing by a
board of visitors and a president, an
army officer without academic experi-
ence. At this institution it appears
that the professors are not even con-
sulted as to the curriculum. An emi-
nent chemist was dismissed from the
University of Paris, because he believed
that Dreyfus was not justly convicted;
an eminent zoologist was compelled to
leave the University of Zurich, because
he took part in temperance reforms;
now in Germany, supposed to be the
home of academic freedom, we have
events that could scarcely happen in
America. The chair of zoology at
Erlangen being vacant in 1897, the
Bavarian 'Landtag' expressed the wish
that the representatives of the natural
sciences in the Bavarian universities
should not be evolutionists. The asso-
ciate professor of zoology at Erlangen,
Dr. Albert Fleischmann, had pub-
lished in 1896, the first part of a
text-book of zoology based, like
all recent works, on the theory of
evolution. But when the second part
was published in 1898, there was a re-
markable conversion; a special chapter
on the theory of evolution was added,
declaring the theory to be absurd. The
author was promoted to the professor-
ship of zoology, and has now published
a book, entitled : 'The Theory of Evolu-
tion: Popular Lectures on the rise and
fall of a scientific hypothesis, delivered
before students of all the faculties.'
The book is not addressed to scientific
men, but to the laity and clergy to
whom the author owes his chair at the
University of Erlangen.

SCIENTIFIC AND EDUCATIONAL
ENDOWMENTS.

Two gifts of great importance to
science have been made during the past
month. Mr. Andrew Carnegie has
created a fund of $10,000,000 for the
Scottish Universities, and Mr. J. D.
Rockefeller has established in New
York an Institute for Medical Research.
Mr. Rockefeller, in the endowment of
the University of Chicago, has enjoyed
the honorable distinction of having
made the largest gift for public pur-
poses, but even his great benefaction
has now been surpassed by Mr. Car-
negie.

The fund for the Scottish Universi-
ties has been transferred to trustees,
in whose wisdom there will be perfect
confidence, and no unwise restrictions
have been placed on their power. At
present, however, the income will be
divided between paying the fees of stu-
dents at the Scottish Universities, and
strengthening the equipment and teach-
ing staff. The scientific and medical
departments, and modern languages
and history, are designated as the sub-
jects on which the money is to be spent.
The Scottish Universities, like our own
institutions, have always been close to
the people, a very large percentage en-
joying the benefits of a college training.
An annual income of $500,000, devoted
to higher education, will mean much
for a comparatively small population.

Mr. Rockefeller's gift of $200,000 for
an Institute for Medical Research is
comparatively small. It is, however,
intended for current expenses, and an
endowment will doubtless be provided
when required. The institute will be
situated in New York City, but a build-
ing will not be erected at present, re-
search being conducted in existing
laboratories. The board of directors,
with Dr. W. H. Welch of the Johns
Hopkins University as president, guar-
antees the conduct of the institute in
accordance with the highest scientific
standards. It is most fortunate that
we should now be on the way to share

TEE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

319

■with Euroiiean countries the duties of
organized medical research. There are
institutions, such as Mr. Rockefeller
has now founded, in Paris, Berlin, St.
Petersburg and elsewhere, and last
year Lord Iveagh established a similar
laboratory in London. It is somewhat
remarkable that great sums should
have been spent annually on research in
astronomy, geology and in other direc-
tions, whereas the advancement of
medical science and its applications
should have been left chiefly to in-
di^vidual effort. The first duty of the
practising physician is to his patient,
and the teacher in a medical school is
doubly burdened, as he usually prac-
tises medicine, and at the same time
instructs large classes. It is not sur-
prising that the four hundred medical
journals published in the United States
are mostly somewhat dreary and
barren, but, rather, that so much has
been accomplished without state or
private endowment.

THE CAUSES OF YELLOW FEVER
AND OF CANCER.

What can be accomplished by prop-
erly directed medical research is proved
by two advances of extraordinary im-
portance made recently by American
students. These are the discovery of
the probable causes of yellow fever and
of cancer. In the present number of
this journal, Surgeon-General Stern-
berg describes the experiments made
under his direction by a board of army
surgeons in Havana. In heroic self-
sacrifice and triumphant achievement
these experiments have surely an
absorbing interest, surpassing any
fiction. Although the yellow fever
parasite has not been seen, its existence
seems as certain as that of the malaria
parasite. We now know that yellow
fever is not directly contagious, but is
transmitted by a special kind of mos-
quito, and, probably, only in this way.
If we exterminate certain kinds of mos-
quitoes, or prevent them from bit-
ing those diseased, or from biting

those who are well, two of the most
dreadful diseases — yellow fever and
malaria — will be exterminated. The
cost in money and life of the Spanish-
American War has been more than re-
paid to society by the services of the
medical army officers.

Science is often said to be cosmopoli-
tan, but men of science owe allegiance
to their country, and there is every
reason to rejoice that it is also to an
American that we owe the discovery of
the probable cause of cancer. Dr.
Harvey R. Gaylord, working in New
York State Pathological Laboratory at
Buffalo, has been able to cultivate the
organisms that cause cancer, and to
produce cancer by injecting them into
healthy animals. These organisms are
not bacteria or yeast cells, but protozoa.
There has long been a difference of
opinion as to whether cancer is due to
alterations in nutrition, or to a para-
site. Now that the latter has been
proved, cancer must be regarded as a
preventable disease, and it remains to
discover the method of its propagation.
It must, of course, be remembered that
Dr. Gaylord's discovery, like all others,
rests on a long line of careful re-
searches carried on in many countries.
There are innumerable names connected
with the development of the germ
theory of disease, but the forerunners
of Gaylord, who especially deserve
mention in connection with cancer, are
Scheuerlin, Kubasoff, Russell, Sanfelice
and Plimmer.

THE BRITISH ANTARCTIC
EXPEDITION.

The resignation of Professor J. W.
Gregory from the scientific staff of the
British Antarctic Expedition is unfor-
tunate, both because he possessed pecu-
liar qualifications for his post, and
because it has brought to light dissen-
sions among those interested in the
success of the expedition. The question
at issue between the Royal Geographical
Society, on the one hand, and the Royal
Society, or some of its members, on the

320

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

other, is one frequently recurring,
namely, should the executive command,
of scientific work be entrusted to a
scientific man or is this unnecessary?
When it was first arranged that Pro-
fessor Gregory should take part in the
expedition, it was imderstood that he
would be the scientific leader. The
British Government, however, gave a
liberal subsidy, and a naval officer,
Lieutenant Robert F. Scott, was ap-
pointed commander. Professor Gregory
being made head of the civilian scien-
tific staff. The relative position of
Captain Scott and Professor Gregory
gave rise to fi'iction. Sir Clements
Markham and the Royal Geographical
Society holding that the scientific work
was under the oontrol of the naval
officer in command. There were numer-
ous conferences, and Professor Gregory
finally consented to be satisfied with
the control of a party to be landed on
the coast. When, however, it was de-
cided that the party should only be
landed if this did not interfere with
geographical exploration, Professor
Gregory resigned. It seems evident
that a scientific expedition can have
but one leader, and it is natural that
the Royal Geographical Society should
regard exploration rather than geo-
logical and biological research as the
primary object in the present case.
The results will depend on the per-
sonality of Captaiia Scott, an unknown
quantity in America; he may simply
engage in adventure, or he may prove
himself a competent scientific leader.
The German expedition, with Dr. von
Drygalski in absolute control, has, how-
ever, an advantage from the scientific
point of view.

SCIENTIFIC NEWS.
Pkofessoe Truman Heney Saf-
FORD, who since 1877 had occupied the
chair of astronomy at Williams Col-
lege, died on June 13, at the age of 64
years. — Dr. Otto Lugger, State ento-
mologist of Minnesota, and well known
for his important contributions to
economic entomology, died of pneu-
monia on May 21. — John Viriamu
Jones, principal of University College,
South Wales, and professor of physics
in that institution, died on June 2, at
the age of 45 years. — The eminent
paleontologist. Professor Gustaf Lind-
strom, keeper of the department of
fossil animals in the Royal Museum,
Stockholm, Sweden, died on May 16.

At the annual meeting of the Ameri-
can Academy of Arts and Sciences, it
was unanimously voted to award the
Rumford Medal to Professor Elihu
Thompson 'for his inventions in elec-
tric welding and lighting.' — One of the
Carnegie Research Fellowships of the
Iron and Steel Institute of Great
Britain has been awarded to Mr. John
A. Matthews, who at present holds the
Columbia University Barnard Fellow-
ship.

Dr. Frederick Peterson, of Colum-
bia University, has been appointed by
Governor Odell the medical member of
the New York State Lunacy Commis-
sion. Dr. Peterson's appointment at
the present time is especially fortimate,
owing to the complications in connec-
tion with the State Pathological Insti-
tute, which will doubtless be settled
with regard to the best interests of
science and the care of the insane in the
State hospitals.

VOL. LIX.— 2:^

DE. lEA EEMSEN.
President of the Johns Hopkins University.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY.

AUGUST, 1901.

OX BODIES SMALLER THAN ATOMS.

By professor J. J. THOMSON,

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY.

nnHE masses of the atoms of the various gases were first investigated
-■- about thirty 3'ears ago by methods due to Loschmidt, Johnstone
Stoney and Lord Kelvin. These physicists, using the principles of the
kinetic theory of gases and making certain assumptions, which it must
be admitted are not entirely satisfactory, as to the shape of the atom,
determined the mass of an atom of a gas ; and when once the mass of an
atom of one substance is known the masses of the atoms of all other
substances are easily deduced by well-known chemical considerations.
The results of these investigations might be thought not to leave much
room for the existence of anvthing smaller than ordinarv atoms, for
they showed that in a cubic centimeter of gas at atmospheric pressure
and at 0° C. there are aboiit 20 million, million, million (2 X lO^'-*)
molecules of gas.

Though some of the arguments used to get this result are open to
question, the result itself has been confirmed by considerations of
quite a diiferent kind. Thus Lord Eayleigh has shown that this num-
ber of molecules per cubic centimeter gives about the right value for
the optical opacity of the air, while a method, which I will now
describe, by which we can directly measure the number of molecules
in a gas leads to a result almost identical with that of Loschmidt.
This method is founded on Faraday's laws of electrolysis; we deduce
from these laws that the current through an electrolyte is carried by
the atoms of the electrolyte, and that all these atoms carry the same
charge, so that the weight of the atoms required to carry a given quan-
tity of electricity is proportional to the quantity carried. We know

324 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

too, by the results of experiments on electrolysis, that to carry the
unit charge of electricity requires a collection of atoms of hydrogen
Avhich together weigh about ^/jq of a milligram; hence if we can
measure the charge of electricity on an atom of hydrogen we see that
^/lo of this charge will be the weight in milligrams of the atom of
hydrogen. This result is for the case when electricity passes through
a liquid electrolyte. I will now explain how we can measure the mass of
the carriers of electricity required to convey a given charge of electricity
through a rarefied gas. In this case the direct methods which are appli-
cable to liquid electrolytes cannot be used, but there are other, if more
indirect, methods, by which we can solve the problem. The first case of
conduction of electricity through gases we shall consider is that of the
so-called cathode rays, those streamers from the negative electrode in a
vacuum tube which produce the well-known green phosphorescence on
the glass of the tube. These rays are now known to consist of nega-
tively electrified particles moving with great rapidity. Let us see how
we can determine the electric charge carried bv a given mass of these
particles. We can do this by measuring the effect of electric and mag-
netic forces on the particles. If these are charged with electricity they
ought to be deflected when they are acted on by an electric force. It was
some time, however, before such a deflection was observed, and many
attempts to obtain this deflection were unsuccessful. The want of suc-
cess was due to the fact that the rapidly moving electrified particles
which constitute the cathode rays make the gas through which they
pass a conductor of electricity ; the particles are thus as it were moving
inside conducting tubes which screen them off from an external electric
field; by reducing the pressure of the gas inside the tube to such an
extent that there was very little gas left to conduct, I was able to get
rid of this screening effect and obtain the deflection of the rays by an
electrostatic field. The cathode rays are also deflected by a magnet,
the force exerted on them by the magnetic field is at right angles to
the magnetic force, at right angles also to the velocity of the particle
and equal to Hev sin 0 where H is the magnetic force, e the charge
on the particle and 0 the angle between H and v. Sir George Stokes
showed long ago that, if the magnetic force was at right angles to the
velocity of the particle, the latter would describe a circle whose radius
is mv/eH (if m is the mass of the particle) ; we can measure the
radius of this circle and thus find m/ve. To find v let an electric force
F and a magnetic force H act simultaneously on the particle, the elec-
tric and magnetic forces being both at right angles to the path of the
particle and also at right angles to each other. Let us adjust these
forces so that the effect of the electric force which is equal to Fe just
balances that of the magnetic force which is equal to Hev; when this
is the case Fe = Hev or t; = F/H. We can thus find v, and knowing

ON BODIES SMALLER THAN ATOMS. 325

from the previous experiment the value of vm/e, we deduce the value of
m/e. The value of m/e found in this way was about 10~", and other
methods used by Wiechert, Ivaufmann and Lenard have given results
not" greatly different. Since m/e = 10~'^, we see that to carry unit
charge of electricity by the particles forming the cathode rays only re-
quires a mass of these particles amounting to one ten thousandth of a
milligram while to carry the same charge by hydrogen atoms would
require a mass of one-tenth of a milligram.*

Thus to carry a given charge of electricity by hydrogen atoms re-
quires a mass a thousand times greater than to carry it by the nega-
tively electrified particles which constitute the cathode rays, and it
is very significant that, while the mass of atoms required to carry a
given charge through a liquid electrolyte depends upon the kind of
atom, being, for example, eight times greater for oxygen than for
hydrogen atoms, the mass of cathode ray particles required to carry a
given charge is quite independent of the gas through which the rays
travel and of the nature of the electrode from which they start.

The exceedingly small mass of these particles for a given charge
compared with that of the hydrogen atoms might be due either to the
mass of each of these particles being very small compared with that of
a hydrogen atom or else to the charge carried hy each particle being
large compared with that carried hy the atom of hydrogen. It is there-
fore essential that we should determine the electric charge carried by
one of these particles. The problem is as follows: suppose in an en-
closed space we have a number of electrified particles each carrying
the same charge, it is required to find the charge on each particle. It is
easy by electrical methods to determine the total quantity of electricity
on the collection of particles and knowing this we can find the charge
on each particle if we can count the number of particles. To count
these particles the first step is to make them visible. We can do this
by availing ourselves of a discovery made by C. T. E. Wilson working
in the Cavendish Laboratory. Wilson has shown that when positively
and negatively electrified particles are present in moist dust-free air
a cloud is produced when the air is closed by a sudden expansion,
though this amount of expansion would be quite insufficient to produce
condensation when no electrified particles are present: the water con-
denses round the electrified particles, and, if these are not too numer-
ous, each particle becomes the nucleus of a little drop of water. Now

* Professor Schuster in 1889 was the first to apply the method of the
magnetic deflection of the discharge to get a determination of the value of
m/e; he found rather widely separated limiting values for this quantity and
came to the conclusion that it was of the same order as in electrolytic solutions,
the result of the method mentioned above as well as those of Wiechert, Kauf-
mann and Leonard make it very much smaller.

326 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

*

Sir George Stokes has shown how we can calculate the rate at which a
drop of water falls through air if we know the size of the drop, and
conversely we can determine the size of the drop by measuring the rate
at which it falls through the air, hence by measuring the speed with
which the cloud falls we can determine the volume of each little drop;
the whole volume of water deposited by cooling the air can easily be
calculated, and dividing the whole volume of water by the volume of
one of the drops we get the number of drops, and hence the number
of the electrified particles. We saw, however, that if we knew the
number of particles we could get the electric charge on each particle;
proceeding in this way I found that the charge carried by each particle
was about 6.5 X 10~^° electrostatic units of electricity or 2.17 X lO""-"
electro-magnetic units. According to the kinetic theory of gases,
there are 3 X lO^'' molecules in a cubic centimeter of gas at atmos-
pheric pressure and at the temperature 0° C; as a cubic centimeter of
hydrogen weighs about 1/11 of a milligram each molecule of hydrogen
weighs about 1/(22 X 10^^) milligrams and each atom therefore
about 1/(44 X 10^") milligrams and as w^e have seen that in the elec-
trolysis of solutions one-tenth of a milligram carries unit charge, the
atom of hydrogen will carry a charge equal to 10/(44 X 10^^) =
2.27 X 10~-° electro-magnetic units. The charge on the particles in a
gas Ave have seen is equal to 2.17 X 10"-** units, these numbers are so
nearly equal that, considering the difficulties of the experiments, we
may feel sure that the charge on one of these gaseous particles is the
same as that on an atom of hydrogen in electrolysis. This result has
been verified in a different way by Professor Townsend, Avho used a
method by which he found, not the absolute value of the electric charge
on a particle, but the ratio of this charge to the charge on an atom of
hydrogen and he found that the two charges were equal.

As the charges on the particle and the hydrogen atom are the same,
the fact that the mass of these particles required to carry a given
charge of electricity is only one-thousandth j^art of the mass of the
hydrogen atoms shows that the mass of each of these particles is only
about 1/1000 of that of a hydrogen atom. These particles occurred in
the cathode rays inside a discharge tube, so that we have obtained from
the matter inside such a tube particles having a much smaller mass
than that of the atom of hydrogen, the smallest mass hitherto recog-
nized. These negatively electrified particles, which I have called cor-
puscles, have the same electric charge and the same mass whatever
be the nature of the gas inside the tube or whatever the nature of the
electrodes; the charge and mass are invariable. They therefore form
an invariable constituent of the atoms or molecules of all gases and
presumably of all liquids and solids.

Nor are the corpuscles confined to the somewhat inaccessible

ON BODIES SMALLER THAN ATOMS. 327

regions in which cathodic rays are found. I have" found that they are
given off by incandescent metals, by metals when illuminated by
ultra-violet light, while the researches of Bccquerel and Professor and
Madame Curie have shown that they are given off by that wonderful
substance the radio-active radium.

In fact in every case in which the transport of negative electricity
through gas at a low pressure (i. e., when the corpuscles have nothing
to stick to) has been examined, it has been found that the carriers of
the negative electricity are these corpuscles of invariable mass.

A very different state of things holds for the positive elec-
tricity. The masses of the carriers of positive electricity have
been determined for the positive electrification in vacuum tubes
by Wien and by Ewers, while I have measured the same thing
for the positive electrification produced in a gas by an incan-
descent wire. The results of these experiments show a remark-
able difference between the property of positive and negative electri-
fication, for the positive electricit}^, instead of being associated with a
constant mass 1/1000 of that of the hydrogen atom, is found to be
always connected with a mass which is of the same order as that of an
ordinary molecule, and which, moreover, varies with the nature of the
gas in which the electrification is found.

These two results, the invariability and smallness of the mass of
the carriers of negative electricity, and the variability and comparatively
large mass of the carriers of positive electricity, seem to me to point un-
mistakably to a very definite conception as to the nature of electricity.
Do they not obviously suggest that negative electricity consists of these
corpuscles or, to put it the other way, that these corpuscles are negative
electricity, and that positive electrification consists in the absence of
these corpuscles from ordinary atoms? Thus this point of view
approximates very closely to the old one-fluid theory of Franklin; on
that theory electricity was regarded as a fluid, and changes in the
state of electrification were regarded as due to the transport of this
fluid from one place to another. If we regard Franklin's electric fluid
as a collection of negatively electrified corpuscles, the old one-fluid
theory will, in many respects, express the results of the new. We have
seen that we know a good deal about the 'electric fluid' ; we know that
it is molecular or rather corpuscular in character; we know the mass
of each of these corpuscles and the charge of electricity carried by
it; we have seen too that the velocity with which the corpuscles move
can be determined without difficulty. In fact the electric fluid is
much more amenable to experiment than an ordinary gas, and the
details of its structure are more easily determined.

Negative electricity {%. c, the electric fluid) has mass; a body
negativelv electrified has a greater mass than the same body in the

-o^

328 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

neutral state; positive electrification, on the other hand, since it in-
volves the absence of corpuscles, is accompanied by a diminution in
mass.

An interesting question arises as to the nature of the mass of
these corpuscles which we may illustrate in the following way. When
a charged corpuscle is moving, it produces in the region around it a
magnetic field whose strength is proportional to the velocity of the
corjjusde ; now in a magnetic field there is an amount of energy pro-
portional to the square of the strength, and thus, in this case, pro-
portional to the square of the velocity of the corpuscle.

Thus jf e is the electric charge on the corpuscle and v its velocity,
there will be in the region round the corpuscle an amount of energy
equal to ^ /J e^v"^ where /? is a constant which depends upon the shape
and size of the corpuscle. Again if m is the mass of the corpuscle its
kinetic energy is %mt'^ and thus the total energy due to the moving
electrified corpuscle is %(m -|-/5 e2)i;2^ so that for the same velocity
it has the same kinetic energy as a non-electrified body whose mass is
greater than that of the electrified body by /3e-. Thus a charged body
possesses in virtue of its charge, as I showed twenty years ago, an
apparent mass apart from that arising from the ordinary matter in
the body. Thus in the case of these corpuscles, part of their mass is
undoubtedly due to their electrification, and the question arises whether
or not the whole of their mass can be accounted for in this way. I
have recently made some experiments which were intended to test this
point; the principle underlying these experiments was as follows: if
the mass of the corpuscle is the ordinary 'mechanical' mass, then, if a
rapidly moving corpuscle is brought to rest by colliding with a solid
obstacle, its kinetic energy being resident in the corpuscle will be
spent in heating up the molecules of the obstacle in the neighborhood
of the place of collision, and we should expect the mechanical equiva-
lent of the heat produced in the obstacle to be equal to the kinetic
energy of the corpuscle. If,' on the other hand, the mass of the cor-
puscle is 'electrical,' then the kinetic energy is not in the corpuscle
itself, but in the medium around it, and, when the corpuscle is stopped,
the energy travels outwards into space as a pulse confined to a thin shell
traveling with the velocity of light. I suggested some time ago that
this pulse forms the Eontgen rays which are produced when the cor-
puscles strike against an obstacle. On this view, the first effect of the
collision is to produce Eontgen rays and thus, unless the obstacle
against which the corpuscle strikes absorbs all these rays, the energy
of the heat developed in the obstacle will be less than the energy of
the corpuscle. Thus, on the view that the mass of the corpuscle is
wholly or mainly electrical in its origin, we should expect the heating
efl'ect to be smaller when the corpuscles strike against a target per-

ON BODIES SMALLER THAN ATOMS. 329

meable by the Eontgen rays given out by the tube in which the cor-
puscles are produced than when they strike against a target opaque to
these rays. I have tested the heating effects produced in permeable
and opaque targets, but have never been able to get evidence of any
considerable difference between the two cases. The differences actually
observed were small compared with the total effect and were some-
times in one direction and sometimes in the opposite. The ex-
periments, therefore, tell against the view that the whole "of the
mass of a corpuscle is due to its electrical charge. The idea that mass
in general is electrical in its origin is a fascinating one, although it
has not at present been reconciled with the results of experience.

The smallness of these particles marks them out as likely to afford
a very valuable means for investigating the details of molecular
structure, a structure so fine that even waves of light are on far too
large a scale to be suitable for its investigation, as a single wave
length extends over a large number of molecules. This anticipation
has been fully realized by Lenard's experiments on the obstruction
offered to the passage of these corpuscles through different substances.
Lenard found that this obstruction depended only upon the density of
the substance and not upon its chemical composition or physical state.
He found that, if he took plates of different substances of equal areas
and of such thicknesses that the masses of all the plates were the same,
then, no matter what the plates were made of, whether of insulators
or conductors, whether of gases, liquids or solids, the resistance they
offered to the passage of the corpuscles through them was the same.
Xow this is exactly what would happen if the atom of the chemical
elements were aggregations of a large number of equal particles of
equal mass; the mass of an atom being proportional to the number
of these particles contained in it and the atom being a collection of
such particles through the interstices between which the corpuscle
might find its way. Thus a collision between a corpuscle and an atom
would not be so much a collision between the corpuscle and the atom
as a whole, as between a corpuscle and the individual particles of
which the atom consists; and the number of collisions the corpuscle
would make, and therefore the resistance it would experience, would be
the same if the number of particles in unit volume were the same,
whatever the nature of the atoms might be into which these particles
are aggregated. The number of particles in unit volume is however
fixed by the density of the substance and thus on this view the density
and the density alone should fix the resistance offered by the sub-
stance to the motion of a corpuscle through it; this, however, is pre-
cisely Lenard's result, which is thus a strong confirmation of the view
that the atoms of the .elementary substances are made up of simpler
parts all of which are alike. This and similar views of the constitu-

330 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tion of matter have often been advocated; thus in one form of it,
known as Front's hypothesis, all the elements were supposed to be
compounds of hydrogen. We know, however, that the mass of the
primordial atom must be much less than that of hydrogen. Sir'jSTpr-
man Lockyer has advocated the composite view of the nature of the
elements on spectroscopic grounds, but the view has never been more
boldly stated than it was long ago by Xewton who says :

"The smallest particles of matter may cohere hy the strongest attraction
and compose bigger particles of weaker virtue and many of these may cohere
and compose bigger particles whose virtue is still weaker and so on for divers
succession, until the progression ends in the biggest particles on which the
operations in Chemistry and the colours of natural bodies depend and which by
adhering compose bodies of a sensible magnitude."

The reasoning we used to prove that the resistance to the motion
of the corpuscle depends only upon the density is only valid when
the sphere of action of one of the particles on a corpuscle does not
extend as far as the nearest particle. We shall show later on that the
sphere of action of a particle on a corpuscle depends upon the velocity
of the corpuscle, the smaller the velocity the greater being the sphere
of action and that if the velocity of the corpuscle falls as low as 10'^
centimeters per second, then, from what we know of the charge on
the corpuscle and the size of molecules, the sphere of action of the
particle might be expected to extend further than the distance between
two particles and thus for corpuscles moving with this and smaller
velocities we should not expect the density law to hold.

Existence of Free Corpuscles or Negative Electricity in Metals.

In the cases hitherto described the negatively electrified corpuscles
had been obtained by processes which require the bodies from which
the corpuscles are liberated to be subjected to somewhat exceptional
treatment. Thus in the case of the cathode rays the corpuscles were
obtained by means of intense electric fields, in the case of the incan-
descent wire by great heat, in the case of the cold metal surface by
exposing this surface to light. The question arises whether there is
not to some extent, even in matter in the ordinary state and free from
the action of such agencies, a spontaneous liberation of those cor-
puscles— a kind of dissociation of the neutral molecules of the sub-
stance into positively and negatively electrified parts, of which the
latter are the negatively electrified corpuscles.

Let us consider the consequences of some such effect occurring in
a metal, the atoms of the metal splitting \ip into negatively electrified
corpuscles and positively electrified atoms and' these again after a time
re-combining to form neutral system. When things have got into a
steady state the number of corpuscles re-combining in a given time
will be equal to the number liberated in the same time. There will

ON BODIES SMALLER THAN ATOMS. 331

thus be diffused tliroiiijli the metal swarms of these corpuscles, these
will be moving about in all directions like the molecules of a gas and,
as they can gain or lose energy by colliding with the molecule of the
metal, we should expect by the kinetic theory of gases that they will
acquire such an average velocity that the mean kinetic energy of a
corpuscle moving about in the metal is equal to that possessed by a
molecule of a gas at the temperature of the metal; this would make
the average velocity of the corpuscles at 0° C. about 10^ centimeters per
second. This swarm of negatively electrified corpuscles when exposed
to an electric force will be sent drifting along in the direction opposite
to the force; this drifting of the corpuscles will be an electric current,
so that we could in this way explain the electrical conductivity of
metals.

The amount of electricity carried across unit area under a given
electric force will depend upon and increase with (1) the number
of free corpuscles per unit volume of the metal, (2) the freedom with
which these can move under the force between the atoms of the
metal; the latter will depend upon the average velocity of these cor-
puscles, for if they are moving with very great rapidity the electric
force will have very little time to act before the corpuscle collides
with an atom, and the effect produced by the electric force annulled.
Thus the average velocity of drift imparted to the corpuscles by the
electric field will diminish as the average velocity of translation,
which is fixed l)y the temperature, increases. As the average velocity
of translation increases with the temperature, the corpuscles will
move more freely under the action of an electric force at low
temperatures than at high, and thus from this cause the elec-
trical conductivity of metals would increase as the temperature dimin-
ishes. In a paper presented to the International Congress of Physics
at Paris in the autumn of last year, I described a method by which
the number of corpuscles per unit volume and the velocity with
which they moved under an electric force can be determined. x\pply-
ing this method to the case of bismuth, it appears that at the tempera-
ture of 20° C. there are about as many corpuscles in a cubic centimeter
as there are molecules in the same volume of a gas at the same tem-
perature and at a pressure of about 14 o^ ^^ atmosphere, and that the
corpuscles under an electric field of 1 volt per centimeter would travel
at the rate of about 70 meters per second. Bismuth is at present the
only metal for which the data necessary for the application of this
method exists, but experiments are in progress at the Cavendish Labor-
atory which it is hoped will furnish the means for applying the method
to other metals. We know enough, however, to be sure that the cor-
puscles in good conductors, such as gold, silver or copper, must be
much more numerous than in bismuth, and that the corpuscular pres-

332 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

sure in these metals must amount to many atmospheres. These cor-
puscles increase the specific heat of a metal and the specific heat gives
a superior limit to the number of them in the metal.

An interesting application of this theor}^ is to the conduction of
electricity through thin films of metal. Longden has recently shown
that when the thickness of the film falls below a certain value, the
specific resistance of the film increases rapidly as the thickness of
the film diminishes. This result is readily explained by this theory
of metallic conduction, for when the film gets so thin that its thick-
ness is comparable with the mean free path of a corpuscle the num-
ber of collisions made by a corj^uscle in a film will be greater than in
the metal in bulk, thus the mobility of the particles in the film will
be less and the electrical resistance consequently greater.

The corpuscles disseminated through the metal will do more than
carry the electric current, they will also carry heat from one part to
another of an unequally heated piece of metal. For if the corpuscles
in one part of the metal have more kinetic energy than those in
another, then, in consequence of the collisions of the corpuscles with
each other and with the atoms, the kinetic energy will tend to pass
from those places where it is greater to those where it is less, and in
tliis way heat will flow from the hot to the cold parts of the metal, as
the rate with which the heat is carried will increase with the number
of corpuscles and with their mobility, it will be influenced by the same
circumstances as the conduction of electricity, so that good conductors
of electricity should also be good conductors of heat. If we calculate
the ratio of the thermal to the electric conductivity on the assumption
that the whole of the heat is carried by the corpuscles we obtain a
value which is of the same order as that found by experiment.

Weber many years ago suggested that the electrical conductivity of
metals was due to the motion through them of positively and nega-
tively electrified particles, and this view has recently been greatly
extended and developed by Eiecke and by Drude, the objection to any
electrolytic view of the conduction through metals is that, as in elec-
trolysis, the transport of electricity involves the transport of matter,
and no evidence of this has been detected, this objection does not apply
to the theory sketched above, as on this view it is the corpuscles which
carry the current, these are not atoms of the metal, but very much
smaller bodies which are the same for all metals.

It may be asked if the corpuscles are disseminated through the
metal and moving about in it with an average velocity of about 10'
centimeters per second, how is it that some of them do not escape from
the metal into the surrounding air ? We must remember, however, that
these negatively electrified corpuscles are attracted by the positively
electrified atoms and in all probability by the neutral atoms as well, so

ON BODIES SMALLER THAN ATOMS. 333

that to escape from these attractions and get free a corpuscle would
have to possess a definite amount of energy, if a corpuscle had less
energy than this then, even though projected away from the metal, it
would fall back into it after traveling a short distance. When the
metal is at a high temperature, as in the case of the incandescent wire,
or when it is illuminated by ultra-violet light some of the corpuscles
acquire sufficient energy to escape from the metal and produce electrifica-
tion in the surrounding gas. We might expect too that, if we could
charge a metal so highly with negative electricity, that the work done by
the electric field on the corpuscle in a distance not greater than the
sphere of action of the atoms on the corpuscles was greater than the
energy required for a corpuscle to escape, then, the corpuscles would
escape and negative electricity stream from the metal. In this case
the discharge could be effected without the participation of the gas
surrounding the metal and might even take place in an absolute
vacuum, if we could produce such a thing. We have as yet no evidence
of this kind of discharge, unless indeed some of the interesting results
recently obtained by Earhart with very short sparks should be indica-
tions of an effect of this kind.

A very interesting case of the spontaneous emission of corpuscles
is that of the radio-active substance radium discovered by M. and
^ladame Ciirie. Eadium gives out negatively electrified corpuscles
which are deflected by a magnet. Becquerel has determined the ratio
of the mass to the charge of the radium corpuscles and finds it is the
same as for the corpuscles in the cathode rays. The velocity of the
radium corpuscles is, however, greater than any that has hitherto
been observed for either cathode or Lenard rays: being, as Becquerel
found, as much as 2 X 10^° centimeters per second or two-thirds the
velocity of light. This enormous velocity explains why the corpuscles
from radium are so very much more penetrating than the corpuscles
from cathode or Lenard rays; the difference in this respect is very
striking, for while the latter can only penetrate solids when they are
beaten out into the thinnest films, the corpuscles from radium have
been found by Curie to be able to penetrate a piece of glass 3 milli-
meters thick. To see how an increase in the velocity can increase the
penetrating power, let us take as an illustration of a collision between
the corpuscle and the particles of the metal the case of a charged
corpuscle moving past an electrified body; a collision may be said to
occur between these when the corpuscle comes so close to the charged
body that its direction of motion after passing the body differs appre-
ciably from that with which it started. A simple calculation shows
that the deflection of the corpuscle will only be considerable when
the kinetic energy, with which the corpuscle starts on its journey
towards the charged body is not large compared with the work done

334 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

by the electric forces on the corpuscle in its journey to the shortest
distance from the charged body. If d is the shortest distance, e and e'
the charge of the body and corpuscles, the work done is ee'/d; while if
m is the mass and v the velocity with which the corpuscle starts the
kinetic energy to begin with is Ynniv'; thus a considerable deflection
of the corpuscle, i. e., a collision will occur only when ee'/d is com-
parable with l^w^v-; and d, the distance at which a collision occurs,
will vary inversely as v-. As d is the radius of the sphere of action for
collision and as the number of collisions is proportional to the area of
a section of this sphere, the number of collisions is proportional to
d-, and therefore varies inversely as i'*. This illustration explains
how rapidly the number of collisions and therefore the resistance
offered to the motion of the corpuscles through matter diminishes as
the velocity of the corpuscles increases, so that we can understand why
the rapidly moving corpuscles from radium are able to penetrate sub-
stances which are nearly impermeable to the more slowly moving cor-
puscles from cathode and Lenard rays.

Cosmical Effects Produced hy Corpuscles.

As a very hot metal emits these corpuscles it does not seem an
improbable hypothesis that they are emitted by that very hot body,
the sun. Some of the consequences of this hypothesis have been de-
veloped by Paulsen, Birkeland and Arrhenius who have developed a
theory of the Aurora Borealis from this point of view. Let us sup,-
pose that the sun gives out corpuscles which travel out through inter-
planetary space; some of these will strike the upper regions of the
Earth's atmosphere and will then or even before then, come under the
influnce of the Earth's magnetic field. The corpuscles when in such
a field, will describe spirals round the lines of magnetic force; as the
radii of these spirals Avill be small compared with the height of the
atmosphere; we may for our present purpose suppose that they travel
along the lines of the Earth's magnetic force. Thus the corpuscles
which strike the earth's atmosphere near the equatorial regions where
the lines of magnetic force are horizontal will travel horizontally,
and will thus remain at the top of the atmosphere where the density
is so small that but little luminosity is caused by the passage of the
corpuscles through the gas; as the corpuscles travel into higher lati-
tudes where the lines of magnetic force dip, they follow these lines and
descend into the lower and denser parts of the atmosphere, where they
produce luminosity, which on this view is the Aurora.

As Arrhenius has pointed out the intensity of the Aurora ought to
be a maximum at some latitude intermediate between the pole and the
equator, for, though in the equatorial regions the rain of corpuscles
from the sun is greatest, the earth's magnetic force keeps these in

ON BODIES SMALLER THAN ATOMS. 335

such highly rarefied gas that they produce but little luminosity, while
at the pole, where the magnetic force would pull them straight down
into the denser air, there are not nearly so many corpuscles; the
maximum luminosity will therefore be somewhere between these places.
Arrhenius has worked out this theory of the Aurora very completely
and has shown that it affords a very satisfactory explanation of tlie
various j^eriodic variations to which it is subject.

As a gas becomes a conductor of electricity when corpuscles pass
through it, the upper regions of the air will conduct, and when air
currents occur in these regions, conducting matter will be driven
across the lines of force due to the earth's magnetic field, electric cur-
rents will be induced in the air, and the magnetic force due to these
currents will produce variations in the earth's magnetic field. Balfour
Stewart suggested long ago that the variation on the earth's magnetic
field was caused b}^ currents in the upper regions of the atmosphere,
and Schuster has shown, by the application of Gauss' method, that the
seat of these variations is above the surface of the earth.

The negative charge in the earth's atmosphere will not increase
indefinitely in consequence of the stream of negatively electrified cor-
puscles coming into it from the sun, for as soon as it gets negatively
electrified it begins to repel negatively electrified corpuscles from the
ionized gas in the upper regions of the air, and a state of equilibrium
will be reached when the earth has such a negative charge that the
corpuscles driven by it from the upper regions of the atmosphere are
equal in number to those reaching the earth from the sun. Thus, on
this view, interplanetary space is thronged with corpuscular traffic,
rapidly moving corpuscles coming out from the sun while more slowly
moving ones stream into it.

In the case of a planet which, like the moon, has no atmosphere
there will be no gas for the corpuscles to ionize, and the negative elec-
trification will increase until it is so intense that the repulsion exerted
by it on the corpuscles is great enough to prevent them from reaching
the surface of the planet.

Arrhenius has suggested that the luminosity of nebulte may not be
due to high temperature, but may be produced by the passage
through their outer regions of the corpuscles wandering about in
space, the gas in the nebulae being quite cold. This view seems in
some respects to have advantages over that which supposes the nebulge
to be at very high temperatures. These and other illustrations, which
might be given did space permit, seem to render it probable that these
corpuscles may pla)- an important part in cosmical as well as in
terrestrial physics.

336 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

DE. WILLIAM GILBEET.
The Philosopher of Colchesteb.

GILBERT OF COLCHESTER. 331

GILBERT OF COLCHESTEE.

THE TEECENTENARY OF ELECTRIC AND MAGNETIC SCIENCE.

By brother POTAMIAN, D.Sc, Lond.,
professor of physics in manhattan college, new york city.

AT a period when natural science was taught and studied in the
schools of Europe from text-books, we find Gilbert of Colchester
proclaiming by example and advocacy the paramount value of experi-
ment for the advancement of learning. He was unsparing in his de-
nunciation of the superficiality and verbosity of mere bookmen, and had
no patience with writers who treated their subjects 'esoterically, rec-
onditely and mystically.' For him, the laboratory method was the
only one that could secure fruitful results and effectively push back the
frontiers of knowledge.

It is true that men of unusual ability and strong character strove
before his time to adjust the claims of authority in matters scientific.
While respectful of the teachings of recognized leaders, they were not
awed into acquiescence by the customary academical ^magister dixit.'
On the contrary, they wanted to test with their eyes in order to judge
with reason; believing in the supreme importance of experiment, they
sought to acquire a knowledge of nature from nature herself.

Such were Albert the Great and Friar Bacon. Albert did not bow
obsequiously to the authority of Aristotle or any of his Arabian com-
mentators; he investigated for himself and became, for his age, a dis-
tinguished botanist and physiologist.

Eoger Bacon, after absorbing the learning of Oxford and Paris,
wrote to the reigning Pontiff, Clement IV., urging him to have the
works of the Stagyrite burnt in order to stop the propagation of error
in the schools. The Franciscan monk of Ilchester has left us in his
Opus Majus a lasting memorial of his practical genius. In the section
entitled 'Scientia Experimentalis,' he affirms that "Without experiment,
nothing can be adequately known. An argument proves theoretically
but does not give the certitude necessary to remove all doubt, nor will
the mind repose in the clear view of truth, unless it find it by way of
experiment." And in his Opus Tertium: "The strongest arguments
prove nothing so long as the conclusions are not verified by experience.
Experimental science is the queen of sciences and the goal of all specu-
lation."

VOL. LIX. 23

338 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

No one, even in our own times, ever wrote more strongly in favor
of the practical method than did this follower of St. Francis in the
thirteenth century. Being convinced that there can be no conflict be-
tween scientific and revealed truths, he became an irrepressible advocate
for observation and experiment in the study of the phenomena and
forces of nature.

The example of Albert and of Friar Bacon, not to mention others
like Vincent of Beauvais, the Dominican encyclopedist, was, however,
not sufficient to wean students and professors from the easy-going
routine of book-learning. A few centuries had to elapse before the
weaning was effectively begun ; and the man who powerfully contributed
to this result was Dr. William Gilbert, the philosopher of Colchester.

Gilbert was born in Colchester * in 1540 in a house which, thanks to
the appreciation of the authorities of that ancient town, the writer
found in an excellent state of preservation on the occasion of his visit
in quest of Gilbertiana.

Having received the elements of his education in the grammar
school of his native town, Gilbert entered St. John's College, Cam-
bridge. He graduated in 1560, 'commenced' M. A. in 1564, and took
his M. D. degree iu 1569. On leaving the university, he traveled for
some time on the Continent, where he made the acquaintance of several
distinguished scholars. On his return to England he practised, we are
told, 'with great success and applause.' His reputation obtained for
him the presidency of the Eoyal College of Physicians for the year
1600, and ultimately led to his being appointed physician in ordinary
to the Queen (Elizabeth).

We are not here concerned with Gilbert as a physician and still less
as a courtier. His claims to enduring recognition are of a higher order,
for we regard him not only as the author of a monumental work of
physical research, but also as founder, by word and deed, of the Experi-
mental School of philosophy.

In his address to the 'candid reader' at the beginning of De Mag-
netej he pointedly says :

"To you alone, true philosophers, ingenuous minds, who not only in books,
but in things themselves, look for knowledge, have I dedicated a new style of
philosophizing. But if any of you see fit not to agree with the opinions ex-
pressed, let them note the great multitude of experiments and discoveries, for it
is these that cause all philosophy to flourish: we have dug them up and demon-
strated them witli much pains and sleepless nights and great money expense."

Further on he adds :

"Nor did we find this, our labor, vain and fruitless, for every day in our
experiments novel and unheard of properties came to light."

* A town in Essex, fifty miles northeast of London.

t The only English translation of this work which we have is by Mr. P.
Henry Mottelay, of New York, published by Wiley & Sons.

GILBERT OF COLCHESTER. 339

On one occasion, lie hears that Baptista Porta, whom he calls 'a
philosopher of no ordinar}^ note/ said that a piece of iron rubbed with
a diamond turns to the north. He suspects this to be heresy. So,
forthwith he proceeds to test the statement by experiment. He was
not dazzled by the reputation of Baptista Porta; he respected Porta,
but respected truth even more. He tells us that he experimented with
seventy-five diamonds in presence of many witnesses, employing a num-
ber of iron bars and pieces of wire, manipulating them with the greatest
care while they floated on corks; and he concludes his long and ex-
haustive research by plaintively saying: "Yet never was it granted me
to see the effect mentioned by Porta."

Though it led to a negative result, this probing inquiry was a
masterpiece of experimental work.

Gilbert incidentally regrets that the men of his time "are deplorably
ignorant with respect to natural things,"' and the only way he sees to
remedy this is to make them "quit the sort of learning that comes only
from books and that rests only on vain arguments and conjectures,"
for he shrewdly remarks that "even men of acute intelligence without
actual knowledge of facts and in the absence of experiment easily fall
into error."

Acting on this intimate conviction, he labored for eighteen years
over the theories and experiments which he sets forth in his great
work on the magnet. "There is naught in these books," he tells us,
"that has not been investigated, and again and again done and repeated
under our eyes." He begs any one that should feel disposed to chal-
lenge his results to repeat the experiments for himself "carefulh', skil-
fully and deftly, but not heedlessly and bunglingly."

It has often been said that we are indebted to Sir Francis Bacon,
Queen Elizabeth's Chancellor, for the inductive method of studjing
the phenomena of nature. This is an error, for all investigators em-
ployed it from Archimedes the Syracusan down to Gilbert, the contem-
porary of Lord Yerulam.* Bacon's merit lies in the fact that he not
only minutely analyzed the method, pointing out its uses and abuses,
but also that he admitted it to be the onlv one bv which we can attain
an accurate knowledge of the physical world around us. His senten-
tious eulogy went forth to the world of scholars invested with all the
importance, authority and dignity which the high position and world-
wide fame of the philosophic Chancellor could give it. But while
Bacon thought and wrote in his study, Gilbert labored and toiled in his
worksliop. By his quill. Bacon made a profound impression on the
philosophic mind of his age; by his researches, Gilbert explored two

"'' Bacon was raised to the peerage as Baron Verulam, and was subsequently
created Viscount St. Albans ; where, then, is the propriety of calling him Lord
Bacon ?

340 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

vast provinces of nature and added them to the domain of science.
Bacon was a theorist, Gilbert an investigator. For eighteen years and
more he shunned the glare of society and the throbbing excitement of
public life; he wrenched himself away from all but the strictest
exigencies of his profession, in order to devote himself undistractedly to
the pursuit of science. And all this more than twenty years before the
apj)earance of Bacon's Novum Organum, the very work which contains
the philosopher's 'large thoughts and lofty phrases' on the value of ex-
periment as a means for the advancement of learning. During that
long period Gilbert haunted Colchester, where he delved into the secrets
of nature and prepared the materials for his grand work, De Magnete.
The publication of this Latin treatise made him known in the univer-
sities at home and especially abroad : he was appreciated by all the great
physicists and mathematicians of his age; by such men as Sir Kenelm
Digby; by William Barlowe, a great 'magneticall' man; by Kepler, the
astronomer, who adopted and defended his views; by Galileo himself,
who said: 'I extremely admire and envy the author of De Magnete/

If any one then deserves to be called the founder of the "experimental
school of philosophy, we contend that it is not Bacon the thinker and
essayist, but Gilbert the methodical worker and fruitful discoverer.

The originality of Gilbert's work and the character of his dis-
coveries, together with the reputation which he enjoyed in the greater
seats of learning, ended by giving umbrage to Bacon, and the world saw
the strange spectacle of a great chancellor forgetting the teachings of
his own philosophy and becoming jealous. He even carried his ill feel-
ing so far as to write belittlingly of the conclusions of his illustrious
rival, saying in his De Augmentis Scientiarum that "Gilbert had at-
tempted a general system upon the magnet, endeavoring to build a ship
out of materials not sufficient to make the rowing-pins of a boat."

It will be interesting to see what these 'rowing-pins' were, for then
we shall have a scale by which to judge the intensity of Bacon's jealousy
and the magnitude of his belittling ability.

11.

Gilbert's electrical work is contained in Book II of De Magnete;
and we may say at once that the second chapter of that famous book is
the first chapter on electricity ever written. Nothing was known be-
fore Gilbert's time save the attraction for light bodies observed in
rubbed amber and jet.

Gilbert goes to work and devises an instrument to enable him to
study readily the electrical behavior of rubbed substances. He called
it a Versorium, we should call it an electroscope. "Make to yourself,"
he says, "a rotating needle of any sort of metal three or four fingers
long and pretty light and poised on a sharp point." He then briskly

GILBERT OF COLCHESTER. 341

rubs and brings near his versoriiim glass, sulphur, opal, diamond,
sapphi^-e, carbuncle, rock-crystal, sealing-wax, alum, resin, etc., and he
finds that all these attract his suspended needle, and not only the neeiille,
but everything else. His words are remarkable: 'Ad electrica feruntur
omnia.'* Here is a great advance on the amber and jet, the only two
bodies previously known as having the power to attract 'straws, chaff
and twigs,' the usual test-substances of the ancients. Pursuing his in-
vestigations, he finds a class of bodies which perplex him, because when
nibbed they do not affect his electroscope. Among these he enumerates :
bone, ivory, marble, flint, silver, copper, gold, iron, even the lodestone
itself. The former class he called electrica, electrics, deriving the term
from eUMron, the Greek name for amber; the latter class he termed
anelectrica, non-electrics.

Science therefore owes to Gilbert the terms electric and "electrical ;
the term electricity was a coinage of a later period, due probably to the
illustrious Irish philosopher, Eobert Boyle, who uses the term in his
work On the Mechanical Production of Electricity, published in 1675. f
Gilbert never uses electricitas, but speaks of corpora electrica, effluvia
electrica, attractio electrica, motus electricus and the like. Had Gil-
bert chosen the Latin name for amber, succinum, as he might have
done, we should not be speaking to-day of electricity, electrostatics,
electro-optics, electrics, dielectrics; but should probably be using suc-
cinic for electric, succinical for electrical, succinicity for electricity,
together with a series of harsh-sounding derivatives and compounds.

As we said, Gilbert was perplexed by the anomalous behavior of his
anelectrics. He toiled and labored hard to find out the cause. He
undertook a long, abstract, philosophical discussion of the nature of
bodies which, from its very subtlety, failed to reveal the cause of his
perplexing anomaly. Gilbert failed to discover the distinction between
conductors and insulators, and, as a consequence, never found out that
similarly electrified bodies repel each other. Had he but suspended an
excited stick of sealing-wax, what a promised land of electrical wonders
would have unfolded itself to his vision ! and what a harvest of results
such a reaper would have gathered in ! He noticed the effect of distance ;
for he says, 'The nearer the electric is to the versorium, the quicker is
the attraction.' It was reserved, however, for the French mathematician
and engineer, Coulomb, to show in 1785 that the law of attraction or re-
pulsion between two electrified particles varies inversely as the square
of the distance between them.

From solids, he proceeds to examine the behavior of some liquids,
and finds that they too are susceptible of electrical influence. He
notices that a piece of excited amber when brought near a drop of water

* All things are drawn to electrics.

t To Boyle we are. also indebted for the name barometer.

342 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

deforms it, drawing it out into a conical shape. He even experiments
with smoke, concluding that the small carbon particles are attracted by
an electrified body. It was only a few years ago that Dr. Oliver Lodge,
extending this observation, proposed to lay the poisonous dust floating
about in the atmosphere of lead works by means of large electrostatic
machines. He even hinted in his Eoyal Institution lecture that they
might be useful in dissipating mists and fogs, recommending that a
trial be made on some of our ocean-bound steamers.

Gilbert next tries heat as an agent to produce electrification. He
takes a red-hot coal and finds that it has no effect on his electroscope;
he heats a mass of iron up to whiteness and finds that it too exerts no
electrical effect. He tries a flame, a candle, a burning torch, and con-
cludes that all bodies are attracted by electrics save those that are afire
or flaming, or extremely rarefied. He then reverses the experiment and
brings near an excited body the flame of a lamp, and he ingenuously
states that the body no longer attracts the pivoted needle. He thus dis-
covered the neutralizing effect of flames, and supplied us with the
readiest means we have to-day of discharging non-conductors.

He goes a step further; for we find him exposing some of his elec-
trics to the action of the sun's rays in order to see whether they acquired
a charge; but all his results were negative. He then concentrates the
rays of the sun by meaus of lenses, evidently expecting some electrical
effect ; but finding none, he concludes with a vein of pathos that the sun
imparts no power, but dissipates and spoils the electric eftluvium.

Professor Eight has shown that a clean metallic plate acquires a
positive charge when exposed to the ultra-violet radiation from any
artificial source of light, but that it does not when exposed to solar rays.
The absence of electrical effects in the latter case is attributed to the
absorptive action of the atmosphere on the shorter waves of the solar
beam.

Of course, Gilbert permits himself some speculation as to the nature
of the agent he was dealing with. He thought of it, reasoned about it,
pursued it in every way; and came to the conclusion that it must be
something extremely tenuous indeed, but yet substantial, jjonderable,
material. "As air is the effluvium of the earth," he says, "so electrified
bodies have an effluvium of their own, which they emit when stimulated
or excited;" and again: "It is probable that amber exhales something
peculiar that attracts the bodies themselves."

In 1862, another Gilbert, Sir Wm. Thomson (now Lord Kelvin),
writing to his friend. Professor Tait, of Edinburgh, said : "Tell me what
electricity is and 111 tell you everything else" ; and in April, 1893, the
same Lord Kelvin, replying to the writer, added: "I see no reason to say
otherwise than what you tell me I said to Professor Tait in 1862."
Despite, then, the great work of Clerk Maxwell and the corroborative

GILBERT OF COLCHESTER. 343

experiments of Hertz, we must still admit that the ultimate nature of
electricity remains wrapped in mystery. It is true, we discard the
material effluvium of Gilbert, but only to substitute for it an ethereal
ripple, a quiver, a wave motion in the hypothetical ether with which we
fill all space.

From 15S0 to 1600, we find Gilbert spending in his workship all the
leisure he can snatch from his professional duties. He notes down his
experiments, his failures as well as his successes, discusses them, reasons
on them, and pursues his inquiry further and further. In a word, we
find him toiling in his workshop at Colchester as Faraday toiled more
than 200 years later in the low, dark rooms of the Eoyal Institution of
Great Britain. Both were actuated by the same calm, persevering, ex-
perimental spirit. Gilbert founded and christened the science of elec-
trics ; he left it in its infancy, it is true ; but with sufficient vitality to
enable it to survive the neglect of years, until at last it was taken up
and fondly cared for by our Franklins and Faradays.

III.

The science of magnetism is even more indebted to Gilbert than that
of electricity. The ancients spoke of the lodestone as the Magnesian
stone, from its being found in Magnesia, in Asia Minor. Gilbert con-
stantly uses the adjective magnetica; and it is to his use of that word
that we owe the terms magnet, magnetic and magnetism.* He showed
that a great number of bodies could be electrified; but he maintained
that those only could exhibit magnetic properties which contain iron.
He satisfies himself of this by rubbing with a lodestone such substances
as wood, gold, silver, copper, zinc, lead, glass, etc., and then floating
them on corks, quaintly adding. that they show 'no poles, because the
energy of the lodestone has no entrance into their interior.'

To-day we know that nickel and cobalt behave like iron, whilst
antimony, bismuth, copper, silver and gold are susceptible of being
influenced by powerful electromagnets, showing what has been termed
diamagnetic phenomena. Even liquids and gases, in Faraday's classical
experiments, yielded to the influence of his great magnet ; and Professor
Dewar, in the same Eoyal Institution, exposed some of his liquid air
and liquid oxygen in the presence of the writer to the influence of
Faraday's electromagnet and found them to be strongly attracted, thus
behaving like the paramagnetic bodies, iron, nickel and cobalt.

Gilbert observes in all his magnets two points, one near each end,
in which the force, or, as he terms it, 'the supreme attractional power,'
is concentrated. He terms these poles by analogy to the earth ; and he
will have it understood that these poles are not mathematical points, as

* According to Humboldt, "the barbarous word magnetismus" was intro-
duced in the eighteenth century.

J44

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the attraction manifests itself 'all over the periphery.' Following the
same analogy, he calls the line joining the two poles the axis of the
magnet, and the equator the line equally distant from them. With the
aid of his steel versorium, he recognizes that similar poles are mutually
hostile, whilst opposite poles seize and hold each other in friendly em-
brace. He also satisfies himself that the energy of magnets resides not
only in their extremities, but that it permeates 'their inmost parts,
being entire in the whole and entire in each part.' This is exactly what
we say ; it is nothing else than the molecular theory proposed by Weber,
extended by Ewing and universally accepted.

At any rate, Gilbert is quite certain that whatever magnetism may
be, it is not, like electricity, a material, ponderable substance ; he ascer-
tained this by weighing in the most accurate scales of a goldsmith a rod
of iron before and after it had been rubbed with the lodestone, and
then observing that the weight is precisely the same in both cases, being
'neither less nor more.' He discovers also that not only the magnet,
but all the space surrounding it, possesses magnetic properties ; for the
magnet 'sends its force abroad in all directions, according to its energy
and quality.' This region of influence he calls orlis virtutis, a sphere,
or, as we call it, a field of force. With wonderful intuition, he sees this
space filled with lines of magnetic virtue passing out radially from his

spherical lodestone, and he calls
these lines radii virtutis magnet-
icae, rays of magnetic force.

When Faraday spoke of field
of force, magnetic field, lines of
electric and magnetic induction,
some thought the idea new,
whereas not only the idea, but also
the very terms occur with appro-
priate illustrations in De Mag-
nete.

Clerk Maxwell was so fasci-
nated with that beautiful concept
that he made it the work of his life
to study the field of force due to
electrified bodies, to magnets and to conductors conveying currents ; his
powerful intellect visualized those lines and gave them accurate mathe-
matical expression in the great treatise on electricity and magnetism
which he gave to the world in 1873.

Gilbert observes that the lodestone may be spherical or oblong;
'whatever the shape, imperfect or irregular, verticity is present, there are
poles,' and the lodestones 'have the selfsame way of turning to the poles
of the world.' We find Gilbert working even with a ring of iron. He

Fig. 1. Gilbert's Spherical Lodestone and
Field of Magnetic Force.

GILBERT OF COLCHESTER. 345

strokes it with a natural magnet and feels certain that he has mag-
netized it ; and he assures ns that 'one of the poles will be at the point
rubbed and the other will be at the opposite side ;' and how does he con-
vince himself that the ring is really magnetized? He cuts it across at
the point opposite the one rubbed, opens it out, and finds that the ends
exhibit polar properties.

A favorite piece of apparatus with Gilbert was a lodestone ground
down into globular form. He called it a terrella, a miniature earth.
He used it extensively for reproducing the phenomena described by
magnetizers, travelers and navigators as observed in their compass
needles. He breaks up terrellas, in order to examine the magnetic con-
dition of their inner parts. There is not a doubtful utterance in his
description of what he finds; he speaks clearly and emphatically. "If
magTietic bodies be divided, or in any way broken up, each several part
hath a north and a south end;"' i. e., each part will be a complete
magnet.

We find him also comparing magnets by Avhat is known to us as
the 'magnetometer method.' He brings the magnetized bars in turn
near a compass needle and concludes that the magnet or the lodestone
which is able to make the needle go round is the best and strongest.
He also seeks to compare magnets by a process of weighing, similar to
what is called, in laboratory parlance, the 'test-nail' method. He also
inquires into the effect of heat upon his magnets, and finds that 'a
lodestone subjected to any great heat loses some of its energy.' He
applies a red-hot iron to a compass needle and notices that it 'stands
still, not turning to the iron.' He thrusts a magnetized bar into the fire
until it is red-hot and shows that it has lost all magnetic power. He
does not stop at this remarkable discovery, for he proceeds to let his
red-hot bars cool while lying in various positions, and he finds : ( 1 ) that
the bar will acquire magnetic properties if it lie in the magnetic merid-
ian; and (2) that it will acquire none if it lie east and west. These
effects he rightly attributes to the inductive action of the earth.

Gilbert marks these and other experiments with marginal asterisks ;
small stars denoting minor and large ones important discoveries of his.
There are in all 21 large and ITS small asterisks, as well as 84 illustra-
tions in De Magnete. This implies a vast amount of original work, and
forms no small contribution to the foundations of electric and magnetic
science.

Gilbert clearly realized the phenomena and laws of magnetic induc-
tion. He tells us that "as soon as a bar of iron comes within the lode-
stone's sphere of influence, though it be at some distance from the
lodestone itself, the iron changes instantly and has its form renewed ;
it was before dormant and inert; but now is quick and active." He
hangs a nail from a lodestone ; a second from the first, a third from the

346

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

second and so on — a well-known experiment, made every da}- for ele-
mentary classes. Xor is this all, for he interposes between his lode-
stone and a mass of iron thick boards, walls of pottery and marble, and
even metals, and he finds that there is nanght so solid as to do away
with this force or to check it, save a plate of iron. All that can be added
to this pregnant observation is that the plate of iron mnst be very thick
in order to carry all the lines of force dne to the magnet, and thus com-
pletely screen the space beyond.

Bnt Gilbert is astonishing when he goes on to make thick l)oxes of
gold, glass and marble, and suspending his needle within them, declares
with excusable enthusiasm that regardless of the box which imprisons

Fig. 2. Gilbert heated and hammered Bars of Iron in the Magnetic Meridian, and

ALLOWED THEM TO COOL WHILE LYING NORTH {Scptetltrio) AND SOUTH (Auster).

the magnet, it turns to its predestined points of north and south. He
even constructs a box of iron, places his magnet within, observes its be-
havior, and concludes that it turns north and south, and would do so
were 'it shut up in iron vaults sufficiently roomy.' Our experiments
show that if the sides of the box are thin, the needle will experience
the directive force of the earth ; but if they are sufficiently thick — thick
as the walls of an ordinary safe — the inside of such a box will be com-
pletely screened; none of the earth's magnetic lines will get into it so
that the needle will remain indifferently in any position in which it is
placed. A few years ago, the physical laboratory of St. Johns College,
Oxford, was screened from the obtrusive lines of neighboring dynamos

GILBERT OF COLCHESTER. 347

by building two brick walls parallel to each other and eight inches apart
and filling in the space with scrap iron. A delicate magnetometer
showed that this structure allowed no leakage of lines of force through
itj but offered an impenetrable barrier to the magnetic influence of the
working dynamos.

Gilbert's greatest discovery is that the earth itself is a vast globular
magnet. ']\Iagnus magnes ipse est globus terrestris' are his own words.
It has its poles, its axis and equator just as the lodestone or terrella.
The pole in our hemisphere he variously calls north, ])oreal, arctic,
whilst that in the other hemisphere he calls south, austral, antarctic.
He is quite aware that his theory is a grand generalization ; and admits
that it is '^a new and till now unheard-of view,' and so confident is he in
its worth that he is not afraid to say that 'it will stand as firm as aught
that ever was produced in philosophy, backed by ingenious argumenta-
tion or buttressed by mathematical demonstration.' Three hundred
years have jDassed aw^ay, and Gilbert's theory is accepted by every man
of science and is taught in every school of physics. Moreover, save the
correction of a few errors of observation, no change of any importance
has been made in it.

Gilbert sought to explain the magnetic condition of our globe by
the presence, especially in its innermost parts, of what he calls true
terrene matter, homogeneous in structure and endowed with magnetic
properties, so that every separate fragment of the earth exhibits the
whole force of magnetic matter. We attribute terrestrial magnetism to
the vast masses of magnetic material which lie near the surface, for at a
depth of ten or twelve miles the temperature of the ferruginous masses
would deprive them of all magnetic properties. The magnetic condi-
tion of the earth is also attributed to the action of electric currents con-
tinually flowing through the crust of the earth. Both these theories,
as Professor Eiicker, of London, said in 1891, are beset with difficulties;
at present we must content ourselves with accumulating facts in the
hope that a clue to an explanation may hereafter be found.

Gilbert's discovery enabled him to offer a philosophical explanation
of the behavior of both compass and dipping needles, as well as of a
great many other phenomena. The declination was known before Gil-
bert's time. Columbus noticed this want of coincidence between the
geographical and magnetic meridians in his first voyage to the New
World. It was on September 13, 1492, when 200 leagues west of Ten-
eriffe, that his attentive eye observed that the magnet pointed slightly
west of north, and that this angular deviation increased during the fol-
lowing days.* For a time he kept the secret in his own mind ; the pilots,
however, soon perceived the variations and grew alarmed, deserted, as

* Columbus was thus the first to observe that the declination or 'variation
of the compass,' as it is called, changes with place.

348

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

they said they were, on the trackless ocean by their only trusty guide.
Columbus calmed their fears by saying that the needle did not turn to
the polar star, but to some fixed and invariable point near it. This
explanation, born of inspiration, quieted the sailors, who marveled
much at the Admiral's great astronomical knowledge. Gilbert rightly
states that the declination changes with place, but he slips into error
when he says : "As the needle hath ever inclined towards east or towards
west, so even now does the arc of variation continue to be the same in
whatever place or region, be it sea or continent; so, too, will it be for-
ever unchanging."

We know, however, that for any given place this angle is continu-
ously, though slowly, changing. Some of these changes require cen-
turies for the completion of their cycle, and are therefore called
'secular'; others require but a year, and are termed 'annual'; whilst
others run their course in the space of a day and are known as 'diurnal.'
Though these periodic changes in the declination have been established
by careful and prolonged observations, we can not say that they are yet
satisfactorily accounted for.

The dip of the needle was also familiar to Gilbert, having been first
observed in 1576 by Robert Korman. Our philosopher illustrates this
phenomenon by balancing a piece of steel so that it remains exactly

horizontal when unmagnetized,
and by observing that the moment
it is stroked by a magnet its north-
seeking end dips 'as low as the
fulcrum on which it is supported
permits.' Gilbert moves a needle
over his terella, and finds (1) that
the dip is 0° on the equator, (2)
that it gradually increases with the
latitude being 90° at either pole.

He extends this experiment
from the terrella to the earth itself,
and even devises an instrument for
determining the latitude of any
place on land or on sea in the
thickest weather and in the darkest night, 'without the help of sunne,
moone, or starre.' In this, however, he was wTong. For he assumed
the isoclinic lines to be circles running parallel to the magnetic equator,
which he erroneously supposed to coincide with the geogrpahical
equator.

Gilbert recognized that the earth exerts on a freely movable needle
a force that gives it direction and not a motion of translation. He illus-
trates this by fioating a needle on a cork and observing that it points

'E=0=J>

<=G:Sj

<J=o=4

P=e^>

Fig. 3. Gilbert's Terella showing the Be-
havior OF A Dipping-needle at its
Poles, Equator and other
Intervening Places.

GILBERT OF COLCHESTER.

349

N. and S., remaining all the while at any place in the vessel of water
in which it may be put. His words, though quaint, are exact: "It re-
volves on its iron center, and is not borne towards the rim of the vessel."
He knew nothing of the mechanical couple in play; but he knew the
fact ; and with the instinct of a true philosopher, tested it in a variety of
ways. With a most Imninous insight into terrestrial magnetic phe-
nomena, he observed that near the poles a compass needle tending, as
it does, to dip greatly, must necessarily experience only a feeble hori-
zontal directive force. To this he adds that 'at the poles there is no
direction,' meaning thereby that a properly balanced compass needle

Fig. 4. Gilbert's Method of showing Magnetic Dip.

would remain indifferently in any azimuth in which it might be placed.
We express the same by saying that the horizontal component of the
earth's force vanishes at the poles.

Gilbert dwells at length on the inductive action of the earth. We
have seen him hammering heated bars of iron and then allowing them
to cool while lying in the magnetic meridian. He notes that they be-
come magnetized, and does not fail to point out the polarity of each
end. He likewise attributes to the influence of the earth the magnetic
condition acquired by iron bars that have for a long time lain fixed in
the north and south position as bars often are fixed in buildings and in
windows, and he ingenuously adds : for great is the effect of long-con-

350 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tinned direction of a body towards the poles. To the same cause he
attributes the magnetization of iron crosses fixed to steeples, towers, etc.
It must be evident from this brief analysis of De Magnete,

1. That Gilbert was acquainted with all the facts in magnetism
known in his days ;

2. That he added profusely to the number;

3. That he coordinated these facts and deduced the laws which
govern them; and

■ 4. That he was the first to offer a scientific explanation of the be-
havior of the compass and the dip needle, as well as of numerous other
phenomena, correctly attributed by him to the magnetic state of our
globe.

Such were some of the 'rowing pins,' as Chancellor Bacon ironically
calls them, with which Gilbert built up one of the greatest monuments
ever erected by the genius of one man. Had Gilbert done nothing else
than propound and establish on the solid basis of observation and ex-
periment his theory that the earth is a great magnet, his name would
ever li^e in the annals of science, surrounded with a halo that even the
unjust strictures of Bacon could not dim; but when we consider his
spirited advocacy of research at the end of the sixteenth century, and
the cardinal advances he achieved in the interpretation of two great
branches of knowledge, we can have no hesitation in considering him
with Poggendorff, 'the Galileo of Magnetism,' and with Priestley, 'the
Founder of Modern Electricity.'

Were we asked to write an inscription for his statue, we should write
the simple words:

Gilbert, the Columbus of the Electrical World.

THE PEOPLING OF THE PHILIPPINES.

351

THE PEOPLING OF THE PHILIPPINES.

By professor RUD. VIRCHOW.

PART II.*

When, on the 18th of March, 1897, I made a commnnication on the
popuhition of the Philippines, a bloody uprising had broken out every-
where against the existing Spanish rule. In this uprising a certain
portion of the population, and indeed that which had the most valid
claim to aboriginality, the so-called Negritos, was not involved. Their
isolation, their lack of every sort of political, often indeed of village
organization, also their meager numbers, render it conceivable that the
greatest changes might go on among their neighbors without their
taking such a practical view of them as to lead to their engaging in
them. Thus it can be understood how they would take no interest in
the further development of the affair.

Since then the result of the war between Spain and the United States
has been the destruction of Spanish power, and the treaty of Paris
brought the entire Philippine Archipelago into the possession of the
United States of America. Henceforth the principal interest is
centered upon the deportment of the insurgents, who have not only
outlived the great war between the powers, but are now determined to
assert, or win, their independence from the conquerors. These insur-
gents, who for brevity are called Filipinos, belong, as I have remarked,
to the light-colored race of so-called Indios, who are sharply differen-
tiated from the Negritos. Their ethnological position is difficult to
fix, since numerous mixtures have taken place with immigrant whites,
especially with Spaniards, but also with people of yellow and of brown
races — that is, with Mongols and Chinese, f Perhaps here and there the
importance of this mixture on the composite type of the Indios has
been overestimated ; at least in most places positive proof is not
forthcoming that foreign blood has imposed itself upon the bright-
colored population. Both history and tradition teach, on the contrary,
as also the study of the physical peculiarities of the people, that among
the various tribes differences exist which suggest family traits. To
this effect is the testimony of several travelers who have followed one

* Sitzungsbericlite der Koniglichen Preussischen Akademie der Wissen-
schaften zu Berlin. Berlin, 1899, Vol. Ill, 19tli .January, pp. 14-26.

t Note. — A brief resume of these many mixtures is given in Tour du
Monde, 27th May and 3d June, 1882; see also statement in this translation.
— Translator.

352 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

another during a long period of time, as has been developed especially
by Blumentritt.

In this connection it must not be overlooke'd that all these immigra-
tions, howsoever many they be supposed to have been, must have
come this way from the west. Indeed, a noteworthy migration from
the east is entirely barred out, if we look no farther back than the
Chinese and Japanese. On the contrary, all signs point to the assump-
tion that from of old, long before the coming of Portuguese and
Spaniards, a strong movement had gone on from this region to the
east, and that the great sea way which exists between Mindanao and
the Sulu islands on the north and Halmahera and the Moluccas on
the south was the entrance road along which those tribes, or at least
those navigators whose arrival peopled the Polynesian Islands, found
their way into the Pacific Ocean. But also the movement of the
Polynesians points to the west, and if their ancestors may have come
from Indonesia there is no doubt that in their long journeys east-
ward they must have touched at the coasts of other islands on their
way, especially the Philippines. Polynesian invasions of the Philip-
pines are not supposed to have closed when a migration of peoples or
of men passing out to the Pacific Ocean laid the foundation of a large
fraction of the population of the archipelago. It is known that now
and then single canoes from the Palawan or the Ladrone islands were
driven upon the east coast of Luzon, but their importance ought not
to be overestimated. The migration this wav from the west must
henceforth remain as the point of departure for all explanations of
this eastern ethnology.

[These statements are well enough for working hypotheses, but actual
proofs are not at hand. Ratzel, Berl. Verhandl., etc.j Phil. Hist. Class, 1898, I,
p. 33. — Translator.]

Xow, how are the local differences of various tribes to be explained,
when on the whole the place of origin was the same? Is there here a
secondary variation of the type, something brought about through
climate, food, circumstances? It is a large theme, which, unfortu-
nately, is too often dominated by previously-formed theories. The
importance of 'environment' and mode of life upon the corporeal
development of man can not be contested, but the measure of this
importance is very much in doubt. Kowhere is this measure, at least
in the present consideration, less known than in the Philippines. In
spite of wide geological and biological differences on these islands,
there exists a close anthropological agreement of the Indios in the
chief characteristics, and the effort to trace back the tribal differences
that have been marked to climatic and alimentary causes has not suc-
ceeded. The influence of inherited peculiarities is also more mighty
here, as in most parts of the earth, than that of 'milieu.'

THE PEOPLING OF THE PHILIPPINES. 353

If we assume, first, that the immigrants brought their peculiarities
with them, which were fixed already when they came, we must also
accept as self-evident that the Negritos of the Philippines do not
belong to the same stock as the more powerful, bright-colored Indios.
As long as these islands have been known, more than three centuries,
the skin of the Negritos has been dark brown, almost black, their hair
short and spirally twisted, and just as long has the skin of the Indios
been brownish, in various shades, relatively clear, and the hair has been
long and arranged in wavy locks. At no time, so far as known, has it
been discovered that among a single family a pronounced variation
from these peculiarities had taken place. On this point there is entire
unanimity. In case of the Negritos there is not the least doubt; of
the Indios a doubt may arise, for, in fact, the shades of skin color
appear greatly varied, since the brown is at times quite blackish, at
times yellowish, almost as varied as is the color of the sunburnt hair.
But even then the practised eye easily detects the descent, and if the
skin alone is not sufficient the first glance at the hair completes the
diagnosis. The correct explanation of individual or tribal variations
is difficult only with the Indios, while no such necessity exists in the
case of the Negritos. But among the Indios these individual and
tribal variations are so frequent and so outspoken that one is justified
in making the inquiry whether there has not developed here a new
type of inherited peculiarities. If this were the case, it must still be
held that already the immigrant tribes had possessed them.

Now, history records that different immigrations have actually
taken place. Laying aside the latest before the arrival of the Span-
iards, that of the Islamites, in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries,
there remains the older one. If ethnologists and travelers in gen-
eral come to the conclusion concerning Borneo — and it is to be taken as
certain — that the differences now existing among the wild tribes of this
island are very old, it ought not be thought so wonderful if, according
to the conditions of the tribes which have immigrated thence, there
should exist on the Philippines near one another dissimilar though
related peoples. This difference is not difficult to recognize in man-
ners and customs — a side of the discussion which is further on to be
treated more fully. We begin with physical characteristics.

Among these the hair occupies the chief place. To be sure, among
all the Indios it is black, but it shows not the slightest approach
to the frizzled condition which is such a prominent feature in the
external appearance of the Negritos and of all the Papuan tribes of
the East. This frizzled condition may be called woolly, or in some-
what exaggerated refinement in the name may be attributed to the
term 'wool,' all sorts of meanings akin to wool; in every case there
is wanting to all the Indios the crinkling of the hair from its exit out

VOL. LIX. — 24

354 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of the follicle, whereby would result wide or narrow spiral tubes and
the coarse appearance of the so-called 'peppercorn.' The hair of all
Indios is smooth and straightened out, and when it forms curves they
are only feeble, and they make the whole outward appearance wavy
or, at most, curled.

But within this wavy or curled condition of the hair there are again
differences. In my former communication I called attention to exami-
nations which I made upon a large number of islands in the Malay
Sea, and in which it was shown that a certain area exists which begins
with the Moluccas and extends to the Sunda group, in which the hair
shows a strong inclination to form wavy locks, indeed passes grad-
ually into crinkled, if not into spiral, rolls. Such hair is found spe-
cially in the interior of the islands, where the so-called aboriginal
population is purer and where for a long time the name of Alfuros*
has been conferred on them. On most points affinity with Negritos
or Papuans is not to be recognized. Should such at any time have
existed, we are a long way from the period when the direct causes
thereof are to be looked for. In this connection the study of the
Philippines is rich with instruction. In the limits of the almost insu-
lar, isolated Negrito enclave, mixtures between Negritos and Indios
very seldom surprise one, and never the transitions that can have
arisen in the post-generative time of development. [The island of
Negros, on the contrary, is peopled by such crossbreeds. — Teans-

LATOR.]

If there are among the bright-colored islanders of the Indian Ocean
Alfuros and Malays close together there is nothing against coming
upon this contrast in the Philippine population also. Among the
more central peoples the tribal differences are so great that almost
every explorer stumbles on the question of mixture. There not only
the Dayaks and the other Malays obtrude themselves, but also the
Chinese and the Mongolian peoples of Farther India. Indeed, many
facts are known, chiefly in the language,! the religion, the domestic
arts, the agriculture, the pastoral life which remind one of known
conditions peculiarly Indian. The results of the ethnologists are so
tangled here that one has to be cautious when one or another of them
draws conclusions concerning immigrations, because of certain local
or territorial specializations. Of course, when a Brahmanic custom
occurs anywhere it is right to conclude that it came here from India.
But before assuming that the tribe in which such a custom prevails
itself comes from Hither or Farther India, the time has to be ascer-

* On this objectionable namcj see supra. That the term does not
connote hair characters cf. A. B. Meyer, Sitzungsb. d. Phil. Hist. Classe der
kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissensch. Wien, 1882, Vol. CI, p. 550. — Teanslator.

t Don T. H. Pardo de Tavera, El sanscrito e la lengua tagalog. Paris, 1887.

THE PEOPLING OF TEE PHILIPPINES. 355

tained to which the custom is to be traced back. The chronological
evidence leads to the confident belief that the custom and the tribe
immigrated together.

Over the whole Philippine Archipelago religious customs have
changed with the progress of external relations. Christianity has in
many places spread its peculiar customs, observances and opinions,
and changed entirely the direction of thought. On closer view are to
be detected in the midst of Christian activities older survivals, as
ingredients of belief which, in spite of that religion, have not vanished.
Before Christianity, in many places, Islam flourished, and it is not
surprising to witness, as on Mindanao, Christian and Mohammedan
beliefs side by side. But, before Islam, ancestor worship, as has long
been known, was widely prevalent. In almost every locality, every
hut has its Anito with its special place, its own dwelling; there are
Anito pictures and images, certain trees and, indeed, certain animals
in which some Anito resides. The ancestor worship is as old as
history, for the discoverers of the Philippines found it in full bloom,
and rightly has Blumentritt* characterized Anito worship as the
ground form of Philippine religion. He has also furnished numerous
examples of Anito cult surviving in Christian communities.

Chronology has a good groundwork and it will have to observe every
footprint of vanishing creeds. Onl}^, it must not be overlooked that
the beginning of the chronology of religion has not been reached, and
that the origin of the generally diffused ancestor worship, at least on
the Philippines, is not known. If it is borne in mind that belief in
Anitos is widely diffused in Polynesia and in purely Malay areas, the
drawing of certain conclusions therefrom concerning the prehistory of
the Philippines is to be despaired of.

Next to religious customs, among wild tribes fashions are most
enduring. Little of costume is to be seen, indeed, among them. There-
fore, here tattooing asserts its sway. The more it has been studied in
late years the more valuable has been the information in deciding the
kinship relations of tribes. Unfortunately, in the Philippines the
greater part of the early tattoo designs have been lost, and the art itself
is also nearly eliminated. But since the journey of Carl Semperf it
has been known that not only Malays but also Negritos tattoo ; indeed,
this admirable explorer has decided that the 'Negroes of the East
Coast' practise a different method of tattooing from that of the Mari-
vales in the west, and on that account they attain different results. In
the one case a needle is employed to make fine holes in the skin in

* Der Ahnencultus und die religiosen Anschauungen der Malaien des Philip-
pinen-ArcMpels. Wien, 1882, p. 2. (From Mittheil. der K. K. Geograpli.
Gesellschaft) .

t Die Philippinen und ihre Bewohner. Wiirzburg, 1869, pp. 50, 137.

356 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

which to introduce the color ; in the other long gashes are made. In the
latter case prominent scars result; in the former a smooth pattern.
But these combined patterns are on the whole the same, instead of
rectilinear figures. Schadenburg has the operations commence with a
sharpened bamboo on children 10 years of age.* Among the wild
tribes of the light-colored population tattooing is not less diffused, but
the patterns are not alike in the different tribes. Isabelo de los Reyes
reports thatf the Tinguianes, who inhabit the mountain forests of the
northern Cordilleras of Luzon, produce figures of stars, snakes, birds,
etc., on children 7 to 9 years old. Hans Meyer describes the patterns
of the Igorrotes.| There appears to exist a great variety of symbols;
for example, on the arms, straight and crooked lines crossing one
another; on the breast, feather-like patterns. Least frequently he saw
the so-called Burik designs, which extended in parallel bands across
the breast, the back, and calves, and give to the body the appearance of
a sailor's striped jacket. It is very remarkable that the human form
never occurs.

What is true concerning tattooing on so many Polynesian islands
holds also completely here. But reliable descriptions are so few, and
especially there is such a meager number of useful drawings, that it
would not repay the trouble to assemble the scattered data. At least
it will suffice to discover whether among them there are genuine tribal
marks or to investigate concerning the distribution of separate patterns.
Those laiown show conclusively that in the matter of tattooing the
Filipinos are not differentiated from the islanders of the Pacific; they
form, moreover, an important link in the chain of knowledge wliich
demonstrates the genetic homogeneity of the inhabitants. The tattoo-
ings of the eastern islanders are comparable only to those of African
aborigines, with which last they furnish many family marks, made out
and recognized. It is desirable that a trustworthy collection of all
patterns be made before the method becomes more altered or destroyed.

Next to the skin, among the wild tribes the teeth are modified in
the most numerous artificial alterations. The preferable custom, com-
mon in Africa, of breaking out the front teeth in greater or less number
has not, so far as I remember, been described among the Filipinos;
I only mention that while I was making a revision of our Philippine
crania, two of them turned up in which the middle upper incisors had
evidently been broken out for a long time, for the alveolar border had
shrunk into a small quite smooth ridge, without a trace of an alveolus.
It is otherwise with the pointing of the incisors, especially the upper

* Zeitsclirift fiir Etlmologie, 1880, XII, p. 136.

t Die Tinguianen ( Luzon ) . Translated from the Spanish by F. Blumen-
tritt (Mitth. der K. K. Geograph. Ges. in Wien), 1887.

t Verhandl. der Berliner Gesellsch. fiir Anthropologie, 1883, p. 380.

TEE PEOPLING OF THE PHILIPPINES. 357

ones, which, also, is not common. I must leave it undecidecl whether
the sharpening is done by filing or by breaking off pieces from
the sides. The latter should be in general far more frequent. In
every case the otherwise broad and flat teeth are brought to such
sharp points as to project like those of the carnivorous animals. I
have met with this condition several times on Negrito skulls and fur-
nished illustrations of them.* On a Zambal skull, excavated by Dr.
A. B. Meyer and which I lay before you, the deformation is easy to be
seen. I called attention at the time to the fact that among the Malays
an entirely different method of modifying the teeth is in vogue, in
which a horizontal filing on the front surface is practised and the sharp
lower edge is straightened and widened. Already the elder Thevenot
has accentuated this contrast when he says :

"These cause the teeth to be equal, those file them to points, giving
them the shape of a saw."f

This difference appears to have held on till the present; at least
no skull of an Indio is known to me with similar deformation of the
teeth. This custom of the Negritos is so much more remarkable since
the chipping of the corners of the teeth is widely spread among the
African blacks.

The other part of the body used most for deformation — the skull —
is in strong contrast to the last-named custom. Deformed crania,
especially from older times, are quite numerous in the Philippines;
probably they belong exclusively to the Indies. If they exist among
the Negritos, I do not know it; the only exception comes from the
Tinguianes, of whom J. de los Eeyes reports their skulls are flattened
behind (por detras oprimido). Such flattening is found, however, not
seldom among tribes who have the practise of binding children on
hard cradle boards — chiefly among those families who keep their
infants a long time on such contrivances. A sure mark by which to
discriminate accidental pressure of this sort from one intentionally
produced is not at hand; it may be that in accidental deformation
oblique position of the deformed spot is more frequent; at any rate,
the difference in the Philippines is a very striking one, since there not
so much the occiput as the front and middle portions suffer from the
disfigurements, and thereby deformations are produced that have
bad their most perfect expression among the ancient Peruvians and
other American tribes.

I have discussed cranial deformation of the Americans in greater
detail, where I exhibit the accidental and the artificial (intentional)

* Abhandlung iiber alte und neue Schadel, in F. Jagor's Reisen in den
Pfeilippinen. Berlin, 1873, p. 374, PI. II, figs. 4 and 5.

tG. A. Baer (Verhandl. d. Berliner Anthrop. Gesellscliaft, 1879, p. 331)
says that such an operation obtains only among Negritos of pure blood.

3S8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

deformation in their principal forms.* The result is that in large
sections of America scarcely any ancient skulls are found having their
natural forms, but that the practise of deformation has not been gen-
eral; moreover, a number of deformation centers may be differentiated
which stand in no direct association with one another. The Peruvian
center is far removed from that of the northwest coast, and this again
from that of the Gulf States. From this it must not be said that
each center may have had its own, as it' were, autochthonous origin.
But the method has not so spread that its course can be followed
immediately. Eather is the supposition confirmed that the method is
to be traced to some other time, therefore that somewhere there must
have been a place of origin for it. On the Eastern Hemisphere, and
especially in the region here under consideration, the relations are
apparently otherwise. Here exist, so far as known, great areas
entirely free from deformation; small ones, on the other hand, full
of it. There are here, also, deformation centers, but only a few.
Among these, with our present knowledge, the Philippines occupy the
first place.

The knowledge of this, indeed, is not of long duration. Public
attention was first aroused about thirty years ago concerning skulls
from Samar and Luzon, gathered by F. Jagor from ancient caves, to
furnish the proof of their deformation. Up to that time next to
nothing was known of deformed crania in the oriental island world.
First through my publication! the attention of J. G. Eiedel, a most
observant Dutch resident, was called to the fact that cranial deforma-
tion is still practised in the Celebes, and he was so good as to send
us a specimen of the compressing apparatus for infants (1874). J
Compressed crania were also found. But the number was small and
the compression of the separate specimens was only slight. In both
respects what was observed in the Sunda islands did not differ from
the state of the case in the Philippines. Through Jagor's collections
different places had become known where deformed crania were
buried. Since then the number of localities has multiplied. I shall
mention only two, on account of their peculiar position. One is Cagra-
ray, a small island east of Luzon, in the Pacific Ocean, at the entrance
of the Bay of Albay ;§ the other, the island of Marinduque, in the west,
between Luzon and Mindoro. From the last-named island I saw, ten
years ago, the first picture of one in a photograph album accidentally

* Crania ethnica Americana. Berlin, 1892, p. 5, and figs.

t Zeitschr. fiir Ethnologie, 1870, Vol. II, p. 151.

$The same, III, p. 110, PI. V, fig. 1; Verhandl. Anthrop. Ges., Vol. VI, p.
215; Vol. VII, p. 11; Vol. VIII, p. 69; Vol. IX, p. 276.

§ Verhandl. der Berliner Anthrop. Gesellsch., 1879, Vol. XI, p. 422; 1889,
Vol. XXI, p. 49.

TEE PEOPLING OF TEE PEILIPPINES. 359

placed in my hands. Since then I had opportunity to examine the
Schadenberg collection of crania, lately come into the possession of the
Eeichsmuseum, in Leyden, and to my great delight discovered in it a
series of skulls which are compressed in exactly the same fashion as
those of Lanang. It is said that these will soon be described in a
publication.

It is of especial interest that this method has been noted in the
Philippines for more than three hundred years. In my first publication
I cited a passage in Thevenot where he says, on the testimony of a
priest, that the natives on some islands had the custom of compressing
the head of a newborn child between two boards, so that it would be
no longer round, but lengthened out; also they flattened the forehead,
which they looked upon as a special mark of beauty. This is, there-
fore, an ancient example. It is confirmed by the circumstance that
these crania are found especially in caves, from the roofs of which
mineral waters have dripped, which have overlaid the bones partly
with a thick layer of calcareous matter. The bones themselves have
an uncommonly thick, almost ivory, fossil-like appearance. Only the
outer surface is in places corroded, and on these places saturated with
a greenish infiltration. It is to be assumed, therefore, that they are
very old. I have the impression that they must have been placed here
before the discovery of the islands and the introduction of Christianity.
Their peculiar appearance, especially their angular form and the thick-
ness of the bone, reminds one of crania from other parts of the South
Sea, especially those from Chatham and Sandwich Islands. I shall
not here go further into this question, but merely mention that I came
to the conclusion that these people must be looked upon as proto-
Malayan.

The changes which will take place in the political condition of the
Philippines may be of little service to scientific exploration at first;
but the study of the population will be surely taken up with renewed
energy. Already in America scholars have begun to occupy them-
selves therewith. A brief article by Dr. Brinton is to be mentioned
as the first sign of this.* But should the ardent desire of the Filipinos
be realized, that their islands should have political autonomy, it is
to be hoped that, out of the patriotic enthusiasm of the population
and the scientific spirit of many of their best men, new sources of
information will be opened for the history and the development of
oriental peoples. To this end it may be here mentioned, by the way,
that the connecting links of ancient Philippine history and the cus-
toms of these islands, as well with the Melanesians as with the Poly-
nesians of the south, are yet to be discovered.

* The Peoples of the Philippines, Washington, D. C, 1898. American
Anthropologist.

36o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

As representatives of these two groups, I present, in closing, two
especially well-formed crania from the Philippines. One of them,
which shows the marks of antiquity that I have set forth, belongs to
an Indio. It has the high cranial capacity of 1,540 cubic centi-
meters, a horizontal circumference of 525 millimeters, and a sagittal
circumference of 386 millimeters; its form is hypsidolicho, quite on the
border of mesocephaly: Index of width, 75,3; index of height, 76.3.
Besides, it has the appearance of a race capable of development; only,
the nose is platyrrhine (index, 52.3), as among so many Malay tribes,
and in the left temple it bears a Processus frontalis squamae temporalis
developed partly from an enlarged fontanelle. The other skull
was taken from a Negrito grave of Zambales by Dr. A. B. Meyer.
It makes, at first glance, just as favorable an impression, but its
capacity is only 1,182 cubic centimeters; therefore 358 cubic centi-
meters less than the other. Its form is orthobrachycephalic ; breadth
index, 80.2; height index, 70.6. As in single traits of development, so
in the measurements, the difference and the debased character of this
race obtrude themselves. Only, the nasal index is somewhat smaller;
on the whole, the nose has in its separate parts a decidedly pithecoid
form.

SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY. 361

SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY.
By professor r. m. wenley,

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN.

TTTHETHEK the average man recognize the situation or palter
^ ^ with it, there can be no doubt that a dualism, a separation, if
not an antagonism, between science and religion forms one con-
spicuous phenomenon of modern life. True, palliating circumstances
may have eased or disguised it somewhat in recent years. But pallia-
tion was always a makeshift, and, everything considered, the funda-
mental opposition remains, little mitigated. Of course, we may allege
that religion and theology are by no means identical, and that the
latter rather than the former withstands scientific views and con-
clusions. Yet, when we summon courage to be quite frank with our-
selves, we must admit freely that religion, as an organized social
factor, is so bound up with theological presuppositions as to render
this distinction more of a subterfuge than a solution. Again, many
in these days seem to think that another marked contrariety of inter-
est characterizes the relation between science and philosophy. And,
indeed, one must admit that, altogether apart from theoretical prob-
lems, certain features of the academic world, in such countries as Scot-
land and the United States, for example, afford basis for this prev-
alent opinion. In the Scottish universities one-half of the professors
of philosophy are clergymen. In the universities and colleges of the
United States the theological affiliations are even more intimate.
Speaking from memory, I recall that in only three of our nine lead-
ing universities do we find the philosophical departments free from
clerical influence, while, in the lesser institutions, clerical control con-
stitutes the rule, not the exception. Small wonder, then, if many
have identified the tendencies of philosophy with the theological, as
opposed to the scientific, side of contemporary controversy.

But, if manifold causes thus support the view that science and
philosophy must necessarily conflict, there happen to be other aspects
of the matter well worth consideration. In Germany, for instance, the
home land of philosophical inquiry during the nineteenth century,
the progress of science has been exercising decisive influence on specu-
lative thought for a generation at least. Furthermore, the rise and
development of experimental psychology has induced many, whose
main work lies on the philosophical rather than on the scientific side

362 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of the fence, to familiarize themselves with the scientific attitude and
temper, while the gradual entry of the sciences into the usual under-
graduate course at our colleges has not left the earlier education of
those who come afterwards to specialize in philosophy so utterly void
of scientific knowledge as it used to be. Moreover, the long com-
merce of our ablest students with German culture cannot but have pro-
duced similar modifications. Be this as it may, the point I desire to
emphasize is that no conflict can exist properly between science and
philosophy, and that a most interesting — possibly the most hopeful —
trait of recent thought may be traced precisely in the inclination
towards an alliance. It ought to be said, too, that some few, whose
work appears to lie in the immediate future — to present symptoms
of decided vitality — tend clearly in this direction. And, when we stay
to reflect for a moment, why should it not be so? Science and
philosophy possess this in common — they search for the truth free
from all trammels of dogmatic presupposition. If they prove true to
themselves, their object must be the same, even if they view it from
different sides and for different purposes. Take them from what
standpoint you please, both are 'science' in the broad sense of the un-
translatable term, Wissenschaft. It may be of interest, therefore, to
devote some attention to the new-old question. What is the relation be-
tween science and philosophy ?

Approaching the problem historically, it proves something of a
shock to learn that the so-called opposition had no existence seventy
years ago. Nay, from the time of Descartes' 'Discours de la Methode'
(1637) till the enunciation of the cellular theory (Schleiden and
Schwann, c. 1838), free interaction, often conscious cooperation, pre-
vailed. Eecall the full title of Descartes' epoch-making tractate,
'Discours de la Methode pour bien conduires sa raison, et chercher la
verite dans les sciences; plus la Dioptrique, les Meteores et la
Geometric, qui sont des Essais de cette Methode'; recall Spinoza, the
optician; recall Leibnitz and his calculus; recall the sober, scientific
temper of the entire British school, from Hobbes to Hume; recall
Kant's cosmogony, the precursor of modern ethereal physics, and re-
member that the critical philosopher likened himself, not to Plato or
Bacon, but to Copernicus; you find no ground for controversy, but
every symptom of mutual good-will. The contrast between this two
hundred years' truce, covering the history of thought from the Eefor-
mation till the French Eevolution, and the undignified, profitless
squabbles, still fresh in the memory of many middle-aged men, is so
striking that a call for reasons goes forth at once. If this matter can
be elucidated, much will have been done to explain away the recent
unfriendliness. At the same time, the case presents peculiar diffi-
culties, because the evolution of thought in this connection furnishes

SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY. 363

one among the great paradoxes of history. Ever fond of revenges, the
Time-spirit becomes supremely ironical here.

Post-Eeformation Europe accomplished much for science and phi-
losophy. In both fields, investigation followed clearly marked lines,
but the conclusions reached were of such a nature that they dove-
tailed easily. For science meant the mathematico-physical sciences,
specifically, mathematics, astronomy and 'molar' physics. Philosophy
meant, on the continent, the metaphysics of dualism, starting from
the question, How can matter and mind, extension and thought, as
they were then termed, be related so as to form a consistent whole; in
Britain, individualistic psychology, concentrated on the problem. How
do I get knowledge, and, when obtained, what is it? In a word, the
sciences and philosophy attacked the same universe — the universe as
conceived by Newton. Philosophy did not aspire to a higher knowl-
edge than that reached by science, but confined its inquiries to some
aspects of the world which had been left untouched by mathematics
and physics. Thus both arrived at consonant conclusions. Harvey,
for example, did not suggest that Bacon wrote on scientific questions
like a philosopher, as he would assuredly have done had they lived
forty years ago ; he said merely, the Lord Chancellor writes like a Lord
Chancellor — a lawyer of assured position.

The general view of the universe then held by scientific men sup-
plied the framework within which the philosophers labored; it did not
occur to the metaphysicians that the modes of thought in which this
universe was conceived could be subjected to fundamental criticism.
What, next, was this view? Briefly, it may be called static, molar and
mechanical in the strictest sense of the word mechanism. It dealt with
self-contained bodies in equilibrium or at rest; with self-contained ag-
gregations of matter capable of measurement; with the relations sub-
sisting between self-contained wholes; that is, with external connection,
not with internal self-manifestation. As time passed, this general con-
ception of things became more and more firmly rooted, thanks to
Newton's genius. Indeed, it maintained itself with little change,
especially in the English-speaking countries and in France, till forty-
five years of the nineteenth century had winged their way. Whewell,
in his great 'History of the Inductive Sciences' (1837-57), displays
astonishing ignorance of the transformations that were afoot in his
day — of Gauss and Weber on absolute measurements, of Schwann on
the cell theory, of Mohl on protoplasm, of Mayer on heat, of Helm-
holtz on the conservation of energy, of Herapath on the mechanical
theory of gases and the like. If the hold of the 'Newtonian philosophy'
remained so strong at this date, we can infer readily how exclusive was
its predominance in previous times. Now the theory of the universe
contained in the Principia had a distinctively philosophical aspect

364 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

in so far as it was universal. Otherwise it presents few qualities to
which we should attach this name at present. For the system con-
templated the division of matter into separate parts, each of which
occupied a place — a place subject to change, no doubt — in empty
space, while to these circling orbs force was linked somehow. The
relation between any two, therefore, can not be the result of inherent
nature, but must follow from the interference of a cause external to the
terms of the relation. Newton has put himself on decided record on
this very question. In a letter to Bentley, written about the new year
of 1693, he says: "It is inconceivable that inanimate brute matter
should, without the mediation of something else, which is not material,
operate upon and effect other matter without mutual contact, as it
must be, if gravitation, in the sense of Epicurus, be essential and in-
herent in it. And this is one reason why I desired you would not
ascribe innate gravity to me. That gravity should be innate, inherent
and essential to matter, so that one body may act upon another at a
distance through a vacuum, without the mediation of anything else,
by and through which their action and force may be conveyed from
one to the other, is to me so great an absurdity that I believe no man,
who has in philosophical matters a competent faculty of thinking,
can ever fall into it. Gravity must be caused by an agent acting con-
stantly according to certain laws; but whether this agent be material
or immaterial, I have left to the consideration of my readers." Sum-
marily put, this means that the solar system is the type of universe,
and it is a system, because 'an agent acting constantly according to
certain laws' has rendered it such. And this implies, further, that,
while a description of the universe may be possible, as in terms of
mathematics, an explanation of it is beyond reach.

Turning to the philosophical side, a curious parallelism attracts
notice at once. Of course, we are dealing no longer with 'heavenly
bodies,' but matter and mind are treated by the philosophers exactly as
Newton dealt with his material wholes. Descartes asks himself in
effect. How is it that thought, which possesses none of the qualities
of extension (matter) and extension, which possesses none of the quali-
ties of thought, comes to unite so as to &e a single whole in man's ex-
perience? He supposes that ideas are copies of things. But, even
so. How do we know that the copies are correct or reasonably ade-
quate? The solution can come by one answer alone. Some agent,
which is neither an idea nor a thing, must vouch for the correspond-
ence. Just as, in the physical world, one body can not affect another,
except by the operation of a law-giving agent, so thought and extension
can not be combined in our universe, except God have so willed it. The
parallelism is precise. A 'third thing,' belonging neither to the sphere
of intellect nor to that of the external world, must be assumed as the

SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY. 365

basis of both. Here we meet that hoary sinner, the 'uncaused cause/
about which, to our modern amazement, the science and philosophy of
that day are agreed entirely.

Passing to England, we find Locke confronted by a different prob-
lem, but the setting remains identical. Assuming, like Newton and
Descartes, two separate factors — others assumed many, but the number
makes no essential difEerence — and asking. How do I, who am inside,
get my knowledge of things, which are outside? Under the circum-
stances, the obvious reply is, through the senses. The senses write
upon the mind. Unfortunately, this information about the external
world lacks directness, for the senses are modifications of the bodily
organism and therefore tell nothing about the real objects. How, then,
placed in such a dilemma, do we know objects ? Locke alleges that Sub-
stance, a thing which we do not perceive, but which we are compelled to
infer, originates the conviction of permanence associated with reality
in objects. Here, once more, a third thing, belonging to neither of the
factors under review, plays the part of Newton's agent and of the
Cartesian deity. Without condescending upon further details, it is easy
to see why science and philosophy could not well fall out during the
period when such conceptions held sway. But this agreement, happy
in its unconsciousness of problems at all events, was not to endure
forever. The world of human experience revealed new aspects, and
fresh questions, sources of dire controversy, loomed upon the horizon.
The dynamic, molecular and organic modes of thought, with their
attendant conception of the universe, were destined to elbow out the
static and mechanical.

Even amid many seeming transformations, the 'Newtonian phi-
losophy^ preserved itself unchanged in essentials. The Deistic move-
ment, Butler's 'Analogy,' Pope's 'Essay on Man' and Paley's 'Natural
Theology,' and the highly wrought productions of the great French
physicists, culminating in Laplace's 'Mecanique Celeste,' even the
Scottish 'common-sense' protest against current scepticism, all emerged
on the basis of its first principles. But, after the middle of the eight-
eenth century, three men shook it to its foundations and made pos-
sible the new structure we now call 'modem' thought. These men
were Hume, Kant and Herder; the half-conscious protest of Spinoza
had passed over the heads of his contemporaries unheeded. Was he
not a Jew, a pantheist and, therefore, a flat blasphemer? The joint per-
formance of this eighteenth century trinity, 'equal in power and glory,'
raises problems of the most complicated kind, so complicated, indeed,
that they have been the bugbear even of expert students during the
last two generations. I can attempt here to put the salient points
only, as clearly as possible.

Many pious efforts to understand Hume have been frustrated by

366 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the idea that he was a dangerous sceptic, an infidel, a bold, bad man
and what not. The simple truth happens to be that Himie found him-
self confronted by certain definite questions which had grown under
the hands of his predecessors. In his case, the power of the man
coincided with the power of the moment; and he still occupies his
lonely pedestal as the single thinker of the first-class produced by the
Anglo-Saxon race, because he settled the account of an age once for
all. Had this been comprehended sooner, the nineteenth century
would have been saved a wealth of waste paper and some lost temper.
Eeduced to its simplest elements, Hume's central problem is by no
means hard to grasp, particularly if the Descartes-ISTewton scheme be
recalled. Granted that separation of individuals, whether of men, of
material bodies or of thought and extension, constitutes the funda-
mental fact in the universe; granted, too, that knowledge flows into
consciousness through the senses, then what value can be attached
legitimately to human experience ? Hume, as one must always remem-
ber, possessed the wit not to rest satisfied with the dogmas that ap-
peased his forefathers after the intellect. He wanted to know what
precise inferences could be extracted from their cherished opinions, and
he suspected that their satisfaction had not been won fairly. Accord-
ingly, he showed, and the proof holds good beyond peradventure, that,
on this traditional basis, human knowledge can be viewed only as a huge
delusion. Objects, self and deity; matter, mind and cause; science
and philosophy engulf themselves. Another alternative is imprac-
ticable, if the presuppositions, common to the mathematico-physical
sciences, to the Cartesian metaphysics and to the British psychology,
be admitted. It was no part of Hume's task to examine this founda-
tion. He accepted it without change as it came to him and proved,
in the most thoroughgoing fashion, that universal nescience was its sole
logical end. Dualism, self-contained bodies, sensationalism, 'an agent
acting constantly according to certain laws' — in short, the entire para-
phernalia held conjointly by the science and philosophy of the seven-
teenth and eighteenth centuries, he hoisted with its own petard and
blew to shivers irretrievably. For, admit his premises and the con-
clusion follows resistlessly. Now, the view of the universe prevalent
from Descartes to Paley, from Galileo to Laplace, depended on Hume's
premises and upon nothing else ! So ended the first lesson, like its
kind, not to be taken to heart for many a long day.

If the real implications of Hume's argument remained hidden from
science, thanks to the continued predominance of the 'Newtonian
philosophy,' and from the men who spoke Hume's tongue, thanks to
contemporary political and theological causes, the same cannot be said
of Kant. His philosophy took Europe by storm and has continued
to infiuence scientific men perhaps more than any other body of philo-

SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY. 367

sophical thought. His contribution to our present subject of inquiry
consisted of two parts: {a) the distinction between Verstand and Ver-
nunft, (&) the conclusions gained in the last division of his master-
piece, the Critique of Pure Reason.' The former was destined to
exercise decisive effect on the relation between science and philosophy;
the latter, as I understand the 'Dialectic/ met much the same fate
as Hume's destructive analysis — it was misinterpreted or overlooked.
We may therefore take it first, and very briefly. In the third part of
the 'Critique of Pure Reason,' entitled 'Dialectic,' because it deals
with subjects capable of dialectical treatment, Kant shows that the
metaphysic of his predecessors must be adjudged a complete failure.
Mathematics and physics exist, for they have objects; but metaphysics
has no existence, its objects are unthinkable, humanly speaking. Take
the soul (or self) as a self-contained thing, occupying a place among
the other self-contained elements of human life ; interpret the universe
as a self-contained object, one among other objects of experience; con-
ceive God as a self-contained 'agent acting constantly according to
certain laws,' and residing far out in the depths of space; in a word,
let your fundamental conceptions be those of the Descartes-Newton
type; then, when you come to analyze them, you will find of a surety
that no such soul or universe or God can possibly enter into human ex-
perience. This Kant proves, and so cuts the throat of the metaphysic
which ruled science and philosophy from the Eeformation till his day.
On the whole, philosophers have not yet fathomed his meaning, while
scientific men have been quick to seize his point, that metaphysic does
not exist, forgetting completely that his work was preliminary to the
necessary question: What, then, are soul, the universe and God? To
declare, with a certain quasi-scientific school, that these are mere ideas,
helps us not a whit. For the declaration, as they do not see, destroys
the validity of science also. Thus, on a broad view, we have still to
reckon with this aspect of Kant's thought.

The distinction between Verstand (understanding) and Vernunft
(reason) — the English words fail to translate, unfortunately — stands
in very different case, having been productive of momentous conse-
quences. Kant's early scientific researches led him to see that a
dynamical account of the material universe ought to be substituted for
the static conception of Newton. Indeed, he hit upon the idea of pre-
organic evolution; but, as thermodynamics lay in the future, experi-
mental evidence lacked, and he was switched on to another line by
Hume. According to Hume, knowledge is phenomenal, and phenome-
nal only. It consists of what apppears to be; can have no commerce
with what is. By analysis, the most complex ideas can be proved to
possess a phenomenal basis. The faculty of analysis, which deals thus
with phenomena, Kant called Yerstand. But he insisted that Hume's

368 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

assumption, that knowledge comes from the senses, did not suffice to
explain experience. Man's mind is endowed with certain forms or
principles of synthesis, by means of which the sense-material is orga-
nized into knowledge. Vernunft is the faculty whereby such principles
may be apprehended. It implies a higher range and a deeper insight
than Verstand. This superior faculty, in combination with an am-
plified reading of Herder's theory of historical evolution, was to be
responsible for much, as we shall see in the sequel.

Herder, a younger contemporary of Kant, turned away from the
mathematico-physical sciences, to which nearly all great intellects had
been attracted for two centuries, and entered enthusiastically upon
the study of the history of culture, of culture in the spacious sense of
civilization. Even in this line of research, he can not be called an
exact student. But his was a vitalizing personality, and so, his limita-
tions notwithstanding, he originated the evolutionary and organic idea
which may be termed appropriately the nineteenth century standpoint.
He took particular delight in poetry, religion, language and the like.
As early as 1767, he enunciated the conception which was to create
historical science. "There is the same law of change in all mankind
and in every individual, nation and tribe. From the bad to the good,
from the good to the better and best, from the best to the less good,
from the less good to the bad — this is the circle of all things. So it is
with art and science; they grow, blossom, ripen and decay. So it is
with language also." In the realm of the human spirit, all things work
together; "history leads us into the council of fate, teaches us the
eternal laws of human nature and assigns us our own place in that
great organism in which reason and goodness . . . must create
order."

At this point we strike the psychological moment when the con-
ditions that led to the conflict between science and philosophy were
assembling. Evidently, the center of gravity of philosophical inquiry
would be shifted from the old mathematico-physical parallelism, if a
professed philosopher were to appear equipped with the insight and
speculative daring requisite to unite Kant's conception of Vernunft
with Herder's fruitful suggestion, that history is a vast organism 'in
which reason must create order.' This epoch-making thinker did arise,
in the person of Hegel. We can not stay to outline the Hegelian sys-
tem, but must rest content to state its germinal idea. Following upon
Herder's pregnant thought, Hegel conceived of the universe as a single
unity, inspired and controlled by a principle of reason, a principle
in and through and for which everything has being. Obviously, if the
human mind can grasp such a principle, Kant's faculty of Vernunft
is the one power endowed with the necessary ability. As obviously, on
these conditions, if a thinker can pick out, as it were, the rational

SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY. 369

forms under which this principle manifests itself, he will have mas-
tered the mystery of all things. From the year 1818, the date of
Hegel's election to the chair of philosophy in the University of Berlin,
till the break-up of his school, about 1850, his thought dominated the
intellect of Germany to a degree unparalleled, and from 1865 till the
present time, it has wielded power in the British and, to a lesser extent,
in the American universities. The reason for this is patent. No other
thinker entertained modern views. In the English-speaking countries
particularly, men faced the past, not the future. Hegel, on the con-
trary, whatever may be said in his despite, had carried the dynamic,
organic and evolutionary explanation into every corner of the human-
istic realm. Nevertheless, he and his disciples must bear the chief
responsibility for the estrangement between science and philosophy
throughout forty years (1850-90) of the nineteenth century. Why?

In the first place, this, the most influential system of modern
philosophy, had been completed to all intents and purposes by the
year 1816. And, unfortunately, this statement implies another. In
1816, modem science was as yet unborn. Of course, one does not
forget the work of Haller, at Gottingen; of Cuvier and Bichat; of
Treviranus, who was the first to use the term 'biology,' in 1802; and,
above all, one calls to mind Charles Bell's capital discovery, in 1811.
Still, all these died in the faith, they having received not the promises.
In France, mathematical science maintained its glorious history, thanks
partly to the favor of Napoleon. In Germany, the rule of the modem
scientific spirit dates from 1826, with the foundation of Liebig's labora-
tory at Giessen. In Britain, all the great advances. Bell's excepted,
fall within the domain of astronomy, physics and the older chemistry.
Yet, despite this meager knowledge, as we deem it now, of the intrica-
cies of nature, a thinker dared to present an absolute philosophy — a
key to all the mysteries.

In the second place, the interpretation of Hegel's system by his
followers, if not its elaboration by himself, had become increasingly
formal, perhaps abstract, just at the moment when science was making
some of its most astonishing discoveries. Small wonder, then, that
investigators of nature, successful beyond all precedent, turned in
contempt from a philosophy which seemed to them, rightly or wrongly,
a species of revived scholasticism. Moreover, the bitter attacks on
Hegel emanating from workers on the philosophical side, like Herbart
and his pupils, who appeared to be, and possibly were, sympathetic
with scientific methods, served to deepen this impression. By 1865,
when the cry, 'Back to Kant !' had taken effective possession of many
and was emphasizing the importance, for science, of a certain interpre-
tation of Kant's thought, this antagonism crystallized finally.

Lastly, Hegel's 'Naturphilosophie,' containing his account of those

VOL. LIX. — 25

370 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

phenomena of nature to which he attempts to apply his principles, was
the weakest spot in his system. As the sciences progressed, this be-
came more and more evident, and it would have been asking too much
of human nature to have required the enemy to forego this grand
opportunity for telling assault. No doubt, these attacks went too far,
as the formative influence of the 'Philosophy of Nature' upon men
like Oken, Oersted, K. E. von Baer, Johannes Miiller and Schonlein
proves overwhelmingly. Nevertheless, the fact remains that the in-
sights of 'Naturphilosophie' were not restored to scientific citizenship
till late in the century, and its unchastened speculations alone at-
tracted general attention in pre-Darwinian times. In this field, the
decisive one for science, be it remembered, the vaunted higher and
special knowledge of philosophy was adjudged guilty of ludicrous
error, of gross carelessness, of otiose imaginings.

While the newer science thus scouted the new philosophy, was it
without sin? In answering this question, we come upon what I have
called one of the greatest paradoxes of history. Just after the nine-
teenth century had passed its zenith, a group of writers, penetrated by
the dynamical and biological tendencies of contemporary science,
thought that the times were ripe for an accordant theory of the
universe. The discoveries of Wohler, who produced an organic sub-
stance by the synthesis of inorganic materials; the startling advances
of biology, especially in the physiological line; and the speculations
of such thinkers as Schopenhauer and Feuerbach, appeared to furnish
a ground for scientific explanation of certain factors in experience
which had defied interpretation hitherto. Thus, despite its contempt
for the regnant philosophy, science, stimulated by its own problems,
produced a philosophical theory. Opponents of this movement, like
opponents in all ages, thought to get rid of an irritating novelty by
means of a nickname. Accordingly, we hear of the monism of Mole-
schott, Biichner, Carl Vogt and Haeckel. By applying this title,
critics intended to indicate that these thinkers suppressed the great
differences of experience — the difference between matter and mind or
between the organic and the inorganic — and saddled one term, in this
case, matter or the inorganic, with the entire responsibility of a solu-
tion. Now, it is true that this school alleged matter to be the cause
of mind, that they said, 'brain secretes thought as the liver secretes
bile,' and did many other things equally foolish or objectionable. At
the same time, their critics stood too near them and a clearly defined
focus was unobtainable. The real fact was — and here the paradox
emerges — that Biichner and the rest set up, not a monism, but a dog-
matism. Despite the circumstance that the progress of science, to
say nothing of Hume and Kant, had demonstrated beyond doubt the
insufficiency and fallacy of the dualistic, static and analytic theory of

SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY. 371

the universe, they accepted this as a presupposition. To begin with,
matter and mind were not one, but two; they were different, that is.
Given this difference, then, how explain them? By showing that, in
the time series, mind came second, and was therefore caused by
matter. The laughable paradox is that men steeped in the biological
view, which utterly overturns this mechanical externality, adopted the
latter as the means adequate to account for the former ! Of course, a
man may do this, if he please, but at his peril. For, Hume and Kant
and the biological sciences have combined to show that, even before it
could be stated, this doctrine had become, not merely untenable, but
positively unthinkable. It was now the philosophers' turn to blas-
pheme their brethren of science. If the errors of 'Naturphilosophie'
had handed speculative thought over to the tender mercies of exact
science, the ludicrous obtuseness of the so-called materialists respecting
what was possible in philosophy brought the thinkers their due re-
venge. Thus the dispute became interminable and the Jew had no
dealings with the Samaritan. For science, philosophy appeared so
much vague or formal speculation; for philosophy, science, in so far as
it tried to explain the world, seemed nothing but a blind blundering
among exploded errors peculiar to Locke and the French encyclope-
dists. Despite Lotze's effort at mediation, too complacent towards
both parties to command the respect of either, this was the substantial
situation from 1850 till 1885. And, when we hear to-day of the
opposition between science and pliilosophy, our ears are really ringing
with echoes from the period of the great paradox. The later develop-
ments of physics, chemistry, biology and psychology have brought
scientific men to a point where they can see that the mere adoption of
the 'Newtonian philosophy,' minus the 'agent acting constantly accord-
ing to certain laws,' is a far too simple solution of the obscure problems
on hand. Seductive it may be, it fails notoriously to fill the bill.
Similarly, philosophers begin to understand that Hegelianism must
go as a system, even though they feel that they must retain Hegel's
one contribution to progress — the principle that experience can be
explained, if at all, only by reference to itself. Also they evince
symptoms of perceiving that the watchword, 'Back to Kant !' valuable
enough in 1860, must be replaced by the new rallying cry, 'Forward
from Kant.' The critical philosophy cleared a site upon which it
is possible and proper for science and speculation to cooperate in
building now.

Science and philosophy may easily return to the old footing, then,
if they will but have a mind to rid themselves of the peculiar dogmas
that have afflicted each during the last century. This implies mutual
self-sacrifice, but sacrifice of the unimportant, very likely of the
harmful. There is no good ground for the belief that with the circle

372 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of the positive sciences knowledge ends; for the naive supposition
that an object can exist without a subject; for the marvelous delusion
that observation and experiment are capable of revealing things new
and old without the aid of mental synthesis or of psychological
volition; for the charming inconsequence that we perceive phenomena
and are therefore ignorant of reality. But equally, no basis can be
found for the idea that philosophy has means of access to some special
knowledge denied science; that one can afford to neglect science in
favor of rational forms ; that the conclusions of physics, chemistry and
biology are subject to revision at a higher tribunal; or that the work
of the sciences is a monstrous delusion. On the contrary, there is
every reason for insisting that science and philosophy are interwined
inextricably — much more inextricably now than they could have been
in Newton's time. Both work upon the same closed universe. This is
the important fact, even if science inquires, What is it? philosophy.
What does it mean? Nay, both questions are unanswerable, and so the
two disciplines alike end in approximation and hypothesis. As Eo-
manes has put it, "The 'Origin of Species' first clearly revealed to
naturalists as a class that it was the duty of their science to take as its
motto what is really the motto of natural science in general, 'Felix qui
potuit rerum cognoscere causas,' not facts, then, or phenomena, but
causes or principles are the ultimate objects of scientific quest." They
are the objects of philosophical quest also, as Romanes shows else-
where. In a word, to become conscious of its own fundamental prin-
ciples, science must transform itself into a kind of philosophy, while
to become acquainted with its own illustrative material, philosophy
must transform itself into a kind of science. This way lie harmony and
progress. We expect the twentieth century to furnish forth the im-
perative eirenicon. It can not come too soon.

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS.

373

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS.

By HAVELOCK ELLIS.
IX.— PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS.

BEFOEE summarizing the results of this study and noting a few
of the conclusions to which it seems to point, there are still
some aspects of British men of genius that the 'Dictionary' serves to
make visible. And as these aspects enable us at once both to complete
our picture and to confirm some of the impressions we have already
obtained, we cannot afford to pass them by. They concern more espe-
cially personal appearance and emotional disposition.

As regards stature we have some information in 281 eases; in 218
cases the information is indefinite, in the remaining 63 cases definite.
Of the first and largest group, 91 are said to be tall, 53 of average or
medium height, while 74 are short. In the smaller group, composed
entirely of males, 4 are 5 feet and under ;* 5 are from 5 feet 1 to 5 feet
4; 14 are from 5 feet 5 to 5 feet 8 ; 26 are from 5 feet 9 to 6 feet; 14
are over 6 feet. The height of the average Englishman at the present
day is 5 feet 8. It may be added that among the general population
of the British Islands 68 per cent, are between 5 feet 4 inches and 5
feet 9 inches in height. But the average height of men of the well-
to-do classes, to which our subjects mainly belong, is somewhat above
this. If we say that it is 5 feet 9, we shall probably be near the mark.
This is confirmed by Galton, who found that the average height of the
fathers of his men of science was 5 feet 9i^. But if this is so, it
would appear that it is the tendency of our men of genius not only
to vary widely, but to be tall more frequently than short, f The center
of the group is really occupied by the individuals who are 5 feet 10,
since 29 are below this height and 27 above it.

It must, of course, be recognized that various fallacies would be
involved were we to take our data as strictly corresponding to the real
facts. The exceptional people are more likely to be mentioned, and
the medium-sized to be passed over, while there is always a tendency
to describe a person as short or tall, rather than as of average size. It

* Pope, 4 feet 6, is excluded, as his excessively low stature was the result of
deformity.

1 1 may remark that among the ordinary population there is some reason to
suppose that superior intellectual capacity tends to be associated with superior
stature; Porter found such an association among school children at St. Louis
and Christopher at Chicago.

374 POPULAE SCIENCE MONTHLY.

may be noted, however, that the group for which we have definite
figures harmonizes fairly with the group for which we have no definite
figures, and that both alike show that the number of medium-sized
persons is vastly below what we ought to expect. Moreover, the group
with definitely ascertained heights shows very wide range of variation.
When we note that among some 850 men there are 14 who are definitely
known to have been over 6 feet in height, and many others who are
known to have been 'gigantic' or 'colossal,' we may be fairly certain
that more definite knowledge would only show more clearly that the
relations that rule here are not exactly the same as those that rule
among the general population, and that men of intellectual ability
show in this respect a greater tendency to variation than is observed
among the general population.*

It is interesting to note that although among the general popula-
tion the well-to-do classes are decidedly taller than the lower social
classes, no such tendency is clearly marked in our groups. Confining
ourselves to the group with definitely known height, we find that none
belong to our 'good family' class, while two belong to our lowest social
class, springing from unskilled workers. The extremely small persons
belong to the middle or lower middle social classes. This seems to
indicate that height is here not a mere social phenomenon, but a real
expression of the organic vitality and nervous make of the man.

It would be of much interest if we could speak definitely concern-
ing the most important of all anthropological criteria, the cephalic
index or length-breadth index of the head. The 'Dictionary' here,
however, is of no assistance. We are told, indeed, of Faraday (the
writer of the article being Tyndall) that he had an abnormally long
head, so that his hats had to be specially made for him, and we are
told of Tyndall himself (the writer here being his widow) that in this
respect Tyndall resembled Faraday. This scrap of evidence, so far as
it goes, would confirm the proverbial belief in favor of the intelligence
of long-headed persons. It is, however, believed by many, who can
bring forward good evidence on their side, that intellectual ability
goes with broad-headedness. It may well be that in this matter, as in
that of stature, the range of variation is great, and that both extremes
tend to prevail to an undue extent. This has been found to be the
case in another abnormal group — that of criminals.

If we turn to a further anthropological character, pigmentation,
or the color of the hair and eyes, we are able to bring forward a much
larger body of evidence, and it is not difficult to supplement the data

* This conclusion harmonizes with an inquiry into this matter, and into its
significance — not, however, confined to persons of British race — which I pub-
lished elsewhere a few years ago ('Genius and Stature,' 'Nineteenth Century,'
July, 1897).

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 375

furnished by the 'Dictionary' by the help of portraits, more especially
those in the National Portrait Gallery. I have information on this
point concerning 334 of the eminent persons on our list. In classify-
ing by pigmentation I have relied in the first place on the eye-color,
but have allowed hair-color a certain influence in modifying the class
in those cases in which there was marked divergence between the two
in lightness or darkness. I have sorted the eminent persons into three
classes, according as their eyes were unpigmented (blue), highly pig-
mented (brown), or occupying an intermediate position (combinations
of blue with yellow, orange or brown). This intermediate class has
necessarily been large, and I have comprised within it three sub-
divisions: a fair medium, a dark medium, and, between these two, a
doubtful medium. Then the question arose as to how the results thus
obtained might be conveniently formulated, so as to enable us to com-
pare the different groups of eminent persons. I finally decided to
proceed with each of these groups as follows: The doubtful medium
persons in each of these classes were divided equally between the fair
medium and the dark medium; then two-thirds of the fair-medium
persons were added to the fair class, the remaining third to the dark
class, and, likewise, two-thirds of the dark medium were added to the
dark class, the remaining third to the fair class; the five classes were
thus reduced to two, and, on multiplying the fair by 100 and dividing
by t'he dark, we obtain what may be called an index of pigmentation.
This method of notation is really simple, and is quite sufficiently ac-
curate for the nature of the data dealt with ; it will be seen that by its
use an index of 100 means that fair and dark people are equally numer-
ous in a group, while indices over 100 mean an excess of fair persons,
and indices under 100 an excess of dark persons. I have been able to
obtain the index of pigmentation in the cases of ten groups, the remain-
ing groups being too small to permit of assured results. I present
them, with their index of pigmentation, in the order of decreasing
fairness: Men of science, 150; Artists, 108; Lawyers, 100; Sailors,
100; Soldiers, 83; Statesmen, 83; Poets, 78; Men of letters, 67;
Divines, 43 ; Actors, 20.

It will be seen that the range is considerable; but I believe we
may have considerable confidence in the results, and the more so since
they are not altogether unexpected, for (although I do not wish to
assume that these phenomena are entirely explicable by race) it is cer-
tainly true that men of science and artists tend largely to come from
fair districts of the country, divines and actors from dark districts.
The fact that allied classes tend to fall together — soldiers and sailors,
poets and men of letters — also gives confidence in the reality of the
relationship thus brought out. It may be noted, as a fact probably not
without significance, that the more active and unemotional classes tend

376 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

to be fair, while the more reflective and emotional classes tend to be
dark,*

There is another physical characteristic to which the national bi-
ographers frequently allude, though I do not propose to attempt to give
it any numerical values, and that is personal beauty or the absence of
it. A very large proportion of persons are referred to as notably hand-
some, comely, imposing; a very considerable, but smaller, proportion
are spoken of as showing some disproportion or asymmetry of feature,
body or limbs, as notably peculiar or even ludicrous in appearance. A
not uncommon type is that of the stunted giant, with massive head and
robust body, but very short legs.

There is one feature, however, which is noted as striking and
beautiful in a very large number of cases, even in persons who are
otherwise wholly without physical attractions. That is the eyes. It
is nearly always found that descriptions of the personal appearance
of men of genius, however widely they may differ in other respects,
agree in finding an unusual brilliancy of the eyes. Thus the eyes of
Burns were said by one observer to be like ^coals of living fire,' and
Scott writes that they 'literally glowed'; while of Chatterton's eyes it
was said that there was 'fire rolling at the bottom of them.' It is
significant that both of these instances, chosen almost at random, were
poets. While, however, the phenomenon seems to be noted more fre-
quently and with more emphasis in poets, it is found among men of
genius of all classes. One can only suppose it to be connected with an
unusual degree of activity of the cerebral circulation.

In regard to the mental and emotional disposition of British per-
sons of genius, the national biographers enable us to trace the preva-
lence of one or two tendencies. One of these is shjoiess, bashfulness
or timidity. This is noted in thirty-four cases, while thirty-two others
are described as very sensitive, nervous or emotional, and, although this
is not equivalent to a large percentage, it must of course be remembered
that the real number of such cases is certainly very much larger,
and also that the characteristic is in many cases extremely well marked.
Some had to abandon the profession they had chosen on account of
their nervous shyness at appearing in public; others were too bashful
to declare their love to the women they were attracted to; Sir Thomas

*I may remark concerning this index of pigmentation that, while it yields
results which are strictly comparable among themselves in the hands of a single
observer, proceeding in a uniform manner, it is doubtful whether two observers
would carry it out in a strictly identical manner. Beddoe's index of nigrescence,
foimded on hair-color and applied directly to living subjects, is a convenient
formula for indicating the degree of pigmentation. But in my observations,
largely made on portraits (in which the hair was often whitened by age, absent,
concealed beneath a wig, or obscured by the darkening of the paint), it was
necessary to accept eye-color as the primary basis of classification.

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 377

Browne, one of the greatest masters of English prose, was so modest
that he was always blushing causelessly; Hooker, one of the chief
luminaries of the English Church, could never look any one in the
face; Dry den, the recognized prince of the literary men of his time,
was, said Congreve, the most easily put out of countenance of any man
he had ever met. It is not difficult to see why the timid temperament
— which is very far from involving lack of courage* — should be espe-
cially associated with intellectual aptitudes. It causes a distaste for
social contact and so favors those fonns of activity which may be
exerted in solitude, these latter, again, reacting to produce increased
awkwardness in social relations. Moreover, the mental state of tim-
idity, which may be regarded as a mild form of folie du doute, a per-
petual self-questioning and uncertainty, however unpleasant it may be
from the social point of view, is by no means an unsatisfactory attitude
in the face of intellectual problems, for it involves that unceasing self-
criticism which is an essential element of all good intellectual work,
and has marked more or less clearly the greatest men of scientific
genius. Fundamentally, no doubt, timidity is a minor congenital defect
of the nervous mechanism, fairly comparable to stammering. It may
be noted that the opposite characteristic of over self-confidence, with
more or less tendency to arrogance and insolence, is also noted, but
with much less frequency, and usually in men whose eminence is not
due to purely intellectual qualities. In some cases, it would seem, the
two opposite tendencies are combined, the timid man seeking refuge
from his own timidity in the assumption of arrogance.

In a certain number of cases information is given as to the general
emotional disposition, whether to melancholy and depression, or of a
gay, cheerful and genial character. In sixty-two cases the disposition
is noted as melancholy, in twenty-nine as cheerful or jovial; in eight
cases both dispositions are noted as occurring, in varying association,
in the same person. This marked tendency to melancholy among
persons of intellectual aptitude is no new observation, but was indeed
one of the very earliest points noted concerning men of genius. It was
remarked by Aristotle, and Reveille-Parise, one of the earliest and still
one of the most sagacious of the modern writers on genius, devoted
a chapter to the point. It is not altogether difficult to account for this
phenomenon. Melancholy children, as Marro found, are in large pro-
portion the offspring of elderly fathers, as we have also found our
persons of intellectual eminence to be. A tendency to melancholy,
again, even though it may always fall short of insane melancholia,
is allied to those neurotic and abnormal conditions which we have

* "None are so bold as the timid when they are fairly roused," wrote Mrs.
Browning in her 'Letters.' The same point has been brought out by Dugas in
his essay on timidity.

378 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

found to be not infrequent. Moreover, it certainly has a stimulating
influence on intellectual work. The more normal man of cheerful
disposition instinctively seeks the consolations of society. The melan-
choly man, like the shy man, is ill-adapted to society, and more
naturally seeks his consolations in a non-social field, such as that of
the intellect, often plunging more deeply into intellectual work the
more profound his melancholy becomes. "Wagner said that his best
work was done at times of melancholy, and among the eminent men
on our list several writers are mentioned who turned to authorship as
a relief to personal depression. It may also be said that not only is
melancholy a favorable condition for intellectual work, but that the
sedentary and nerve-exhausting nature of nearly all forms of intel-
lectual work in turn reacts to emphasize or produce moods of depression.

There is another cause which serves to explain or to accentuate
the tendency of men of genius to melancholy. I refer to the attitude
of the world towards them. Every original worker in intellectual
fields, every man who makes some new thing, is certain to arouse hos-
tility where he does not meet with indifference. He sets otit in his
chosen path, ignorant of men, but moved by high ideals, content to
work in laborious solitude and to wait, and when at last he turns to his
fellows, saying, 'See what I have done for you !' he finds that he has
to meet only the sneering prejudices of the few who might have com-
prehended, and the absolute indifference of the many who are too
absorbed in the daily struggle for bread to comprehend any intellectual
achievement. The wise worker knows this and arms himself with
contempt, as a protection alike against the few and the many;* but
it has to be remembered that the prevailing temperament of men of
genius is one of great nervous sensitiveness and irritability — so that,
as Eeveille-Parise puts it, they are apt to 'roar at a pin-prick'— and
even when they are well aware what the opinion of the world is worth,
they still cannot help being profoundly affected by that opinion. Hence
a fruitful source of melancholy.

The attitude of the world towards the man of original intellect is,
however, by no means one merely of disdain or indifference. It con-
stantly tends to become more aggressive. It is practically impossible
to estimate the amount of persecution to which this group of pre-
eminent British persons has been subjected, for it has shown itself
in innumerable forms, and varies between a mere passive refusal to

* Thus of one of the great men of science on our list, Stephen Hales, it was
said that he could look "even upon those who did him unkind offices without
any emotion of particular indignation, not from want of discernment or sensi-
bility; but he used to consider them only like those experiments which, upon
trial, he found could never be applied to any useful purpose, and which he there-
fore calmly and dispassionately laid aside."

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 379

have anything whatever to do with them or their work and the active
infliction of physical torture and death. There is, however, at least one
form of persecution, very definite in character, which it is easy to
estimate, since the national biographers have probably in few cases
passed it over. I refer to imprisonment. I find that over 14 per cent,
of these 902 eminent persons were imprisoned, once or oftener, for
periods of varying length, while many others only escaped imprison-
ment by voluntary exile. It is true that the causes of imprisonment
were various, but even imprisonment for debt may usually be taken to
indicate an anomalous lack of adjustment to the social environment.
The man of genius is an abnormal being, thus arousing the instinctive
hostility of society, which by every means seeks to put him out of the
way.

It will be seen that the various personal traits noted in this sec-
tion, while completing our picture of British persons of genius, may
be linked on at various points to other traits we have previously noted.
It only remains to gather together the various threads we have traced
and to ascertain how far they may be harmoniously woven into a com-
plete whole.

38o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

FKEDEEIC MYERS'S SERVICE TO PSYCHOLOGY.*

By professor WILLIAM JAMES,

HARVARD UNIVERSITY.

/^N this memorial occasion it is from English hearts and tongues
^-^ belonging, as I never had the privilege of belonging, to the
immediate environment of our lamented President, that discourse of
him as a man and as a friend must come. It is for those who partici-
pated in the endless drudgery of his labors for our Society to tell of
the high powers he showed there; and it is for those who have some-
thing of his burning interest in the problem of our human destiny to
estimate his success in throwing a little more light into its dark
recesses. To me it has been deemed best to assign a colder task.
Frederic Myers was a psychologist who worked upon lines hardly ad-
mitted by the more academic branch of the profession to be legitimate ;
and as for some years I bore the title of 'Professor of Psychology,' the
suggestion has been made (and by me gladly welcomed) that I should
spend my portion of this hour in defining the exact place and rank
which we must accord to him as a cultivator and promoter of the
science of the mind.

Brought up entirely upon literature and history, and interested at
first in poetry and religion chiefly; never by nature a philosopher
in the technical sense of a man forced to pursue consistency among
concepts for the mere love of the logical occupation; not crammed
with science at college, or trained to scientific method by any passage
through a laboratory; Myers had as it were to re-create his per-
sonality before he became the wary critic of evidence, the skilful
handler of hypothesis, the learned neurologist and omnivorous reader
of biological and cosmological matter, with whom in later years we
were acquainted. The transformation came about because he needed
to be all these things in order to work successfully at the problem
that lay near his heart; and the ardor of his will and the richness
of his intellect are proved by the success with which he underwent so
unusual a transformation.

The problem, as you know, was that of seeking evidence for human
immortality. His contributions to psychology were incidental to that
research, and would probably never have been made had he not
entered on it. But they have a value for science entirely inde-

* From the 'Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research.'

FREDERIC MYERS. 381

pendent of the light they shed upon that problem; and it is quite
apart from it that I shall venture to consider them.

If we look at the history of mental science we are immediately
struck by diverse tendencies among its several cultivators, the conse-
quence being a certain opposition of schools and some repugnance
among their disciples. Apart from the great contrasts between minds
that are teleological or biological and minds that are mechanical, be-
tween the animists and the associationists in psychology, there is the en-
tirely different contrast between what I will call the classic-academic
and the romantic type of imagination. The former has a fondness for
clean pure lines and noble simplicity in its constructions. It explains
things by as few principles as possible and is intolerant of either
nondescript facts or clumsy formulas. The facts must lie in a neat
assemblage, and the psychologist must be enabled to cover them and
'tuck them in' as safely under his system as a mother tucks her babe in
under the down coverlet on a winter night. Until quite recently all
psychology, whether animistic or associationistic, was written on
classic-academic lines. The consequence was that the human mind, as
it is figured in this literature, was largely an abstraction. Its normal
adult traits were recognized. A sort of sunlit terrace was exhibited on
which it took its exercise. But where that terrace stopped, the mind
stopped; and there was nothing farther left to tell of in this kind of
philosophy but the brain and the other physical facts of nature on the
one hand, and the absolute metaphysical ground of the universe on the
other.

But of late years the terrace has been overrun by romantic im-
provers, and to pass to their work is like going from classic to
Gothic architecture, where few outlines are pure and where uncouth
forms lurk in the shadows. A mass of mental phenomena are now seen
in the shrubbery beyond the parapet. Fantastic, ignoble, hardly
human, or frankly non-human are some of these new candidates for
psychological description. The menagerie and the madhouse, the
nursery, the prison, and the hospital, have been made to deliver up their
material. The world of mind is shown as something infinitely more
complex than was suspected ; and whatever beauties it may still possess,
it has lost at any rate the beauty of academic neatness.

But despite the triumph of romanticism, psychologists as a rule
have still some lingering prejudice in favor of the nobler simplicities.
Moreover there are social prejudices which scientific men themselves
obey. The word 'h3^pnotism' has been trailed about in the newspapers
so that even we ourselves rather wince at it, and avoid occasions of its
use. 'Mesmerism,' 'clairvoyance,' 'medium' — Jiorrescimus referentes! —
and with all these things, infected by their previous mystery-mongering
discoverers, even our best friends had rather avoid complicity. For

382 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

instance, I invite eight of my scientific colleagues severally to come
to my house at their own time, and sit with a medium for whom the
evidence already published in our 'Proceedings' had been most note-
worthy. Although it means at worst the waste of the hour for each,
five of them decline the adventure. I then beg the 'Commission' con-
nected with the chair of a certain learned psychologist in a neighboring
university to examine the same medium, whom Mr. Hodgson and I
offer at our own expense to send and leave with them. They also
have to be excused from any such entanglement. I advise another
psychological friend to look into this medium's case, but he replies
that it is useless, for if he should get such results as I report, he would
(being suggestible) simply believe himself hallucinated. When I
propose as a remedy that he should remain in the background and
take notes, whilst his wife has the sitting, he explains that he can never
consent to his wife's presence at such performances. This friend of
mine writes ex cathedra on the subject of psychical research, declaring
(I need hardly add) that there is nothing in it; the chair of the psychol-
ogist with the Commission was founded by a spiritist, partly with a
view to investigate mediums; and one of the five colleagues who de-
clined my invitation is widely quoted as an effective critic of our evi-
dence. So runs the world away ! I should not indulge in the person-
ality and triviality of such anecdotes, were it not that they paint the
temper of our time, a temper which, thanks to Frederic Myers more
than to any one, will certainly be impossible after this generation.
Myers was, I think, decidedly exclusive and intolerant by nature. But
his keenness for truth carried him into regions where either intellectual
or social squeamislmess would have been fatal, so he 'mortified' his
amour propre, unclubbed himself completely, and became a model of
patience, tact, and humility wherever investigation required it. Both
his example and his body of doctrine will make this temper the only
one henceforward scientifically respectable.

If you ask me how his doctrine has this effect, I answer: By
coordinating ! For Myers's great principle of research was that in order
to understand any one species of fact we ought to have all the species
of the same general class of fact before us. So he took a lot of
scattered phenomena, some of them recognized as reputable, others
outlawed from science, or treated as isolated curiosities; he made
series of them, filled in the transitions by delicate hypotheses or
analogies, and bound them together in a system by his bold inclusive
conception of the Subliminal Self, so that no one can now touch one
part of the fabric without finding the rest entangled with it. Such
vague terms of apperception as psychologists have hitherto been satis-
fied with using for most of these phenomena, as 'fraud,' 'rot,'
'rubbish,' will no more be possible hereafter than 'dirt' is possible

FREDERIC MYERS. 383

as a head of classification in chemistry, or 'vermin,' in zoology.
Whatever they are, they are things with a right to definite description
and to careful observation.

I cannot but account this as a great service rendered to psychology.
I expect that Myers will ere long distinctly figure in mental science as
the radical leader in what I have called the romantic movement.
Through him for the first time, psychologists are in possession of their
full material, and mental phenomena are set down in an adequate
inventory. To bring unlike things thus together by forming series
of which the intermediary terms connect the extremes, is a procedure
much in use by scientific men. It is a first step made towards
securing their interest in the romantic facts, that Myers should have
shown how easily this familiar method can be applied to their study.

Myers's conception of the extensiveness of the Subliminal Self quite
overturns the classic notion of what the human mind consists in. The
supraliminal region, as Myers calls it, the classic-academic conscious-
ness, which was once alone considered either by associationists or
animists, figures in his theory as only a small segment of the psychic
spectrum. It is a special phase of mentality, teleologically evolved for
adaptation to our natural environment, and forms only what he calls
a 'privileged case' of personality. The outhing Subliminal, according
to him, represents more fully our central and abiding being.

I think the words subliminal and supraliminal unfortunate, but
they were probably unavoidable. I think, too, that Myers's belief in the
ubiquity and great extent of the Subliminal will demand a far
larger number of facts than sufficed to persuade him, before the next
generation of psychologists shall become persuaded. He regards the
Subliminal as the enveloping mother-consciousness in each of us, from
which the consciousness we wot of is precipitated like a crystal. But
whether this view get confirmed or get overthrown by future inquiry,
the definite way in which Myers has thrown it down is a new and
specific challenge to inquiry. For half a century now, psychologists
have fully admitted the existence of a subliminal mental region, under
the name either of unconscious cerebration or of the involuntary life;
but they have never definitely taken up the question of the extent of
this region, never sought explicitly to map it out. Myers definitely
attacks this problem, which, after him, it will be impossible to ignore.

What is the precise constitution of the Subliminal — such is the
problem which deserves to figure in our science hereafter as the prob-
lem of Myers; and willy-nilly, inquiry must follow on the path which
it has opened up. But Myers has not only propounded the problem
definitely, he has also invented definite methods for its solution. Post-
hypnotic suggestion, crystal-gazing, automatic writing and trance-
speech, the willing-game, etc., are now, thanks to him, instruments of

384 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

research, reagents like litmus paper or the galvanometer, for revealing
what would otherwise be hidden. These are so many ways of putting
the Subliminal on tap. Of course without the simultaneous work on
hypnotism and hysteria independently begun by others, he could not
have pushed his own work so far. But he is so far the only
generalizer of the problem and the only user of all the methods;
and even though his theory of the extent of the Subliminal should
have to be subverted in the end, its formulation will, I am sure,
figure always as a rather momentous event in the history of our
science.

Any psychologist who should wish to read Myers out of the pro-
fession— and there are probably still some who would be glad to do so
to-day — is committed to a definite alternative. Either he must say
that we knew all about the subliminal region before Myers took it up,
or he must say that it is certain that states of super-normal cognition
form no part of its content. The first contention would be too absurd.
The second one remains more plausible. There are many first-hand
investigators into the Subliminal who, not having themselves met with
anything super-normal, would probably not hesitate to call all the re-
ports of it erroneous, and who would limit the Subliminal to dissolutive
phenomena of consciousness exclusively, to lapsed memories, sub-
conscious sensations, impulses and phobias, and the like. Messrs. Janet
and Binet, for aught I know, may hold some such position as this.
Against it Myers's thesis would stand sharply out. Of the Subliminal,
he would say, we can give no ultra-simple account: there are discrete
regions in it, levels separated by critical points of transition, and no
one formula holds true of them all. And any conscientious psycholo-
gist ought, it seems to me, to see that, since these multiple modifica-
tions of personality are only beginning to be reported and observed
with care, it is obvious that a dogmatically negative treatment of them
must be premature, and that the problem of Myers still awaits us as
the problem of far the deepest moment for our actual psychology,
whether his own tentative solutions of certain parts of it be correct
or not.

Meanwhile, descending to detail, one cannot help admiring the great
originality with which Myers wove such an extraordinarily detached
and discontinuous series of phenomena together. Unconscious cerebra-
tion, dreams, hypnotism, hysteria, inspirations of genius, the willing-
game, planchette, crystal-gazing, hallucinatory voices, apparitions of
the dying, medium-trances, demoniacal possession, clairvoyance,
thought-transference — even ghosts and other facts more doubtful —
these things form a chaos at first sight most discouraging. No wonder
that scientists can think of no other principle of unity among them
than their common appeal to men's perverse propensity to superstition.

FREDERIC MYERS. 385

Yet Myers has actually made a system of them, stringing them con-
tinuously upon a perfectly legitimate objective hypothesis, verified in
some cases and extended to others by analogy. Taking the name
automatism from the phenomenon of automatic writing — I am not sure
that he may not himself have been the first so to baptize this latter
phenomenon — he made one great simplification at a stroke by treating
hallucinations and active impulses under a common head, as sensory
and motor automatisms. Automatism he then conceived broadly as a
message of any kind from the Subliminal to the Supraliminal. And he
went a step farther in his hypothetic interpretation, when he insisted
on 'symbolism' as one of the ways in which one stratum of our per-
sonality will often interpret the influences of another. Obsessive
thoughts and delusions, as well as voices, visions, and impulses, thus
fall subject to one mode of treatment. To explain them, we must
explore the Subliminal; to cure them we must practically influence it.

Myers's work on automatism led to his brilliant conception, in 1891,
of hysteria. He defined it, with good reasons given, as "a disease of
the hypnotic stratum." Hardly had he done so when the wonderfully
ingenious observations of Binet, and especially of Janet in France, gave
to this view the completest of corroborations. These observations have
been extended in Germany, America, and elsewhere; and although
Binet and Janet worked independently of Myers, and did work far
more objective, he nevertheless will stand as the original announcer
of a theory which, in my opinion, makes an epoch, not only in
medical, but in psychological science, because it brings in an entirely
new conception of our mental possibilities.

Myers's manner of apprehending the problem of the Subliminal
shows itself fruitful in every possible direction. While official science
practically refuses to attend to Subliminal phenomena, the circles
which do attend to them treat them with a respect altogether too undis-
criminating — every Subliminal deliverance must be an oracle. The
result is that there is no basis of intercourse between those who best
know the facts and those who are most competent to discuss them.
Myers immediately establishes a basis by his remark that in so far as
they have to use the same organism, with its preformed avenues of ex-
pression— what may be very different strata of the Subliminal are
condemned in advance to manifest themselves in similar ways. This
might account for the great generic likeness of so many automatic
performances, while their different starting points behind the threshold
might account for certain differences in them. Some of them, namely,
seem to include elements of supernormal knowledge; others to show a
curious subconscious mania for personation and deception; others
again to be mere drivel. But Myers's conception of various strata or
levels in the Subliminal sets us to analyzing them all from a new point

VOL. LIX. — 26

386 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of view. The word Subliminal for him denotes only a region, with
possibly the most heterogeneous contents. Much of the content is cer-
tainly rubbish, matter that Myers calls dissolutive, stuff that dreams
are made of, fragments of lapsed memory, mechanical effects of habit
and ordinary suggestion ; some belongs to a middle region where a
strange manufacture of inner romances perpetually goes on; finally,
some of the content appears superiorly and subtly perceptive. But each
has to appeal to us by the same channels and to use organs partly
trained to their performance by messages from the other levels. Under
these conditions what could be more natural to expect than a confusion,
which Myers's suggestion would then have been the first indispensable
step towards finally clearing away.

Once more, then, whatever be the upshot of the patient work
required here, Myers's resourceful intellect has certainly done a service
to psychology.

I said a while ago that his intellect was not by nature philosophic in
the narrower sense of being that of a logician. In the broader sense
of being a man of wide scientific imagination, Myers was most
eminently a philosopher. He has shown this by his unusually daring
grasp of the principle of evolution, and by the wonderful way in which
he has worked out suggestions of mental evolution by means of bio-
logical analogies. These analogies are, if anything, too profuse and
dazzling in his pages; but his conception of mental evolution is more
radical than anything yet considered by psychologists as possible. It
is absolutely original; and, being so radical, it becomes one of those
hypotheses which, once propounded, can never be forgotten, but soon
or later have to be worked out and submitted in every way to criticism
and verification.

The corner-stone of his conception is the fact that consciousness has
no essential unity. It aggregates and dissipates, and what we call
normal consciousness — the 'Human Mind' of classic psychology — is
not even typical, but only one case out of thousands. Slight organic
alterations, intoxications and auto-intoxications, give supraliminal
forms completely different, and the subliminal region seems to have
laws in many respects peculiar. Myers thereupon makes the sugges-
tion that the whole system of consciousness studied by the classic
psychology is only an extract from a larger total, being a part told off,
as it were, to do service in the adjustments of our physical organism to
the world of nature. This extract, aggregated and personified for this
particular purpose, has, like all evolving things, a variety of peculiari-
ties. Having evolved, it may also dissolve, and in dreams, hysteria, and
divers forms of degeneration it vseems to do so. This is a retrograde
process of separation in a consciousness of which the unity was once
effected. But again the consciousness may follow the opposite course

FREDERIC MYERS. 387

and integrate still farther, or evolve by growing into yet untried direc-
tions. In veridical automatisms it actually seems to do so. It drops
some of its usual modes of increase, its ordinary use of the senses, for
example, and lays hold of bits of information which, in ways that we
cannot even follow conjecturally, leak into it by way of the Subliminal.
The ulterior source of a certain part of this information (limited and
perverted as it always is by the organism's idiosyncrasies in the way
of transmission and expression) Myers thought he could reasonably
trace to departed human intelligence, or its existing equivalent. I pre-
tend to no opinion on this point, for I have as yet studied the evidence
with so little critical care that Myers was always surprised at my negli-
gence. I can therefore speak with detachment from this question and,
as a mere empirical psychologist, of Myers's general evolutionary
conception. As such a psychologist I feel sure that the latter is a
hypothesis of first-rate philosophic importance. It is based, of course,
on his conviction of the extent of the Subliminal, and will stand or fall
as that is verified or not; but whether it stand or fall, it looks to me
like one of those sweeping ideas by which the scientific researches of
an entire generation are often moulded. It would not be suprising
if it proved such a leading idea in the investigation of the near future ;
for in one shape or another, the Subliminal has come to stay with us,
and the only possible course to take henceforth is radically and
thoroughly to explore its significance.

Looking back from Frederic Myers's vision of vastness in the field
of psychological research upon the programme as most academic
psychologists frame it, one must confess that its limitation at their
hands seems not only unplausible, but, in truth, a little ridiculous.
Even with brutes and madmen, even with hysterics and hypnotics
admitted as the academic psychologists admit them, the official out-
lines of the subject are far too neat to stand in the light of analogy
with the rest of nature. The ultimates of nature — her simple ele-
ments, if there be such — may indeed combine in definite proportions
and follow classic laws of architecture; but in her proximates, in her
phenomena as we immediately experience them, nature is everywhere
gothic, not classic. She forms a real jungle, where all things are pro-
visional, half -fitted to each other, and untidy. When we add such a
complex kind of subliminal region as Myers believed in to the official
region, we restore the analogy; and, though we may be mistaken in
much detail, in a general way, at least, we become plausible. In com-
parison with Myers's way of attacking the question of immortality in
particular, the official way is certainly so far from the mark as to be
almost preposterous. It assumes that when our ordinary consciousness
goes out, the only alternative surviving kind of consciousness that
could be possible is abstract mentality, living on spiritual truth, and

388 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

communicating ideal wisdom — in short, the whole classic platonizing
Sunday-school conception. Failing to get that sort of thing when it
listens to reports about mediums, it denies that there can be anything.
Myers approaches the subject with no such a priori requirement. If he
finds any ppsitive indication of 'spirits/ he records it, whatever it may
be, and is willing to fit his conception to the facts, however grotesque
the latter may appear, rather than to blot out the facts to suit his con-
ception. But, as was long ago said by our collaborator, Mr. Canning
Schiller, in words more effective than any I can write, if any con-
ception should be blotted out by serious lovers of nature, it surely
ought to be the classic academic Sunday-school conception. If any-
thing is i^/ilikely in a world like this, it is that the next adjacent thing
to the mere surface-show of our experience should be the realm of
eternal essences, of platonic ideas, of crystal battlements, of absolute
significance. But whether they be animists or associationists, a
supposition something like this is still the assumption of our usual
psychologists. It comes from their being for the most part philoso-
phers in the technical sense, and from their showing the weakness
of that profession for logical abstractions. Myers was primarily a
lover of life and not of abstractions. He loved human life, human
persons, and their peculiarities. So he could easily admit the possi-
bility of level beyond level of perfectly concrete experience, all 'queer
and cactus-like' though it might be, before we touch the absolute, or
reach the eternal essences.

Behind the minute anatomists and the physiologists, with their
metallic instruments, there have always stood the out-door naturalists
with their eyes and love of concrete nature. The former call the
latter superficial, but there is something wrong about your laboratory-
biologist who has no s}Tnpathy with living animals. In psychology
there is a similar distinction. Some psychologists are fascinated by the
varieties of mind in living action, others by the dissecting out, whether
by logical analysis or by brass instruments, of whatever elementary
mental processes may be there. Myers must decidedly be placed in the
former class, though his powerful use of analogy enabled him also to do
work after the fashion of the latter. He loved human nature as Cuvier
and Agassiz loved animal nature; in his view, as in their view, the
subject formed a vast living picture. Whether his name will have in
psychology as honorable a place as their names have gained in the
sister science, will depend on whether future inquirers shall adopt or
reject his theories; and the rapidity with which their decision shapes
itself will depend largely on the vigor with which this Society continues
its labor in his absence. It is at any rate a possibility, and I am dis-
posed to think it a probability, that Frederic Myers will always be re-
membered in psychology as the pioneer who staked out a vast tract of

FREDERIC MYERS. 389

mental wilderness and planted the flag of genuine science upon it. He
was an enormous collector. He introduced for the first time com-
parison, classification, and serial order into the peculiar kind of fact
which he collected. He was a genius at perceiving analogies; he was
fertile in hypotheses; and as far as conditions allowed it in this
meteoric region, he relied on verification. Such advantages are of no
avail, however, if one has struck into a false road from the outset. But
should it turn out that Frederic Myers has really hit the right road by
his divining instinct, it is certain that, like the names of others who
have been wise, his name will keep an honorable place in scientific
history.

390 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE POSE OF THE BODY AS EELATED TO THE
TYPE OF THE CRANIUM AND THE DIREC-
TION OF THE VISUAL PLANE.*

By GEORGE T. STEVENS, M.D.. Ph.D.

NEW YORK.

TT is a novel proposition that the position of the head in respect to
-*- the body or of the shoulders in reference to the back, that the
carriage of the whole body in walking and the attitude of a person in
conversation, should be governed in an important measure by the form
of the cranium. It will also, doubtless, be regarded as a bold assertion
to say that all these positions and attitudes and even the gait of in-
dividuals are largely modified, even in many instances controlled, by
the normal position of the eyes in respect to the cranium. Yet it is
not difficult to show that both these propositions are true and that the
truth contained in these statements is not only of importance as a
principle in art, but that it is of great practical value from the point
of view of the well-being of large classes of persons.

From the standpoint of art the principle involved in these proposi-
tions shows the error of representing individuals who have certain
forms of crania in attitudes which, for persons with those special
cranial characteristics, would be unnatural and almost absurd. For
example, when Thorwaldsen represented Sir Walter Scott with his chin
elevated high in the air, he gave to the distinguished author of Waverley
a posture of the head which would have been not only painful, but
almost impossible for him to have maintained as a characteristic pose.

From the more practical and more important standpoint it may even
be said that, owing to the position of the visual plane in respect to the
head, there may be comparative immunity from certain complaints
and diseases or a comparative predisposition to those very affections
according to the type of the head and the direction of the normal plane
of vision.

In order to facilitate the examination of the topic, it will be neces-
sary to define some of the terms and some of the principles- which
enter into it.

The term 'normal plane of vision' will be used, and it should at
the outset be understood exactly what is meant by the phrase.

* An address delivered before the Section of Anthropology of The Amer-
ican Association for the Advancement of Science, at its session at Yale Univer-
sity, New Haven, December 27th, 1899.

THE POSE OF THE BODY. 391

By the term 'normal plane of vision/ as here employed, it is in-
tended to express the direction which the lines of sight would assume,
the head being in the erect, or more technically in what is known
as the 'primary, position, in case no muscular effort should be made to
change the eyes from an entirely passive adjustment.

Under these conditions the line of sight of each of the two eyes lies
in an imaginary plane which may be coincident with, or somewhat
higher than, or somewhat lower than, the plane of the horizon.

The normal plane of vision differs essentially from the primary
plane of regard of Helmholtz and other writers, for this plane of regard
refers to the plane formed by the two visual lines when these lines are
directed toward the horizon, the head being in the primary position.
The plane of regard is therefore unalterable. It was my own privilege
to show that the normal plane of vision not only varies in different
individuals but that, as a general rule, this variation is associated with
and controlled by certain cranial characteristics which will presently
engage our attention.*

This leads us to the consideration of certain types of the human
cranium as they are recognized by craniologists.

While the form of the head of an individual may not be so clearly
of one or another type that it must be classified as belonging to a cer-
tain group, in general, heads are grouped into three great classes or
types, and these classes or types are again divided into subtypes. In
this connection the subtypes need not be taken into consideration, but
some knowledge of the main types is essential.

Craniologists,. then, classify crania as long, hroad and medium.
Medium skulls, in order to avoid misconception, will be here designated
as tall skulls, since the term medium does' not, in this relation, refer to
capacity, but to certain special measurements, and the accepted term
might be misleading to those not well versed in the subject.

The basis for the classification consists of the proportion which the
longest diameter from before backwards bears to the longest transverse
diameter. If the transverse diameter is ^Vioo that of the longer
diameter or less than '^Viooj the head is said to be in the class of long
heads ; but if the transverse diameter equals or exceeds ^ Vioo the length
of the skull, it is a broad skull. Medium skulls, or, as we are now to call
them, tall skulls, are those in which the transverse diameter is between
"/loo and ^Vioo and, as might be supposed, the measurement from the
base of the skull to its summit, while it may not of itself be greater in
an individual case than that of one of the long or one of the broad type
nor even so great, is greater in proportion to the other measurements.

* The Normal Plane of Vision in Relation to Certain Cranial Character-
istics. 'Archives of Ophthalmology,' Vol. xxvi, No. 3, 1897.

392

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The diagrams, Figs. 1, 2 and 3, give the general outline of the
form of heads of these types when looked at from above.

Fig. 1. The Long Head.

Fig. 2. The Tall Head.

Fig. 3. The Broad Head.

In typical heads belonging to either of these types the outline of
the face is likely to be characteristic of the type. Thus, the general
outline of the face from the line of the brows to the tip of the chin as
seen from the side differs, as a rule, according to the type of the
cranium. Associated with the long cranium there is generally a convex
facial outline, while a side view of the face of one from the class of tall
heads shows usually very little or no curve. On the other hand the face
of one from the class of broad skulls is likely to show a concave line.

The next series of figures, 4, 5 and 6, gives an idea of the general
form from a side view of each of these three types in the living subject.

Fig. 4. The Long Head.
Facial angle + 10°.

Fig. 5. The Tall (medium) Head.
Facial angle 0°.

Fig. 6. The Beoad Head.
Facial angle — 10°.

To nearly all general laws affecting the form of the human body
there are exceptions, and the rule just stated is not absolutely uniform
in its application. However, the type of head and the outline of face
are generally in the relation shown by the diagrams.

THE POSE OF THE BODY. 393

In these three classes of crania the normal visual plane does not as
a rule occupy the same position in relation to the horizontal plane, but
varies according to the type of skull.

The relation of the normal visual plane to the type of tne cranium
in each of the three classes may be arrived at by direct and by indirect
methods.

In the case of the living subject, the dimensions of the head may be
taken and the plane of vision established in the same individual. The
determination of the plane of vision in the living subject is accom-
plished through the aid of an instrument known as the tropometer.
The relation is thus established by a direct method. The indirect
method is that of ascertaining the direction of the imaginary line con-
stituting the axis of the orbit in
the prepared skull, the measure-
ments of which are known. The
orbits are more or less cone-
shaped. If the extreme apex of
the cone, at which the optic nerve
enters it, is taken as one point of
the line of the axis, and a point
where two straight lines drawn at
nearly right angles with each - — -^ ^

other from certain parts of the ^"' ''■ ^he author's method of deter-

•^ MINING THE Axis of the Orbit.

Circle of bone constituting the

outer border of the orbit cross is taken as another point in the line of
the axis, the line which would pass through these two points would
represent the axis. This imaginary line, if projected forward and be-
yond the orbit, would be seen in most cases to point somewhat down-
ward, the skull being in the primary position, and in some types of
skulls it points much more downward than in other types.

It is interesting to find that the pointing of the imaginary line rep-
resenting the axis of the orbit closely corresponds with the observations
on the normal visual plane in the living subject.

The interest is more considerable when it is found that the form of
the orbit in the different classes of skulls offers an explanation of the
peculiarities in the direction of the orbital axis, as well as of the
normal plane of vision.

Figs. 8, 9 and 10 represent the front views of skulls of the long,
tall and broad types respectively, showing the form of the orbit corre-
sponding to each type. It will be seen that in the long skull (Fig. 8)
the roof of the orbit is much lower than that of the tall skull (Fig. 9)
and that the lower border extends more downward. The orbit of the
tall skull is not only placed with its opening higher, but it is more
narrow from side to side. In the case of the broad skull (Fig. 10) the

394

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

roof of the orbit is low like that of the long skull, but the lower border
does not extend so far downward and the direction of the transverse
diameter is more oblique.

Measurements of the direction of the axis of the orbit in these
three classes show that in the long skull the direction is usually quite

Fig. 8.

Front view of Long Skull :

Cephalic Index 71.4 : 100.

Fig. 9.

FfioNT VIEW OF Tall Skull :

Cephalic Index 81 : 100.

Fig. 10.

Front view of Broad Skull :

Cephalic Index 85 : 100.

low, that in the tall skull it is much higher and that, while the axis of
the broad skull is lower than that of the tall one, it is scarcely as low on
the average as in the case of the long skull; and these comparative
positions of the axes of the orbits in the prepared skulls correspond
remarkably with the positions of the visual plane in the case of living
subjects with heads of corresponding types. That is, the visual plane
of the long head is low, of the broad head also low and that of the
tall head is high.

Notwithstanding the apparent simplicity of these relations of the
form of the orbit with the type of the skull and of the direction of the
visual plane to the type of cranium, there are, in practice, certain modi-
fying features.

The most important of these from the anatomical standpoint is
found in the angle of the face. In forming a judgment, therefore, of
the probable direction of the normal visual plane in the living subject
without resorting to measurements by the tropometer, it is necessary
to measure or to estimate this angle. None of the measurements em-
ployed for the prepared skull will serve the purpose here, and it has
been found most practical to use for fixed points for the measurement
of this angle the following: the glabella, which is the elevation above
the root of the nose and just between the ridges of bone above the orbits ;
the depression just below the nose, and the tip of the chin.

If these three fixed points are selected for the measurement of
the angle of the face, it will readily be seen that this angle varies
greatly in different individuals. It may, indeed, vary considerably in
heads belonging to the same type. Yet, on the whole, there is a pretty

THE POSE OF THE BODY.

395

Fig. 11. Stevens's Facial
Goniometer.

general association between the character of the face and the type of
the head.

In the case of the long head, for example, the angle is external, as
^vill be seen on turning to the diagram, Fig. 4, in which the facial
angle is plus (-}-) 11°, or to Fig. 14 where
it is plus (-(-) 15°. In the broad head, on the
contrary, the angle is likely to be inverse, as
in Fig. 6 where the angle is minus ( — ) 10°.
In the tall head, however, the facial angle
almost vanishes. It is, in general, 0° as in
Fig. 5 or only an angle of from -j- 2° to -(- 4°,
rarely exceeding -[-6°. But, as already inti-
mated, the angle may vary in each type of
head.

ISTow, if the angle of the face is taken in
connection with the type of head, we have a
fairly certain indication of the direction of the
plane of vision.

With the long head and strong external
facial angle the plane of vision is almost in-
variably low. With the broad head and inverse
angle the visual plane is also low, but there is
a restricted downward range of the rotations of the eyes, notwithstand-
ing this depressed position of the visual plane. With the tall head and
straight face the plane of vision is high and in proj)ortion as the head
is comparatively tall it may be very high.

When these elemental principles are once understood it is not diffi-
cult to comprehend the phenomena to wliich they give rise.

Thus it is easy to see that a person whose normal plane of vision
is quite low finds it easier to throw the head backwards, lifting the chin
and forcing the forehead back, than to raise the visual plane to the
level of the horizon or even to the lower plane which the eyes assume
in walking, if that visual plane has to be thus elevated and the eleva-
tion maintained for some time by the delicate muscles which act
directly in elevating the eyes.* On the contrary one whose visual
plane is very high prefers to throw the forehead in advance and the
chin into the breast rather than maintain a tension upon the little
muscles which act directly upon the eyes to pull them down.

Thus it will be seen that the person represented at Fig. 12, with the
long head (from before backward) and the strong angle of the face,
carries the forehead quite far back and the chin well up, not from

* There is more in this statement than would at first appear, for the im-
portant question of the horopter must be included here, but this would add an
element too extensive for present discussion.

396

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

any affectation of attitude, but because it is less wearisome to the eyes
to assume this position. As a matter of fact this person's eyes were
normally adjusted 10° below the plane which has been found to be the

Fig. 12.

Fig. 13.

best and which may be called the standard plane. On the contrary the
person whose pose is represented at Fig. 13, whose head is high com-
pared to its transverse and horizontal diameters, a head which is neither
of the long nor broad type, but of the medium (tall) type with the
absence of a strong angle of the face, had the plane of vision very
high. Such a person prefers to throw the forehead in advance and the
chin into the breast, rather than make a continual and somewhat tire-
some effort to draw the eyes to the proper plane by direct tension upon
the depressor muscles of the eyes.

It is not difficult to see that this selection of the easiest method of
adjusting the lines of sight to surrounding objects exercises a com-
manding influence on the whole pose of the body.

While the rule generally holds that the form of the skull and there-
fore the form of the orbit governs the direction of the visual plane and
hence also the pose of the head and of the body, there are other ele-
ments which enter into the case and give rise to exceptions. The most
important of these modifying elements is the condition known as the
'declination of the vertical meridians of the retina';* still, in order

* The subject of the horopter has already been referred to in the note to
page 395. In regard to declinations, while it would be impossible to enter upon
that complex subject here, it would be misleading were we to pass it by without
the statement that the pose of t*he head is sometimes governed, even against the
rule which it is sought here to point out, by the direction of the retinal
meridians and hence in practice a knowledge of this subject would be essential
to a full understanding of the subject under discussion.

THE POSE OF THE BODY. 397

to avoid taking too wide a range of discussion, we shall treat the sub-
ject as though the influence of the plane of vision were in all cases
uniform, which is not strictly the case; yet, for our present purpose,
we may omit the exceptions, and the statements that follow must be
accepted as general and as including the proviso, other things being
equal.

Examining then the pose of the head and body in their relations
to the position of the visual plane more in detail, it will be found that
when the visual plane is quite low not only is there a tendency for the
individual to elevate the chin and throw the head back, but the muscles
of the whole back, even those of its lower 'part, are put in a state of
tension. This tension is so considerable that in a great many in-
stances among persons who are not very strong the resulting habitual
pains of the muscles engaged are often mistaken and treated for diseases
of internal organs or of the spine year after year.

An element of the facial expression with this direction of the visual
plane is the pronounced elevation of the brows upon the forehead
and the somewhat drooping appearance of the eyelids (see Fig. 4).
There are other facial expressions characteristic of this depressed plane
of vision which may be passed over in this connection.

The attitude and gait of the individual are also generally influenced
by the downward direction of the visual plane. In walking the
shoulders are thrown back and the chest is thrust forward. The foot,
in many cases, swings forward considerably beyond the limit of the
completed step, so that it is drawn somewhat backward as it comes to
the ground.

While persons of this class are more liable than others to certain
physical complaints and nervous disturbances which can be traced
directly to this ocular condition than are those whose eyes are adjusted
for a higher plane, they are, on the other hand, compared with this
latter class far less subject to certain other forms of diseases and affec-
tions.

A single example will serve to illustrate this proposition. Although
the illustration relates to a trouble with the eyes themselves it would be
easy to present many examples to illustrate immunity of the same class
of persons from a variety of more general affections.

A few years since a distinguished oculist of one of our southern
cities aimounced that trachoma, that form of eye trouble commonly
known as granular lids, and which is one of the prolific sources of
blindness, is unlcnown among pure negroes. The discussion of this
proposition, after occupying the attention of oculists for some time,
was at length taken up in a different way by a distinguished colleague
in Constantinople.

This gentleman wrote to oculists in all parts of the world asking

398

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

for the results of their observations in their own countries in regard
to all classes of people. He at length published a symposium of the
answers showing the prevalence of trachoma in different countries and
among the different classes of people. As given in this contribution
there seemed to be a confused accumulation of facts which had, on the
whole, apparently little meaning. Peoples of contiguous countries, of
the same color and not very different in habits of life, were reported as
differing widely in respect to the prevalence of the affection. Ko
reasons were assigned and none seemed to be suggested by the varying
facts. An analysis which I made of this report showed that among
peoples with the 'medium' or tall heads, like the Irish and the Italians,
trachoma is rife; while among peoples with the broad head, like the
Bavarians, or with the long head, like the negroes whose ancestors
were from the West or Guinea coast of Africa, trachoma did not pre-
vail ; but it is interesting to note that descendants of the negroes of the
northern part of Africa, where the heads of the natives are often tall,
are subject to trachoma equally with the whites among whom they live.
I have in another connection discussed this question at more length.*

A glance at Fig 14 will show that the negro
as he is known in our Southern States not only
throws the head backward in the manner char-
acteristic of the long head, the strong facial
angle and the depressed visual plane, but that
the eyebrows are characteristically elevated.
This drawing up of the brow is accompanied
with a drawing upon the lids and hence no
pressure is brought upon the surface of the
eyes by the upper lids. In the case of the tall
head with the high plane of vision the brows
are strongly compressed and the lids bind
upon the eyeball and thus in the midst of dust
and filth or even in good sanitary surround-
ings disease of the lids may be promoted.
Eeverting once more to the declinations of the retinal meridians,
the same effect may be induced both as to the pose of the head and the
relaxed state of the lids. It is, however, impracticable to consider the
subject from that point of view at present.

Turning to a larger and more important subject, the negro is
known to be especially subject to tubercular diseases, yet he is, to an
unusual degree, immune from consumption. In my investigations
during the past few years, I have not seen a consumptive the direction
of whose visual plane was not much higher than the standard. We
shall come to this from another point of view. It is easy to see that
* 'Transactions of the British Medical Association,' 1897.

Fig. 14. The Long Head with
Pkognathous Face. Fa-
cial ANGLE +15°.

THE POSE OF THE BODY.

399

the principle which applies in the case of the long skull applies
similarly also in that of the broad skull although, in general, in some-
what less degree.

People who have broad heads with inverse angle of the face usually
carry the head with the forehead thrown back and the chin elevated.
Those who have this form of head and this consequent depression of
the visual plane often suffer from the neuralgic or myalgic affections
of the back of the head and the spinal region like the class with the
long head and strong exterior facial angle. The differences need not be
discussed here.

Directing our attention now to the excessive upward direction of
the plane of vision which is found principally with the tall, or more
correctly and technically, the mesocephalic head, we find not only a
great difference in the adjustments of the facial muscles as compared
with the class which we have just considered, but also in the poise of
the body. In the class now to be considered the brows are compressed
and the expression is one of intensity. The chin is not elevated as in
the other class, but the forehead is advanced and the body leans
forward. The shoulders bend forward and the chest is often com-
pressed. With the noblest form of the head comes a stoop of the body.
Fortunately for the world these people do not all have consumption,
for if they did one "of the highest forms of development of humanity
would be wiped out. Unfortunately, however, it is from this class
of people that consumption finds the great majority of its victims.
Glance at the position of the air passages in these two portraits in each
of which the habitual pose of the body and head is fairly represented.

Fig. 15.

Fig. 16.

In the case of the one with the broad head and difficult upward
rotations of the eyes (Fig. 15), a swarm of tubercle bacilli would pass in
and out of the respiratory passages with much the same effect as any

400 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

other minute particles of dust, while in the case of the tall headed boy
(Fig. 16) who has, by actual measurement, the visual plane adjusted
more than twenty degrees above the horizon, the larynx forms a hinge-
like valve and in the quiet eddies of a lung under these circumstances
the tubercle bacilli can easily hold high carnival. If the direction of
the large branches of the air tubes is considered it is evident that the
circulation of the air in the very upper portions of the lungs of one
with such a habitual pose would naturally be even less active than in
the lower parts, and it is interesting to remember that it is in the
upper lobes that the bacilli usually commence their inroads. The
modern treatment of consumption is fresh air. It is evident that the
amount of air admitted to the lungs of a person with the habitual
attitude of this boy must be very materially modified by this position
of the head; and could the normal pose be improved he would by that
means be subjected to the fresh-air treatment. It will be seen that
this is entirely practicable.

The comparative immunity of the negro race from consumption has
already been referred to, and it is a fact of much practical interest
that among the people of Iceland, people with the extreme broad
head and with the characteristic pose, the head thrown back, the chin
elevated, consumption is unknown. Yet these people habitually inhale
the most vitiated atmosphere, an atmosphere which, habitually inhaled
by the people of this country, would induce an epidemic of con-
sumption which would be of the most devastating character.

As the general pose of the head and the attitude of the body differ
in the class with high heads from those of the other classes, so the gait
and carriage of these people differ widely from those of the others. If
the cake walk is an extravagant exaggeration of the walk of the classes
with the low visual plane, the stoop of Shylock as it is represented
on the stage is the exaggeration of the carriage of the other class.

This is but a most cursory glance at a most important subject; and
the affections and characteristics mentioned are but a group of those
whose name is legion and which have for their cause one or other of
these visual conditions.

Several years ago attention was called by the writer of this article
to the one-sided carriage of the head of those who have the visual line
of one eye higher than that of the other. I will only refer to it here as
one of the elements in this interesting subject.

The practical question which arises from the presentation of this
subject is: Can the direction of the visual axes be so modified in the
individual case as to change the pose of the head and body so as to
relieve the person from the results of his physical peculiarity? To this
an emphatic affirmative answer can be given. The eyes can be adjusted
for any desired plane by a safe and speedy procedure. It may be said

TEE POSE OF TEE BODY. 401

that, in the hands of one specially skilled in this procedure, the incon-
venience and risk are scarcely as great as those resulting from vaccina-
tion as commonly practised.

Thus, by practical and judicious methods, the unfortunate posi-
tions of the eyes due to the hereditary form of the orbits may be recti-
fied, and the handicap with which large classes of persons enter upon
the course of life may be removed, thereby offering them that advantage
and that staying quality in the contest for welfare and for success to
which, by their native strength and inborn abilities, they are fairly
entitled.

VOL. LIX. — 27

402 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE GEEAT MOETALITY.

By professor EDWARD P. CHEYNEY.

TISr every city of the civilized world to-day, armed and watchful men
-L are standing on guard against a dreaded invader; men armed
with knowledge obtained from scientific investigation, with experi-
ence drawn from former attacks, with authority of law to enter every
household and set aside every individual claim in the work of resist-
ance to the first onset of the foe. This anticipated enemy is the
bubonic plague, and the officials of boards of health form a civic guard
against it more nearly impassable than any military cordon. Yet with
all this watchfulness, with the expenditure of vast sums in delimitation
and extirpation, with the relatively cleanly surroundings of daily life
in this century, the plague has within the last five years broken through
the barriers and made its way into various cities of Asia, Africa, Aus-
tralia, Europe and North and South America. Kot only in its in-
digenous home in India, but in Sydney and Honolulu, in Lisbon and
Eio de Janeiro, in Glasgow and San Francisco, in Cairo and Cape
Town, it has made a longer or shorter lodgment.

There was a time when there was no such guard against invasion,
when the same disease passed westward from its Asiatic birthplace in a
fierce attack upon the nations of Europe, and found no measures taken
to resist its advance; indeed, in the squalid houses and streets of
medieval towns and villages, there was every inducement to enter and
batten on populations unfitted by habits of life or by medical knowledge
to expel, resist or even mollify their enemy.

"In the year of grace 1349," an old chronicle says, "a great mor-
tality of mankind advanced over the world ; beginning in the regions of
the north and east and ending with so great a destruction that scarcely
half of the people remained. Then towns once full of men became
destitute of inhabitants, and so violently did the pestilence increase
that the living were scarce able to bury the dead," So sudden, so
mysterious, so fatal was this pestilence that even the dry medieval
annalist personified it, spoke of it as if it were some active sentient
personality. "Very many of those who were attacked in the morning
it carried out of human affairs before noon ; and no one whom it willed
to die did it permit to live longer than three or four days."

Friar Clyn, in his 'Chronicle of Ireland,' after giving many details of
the plague, says: "I, therefore, brother of John Clyn of the order of

TEE GREAT MORTALITY. 403

the Minors and the convent of Kilkenny, have written down in this
book these wonderful occurrences of our time as I have seen them
with my eyes or heard them from credible witnesses; and lest such
strange things should perish with the passage of time and should pass
from the memory of men who are to come, watching these many evils
and the whole world fallen into sickness, and waiting among the
dead till death shall come, I have put into writing what I have heard
truthfully and observed carefully. And lest the writing should perish
with the writer and the labor should fail with the laborer, I leave
parchment to continue the work, if it should chance that any man
should survive, or any of the race of Adam succeed in escaping this
pestilence, to continue the work which I have begun." Then follow
two or three confused sentences, when his expectation of death must
have been justified, for there is nothing more of the chronicle except
an annotation by a later hand, videtur quod auctor hie ohiit, 'it seems
that the author here died.' Another chronicler lays down his pen at
the onset of the plague, and long afterward when resuming his narra-
tive, sick at heart, perhaps, or feeling his skill inadequate to the de-
scription of such a period of confusion, enters in the appropriate place
only the words magna mortalitas, ''the great mortality.'

This great mortality came 'from the north and east.' On the
confines of Asia and Europe, at the mouth of the Sea of Azov, lay
the medieval trading city of Kaffa. Here goods were brought from
Persia, from India and from China to be handed over by men of the
east to men of the west. Genoese and Venetian bought from Tartar
and Arab silk, cotton, spices, precious stones and metals, gums, woods
and sugar, and carried them through the Black Sea and the Mediter-
ranean to be distributed finally among all the countries of Europe. In
the year 1347 a war broke out in the Crimea between these men of the
west and of the east, and the Italian inhabitants of Kaffa were be-
sieged by the Tartars. In the midst of the hostilities a terrible pesti-
lence broke out among the besiegers, which devastated their hordes like
the hand of the destroying angel in the camp of the Assyrians. In
their frenzy the survivors threw numbers of the bodies of those who
had died of the plague from their catapults into the besieged city and
thus carried infection to those within. The siege was soon raised, and
the Genoese merchants and sailors, resuming their trading, set sail
toward the west. But they took with them on their voyage, along with
the luxuries from the far east, a new scourge for Europe, the con-
tagion of the plague — the Black Death, as it has been called in mod-
ern times.

The symptoms of the disease were obscure and varying, and so re-
mained through successive attacks, until only too abundant opportuni-
ties for observation have recently enabled modern medical observers to

404 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

differentiate its various types. But it showed itself then, as it still
remains, fatal in a greater proportion of cases than any other disease
to which humanity is subject.

The distribution of its germs through the Mediterranean lands was
quickly accomplished. In the fall of 1347 Constantinople was more
than decimated. The shores of the ^gean were quickly infected, and
before the close of the year Sicily, the cities and towns of southern
Italy, and all the ports of the Adriatic were alike prostrate under the
scourge. A Sicilian tells how "a most deadly pestilence sprang
up over the entire island. It happened that in the month of October,
in the year of our Lord 1347, about the beginning of the month, twelve
Genoese ships flying from the divine vengeance which our Lord for
their sins had sent upon them, put into the port Messina, bringing
with them such a sickness clinging to their very bones that, did anyone
speak to them, he was directly struck with a mortal siclcness from which
there was no escape. Flight profited nothing, for the sickness already
contracted and clinging to the fugitives was only carried wherever they
sought refuge. Some of those who fled fell on the roads and dragged
themselves to die in the fields, the woods, the valleys."

By the springtime the storm had spent its fury in the south of
Italy, but it had passed on northward. It was in April of 1348,
Boccaccio tells us, that the malady appeared in the fair city of Florence.
There while human nature was resolved into its most primitive ele-
ments, as he describes in the introduction to the Decameron, his little
group of story tellers gathered in a country house about two miles out-
side of the city trying to avoid the pestilence, or at least to make what
time should remain pass more cheerfully in the recounting of sad or
merry tales. The occasional pathos, the frequent salacity, and the
unvarying humor and grace of the tales stand out boldly in Boccaccio's
setting of them against the dark background of the mournful re-
membrance of that most fatal plague so terrible yet in the memories
of us all. In the city the sick were lying deserted by friends, family,
servants, physicians and even by the priest, as implacable death crept
upon them ; palaces stood deserted and unfastened, jewels and rich gar-
ments Ijdng unguarded, except by the dread of infection; the bodies
of the dead were being hastily dragged from the houses, carried to
the cemeteries and deposited in long rows in pits, with no bells rung,
no rites said, no solemn chant or mourning of friends; while outside
the city the story tellers of the Decameron were passing away the time
governed by the one rule that none should bring to them any news of
the plague-stricken outer world.

Not only Boccaccio in Florence, but Petrarch in Parma, writes in
the midst of the plague: "Where are now our pleasant friends?
Where the loved faces? Where their cheering words? Where their

THE GREAT MORTALITY. 405

sweet and gentle conversation? We were surrounded by a crowd of
friends; now we are almost alone." And he might well see the world
darkening around him, for had not Laura just died of the plague at
Avignon? The 'great mortality' was indeed no respecter of persons.
It is true that the poor died in greater numbers in proportion to the
closeness and insalubrity of their dwellings and to their lack of power
of resistance from insufficient food. But the list of the great ones of
the earth who died is a long one. One of the earliest victims of the
plague on its entrance into Europe was Andronicus, the son of the
Emperor at Constantinople. The King and Queen of Arragon both
died from it. Joan, the daughter of Edward III., on her way to
Castile to be married, was smitten suddenly at Bordeaux and died,
escaping, it is true, the worse fate of living to be the wife of Pedro the
Cruel. Great churchmen died in all parts of Europe — the archbishop
of Cantania, the archbishop of Canterbury, the archbishop of Dront-
heim; bishops and abbots in every country. Of the twelve city
magistrates of Montpellier, in France, ten died; of the twenty-four
prominent physicians, twenty. Nobles and burghers, ecclesiastics and
lawyers fared but little better than the great masses, except that their
names are mentioned, while the hundreds of thousands of lesser men
died unknown.

The Mediterranean was then still the middle of the world, and the
pestilence, like art and literature and money, was distributed readily
from Italy to all parts of Europe. Before the year 1348 was over it
was in France, Switzerland and Germany, and had obtained a foothold
in the southern seaports of England. The next year it passed still
further northward through England, Scotland and Ireland. It was
carried from England to Scandinavia by a London ship, all of whose
crew died, leaving the boat with its fatal cargo to be cast on the Nor-
wegian coast at Bergen. During the same year and the succeeding
spring, it had passed down the Valley of the Ehine, through the
Netherlands and northern Germany, until the year 1350 saw 'the great
mortality,' its harvest reaped for that season, passing out of the north-
ern and western portals of Europe to the all-purifying waters of the
great ocean.

But during those four years of devastation what experiences had
humanity gone through ! We can look back now and see only dimly
through the mist. The figures are blurred and their movements indis-
tinct. The light of imagination fails to illuminate a condition so dif-
ferent from normal experience. Only here and there a clear light is
cast upon some spot by a record made at the time. In the inn of a little
town in Spain a French pilgrim returning from the tomb of St. James
of Campostella, after supping with the host, who with two daughters
and one servant had alone so far survived of his entire family and

4o6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

who was not then conscious of any sickness upon them, settled with
him for his entertainment, intending to start on his journey at day-
break, and went to bed. The next morning, rising and wanting some-
thing from those with whom they had supped, the travelers could make
no one hear. Then they learned from an old woman whom they found
in bed that the host, his two daughters and servant had died in the
night. "In the spring of 1348 a Genoese, infected with the plague,
came to Piacenza. He sought out his friend, Fulchino della Croce, who
took him into his house. Almost immediately afterward he died, and
the said Fulchino was also quickly carried ofE with his entire family
and many of his neighbors." "The bishop of Eochester out of his
small household lost four priests, five gentlemen, ten serving men,
seven young clerks and six pages, so that not a person remained who
might serve him in any oflfiee." "Alas, for our sorrow ! This mortality
swept away so vast a multitude of both sexes that none could be found
to carry the corpses to the grave. Men and women bore their own
offspring on their shoulders to the church and cast them into a com-
mon pit." "And I, Agniolo di Tura, carried with my own hands my
five little sons to the pit."

Everywhere through Europe the story is the same. The sudden
onset, the four or five months of devastation, the glutting of the old
cemeteries and the opening up of new, the pits into which the bodies
were piled, the extermination of whole families, the collapse of govern-
ment, the desertion of the sick and the dead, the avoidance of the
infected, the occasional heroism, self-sacrifice, devotion to duty, and
the sadly more frequent selfishness, cruelty, callousness and reckless-
ness; then the passing away of the visitation, leaving behind it, often,
according to the bewildered judgment of the contemporary chronicler,
not a tenth part of the people, and even according to modern and
moderate computation seldom as many as one-half of the population
it had found.

Then came the gleaning. Physical disease then as always brought
moral degeneracy. A great catastrophe then as always weakened the
virtues and strengthened the vices of poor custom-bound humanity.
A physician at Avignon writes: "The father did not visit his son, nor
the son his father. Charity was dead." Villani says of his neighbors
at Florence that they behaved as "might perhaps be expected from
infidels and savages." "Men gave themselves up to the enjoyment of
the worldly riches to which they had succeeded." The English manor
court rolls record more than one case where a house bereft of its
occupants by the plague was plundered by the neighbors, and bodies of
the dead stripped by their own fellow villagers. The wealthy, in the
months following the plague, gambled, reveled, steeped themselves in
gluttony and lechery; the poor idled, brawled, took advantage of the

TEE GREAT MORTALITY. 407

necessities of their lords, and became irreligious and rebellious.
Scarcely a writer fails to record the utter selfishness of the period of
the visitation and the dissoluteness and lowered morals which fol-
lowed in its wake. The surviving laborers insisted on higher wages,
and employers used their influence with the Government to pass laws
to compel the acceptance of the old rates. Contention raged between
rich and poor, and the seeds were sown for Jacqueries and Peasants'
Eebellions. The building of churches ceased for a time. The newly
laid foundations of the vast nave and choir of the cathedral at Siena
were left as they were and have never been built upon to this day. A
thousand partially built churches remained stationary for a time, and
their construction was resumed only when architectural style had
changed so distinctly that the line of division can still be seen. At
Oxford and Cambridge and Paris the number of students was depleted
and never again rose to its former number. The clergy suffered more
than any other class in the community. Many a monastery had lost
its whole body of occupants. In others the few survivors, with dimin-
ished income from their land and weakened devotion and discipline
because of the death of their leading members, never refilled their
numbers or regained their old prosperity and vigor. The bishops were
compelled to ordain to the service of the church the young, the inex-
perienced, the illiterate ; and even then there were too few for its needs.
Society gradually reconstructed itself on much the same old lines.
Permanent changes come not from sudden and conspicuous, but from
slowly acting and obscure, influences. Yet Europe was never quite the
same again. Two centuries may have passed before the void in me-
dieval population was refilled. Even to this day grain ripens yearly
over the sites of villages which lost their population and their name in
the great mortality. Various social changes were hastened or retarded
or deflected from their former direction. Even though there was no
actual breach in the continuity of European development, yet new in-
terests arose, new evil and new good appeared. 'Sithence the pesti-
lence' is an era which Piers Plowman quite naturally uses; for it was
graven deep in the memory of his generation.

4o8

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE.

GEOLOGY AND THE DELUGE.

To the Editor: — I have read with
much bewilderment an article entitled
'Geology and the Deluge,' contributed
to 'McClure's Magazine' for June, by
Dr. Frederick G. Wright, professor of
the harmony of science and religion in
Oberlin College. Doubtless other men
of science would also be gratified if
Professor Wright would consent to
make his position clear by answering
the following questions:

1. You say, Professor Wright, that
"The Paleolithic man of science may
well be the Antediluvian man of
Genesis." Was Tubal Cain, 'an instruct-
or of every artificer in brass and iron,'
an antediluvian man, and, if so, had
he not learned to use smoothed stone
instruments? Was Noah, himself, a
paleolithic or a neolithic man, and did
he build the ark with flaked or polished
flint implements?

2. You say: "But towards the close
of this period there were 120 years
(specially mentioned in the Bible as a
time of warning) in which the move-
ment was accelerated to such a degree
that the rising waters gave point to
the preaching of Noah." The period
of 120 years here mentioned was de-
duced from the statement that Noah
was 600 years old at the time of the
flood. Do you believe that Noah was
600 years old, and that his grandchil-
dren that peopled the earth were sub-
sequently born?

3. You say: "During the last 371
days of this period the catastrophe
culminated in the facts specifically re-
lated in the Book of Genesis." Do you
believe that the 'facts specifically re-
lated in the Book of Genesis' are true?

For example, that "every living sub-
stance was destroyed which was upon
the face of the ground, both man, and
cattle, and the creeping things, and the
fowl of the heaven; and they were de-
stroyed from the earth : and Noah only
remained alive, and they that were
with him in the ark."

The readers of 'McClure's Magazine'
will probably understand that Profess-
or Wright claims to have confirmed
by his geological discoveries the details
related in Genesis. Are Professor
Wright's fellow geologists also to un-
derstand that he believes that the early
chapters of Genesis are in accord with
modern science and that they are sup-
ported by his recent observations in
Asia?

X. Plain.

ETHER AND CHLOROFORM.

To the Editor: — In the course of an
article on 'Cocaine Analgesia of the
Spinal Cord,' in the July number of
the Popular Science Monthly, Dr.
JelliflTe writes, "Soon after chloroform
came ether, the safer anaesthetic," etc.
Ether was, however, introduced before
chloroform. On September 30, 1846,
Morton, of Boston, used ether in dental
surgei-y, and during the following
months it was administered in surgical
operations at the Massachusetts Gen-
eral Hospital. The news reached Eng-
land on December 17, 1846. It was
used by Simpson, of Edinburgh, in
midwifery practice in January, 1847,
and it was not until November, 1847,
that he announced the discovery of the
anaesthetic properties of chloroform.

C. Heebman.

SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE.

409

SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE.

REGENT CONTRIBUTIONS TO EN-
GINEERING.
'Tunneling: A Practical Treatise,'
by Charles Prelini, of Manhattan Col-
lege, is a well-printed book, just pub-
lished by D. Van Nostrand Company,
which appears to fill a real need, since
no American work on the subject has
appeared during the past twenty years.
The various methods of driving tun-
nels through earth are fully illus-
trated, especial attention being given
to the shield process which has been so
thoroughly developed in recent years.
Submarine tunnels are discussed fully,
with illustrations of those in New
York, Chicago and Milwaukee. Tun-
nels in rock occupy nearly one- half the
volume, the modern methods used in
the St. Gothard and Simplon tunnels
receiving detailed notice. Subway con-
struction in Boston and New York is
also discussed. Interesting historical
information regarding ancient tunnels
is given, while methods of surveying,
centering, blasting and ventilating are
explained in a manner which sets forth
principles as well as facts. The book
is one that shows much painstaking
work on the part of the author, and it
deserves high commendation.

In ancient times it was the cus-
tom for the title page of a book to
give a full account of its contents.
This plan is followed in a work by
James D. Schuyler, published by Wiley
& Sons, whose title is 'Reservoirs for
Irrigation, Water Power, and Domes-
tic Water Supply, with an account of
various types of dams and the methods
and plans of their construction,
together with a discussion of the avail-
able water supply for irrigation in
various sections of arid America; the

distribution, application and use of
water; the rainfall and run-oflf, the
evaporation from reservoirs, the effect
of silt upon reservoirs, etc' The vol-
ume is a large octavo of 400 pages
with numerous full-page half-tones and
several folding plates. It is mostly de-
voted to constructions west of the
Rocky mountains; here hydraulic-fill
dams and rock-fill dams originated, and
the book contains descriptions of all
that have been built^ as well as ac-
counts of the most important masonry
and earthen dams. The treatment is
descriptive and statistical rather than
scientific, and the work is hence mainly
one of reference for the use of enjri-
neers.

'The Cement Industry,' published
by the 'Engineering Record,' is an
octavo volume of 235 pages which gives
detailed descriptions of numerous
cement plants in Europe and America.
The production of natural cement in
the United States has been somewhat
checked during the last decade by the
rapid improvements in the manufac-
ture of the Portland product, particu-
larly by the introduction of rotary
kilns. From 1895 to 1900 the produc-
tion of Poi-tland cement increased from
one to seven million barrels per year,
and the price suffered a reduction of
nearly fifty per cent. The great de-
piosits of argillaceous limestone in the
Lehigh Valley form the principal
source of Portland cement^ but in the
west it is made by mixing clay and
marl in proper proportions, and there
are also two or three plants where
blast-furnace slag is used. The book,
which is well illustrated, gives full de-
tails of the methods of manufacture of
both natural and Portland cements.

VOL. LIX. — 28

4IO

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

A MONTHLY journal called 'Revista
de Construcciones y Agrimensura' is
published monthly at Havana by
Aurelio Sandoval. It contains many
excellent plans and illustrations of
buildings, articles on road and railroad
construction, surveying, mechanics and
technical education, and appears to be
edited with much care. The last num-
ber contains the questions propounded
to the candidates for chief of the me-
chanical laboratory in the engineering
department of the University of Ha-
vana, and these indicate that a high
scientific and technical standard is de-
manded as a qualification for a pro-
fessorship. The University of Havana
was completely reorganized in 1900,
under an order issued by Gen. Chaffee,
and the previously independent school
of engineering made one of its depart-
ments under the faculty of letters and
sciences. The university recently con-
ferred its first degree of Civil Engi-
neer upon Sr. Andrfis Castella, who had
the highest rank in an examination
held for an assistant professorship in
engineering.

'The Economic Disposal of Towns'
IIefuse,' by W. Francis Goodrich, is
one of the 'Engineering Times' Library,
published by King & Son, London.
The author holds that garbage and
street sweepings should be destroyed by
fire and in no other way, and he pre-
sents facts and figures from all coun-
tries showing the great growth of pro-
cesses of cremation. Dumping street
refuse at sea, sorting it out into parts
which may be utilized, and the pro-
cesses of reduction by boiling are sum-
marily dismissed as unworthy of con-
sideration. The volume contains a
large amount of information regarding
different kinds of crematories, with re-
sults of comparative tests, and also a
lengthy discussion as to the best kind
of chimneys and boilers to utilize the
hot waste gases for the purpose of
generating power. Cremating furnaces
are now in operation at 106 towns in

England, there being 18 in London
alone, and at 12 towns in Scotland and
Ireland. At Bradford, Canterbury,
Fleetwood, Oldham and a few other
places, the waste gases are utilized for
producing electric power for street
lighting.

'Public Watek Supplies,' by Profess-
ors F. E. Turneaure and F. H. Russell
(John Wiley & Sons), is a comprehen-
sive work covering the entire range of
the subject, sanitary as well as con-
structive. That certain diseases are
communicated through water is now
thoroughly established, and the demon-
stration that the water can be rendered
harmless by proper filtration is com-
plete. Hence purity as well as quan-
tity is an important factor in the con-
sideration of a modern water supply.
The chemical and bacteriological part
of such works has heretofore been gen-
erally kept aside from the engineering
part, but by the cooperation of two au-
thors, both specialists in their respect-
ive lines, the difficult task of coordina-
tion has been here attempted. The
book is mainly designed for engineer-
ing students in technical schools, but
it cannot be said that the chapters on
the chemistry and bacteriology of
water are written in such a manner as
to produce the best results. The engi-
neering discussions relating to filter
beds, walls, reservoirs, mains, stand-
pipes and other details seem, on the
other hand, to be clear and complete
and likely to be of interest and value to
all engaged in planning water supplies.
The volume is the largest yet published
on this subject in this country, is well
printed with the exception of some of
the cuts, and contains many carefully
prepared descriptions of constructed
plants. That the authors have not
been completely successful in com-
bining the sanitary and constructive
elements is not surprising, in view of
the difficulty of the task, but they de-
serve great credit for their painstaking
work and the valuable volume pro-
duced.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

411

THE PROGEESS OF SCIENCE.

THE WASHINGTON MEMORIAL
INSTITUTION.

It is generally though not univer-
sally known that Washington made
provision in his will toward the estab-
lishment of a national university. For
reasons somewhat difficult to under-
stand his bequest has never been used,
and only after the lapse of a hundred
years has an institution been estab-
lished in his memory which will fully
accomplish under the conditions now
existing the great objects he had in
view. These have, it is true, in large
measure been met by the growth of
private and state universities, and by
the development of scientific work un-
der the government, but at last these
different lines will converge in the
Washington Memorial Institution.
This has resulted from the union of
more or less independent efforts. An
enthusiastic group of men and women
has long advocated the establishment
of a national university, and for this
purpose a George Washington Me-
morial Association was incorporated in
1898. In the same year the Washing-
ton Academy of Sciences was organ-
ized, giving a definite center for scien-
tific interests in the city and to a cer-
tain extent throughout the country.
In the same year a committee of the
National Educational Association was
appointed, which recommended the
utilization for research of the scientific
and other departments of the govern-
ment. In the same year a committee
of the Association of Agricultural Col-
leges and Experiment Stations recom-
mended the organization of oppor-
tunities for study and research for
students of the land grant and other
colleges. The year 1898 is consequently

an important one in the history of the
development of education and research
in the United States, and the present
year marks the union and fruition of
these efforts.

The Washington Memorial Institu-
tion was incorporated on May 20, its
objects being defined as follows:

To create a memorial to George
Washington, to promote science and
literature, to provide opportunities and
facilities for higher learning, and to
facilitate the utilization of the scien-
tific and other resources of the govern-
ment for purposes of research and
higher education.

A board of fifteen trustees has been
created, including representatives of
the leading universities of the country
and of the scientific work under the
government. The officers include Dr.
D. C. Gilman, lately president of the
Johns Hopkins University, as director;
Dr. Charles D. Walcott, president of
the Washington Academy of Sciences
and director of the U. S. Geological
Survey, as president of the board of
trustees; and Professor Nicholas Mur-
ray Butler, of Columbia University, as
secretary of the board. Under these
auspices there will surely develop at
Washington a great institution, which
Avill in fact be a national university.
It will not, however, be a rival to exist-
ing universities, but Avill coordinate
their work; it will utilize the oppor-
tunities for study and research in the
government departments, without in-
terfering with their legitimate func-
tions; it will be a center of research
and intellectual activity, worthily rep-
resenting our great universities and
the scientific work of the national
government.

412

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

TEE CELEBRATIONS AT GLAS-
GOW AND CHICAGO.
Glasgow University celebrated its
ninth jubilee exactly at the same time
that the University of Chicago cele-
brated its first decennial. On both occa-
sions there were elaborate academic
ceremonies, and the sciences were well
represented. Indeed at Glasgow science
appears to have been predominant, the
four principal addresses being in cele-
bration of four men of science, promi-
nently connected with the university in
the past. Lord Kelvin delivered an
oration on James Watt, Professor

addresses being made on different sub-
jects. The only two foreign delegates
appear to have been Professor J. H.
van't HoflF, the eminent physical chem-
ist of Berlin, and Professor Marcus
Dods, the theologian of Edinburgh.
Eleven honorary degrees were given,
including in the sciences, in addition
to Professor van't Hoff, Professor E.
C. Pickering, director of the Harvard
College Observatorv; Dr. Charles D.
Walcott, director of the U. S. Geologi-
cal Survey, and Professor E. B. Wil-
son, professor of zoology in Columbia
University. The address of most inter-

■''i ' ■'•■<

The Leon Mandel Assembly- Hall, the Student's Club House, the Tower and the
Commons of the University of Chicago.

Smart on Adam . Smith, Professor
Young on William Hunter, and Sir
Joseph Hooker, in connection with the
opening of the new botanical depart-
ment, on his father. The LL.D. was
given to somewhat over one hundred
delegates, including, among Americans,
J. Mark Baldwin, professor of psychol-
ogy, Princeton University; William G.
Farlow, professor of cryptogamic bot-
any, Harvard University; Adolph
Meyer, lecturer on psychiatry, Clark
University; and R. Mark Wenley, pro-
fessor of philosophy. University of
Michigan. The celebration at Chicago
was even more elaborate, a number of

est from a scientific point of view was
Dr. Walcott's on 'The Relation of the
National Government to Higher Edu-
cation and Research.' Mr. and Mrs.
Rockefeller were present at the exer-
cises, and President Harper took the
occasion to say that the world knows
what ten or twelve million dollars mil
do for a university, but that the time
is coming for the world to learn what
fifty million dollars can accomplish.
As part of the ceremonies the corner
stones of a number of new buildings
were laid, the most important group of
uhieh is shown in the accompanying
illustration.

THE PBOGBESS OF SCIENCE.

41.

THE CARNEGIE SCHOOLS.
IxsTiTUTiONS for Scientific educa-
tion and research are developing in the
United States with a rapidity that is
truly bewildering. Industrial condi-
tions, created by the advance of science,
have produced wealth that is both
widely distributed and collected in
great fortunes. Several of those who
have freely received have also freely
given. To them the world is forever
indebted, for they have not only by
their contributions to education and
science made new advances inevitable,
but, by repaying their debt to society,
they have contributed greatly to its
stability. During the past month Mr.
Jacob S. Rogers, of Paterson, N. J., a
manufacturer of locomotives, has be-
queathed nearly his entire fortune, $8,-
000,000 it is said, to the Metropolitan
Museum of Art in Xew York City, and
Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan has given
$1,000,000 to Harvard University for
its Medical School. Mr. Carnegie's
gifts of $10,000,000 to the Scottish uni-
versities and of an equal sum for
American libraries have recently been
made, and now it appears that he is
planning with equal munificence for
technical schools at Pittsburg-.

In the May issue of this magazine.
Dr. W. J. Holland, director of the Car-
negie Museum, described Mr. Car-
negie's great foundation. The trus-
tees of the Institute and Library were
requested by Mr. Carnegie to draw up
plans for technical schools, and they
appointed an expert committee, which
has just made a report. This commit-
tee consists of Professor Robert H.
Thurston, director of Sibley Engineer-
ing College, Cornell University; Pro-
fessor J. B. Johnson, dean of the Col-
lege of Engineering, University of
Wisconsin; Professor Thomas Gray, of
the Rose Polytechnic Institute, and
Professor V. C. Alderson, of the Ar-
mour Institute. Their report outlines
a technical institute covering the whole
field Avith unparalleled thoroughness, 1
including a college, a high-school and j

special classes. The college would offer
courses in the sciences, in modern lan-
guages and in all departments of engi-
neering, and provide the fullest facili-
ties for investigation and research,
being in fact a great national school of
technology. The high-school would be
local in character, but would be a
model for the similar schools that will
surely be established in other cities.
Special classes will provide instruction
for those who are unable to give their
entire time to study. These are only
the recommendations of the committee,
but there is every reason to believe
that Mr. Carnegie has in view the es-
tablishment at Pittsburg of the great-
est technical schools in the world.

THE TELEGRAPHONE.

Mr. Poulsex, of Copenhagen, has
given the name telegraphone to an in-
strument in which he has most ingen-
iously combined the telephone and the
phonograph. Its general construction
will be understood from the illustra-
tions, originally published in the Lon-
don 'Electrician.' The details of the
two instruments differ, a short \\are
being used in the one and a long steel
ribbon in the other, but the general
principle is the same. The steel wire
or ribbon passes before the poles of an
electro-magnet in a telephone circuit,
and is thus magnetized in a manner
varying with the current in the tele-
phone circuit produced by the voice of
the speaker. \Yhen the steel wire is
then passed over the poles of an elec-
tro-magnet, the same undulations will
be set up in the current passing
through its coils, and the sounds will
be reproduced in the receiver. The re-
production is as definite as in a good
telephone and much superior in quality
to that of any form of phonograph.
The record can be used as often as de-
sired, and is said to last indefinitely,
but it can be mped out by passing the
v.ire over an electro-magnet. The wire
can be passed over any number of re-

414

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

ceiving magnets, and messages can Oppolzer, of the planet's variability,
thus be transmitted practically simul- A variable planet, with a range of-

The Telegraphone.

taneously to any number of stations.
It is said also that the magnets may, in
this way, be used as a telephonic relay,
which would be a result of the utmost
practical importance.

THE PLANET EROS.
The little planet Eros bids fair to
hold the attention of astronomers for
several years to come. Before the ob-
servations necessary for the determina-
tion of the sun's distance had been com-
pleted, came the announcement, by Dr.

variation, such as Eros has shown, is
in itself something new and striking,
but this is only the beginning of the
problem. Several hundred stars are
known to vary their light periodically,
and some advance has been made in
the theory of their variability. Varia-
ble stars, however, do not become in-
variable, neither do invariable stars,
after a time, become variable. From a
variable planet, having an extremely
short period and large range of vari-
ation, Eros recently became invariable.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

415

In Europe, soon after the discovery of
its variability, its range was said to be
two magnitudes, that is, it shone witli
about six times more light at maxi-
mum than at minimvim. Precise photo-
metric measurements of the light of
Eros, made by Professor Wendell, on
March 12 of the present year gave a
range of variation of 1.1 magnitudes
and on April 12, of 0.4 of a magnitude.
On May 6 and 7 no variation was per-
ceptible, and it was less, probably, than
a tenth of a magnitude. Owing to poor
weather and the planet's approach to
the sun, later observations have been
difficult. But a slight variation was
apparent in June. These unique phe-
nomena probably are the result of the
changing direction of the axis of rota-
tion referred to the line of sight. Al-
though the direction of this axis in
space is fixed, it will constantly change
with reference to an observer on the
earth. When the axis, if ever, points
directly towards the earth, there can
be no variation of light, and the maxi-
mum range mil be found when the axis
is perpendicular to the line of sight.
Apparently this axis has recently been
pointing towards the earth. We may
confidently expect that within a short
time Eros will again show well marked
changes, although the planet's position
may not permit exact observations.
On March 5, M. Ch. Andre communi-
cated to the 'Astron. Nach.' a discussion,
in which he assunxed that the vari-
ation is due to the fact that Eros is a
double asteroid. M. Andre even gave
approximate elements for a system
which appeared to him to satisfy the
conditions. Professor Pickering has
recently pointed out. that the vari-
ations in light can hardly be accounted
for by two similar bodies alternately
eclipsing each other, and has suggested
that the known facts can be explained by
the rotation either upon an elongated,
cigar-shaped body, or of a body, one
side of which is much darker than the
other. The solution of the interesting
problems, which Eros presents, may

not be possible until the next opposi-
tion, which does not occur for about
two years. Eros will be in conjunction
with the sun in the spring of 1902, and
in opposition in the summer of 1903.
The distance of the planet at that time
will be great, since Eros will not be at
perihelion, but this will not prevent
precise determinations of the changes
in light, with a telescope of sufficient
I power. At the next opposition, how-
ever, the path of Eros will be in the
southern sky. The most favorable time
for observation will be from March to
August, 1903. During these months
its declination will be between 30° and
45° south of the equator, which will
make it difficult or impossible of ob-
servation at northern observatories.

JOSEPH LE GONTE.
In the death of Professor Joseph Le
Conte, America has lost the man of
science who was most honored and be-
loved. An age of extreme specializa-
tion and keen competition can still
appreciate the general culture and
broad survey of nature which make a
great teacher and a great man. Other
contemporary men of science have more
exact knowledge of a limited field and
have made more definite contributions
i to science, but there is perhaps no one
who has done such good work in such
diverse directions or whose influence,
has been so wide and beneficent. Le
Conte was descended from a Huguenot
family, driven to America after the
revocation of the edict of Nantes. His
father, uncle and brother were all emi-
ment in science. Born in the South in
1828, he began to practise medicine,
but his love of natural science led him
to go to Harvard to work under
Agassiz. He held chairs in southern
imiversities, but these being disabled
by the civil war, he accepted a call to
the University of California before its
opening, and for thirty-two years has
been professor of geology and natural
history and the leading scientific man
on the Pacific coast. His teaching and

4i6

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

his publications have covered a wide
field. His book on 'Sight' is the best
English treatise on this subject; he
published standard works on geology
and recently a work on zoology. His
special papers on these subjects and on
education and philosophy are numerous
and valuable. He Avas a member of
the National Academy of Sciences,
president of the American Association
for the Advancement of Science and
president of the Geological Society of
America. He died in the Yosemite
Valley on July 6 ; it seems fitting that
death should have come suddenly in
the midst of the mountains that he
studied and loved. A biographical
sketch of Joseph Le Conte, with a por-
trait, was published in The Popular
Science Monthly for January, 1878.

SCIENTIFIC NEWS.

Dr. John Fiske, eminent for his
contributions to the theory of evolu-
tion and to American history and
widely known for his popular writings
and lectures, died on July 4. We re-
gret also to record the death of Pro-
fessor Peter Guthrie Tait, who, for
forty years, held the chair of natural
philosophy at Edinburgh and made im-
portant contributions to physical
science.

A COMMITTEE, Consisting of Pro-
fessors Ira Remsen, J. S. Ames and W.
H. Welch, has been appointed at the
Johns Hopkins University to arrange a
memorial to the late Professor Henry
A. Rowland.

M. Laveran, who discovered the
malaria parasite, has been elected a
member of the Paris Academy of

Sciences in the section of medicine, and
M. Zeiller a member in the section of
botany. — The following fifteen candi-
dates have been elected members of the
Royal Society: Professor Alfred Will-
iam Alcock, Mr. Frank Watson Dyson,
Mr. Arthur John Evans, Professor John
Walter Gregory, Captain Henry Brad-
wardine Jackson, Mr. Hector Munro
Jylacdonald, Mr. James Mansergh, Pro-
fessor Charles James Martin, Major
Roland Ross, Professor William Schlich,
Professor Arthur Smithells, Mr. Michael
Rodgers, Mr. Oldfield Thomas, Mr.
William W'atson, Mr. William Cecil
Dampier Whetham, and Mr. Arthur
Smith Woodward.

Professor James Dewar, the emi-
nent chemist, has been elected presi-
dent of the British Association to fol-
low Professor A. W. Riicker, and will
preside at the Belfast meeting in 1902.
Professor A. S. Packard, who has held
since 1878 the chair of zoology and
geology at Brown University, has been
elected a foreign member of the
Linnean Society of London.

Professor William James, of Har-
vard University, gave his course of
Gilford Lectures on the psychology of
religion at Edinburgh during May.
— Professor J. H. van't Hoff, of the
University of . Berlin, gave in June
limited number of lectures on physical
chemistry at the University of Chicago.
— Dr. William Z. Ripley, of the Massa-
chusetts Institute of Technology, has
been invited to deliver the second
Huxley Memorial Lecture before the
Anthropological Institute of Great
Britain. The first lecture was given
last year by Lord Avebury, and was
published in this Journal.

VOL. Lix. — 2y

PEOFESSOR CHARLES SEDGWICK MINOT,
President of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY.

SEPTEMBER, 1901.

THE GREATEST BIOLOGICAL STATIOX
IX THE WORLD.*

By Professor W. a. HERDMAX, F.R.S.,

UNIVERSITY COLLEGE,- LIVERPOOL.

T3I0L0GICAL, Zoological, Marine Stations are all of them merely
-'— ^ the seaside workshops of the modern naturalist Svrit large.'
But they offer wonderful facilities for the most advanced and best
kinds of biological work and it is almost impossible to overestimate the
influence they have had in the advancement of our knowledge of living
nature. The field-naturalist of old, before the days of college
laboratories, studied his animals and plants alive in the open, or col-
lected and arranged them in his cabinets and museums. The work was
interesting and necessary, but to some extent superficial. We see its
importance enhanced in these later days in the light of Darwinism. It
Avas an enormous gain to science when zoological and botanical labo-
ratories were equipped in the universities, and when every student came
to examine everything for himself and to probe as deeply as possible
into structure and function. It is no wonder if for a time, in some
•quarters, in the fascinations of microscopic dissection and section-
cutting and mounting, there was perhaps a tendency to lose sight of
living nature, and to convert refinement of method and beauty of prep-
aration into the end, in place of being only the means of the in-
vestigation.

The biological station came to put all that right. It presented a
happy union of the observational work of the field-naturalist with the
minute investigations of the laboratory student. It brought the labo-
ratory to the seashore, and the sea, in the form of well-equipped healthy

* From notes taken on a recent visit to the Zoological Station at Naples.

420

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

tanks, within the walls of the lahoratory. It enabled the living organ-
isms to be studied almost in their native haunts by the most refined
laboratory methods.

Thirty years ago the biological station was almost unknown; now
there are, I sujopose, about fifty or possibly more, large and small, scat-
tered along the shores of the civilized world from the arctic circle to the
tropics and Australia, from western California to far Japan in the
East — and of these the parent institution, and by far the finest and
most important, is the world-renowned 'Stazione Zoologica,' under the
direction of Dr. Anton Dohm, at Naples.

It is almost impossible to think of the Xaples station apart from
Anton Dohrn. He is the founder, benefactor, director, the center of

The Naples Zoological Station.

all its activities, the source of its inspiration. He established the first
building in 1872, and, although he has had support from the German
and Italian Governments and from scientific institutions all over the
world, still I believe it is no secret that his own private fortune used
unsparingly has contributed much to the permanence and success of
the undertaking. He has fostered and directed it continuously for
nearly thirty years : the twenty-fifth anniversary of the foundation was
celebrated on the 14th of April, 1897, by a remarkable memorial in
which all the leading biologists of the world were united.

The international character of the institution is a most interesting
and important feature. Situated in the south of Italy, founded and

THE GREATEST BIOLOGICAL STATION. ■ 421

directed by a German, subsidized (in an excellent manner described
below) by most European governments, including even those of
Switzerland, Hungary, Holland, Belgium and Spain, the members of
the staff and the naturalists at work in the institution may be of any
nation and usually are of many ; and at any hour of the day at least the
four languages, French, German, English and Italian, may be heard
among the busy groups in the laboratory and the library.

But the Xaples Zoological Station is not wholly for the scientific
man — in fact many visitors to Xaples do not know that science has
anything to do with it. The more public department of the institution,
the celebrated ^^.cquario," is one of the sights of Naples and is well
known to and highly appreciated by the more intelligent of the tourists
you meet at the hotels. The whole institution is usually known to the
English-speaking tourist as 'The Aquarium,' and few, even of those
who visit and enjoy it, seem to know or wonder anything about the
remainder of the great white edifice into the ground floor alone of
which they are allowed to jienetrate.

The zoological station of Xaples in its present condition (it was
once smaller, and will probably some day soon be larger) consists of
two great, white, flat-topped buildings of imposing appearance, con-
nected by a central yard and large iron galleries, placed on the Chiaja
in the Villa Nazionale, the beautiful public garden which occupies that
part of the shore of the wonderful Bay of Naples. Surrounded by
palms, cactus, aloes, with groups of statuary, fountains and minor tem-
ples, looking out upon the incomparable panorama from Vesuvius by
Sorrento and Capri to Procida and Ischia, there is probably no finer
situation in the world than that occupied by what is unquestionably
the most important of zoological institutions.

As to this importance, no university laboratory approaches it.
There is no other laboratory where the work-places are occupied by
some forty or fifty doctors and professors and investigators of estab-
lished reputation from all parts of Europe and America, who have come
there to do original work, attracted by the fame of the institution and
its director; no laboratory where forty such workers can be kept sup-
plied with abundance of fresh material for their researches (of the most
diverse description) brought from the sea at least twice a day: no
laboratory where there are such excellent facilities for work and such
charming opportunities for scientific intercourse.

The staff of the institution now consists of :

1. Professor Dr. Anton Dohrn, the founder and director.

2. Seven Scientific Assistants — viz.. Dr. Eisig, tlie administrator of the
laboratories; Dr. Paul flayer, the editor of the publications, Dr. W. Giesbrecht,
the assistant editor, and the supervisor of the illustrations; Dr. Gast, also con-
cerned in the publications in addition to other work ; Dr. Schcebel, the
librarian; Dr. Lo Bianco, the administrator of the fisheries and preparateur;

422

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Dr. Hollandt, in charge of the microscopic sections department — all of them
well-known men, each eminent in his own line of investigation.

The post of assistant in the physiological department formerly held by the
late Dr. Schoenlein is now vacant.

3. In addition to these scientific heads of departments there are: — the
secretary, Mr. Linden, two painters, and the chief engineer; and, finally, about
thirty attendants, collectors and others employed, in the laboratories, in the
collecting and preserving departments, in the aquarium and elsewhere.

This may seem at the first thought a very hirge staff, but the activi-
ties of the institution are most varied and far-reaching, and eveiy thing
that is undertaken is carried to a high standard of perfection.
Whether it he in the exposition of living animals to the public in the
wonderful tanks of the 'Acquario,' in the collection and preparation of
choice specimens for museums, in the supply of laboratory material and
mounted microscopic objects to universities, in the facilities afforded

The Zoological Station from the Edge of the Sea.

for research, or in the educational influence and inspiration which all
young workers in the laboratory feel — in each and all of these directions
the Naples station has a world-wide renown. And the best proof of
this reputation for excellence is seen in the long list of biologists from
all civilized countries who year after year obtain material from the
station or enroll as workers in the laboratory. Close on 1,200 natural-
ists have now, since the opening of the zoological station in 1873,
occupied work-tables, and, as these men have come from and gone back
to practically all the important laboratories of the world, Naples may

THE GREATEST BIOLOGICAL STATION.

423

fairl}' claim to have been for the last quarter-century a great inter-
national meeting ground of biologists, and so to have exercised a stimu-
lating and coordinating influence upon biological research which it
would be difficult to overestimate.

The success of the institution has caused constant additions and has
stimulated the staff to fresh undertakings. To the original aquarium
and zoological laboratories a second building mainly for botany and
physiology and the preparation of specimens was soon added; and it is
said that a third is in contemplation. In the meantime additional ac-
commodation has been obtained during the last decade by a rearrange-
ment of the roof of the main building. This gives space for a second
large zoological laboratory, a supplementary library and various smaller
rooms, used as chemical and physiological laboratories, for photography

Landing Place of the Fisherman at Posilipo, Naples.

and for bacteriology. A good deal of the research in recent years, both
on the part of those occupying work-tables and of the permanent staff,
has been in the direction of comparative physiology, experimental em-
bryology and the bacteriology of sea-water, and all necessary facilities
for such work are now provided.

The laboratories contain accommodation for over fifty scientifie men
to work, and each such work-place, known technically as a 'table,'
consists either of a small room or of an alcove or a portion screened off
from a larger room. Such tables are rented at £100 a year, not to in-
dividuals, but to states or universities or committees, and of the fifty-
five tables at present available about thirty-four are permanently
engaged — thus Ininging in a considerable annual subsidy to the ad-

424

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

ministration. Germany takes some ten of these tables, and Italy seven.
There are, I believe, three American tables — one belonging to the
Women's Association — and there are three English (rented by the
Universities of Cambridge and Oxford and the British Association re-
spectively), consequently there are generally about half-a-dozen English
and American biologists at work in the station; but Dr. Dohrn inter-
prets in a most liberal spirit the rules as to the occupancy of a table,
and, as a matter of fact, during a recent visit of the present writer
there were, for a short time, no less than three of us on the books m
occupying simultaneously the British Association table, but in reality
all provided with separate rooms.

Wt)RK Places in the La hue Laboratory.

A work-table is then really a small laboratory fitted up with all that
is necessary for ordinary biological research, and additional apparatus
and reagents can be obtained as required. The investigator is sup-
posed to bring his own microscope and dissecting instruments, but is
supplied with alcohols, acids, stains and other chemicals, glass dishes
and bottles of various kinds and sizes, drawing materials and mounting
reagents. Eequisition forms are placed beside the worker on which to
notify his wishes in regard to material and reagents; he is visited at
frequent intervals by members of the scientific staff; he has an attend-
ant to look after his room and help in other ways, and in fact all his
reasonable wants are supplied in the most perfect manner. A scientific
man, or woman, then, wishing to do a special research at the Naples

THE GEE AT EST BIOLOGICAL STATION.

425

station must be appointed to a particular table for a definite time by
his government, universit}^ or the controlling committee of that
'table,' and this is the system which has worked so well for over quarter
of a century and which gives a certain stamp and tradition to some at
least of the tables.

The opportunities for taking part in collecting expeditions at sea
are most valuable to the young naturalist, and especially to such as have
not had previous experience of the rich Mediterranean fauna. Dredg-
ing, 'plankton' collection and fishing are carried on daily in the Bay of
Naples by means of the two little steamers (the 'Johannes Miiller' and
the 'Francis Balfour* — both classic names in biology) belonging to the

In the Library.

station, and by a flotilla of fishing and other smaller boats which start
for work in the very early morning and return laden with treasure in
time to supply the workers in the laboratory for the day. Many of the
Neapolitan fishermen are more or less in the employ of the station
and bring to the laboratory such rare specimens as they may chance to
find in their day's work.

Chevalier Dr. S. Lo Bianco, the genial chief of the collecting and pre-
serving department, has a phenomenal knowledge of the marine fauna,
and of where, when and how to catch any particular thing — and, more-
over, of how best to preserve it when caught. Each afternoon he visits
the laboratories and ascertains the wants of the workers, each night he

426 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

gives his orders to his crews of fishermen, with various hints as to
likely haunts and the best tactics to pursue; and the following morning
sees a procession of tubs and baskets filled with glass jars, containing
the specimens rich and rare, being conveyed from the little dock to the
laboratory — generally balanced in wonderful piles on the heads of the
stalwart and picturesque boatmen. Dredging expeditions during the
day along the shores or to the neighboring bay of Pozzuoli take place
in the steam launch, and workers who wish to search for some special
animal or who are studying the fauna can join such trips. Then about
once a fortnight or so a longer excursion is organized, say to Ischia or
to Capri, occupying the whole day, and to this all in the laboratory
who care for it are invited. It is on these occasions that Cav. Lo
Bianco is seen — if I may say so with all respect — in his glory ; directing
all proceedings, the center of all activities, full of geniality and infor-
mation, he is the life and soul of the party. He speaks to us in any
language, and knows everything we catch on land or sea; patting the
fishermen on the back, talking seriously with the strictly scientific,
joking with the more versatile, sympathizing if necessary with the sea-
sick and helping everyone to enjoy the day and profit by the experience,
he is an ideal leader of the marine biological picnic.

The finest specimens caught or those not required for immediate
investigation are either most skilfully preserved for museums or pass
into the tanks of the aquarium. And it is possible, without ever going
to sea, to gain a very fair idea of the local Mediterranean fauna from
that last named part of the institution. The beauty and interest of the
aquarium are due, of course, in great measure to the brilliancy and
abundance of the rich fauna in the neighboring waters, but also
in part to scientific knowledge and skill. The tanks are most care-
fully watched and governed, and their exact condition is always known
— the temperature, specific gravity, number of bacteria present, and
other particulars of the water, are constantly tested and considered.
The public admiring the tanks in the ground fioor little know of
the 'council of war' occasionally summoned in the laboratory upstairs
consisting of experts in the subjects concerned, chemistry, biology,
bacteriology, to examine some unusual sample or settle some delicate
question. And so, by much care and thought, results and effects are
produced which we admire greatly in the aquarium and which,
although no doubt in part due to the latitude, are also dependent upon
the scientific knowledge and manipulative skill behind the scenes.

Amongst the fishes, we see in one tank fine specimens of the Mura?na
— the real old Roman eel — coiling their snake-like bodies through the
uecks of broken jars just as their ancestors no doubt did two thousand
years .ago with the same pots and jars — for those in the tanks are
antiques — in the neighboring bay of Baise. We can see the Torpedo or

THE GUEATEST BIOLOGICAL STATION.

427

In the AyUARiu.M.

428 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

electric ray in an open shallow tank, and by putting the thumb above
and the fingers under the animal's flat shoulders, whilst we pull or
squeeze the tail with the other hand, an electric shock can be obtained.
Octopus, Squids and other Cuttlefish are present in abundance ; crabs
that mimic their surroundings, those with anemones and with sponges
on their backs, animals that look like plants, corals and sea-fans of
many kinds, worms that live in leathery tubes a foot long and expand
out of the top, like gorgeous flowers six inches across with innumerable
spirally-arranged petals — these seem to be the favorites with visitors.
But probably the most interesting tanks to the scientific man are those
containing the recently caught 'plankton,' the Medusas and other deli-
cate and gelatinous surface organisms. There is one marvelous crea-
ture that can be seen almost nowhere else, the Cestus veneris, which
is like an undulating, pulsating band of light, in some positions abso-
lutely transparent, in others flashing iridescent fire like a diamond
from its sides. So much for the public aquarium, which, at an admis-
sion fee of two francs, brings in to the institution a revenue of about
£1,000 a year. Now a word as to the publications of the station.

Workers at Naples are free to publish the results of their investi-
gations where they like, and records of the good work in all depart-
ments of biology which has been done at this station are to be found
in all civilized countries in the form of memoirs and articles contributed
to the scientific periodicals of the world. But still a considerable
amount of the whole, including a number of the more extended, more
solid and more noteworthy contributions, has been published at Naples
as a noble series of monographs on the 'Fauna and Flora of the Gulf
of Naples' — each monograph being one or more quarto volumes, richly
illustrated, and dealing with one particular group of animals, or a
section thereof. This great series, of which 26 monographs have now
appeared, is amongst the most cherished possessions of every zoological
library. Besides these monographs fourteen volumes of a smaller
yearly journal, the 'Mittheilungen,' have been published containing
shorter but still important papers, and Dr. Paul Mayer also edits a
yearly summary or record, the 'Zoologischer Jahresbericht,' of the ad-
vances made in all departments of zoology in all parts of the world.

But although the work of the Naples Zoological Station is thus
many-sided, the leading idea is certainly original research. An in-
vestigator usually goes to Naples to make some particular discovery,
and he goes there because he knows he will find material, facilities and
environment such as exist nowhere else in the same favorable combina-
tion. As a result of the splendid pioneer work which Dr. Dohrn has
flone at Naples, every civilized country has now established its own
biological stations, some larger, some smaller ; but although these are of
prime importance amongst scientific institutions, as enabling the young

THE GREATEST BIOLOGICAL STATION. 429

investigator to commence research in living material without leaving
home, it must not be thought that they detract from the advantages of
a visit to the Naples station, or affect the commanding position of that
unique University of Natural History. Notwithstanding Woods Holl,
Heligoland and Plymouth — aye, and any others that are likely to fol-
low— Naples is still the Mecca of the young biologist and remains the
greatest biological station in the world.

43°

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

^^

HENRY CAVENDISH. 431

HENKY CAVENDISH.

By C. K. EDMUNDS,

JOHNS HOPKINS I'NIVERSITY.

"pERHAPS the most remarkable character in the history of science
-*- is Henry Cavendish. One of the few men of science who have
possessed great fortunes, he yet ignored the power of his wealth, allow-
ing himself but few and simple wants. Highest bom of the distin-
guished chemists of Great Britain, he cared nothing for the external
advantages of birth, preferring to house himself till forty years of
age in his father's stables, where unmolested he might devote his days
to the pursuit of truth. Outside the monk's cell and the prisoner's
dungeon, few men have lived and held so little communication with
their fellows or made so few friendships as he. Yet his fame could not
be kept from proclaiming itself even during his lifetime, while to-day
he is called the 'Newton of Chemistry' and the 'Father of Quantitative
Physics,' being declared by Biot to be 'the richest of scientists, and the
most scientific of the rich.'

Of a family, tracing its pedigree to the Lord Chief Justice under
Edward III., he was the son of Lord Charles Cavendish, the third son
of the Duke of Devonshire, and of Lady Anne Grey, daughter of Henry,
Duke of Kent, and was born October 10, 1731, at Nice, Italy, whither
his mother had gone on account of ill-health. His mother died two
years later, after giving birth to a second son, Frederick; and Caven-
dish, residing with his father in London till eleven j^ears of age and
spending the next eleven years away at school, was deprived at the
most critical period of his life of the salutary influences of a happy
liome, that might have tempered the peculiarities of his character,
which in the last analysis, however, are to be referred chiefly to original
conformation.

Having entered Peterhouse College, Cambridge, in 17-19, he left in
1753 without taking his degree, a step scarcely due to fear of the ex-
aminations themselves, but rather in keeping with his very pronounced
sh3Tiess, which he was said to possess to a degree bordering on disease.
His personal history is a blank for the next ten years, but his subse-
quent writings show that they were spent in mathematical, chemical
and physical research. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society
in 1760.

In 1783, the death of his father left him free to follow his own
tastes. During his father's lifetime he was kept on an annuity of

432 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

£500, and some regard this fact as explaining in part the peculiarities
of his character; for during this period he acquired those habits of
economy and those singular oddities of character which he ever after-
ward exhibited in so striking a manner. For some years Cavendish was
allowed by his. father to attend the Koyal Society Club regularly, but
was given the exact five shillings for the dinner, not a penny more.
There is reason to believe that his father's parsimony has been misap-
prehended, for while Cuvier, Biot and Lord Brougham make dissatis-
faction with Henry for not entering on public or political life the
ground for his illiberality towards him, yet others assert that Lord
Charles Cavendish was not a rich man and allowed his son all he
could afford. There is no certainty as to when or from what source
Cavendish inherited the riches which ultimately came into his posses-
sion, though they were probably a legacy from a rich uncle. All the
testimony, however, is at one on two cardinal facts: that Cavendish
was for the first forty years of his life a poor man, and for the last
thirty-nine an exceedingly wealthy one.

The possession of several hundred thousand pounds did not alter
his life in the least; he simply did not know what to do with it, and
hence let it alone, allowing it to accumulate till at his death his estate
was worth £1,175,000. Cavendish's indifference to pecuniary affairs
was so great that when his banker called on him with regard to the
investment of a portion of the vast sum that had grown on his hands,
he was rudely ordered to be gone and not to come there to plague him,
or he would lose the control of the funds. It may seem strange that
none of this large fortune was devoted to scientific or charitable pur-
poses, but we must remember that Cavendish never thought of himself,
much less of others. Sir Humphry Davy was indebted to him for 'some
bits of platinum,' but tacitly appealed in vain for financial aid in his
electrical researches. Just before the subscription for the enlarged
voltaic battery was taken. Cavendish was in Davy's apartments at the
Eoyal Institution, and upon Davy expressing fear that he should fail to
secure the necessary amount. Cavendish joined heartily in deploring
the lack of liberality in the patrons of science, but did not seem to con-
sider himself at all called upon actively to forward the desired object.
Yet had he been directly asked to sign a cheque in Sir Humphry's
name for £500 he would probably have done so at once. When re-
minded of some needy cliaritable object, he gave liberally, but he
never himself saw a need. Whether from original or acquired indiffer-
ence, he exhibited a passive selfishness in all his dealings.

To his town residence, close to the British Museum, few visitors
were admitted, and these have reported it to contain only books and
apparatus. For the former he also set aside a separate mansion on
Bradford Square, and here collected a large and carefully chosen library

HENRY CAVENDISH. 433

of science, wliicli he tlirew open to all engaged in research, and from
which he himself never took a book without leaving a formal receipt.
His favorite residence was a beautiful suburban villa at Clapham,
which now, as well as a street in the neighborhood, bears his name.
The whole house was occupied with workshops and laboratory, only a
small part being set aside for personal comfort. He needed nothing
more for himself, and he did not wish others to visit him. When occa-
sionally he had guests, they were always feasted on a leg of mutton.
On one occasion his housekeeper suggested that a leg of mutton would
not be enough. Well, then get two, was the reply.

The more prominent of Cavendish's contemporaries have left
graphic estimates of his remarkable and interesting peculiarities of
character. The most striking was a singular love of being alone. He
held aloof from social intercourse, even with members of his own family,
and only once a year saw the one he had made his heir. To the great
objects of common regard which excite the fancy, the emotions and the
higher affections, he was equally indifferent. The beautiful, the sub-
lime and the spiritual seem to have lain entirely beyond his horizon.
Although he is thought to have held Unitarian views, he is also under-
stood never to have attended a place of worship. In the words of one of
his contemporaries, 'he was the coldest and most indifEerent of mortals.'
He never married and was reputed to have a positive dislike for women.
Lord Brougham tells us that Cavendish ordered his dinner daily by a
note, left on the hall table, where the housekeeper could afterwards get
it. Another authority relates that Cavendish 'one day met a maid ser-
vant on the stairs with a broom and pail, and was so annoyed that he
immediately ordered a back staircase to be built.' His dress was that
of the gentleman of the preceding half century. The frilled shirt-
Avaist, the greatcoat of a greenish color, and the cocked hat, made a pic-
ture no one was likely to mistake. But gleams of genius often broke
through this unpromising exterior. He never spoke except to the
point, and always supplied excellent information or drew some impor-
tant conclusion from his own very extensive and accurate knowledge.
So that while Sir Humphry Davy said of him, "His voice was sqiieak-
ing, his manner nervous, he was afraid of strangers, and seemed, when
embarrassed, even to articulate with difficulty," he also said, "He was
acute, sagacious, and profound, and, I think, the most accomplished
British philosopher of his time."

But two additonal dates remain to be given in reference to his per-
sonal history: The first, March 25, 1803, when he was elected one of the
eight foreign associates of the French Institute; the second, February
24, 1810, when he died, in his seventy-ninth year. As he lived so he
died by rule, predicting his death as if it had been the eclipse of some
great luminary (as indeed it was), and counting the moment when

VOL. LIX. — 30

434 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the shadow of the unseen world should enshroud him in its darkness.
After an illness of only three days, the only one he ever had, he called
his servant, told him he was going to die, and commanded him to stay
away and to keep everyone else away until the event was over. The
servant obeyed, and, when he returned. Cavendish had breathed his
last.

An intellectual head thinking, a pair of wonderfully acute eyes
observing, and a pair of very skilful hands experimenting and record-
ing, are all that we realize in reading his memorials. His theory of
tlie universe seems to have been that it consisted of a multitude of ob-
jects to be weighed, numbered and measured; and the vocation to
which he thought himself called was to weigh, number and measure as
many of these objects as his threescore years would allow. Whenever
we catch sight of him, we find him with his measuring rod and balance,
his graduated jar, thermometer, barometer and table of logarithms.
Most of his researches were avowedly quantitative; he weighed the
earth, he analyzed the air, he discovered the compound nature of
water, and he noted with numerical precision the actions of the ancient
element fire. Everything pertaining to each, to which a quantitative
value could be attached, was set down in figures, before it went out to
the scientific world with its passport signed and sealed. In all his re-
searches he displayed the greatest caution, not from hesitation or
timidity, but from his recognition of the difficulties which attend the
investigation of nature. Cavendo tutus was the motto of his family,
and seems ever to have been before him, so that he well deserves the
title — 'Father of Quantitative Physics.'

His first recorded scientific work was 'Experiments on Arsenic'
(1764). In 1765 'Experiments in Heat' were performed which, though
written out for a friend, were not made public till nineteen years
later, but which, had they been published in 1764, would have given
Cavendish precedence to Black in some of his discoveries as to 'latent
heat' and 'specific heat,' and equal merit in others. In his first public
contribution to science, 'Experiments on Factitious Airs,' sent to the
Royal Society in 1766, he defines 'factitious air' as air which is driven
off when compounds are heated or treated with acids, and the ques-
tions of the permanent elasticity of 'factitious airs,' their solubility in
different liquids, their power to support combustion, their specific
gravity, and likewise their combining equivalents, were all carefully
considered. 'Fixed air' (COo) was only a particular kind of factitious
air driven off from the alkalis (carbonates), and he found that when
it was mixed with common air in the proportion of one part to
nine, it rendered the air unfit for respiration. Cavendish first isolated
and experimented with hydrogen, though he cannot be called its dis-
coverer, for Paracelsus, about 1540, obtained it by acting on metals

HENRY CAVENDISH. 435

with sulphuric acid, the result of which he described as the 'rising
of the wind'; and many of Cavendish's predecessors, Boyle among
others, had encountered it; but Cavendish, who called the gas 'inflam-
mable air,' was the first to examine its properties carefully and to de-
scribe them.* Cavendish is also entitled to be called the discoverer of
the constant composition of the atmosphere, and its first accurate
analyst, for in 'An Account of a New Eudiometer' (1783) he showed
the atmosphere to be of constant composition and to consist chiefly of
'phlogisticated' and 'dephlogisticated air' (nitrogen and oxygen), and
he observed that when the electric spark passing through his eudiometer
caused the 'phlogisticated' and 'dephlogisticated air' to unite, there
was always left a small bubble which he could not get rid of in any
way. This small bubble we now know to have been 'argon/ In his
celebrated paper read before the Royal Society in 1784, on 'Experi-
ments on Air,' he gave an account of the discovery of the composition
of water and of nitric acid. He showed that nitric acid, which had been
known by Geber probably in the eighth century, was produced when
nitrogen mixed in small quantity with hydrogen was exploded by the
electric spark in the presence of an excess of oxygen. But strictly
speaking we cannot assign to him the merit of the discovery of the
composition of nitric acid, for he regarded nitric acid as a simple, or
at least an undecompounded body, while nitrogen, according to him,
was a compound. He was thus not the direct asserter of the modern
doctrine of the composition of nitric acid, and to Lavoisier belongs the
merit of the true interpretation of Cavendish's results.

Wilson's presentation of 'A Critical Inquiry into the Claims of All
the Alleged Authors of the Discovery of the Composition of Water' f
makes it certain that Cavendish was the first consciously to convert
hydrogen and oxygen into water, and to teach that it consisted of them.
In his own words 'water consists of dephlogisticated air united with
phlogiston,' and as dephlogisticated air was his term for oxygen and
phlogiston his term for hydrogen, this statement corresponds closely
with the modern view of the nature of water. His inheritance of the
prejudices of the early phlogiston school led him to the erroneous
conclusion that every combustible contains hydrogen, and that the
deoxidation of air and the oxidation of combustibles are invariably
accompanied by the production of water. The discoverer of so great a
truth as the composition of water may be forgiven for .overestimating
its importance.

While his experiments on the composition of water were made in
the summer of 1781, his paper, 'Experiments on Air/ was not read

* Lavoisier named the gas 'hydrogen,' i. e., water-former.
t In the 'Life and Works of Cavendish,' by Dr. G. Wilson, published for the
Cavendish Society, London, in 1851.

436 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

to the Eoyal Society till January, 1784; and this delay, resulting
from his desire to investigate the nature of the acid (nitric) formed
on the passage of the electric spark through a mixture of hydrogen
and oxygen, containing, as was afterwards found, a little nitrogen,
caused his claim to the discovery of the composition of water to be con-
tested by no less rivals than the celebrated James Watt and the great
French chemist, Lavoisier. The modest, retiring and almost inordi-
nately cautious man, whose personal history has just been detailed, has
been accused of both incapacity and dishonesty, by men distinguished
in letters and science, whose connection with the vexed question gives it
an interest apart from its intrinsic merit.

Though Cuvier, in 1812, as secretary of the French Academy in
reading an eloge on Cavendish could say that "his demeanor and the
modest tone of his writings procured him the uncommon distinction of
never having his repose disturbed either by jealousy or by criticism,"
Cuvier's distinguished, successor, Arago, in writing the eloge on Watt
in 1839, charged that Cavendish learned the composition of water,
not by experiments of his own, but by obtaining sight of a letter from
Watt to Priestley. The French Academy heard the one side argued, and
the British Association in the same year heard Cavendish's vindication
delivered by the Eev. W. Vernon Harcourt, the president for that year.

At the very threshold of the water controversy we encounter a per-
plexing dilemma. Two unusually modest and unambitious men, uni-
versally respected for their integrity, famous for their discoveries and
inventions, and possessed of rare intelligence, are suddenly found
standing in a hostile relation to each other, and, although declining to
publish their own unquestioned achievements, are seen contending for
a single discovery, which the one believes the other to have learned at
second hand from the revelations made to a common friend, and
which that other accuses his rival of having gathered from a letter
that he was allowed to peruse. A misunderstanding such as this would
never have occurred had Watt and Cavendish been intimate in 1783.
As yet, however, the friendly intercourse which afterwards subsisted
between them had not commenced. The one was resident in London,
the other in Birmingham, and each was informed of the other's doings
by third parties, upon whom mainly though not equally, rests the blame
of having occasioned the water controversy. Those in question are : Dr.
Priestley, J. A. DeLuc and Sir Charles Blagden, all eminent men of
unblemished character. Through the first, knowledge of Cavendish's
experiments passed to Watt, and a knowledge of Watt's conclusions to
Cavendish; by the second. Watt was informed that Cavendish had
deliberately pilfered his theory; and the third, who was Cavendish's
assistant, reported the latter's conclusions as well as those of Watt, to
Iiavoisier, whom he accused of appropriating the ideas of both English

IIEXRT CAVENDISH. 437

philosophers. Blagden also made certain changes in the manuscript
of Cavendish's 'Experiments on Air,' and while superintending, in his
capacity of secretary of the Eoyal Society, the printing of the paper,
and of Watt's rival essay, suffered certain typographical errors to occur,
which involved himself and his principle in accusations of unfairness,
in which, however, Wilson shows that with the exception of a careless-
ness in correcting printer's proof, Blagden was guiltless of any wrong
toward Watt or of unfairness toward Lavoisier, and that to DeLuc
belongs the unenviable distinction of deliberately provoking the water
controversv, doing Cavendish and also Watt a great wrong 1>y hastily
deciding against the former, and filling Watt's mind with suspicions
that Cavendish had borrowed from Watt's letter to Priestley the views
which he published as his own, because he had in truth discovered them
for himself, and that too at an earlier date (1781) than Watt (1784:) or
Lavoisier (1784-86).

Eemarkable as Cavendish's achievements in chemistry were, his
greatest fame as a scientist will ever be based on his researches in
physics ; his single experiment in dynamics would place him in the first
rank, and a very large part of the modem development of electrical
science is based upon his work in electrostatics and electro-djTiamics.

Cavendish verified the law of inverse squares for gravitational
attraction, and determined the mean density of the Earth. The appa-
ratus, devised by the Eev. John Michell, consisted of a horizontal
lever six feet long, suspended by a wire forty inches in length, carrying
at each end a lead ball two inches in diameter. Two large masses of
lead (each about 317 lbs.) were placed near the ends of the lever and
on opposite sides, so that, their attraction would produce turning
moments in the same direction. The angle of rotation having been
measured by means of telescopes with verniers, and the torsion of the
suspending wire determined by observing the time of vibration of the
rod, the force was calculated which would have been exerted by a globe
of water the size of the earth on the same body on its surface, and from
this the density of the earth was obtained as the mean of seventeen
terminations to be 5.48 ± 0.38.*

Cavendish cared more for investigation than for publication. He
would undertake the most laborious researches in order to clear up a
difficulty which none but himself could apprehend, or was even aware
of, and we cannot doubt that the result of his enquiries gave him a cer-
tain degree of satisfaction. But it did not excite in him the desire to
communicate the discovery to others which, in the case of ordinary men
of science, generally ensures the publication of their results. How

* This work has recently been edited, together with that of Newton,
Bouguer and others, by Professor A. S. Mackenzie in 'The Laws of Gravitation,'
Scientific Memoirs, American Book Company.

438 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

completely these researches of Cavendish remained unknown to other
men of science is shown by the subsequent external history of electricity.
Cavendish's work as a member of the committee appointed by the
Royal Society to investigate protection from lightning shows him
cooperating with Franklin and others in an investigation on behalf of
the nation. But most of his work was a private matter and in elec-
trical science, in which he was by far the authority of his day, he
published only two papers, 'Of the Electrical Property of the Torpedo'
(1776) and 'An Attempt to explain some of the principal Phenomena
of Electricity by means of an Elastic Fluid' (1771-72). Yet he left
behind him some twenty packets of manuscript on mathematical and
experimental electricity, which were but little known till Maxwell
edited them in 1879, for they were only alluded to in his celebrated
paper on the Torpedo. They anticipated, however, many of the facts
subsequently made known by Coulomb and other celebrated physicists,
and contained some of the results of experiments of a refined kind in-
stituted at a much later day.

Cavendish proved the law of inverse squares for electric charges
not by actually measuring the forces as in the case of gravitational
attraction, but by showing that the entire charge resides on the surface
of a charged body and that there is no charge at all communicated to a
sphere within a sphere when electrically connected and a positive
charge is given to the outer one. He then established the theorem
that the force must vary inversely as the second power of the distance
between charges in order to explain this result of experiment, showing
that if it varied according to any higher power, the inner globe would
receive a part of the positive charge, if according to any lower power,
the inner globe would be negatively charged.

These experiments on the law of inverse squares were performed in
December, 1772, and in fact all of his work in electrostatics was
completed before 1774, while it was not till 1785 that Coulomb pub-
lished the first of his seven memoirs, on the data of which the mathe-
matical theory of electricity as we now know it was founded by Poisson ;
and as Cavendish never published his at all, it is plain that each
worked in ignorance of the other's results. The method of each was
distinctly his own. Coulomb made direct measurements of the electric
force at different distances and compared the density of the surface
charge on different parts of conductors. On the other hand, the very
idea of the capacity of a conductor as a subject for investigation is due
entirely to Cavendish, and nothing equivalent to it occurs in the
memoirs of Coulomb. The method that Cavendish adhered to through-
out his experimental work was the comparison of capacities, and the
formation of a graduated series of condensers, such as is now regarded
as the most important apparatus in electrostatic measurements.

HENRY CAVENDISH. 439

Great difficulty is very often encountered in interpreting the work
of former experimenters in terms of modern units, yet Cavendish had
such a clear insight and worked so quantitatively that we can readily
express his results in terms of modern nomenclature and units. His
'inches of electricity/ for instance, can be directly compared with
modern measurements, for while his 'inches' express the diameter of a
sphere of equal capacit}^, modern measurements express capacity as the
radius of the same sphere in centimeters. When we consider the crude-
ness of some of Cavendish's apparatus, we are amazed at the accuracy
of the results he obtained. The capacity of a circular disc, for example,
was determined experimentally by him to be 1/1.57 of that of a sphere
of the same radius, while the most modern calculation gives 1/1.571
for the same ratio.

Cavendish also entertained exceedingly clear views on what we now
know as 'potential' and 'resistance,' and, besides Coulomb's law of
inverse squares, his papers contain anticipations of Faraday's 'specific
inductive capacity' and 'electric absorption,' and Ohm's 'law of elec-
trical resistance.' In observing that the charges of coated plates were
always several times greater than the charges computed from their
thickness and the area of the coatings, Cavendish not only anticipated
Faraday's discovery of the specific inductive capacity of different sub-
stances, but actually measured its numerical value in some cases. He
also considered the question, of fundamental importance in the theory
of dielectrics, whether the electric induction is strictly proportional to
the electromotive force which produces it, or in other words is the
capacity of a condenser the same for high as for low potentials. He re-
garded his results as not decisive, but, in observing that the apparent
capacity of a Florence flask was greater when it continued charged a
good while than when it was charged and discharged immediately,
Cavendish discovered the phenomenon called by Faraday 'electric ab-
sorption,' which was fully studied later for different kinds of glass by
Dr. Hopkinson, and connected with the long-known phenomenon of
'residual charge.'

But besides this series of experiments on electric capacity, an-
other course of experiments on electric resistance was going on between
1773 and 1781, the knowledge of which seems never to have been com-
municated to the world till Maxwell edited Cavendish's electrical re-
searches in 1879. We learn from the manuscripts thus published that
Cavendish was his own galvanometer, comparing the intensity of cur-
rents by the intensity of the sensations he felt in his wrist and elbows
when they passed through his body. The accuracy of his discrimina-
tions of the intensity of shocks is truly marvelous, whether we judge
by the consistency of his results among themselves or by comparing
them with the latest results obtained with a galvanometer, using all

440 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the precautions suggested by experience in measuring the resistance of
electrolytes. Indeed, such was the reputation of Cavendish for scien-
tific accuracy, that his bare results were accepted at once and readily
became a part of general knowledge, although no one conjectured by
what method he had obtained them, more than forty years before the
invention of the galvanometer, the only instrument by which any one
else has ever been able to compare electrical resistances. In carrying
out this work Cavendish not only arrived at the result, which Kohl-
rausch has since shown to be nearly accurate, that for weak solutions
the product of the resistance by the percentage of salt is nearly con-
stant, and also stated accurately the laws of multiple and divided cur-
rents, but he even anticipated, in January, 1781, the law of electrical
resistance, discovered independently by Ohm and published by him in
1827. Moreover, in a very remarkable set of experiments on a series of
salts and acids in order to determine their relative electric resistance,
Cavendish tells us, 'that the quantity of acid in each should be equiva-
lent to that in a solution of salt in twenty-nine of water,' and it is
difficult to account for agreement not only of the ratios, but also for
the absolute numbers given by Cavendish with those of the modern
system, in which the equivalent weight of hydrogen is taken as unity.
They must have been derived from his own work, for Wenzel's 'Lehre
von der Verwandschaften' was published in 1777, and also gives values
greater than those used by Cavendish, and Eichter's 'Anfangsgrimde
der Stochyometrie' was not published till 1792, while Cavendish's ex-
periments were made in 1777. It is only by comparing the dates of
these researches with the dates of the principal discoveries in chemistry
that we become aware that in the incidental mention of these numbers
we have the sole record of one of those secret and solitary researches,
the value of which to other men of science Cavendish does not seem
to have taken into account after he had satisfied his own mind as to the
facts. He dealt with his discoveries as with his great wealth, allowing
the larger part of them to lie unused.

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS.

441

A STUDY OF BRITISH GEmUS.

By HAVELOCK ELLIS.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS.

WE have now examined all those characteristics of the most emi-
nent British persons of intellectual ability which the 'Dic-
tionary of National Biography' enables us to investigate in a fairly
generalized manner. We have found that, excluding the living, at least
902 persons (859 men and 43 women) of such preeminent ability have
appeared in the British Islands between the fourth and the end of
the nineteenth centuries, the century richest in genius being, so far as
we can trace, the eighteenth. We have found that, in regard to dis-
tribution among the various elements of nationality, England seems to
have her fair proportion of eminent persons, Scotland an excess, Ire-
land and Wales a deficiency, though Ireland and Wales profit consider-
ably among those cases in which there has been intermixture ; the only
important foreign strain is derived from France. We have found that,
as regards social class, the upper and upper middle classes have been
peculiarly rich in genius, that the country and small towns have chiefly
yielded notable men, and that of all professions the clergy have pro-
duced by far the greatest number of distinguished children. Our in-
quiry, further, confirms the views of Galton and others that intellec-
tual ability is to some extent hereditary, though it may well be that
different kinds of ability are not all equally apt to be transmissible.
We have found that persons of genius, like the members of other men-
tally abnormal groups, tend to belong to unusually large families, are
much oftener youngest children, and still more eldest children, than
in any intermediate position, and that, much more frequently than in
the case of the ordinary population, they are the offspring of elderly
parents. These eminent persons, we have seen, have in a notal)le num-
ber of instances showed remarkably feeble health during infancy and
childhood (being in many cases the only surviving children of large
families) but have tended to become more robust as they grew older,
and they have been notably precocious. Though not generally subjected
to very strenuous intellectual training, they have usually enjoyed excel-
lent opportunities for intellectual development; the majority were at
some university; a very large proportion possessed extended opportuni-
ties for studvinsT life in foreign lands durins: vouth or earlv manhood.
There is a marked tendencv to a celibate life, and marriage when it

442 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

occurs tends to take place rather late ; there is an excess of sterile mar-
liages, though the fertility of the fertile marriages, while below that
of the parents of the eminent persons, does not appear to be small when
compared with the general population. We have seen that the longevity
of our intellectual persons is great; we have also seen that they show
a special liability to suffer from nervous affections like angina pectoris
and asthma, while gout is peculiarly frequent; insanity is also un-
usually frequent. Minor mental anomalies, like stammering, are re-
markably prevalent. There is also a tendency to melancholy. These
are the chief conclusions we have reached concerning British persons
of intellectual ability.

It may be reasonable to ask how far these are the characteristics of
British persons of genius, and to what degree an investigation of per-
sons of eminent intellectual aptitude belonging to other countries
would bring out different results. It is not possible to answer this ques-
tion quite decisively. The fact, however, that at many points our in-
vestigation simply gives precision to characteristics which have been
noted as marking genius in various countries seems to indicate
that in all probability the characters that constitute genius are
fundamentally alike in all countries, though it may well be that minor
modifications are associated with national differences. The point is
one that can only be decisively settled when similar investigations are
carried out concerning similar groups of persons of superior intellectual
ability belonging to various countries.

A further question may be asked. How far has confusion been in-
troduced by lumping together persons whose intellectual aptitudes have
been shown in very different fields? May not the average biological
characteristics of the man of science be the reverse of those of the actor,
and those of the divine at the other extreme from those of the lawyer?
I believe that Galton is inclined to assume that the investigation of
groups of men with different intellectual aptitudes would yield different
results. As;, however, we have seen, the investigation of eminent
British persons, when carried out without reference to the particular
fields in which their activity has been exercised, yields results which,
when comparable with those of Galton, do not usually show any strik-
ing discrepancies. Nor, so far as I have at present looked into the
matter, does it appear that on the whole, when we consider separately
the various groups of British eminent persons we are here concerned
with, such groups show any widely varying biological characters. Cer-
tain variations there certainly are; we have seen that the geographical
distribution of the various departments of intellectual activity to
some extent varies, and also that in pigmentation there are in some
cases marked variations. On the whole, however, it would appear that,
whatever the field in which it displays itself, the elements that con-

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 443

stitute the temperament of genius show a tendency to resemble each
other.

I shall probably be asked to define precisely what the 'tempera-
ment' is that underlies genius. That, however, is a question which the
material before us only enables us to approach very cautiously. There
are two distinct tendencies among writers on genius. On the one hand
are those who seem to assume that genius is a strictly normal variation.
This is the standpoint of Galton.* On the other hand are those, chiefly
alienists, who assume that genius is fundamentally a pathological
condition and closely allied to insanity. This is the position of Lom-
broso, who compares genius to a pearl, — so regarding it as a pathological
condition, the result of morbid irritation, which by chance has pro-
duced a beautiful result, — and who seeks to find the germs of genius
among the literary and artistic productions of the inmates of lunatic
asylums.

It can scarcely be said that the course of our investigation, uncer-
tain as it may sometimes appear, has led to either of these conclusions.
On the one hand, we have found along various lines the marked prev-
alence of conditions which can scarcely be said to be consonant with a
normal degree of health or the normal conditions of vitality; on the
other hand, it cannot be said that we have seen any ground to infer
that there is any general connection between genius and insanity, or
that genius tends to proceed from families in which insanity is prev-
alent; for while it is certainly true that insanity occurs with remark-
able frequency among men of genius, it is very rare to find that
periods of intellectual ability are combined with periods of insanity,
and it is, moreover, notable that (putting aside senile forms of in-
sanity) the intellectual achievements of those eminent men in whom
unquestionable insanity has occurred have rarely been of a very high
order. We cannot, therefore, regard genius either as a purely healthy
variation occurring within normal limits nor yet as a radically path-
ological condition, not even as an alternation — a sort of allotropic
form — of insanity. We may rather regard it as a very highly sensitive
and complexly developed adjustment of the nervous system along
special lines, with concomitant tendency to defect along other lines. Its
elaborate organization along special lines is built up on a basis even
less highly organized than that of the ordinary average man. It is no
paradox to say that the real affinity of genius — and I am now speaking
of the highest manifestations of human intellect, of genius in so far as
it can be distinguished from talent — is with congenital imbecility
rather than with insanity. If indeed we consider the matter well we
see that it must be so. The organization that is well adapted for adjust-

* In the preface to the second edition of 'Hereditary Genius' Galton has
somewhat modified this view.

444 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ment to the ordinary activities of the life it is born into is not prompted
to find new adjustments to suit itself. The organic inhibition of
ordinary activities is, necessarily, a highly favorable condition for the
development of extraordinary abilities, when these are present in a
latent condition. Hence it is that so many men of the highest intellec-
tual aptitudes have so often shown the tendency to muscular incoordi-
nation and clumsiness which marks idiots, and that even within the
intellectual sphere, when straying outside their own province, they
have frequently shown a lack of perception wliich placed them on
scarcely so high a level as the man of average intelligence. It is not
surprising that by means of the idiots savants, the wonderful calcu-
lators, the mattoids and 'men of one idea,' and the men whose intel-
lectual originality is strictly confined to one field, we may bridge the
gulf that divides idiocy from genius.

Since a basis of organic inaptitude — a condition which in a more
marked and unmitigated form we call imbecility — may thus often be
traced at the foundation of genius, we must regard it as a more funda-
mental fact in the constitution of genius than the undue prevalence
of insanity, which is merely a state of mental dissolution, in nearly
every case temporarily or permanently abolishing the aptitude for in-
tellectual achievement. But it must not, therefore, be hastily concluded
that the prevalence of insanity among men of genius is an accidental
fact, meaningless or unaccountable. In reality it is a very significant
fact. The intense cerebral energy of intellectual creation involves an
expenditure of tissue which is not the dissolution of insanity, for waste
and repair must here be balanced, but it reveals an instability which
may sink into the mere dissolution of insanity, if the balance of waste
and repair is lost and the high pressure tension falls out of gear. In-
sanity is rather a Nemesis of the peculiar intellectual energy of genius
exerted at a prolonged high tension than an essential element in the
foundation of genius. But a germinal nervous instability, such as to
the ordinary mind simulates some form of insanity, is certainly present
from the first in many cases of genius and is certainly of immense
value in creating the visions or stimulating the productiveness of men
of genius. We have seen how significant a gouty inheritance seems to
be. A typical example of this in recent years was presented by Wil-
liam Morris, a man of very original genius, of great physical vigor and
strength, of immense capacity for work, who was at the same time
abnormally restless, very irritable, and liable to random explosions of
nervous energy. Morris inherited from his mothers side a peculiarly
strong and solid constitution; on his father's side he inherited a
neurotic and gouty strain. It is evident that, given the robust consti-
tution, the germinal instability furnished by such a morbid element as
this — falling far short of insanity — acts as a precious fermentative ele-

A STUDY OF BRITISH GENIUS. 445

ment, an essential constituent in the man's genius. The mistake
usually made is to exaggerate the insane character of such a fermenta-
tive element, and at the same time to ignore the element of sane and
robust vigor which is equally essential to any high degree of genius.
We may perhaps accept the ancient dictum of Aristotle as reported by
Seneca : 'ISTo great genius without some mixture of insanity.' But we
have to remember that the 'insanity' is not more than a mixture, and it
must be a finely tempered mixture.

This conclusion, suggested by our survey of British persons of pre-
eminent intellectual aptitude, is thus by no means either novel or mod-
ern. It is that of most cautious and sagacious inquirers. The saine
position was, rather vaguely, adopted by Moreau (de Tours) in his
PsycJiologie morhide dans ses rapports, etc., published in 1859, though,
as his book was prolix and badly written, his proposition has often been
misunderstood. He regarded genius as a 'neurosis,' but he looked
upon such 'nevrose' as simply "the synonym of exaltation (I do not
say trouble or perturbation) of the intellectual faculties, . . . The
word 'neurosis' would indicate a particular disposition of the faculties,
a disposition still in part physiological, but overflowing these physio-
logical limits"; and he presents a genealogical tree with genius, in-
sanity, crime, etc., among its branches; the common root being 'the
hereditary idiosyncratic nervous state.' J. Grasset, again, more re-
cently (La superiorite intellectuelle et la nevrose, 1900), while not re-
garding genius as a neurosis, considers that it is united to the neuroses
by a common trunk, this trunk being a temperament and not a disease.
The slight admixture of morbidity penetrating an otherwise healthy
constitution, such as the present investigation suggests as of frequent
occurrence in genius, results in an organization marked by what
Moreau calls a 'neurosis' and Grasset a 'temperament.'

It has been necessary to state, as clearly as may be possible, the
conclusions suggested by the present study as regards the pathological
relationships of genius, because, although those conclusions are not
essentially novel, the question is one that is apt to call out extravagant
answers in one direction or another. The most fruitful part of our
investigation seems, however, to lie not in the aid it may give towards
the exact definition of genius — for which our knowledge is not
sufficient — but in the promising fields it seems to open out for
the analysis of genius along definite and precise lines. The time
has gone by for the vague and general discussion of genius. We are
likely to learn much more about its causation and nature by fol-
lowing out a number of detailed lines of inquiry on a carefully
objective basis. Such an inquiry, as we have seen, is difficult on
account of the defective nature of the material and the lack of ade-
quate normal standards of comparison. Yet even with these limita-

446 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tions it has not been wholly unprofitable. It has enabled lis to trace
a number of conditions which, even if they cannot always be described
as factors of the genius constitution, clearly appear among the in-
fluences highly favorable to its development. Such a condition seems
to be the great reproductive activity of the parents, the child destined to
attain intellectual eminence in many cases alone surviving. The fact
of being either the youngest or the eldest child is a condition favor-
able for subsequent intellectual eminence; and I may add that I could
refer to numerous recent instances of large families, in which the
eldest and the youngest, but no other members, have attained intellec-
tual distinction. We have further seen that there is a tendency for
children who develop genius to be of feeble health, or otherwise dis-
abled, during the period of physical development. It is easy to see the
significance of this influence which by its unfavorable effects on the de-
velopment of the limbs — an effect not exerted on the head which may
thus remain relatively large — leaves an unusual surplus of energy to
be used in other directions; at the same time the child, who is thus
deprived of the ordinary occupations of childhood, is thrown back on to
more solitary and more intellectual pursuits. The clumsiness and
other muscular incoordinations which we have found to be prevalent —
while there is good reason to believe that they are of congenital origin
— cooperate to the same end. Again, it is easy to see how the shock of
contact with a strange and novel environment, which we have proved to
be so frequent, acts as a most powerful stimulant to the nascent in-
tellectual aptitudes. It is possible to take a number of other common
peculiarities in the course of the development of genius and to show
how they either serve to inhibit the growth of genius along unfruitful
lines or to further it along fruitful lines.

Such an investigation as the present is far from enabling us to
state definitely all the determining factors of genius, or even all the
conditions required for its development. It suggests that they are
really very numerous and that genius is the happy result of a combina-
tion of many concomitant circumstances, though some of the prenatal
group of circumstances must remain largely outside our ken. We are
entitled to believe that the factors of genius include the nature of the
various stocks meeting together in the individual and the manner of
their combination, the avocations of the parents, the circumstances at-
tending conception, pregnancy and birth, the early environment and all
the manifold influences to which the child is subjected from infancy
to youth. The precise weight and value of these manifold circum-
stances in the production of genius it must be left to later investiga-
tors to determine.

THE STATISTICAL STUDY OF EVOLUTION. 447

THE STATISTICAL STUDY OF EVOLUTION.

By Professor C. B. DAVEXPORT,
university of chicago.

AS I was going through the chemical section of the John Crerar
Library the other day I stopped to examine two books. The
first was one of those dawning-chemical works — Ghiuber's — which en-
joyed a wide reputation in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It
contained an abundance of speculation and of recipes; but the recipes
were of a purely qualitative sort — mix this and this, the amount is
immaterial. The second book was the lectures of Van't Hoff, marking
the most recent development of the science of chemistry. This book is
full of formulae and tables; numbers, signs and quantities fill every
page; they are symbols not only of quantitative relations but also
of the direction and cause of advance of chemistry since the days of
the alchemists. The history of chemistry is the history of the other
quantitative natural sciences, of astronomy and physics. As science
advances its methods become more and more quantitative.

Biology is often contrasted with physics and chemistry as a quali-
tative science. But there is nothing so fundamentally dissimilar in
the phenomena of chemistry and biology that they must necessarily be
studied so differently. Both treat of matter, not only statically but
also dynamically. But the phenomena of biology are more complex
than those of chemistry, the things to be described and compared are
more numerous ; and so the science, which is hardly more than a century
old, is still in the descriptive and comparative stage. But the history
of science in general justifies the prediction that biology, too, will in
time use chiefly quantitative methods in studying processes.

Evolution is an organic process. It has been studied in various
ways. Many have sought by ingenious logic to discover its workings.
Others have reasoned by analogy from the effects of artificial breeding.
Others still, having observed a pro1)able factor of evolution in one case,
have argued for its universality. But all of these methods have been
qualitative. More recently, on the other hand, there has been under-
taken an exact, quantitative study of the condition of species in nature
under different environments, to determine exactly the effects that the
different environments have produced. This new method, which now
demands our attention, is nothing less than the quantitative study of
evolution.

448 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

AVe all know that a lot of people, taken at random, show individual
physical differences. Even when the people form a homogeneous lot
and are of one sex, are all adults, and are of one race, and when such
individuals as are very pathological or freaks are excluded, we still find
that they differ in stature, weight, proportions of trunk and appendages,
color of hair and eyes, proportions of facial features and various other
characters. These differences are so slight and multitudinous that the
language of adjectives fails to indicate them; measurements must he
made in order that they may be expressed numerically.

But how can these numbers tell us anything about the evolution
of the human species? The general principle is this: The differences
between the races of man are of the same kind as, and differ only in
degree from the differences between the individuals of a race. Conse-
quently, the laws of individual variation in a race may be relied on to
illuminate the method of origin of the race or species under consider-
ation. Just how, will be clearer after we have considered the sorts of
individual variation.

The laws of nature are got at only with the key of the proper
method. And it is only within recent years that an adequate quan-
titative method has been developed in biology. It will now be neces-
sary to consider this method.

Imagine a file of 40 men arranged in order of stature — the tallest
at the head of the column. The crown of their heads will form a
flowing curve, nearly level in the middle of its course and becoming
more oblique at the ends. The reason for this is that the middle
statures are much m.ore common than the extreme ones. Half the
people have a stature within two inches of the average (Fig. 1).
The general features of such a curve are common to all classes of
men, but the details differ in different classes of men. The character-
istic differences are measured by what are called the constants of the
curve.

The stature of the middle man in the file will give us very nearly
the first constant, the mean or average. The average is obtained exactly
by adding all the individual statures together and dividing by the
number of men (e. g., by 40). The average is used constantly and as
a matter of course by nearly every one who wishes to compare two com-
parable series of numbers. It is awkward to compare all the separate
data so we let the average stand for the lot. The average is, however,
an entirely ideal quantity which need not agree with the measurement
of any individual ; and it is a little curious that it is so universally used
in statistics. Of a series of measurements made on one and the same
dimension, the average is demonstrably nearest the true value, and con-
sequently engineers, physicists, astronomers and others who aim at the
greatest possible precision in the measurement of the individual

THE STATISTICAL STUDY OF EVOLUTION. 449

])lu'ii()iiu'iion must make use of it. But in measurements made on a
series of distinct individuals the average does not signify the value
nearest tlu^ tnith, and we cannot infer that it is the most significant
single representative of the series. The average has this disadvantage,
moreover, that the introduction of a few very extraordinary individuals
has undue influence on the result. Thus in calculating the average
income of American colleges, one institution with an income of $1,200,-
000 increases the average by an amount ($2,500) equal to the total
income of about 5 per cent, of the 'colleges and universities.' The
average has indeed been over-rated and over-used, as though it were
always the best single representative of a series; whereas there are
other representatives wdiich are sometimes superior. Among these is
the middle value, Avhich is usually got without much calculation. It

Fig. 1. File of Forty University of Chicago Students arranged (APPnoxiMATELV) in ur-

DEK OF Height.

is the value above and below which fifty per cent, of the cases lie. In
the case of income of American colleges the middle value is not far
from $15,000, while the average is $43,000; the former amount un-
fortunately gives the truer idea of the usual American college; for
about 80 per cent, of the colleges have an income of less than $43,000
Still another rei^resentative value is the geometric mean which is
especially important in many biologic and economic statistics. The
geometric mean is the number corresponding to the average of the
logarithms of the individual quantities.

Finally, if there is one representative of a biological series that is
more apt to be significant than any other, it is tlie value that occurs
with the greatest frequency or, in other words, the commonest value.
Since this value may be said figuratively to be the most fashionable one,

VOL. LIX. 31

45°

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

it has been called the mode. The peculiar value of the mode lies in this,
that it is not the result of calculation and is not an ideal value merely,
but is the prevailing or typical actual condition. In biological statistics
the mode should always be considered.

No single value can, however, adequately take the place of all the
values obtained. Nevertheless, it is necessary to combine these data in
some unit for purposes of comparison. .The best unit is the so-called
'frequency j)olygon.' The frequency polygon is got first by sorting out
the data into a number of equally extensive 'classes'; then by laying
off these classes as a series of points at equal intervals of space along a
horizontal base-line; by erecting perpendiculars proportional to the
frequercy of each class, and by joining with a line the tops of
all Ihjse perpendiculars. Or, if the tops be united by a flowing
line, the frequency polygon is replaced by the frequency curve.

Fig. 2. ButD's-EYE View of 40 University of Chicago Students arranged in Files by

Classes of Stature.

Such frequency polygons may also be obtained, without draw-
ing on paper, by putting the individuals belonging to the same
class in the same vertical column and arranging the columns in order
along a common base-line. For example, we may separate our univer-
sity students into stature classes as follows: 56 to 57.9 inches, 58 to
59.9, 60 to 61.9; 62 to 63.9; 64 to 65.9; 66 to 67.9; 68 to 69.9; 70 to
71.9; place tliose falling into the same stature class in a file; and place
the files next each other in order, all starting from a common base-line.
Then if we take a bird's-eye view' of this body of students, we get the
frequency polygon of their statures ( Fig. 2 ) . The construction of fre-
quency polygons may l^e illustrated by another example. The com-
mon scallop shells of the Atlantic coast have a variable number of

THE STATISTICAL STUDY OF EVOLUTION. 451

'ribs' (Fig. 3). In any hundred individuals from one locality the num-
ber of ribs may vary from 15 to 21. If we put in one pile the shells
having the same number of ribs and arrange the piles in order, from
lr5 to 20, upon a level base we shall get a figure which is the frequency
polygon for the ribs of Pecten shells from the given locality (Fig. 4).

Frequency polygons may be obtained in the same way from meas-
urements or countings made on almost any organ of any plant or
animal. The shapes of the polygons are probably never exactly alike in
different organs; consequently, there is a field for the comparing of
pol5^gons and for drawing interpretations from differences in their form.

In comparing frequency polygons attention should be directed, first
of all, to two characters ; namely, the position and relative proportion of
individuals included in the modal class and the spread of the polygon
at the base. This spread is known technically as the range. While

Fig. 3. Scallop Shell with 15 and 20 Ribs
Respectively.

Fig. 4. Self-foemed Frequency Poly'gon
OF Pecten Ribs.

some frequency polygons have a high mode and narrow range others
have a low mode and a broad range. The importance of this fact is
tliat a narrow range implies relatively small variability, since relatively
few individuals depart far from the modal condition. On the other
hand, wide range implies great variability. Range, however, is not an
accurate measure of variability because it is too easily affected by the
accidental occurrence of even one aberrant individual. We need a
measure of variability that shall take into account the departures of all
the individuals from the mode. One such measure is the arithmetical
average of all the departures from the mean in both directions; and
this measure has been widely employed. At present another method is
preferred; namely, the square root of the average of the squared de-
partures. This measure is called the standard deviation. The standard
deviation is of great importance, because it is the index of variability.
This index in the case of measured organs is, like the range, a con-
crete number; consequently indices are not always comparable, being
expressed, e. ^r., in feet, millimeters, degrees or pounds. So it has been
proposed to reduce all indices (except those based on countings) to

452

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

percentages of the average value. This proportional index is called
the coefficient of variability. So much then for the principal oper-
ations: counting or measuring; seriation of the numbers; determina-
tion of the mode, average, standard deviation, and coefficient of varia-
bilitv.

The results of comparative variation studies, so far, fall into two

3475 [—

3019 r—

1947

ia37

526

SO

_L

4054

3631

3133

2075

1485

680

.543
118

42

SOU S2 Si S^ S5 Se 57 SQ S9 60 6l 62 63 64 62 66 67 68 69 10 II 72 7d 74 75 76 77

Fig. 5. Fkequency Polygox of Statcres of 25,820 American Males ; Lower Polygon,

OF 100 University Students.

general categories. First, we have got some notion of the classes of
variation polygons that may occur among organisms ; secondly, we have
some evidence as to the significance of these different forms. As the
science is only about five years old it is l)ut to be expected that a satis-
factory solution of even the princijjal j^i'oblems concerning polygon

THE STATISTICAL STUDY OF EVOLUTION. 453

interpretation is still to Ije worked out. The beginnings are, however,
instructive.

A-^ariation polygons are of two main sorts — simple and complex.
Simple variation polygons possess only a single mode, whilst complex

''' ~ ' ' ..x

i 7\- -

r t X -

i \

"■■ r -it ^

J J^ V

\- IJ 5

V S i T^ ^

^^i -K i T iT\ ^

^~ '^ / ^tc---

-W^^^4m^^'-1^^'^^^

1

'

^ "* T T

lU -/-A

r^. / 3 ^^

^ ^^ j--i

Z ^c^ -/ -t\

/ ^- / ^.

^ S-+ ' V

■ 'iff to-fcf Am^>K^mf'**^4ffA^t»'t 1 '

Je'^~f«^-»«'M'**- '^ ( \

-^ \ \ ^^

\ ' 'I'fTOSrT'lS^r,;^^^^

( cdu w w /J i w/icr/£^ iTj^Tisr ■cs. l^jT''!^^ siri.' "tc^S^

1 1 1 1 1 1_ ip. .i^^ 3^ _^_|:^L^

Fig. 6. Types OF FBEiji'ENCY Cuhves. From K. Peakson.

polygons usually show a trace of more than one mode. Simple varia-
tion polygons are of several types. Some are symmetrical about the
mode as in Fig. 5. Others are more or less iins}anmetrical or skew, as

1

i

i

!

U

!

y.

IS

fi —
i

1

/

1
i

.

\

s

/

^

:<[-'•

^

^

t li t\ IS M 4t m a 20 II U U ^« 25 2« 27 £6

Fig. 7. Cvkves of vssEi.ErTED and selected lots of white daisies.

curves of frequencies of various members of ray flowers IX WILD DAISIES.

" " " ■' •■ ■' •• IX descexdaxts of 12 or

18-RAYEDWILD DAISIES.

. " " " " " OF RAY FLOWERS IX DESCEXDAXTS of 21-RAY-ED

WILD DAISIES.

they are technically called (Fig. 6). Skew polygons usually tail out
at the base further from the mode on one side than on the other. The
polygon is said to be skew in the direction of this longer partial base.
Why some distributions are symmetrical and others skew is not fully

454

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

understood, but at present it seems probable that we get symmetrical
polj^gons when the organ measured is not undergoing evolution and,
on the other hand, that unsymmetrical polygons indicate evolutionary
progress. Also the direction of skewness is probably determined by the
direction of evolution. At present, however, we can only say that in
many cases the skew polygon tails off (or is skew) in the direction from
which the race is evolving. This conclusion, which I believe to be new,
is based upon certain results of experiments as well as upon data gath-
ered from material which had developed under natural conditions. Of
this material the most important for our purpose is that in which
two polygons have apparently arisen by a splitting off from the original
polygon of the two extremes which now form two distinct and widely
separated types. The first case (Fig. 7) is derived from the common

140

120
MO
100
90

m

'

to

60

so

50

n

■0

100 120 130 160 180 200 220 24-0 £60 280 300

FiG.8. Polygon OF FREtjuENCiES OF i-EXGTHS IN Fig. 9. Folyijon of fkequenhy of

MILLIMETERS OF CEPHALIC BONES OF 343 RHINOCE- LENGTHS OF WING, IN HUNDREDTHS OF A
ROS BEETLES. FROM DATA OF BATESON. MILLIMETER, FOR A LOT OF CHINCH BUGS.

white daisy. In the figure the full-line polygon gives the frequency
distribution of the ray-flowers in a collection of wild daisies. This
polygon has a -f- skewness of 1.18. The left-hand, dot-and-dash,
polygon gives the ray frequences in the descendants of 12- or 13-rayed
wild plants. The positive skewness is increased as a result of this
selection to -\- 1.92. The right-hand polygon gives the ray frequencies
in the descendants of the 21 -rayed plants, a single highly aberrant
case of 32 rays being omitted. The skewness is — 0.13. In this case
we have experimental evidence that curves are skew towards the origi-
nal, ancestral, condition. The cases in which the frequency curve is
bimodal frequently signify that two races are arising out of a former

TEE STATISTICAL STUDY OF EVOLUTION. 455

ancestral intermediate condition; i. e., they correspond to the right-
and left-hand polygons of Fig. 7. Consequently we may expect them
to he skew in opposite directions and so we find them to he. For ex-
ample, Bateson has measured the horns on the heads of 343 rhinoceros
beetles; the frequency curve is shown in Fig. 8. The left-hand
polygon has a skewness of -)- 0.48; the right-hand polygon of — 0.03.
One might infer that the right-hand form, the long-horned beetles,
had diverged less from the ancestral condition than the short-horned
beetles. Again, my pupil, Mr. Garber, has obtained a bimodal distribu-
tion polygon in the length of the chinch bug's wing (Fig. 9). The

n

1 nV

J 1

r'

In

r

L|

7

f-l

r S

T ^

-,

r

/

iJ

n

Fig. 10. Fkequkncy Poly-
gon OF THE Number of
Petals in Buttercups.

65
60
55
50
45
10
55
50
25
20
15
10
5

ta <VS 50 55 60 65 70 15 60 .•%vr.

Fig. 11. Polygon of frequency of

LENGTHS IN MILLIMETERS, OF PECTEN SHELLS
G.iTHERED AT RANDOM FROM A FISHERMAN'S
SHELL HEAP.

short- winged form has a skewness of -j- .44 ; the long w^inged form of
— .43. In this case also the ancestral form lies between the present
modes. It is obvious that we may get cases in which two modes, repre-
senting conditions in different places, have moved, to different extents,
in the same direction. Thus the index (breadth -^- length) of the shell
of Littorina, a marine snail, as measured by Bumpus, has at Newport
a mode of 90; at Casco Bay of 93. The skewness is positive in both
•places and greater (-(- .24) at the more southern point than at Casco
Bay (+.13). This result indicates that the Littorina came from a
more northern home, for which we have confirmatory historical evi-
dence, and that these ancestral races were rounder, having an index

456

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

possibly not far from 96. Likewise the Littorinas from South Kin-
cardineshire, Scotland, have a modal index of 88 and a positive skew-
ness of 0.065; while those of the Hnniber, having a mode of 91, have a
skewness of -|- 0.048. These figures suggest an ancestral index of
about 97, or about the same as before. The fonn of the frequency
polygon may thus enable us to infer the ancestral condition of a race
or species and may consequently help us to get at the history of the
race.

Skewness may, as we have seen, depart to any extent from a nearly
symmetrical condition. The extreme case occurs when the mode lies
at one end of the range. This case is sometimes found among plants.
It indicates that the group has in respect to the character in question
reached an extreme condition (Fig. 10).

Complex frequency polygons have various interpretations. We
have already seen that one of these interpretations at least is a splitting
of one race into two. Another kind of complex polygon is due to

0 ? 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 II 12 15 1* IS fm.

Fui.l2. Complex curve of length in cm. of fasciated stem of 146 individuals of Crepis
biennis derived from fasciated ancestors. one individual of 19 centimeters omitted.
From de Vries, "95, Bulletin Scientifique, Tome 27, p. 397. Ordinates, number of indi-
viduals ; ABsciss.iJ, length of fascia rED stem.

differences of age. Suppose an animal that breeds at one restricted
season of the year and that annually nearly doubles in size. If we
inake a collection of a lot of these animals from a place at one time,
we shall include individuals of different ages such as, for instance, six
months, one year and six months, two years and six months, and so

TEE STATISTICAL STUDY OF EVOLUTION. 457

on. If now the length of all these individuals be measured we shall
obtain a series of modes of which each corresponds to one of the
broods (Fig. 11). Still again, two modes may appear when the
material is not perfectly homogeneous although the age be constant.
For instance the material may contain both normal and abnormal
individuals. An example of this sort of polygon is given in Fig. 13.
A very complex curve is afforded by the number of the ray flowers of
composite plants. If the lappets of a thousand white daisies be
counted it will be found that there is not a single mode only but a
series of them. These modes increase in height from one extremity of
the range, reach a great mode at one point and then diminish again
(Fig. 13). It appears also that the modes do not occur at haphazard.

?60

?V)

f

??n

I

?m

r"

ifin

ifin

140

l?0

ino

w

/

\

60

/

\

4(1

/

\

?n

/

/ -

\

\

y

X.

^^

,^_

0

25

50

4U

Fig. 13. Polygon of frequency of numbers of kay flowers of the white daisy gathered

AT RANDOM FROM VARIOUS GERMAN LOCALITIES. FEOM DATA OF LUDWIG.

but chiefly in the series of numbers: 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 44, and 65.
This is a mathematical series in which each term is the siun of the two
preceding. Also the ratios of these numbers, namely, %, %, %, %,
and so on, have long been known to represent the arrangement of
leaves on a stem; and this seems to be why the numbers of this series
are so prominent in the rays of the flower head.

The comparative study of frequency polygons, such as we have been
making, enables us, it will be seen, to distinguish different kinds of
variation and to make that philosophical classification which is the
first step in advancing knowledge. Although the causes of variation
are not at once revealed, we are directed to working hypotheses that

VOL. LIX. — 32

458 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

can be tested by experiment. It is not too much to say that the fre-
quency polygon is the key to the first door that has barred true
progress in the difficult subject of the origin of organic diversity.

In what has gone before we have considered variation of single
organs or qualities of a species. Yet, although we have to study the
variation of organs taken one at a time, in nature no organ under-
goes variation by itself alone. For the parts of the body are so knit
together, their morphological kinship or their physiological inter-
dependence is such, that when one organ deviates from the mode many
others deviate also. This fact has long been known as correlation of
variation. A recognition of the law by Cuvier was the justification,
slight though it was, of his premature attempts to reconstruct an ex-
tinct form from one of its bones. Now, correlation is of great im-
portance in the origin of species; it makes it easier to understand how
evolution can take place. For example, when it was objected that
natural selection by acting on one part at a time could hardly build up
so complex a structure as the eye with so many mutually dependent
parts, Darwin was able to rejoin that the principle of correlation
comes in to ensure that when any one part is improved all other parts
shall vary to meet the new conditions. And in general, a knowledge
of correlation is necessary in order to complement the study of in-
dividual variation and to perfect our investigations upon the origin of
species. And correlation must be studied quantitatively. A proper
method has been afforded by Galton and Pearson. That method may
be briefly stated. Let us suppose that we desire to find the degree of
correlation in variation, or deviation from the mean, between an organ
A, called subject, and a second organ B, called relative. We first take
all the individuals of one (subject) class; that is, individuals whose
subject organ deviates from the mean by a constant quantity, p. We
next find for those individuals the average deviation-from-the-mean of
the organ B, and call it q. We then find the ration q/p; this is the
partial index of correlation. We find this ratio for every subject class.
The average of the ratios is the index of correlation sought. The
ratio will not exceed unity; because q is bound in the long run not to
exceed p. ^Vhen q^^^p, correlation is perfect and is equal to 1. When
the index of correlation is zero, correlation is absent; when the index
is negative, correlation is inverse and a large organ is associated with
a small one. A good example of organs with strong positive correlation
is the right and left arm. Inverse correlation is rarer; an example
is stature and cephalic index. The results of studying correlation
quantitatively are interesting, as showing how intimately bound
together the most remote parts of the body are. Take for example
the following table of correlation of parts of the human skeleton,
from Pearson's 'Grammar of Science.'

THE STATISTICAL STUDY OF EVOLUTION. 459

Femur and tibia 81 to .89

Femur and humerus 84 to .87

Humerus and radius 74 to .84

Humerus and ulna 75 to .86

Clavicle and humerus 44 to .63

Clavicle and scapula 12 to .16

Stature and femur 80 to .81

Stature and humerus 77 to .81

Stature and fore-arm .37

Stature and cephalic index — .80

Length and breadth of skull 29 to .49

Breadth and height of skull 10 to .34

Length and capacity of skull 50 to .89

Length x breadth x height and capacity of skull 70 to .80

Weight and length (babies) 62 to .64

\Veight and stature (adolescents) 50 to .72

Right and left femur .96

llight and left first joint of ring finger .93

First joints of right hand, index and middle fingers .90

First joints of right hand, index and little fingers .82

Metacarpal phalanges, right hand, index and middle fingers. .94

Metacarpal phalanges, right hand index and little fingers . . .89

Strength of pull and stature 22 to .30

Strength of pull and weight 34 to .54

A study of this table shows us how justified was Darwin's con-
tention that the evolution of one organ necessarily means the evolution
of many parts of the body.

The modern methods of studying evolution have still another appli-
cation. It is sometimes said that variation and heredity are the two
factors of evolution. Heredity is, however, only a special case of
correlated variation; a correlation between parents and offspring or
between any two blood relatives. So evolution is reduced to a single
factor — variation, simple and correlated.

As a criticism of the new methods of studying variation it has
been urged that, after all, they deal not so much with the causes of
evolution as with the mere results. To this criticism it may be
rejoined that the first step toward the determination of the causes of
a phenomenon is a precise knowledge of the limitations and condi-
tions of the phenomenon itself; and this is what the quantitative
study of variation gives. Science has been more retarded by wasted
efforts to explain erroneous data than by conscientious attempts to dis-
cover the precise facts. For when the facts are correctly known the
true explanation often follows at once. Even if the explanation does
not follow at once the proper direction of experimentation to discover
causes is indicated. Statistics tell us not only the exact static condi-
tion of species to-day under the varying circumstances of environ-
ment; but they will enable us to measure precisely the results of any
change in environment, artificially or naturally brought about. We

46o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

shall thus be able not only to tell what are the factors of phylogenetic
change, but also the rate of such change. We shall get possession of
the laws of evolution so that we can not only reconstruct the past, but
also predict the future development of a race.

The importance of knowing the methods of evolution is partly
theoretical, like the importance of astronomical investigation, and
partly practical. For, on the one hand, a rapid and thoroughgoing
improvement of the human race can probably be effected only by
understand and applying these methods; and on the other hand, the
improvement of live-stock and of food plants must depend on a knowl-
edge of the laws of phylogenesis. How appalling is our ignorance, for
example, concerning the effect of a mixing of races as contrasted with
pure breeding; a matter of infinite importance in a country like ours
containing numerous races and subspecies of men. How little do we
know of the direct effect of climate on 'blood' ; a matter of concern in a
land with such diversified geography. In our fast-filling earth all
problems will some day be secondary to that of raising more grain or
beef to the acre; then at least the biologic-evolutionary problems will
be recognized as paramount. It is for us to anticipate in part the
future demands on biology. The State Experiment Stations of our
day are doing something in this direction, but for the most part in too
narrow a fashion. For the future, broad, far-reaching experiments in
evolution are required, with a quantitative study of causes and results.

THE COMBATING OF TUBERCULOSIS. 461

THE COMBATIXG OF TUBERCULOSIS.

IN" THE LIGHT OF THE EXPERIENCE THAT HAS BEEN GAINED IN
THE SUCCESSFUL COMBATING OF OTHER INFECTIOUS DISEASES.*

By Professor ROBERT KOCH,

DIRECTOR OF THE INSTITUTION FOR INFECTIOUS DISEASES, BERLIN.

nnHE task with which this Congress will have to busy itself is one of
-^ the most difficult, but it is also one in which labor is most sure
of its reward. I need not point again to the innumerable victims tuber-
culosis annually claims in all countries, nor to the boundless misery it
brings on the families it attacks. You all know that there is no disease
which inflicts such deep wounds on mankind as this. All the greater,
however, would be the general joy and satisfaction if the efforts that are
being made to rid mankind of this enemy, which consumes its inmost
marrow, were crowned with success. There are many, indeed, who
doubt the possibility of successfully combating this disease, which has
existed for thousands of years and has spread all over the world. This
is by no means my opinion. This is a conflict into which we may enter
with a surely-founded prospect of success, and I will tell you the
reasons on which I base this conviction. Only a few decades ago the
real nature of tuberculosis was unknown to us; it was regarded as a
consequence, as the expression, so to speak, of social misery, and as this
supposed cause could not be got rid of by simple means people relied
on the probable gradual improvement of social conditions and did noth-
ing. All this is altered now. We know that social misery does indeed
go far to foster tuberculosis, but the real cause of the disease is a
parasite — that is, a visible and palpable enemy which we can pursue and
annihilate, just as we can pursue and annihilate other parasitic enemies
of mankind.

Strictly speaking, the fact that tuberculosis is a preventable disease
ought to have become clear as soon as the tubercle bacillus was dis-
covered and the properties of this parasite and the manner of its trans-
mission became known. I may add that I, for my part, was aware of
the full significance of this discovery from the first, and so will every-
body have been who had convinced himself of the causal relation be-
tween tuberculosis and the tubercle bacillus. But the strength of a

* An address delivered before the British Congress on Tuberculosis on
July 23.

462 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

small number of medical men was inadequate to the conflict with a
disease so deeply rooted in our habits and customs. Such a conflict re-
quires the cooperation of many, if possible of all, medical men, shoulder
to shoulder with the State and the whole population, and now the
moment when such cooperation is possible seems to have come. I sup-
pose there is hardly any medical man now who denies the parasitic
nature of tuberculosis, and among the non-medical public, too, the
knowledge of the nature of the disease has been widely propagated.
Another favorable circumstance is that success has recently been
achieved in the combating of several parasitic diseases and that we have
learned from these examples how the conflict with pestilences is to be
carried on. The most important lesson we have learned from the said
experience is that it is a great blunder to treat pestilences according to
a general scheme. This was done in former times. No matter whether
the pestilence in question was cholera, plague, or leprosy, isolation,
quarantine, useless disinfection were always resorted to. But now we
know that every disease must be treated according to its own special
individuality and that the measures to be taken against it must be most
accurately adapted to its special nature, to its etiology. We are entitled
to hope for success in combating tuberculosis only if we keep this lesson
constantly in view. As so extremely much depends just on this point
I shall take the liberty to illustrate it by several examples.

The pestilence which is at this moment in the foreground of in-
terest, the bubonic plague, may be instructive to us in several respects.
People used to act upon the conviction that a plague patient was in
the highest degree a center of infection, and that the disease was trans-
mitted only by plague patients and their belongings. Even the most
recent international agreements are based on this conviction. Although,
as compared with formerly, we now have the great advantage that
we can, with the aid of the microscope and of experiments on animals,
recognize every case of plague with absolute certainty, and although
the prescribed inspection of ships, quarantine, the isolation of patients,
the disinfection of infected dwellings and ships, are carried out with
the utmost care, the plague has, nevertheless, been transmitted every-
where, and has in not a few places assumed grave dimensions. Why
this has happened we know very well, owing to the experience quite
recently gained as to the manner in which the plague is transmitted.
It has been discovered that only those plague patients who suffer from
plague-pneumonia — a condition which is fortunately infrequent — are
centers of infection, and that the real transmitters of the plague are the
rats. There is no longer any doubt that in by far the majority of the
cases in which the plague has been transmitted by ocean traffic the
transmission took place by means of plague among the ship rats. It
has also been found that wherever the rats were intentionally or unin-

TEE COMBATING OF TUBERCULOSIS. 463

tentionally exterminated the plague rapidly disappeared; whereas at
other places where too little attention had been paid to the rat plague
the pestilence continued. This connection between the human plague
and the rat plague was totally unknown before, so that no blame
attaches to those who devised the measures now in force against
the plague if the said measures have proved unavailing. It is
high time, however, that this enlarged knowledge of the etiology of the
plague should be utilized in international as well as in other traffic. As
the human plague is so dependent on the rat plague it is intelligible
that protective inoculation and the application of antitoxic serum have
had so little effect. A certain number of human beings may have been
saved from the disease by that, but the general spread of the pestilence
has not been hindered in the least.

With cholera the case is essentially different; it may under certain
circumstances be transmitted directly from human beings to other
human beings, but its main and most dangerous propagator is water,
and therefore in the combating of cholera water is the first thing to be
considered. In Germany, where this principle has been acted on, we
have succeeded for four years in regularly exterminating the pestilence
(which was introduced again and again from the infected neighboring
countries) without any obstruction of traffic.

Hydrophobia, too, is not void of instruction for us. Against this
disease the so-called protective inoculation proper has proved eminently
effective as a means of preventing the outbreak of the disease in per-
sons already infected, but of course such a measure can do nothing to
prevent infection itself. The only real way of combating this pestilence
is by compulsory muzzling. In this matter also we have had the most
satisfactory experience in Germany, but have at the same time seen
that the total extermination of the pestilence can be achieved only by
international measures, because hydrophobia, which can be very easily
and rapidly suppressed, is always introduced again year after year
from the neighboring countries.

Permit me to mention only one other disease, because it is etiologi-
cally very closely akin to tuberculosis, and we can learn not a little
for the furtherance of our aims from its successful combating. I mean
leprosy. It is caused by a parasite which greatly resembles the tubercle
bacillus. Just like tuberculosis, it does not break out till long after
infection and its course is almost slower. It is transmitted only from
person to person, but only when they come into close contact, as in
small dwellings and bedrooms. In this disease, accordingly, immediate
transmission plays the main part; transmission by animals, water, or
the like is out of the question. The combative measures, accordingly,
must be directed against this close intercourse between the sick and
the healthy. The only way to prevent this intercourse is to isolate the

464 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

patients. This was most rigorously done in the Middle Ages by means
of numerous leper-houses, and the consequence was that leprosy, which
had spread to an alarming extent, was completely stamped out in
Central Europe. The same method has been adopted quite recently
in Norway, where the segregation of lepers has been ordered by a special
law. But it is extremely interesting to see how this law is carried out.
It has been found that it is not at all necessary to execute it strictly,
for the segregation of only the worst cases, and even of only a part of
these, sufficed to produce a diminution of leprosy. Only so many infec-
tious cases had to be sent to the leper-houses that the number of fresh
cases kept regularly diminishing from year to year. Consequently the
stamping-out of the disease has lasted much longer than it would have
lasted if every leper had been inexorably consigned to a leper-house, as
in the Middle Ages, but in this way, too, the same purpose is gained,
slowly indeed, but without any harshness.

These examples may suffice to show what I am driving at, which
is to point out that in combating pestilences we must strike the root
of the evil and must not squander force in subordinate ineffective
measures. Now the question is whether what has hitherto been done
and what is about to be done against tuberculosis really strikes the root
of tuberculosis so that it must sooner or later die. In order to answer
this question it is necessary first and foremost to inquire how infection
takes place in tuberculosis. Of course, I presuppose that we under-
stand by tuberculosis only those morbid conditions which are caused
by the tubercle bacillus. In by far the majority of cases of tuberculosis
the disease has its seat in the lungs, and has also begun there. From
this fact it is justly concluded that the germs of the disease — i. e., the
tubercle bacilli — must have got into the lungs by inhalation. As to the
question where the inhaled tubercle bacilli have come from, there is
also no doubt. On the contrary, we know with certainty that they get
into the air with the sputum of consumptive patients. This sputum,
especially in advanced stages of the disease, almost always contains
tubercle bacilli, sometimes in incredible quantities. By coughing and
even speaking it is flung into the air in little drops — i. e., in a moist
condition — and can at once infect persons who happen to be near the
coughers. But then it may also be pulverized when dry, in the linen or
on the floor for instance, and get into the air in the form of dust. In
this manner a complete circle, a so-called circulus vitiosus, has been
formed for the process of infection from the diseased lung, which pro-
duces phlegm and pus containing tubercle bacilli, to the formation of
moist and dry particles (which in virtue of their smallness can keep
floating a good while in the air), and finally to new infection if par-
ticles penetrate with the air into a healthy lung and originate the
disease anew. But the tubercle bacilli may get to other organs of the

THE COMBATING OF TUBERCULOSIS. 465

body in the same way and thus originate other forms of tuberculosis.
This, however, is a considerably rarer case. The sputum of consump-
tive people, then, is to be regarded as the main source of the infection
of tuberculosis. On this point, I suppose, all are agreed. The question
now arises whether there are not other sources, too, copious enough to
demand consideration in the combating of tuberculosis.

Great importance used to be attached to the hereditary transmission
of tuberculosis. Now, however, it has been demonstrated by thorough
investigation that, though hereditary tuberculosis is not absolutely non-
existent, it is nevertheless extremely rare, and we are at liberty in con-
sidering our practical measures to leave this form of origination entirely
out of account. But another possibility of tuberculous infection exists,
as is generally assumed, in the transmission of the germs of the disease
from tuberculous animals to man. This manner of infection is gener-
ally regarded nowadays as proved and as so frequent that it is even
looked upon by not a few as the most important, and the most rigorous
measures are demanded against it. In this Congress also the discussion
of the danger with which the tuberculosis of animals threatens man
will play an important part. Now, as my investigations have led me
to form an opinion deviating from that which is generally accepted, I
beg your permission, in consideration of the great importance of this
question, to discuss it a little more thorouglily.

Genuine tuberculosis has hitherto been observed in almost all
domestic animals, and most frequently in poultry and cattle. The
tuberculosis of poultry, however, difEers so much from human tuber-
culosis that M^e may leave it out of account as a possible source of in-
fection for man. So, strictly speaking, the only kind of tuberculosis
remaining to be considered is the tuberculosis of cattle which, if really
transferable to man, would indeed have frequent opportunities of
infecting human beings through the drinking of the milk and the eat-
ing of the flesh of diseased animals. Even in my first circumstantial
publication on the etiology of tuberculosis I expressed myself regard-
ing the identity of human tuberculosis and bovine tuberculosis with
reserve. Proved facts which would have enabled me sharply to distin-
guish these two forms of the disease were not then at my disposal, but
sure proofs of their absolute identity were equally undiscoverable, and
I therefore had to leave this question undecided. In order to decide it
I have repeatedly resumed the investigations relating to it, but so long
as I experimented on small animals, such as rabbits and guinea pigs,
I failed to arrive at any satisfactory result, though indications which
rendered the difference of the two forms of tuberculosis probable were
not wanting. Not till the complaisance of the Ministry of Agricul-
ture enabled me to experiment on cattle, the only animals really suitable
for these investigations, did I arrive at absolutelv conclusive results.

466 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Of the experiments which I have carried out during the last two years
along with Professor Schiitz of the Veterinary College in Berlin I will
tell you briefly some of the most important.

A number of young cattle which had stood the tuberculin test, and
might therefore be regarded as free from tuberculosis, were infected in
various ways with tubercle bacilli taken from cases of human tuber-
culosis; some of them got the tuberculous sputum of consumptive
patients direct. In some cases the tubercle bacillus or the sputum was
injected under the skin, in others into the peritoneal cavity, in others
into the jugular vein. Six animals were fed with tuberculous sputum
almost daily for seven or eight months; four repeatedly inhaled great
quantities of bacilli, which were distributed in water and scattered
with it in the form of spray. None of these cattle (there were 19 of
them) showed any sjmptoms of disease and they gained considerably
in weight. From six to eight months after the beginning of the ex-
periments they were killed. In their internal organs not a trace of
tuberculosis was found. Only at the places where the injections had
been made small suppurative foci. had formed, in which few tubercle
bacilli could be found. This is exactly what is found when dead
tubercle bacilli are injected under the skin of animals liable to con-
tagion. So the animals we experimented on were affected by the liv-
ing bacilli of human tuberculosis exactly as they would have been by
dead ones ; they were absolutely insusceptible to them.

The result was utterly different, however, when the same experiment
was made on cattle free from tuberculosis with tubercle bacilli that
came from the lungs of an animal suffering from bovine tuberculosis.
After an incubation-period of about a week the severest tuberculous dis-
orders of the internal organs broke out in all the infected ani-
mals. It was all one whether the infecting matter had been injected
only under the skin or into the peritoneal cavity or the vascular system.
High fever set in and the animals became weak and lean ; some of them
died after from one and a half to two months; others were killed in
a miserably sick condition after three months. After death extensive
tuberculous infiltrations were found at the place where the injections
had been made and in the neighboring lymphatic glands, and also far-
advanced alterations of the internal organs, especially of the lungs and
the spleen. In the cases in which the injection had been made into
the peritoneal cavity the tuberculous growths which are so character-
istic of bovine tuberculosis were found on the omentum and peri-
toneum. In short, the cattle proved just as susceptible to infection by
the bacillus of bovine tuberculosis as they have proved insusceptible
to infection by the bacillus of human tuberculosis. I wish only to
add that preparations of the organs of the cattle which were artificially
infected with bovine tuberculosis in these experiments are exhibited
in the museum of pathology and bacteriology.

TEE COMBATING OF TUBERCULOSIS. 467

An almost equally striking distinction between human and bovine
tuberculosis was brought to light by a feeding experiment with swine.
Six young swine were fed daily for three months with the tuberculous
sputum of consumptive patients. Six other swine received bacilli of
bovine tuberculosis with their food daily for the same period. The ani-
mals that were fed with sputum remained healthy and grew lustily,
whereas those that were fed with the bacilli of bovine tuberculosis soon
became sickly, were stunted in their growth, and half of them died.
After three and a half months the surviving swine were all killed and
examined. Among the animals that had been fed with sputum no
trace of tuberculosis was found, except here and there little nodules
in the l}Tnphatic glands of the neck and in one case a few grey nodules
in the lungs. The animals, on the other hand, which had eaten bacilli
of bovine tuberculosis had, without exception (just as in the cattle ex-
periment), severe tuberculous diseases, especially tuberculous infiltra-
tion of the greatly enlarged lymphatic glands of the neck and of the
mesenteric glands, and also extensive tuberculosis of the lungs and
the spleen.

The difference betw^een human and bovine tuberculosis appeared
not less strikingly in a similar experiment with asses, sheep and goats,
into whose vascular systems the two kinds of tubercle bacilli were in-
jected.

Our experiments, I must add, are not the only ones that have led
to this result. If one studies the older literature of the subject, and
collates the reports of the numerous experiments that were made in
former times by Chauveau, Giinther and Harms, Bollinger and others,
who fed calves, swdne and goats with tuberculous material, one finds
that the animals that were fed with the milk and pieces of the lungs of
tuberculous cattle always fell ill of tuberculosis, whereas those that
were fed with human material did not. Comparative investigations
regarding human and bovine tuberculosis have been made very recently
in North America by Smith, Dinwiddle, Frothingham and Eepp, and
their result agreed with that of ours. The unambiguous and absolutely
conclusive result of our experiments is due to the fact that we chose
methods of infection which excluded all sources of error, and carefully
avoided everything connected with the stalling, feeding and tending
of the animals that might have a disturbing effect on the experiments.
Considering all these facts, I feel justified in maintaining that human
tuberculosis differs from bovine and cannot be transmitted to cattle.
It seems to me very desirable, however, that these experiments should
be repeated elsewhere, in order that all doubts as to the correctness of
my assertion may be removed. I wish only to add that, owing to the
great importance of this matter, our Government has resolved to ap-
point a commission to make further inquiries on the subject.

468 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

But, now, how is it with the susceptibility of man to bovine tuber-
culosis? This question is far more important to us than that of the
susceptibility of cattle to human tuberculosis, highly important as that
is too. It is impossible to give this question a direct answer, because,
of course, the experimental investigation of it with human beings is
out of the question. Indirectly, however, we can try to approach it. It
i"- well known that the milk and butter consumed in great cities very
often contain large quantities of the bacilli of bovine tuberculosis in a
living condition, as the numerous infection-experiments with such dairy
products on animals have proved. Most of the inhabitants of such
cities daily consume such living and perfectly virulent bacilli of bovine
tuberculosis, and unintentionally carry out the experiment which we
are not at liberty to make. If the bacilli of bovine tuberculosis were
able to infect human beings, many cases of tuberculosis caused by the
consumption of alimenta containing tubercle bacilli could not but occur
among the inhabitants of great cities, especially the children. And most
medical men believe that this is actually the case.

In reality, however, it is not so. That a case of tuberculosis has
been caused by alimenta can be assumed with certainty only when
the intestine suffers first — i. e., when a so-called primary tuberculosis
of the intestines is found. But such cases are extremely rare. Among
many cases of tuberculosis examined after death I myself remember
having seen primary tuberculosis of the intestine only twice. Among
the great post-mortem material of the Charite Hospital in Berlin 10
cases of primary tuberculosis of the intestine occurred in five years.
Among 933 cases of tuberculosis in children at the Emperor Frederick's
Hospital for Children Baginsky never found tuberculosis of the in-
testine without simultaneous disease of the lungs and the bronchial
glands. Among 3,104 post-mortem examinations of tuberculous chil-
dren Biedert observed only 16 cases of primary tuberculosis of the
intestine. I could cite from the literature of the subject many more
statistics of the same kind, all indubitably showing that primary
tuberculosis of the intestine, especially among children, is a compara-
tively rare disease, and of the few cases that have been enumerated it
is by no means certain that they were due to infection by bovine tuber-
culosis. It is just as likely that they were caused by the widely-
propagated bacilli of human tuberculosis, which may have got into
the digestive canal in some way or other — for instance, by swallowing
saliva of the mouth. Hitherto nobody could decide with certainty in
such a case whether the tuberculosis of the intestine was of human or
of animal origin. Now we can diagnose the two. All that is necessary
is to cultivate in pure culture the tubercle bacilli found in the tuber-
culous material and to ascertain whether they belong to bovine
tiiberculosis by inoculating cattle with them. For this purpose I recom-

THE COMBATING OF TUBERCULOSIS. 469

mend subcutaneous injection which yields quite specially charac-
teristic and convincing results. For half a year past I have occupied
myself with such investigations, but owing to the rareness of the
disease in question the number of the cases which I have been able to
investigate is but small. What has hitherto resulted from this investi-
gation does not speak for the assumption that bovine tuberculosis
occurs in man.

Though the important question whether man is susceptible to bovine
tuberculosis at all is not yet absolutely decided, and will not admit of
absolute decision to-day or to-morrow, one is nevertheless already at
liberty to say that, if such a susceptibility really exists the infection of
human beings is but a very rare occurrence. I should estimate the
extent of infection by the milk and flesh of tuberculous cattle and the
butter made of their millc as hardly greater than that of hereditary
transmission, and I therefore do not deem it advisable to take any
measures against it.

So the only main source of the infection of tuberculosis is the
sputum of consumptive patients and the measures for the combating
of tuberculosis must aim at the prevention of the dangers arising from
its diffusion. Well, what is to be done in this direction ? Several ways
are open. One's first thought might be to consign all persons suffering
from tuberculosis of the lungs whose sputum contains tubercle bacilli
to suitable establishments. This, however, is not only absolutely im-
practicable but also unnecessary. For a consumptive who coughs out
tubercle bacilli is not necessarily a source of infection on that account
so long as he takes care that his sputum is properly removed and ren-
dered innocuous. This is certainly true of very many patients, espe-
cially in the first stages, and also of those who belong to the well-to-do
classes and are able to procure the necessary nursing. But how is it
with people of very small means? Every medical man who has often
entered the dwellings of the poor, and I can speak on this point from
my own experience, knows how sad is the lot of consumptives and their
families there. The whole family have to live in one or two small, ill-
ventilated rooms. The patient is left without the nursing he needs be-
cause the able-bodied members of the family must go to their work.
How can the necessary cleanliness be secured under such circum-
stances? How is such a helpless patient to remove his sputum so that
it may do no harm ? But let us go a step further and picture the condi-
tion of a poor consumptive patient's dwelling at night. The whole
family sleep crowded together in one small room. However cautious
he may be the sufferer scatters the morbid matter secreted by his dis-
eased lungs every time he coughs and his relatives close beside him
must inhale this poison. Thus whole families are infected. They die
out and awaken in the minds of those who do not know the infectious-

470 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ness of tuberculosis the opinion that it is hereditary, whereas its trans-
mission in the cases in question was due solely to the simplest pro-
cesses of infection, which do not strike people so much because the
consequences do not appear at once, but generally only after the lapse
of years.

Often in such circumstances the infection is not restricted to a
single family, but spreads in densely inhabited tenement houses to the
neighbors, and then, as the admirable investigations of Biggs have
shown in the case of the densely peopled parts of New York, regular
nests or foci of disease are formed. But if one investigates these mat-
ters more thoroughly one finds that it is not poverty per se that favors
tuberculosis, but the bad domestic conditions under which the poor
everywhere, but especially in great cities, have to live. For, as the Ger-
man statistics show, tuberculosis is less frequent, even among the poor,
when the population is not densely packed together, and may attain
very great dimensions among a well-to-do population when the domestic
conditions, especially as regards the bedrooms, are bad, as is the case,
for instance, among the inhabitants of the North Sea coast. So it is
the overcrowded dwellings of the poor that we have to regard as the
real breeding-places of tuberculosis; it is out of them that the disease
always crops up anew, and it is to the abolition of these conditions that
we must first and foremost direct our attention if we wish to attack the
evil at its root and to wage war against it with effective weapons.
This being so, it is very gratifying to see how efforts are being made
in almost all countries to improve the domestic conditions of the poor.
T am also convinced that these efforts, which must be promoted in
every way, will lead to a considerable diminution of tuberculosis. But
a long time must elapse ere essential changes can be effected in this
direction, and much may be done meanwhile in order to reach the goal
much more rapidly.

If we are not able at present to get rid of the danger which small
and overcrowded dwellings involve, all we can do is to remove the
patients from them and, in their own interests and that of the people
about them, to lodge them better, and this can be done only in suitable
hospitals. But the thought of attaining this end by compulsion of any
kind is very far from me; what I want is that they may be enabled
to obtain the nursing they need better than they can obtain it now.
At present a consumptive in an advanced stage of the disease is re-
garded as incurable and as an unsuitable inmate for a hospital. The
consequence is that he is reluctantly admitted and dismissed as soon
as possible. The patient, too, when the treatment seems to him to
produce no improvement and the expenses, owing to the long duration
of his illness, weigh heavily upon him, is himself animated by the
wish to leave the hospital soon. That would be altogether altered if

THE COMBATING OF TUBERCULOSIS. 471

we had special hospitals for consumptives, and if the patients were
taken care of there for nothing, or at least at a very moderate rate.
To such hospitals they would willingly go ; they could be better treated
and fed there than is now the case. I know very well that the execu-
tion of the project will have great difficulties to contend with, owing
to the considerable outlay it entails. But very much would be gained
if, at least in the existing hospitals, which have to admit a great num-
ber of consumptives at any rate, special wards were established for
them in which pecuniary facilities would be offered them. If only a
considerable fraction of the whole number of consumptives were suit-
ably lodged in this way a diminution of infection, and consequently
of the sum-total of tuberculosis, could not fail to be the result. Permit
me to remind you in this connection of what I said about leprosy.
In the combating of that disease also great progress has already been
made by lodging only a fair number of the patients in hospitals. The
only country that possesses a considerable number of special hospitals
lor tuberculous patients is England, and there can be no doubt that
the diminution of tuberculosis in England, which is much greater
than in any other country, is greatly due to this circumstance. I
should point to the founding of special hospitals for consumptives and
the better utilization of the already existing hospitals for the lodging
of consumptives as the most important measure in the combating of
tuberculosis, and its execution opens a wide field of activity to the
State, to municipalities, and to private benevolence. There are many
people who possess great wealth and would willingly give of their
superfluity for the benefit of their poor and heavily afflicted fellow-
creatures, but do not know how to do this in a judicious manner. Here
is an opportunity for them to render a real and lasting service by
founding consumption hospitals or purchasing the right to have a
certain number of consumptive patients maintained in special wards
of other hospitals free of expense.

As, however, unfortunately, the aid of the State, the munici-
palities, and rich benefactors will probably not be forthcoming for a
long time yet, we must for the present resort to other measures that
may pave the way for the main measure just referred to and serve as a
supplement and temporary substitute for it. Among such measures I
regard obligatory notification as specially valuable. In the combating of
all infectious diseases it has proved indispensable as a means of
obtaining certain knowledge as to their state, especially their dis-
semination, their increase, and their decrease. In the conflict with
tuberculosis also we cannot dispense with obligatory notification; we
need it not only in order to inform ourselves as to the dissemination of
this disease, but mainly in order to learn where help and instruction
can be given, and especially where the disinfection which is so urgently

472 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

necessary when consumptives die or change their residences has to be
effected. Fortunately it is not at all necessary to notify all cases of
tuberculosis, nor even all cases of consumption, but only those that,
owing to the domestic conditions, are sources of danger to the people
about them. Such limited notification has already been introduced
in various places — in Norway, for instance, by a special law, in
Saxony by a Ministerial decree, in New York, and in several American
towns which have followed its example. In New York, where notifi-
cation was optional at first and was afterwards made obligatory, it has
proved eminently useful. It has thus been proved that the evils which
it used to be feared the introduction of notification for tuberculosis
would bring about need not occur and it is devoutly to be wished that
the examples I have named may very soon excite emulation everywhere.

There is another measure connected with notification — viz., disin-
fection, which, as already mentioned, must be effected when consump-
tives die or change their residence in order that those who next occupy
the infected dwelling may be protected against infection. Moreover,
not only the dwellings but also the infected beds and clothes of con-
sumptives ought to be disinfected. A further measure, already recog-
nized on all hands as effective, is the instructing of all classes of the
people as to the infectiousness of tuberculosis and the best way of
protecting oneself. The fact that tuberculosis has considerably
diminished in almost all civilized states of late is attributable solely
to the circumstance that knowledge of the contagious character of
tuberculosis has been more and more widely disseminated and that
caution in intercourse with consumptives has increased more and more
in consequence. If better knowledge of the nature of tuberculosis has
alone sufficed to prevent a large number of cases this must serve us
as a significant admonition to make the greatest possible use of this
means and to do more and more to bring it about that everybody may
know the dangers that threaten them in intercourse with consump-
tives. It is only to be desired that the instructions may be made
shorter and more precise than they generally are, and that special
emphasis may be laid on the avoidance of the worst danger of infec-
tion, which is the use of bedrooms and small ill-ventilated work-
rooms simultaneously with consumptives. Of course the instructions
must include directions as to what consumptives have to do when they
cough and how they are to treat their sputum. Another measure,
which has come into the foreground of late, and which at this moment
plays to a certain extent a paramount part in all efforts for the com-
bating of tuberculosis, works in quite another direction. I mean the
founding of sanatoria for consumptives.

That tuberculosis is curable in its early stages must be regarded
as an undisputed fact. The idea of curing as many tuberculous

THE COMBATING OF TUBERCULOSIS. 473

patients as possible in order to reduce the number of those that reach
the infectious stage of consumption and thus to reduce the number
of fresh cases was therefore a very natural one. The only question
is whether the number of persons cured in this way will be great
enough to exercise an appreciable influence on the retrogression of
tuberculosis. I will try to answer this question in the light of the
figures at my disposal. According to the business report of the Ger-
man Central Committee for the Establishment of Sanatoria for the
Cure of Consumptives, about 5,500 beds will be at the disposal of
these institutions by the end of 1901, and then, if we assume that the
average stay of each patient will be three months, it will be possible
to treat at least 20,000 patients every year. From the reports hitherto
issued as to the results that have been achieved in the establishments
we learn further that about 20 per cent, of the patients who have
tubercle bacilli in their sputum lose them by the treatment there.
This is the only sure test of success, especially as regards prophylaxis.
If we make this the basis of our estimates, we find that 4,000 con-
sumptives will leave these establishments annually as cured. But,
according to the statistics ascertained by the German Imperial Office
of Health, there are 226,000 persons in Germany over fifteen years
of age who are so far gone in consumption that hospital treatment is
necessary for them. Compared with this great number of consump-
tives the success of the establishments in question seems so small that
a material influence on the retrogression of tuberculosis in general is
not yet to be expected of them. But pray do not imagine that I wish
by this calculation of mine to oppose the movement for the estab-
lishment of such sanatoria in any way. I only wish to warn against
the overestimating of their importance which has recently been
observable in various quarters, based apparently on the opinion that
the war against tuberculosis can be waged by means of sanatoria
alone and that other measures are of subordinate value. In reality
the contrary is the case. What is to be achieved by the general
prophylaxis resulting from recognition of the danger of infection
and the consequent greater caution in intercourse with consumptives is
shown by a calculation of Cornet's regarding the decrease of mortality
from tuberculosis in Prussia in the years 1889 to 1897. Before 1889
the average was 31.4 per 10,000, whereas in the period named it sank
to 21.8, which means that in that short space of time the number
of deaths from tuberculosis was 184,000 less than was to be expected
from the average of the preceding years. In New York, under the
influence of the general sanitary measures directed in a simply ex-
emplary manner by Biggs, the mortality from tuberculosis has
diminished by more than 35 per cent, since 1886. And it must be
remembered that both in Prussia and in New York the progress indi-

VOL. LIX. — 33

474 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

cated by these figures is due to the first beginnings of these measures.
Considerably greater success is to be expected of their further de-
velopment. Biggs hopes to have got so far in five years that in the
city of JSTew York alone the annual number of deaths from tuber-
culosis will be 3,000 less than formerly.

Now, I do indeed believe that it will be possible to render the
sanatoria considerably more efficient. If strict care be taken that
only patients be admitted for whom the treatment of those establish-
ments is well adapted and if the duration of the treatment be pro-
longed it will certainly be possible to cure 50 per cent, and perhaps
still more. But even then, and even if the number of the sanatoria be
greatly increased, the total effect will always remain but moderate.
The sanatoria will never render the other measures I have mentioned
superfluous. If their number becomes great, however, and if they per-
form their functions properly, they may materially aid the strictly
sanitary measures in the conflict with tuberculosis.

If now, in conclusion, we glance back once more to what has been
done hitherto for the combating of tuberculosis, and forward to what
has still to be done, we are at liberty to declare with a certain satis-
faction that very promising beginnings have already been made.
Among these I reckon the consumption hospitals of England, the
legal regulations regarding notification in Norway and Saxony, the
organization created by Biggs in New York (the study and imitation
of which I most urgently recommend to all municipal sanitary authori-
ties), the sanatoria, and the instruction of the people. All that is
necessary is to go on developing these beginnings, to test and, if possible,
to increase their influence on the diminution of tuberculosis, and
wherever anything useful has yet been done to do likewise. If we
allow ourselves to be continually guided in this enterprise by the spirit
of genuine preventive medical science, if we utilize the experience
gained in conflict with other pestilences, and aim, with clear recognition
of the purpose and resolute avoidance of wrong roads, at striking the
evil at its root, then the battle against tuberculosis, which has been so
energetically begun, cannot fail to have a victorious issue.

THE LA^Y OF GEAVITATION. 475

THE DISCOVERY OF THE LAW OF GRAVITATION.

By the late Professor JOHN T. DUFFIELD,

PRINCETON UNIVERSITY.

rr^HE law of gravitation, that all matter attracts all matter, directly
-'- as the mass and inversely as the square of the distance, whether
we consider the extent of its reach, or the nnmher and variety and
peculiar interest of the problems of which it furnishes the solution, or
the grandeur of many of those problems by reason of the magnitude of
the elements involved ; whether we consider the power which it gives us
to anticipate nature, and predict with the minutest accuracy andcertainty
of a mathematical demonstration celestial phenomena for ages to come ;
we cannot but regard it as the most important truth in the whole
book of nature and its discovery as the most interesting event in the
history of physical science. As there is but one material universe and
the law of gravitation solves the enigma of its structure, no other
problem of equal interest and importance can ever occupy the attention
of the student of nature.

Kepler has remarked that: "The occasions by which men have
acquired a knowledge of celestial phenomena, are not less admirable
than the discoveries themselves." If this be so, the history of the dis-
covery of that great law of nature by which all celestial phenomena
are determined can never cease to be a matter of peculiar interest.

In the account which we propose to give of the discovery we shall
select as our chronological starting point the beginning of the seven-
teenth century. At that period the theory in regard to the structure
of the material universe which, with few exceptions had been held from
time immemorial, still prevailed. The earth was regarded as the center
of the universe, about which the sun, moon, planets and stars per-
formed their ceaseless revolutions. More than half a century before
(in 1543) Copernicus, in his memorable work, 'De Orbium Coelestium
Revolutionibus,' had, indeed, announced the true system of the uni-
verse, yet as he was led to the adoption of the theory he proposed, not
so much by positive evidence in its favor as by the difficulty of recon-
ciling certain phenomena with the Ptolemaic theory; moreover, as the
objections to this theory were from their very nature such that few
could appreciate their force, whilst in the apparent motions of the
heavenly bodies every one could see what seemed to be an ocular dem-
onstration of its truth, it is not strange that the doctrine of Coper-
nicus should have been for so long a time generally regarded as an

476 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

interesting yet fanciful speculation. It remained for a subsequent age
to furnish proof of the truth of the Copernican system which could
not be gainsaid or resisted.

At the beginning of the seventeenth century, the dicta of Aristotle,
in regard to matters of science as well as philosophy, were still accepted,
as they had been for many centuries preceding, as of infallible author-
ity. In regard to the subject of our inquiry, he taught that bodies at
the surface of the earth fell or tended to fall toward the center of the
earth, not in virtue of any attraction of the earth, but in virtue of the
fact that the center of the earth was the center of the material universe
— that if the earth itself should be moved out of its place and then left
free to move, it would return to its place by the same law of nature
which controlled all terrestrial bodies. He taught moreover that celes-
tial bodies were different in kind from bodies terrestrial — that whilst
the latter were imperfect, corruptible and changeable, the former were
perfect, (and therefore, according to his fancy, perfectly spherical in
form) incorruptible, unchangeable and self-luminous. Being different
in kind, he held that they were subject to entirely different physical
laws; that whereas the motion of terrestrial bodies when free to move
was rectilinear, by a necessity of their nature, the motion of celestial
bodies was circular by a like necessity of their nature. His language
on this point is worth quoting as an illustration of the contrast be-
tween the ancient and modern method of philosophizing in regard to
natural phenomena. He says: "All simple motion must be rectilinear
or circular; either to a center or from a center, each of which is recti-
linear, or about a center. It is natural for two of the elements —
earth and water — which are heavy, to tend to a center; two — air and
fire — which are light, to tend from a center. As the motion of all
terrestrial elements is therefore rectilinear, it seems reasonable that
celestial bodies, which are of a different nature, should have only
the other simple motion possible, namely, circular motion."

The year 1609 marks a new era in the history of astronomy. In
this year two events occurred, independent, yot alike memorable as con-
tributing to the overthrow of the theory in r>_gard to the structure of
the material universe which had previously prevailed and establishing
the doctrine of Copernicus upon an immovable foundation. The inven-
tion of the telescope by Galileo, and the immediate discovery by means
of it of the inequalities of the moon's surface, the phases of Venus, the
satellites of Jupiter and the rings of Saturn, at once annihilated the
fancies of Aristotle as to the perfectly spherical form of the planets,
their self-luminosity, and their difference in kind from bodies terres-
trial. The other memorable event referred to was the publication of
Kepler's great work on 'The Motions of Mars,' in which, with much
that was fanciful, two of the three laws of planetary motion were for

THE LAW OF GRAVITATION. All

the first time announced. Some twelve years later, in his work,
entitled 'Harmonies/ he announced the third law of planetary motion,
fully establishing his right to the title, by which he has since been dis-
tinguished 'The Legislator of the Heavens.'

These laws of Kepler are: First, that the orbits of the planets are
elliptical, the sun being at one of the foci; second, that the radius
vector, that is, a line drawn from a planet to the sun, passes over equal
spaces in equal times; third, that the squares of the times of revolution
of the different planets, are to each other as the cubes of the mean
distances from the sun.

Together with these laws of planetary motion, two of the three
axioms of the science of mechanics, known as the Laws of Motion,
were about this time discovered, or rather, were now for the first time
distinctly apprehended and enunciated. The first of these was given
by Kepler — the law of inertia, namely, that a body will persevere in
the state in which it is, whether of rest or motion, until it is acted on
by some force; or more precisely, a body at rest will continue at rest
until acted on by some force, and when acted on by any single force,
if free to move, its motion will be rectilinear, uniform and continuous
until the body is acted on by some other force. The second law of
motion was announced by Galileo, and is known as the law of the
coexistence of motions, or independence of forces. It may be expressed
as follows: If a body be acted on by several forces simultaneously, it
will obey the impulse of each force, just as it would if the others were
not acting. [The simplest illustration of this law is what is known
as the parallelogram of forces. If the direction and intensity of two
forces acting simultaneously on a body be represented by the sides of a
parallelogram, the body will describe the diagonal of the parallelogram ;
that is, at the end of a unit of time the body will be just where it
would have been if the forces had, each for a unit of time, acted con-
secutively.]

The true system of the universe, the laws of planetary motion and
the fundamental principles of mechanics having become known, for
the first time in the history of the race any intelligent inquiry as to
the physical causes of the motions of the heavenly bodies became pos-
sible. With earnestness and assiduity proportioned to the interest and
grandeur of the problem, men of science at once applied themselves to
its solution, and yet half a century of gradual progress elapsed before
the desired result was reached. From the facts which we shall have
occasion to mention it will appear how much, or rather how little,
foundation there is for the common belief that the idea of the law of
gravitation was wholly original with Newton — suggested to him for
the first time by observing the fall of an apple, and then suddenly
coming forth from his brain like Minerva from the head of Jove, un-

478 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

heralded and complete. The ordinary method of transition from wide-
spread and plausible error to the truth is by slow and gradual progress,
and the discovery of the law of gravitation, so far from being an excep-
tion to this rule, is but one of its most striking illustrations. Such
an accident as that wliich the discovery of the law of gravitation is
supposed to have been is of the kind which only happens to men of large
knowledge, profound thought, and after intense and protracted mental
effort. Simple as this law is known to be, and easily apprehended
and even demonstrated by ordinary minds, it needed one endowed
v/ith the most gigantic intellect probably ever given to mortal — avail-
ing himself of the suggestions and the results of the labors of those
who had preceded him in the same field of inquiry — to make the dis-
covery.

In tracing the history of this discovery, from the epoch when by
the previous discovery of all the necessary data it for the first time
became possible, the first place in the order of time, and next to
Newton in the order of merit, is undoubtedly due to Kepler. Possessing
a singularly lively imagination — we might say, volatile fancy — com-
bined with a love for the truth that amounted to a ruling passion, and
a breadth of knowledge in his favorite science far in advance of any
other man of his age, he was eminently fitted for the work which he so
successfully performed of scientific discovery. Fertile in hypotheses —
sometimes the most extravagant — he was indefatigable in his labors to
test his hypotheses by the facts. Without the slightest pride of opinion,
he seemed to take a satisfaction in exploding his own theories when
they were false, that was only exceeded by his delight when successful
in demonstrating their truth. Of the men who have contributed to the
advancement of science, there are few to whom we are under greater
obligation, or whose character as an investigator of nature is more
worthy of admiration, than 'The Legislator of the Heavens' — the father
of modern astronomy.

In the introduction to his memorable work on 'The Motions of
Mars,' referred to above, he opposed the doctrine of Aristotle on the
subject of terrestrial gravity, and in the course of the discussion uses
the following remarkable language :

A mathematical point, whetlier the center of tlie universe, or not, has no
power to move heavy bodies to approach it. Let philosophers prove, if they
can, that natural things have any sympathy with that which is nothing.

The true theory of gravity is founded on the following axioms. Oravity is
a mutual affection between cognate bodies toicard union or conjunction, similar
to the magnetic virtue. If we assume the earth to be the center of the world,
heavy bodies are not carried toward its center in virtue of its quality of center
of the world, but in virtue of its quality of center of a cognate round body;
BO that wheresoever the earth may be placed, or whithersoever it may be car-
ried by its animal faculty (alluding to a fanciful theory which we shall have
occasion presently to notice) heavy bodies will always be carried toward it.

THE LA}Y OF GRAVITATION. 479

If the earth were not round, heavy bodies would not tend from every side
toward its center, but to different points from different sides.

If two stones were phiced in any part of the universe, near each other, and
beyond the sphere of the influence of a third cognate body, these stones would
come together at an intermediate point, each approaching the other at a dis-
tance proportional to the comparative mass of the other.

If the moon and the earth were not retained in their orbits by their an-
nual force, or some other equivalent, the earth would mount to the moon by
a fifty-fourth part of their distance from each other, and the moon would fall
toward the earth through the other fifty-three parts, that is, assuming that the
substance of the earth is of the same density.

The sphere of the attractive virtue which is in tlie moon, extends to the
earth and entices up the waters, but as the moon flies rapidly across the zenith
and the waters cannot follow so quickly, a flow of the ocean is occasioned
toward the westward.

If the attractive virtue of the moon extends to the earth, it follows,
with greater reason, that the attractive virtue of the earth extends to the moon
and much farther, and in short, nothing which consists of earthy substance,
however constituted, although thrown up to any height, can ever escape the
powerful operation of this attractive virtue.

These views of Kepler — so novel at the time they were announced
by him and yet which we now know to be in the main so correct — were
published more than thirty years before Newton was born. As we read
them, our first feeling is one of surprise that any subsequent investi-
gator of the phenomena of gravitation should be able, by his dis-
coveries, to achieve for himself a fame which should not only render
his name immortal but should almost wholly hide from view the merit
of the great pioneer in this field of inquiry. To appreciate, however,
the importance of the work which yet remained to be performed, we
should bear in mind that whilst Kepler's views in regard to terrestrial
gravity were so remarkably just, he at the same time, in common with
the age in which he lived, and, we may say, with all preceding ages —
regarded the tendency of bodies near the earth to fall toward its center,
and the motions of heavenly bodies, as entirely different phenomena
and not at all referable to the same physical cause. He indeed specu-
lated on the possibility of referring the motions of the planets to an
attractive force emanating from the sun, similar to that which caused
bodies near the earth to tend toward its center, and concluded that
such a hypothesis was untenable, inasmuch as the motion in one ease
was rectilinear, and in the other curvilinear. Again, not to over-
estimate the merit of Kepler in connection with the discovery of the
law of gravitation, we should remember that a theory as to the physical
cause of natural phenomena, even if it be in the main correct, will
furnish no complete solution of the problems which phenomena pre-
sent, unless it express accurately and precisely the measure as well as
the mode of the action of the assigned cause. For example, to know
merely that all matter attracts all matter, would not enable us to

48o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

explain the phenomena of gravitation; we need to know precisely
how the intensity of this attraction is affected by the comparative mag-
nitude of the masses and by the distance of the masses from each
other. Now the theory of Kepler in regard to gravity was correct as
to the first of these points, namely that the intensity of this attraction
was directly as the mass, bnt he was in error in regard to the second
point, as he supposed that the intensity of the attraction was inversely
as the distance, instead of what was subsequently found to be the fact,
the square of the distance.

Once more, to estimate at its just value the part which Kepler per-
formed in the discovery of the laws of gravitation, we should bear in
mind, that an hypothesis, even if subsequently it be found to be cor-
rect, is of no authority until its truth be demonstrated. It may be of
great importance, by way of suggestion, in directing the labors of subse-
quent inquirers, but the chief merit of the discovery of the truth is due
to the individual who furnishes its demonstration. When this is done,
and not before, that which was previously but an hypothesis takes its
place among the recognized laws of nature.

As in Kepler's day, the tendency of bodies near the earth to fall
toward its center and the motions of the heavenly bodies were regarded
as phenomena of entirely different laws of nature, his views as to the
physical cause of planetary motion next claim our attention. He sup-
posed that the motion of the planets in their orbits was due to an in-
fluence emanating from the sun, but assuming that if this influence
were an attractive force, similar to terrestrial gravity, its effect would
be to cause tlie planets to fall toward the sun in straight lines, instead
of the actual motion of revolution about the sun; he supposed that the
emanation was of a corporeal nature, somewhat analogous to light ; that
as the sun revolved on its axis, this emanation revolved with it just as
the spokes of a wheel when the hub revolves, and that the planets were
swept along in their orbits by the revolution of this emanation — the
force which caused them to move being a 'propulsion and not an attrac-
tion. As the hypothesis would seem to require that the times of revolu-
tion of all the planets should be the same, whereas they are different,
the nearer performing their annual revolution in a time less than the
more remote — he supposed that the density of the emanation dimin-
ished as its distance from the sun increased; that consequently its
virtue, or propulsive energy, diminished in like manner, just as the
intensity of light diminishes with the increase of the distance from the
luminous center. This would account in a general way for the fact
that the times of revolution of the planets nearer the sun are shorter
than the times of revolutions of those more remote, but the precise
difference in the observed times of revolution was not exactly that
which would be required by the hypothesis. Moreover, he had observed

THE LAW OF GRAVITATION. 481

that the orbits of the phmets were not circuhir, as would seem to be
required by his hypothesis, but elliptical, the sun being at one of the
foci ; also, the ever- varying radius vector always passed over equal spaces
in equal times, hence the motion of the planet in its orbit was not
uniform, as his hypothesis would require, but ever- varying ; and this
variation too was evidently not fortuitous or uncertain but increased or
diminished in the exact ratio to the varying distance of the planet from
the sun required by the law just mentioned, of equal spaces in equal
times. These facts, apparently so inconsistent with his hypothesis,
Kepler accounted for by supposing that each of the planets was ani-
mated by an intelligent spirit, by whose agency the motion of the planet
was, in part at least, determined. We have seen an allusion to this
theory in the quotation above given, on the subject of gravity. He re-
garded each of the heavenly bodies, and the earth as one of them, as
literally a huge animal, and in one of his works describes with some
minuteness the habits of that particular animal on whose body it is our
lot to live.

Kepler's hypothesis of an emanation from the sun of a corporeal
nature by whose revolution the planets were propelled in their orbits
was received with more or less favor for a time, but was soon super-
seded by another memorable hypothesis no more reasonable or plausible
and yet from the time of its announcement until the publication of
'The Principia' demonstrated its fallacy, it was adopted by most men
of science and may be said to have been the accepted theory on the
subject. We refer to the Vortices of Descartes. This distinguished
jDhilosopher, born 1596, rose to eminence about the time of Kepler's
death, which occurred in 1630. By the force of his genius, illustrated
not only by that achievement for which his name will ever be held in
honored remembrance — the invention of analytical geometry — but by
the abundance and ability of his labors in every department of science
and philosophy, Descartes, for more than half a century, occupied a
position in the learned world scarcely inferior to that which for ages
preceding had been held by Aristotle.

As to the cause of planetary motion, Descartes assumed the ex-
istence, throughout the limits of our system, of a subtle transparent
fluid in ceaseless revolution about the sun as its center, and that the
planets floated in this fluid and were consequently carried round by the
sun in its motion, just as in a whirlpool a cork or floating body is car-
ried round by the motion of the water. To account for the difference
in the times of revolution of different planets, he supposed that the
velocity of the revolution of the fluid, at different distances from the
sun was different. To account for the revolution of the satellites of
the planets, he assumed that in the nighborhood of each planet this
fluid revolved about the planet as a center. To this purely fanciful

VOL. LIX. — 34

482 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

liypothesis there are several fatal objections, as was subsequently dem-
onstrated by D'Alembert, of which it will be sufficient to mention
that the very existence of a spherical vortex is a mechanical impossi-
bility. And yet such was the weight of the authority of its author, and
the ingenuity with which it was defended by hunself and his followers,
that, as was mentioned above, it not only was received with general
favor but for more than half a century it was accepted by most men
of science without questioning and continued to be maintained by
some, even after Newton had announced and demonstrated the law of
gravitation. It is a notable illustration of the tenacity of error when
once it becomes firmly fixed and widespread, that for some years after
the publication of 'The Prineipia,' a Latin translation from the French
of 'The Physics of Eohault' — a work entirely Cartesian — continued
to be the text-book in Philosophy at the University of Cambridge —
jSTewton himself being at the time Lucasian Professor of Mathematics.
We have the authority of Play fair for the statement (which, indeed,
has been called in question by Sir David Brewster, in his 'Life of
Newton,' though so far as we have been able to see, without any suffi-
cient reason) that the doctrines of 'The Prineipia' were introduced
into the regular course of instruction at Cambridge by strategem. Dr.
Samuel Clarke, a zealous advocate of the Newtonian Philosophy, pre-
pared a new and more elegant translation of Eohault, with copious
notes, in which the doctrines of 'The Prineipia' were explained and
defended, and it was by this work, more directly than by the lectures
of Newton himself, that Cartesianism was finally driven from the
University.

Whilst Kepler's speculations as to the cause of the motions of
heavenly bodies were soon supplanted by the hypothesis of Descartes,
his more just views in regard to terrestrial gravity commended them-
selves to the scientific world and speedily passed into universal and
abiding favor. In the memorable work of Galileo on the true system
of the universe — completed the very year after Kepler's death, and
published two years after; a work which, aside from its own merit,
'The Holy Inquisition,' by the persecution of its author, has made im-
mortal— we find the doctrine of Kepler, on the subject of gravity,
distinctly stated and elaborately defended. The Inquisition had power
to imprison Galileo and commit copies of his work to the flames, but
the truth it contained could not be burnt or bound. The earth 'still
moved,' and matter continued to attract matter, unawed by the terrors
of the Inquisition. The truth, once distinctly apprehended nnd an-
nounced, was never again to be lost, but was destined to grow in im-
portance and be extended in its application far beyond the conceptions
even of the great prophets of nature who were the first to proclaim it.
The doctrine of Kepler on the subject of gravity may be regarded as.

THE LAW OF GRAVITATION. 483

historically, the foundatiou of that sublime superstructure wliicli in
a subsequent age was reared by Newton, and which, by reason of the
magnitude of its proportions and the multiplicity of its details, all
pervaded and determined by the most admirable unity, now stands
and in all probability will ever stand, as the most imposing monument
ever erected by the human intellect.

Although Kepler's theory, that bodies terrestrial mutually at-
tracted each other, met with ready reception, more than thirty years
elapsed after the publication of this work before the idea was enter-
tained, at least favorably, of accounting for the revolutions of the
heavenly bodies on the theory of the universality of the attraction of
gravitation. Kepler indeed, as we have remarked above, alludes to
such an hypothesis only however to expose, as he imagined, its fallacy.
The motions of the heavenly bodies being curvilinear, whilst the
motions of bodies under the influence of gravity were rectilinear, it
was taken for granted as a thing self-evident that the two phenomena
must be due to entirely different physical causes. Familiar as we are
with the fact, that by the two laws of motion above mentioned, the
hypothesis of an attractive force of the sun, combined with the
hypothesis of a tendency of the planets to move in a straight line in
virtue of an original impulse communicated to them, would satisfac-
torily and readily account for their curvilinear motion, it cannot but
be a matter of surprise that the truth should have remained so long
unrecognized.

The credit of having been the first to generalize the idea of gravity,
and refer the revolutions of the heavenly bodies to the attraction of
matter for matter, appears to be due to Borelli, an Italian philosopher,
a pupil of Galileo. It is announced in a work which he published "^On
the Satellites of Jupiter,' in 1666, although, as we shall have occasion
to notice subsequently, Newton had conceived the same idea at least as
early as 1665. Both Newton and Huyghens, however, attributed to
Borelli the honor of having been the first to announce the important
truth.

The idea, having been suggested, was at once accepted by many
with favor and immediately led to the investigation of a hitherto unex-
plored field in the department of mechanical philosophy. Whilst the
labors of others in this field were not unimportant, particularly those
of Wallis, the name which is especially deserving of honorable mention
in this connection is that of Huyghens. In a work published in 1672,
we meet for the first time with a scientific discussion of the doctrine
of Central Forces. His investigations were remarkably satisfactory
and complete as to the phenomena of circular motion, the attractive
force being at the center and contributing largely to the success of the
labors of subsequent inquirers.

484 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

A great step had been taken toward the solution of the problem of
planetary motion, but a formidable difficulty yet remained to be over-
come. The orbits of the planets were not circular, but elliptical, and
the sun — the center of the attractive force — was not at the center of
the ellipse, but at one of the foci. For the complete solution of the
actual problem which the phenomena presented, a calculus was needed
which neither Borelli nor Huyghens possessed, and the preeminent
genius of Newton was illustrated, probably more by the invention of
the needed calculus than by his successful application of it to the
solution of the important problem in question.

The general fact having been established that the curvilinear
motion of the heavenly bodies was explicable on the hypothesis of a
central attractive force, it was soon surmised that the particular char-
acter of the planetary orbits — involving as it did a continual variation
in the distance of each planet from the sun, as well as a continual
variation in the velocity of the planet's motion — could be due to no
other cause than a difference in the intensity of the sun's attractive
force at different distances. The query was : What was the precise law
of this variation in intensity, which would account for the phenomena ?
Was the attraction inversely as the distance? or, as the square of the
distance? or, as the cube? or, was it such as admitted of any precise
expression? Guided probably by the best known fact as to the dis-
tribution of light, of heat, indeed of any emanation radiating in all
directions from a center, several individuals, independently as it would
seem, adopted the conclusion which was afterwards demonstrated to
be correct, namely: That the attractive force of matter for matter
varied inversely as the square of the distance, that is, at double the
distance the attraction is one-fourth, at treble the distance one-ninth,
and so on. The first to announce the true law of variation in the in-
tensity of attraction was a French philosopher, Bouilland, or as his
name ordinarily appears in the Latinized form, Bullialdus. About
the same time. Sir Christopher Wren, the distinguished architect
of St. Paul's, Dr. Hooke, for a long time secretary of the Eoyal Society,
and the eminent mathematician astronomer, Halley, had arrived at
the same conclusion. It was still however but a conjecture. In spite
of the most earnest and persevering effort no one was able to furnish a
demonstration.

As contributing to the discovery of the demonstration, the place of
merit next to that of Newton, though of course far inferior, is doubt-
less due to Hooke. His labors were probably of aid to ISTevrton by way
of suggestion, without however affording any just ground for the
charge which Hooke subsequently made that Newton was wearing
the laurels to which he himself was justly entitled. As early as 1666
Hooke exhibited in the presence of the Eoyal Society an experiment

TEE LAW OF GRAVITATION. 485

now quite familiar but at this time new and of exceeding interest. He
suspended from the ceiling a long wire to the end of which a ball of
wood was attached — a simple pendulum on a large scale. On removing
the pendulum from the vertical position and then giving it a lateral
impiilse at right angles to the plane in which it tended to oscillate, the
ball described an ellipse — the eccentricity of the ellipse varying with a
variation of the intensity of the lateral impulse. An ocular demonstra-
tion was thus given of the important fact that elliptical motion could
be produced by the combined action of two forces — one impulsive and
the other central — and that the particular form of the ellipse depended
upon the relative intensities of the two forces. Although in the ex-
periment the attractive force was at the center of the ellipse, whilst
in the case of planetary motion it was at one of the foci, still the fact
exhibited must have been highly suggestive to any subsequent inquirer
as to the cause of planetary motion.

In 167-i Hooke published a dissertation entitled 'An Attempt to
prove the motion of the earth by observations,' in which he says: "I
shall hereafter explain a system to the world, differing in many par-
ticulars from any yet known, depending upon three suppositions." The
first — which he gave at some length — is a distinct statement of the
universality of the attraction of gravitation. The second is substan-
tially Kepler's law of inertia. The third is "that the attractive powers
of the heavenly bodies are so much the more powerful, by how much
nearer the body wrought upon is to their own centers." And, he adds,
"Now what these several degrees are, I have not yet experimentally veri-
fied, but it is a notion which, if fully prosecuted, as it ought to be, will
mightily assist the astronomers to reduce all celestial motions to a cer-
tain rule, which, I doubt not, will never be done without it." From
this declaration it is evident, first, that at this time he was still in
doubt as to the true law of gravitation; and second, that he was en-
deavoring to discover it by experiment — a method by which he could
never have arrived at the truth. A few years later, as appears from his
correspondence with Newton, Wren and Halley, he was fully convinced
that the intensity of the attraction of gravitation was inversely as
the square of the distance, and he even professed to be able to furnish
a demonstration. In this he was either insincere at the time or dis-
covered subsequently that his supposed demonstration was defective, as
he never presented it, though repeatedly urged by Wren and Halley
to do so.

We are now prepared to understand and appreciate aright the pre-
cise work which Newton performed in connection with the discovery
of the law of gravitation. Born on Christmas day of the year 1642,
the year in which Galileo died, in 1665 we find Newton a student of
Trinity College, Cambridge, which he had entered in 1660. But

486 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

twenty-three years of age, he had already not only mastered all of
value that had previously been written on Mathematics, Astronomy
and Natural Philosophy, but he had discovered the Binomial Theorem,
and had conceived and to an extent developed the Differential Calculus
— an achievement with which few other events in the history of science
deserve to be compared, after we except his own subsequent brilliant
discoveries in Optics, and his successful application of the calculus to
the discovery of the law and explanation of many of the most inter-
esting phenomena of gravitation. In the summer of 1665 he left
Cambridge on account of the plague which prevailed there at the time
and returned to his native town of Woolsthorpe in Lancashire.
It was during this visit to Woolsthorpe that the famoiis inci-
dent occurred which, as is generally supposed, first suggested to him
the idea of gravitation and was the occasion of his great discovery.
The account of it is given by his contemporary and friend Pemberton.
One day as he was sitting under an apple tree in the garden an apple
fell before him. This turned the currents of his thoughts and led him
to reflect upon the nature of that mysterious influence which urges all
terrestrial bodies toward the center of the earth, causing them, when
free to move, to fall with a constantly accelerated velocity, which con-
tinues to act moreover without sensible diminution in intensity at the
top of the highest towers or even the summit of the loftiest mountain.
The thought was suggested to his mind, why may not this power
extend to the moon? And if so, is not this the influence which retains
her in her orbit round the earth? He at once applied himself to the
determination if possible of the truth of this conjecture. If the
moon were really retained in her orbit by terrestrial gravity, he con-
cluded that the planets were probably retained in their orbits by a
similar influence of the sun. Moreover, if the attractive influence of
the earth extended to the moon and that of the sun to the farthest
limits of our system, he concluded that the intensity of the attraction
in each case diminished as the distance from the center of attraction
increased. If this were so, it would manifest itself by a difference in
the velocities of the planets, they being at different distances from
the sun, and he accordingly inferred that by a comparison of the
velocities of the motions of the several planets with each other, the law
of variation of the intensity of the attractive force might be deter-
mined. Kepler's third law, that the squares of the times are as the
cubes of the mean distances, furnished him at once with the necessary
data for the calculation. He was not at the time able to solve the
precise problem which the actual phenomena presented, the planetary
orbits being elliptical and the attractive force at one of the foci, but
assuming the orbits to be circular and the attractive force at the
center, he found that Kepler's law would follow, if the variation in the

THE LAW OF GRAVITATION. 487

intensity of the attraction were inversely as the square of the distance.

It deserves to be noticed, that to solve even this problem, Newton
must at the time have been familiar with the doctrine of central forces,
though Huyghens' work on that subject was not published until more
than six years after.

Though the data which Newton assumed were not precisely those
which the planetary systems presented, the result reached was highly
interesting and calculated to encourage and direct further inquiry.
The next question to be determined w^as, the law of the variation of
the earth's attraction — Was this also inversely as the square of the
distance? If so, the universality of the attraction of gravitation vary-
ing in intensity according to the law just mentioned, would be almost
indubitable.

The method by which Newton undertook to determine the varia-
tion of the earth's attractive influence — so simple when once suggested
— was entirely original with him, and is one, though but one, of the
grounds for attributing to him preeminently the honor of the dis-
covery of the law of gravitation. Hooke, and doubtless others, sub-
sequently labored for years to determine whether the intensity of the
earth^s attraction diminished with an increase of the distance from
the center, and if so, according to what law, and yet all their efforts
were fruitless. Newton's method was simply this, assuming the sup-
posed distance of the moon from the earth to be correct, the length
of the entire orbit of the moon may be readily determined. Moreover,
the time of a complete revolution of the moon about the earth being
Icnown, the arc which she describes in one minute of time becomes
known. Eegarding this arc, which differs but little from a straight
line, as the diagonal of a parallelogram, by the parallelogram of forces
one of the sides of this parallelogram would represent the distance
which the moon actually falls toward the earth under the influence of
the earth's attraction in one minute of time. The arc just mentioned
being known, this distance, which is the versed sine of the arc, may be
readily determined. A measure is thus obtained of the intensity, at
the moon, of the earth's attraction. By comparing this with the in-
tensity of the attraction at the surface of the earth, as indicated by the
distance a body near the surface will fall in one minute, the law of
the variation in the intensity may be determined. Upon making the
necessary computations the result was not just that which Newton
anticipated, or rather hoped for. The distance which the moon ought
to have fallen in one minute, according to the hypothesis, was one-sixth
greater than that which, as it appeared, she actually did fall. Most
men would have regarded this discrepancy as of little account, and
accepting the result as, for the time at least, a sufficiently accurate
demonstration of the hypothesis, would at once have given it publicity.

488 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

I^ewton, however, though he could not but feel assured that the true
law of gravitation was indicated in the result he had reached, with
that singular reticence as to his labors and indifference to fame which
were among the marked features of his character, not only did not
publish his investigations but did not even in his correspondence with
his friends allude to the subject. For more than thirteen years he
does not appear to have made any further progress toward the solution
of the problem of gravitation. Though his attention was doubtless
at times directed to it, he was mainly occupied during this period
with other scientific labors, particularly in investigating the phenomena
of light, making many brilliant discoveries on this subject which, even
if he had not subsequently discovered the law of gravitation, would
have entitled him to a distinction among men of science scarcely
inferior to that which is now awarded him.

In 1679, after Bouilland, Hooke, Wren, Halley and others had
become well convinced of the true law of gravitation and yet were
unable to furnish a demonstration of it, Newton was led to a renewed
investigation of the subject. Hooke had for some time been investi-
gating the motion of projectiles, and in a letter to Newton about this
time asserted that a body acted on by an impulsive force and at the
same time by an attractive force varying in intensity inversely as the
square of the distance, would describe an ellipse. What proof Hooke
had of the fact asserted does not appear. It may be regarded as cer-
tain that he was not able to give a mathematical demonstration of it.
As he had become well convinced that the attraction of gravitation
varied according to the law mentioned, it is altogether probable that
the main if not the sole ground for his assertion, was the fact that
the orbits of the planets are elliptical. However this may be, Newton
at once appreciated the importance of the assertion if it could be
demonstrated, and was led to attempt the solution of the problem sug-
gested by Hookcy or rather the converse problem, namely, to determine
the law of variation in intensity of a central force which would cause
the body acted upon to describe an ellipse. By the aid of the calculus,
which he had by this time considerably perfected, he finally succeeded,
after long and laborious effort, in demonstrating in its most general
form the truth of Hooke's assertion. The importance of the result
cannot be over estimated. The enigina which the elliptical orbits of
the planets had presented was solved, and not only the fact of the sun's
attraction but the precise law of the variation in intensity of that
attraction was at last established beyond the possibility of further doubt
or questioning.

The demonstration of the universality of gravitation however was
still incomplete. The sun indeed attracted the planets with a force
varying inversely as the square of the distance, but was this a property

TEE LAW OF GRAVITATION. 489

commou to all matter? Was it identical with the attraction of the
earth which caused bodies near it to fall toward its center? Were the
revolutions of the planets and the revolution of the moon phenomena
referable to one and the same great law of nature? The result which
Newton had reached in his investigations in 1665 seemed to render
this doubtful, or at least presented a difficulty for the time inexplicable.
Accordingly, with that characteristic reticence to which we have
previously referred, Kewton refrained from communicating to any one
the important discovery he had made, preferring to await the solution
of the difficulty which the anomalous fact of the apparent intensity of
the earth's attraction at the moon presented.

Three years afterwards, in June, 1682, Newton attended a meet-
ing of the Eoyal Society. Whilst in London, he accidentally learned
that Picard in France had just measured the arc of the meridian with
great accuracy, and that the result which he obtained for the length of
a degree in that latitude differed somewhat from the measurement
previously accepted as reliable. Kewton at once perceived the im-
portance of this fact in connection with the determination of the
intensity of the earth's attraction. If the commonly received measure
of a degree of the meridian was erroneous, the accepted estimate of
the size of the earth was erroneous; moreover, if the assumed semi-
diameter of the earth was incorrect, the supposed distance of the moon
from the earth, in the calculation of which the earth's semi-diameter
is involved, must also be incorrect. The possible explanation of the
annoying result he had reached in 1665 was immediately suggested.
Obtaining accurately the measurement of a degree of the meridian as
given by Picard, immediately on his return to Cambridge he deter-
mined the size of the earth and the distance of the moon, on the sup-
position that Picard's measurement was the true one. With the data
thus obtained he returned to the problem at which he had labored six-
teen years before, and by the same method then pursued sought anew
to determine the law of the variation of the earth's attraction. Perceiv-
ing, as he advanced in the calculation, the tendency of the numbers to
produce the desired result, he became so much agitated that he was
unable to finish the computation and was under the necessity of re-
questing a friend to do it for him. The identity of the force which
causes bodies near the earth to fall toward its center and that which
causes the heavenly bodies to revolve was fully established, the univer-
sality of the law of gravitation was finally and forever demonstrated,
the solution of the grand problem of the universe was complete.

We might have supposed that Newton would have eagerly hastened
to announce his great discovery and secure for himself the eminent
honor to which he was entitled, and yet more than two years elapsed
before the discovery was published to the world; and then, not of his

490 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

own motion but at the instance of his friend, Halley, wlio subsequently
boasted that he was the Ulysses who had discovered Achilles and
brought him forth from his concealment. In the month of August,
1684, Halley, having become satisfied that Hooke could not furnish the
demonstration of the law of gravitation which he had repeatedly
promised, visited Cambridge to confer with iS'ewton on the subject on
which he had become deeply interested and been long laboring without
any satisfactory result. He inquired of jSTewton, what would be the
curve described by the planets on the supposition that the attractive
influence of the sun diminished as the square of the distance ? Newton
at once replied, 'An ellipse.' When asked how he knew this, he re-
plied: 'I have calculated it.' Halley, surprised and delighted at the
announcement, asked to see the demonstration. Newton was unable to
lay his hands on the calculation he had made two years before, nor
could he at the moment reproduce it. He promised Halley however
that he would send him the demonstration as soon as he was able, and
in the month of November following he fulfilled his promise. Halley
immediately revisited Cambridge to obtain Newton's consent to the
publication of the discovery. In this he succeeded, and on the 10th of
December he informed the Royal Society of the discovery and that
Newton had consented to prepare a paper on the subject for the society.
In February, 1685, the promised cormnunication was received — a paper
of twenty-four pages, containing four theorems and seven problems.
He refers to it in the accompanying letter, as his 'Notions about
Motion.' This humble yet most memorable paper ever presented to
the Society was the germ of 'The Principia.'

The great discovery having been made public, Newton seems to
have felt that the time had come to enter on the gigantic task he had
doubtless proposed to himself when the discovery was first made but
which other occupations had hitherto prevented him undertaking,
namely, putting his demonstration in a complete and conclusive form
and applying it to the solution of the many interesting and sublime
problems which the phenomena of the material universe presented.
For two years he dismissed from his mind all other occupation, and
devoted himself with all the energy of his mighty intellect to the
Herculean task. With untiring industry, prolonged attention, and
intense thought, probably never paralleled in the history of intel-
lectual effort, he lived but to meditate and calculate; oftentimes so
wholly absorbed with the grand themes which occupied his mind as to
be for the time unconscious of all the ordinary concerns of life. Fre-
quently, on rising in the morning he would sit for hours on his bedside
arrested by some new conception, and had it not been for the attention
of the members of his family would often have neglected to take his
daily food.

THE LAW OF GRAVITATION. 491

Wc cannot enter uj^on any detail or present even a snmmary of
the magnificent result of these labors. They are to be found in his
immortal work, the 'Philosophise Naturalis Principia Mathematica/
given to the world in 1687 under the auspices of the Koyal Society.
Of this work, the great Laplace, who, of those who have applied the
highest powers of the human mind to the investigation of the
phenomena of gravitation, stands second only because Newton lived
before him, says: "The universality and generality of the discoveries
it contains, the number of profound and original views respecting the
system of the universe it presents, and all presented with so much
elegance, will insure to it a lasting preeminence over all other pro-
ductions of the human mind." "It is a work," says Sir David Brewster,
''which will be memorable, not in the annals of one science or one
country only, but which will form an epoch in the history of the world,
and will ever be regarded as the brightest page in the records of human
reason. It is a work which would be read with delight in every planet
of our system, and in every system in the universe. There was but one
earth on whose form and movements and tides the philosopher could
exercise his genius; one moon whose perturbations and inequalities
and action he could study ; one sun whose controlling force and appar-
ent motions he could calculate and determine; one system of comets
whose eccentric paths he could explore and rectify; one universe of
stars to whose binary and multiple combinations he could extend the
law of gravity. To have been the chosen sage, summoned to the study
of that earth, these systems and that universe, the favored lawgiver to
worlds unnumbered, the high-priest in the temple of boundless space,
was a privilege that could be granted to but one member of the human
family; and to have executed the task, was an achievement which, in
its magnitude, can be measured only by the infinite in space, and in
the duration of its triumphs by the infinite in time."

492 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

PLANTS AS WATEE-CARRIERS.

By Professor BYRON D. HALSTED,

RUTGERS COLLEGE.

A GIANT redwood, the monarch of the California forests, stands
-^-*- with its stem-tip three hundred and fifty feet above the soiL
From the surface of the millions of tender delicate leaves near the top
of the tree there are exhaled many gallons, perhaps barrels, of water
daily. The force required to make good this loss is, of course, equal to
that needed to raise the water through the three hundred feet or more
of vertical space. It is no wonder that the thoughtful person will
pause as he contemplates this exhibition of force. It makes no noise;
work is being done, but it is not easy to see how.

Let us begin with the soil, as that is the source of the water supply
of plants, and briefly consider its constitution, texture and relations
to the problem of water-carrying. In other words, does soil carry
water and, if so, in what way is it conveyed ? Soil is rock that has been
broken into small pieces in one way or other, a refinement of rock, so
to speak, whether by frost, moving water or chemical action. For our
purpose soils, having many degrees of fineness, may be classified into
coarse, medium and fine. Coarse soil may be compared to masses of
cannon balls touching each other but with large spaces between them,
while the medium soil is similar to peas in piles, and the fine soil is like
clover seed. The chief difference is in the amount of surface exposed
by the particles which go to make up a definite portion of soil.

The next point for us to consider is the capacity of soil for holding
moisture. Thrust the hand into a dish of water and upon removal it
will be wet, except any portion that has been coated with oil or similar
substance. In short, water will leave its own mass and adhere to the
surface of the hand. If the hand held a quantity of clean earth the latter
would likewise become wet. The amount of water that the soil will
hold depends upon the surface exposure of its particles. As this is an
exceedingly important point, permit me, at the risk of dealing largely
in dry figures but for explanation and proof, to draw upon some re-
sults given by Professor King in his charming book 'The Soil.' With
columns of sand ten feet long, the one with the grains averaging in
diameter 186/10,000 inch, after percolating for 111 days, contained
3.77 per cent, of water; the 73/10,000-inch grains retained 4.92 per
cent.; the 61/10,000-inch grains, 5.76 per cent, and the 45/10,000-
inch grains, 7.57 per cent. In other words, the smaller the size of the

PLANTS AS WATER-CARRIERS. 493

grains and the pores the greater the amount of water retained. With
soils of still smaller particles the water-holding power would be cor-
respondingly greater.

If the soils are placed in long upright glass tubes and water is
added at the bottom, it will rise through the soil to the top. This
phenomenon of capillarity is best illustrated with tubes having bores
of varying diameter. The tables given us on this subject are to the
effect that, when an inch tube is plunged into a vessel of water, the
height of the water column in the tube above the general level is .054
inch; for a 1/10-inch bore .545 inch, 1/100-inch bore 5.456 inches and
for a 1/1,000-inch bore, 54.56 inches. While the actual surface pull of
the smallest tube is much less than that of the largest, it is through a
vastly greater distance and by a multiplication of the number of such
minute tubes in a given space that the greater lifting is brought
about.

The soil itself, consisting of minute particles, admits of the capillary
action; for the pores, although not straight, extend in irregular lines
and permit the surface tension that is evident in fine tubes. This
lifting power of minute passageways is abundantly illustrated in the
everyday operations of crop-growing, and the skilful tiller makes
abundant use of it or checks it as best suits his purpose. If a dark soil
contains an abundance of light alkaline salt, it is possible that it may
have a white crust form upon the surface during a drought to be
carried back upon the falling of a substantial rain, and this rise and fall
may be repeated indefinitely as happens on some of our alkaline lands,
where the precipitation is light and vegetation scant.

It has been shown that the soil, on account of its porosity, is able to
lift water through considerable distances, simply through the greater
pull of a solid for the liquid than the liquid has for its own particles.
The hand is wet by the water; a towel hung high with barely one
corner dipping into the basin may become wet throughout, and, by
evaporation, the dish may be pumped dry.

Into this complex physical porous mixture, to the component par-
ticles of which a liquid adheres with such force as to be present when
even the air is dry, the plants establish themselves by means of their
tiny rootlets and the much more minute root hairs which, insinuating
themselves between the microscopic pebbles, become misshapen and con-
torted beyond all recognition of the simple vegetable cells out of which
they have grown. The movements of the water in the soil, whether to
the right or left, up or dovni, are governed, as has been shown, by the
law of surface attraction. When we come to the plant cell, the whole
physical basis is changed, and, among other things, we are brought
face to face with membranes of extreme thinness and delicacy, and,
more than all, with the living protoplasmic film.

494 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The two ends of the microscopic aqueous canals, in plants of the
ordinary sort, are the active imbibing root-hairs, above mentioned, and
the exposed surfaces of the aerial parts, chief of which are the leaves.
The lower terminal is buried beneath the soil from which it receives
its supply, and consists of a sac with a very thin and elastic wall, lined
with a delicate film of living protoplasmic substance. We may imagine
one of these cells many hundred times enlarged, its contents con-
sisting of a thin syrup, but slightly more dense than the liquid in
which it is immersed. As time passes, there is a flow inward of the less
dense liquid and an increase of the wall tension of the cell. This
tension might be observed by pricking the wall, when from the pin-
hole the liquid would spurt for some distance. The same pressure
might aid in the passage of the liquid from the sac to the one next
adjoining, and in that way a flow would be set up from the less to the
more dense cell contents.

A homely and common illustration of this osmosis or membrane
diffusion is seen in the action of sugar upon ripe strawberries, the sugar
taking the thin juice from the cells and making a syrup that flnally
surrounds the berries. Place dried prunes in a dish of warm water,
and a similar exchange is demonstrated, but in this case the flow is
into the dry cell contents, and the prunes finally become plump. There
has been a transportation of liquid in both these instances, and it has
been from one cell to another through the whole necklace, so to say, of
many beads, from the surface to the innermost cell or vice versa, as the
case may be.

Let us ascend a tall tree, figuratively, and study microscopically
the upper terminals of the lines of water-carriers. Here we find the
leaves in great numbers, presenting, possibly, acres of actual visible
surface to tile drying influence of the almost constantly changing air.
But if we note the exceedingly porous structure of a leaf, how one cell
touches its fellows at but few points and the bulk of the space is in-
tercellular, the actual surface exposed to the atmosphere is a hundred
times more than the naked eye reveals. As with the soil terminal, so
here the end of the transportation line divide up into a million parts.
In the former, each is for the reception of liquid; in the latter, they
are all places of unloading. The drying air sweeps over them, and
something of their contents is vaporized and is gone from the plant.
But this evaporation increases the density of the cell contents and were
there no reserve the tissues would wither, dry up and become dead, as
is the case when a branch is cut off or grass is mown in the meadow.

If we apply the law illustrated in the dried prunes, it will be seen
that each surface cell in the loose pulp of the leaf is dependent upon
the next below it, and that, in honoring the draft upon it, is making a
physical call upon another, and so the line is established, like men

PLANTS AS WATER-CARRIERS. 495

passing buckets at a fire, or tossing melons in the loading of a schooner
for a northern market.

The whole story of water-carrying is not ended with the above.
One of the most delicate of all plant mechanisms is that which is
associated with the transportation of its liquids. The leaves and
green surfaces generally are closely studded with minute structures,
100,000 or more to a square inch, that open or close as the emergencies
of the case demand. They are vitalized and exceedingly sensitive
valves, usually constructed of two crescent-shaped cells set in the skin
and highly charged with protoplasm. These organs are influenced by
sunlight and darkness, by heat and cold; in fact, their functioning
calls forth the admiration of any careful student of the subject. The
two guard cells are so hung that they become turgid when the leaf is
well filled with water, and thus enlarge the opening to its full capacity
for the passage of vapor-laden gases. As soon as these guard cells
lose much water, they become less plump, and this brings about the
closing of the pore. They are, therefore, valves of safety, and, as the
other portions of the leaf are covered with a cuticle more or less im-
pervious to gases, it is seen that the stomates are the organs that regu-
late the evaporation stream.

That the amount of water carried is very great scarcely needs
to be emphasized. Kote the rapidity with which grass wilts when cut
for hay or the leaves upon a branch that has received any injury. If
a melon vine with twelve leaves will carry a liter of water in a single
day, as it has been known to do, what must be the vastness of the lift
in a forest of a thousand acres upon a dry day when the leaves are
fresh and most active !

That it needs to be great is seen from the requirements of the plant.
The soil water is weak in all salts that a plant must acquire, and to
take them in concentrated form would be as poison. The whole plan,
therefore, is to carry large quantities of a dilute solution, and after-
wards bring it to the required strength. In the evaporation there is
a cooling obtained that may possibly save the plant from destruction.

We thus far have seen that an ordinary plant has its slender,
delicate, insinuating root-hairs closely applied to the soil particles from
which they imbibe the adhering moisture. It has further been shown
that the opposite terminal of the waterways has also a vast number
of delicate living cells exposed, not dangerously, to the drying action
of the atmosphere. Between these two extremities is the body of the
tree, the main roots and branches, and it is for us to determine through
what parts the upward flow takes place. This admits of demonstration
by the removal of certain portions and observing the effects. That it
does not take place through the central or heart wood is to be expected,
for the cells here are often all filled up with lignin and coloring

496 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

matter, and the way is blocked ; the canal is filled with debris, so to say,
and has become disused. Again, the old central wood frequently decays
until there is only the outer ring of the later-formed wood remaining
with the bark that covers it. That the bark is not the water-carrier
may be shown by removing a ring of it and thus breaking the con-
nection without interrupting the upward flow. That it does pass
through the young wood may be shown by cutting this portion without
harming materially the bark or the heart wood, when the leaves quickly
wither and the tree may die. In short, the sap-wood is well named, as
through it the soil-water mounts upward from the roots to the leaves.

In many plants, however, there is no well-developed ring of wood.
Either the stem is too young to have one or its construction such
that it never appears. However, the same kind of tissue is somewhere
to be found in the stem, usually in strands or portions of tough
threads, as in the corn-stalk, and through these the crude sap is trans-
ported. Some of these succulent stems are so transparent that they
admit of experiments which demonstrate both the path and the rate of
the upward flow. For example, a balsam stem may be cut and, while
fresh, plunged into a harmless colored liquid, as that of some aniline
dye. It is found that the woody bundles are the flrst to take the stain
and that it mounts upward with a rate that is an index of the flow of
sap and may be some feet in a single hour. Another test for the rate is
found in the use of a harmless salt, easily detected in extremely minute
quantities by the spectroscope. Let it be lithium nitrate, for example,
and its rise discovered by making sections of the stem at different dis-
tances and burning small fragments.

But having determined the place of entrance, line of ascent and
point of departure of the aqueous stream, it by no means follows that
all the forces have been named that bring about the transfer. That
living plants carry water and make it one of the chief labors of all
their active days is beyond question, but physicists and physiologists,
chemists and biologists are as one concerning the mystery tliat here
exists. A grape-vine stump bleeding in early spring is a stumbling
block for them all, and they fall back upon 'root pressure,' a term more
convenient for covering much ignorance than for service as a full,
well-rounded explanation of the phenomena in question. Membrane
diffusion will account for much, capillary attraction helps considerabl}'-,
and the differences of gas pressure within and without the cells, as in
ihe tapped sugar maple in early spring, count for something ; but back
of all is a vital force that has not been reduced to a physical or chemical
basis.

SOLUBLE FERMENTS OR ENZYMES. 497

THE SOLUBLE FEEMENTS OK ENZYMES.*

By Professor EDWIN O. JORDAN,

UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO.

IT has been said somewhat sententiously that the advance of science
consists simply in a change of problems; we achieve progress
when we substitute for one problem another at once more delicate and
more precise. The recent history of the theory of alcoholic fermenta-
tion furnishes a conspicuous illustration of this aphorism. Liebig's
ingenious conception concerning the breaking-down of the sugar mole-
cule by the decomposing albuminous compounds in dead and dying
yeast cells — his notion being that the sugar is toppled over, so to speak,
by the mechanical shock of other falling molecules — was forced to
yield to Pasteur's apparently clear demonstration of the part played
under natural conditions by the living yeast cell. More recently the
conception of the living cell as the essential feature of the process has
been dethroned in its turn, and alcoholic fermentation is now shown to
rest on the action of an ^unorganized,' 'lifeless,' or 'soluble' ferment or
enzyme, secreted by the yeast plant. Further, the action of this enzyme
and of other and more familiar 'unorganized' ferments has been
brought into line with some of the most characteristic activities of the
living cell, and many general life phenomena have been shown to be in
reality phenomena of fermentation.

The consequent focusing of attention upon the enz}Tnes, their
nature, mode of action and chemical relations, has already been prolific
in results of great biological interest. The science of experimental
medicine, in particular, is discovering that many of the problems
relating to immunity, to toxins, antitoxins and agglutinating sub-
stances are closely connected with the problems of fermentation and
the enzymes.

So far as is known, the peculiar substances called enzymes are pro-
duced only by the living cells of animals and plants, although there
are certain inorganic substances that so closely reproduce the essential
qualities of enzyme action that they might almost be termed 'inorganic
enzymes.' The enzymes obtained from the animal or plant cell have

* The Soluile Ferments and Fermentation. J. Reynolds Green. Cambridge
University Press, 1899.
Masson, Paris, 1899.

Trait4 de microiiologie, II., diastases, toxines et venins. E. Duclaux.

Les enzymes et leurs applications. J. Effront. Carre et Naud, Paris, 1899.

VOL. Lix. — 35

498 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

never been isolated in a pure condition, and hence no definite knowl-
edge of their chemical composition and constitution has yet been
secured. In general, enzymes are precipitated by alcohol from the
watery extract of plant or animal tissue, but such a precipitate con-
tains the enzyme inextricably mingled with other chemical compounds,
and all attempts to separate out a pure enzyme have thus far signally
failed. The whole field of enzyme study is therefore at present beset
with the same sort of difficulties that the science of bacteriology en-
countered before the days of 'pure cultures,' and it is doubtless true that
effects that are at the present time ascribed to individual enzymes are
in reality caused by mixtures of distinct varieties.

The different kinds of enzymes are at present chiefly distinguished
through the differences in the changes that they produce in other sub-
stances. The enzymes that act upon starchy substances, for instance,
may be conveniently grouped together; those that disintegrate
albuminous compounds may be similarly treated, and so on.

Enzymes converting starchy substances into sugar. The longest
known and perhaps most thoroughly studied enzyme is a representative
of the group that transforms insoluble carbohydrate substances into
soluble ones. Amylase, or diastase, is the well-known enzyme that
accomplishes the conversion of the starch of the barley-grain into
sugar in the process of malting. The action of the enzyme in
this process appears to be quite elaborate since the complex
starch molecule passes through several stages during its conver-
sion into sugar, the hardly less complex substances known as
'erythrodextrins' and 'achroodextrins' being formed on the way.
The theory has been advanced that the starch molecule breaks down by
the taking on of successive molecules of water and by subsequent de-
compositions, sugar (maltose) being formed at each splitting, together
with a dextrin of lower molecular weight. Duclaux, however, main-
tains the existence of two enzymes in malt, one, a liquefying or de-
coagulating enzyme to which he would restrict the name amylase, and
which converts the insoluble starch into the soluble dextrins, and a
second (dextrinase), which has a saccharifying power and converts the
dextrins into sugar. Other enzymes that may be placed in the same
group with amylase are inulase and cytase. Inulase converts into fruit
sugar a reserve food-substance found in many plants and known as
inulin. Inulin is allied to starch in its chemical composition, and
probably breaks down by successive stages under the action of inulase
just as starch does under the influence of amylase. Another form of
reserve food-substance stored up by many plants is the familiar sub-
stance comprising the cell-wall of most plants and known as cellulose.
This substance, like inulin and starch, can be changed into a more
directly utilizable substance by the action of cytase, an enzyme found

SOLUBLE FERMENTS OR ENZYMES. 499

in many plant cells. The produets of the activity of cytase have as yet
been imperfectly studied, and it is possible that several different
enzymes, corresponding to the different kinds of cellulose, are at
present included under this name. Cytase may be useful in various
ways to the organisms secreting it. Some parasitic fungi are able to
attack and penetrate the cell-walls of the host-plant by virtue of the
dissolving power of the cytase secreted in the tip of the growing hypha3.
Enzymes acting upon sugars. Another group of enzymes is con-
cerned with the conversion of the higher sugars or polysaccharides
into the lower. The classic instance is the so-called 'inversion' of
cane-sugar or sucrose into equal parts of grape-sugar and fruit-sugar,
according to the equation :

sucrose or dextrose or levulose or

cane-sugar. ' grape-sugar, fruit-sugar.

A solution of cane-sugar turns a ray of polarized light to the right,
but the mixture of dextrose and levulose, owing to the superior Isevo-
rotatory power of levulose, turns the ray to the left, whence the term
'inversion' as applied to this process. The enzyme that is able to pro-
duce the inversion of cane-sugar was discovered by Berthelot in 1860.
Sucrase, or invertase, is found in many yeasts and other fungi, in
pollen-grains, in the beet-root, and to a slight extent in some animal
secretions. Cane-sugar is not directly assimilable by the animal body,
and if injected into a vein is excreted almost unchanged. The inver-
sion which occurs in the intestine when the cane-sugar is taken into the
body by way of the alimentary tract seems to be a necessary prelimi-
nary to the utilization of this sugar as a food substance.

The same is true to a certain extent of maltose, which is a sugar
of the same percentage composition as sucrose, but with a different ar-
rangement of the atoms within the molecule. Maltose is split up by
the action of the enzyme maltase into two molecules of dextrose. Mal-
tose, like sucrose, is only with difficulty assimilable, and its conversion
into dextrose constitutes an important phase of carbohydrate nutrition.
Maltase, like sucrase, is a widely distributed enzyme and is found in
many animal and plant tissues.

The action of maltase upon maltose presents a significant example
of what chemists call a 'balanced' action. When a certain proportion
of maltose has been converted into dextrose, the action of the maltase
ceases, and if now an excess of dextrose be added the action of the
enz}Tne is reversed, and a certain proportion of the dextrose is con-
verted back into maltose until a new equilibrium be reached. This re-
versibility of action has been thought to indicate that the action of
maltase falls in line with other chemical reactions and is not essentially
different from that evinced by many well-studied inorganic substances.

500 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Together with sucrase and maltase may be grouped other euzyiaes
that split up the higher sugars into those of lower molecular weight,
such as lactase which converts lactose or milk-sugar into dextrose
and galactose, trelialase which splits up trehalose, a sugar obtained
from Syrian manna, into two molecules of dextrose, and raffinase and
melizitase which act upon certain of the higher polysaccharides.

Coagulating enzymes. The gTOup of clotting or coagulating
enzymes includes two comparatively well-known enzymes, rennet and
plasmase or fibrin ferment. The use of rennet in setting curd for
cheese and in preparing the delicate dessert known as junket is gen-
erally familiar. The source of most of the commercial rennet is the
extract of the mucous membrane of the stomach of the calf ; this enzyme
is found also in many other young mammals during the period of lac-
tation. Eennet has been obtained likewise from several vegetable
sources; parts of the plant Galium are used in the country districts of
England to aid in the formation of curd in cheese-making, and the
peasants of the Italian Alps use the leaves of the butterwort {Pin-
guicula) for a similar purpose. The curdling or precipitation of the
casein by rennet is singularly dependent upon the presence of salts of
lime. A very minute quantity of rennet in the presence of calcium
salts will curdle a prodigious quantity of casein. It is in fact uncer-
tain whether rennet can act at all in the entire absence of calcium. In
the presence of calcium the potency of rennet ranks higher than that of
any other enzyme yet studied, one part of rennet being able to
coagulate more than 250,000 times its own weight of casein.

The phenomenon of the clotting of blood is dependent upon a
variety of factors as yet imperfectly understood. That the fibrin or
solid portion of the clot is separated out from the blood plasma by the
action of an enzyme is, however, solidly established. The character and
mode of action of this enzyme — termed plasmase, or fibrin ferment —
are still quite obscure, although the fact that in mammalian blood the
enzyme originates from the leucocytes, or white blood corpuscles, seems
to be generally admitted. In birds the enzyme exists in the cells of
the tissues and not in the blood corpuscles. The blood of all verte-
brates with nucleated red corpuscles presents a marked resistance to
spontaneous coagulation; clotting, on the contrary, is almost imme-
diate among the mammals, which possess enucleated red corpuscles.
As is the case with rennet, calcium salts favor coagulation; their
presence seems, however, not to be necessary.

Other clotting phenomena have been shown to be due to enzyme
action. The formation of jelly from the juices of various fruits and
berries is due to the gelatinizing or coagulating effect of an enzyme,
pectase, which acts upon pectose, a carbohydrate allied to cellulose and
occurring in many fruits and vegetables.

SOLUBLE FERMENTS OR ENZYMES. 501

The various phenomena of clotting and gelatinizing belong in the
debatable border land between physics and chemistry. Duclaux has
given in his treatise a clear exposition of his reasons for believing that
the changes involved in the various processes of coagiilation are due to
a disturbance of the physical equilibrium of the substances in solution
rather than to any chemical reaction.

Enzymes acting upon proteid substances. One of the most im-
portant groups of enzjTues is that of the proteolytic enzymes,
characterized by their property of breaking down albuminous
or proteid compounds into simpler ones. Owing to the promi-
nent role they play in the human body in connection with
digestive processes they have been subjected to exhaustive study. Two
chief groups are recognized, the peptic enzymes, of which pepsin, the
enzjTne of the gastric juice, is the type, and the tryptic enzymes, the
best known of which is the trypsin secreted by the mammalian pan-
creas. The peptic enzymes are almost unique among known enzymes,
inasmuch as they can act only in an acid medium; they are further
characterized by their inability to carry the decomposition of proteid
substances beyond the 'peptone' stage. The tryptic enzymes, on the
other hand, are most potent in a slightly alkaline medium, and they
are able to push proteid decomposition to a point beyond that reached
by the pentic enzymes. Two of the most characteristic end-products of
tryptic digestion are the substances leucin and tryosin which, like
urea, are not assimilable by the tissues and are eliminated from the
body. Several tryptic enzymes of vegetable origin are known, among
which hromelin from the juice of the pineapple and papain from the
fruit of the papaw-tree have been thoroughly studied. It is probable
that the digestive enzyme secreted by insectivorous plants belongs to
the tryptic class.

An interesting tryptic enzyme has been recently discovered in fresh
milk by Professors Babcock and Eussell. This enzyme, called galactase
by its discoverers, acts upon the proteids in milk and plays a most im-
portant part in the manufacture of cheese; it is probably responsible
for many of the phenomena of cheese-ripening that were formerly
ascribed to bacteria.

Owing to the great chemical complexity of proteid substances and
to the fact that little is known about their chemical constitution, the
study of proteolytic enzymes is hampered by difficulties of an especially
serious nature. Since neither the initial composition of the proteid
compound nor the substances to which it gives rise on decomposition
can be accurately determined, the distinction of different kinds of
proteolytic enzymes is attended with greater difficulty than is ex-
perienced in the case of enzymes that attack chemical compounds so
comparatively well understood as the sugars.

502 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The alcoholic enzyme. The enzyme that converts sugar into alcohol
and carbon dioxide has been only recently discovered, although it has
been diligently sought for since the time of Pasteur. The discovery
of Buchner in 1896 that, by applying great pressure to a mass of yeast
cells, an enzyme, which he named zymase, could be extracted gave in
fact a new impulse to all enzyme study. Zymase appears to dislocate
the sugar molecule according to the classic formula :

CaHi^Oe — 2C2H5OH + 2CO2
dextrose alcohol carbon dioxide

180 gr. 92 gr. 88 gr.

The explanation of the prolonged failure of investigators to dis-
cover zymase lies in the fact that this enzyme is closely associated with
the substance of the living yeast cell and does not diffuse out into the
surrounding medium as does another common yeast enz}T2ie already
mentioned under the name of invert-ferment or sucrase. In solution,
zTma&e quickly loses its strength, probably partly because of oxidation,
partly because of the destructive action of the tryptic enzymes of yeast.
Zymase is able to convert a number of different sugars into alcohol and
carbon dioxide: maltose and sucrose are readily fermentable, galactose
much less readily and lactose not at all. Glycogen can be slowly fer-
mented by zymase, but is not fermented by the living yeast cell because
it can not pass through the cell-membrane into the cell and zymase
can not pass out. The brilliant researches of Emil Fischer upon the
relation of the configuration of the eugar molecule to its f ermentability
have demonstrated how delicate is the relation obtaining between the
structure of the sugar molecule and the enzyme that attacks it. A
slight rearrangement in the position of the atoms within the molecule,
the actual number of atoms remaining all the while the same, is suffi-
cient to determine whether a sugar can be fermented or not. Only in
those cases where the geometrical build of the enzyme conforms to that
of the sugar molecule can fermentation occur. To use Fischer's meta-
phor, the enzyme must fit the substance it attacks as closely as the right
key fits the wards of the lock that it opens.

Other enzymes. A few other important enzymes can be but briefly
mentioned, since the limits of this review do not permit of a fuller con-
sideration. A group of enzymes of which emulsin is the type may be
classed as the glucoside-splitting enzymes. These ferments are able to
split up glucosides — which may be described as compounds of glucose
(or some other sugar) with an alcohol, ether, aldehyde, or similar
body — into glucose and the aldehyde or other associated compound.
Emulsin is found in many plant tissues, but it is doubtful if it occurs
in any animal body. The physiological role of emulsin is not wholly
understood ; it is possible that the glucose formed by the enzyme action
is useful in the nutrition of the plant, or it may be true that the toxic

SOLUBLE FERMENTS OR ENZYMES. 503

or bitter principle also split off has a protective value and prevents
injury to the plant by animals. Besides emulsin, a few other glucoside-
splitting enzymes are known.

Lipase, a fat-splitting enzyme; laccase, an oxidizing enzyme con-
cerned in the production of the famous black varnish used in lacquer
work; and urease, an enzyme that converts urea into ammonium car-
bonate, are among the other better-known enzymes.

There is reason to believe also that the various anti-microbic sub-
stances found in the bodies of some artificially immunized and some
naturally immune animals are to be regarded as enzymes, as is like-
wise the substance that is found in the blood of typhoid patients and
that has a 'clumping' or 'agglutinating' action upon the typhoid bacilli.
Eesearch in this direction has not, however, proceeded far enough to
enable us to offer anything more than a conjecture as to the real char-
acter of the 'agglutinines' and lysines.'

The precise mode of action of enzymes has been the theme of
much speculation. Perhaps the simplest and most natural view of
some cases is to suppose that the enzyme combines first, for example,
with a molecule of water, and then attaches itself to the body upon
which it acts. This new compound, meeting with another molecule of
the same substance, is then decomposed into the body which the enzyme
produces and the enzyme itself. The enzyme thus acts as a simple
intermediary, bringing the molecule of water or oxygen in closer contact
with the fermentable substance. This view has certain arguments in its
favor, as for instance the fact that the enzyme does not exhaust itself in
the course of the changes that it produces. If it is unceasingly decom-
posed and reconstituted the reason for this is clear.

Such an explanation, however, is hardly valid for the action of
zymase upon sugar and for the reversible action of maltase. Now
there are certain facts regarding the action of mineral acids upon
sugars and proteids, of various salts upon the phenomena of clotting
and oxidation and of other changes brought about by inorganic
substances which render it difficult to set enzyme action apart as a'
thing by itself. The action of an enzyme is essentially 'catalytic,'
that is, it is able to exert an influence wholly out of proportion to its
quantity, and itself remain unaltered at the end of the process. It has
been pointed out that the influence of an enzyme or indeed any catalytic
agent is simply to retard or accelerate changes which ordinarily take
place more slowly or more rapidly. In other words, an enzyme simply
influences the rate of change, not the final condition of the substance
upon which it acts. The nature of the change, the final state of chemi-
cal equilibrium, is determined by the chemical forces within the sub-
stance itself, the speed at which the change occurs is determined
by the enzyme.

504

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

DISCUSSION AND COERESPONDENCE.

GEOLOGY AND THE DELUGE
AGAIN.

To the Editor: — The August number
of The Popular Science Monthly
contains a letter signed 'X. Plain'
which asks Prof. G. Frederick Wright
certain questions in regard to his re-
cent article in 'McClure's Magazine' en-
titled 'Geology and the Deluge.' Is
this quite a fair procedure on the part
of X. Plain? He knows that Prof.
Wright holds the chair of the harmony
of science and religion in Oberlin Col-
lege, and that he is filling the position
in a manner satisfactory to his constit-
uents. Then is it fair, I ask, for X.
Plain, whoever he may be, to stand be-
hind the door and, thus protected by an
assumed name, take Professor Wright
to task for doing his legitimate busi-
ness in an acceptable, even masterly
manner? X. Plain evidently does not
dare to say what he thinks upon bibli-
cal matters. Nobody in this country
does. Ingersoll said a few things, and
I have heard good Christians say that
he should have been burnt alive for
saying them. Other very good Chris-
tians whom I know will not permit his
works in their homes. Elbert Hubbard
rather pvits a damper upon the sup-
posed harmony of science and biblical
history by saying a few things every
little while. Ingersoll was not afraid,

and Hubbard is not afraid, but the rest
of us are, X. Plain included. We do
not dare to put in words our estimate
of the Bible if we wish to retain our
positions, either professionally or
socially. The professor of biology to-
day must teach evolution. The tide of
evidence is so overpowering that he is
carried nolens volens along with it.
The church has been forced to accept
the 'theory' of evolution. It has 'har-
monized' apparent discrepancies, and
has comforted trembling souls as
mothers do their little ones: "There,
there, there, Evolution shall not hurt
you." But a professor of any one of
the natural sciences is obliged to be a
very juggler with words, in order to
teach the truths of evolution to those
who are able to comprehend them, and
at the same time not disturb the faith
of those who wish to keep intact the
religion, or rather theology, which they
have inherited. Because of that im-
perative law of evolution, self-preserva-
tion, we must earn our bread and but-
ter. Therefore the myths of Genesis
are 'reconciled' with science. Hence we
fall meekly into line, and, as we dare
not express our thoughts freely, we
maintain a careful silence. In melan-
choly proof of which, I too must use
the shield of anonymity.

Y. Obscxiee.

SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE.

505

SCIENTIFIC LITEEATUEE.

a:sitarctica.

The great national antarctic expedi-
tions of Great Britain and Germany
are now on their way to the southern
hemisphere, the Discovery having set
sail from Cowes on August 6, and the
Gauss from Kiel on August 11. Those
who wish to follow intelligently the re-
sults of the explorations of the next
three years will want to know what has
been already accomplished, and there
are fortunately two books giving the
necessary information. A little while
since, The Macmillan Company pub-
lished in America a translation by Mr.
A. Sonnenschein of Dr. Karl Fricker's
excellent work on the 'Antarctic
Regions.' With true German thorough-
ness, he begins with the conjectures of
Aristotle and follows the history of
discovery to the recent expeditions.
The book is elaborately illustrated with
maps and photographs. Still more im-
portant is the 'Antarctic Manual' pre-
pared for the use of the British ex-
pedition. Under the auspices of the
Royal Geographical Society and
through the initiative of Sir Clements
Markham, Dr. George Murray, the
director of the civilian scientific staff,
has compiled a volume of 600 pages,
giving information likely to be of use
in the conduct of the expedition. The
contributors are the most eminent Brit-
ish men of science. Lord Kelvin
writes on atmospheric electricity and
Professor Schuster on the aurora; Pro-
fessor Darwin on tidal observations
and Professor Glazebrook on the
pendulum. The contributors on the
natural sciences include Professors Bon-

ney and Gregory, and Messrs. Lydek-
ker, Boulenger, Fletcher and Murray.
Then a number of older articles are re-
printed, the 'Narrative' of Charles
Wilkes, the 'Journal' of Dumont
d'Urville, etc. The work has been pre-
pared for the officers of the expedition,
but a limited edition will be sold to
the public through Mr. John Murray.

INVENTIONS.
'Twentieth Century Inventions;
A Forecast,' by George Sunderland
(Longmans, Green & Company) is a
readable, sober and profitable book
which is entirely free from the exag-
gerations which mark most efforts in
this direction. The author takes the
ground that the germs of future inven-
tions are already formed and that
future progress is but the evolution of
present tendencies. Thus he develops
a new form of steam engine from the
principles of the construction of the
aneroid barometer, a new form of
railroad from the rope cableway, and
a new method of typesetting from the
linotype machine. It is a curious fact
that some of his proposed methods
have not only been invented, but
actually used in this country; for in-
stance, the inclined movable staircase,
electric motors for house elevators,
electric heating, and the generation of
power by wave action have already
been shown to be possible if not fea-
sible economically. The author is sound
in his general ideas of evolution, but it
may be possible that the century will
witness inventions which he and we
cannot imagine.

5o6

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE PEOCtEESS OF SCIENCE.

THE DENVER MEETING OF THE
AMERICAN ASSOCIATION.

The chief scientific event of August
is the annual meeting of the American
Association for the Advancement of
Science, and the present meeting is of
more than usual significance. It is
doubtless a mere coincidence that the
fiftieth meeting of the Association and
the first meeting of the twentieth cen-
tury should be the first to be held in
the western states. The meeting itself
is, however, nearly as important an
event for science in the west as was
the original foundation of the Asso-
ciation for science in the east. It
means that the scientific men of the
western states have now become suffi-
ciently numerous and influential to
meet on terms of equality with those
of the east. The development of
scientific work in the central and
western states during the past ten
years has perhaps never been rivaled
in the history of ci\'ilization. Of the
twelve American universities having in
their faculties the largest number of
scientific men, seven are in this
region — Chicago, California, Michigan,
Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois and
Stanford. Each of these universities
has on its faculties twenty-five or more
scientific men, apart from medicine
and engineering, and other institutions
— Nebraska, Kansas, jMissouri, Iowa,
Indiana, Texas, Washington and more
— will soon be of the same rank. With
a prejudice that is not unreasonable,
we assume that the scientific intelli-
gence of the country may be measured
by the percentage of people that sub-
scribe to this journal. Massachusetts
would, by this criterion, stand first,
but Colorado would have twice the in-
telligence of New Jersey, California

nearly three times the intelligence of
Pennsylvania and Arizona ten times
the intelligence of Maryland. During
the past ten years the population of
the western half of the country has not
increased appreciably more rapidly
than that of the eastern half, but its
educational and scientific development
has been truly marvelous.

The meeting of the American Asso-
ciation at Denver, midway between
Chicago and the Pacific coast, will be
largely attended by those scientific men
for whom it is the geographical cen-
ter, and the excursion to Colorado is
so attractive that the eastern states
are certain to be well represented. The
council holds a preliminary meeting on
August 24, but the meeting really
opens on the twenty-sixth. In the
morning there is the usual formal wel-
come by the governor of the state, the
mayor of the city and other officers,
and the presidency is transferred by
Professor Woodward, of Columbia, to
Professor Minot, of Harvard. On
Monday afternoon the addresses of the
vice-presidents are delivered, and on
Tuesday the retiring president gives
Ms address, the subject being 'The
Progress of Science.' During the week
the Association meets in nine sections,
and more or less closely affiliated with
them are the meetings of nine special
societies. The usual entertainments
are offered by the citizens of Denver,
and excursions of more than usual
interest are planned to precede and fol-
low the meeting. The geology, paleon-
tology, flora, archeology and mining re-
sources of the region are of peculiar
interest to scientific men, and the
scenic beauty of the state and of the
surrounding states is known through-
out the world.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

507

The Association is this year particu-
larly fortunate in its retiring and in
its incoming presidents. Other emi-
nent men have presided over the Asso-
ciation, but perhaps not before have
they united scientific eminence with
such great services to the Association
and the organization of science in
America. Those who have heard or
read the presidential addresses which
Professor Woodward gave last year be-
fore the American Mathematical So-
ciety and before the New York Acad-
emy of Sciences will look forward
with great interest to the Denver ad-
dress, which we hope to publish in the
next issue of this journal. Professor
Minot, the incoming president of the
Association — whose portrait is given as
frontispiece — is known here and
abroad for his important contributions
to embryology, physiology, animal
morphology and zoology. As a boy
Minot collected insects, and his earliest
publications were on entomological
topics. Graduating at the age of
twenty from the Massachusetts insti-
tute of Technology in 1872, he could at
that time find in America no good op-
portunity to carry on advanced studies
and consequently went abroad and
spent three years in Germany and
France. He was given the S.D. by Har-
vard in 1878 and appointed lecturer
in the medical school in 1880, being
promoted to an assistant professorship
in 1887 and to the full professorship
of histology and embryology in 1892.
At first Minot's work was chiefly
physiological — while a student under
Ludwig at Leipzig he published an
article shovping that muscles can main-
tain their contraction without forming
carbonic acid — and in the direction of
experimental biology, his investiga-
tions covering topics such as growth,
heredity and the differentiation of
tissues. This work led to two impor-
tant laws, namely, that, aside from
minor fluctuations, the power of
growth diminishes from birth onwards,
there being really in animals no period

of development as opposed to decline;
and that the decline in the rate of
growth is correlated with the increase
and differentiation of the protoplasm
of the cells. Another field of early
study was the structure of worms.
Here his most important result was the
demonstration that the Nemertean
worms, which had always been classed
with the Plathelminths, form a dis-
tinct class. The microscopic anatomy
of insects and vertebrates was the sub-
ject of a number of investigations,
among them an extended essay on the
histology of the locust, which con-
tains many new observations on insect
anatomy.

Owing to the claims of his professor-
ship, strictly embryological work has
steadily grown more predominant dur-
ing the last twenty years. His first
important embryological paper was a
comparative study of the uterus and
placenta, being the first comprehensive
account of the microscopic anatomy of
the human uterus during pregnancy,
and containing many additions to
knowledge. During recent years his
vsrritings — which in all number over
one hundred and fifty titles — have
chiefly presented the results of various
embryological investigations. The book
on 'Human Embryology,' first pub-
lished in 1892, is a standard work here
and in Europe.

As has been indicated, Professor
Minot, while making these important
contributions to science and conducting
a department in a great medical
school, has found time to take a lead-
ing part in what may be called the or-
ganization of science. He has written
admirable articles and addresses of a
general character, published in this and
in other journals; he has by his pub-
lications and personal efforts done
much to advance medical education and
to unite it with biological research;
he has accomplished much for bibliog-
raphy, for the building and equip-
ment of laboratories and in other di-
rections. Following the suggestion of

5o8

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Professor Hyatt, he founded the Amer-
ican Society of Naturalists and has
been its president; he was one of the
active founders of the Marine Biolog-
ical Laboratory at Wood's Holl, and it
was chiefly through his exertions that
the American Society for Physical Re-
search was started. He has been presi-
dent of the American Morphological
Society, and since 1897 president of
the Boston Society of Natural History.
He is, of course, a member of the Na-
tional Academy and of many other
scientific societies. In 1885 he was
general secretary of the American As-
sociation and in 1890 vice-president for
the section of biology. The Associa-
tion is fortunate when the country pro-
duces for its presidents such men as
Professors Woodward and Minot.

TEE BRITISH CO^SIGRESS ON
TUBERCULOSIS.

The recent congress in London was
as much an institution for public edu-
cation as a scientific meeting. As a
rule people do not profit greatly by
learning about the diseases to which
they are subject, but consumption is
an exception. This disease is still re-
garded by many as hereditary and in-
curable; its existence is consequently
ignored and concealed, and becomes a
source of danger to others. But con-
sumption is a curable and especially a
preventable disease. Post-mortem ex-
aminations of those dying by accident
show that about one-half of all people
living in cities have had tuberculosis of
the lungs, usually of course without
knowing it. The disease has been
cured without precautions and under
unhygienic conditions. WTien detected
in time, tuberculosis is not only cur-
able, but is one of the most easily cured
of chronic diseases. It has been de-
creased by one-half in Great Britain by
improved sanitary conditions; it has
within a few years been decreased by
one-third in New York City as the re-
sult of municipal control. The disease
is chiefly spread by the tubercle germs

in the sputum carelessly scattered
abroad, and chiefly favored by general
insanitary conditions. It is conse-
quently a matter of great concern, both
to those who sufl"er from consumption
and to those brought in contact with
them, — and practically every one be-
longs to one of these clases — that the
public should be educated to understand
and support the measures required to
combat the most terrible of all diseases.
If the congress in London accom-
plished more for the education of the
laity than for the increase of knowl-
edge, this is not to be regretted. The
reception of foreign delegates, their
presentation to the king and elaborate
entertainment, led to the wide report-
ing of the proceedings in the press, and
many of the papers were intended for
the general public rather than for the
specialist. Professor Koch's admirable
address, which is published in this
issue of the Monthlt, can be read
with interest and profit by any one,
though it contains the announcement
of important scientific research. Pro-
fessor Koch's claim that the bovine
tubercle cannot develop in the human
body naturally attracted much atten-
tion, as it is obviously a matter of
great practical importance. Lord Kel-
vin, Professor Virchow and other
authorities, however, do not regard
Professor Koch's experiments and ob-
servations as conclusive. Attention
does not seem to have been called at the
congress to the important experiments
of Dr. Theobald Smith, of Harvard
University, published some three years
ago in 'The Journal of Experimental
Medicine.' These demonstrate the dif-
ference between the human and bo\ane
tubercle bacilli.

TEE RECENT COMET.
The first brilliant comet of the cen-
tury has come and gone. Although at
one time so bright that it was visible
in daylight, it was seen by few persons
and at but two northern observatories.
It was discovered, April 24, by Mr.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

509

Halls, of Queenstown, Cape Colony,
and was later, but independently, dis-
covered at the Peruvian Station of the
Harvard Observatory and elsewhere.
Its path lay about 20° south of the
sun, so that it was especially well
situated for observers in the southern
hemisphere. It seems remarkable that
so bright a comet could escape more
general attention. Bad weather and
its southern position in part account
for this, but the chief reason is asso-
ciated with the path of the comet, and
the position in which the earth chanced
to be at the time. From the inter-
stellar spaces the comet swept into the
solar system on the opposite side of the
sun from the earth. On this account,
doubtless, it was not seen imtil it had
already passed perihelion. At that
time it w^as visible in the morning. A
week later it was seen in the evening
sky. At one time, except for the in-
clination of the plane of its orbit to
that of the earth, it was moving di-
rectly towards us, but, swung about by
the sun's attraction, it passed between
that luminary and the earth. By the
middle of May the comet and the earth
were moving in nearly opposite direc-
tions. For a large part of the time
during which the comet was under
observation, it was visible only in
strong twilight. About May 5 its posi-
tion was more favorable, and it was a
splendid object. It has now passed out
of sight. The comet is described by
Mr. Innis, of the Cape Observatory,
when first seen, as of a deep yellow
color. The nucleus was condensed, and
of about the same brightness as Mer-
cury. It had a tail about 10° long,
but no coma, or 'hair.' As soon as the
comet had emerged from the evening
twilight, early in May, its most unique
feature became apparent. This was a
faint secondary tail, which preceded
the comet, as it left the sim, at an
angle of about 40° from the primary
tail, which had become double. The
main tail at this time, according to
Mr. Lunt, was about 7° long, while the

faint one was three times as long, or
about 25°. Between these two were
also two other very faint tails. At no
time did the comet approach very near
to the sun, or to the earth. Good
photographs of it were obtained at the
I'oyal Observatory, Cape of Good Hope,
and at the Harvard Station in Peru.
This adds one more brief but interest-
ing chapter to the history of comets;
but in spite of their frequent appear-
ance and the attention which they re-
ceive, comets still remain, in many re-
spects, one of the unsolved astronom-
ical puzzels.

VITRIFIED SILICA.
One of the most promising of recent
developments in connection with chem-
ical and physical apparatus has been
the discovery of practicable methods of
working vitrified quartz. With all the
serviceability of glass and porcelain,
there is a real need for some plastic
material, more infusible, more in-
soluble, more fully transparent, more
elastic, and more stable under changes
of temperature than glass. These needs
would be supplied by quartz, were it
not for the great difficulty of working
it. When touched with the flame, quartz
splinters so badly as to be almost un-
workable, though in time past a few
have used it for small objects, and some
ten years ago Professor Boys intro-
duced the use of quartz fibres, which
have found several important applica-
tions in the physical laboratory. To
Professor W. A. Shenstone, however,
belongs the credit of having rendered
practicable the working of quartz into
more or less complicated apparatus.
The most important step in his process
is the preparation of a non-splintering
silica, which he accomplishes by heat-
ing quartz in small pieces to a tem-
perature of about 1,000°C. and then
throwing it into cold water. The white,
enamel-like mass obtained can then be
subjected to any changes of tempera-
ture vrithout splintering. It is worked
in the hottest possible oxy-hydrogen

5IO

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

flame, becoming plastic enough for
manipulation only above the melting
point of platinum. In preparing tubes
the first step is a rod, which is made by
fusing small pieces of silica together,
one after another. This rough rod is
then re-heated and drawn out into finer
rods about a millimeter in diameter.
These rods are then bound around a
thick platinum wire and heated till
they adhere to each other forming a
tube which can then be drawn out and
worked much as a tube of glass. By
blowing a small bulb on the end of the
tube, surrounding it with a ring of
silica, re-heating and blowing, the tube
can be lengthened or the bulb enlarged
at will. From this starting point it is
possible to make quite complicated
apparatus.

An examination of vitrified silica re-
veals several properties which give it a
peculiar value for many purposes. Its
melting point is so high that a plati-
num wire imbedded in a thick silica
tube can be fused so as to flow out, be-
fore the tube softens sufficiently to lose
its shape. Its coefficient of expansion
is far less than that of any similar sub-
stance, being only one- seventeenth that
of platinum. This expansion is very
regular up to 1,000", when it dimin-
ishes rapidly up to 1,200° and from
this point on it contracts. Up to 1,500°
it remains practically solid. In its ex-
pansion it difi"ers very markedly from
quartz, which not only has a much
higher coefficient of expansion, but
which at 570° expands so rapidly that
it is shattered. A rod of vitrified silica
can be heated white hot and then imme-
diately plunged into liquid air with-
out sufi"ering injury, indeed it gains in
elasticity when thus treated. These
properties promise to be of great value
in the construction of thermometers.
Its transparency to the ultra-violet
rays of the spectrum will give it a de-
cided advantage over glass in spectro-
scopic work. It is also interesting to
note that tubes of silica can be heated
sufficiently high for nitrogen and

oxygen to unite directly on passing
through them. It is, on the other hand,
slightly permeable to hydrogen at a
temperature of 1,000°C. Altogether
vitrified silica offers an interesting field
of development in the immediate
future.

TWO REMARKS CONCERNING
THE 'MONTHLY.'

The following paragraph is repro-
duced from the 'Electrical World,' as a
favorable occasion for two remarks
that it has for some time seemed de-
sirable to make:

In the current number of our
esteemed contemporary, the Poptjlar
Science Monthly, which is, alas!
more popular than scientific in the
single particular that its pages lie
largely sealed from mortal eye until
separated by that anachronous atrocity
— the paperknife — appears a delightful
article by Professor J. J. Thomson,
'On Bodies Smaller than Atoms,' an
abstract of which appears in the
Digest. It is a commentary upon the
spread of technical education that a
paper on this most abstruse subject,
and actually containing some little
algebra, should find the light of day
in popularized literature, and awake a
gleam of recognition from the eyes of
many who are not scientists. Twenty
years ago such an article on such a
subject would have lain on popular
benches as caviare to the multitude. It
is difficult to say which commands our
admiration the more — the article itself,
or the fact that the great world should
be capable of admitting it into semi-
popular literature. Either considera-
tion presents a triumph, the one over
inanimate, the other animate, nature.

The first remark concerns trimming
the pages of the Monthly. It appears
from the correspondence of the publi-
cation department that to trim or not
to trim is a burning question. An
'anachronous atrocity' is pretty strong
language, but it seems to define a
widespread creed. Some people ap-
parently do not know that there is a
good scientific reason for not trimming
the edges, namely, that a magazine or
book that has been trimmed cannot be
; properly bound afterwards. Conse-

TEE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

511

quently all librarians prefer untrimmed
copies, and the publishers of this maga-
zine must provide for some fifteen hun-
dred libraries. Then, we are not pre-
pared to admit that it is unscientific to
regard aesthetic considerations. Un-
trimmed copies look better to most
people, and there are a few who even
enjoy the use of the paperknife. This
preference may be in large measure a
survival; still a trimmed magazine
seems to be ready for the waste-paper
basket, whereas an uncut copy seems
to be waiting for its place on the
library shelf. Accordingly, copies of
this magazine with the edges cut are
supplied to the news-stands, but un-
trimmed copies are mailed to sub-
scribers. Any subscriber, however, who
asks for trimmed copies will receive
them.

The second remark to which the
editorial in the 'Electrical World' gives
occasion is more important. It is in-
deed a matter for congratulation that
this country is able to support a
journal which calls itself popular and
yet publishes only articles strictly
scientific in character. Such a journal
obviously does not appeal to children
or to superficial readers; and its very
existence bears witness to the presence
in America of a large class of highly
educated and thinking people. It may
be, however, that some of those who
have read the magazine for thirty years
regret a certain change in its charac-
ter and do not appreciate that this is
simply an evolution fitting it to ex-
isting conditions. Some years ago the
truths of evolution needed a fearless
advocate, but when these are preached
from the pulpit there is no longer need
of a special organ. The daily press
now publishes articles everywhere of a
readable and light character on scien-
tific topics, and no monthly magazine
is complete without one or two such
articles. What the country needs is a
journal that will set a standard of
accuracy and weight, and will separate
the real advances of science from the

vagaries of the charlatan. An article
such as Professor Thomson's 'On
Bodies Smaller than Atoms' must be
read with care, but when understood,
it is, as the 'Electrical World' remarks
in the editorial from which we have
quoted, 'more entertaining than the
story of the early crusades and more
astounding than those of the Arabian
Nights.'

SCIENTIFIC ITEMS.
By the death of Charles Anthony
Schott, the government loses one of its
most distinguished officers. He was
born in Germany, but was for fifty-
three years connected with the U. S.
Coast and Geodetic Survey. His dis-
tinguished position in the scientific
world is sufficiently indicated by the
fact that the Paris Academy of Sci-
ences made to him the first award of
the Wilde prize, which is given with-
out regard to nationality for the most
important researches in the physical
sciences. — We regret also to record the
death of H. W. Harkness, a student of
the cryptogams and prominent for his
services to science on the Pacific
coast, having been for many years
president of the California Academy of
Sciences; of James Marvin, formerly
professor of mathematics and astron-
omy and chancellor of the University
of Kansas; of Williis H. Barris,
known for his contributions to paleon-
tology and long president of the
Davenport Academy of Sciences; of
George K. Lawton, an astronomer of
the U. S. Naval Observatory, and of
Charles Mohr, a well-known botanist,
recently connected with the Geological
Survey of Alabama. — Among foreign
students of science the following
deaths are announced: of Henri de
Lacaze-Duthiers, the eminent French
zoologist; W. Schur, professor of as-
tronomy at Gottingen; Johannes Lamp,
a geodesist of Kiel University; Henri
d'0rl6ans, known for his geographical
explorations in Asia and Africa; of C.
E. Peek an English meteorologist;

512

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Eleanor A. Ormerod, the English ento-
mologist; and Baron Adolf Erik Nor-
denskjold, the Swedish arctic explorer
and naturalist.

Professor Rudolf Virchow will
celebrate his eightieth birthday on
October 13; a research fund is being
collected in his honor and he has been
made a knight of the Prussian order
'pour le merite,' this mark of imperial
favor having been long delayed, appar-
ently owing to his liberal politics. —
Professor A. W. Riicker, the physicist,
has been elected principal of the newly
organized London University. — Two of
the prizes created by the will of Alfred
Nobel will be awarded to Dr. Niels R.
Finsen of Denmark, for discovering the
light treatment for lupus, and to Pro-
fessor I. P. Pavlov, the Russian phy-
siologist, for his researches in nutri-
tion.— Dr. Patrick Manson has been
awarded the Stewart prize of the
British Medical Association for his re-
searches in pathology and tropical
diseases.

Sir John Murray has returned from
a six months' expedition to Christmas
Island, during which he crossed the
island from end to end, the first occa-
sion on which it has been traversed.
— Prof. Frederick W. Starr, of the Uni-
versity of Chicago, has completed
a four months' expedition among the
Mexican Indians. — Professor Engler,
director of the Botanical Garden at
Berlin, has visited the Canary Islands,
in order to study their flora. — Pro-
fessor C. L. Bristol, of New York Uni-

versity, has left New York to direct
the Biological Station at Bermuda.

An international botanical associa-
tion had its first meeting at Geneva
beginning on August 7. — The Fifth
International Congress of Criminal
Anthropology will be held in Am-
sterdam from September 9 to 14, 1901.
— The summer session of the American
Mathematical Society was held at
Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y., dur-
ing the week beginning on August 19.
— The American Forestry Association
will hold its meeting in affiliation with
the American Association at Denver on
August 27, 28 and 29.

According to the census taken on
March 31, the population of England
and Wales was 32,525,716, being an in-
crease of 12.15 per cent, in ten years.
The increase in the preceding decen-
nium was 11.65. The percentage in-
crease of London was only 7.3 per cent.,
its population now being 4,536,034.
There has, however, been a large in-
crease in the surrounding country, the
population of Middlesex having nearly
doubled. The population of Ireland is
4,456,546 and of Scotland 4,471,957.
The change in the population of Ireland
and of Scotland in the past sixty years
is remarkable:
Year. Ireland. Scotland.

1841 8,197,000 2,620,000

1851 6,574,271 2,888,742

1861 5,798,967 3,062,294

1871 5,412,377 3,360,018

1881 5,174,836 3,735,573

1891 4,704,750 4,025,647

1901 4,456,546 4,471,957

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY.

OOTOBEE, 1901.

THE PEOGEESS OF SCIENCE.*

By Professor R. S. WOODWARD,

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY.

A CONSTITUTIONAL provision of our Association stipulates
-^--^ that "It shall be the duty of the President to give an address
at a General Session of the Association at the meeting following that
over which he presided." Happily for those of us who must in turn
fulfill this duty the scientific foresight of our predecessors set no metes
and bounds with respect to the subject-matter or the mode of treat-
ment of the theme that might be chosen for such an address. So far,
therefore, as constitutional requirements are concerned, a retiring
president finds himself clothed for the time being with a degree of
liberty which might be regarded as dangerous were it not for an un-
written rule that one may not hope to enjoy such liberty more than
once. But time and place, nevertheless, as well as the painful personal
limitations of any specialist, impose some rather formidable restrictions.
One may not tax lightly, even, in a summer evening, the patience of his
audience for more than an academic hour, the length of which in most
cases is less than sixty minutes. One must confine himself to gener-
alities, which, though scientifically hazardous, serve as a basis for semi-
popular thought ; and one must exclude technical details, which, though
scientifically essential, tend only to obscure semi-popular presentation.
Courtesy, also, to those who are at once our hosts and our guests re-
quires that, so far as possible, one should substitute the vernacular for
the 'jargon of science,' and draw his figures of speech chiefly from the

* Address of the retiring president of The American Association for the
Advancement of Science, given at the Denver Meeting, August 27, 1901.
VOL. ijx. — 36

514 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. '

broad domain of every-day life rather than from the special, though
rapidly widening, fields of scientific activity.

Between this nominally unlimited freedom on the one hand, and
these actually narrow restrictions on the other, I have chosen to invite
your attention for the hour to a summary view of the salient features
of scientific progress, with special reference to its effects on the masses,
rather than on the individuals, of mankind. We all know, at least
in a general way, what such progress is. We are assured almost daily
by the public press and by popular consent that the present is not only
an age of scientific progress, but that it is preeminently the age of
scientific progress. And with respect to the future of scientific achieve-
ment, the consensus of expert opinion is cheerfully hopeful, and the
consensus of public opinion is extremely optimistic. Indeed, to borrow
the language sometimes used by the rulers of nations, it may be said
that the realm of science is now at peace with all foreign parts of the
world, and in a state of the happiest domestic prosperity.

But times have not been always thus pleasant and promising for
science. As we look backward over the history of scientific progress
it is seen that our realm has been taxed often to the utmost in defense
of its autonomy, and that the present state of domestic felicity, border-
ing on tranquillity, has been preceded often by states of domestic dis-
cord bordering on dissolution. And, as we look forward into the new
century before us, we may well enquire whether science has vanquished
its foreign enemies and settled its domestic disputes for good and all, or
whether future conquests can be made only by a similarly wasteful out-
lay of energy to that which has accompanied the advances of the past.
Especially may we fitly enquire on an occasion like the present what are
the types of mind and the methods of procedure which make for the
progress, and what are the types of mind and the methods of procedure
which make for the regress, of science. And I venture to think that
we may enquire also with profit, in some prominent instances, under
what circumstances in the past science has waxed or waned, as the case
may be, in its slow rise from the myths and mysticism of earlier eras
to the law and order of the present day. For it is a maxim of common
parlance, too well justified, alas ! by experience, that history repeats
itself ; or, to state the fact less gently, that the blunders and errors of
one age are repeated with little variation in the succeeding age. This
maxim is strikingly illustrated by the history of science, and it has been
especially deeply impressed upon us — burnt in, one might say — by the
scientific events of our own times. Have we not learned, however,
some lasting lessons in the hard school of experience, and may we not
transmit to our successors along with the established facts and principles
of science the almost equally well established ways and means for the

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 515

advancement of science? Will it be possible for society to repeat in
the twentieth century the appalling intellectual blunders of the nine-
teenth century, or have we entered on a new era in which, whatever
other obstacles are pending, we may expect man to stand notably
less in his own light as regards science than ever before? To a
consideration of these and allied questions I beg your indulgence, even
though I may pass over ground well known to most of you, and en-
croach, perhaps, here and there, on prominences in fields controversial;
for it is only by discussion and rediscussion of such questions that we
come at last, even among ourselves in scientific societies, to the unity
of opinion and the unity of purpose which lead from ideas to their
fruitful applications.

From the earliest historic times certainly, if not from the dawn of
primitive humanity, down to the present day, the problem of the uni-
verse has been the most attractive and the most illusive subject of the
attention of thinking men. All systems of philosophy, religion and
science are alike in having the solution of this problem for their ulti-
mate object. Many such systems and sub-systems have arisen,
flourished and vanished, only to be succeeded by others in the seemingly
Sisyphean task. Gradually, however, in the lapse of ages there have
accumulated some elements of knowledge which give inklings of partial
solutions; though it would appear that the best current opinion of
philosophy, religion and science would again agree in the conclusion
that we are yet immeasurably distant from a complete solution. Al-
most equally attractive and interesting, and far more instructive, as
it appears to me, in our own time, is the contemplation of the ways in
which man has attacked this perennial riddle. It is, indeed, coming
to be more and more important for science to know how primitive,
barbarous and civilized man has visualized the conditions of, and
reached his conclusions with respect to, this problem of the centuries;
for it is only by means of a lively knowledge of the baseless hypotheses
and the fruitless methods of our predecessors that we can hope to pre-
vent history from repeating itself unfavorably.

Looking back over the interval of two to three thousand years that
connects us by more or less authentic records with our distinguished
ancestors, we are at once struck by the admirable confidence they had
acquired in their ability to solve this grand problem. Not less admi-
rable, also, for their ingenuity and for the earnestness with which they
were advanced, are the hypotheses and arguments by which men satis-
fied themselves of the security of their tenets and theories. Koughly
speaking, it would appear that the science of the universe received its
initial impulse from earliest man in the hypothesis that the world is
composed of two parts ; the first and most important part being in fact,

5i6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

if not always so held ostensibly, himself, and the other part being the
aggregate of whatever else was left over. Though dimly perceived
and of little account in its effects, this is, apparently, the working
hypothesis of many men in the civilized society of to-day. But the
magnitude of the latter part and its inexorable relations to man seem
to have led him speedily to the adoption of the second hypothesis,
namely, that the latter part, or world external to himself, is also the
abode of sentient beings, some of a lower and some of a higher order
than man ; their role tending on the whole to make his sojourn on this
planet tolerable and his exit from it creditable, while yet wielding at
times a more or less despotic influence over him.

How the details of these hypotheses have been worked out is a matter
of something like history for a few nationalities, and is a matter absorb-
ing the attention of anthropologists, archeologists and ethnologists as
it concerns races in general. Without going far afield in these pro-
foundly interesting and instructive details, it may suffice for the present
purposes to cite two facts which seem to furnish the key to a substan-
tially correct interpretation of subsequent developments.

The first of these is that the early dualistic and antithetical visual-
ization of the problem in question has persisted with wonderful tenacity
down to the present day. The accessible and familiar was set over
against the inaccessible and unfamiliar; or what we now call the
natural, though intimately related to, was more or less opposed to the
supernatural; the latter being, in fact, under the uncertain sway of,
and the former subject to the arbitrary jurisdiction of, good and evil
spirits.

The second fact is that man thus early devised for the investigation
of this problem three distinct methods, which have likewise persisted
with equal tenacity, though with varying fortunes, down to the present
day. The first of these is what is known as the a priori method. It
reasons from subjective postulates to objective results. It requires,
in its purity, neither observation nor experiment on the external world.
It often goes so far, indeed, as to adopt conclusions and leave the as-
signment of the reasons for them to a subsequent study. The second
is known as the historico-critical method. It depends, in its purity,
on tradition, history, direct human testimony and verbal congruity. It
does not require an appeal to Nature except as manifested in man. It
limits observation and experiment to human affairs. The third is the
method of science. It begins, in its elements, with observation and ex-
periment. Its early applications were limited mostly to material things.
In its subsequent expansion it has gained a footing in nearly every
field of thought. Its prime characteristic is the insistence on objective
verification of its results.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 5^7

All these methods have been used more or less by all thinlcing men.
But for the purpose of ready classification it may be said that the first
has been used chiefly by dogmatists, including especially the founders
and advocates of all fixed creeds from the atheistic and the pantheistic
to the theistic and the humanistic ; the second has been used chiefly by
humanists, including historians, publicists, jurists and men of letters;
and the third has been used chiefly by scientists, including astronomers,
mathematicians, physicists, naturalists, and more recently the group
of investigators falling under the comprehensive head of anthropologists.
The first and third methods are frequently found to be mutually an-
tithetical, if not mutually exclusive. The second occupies middle
ground. Together they are here set down in the order of their apparent
early development and in the order of their popularly esteemed im-
portance during all historic time previous to, if not including, this
first year of the twentieth century.

No summary view of the progress of science, it seems to me, can be
made intelligible except by a clear realization of these two facts, which
may be briefly referred to as man's conception of the universe and his
means of investigating it. What, then, in the light of these facts, has
been the sequel ? The full answer to this question is an old and a long
story, now a matter of minute and exhaustive history as regards the past
twenty centuries. I have no desire to recall the dramatic events in-
volved in the rise of science from the Alexandrian epoch to the present
day. All these events are trite enough to men of science. A mere
reference to them is a sufficient suggestion of the existence of a family
skeleton. But, setting aside the human element as much as possible,
it may not be out of place or time to state what general conclusions ap-
pear to stand out plainly in that sequel. These are our tangible heri-
tage and ^^pon them we should fix our attention.

In the first place, the progress of science has been steadily opposed
to, and as steadily opposed by, the adherents of man's primitive con-
cepts of the universe. The domain of the natural has constantly
widened and the domain of the supernatural has constantly narrowed.
So far, at any rate, as evil spirits are concerned, they have been com-
pletely cast out from the realm of science. The arch fiend and the
lesser princes of darkness are no longer useful even as an hypothesis.
We have reached — if I may again use the cautious language of diplo-
macy— a satisfactory modus vivendi if we have not attained permanent
peace in all our foreign relations. Enlightened man has come to see
that his highest duty is to cooperate with Nature, that he may expect
to get on very well if he heeds her advice, and that he may expect to
fare very ill if he disregards it.

Secondly, it appears to have been demonstrated that neither the a

5i8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

priori method of the dogmatists nor the historico-critical method of the
humanists is alone adequate for the attainment of definite knowledge
of either the internal or the external world, or of their relations to one
another. In fact, it has been shown over and over again that man
cannot trust his unaided senses even in the investigation of the simplest
and most obvious material phenomena. There is an ever-present need
of a correction for personal equation. Left to himself, the a priori
reasoner weaves from the tangled skein of thought webs so well tied
with logical knots that there is no escape for the imprisoned mind except
by resort to the weapon applied to cobwebs. And in the serenity of his
repose behind the fortress of 'liberal culture,' the reactionary humanist
will prepare apologies for errors and patch up compromises between
traditional beliefs and sound learning with such consummate literary
skill that even 'the good demon of doubt' is almost persuaded that if
knowledge did not come to an end long ago it will soon reach its limit.
In short, we have learned, or ought to have learned, from ample ex-
perience, that in the search for definite, verifiable knowledge we should
beware of the investigator whose equipment consists of a bundle of
traditions and dogmas along with formal logic and a facile pen; for
we may be sure that he will be more deeply concerned with the question
of the safety than with the question of the soundness of scientific doc-
trines.

Thirdly, it has been demonstrated equally clearly, and far more
cogently, that the sort of knowledge we call scientific, knowledge which
has in it the characteristics of immanence and permanence, is founded
on observation and experiment. The rise and growth of every science
illustrate this fact. Even pure mathematics, commonly held to be
the a priori science par excellence, and sometimes called 'the science of
necessary conclusions,' is no exception to the rule. Those who would
found mathematics on a higher plane have apparently forgotten to con-
sider the contents of the mathematician's waste-basket. The slow and
painful steps by which astronomy has grown out of astrology and chem-
istry out of alchemy; and the faltering, tedious, and generally hotly
contested, advances of geology and biology have been made secure only
by the remorseless disregard which observational and experimental evi-
dence has shown for the foregone conclusions of the dogmatists and the
literary opinions of the humanists. Thus it has been proved by the
rough logic of facts and events that the rude processes of 'trial and
error,' processes which many philosophers and some men of science
still affect to despise, are the most effective means yet devised by man
for the discovery of truth and for the eradication of error.

These facts are so well known to most of you, so much a matter of
ingrained experience, that the categorical mention of them here may

TEE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 519

seem like a rehearsal of tniisins. But it is one of the paradoxes of
human development that errors which have been completely dislodged
from the minds of the few may still linger persistently in the minds
of the many, and that the misleading hjrpotheses and the dead theories
of one age may be resuscitated again and again in succeeding ages.
Thus, to cite one of the simplest examples, it doubtless appeared clear to
the Alexandrian school of scientists that the flat, four-cornered earth of
contemporary myths would speedily give way to the revelations of geom-
etry and astronomy. How inadequate such revelations proved to be at
that time is one of the most startling disclosures in all history. The
'Divine School of Alexandria' passed into oblivion. The myth of a
flat and four-cornered earth was crystallized into a dogma strong
enough to bear the burden of men's souls by Cosmas Indicopleustes in
the sixth century; it was supported with still more invincible argu-
ments by Martin Luther in the sixteenth century; and it was revived
and maintained with not less truly admirable logic, as such, by John
Hampden and John Jasper in the last decades of the nineteenth cen-
tury. To cite examples from contemporary history showing how dif-
ficult it is for the human mind to get above its primitive conceptions,
one needs only to refer to the daily press. During the past two months,
in fact, the newspapers have related how multitudes of men, women
and children, many of them suffering from loathsome if not contagious
diseases, have visited a veritable middle age shrine in the city of New
York, strong in the hoary superstition that kissing an alleged relic of
St. Anne would remove their afflictions. During the same interval a
railway circular has been distributed explaining how tourists may wit-
ness the Moki snake-dance, that weird ceremony by which the Pueblo
Indian seeks to secure rain in his desert; and a similar public, and
officially approved, ceremony has been observed in the heat-stricken
State of Missouri.

Such epochs and episodes of regression as these must be taken into
account in making up an estimate of scientific progress. They show
us that the slow movement upward in the evolution of man which gives
an algebraic sum of a few steps forward per century is not inconsistent
with many steps backward. Or, to state the case in another way, the
rate of scientific advance is to be measured not so much by the positions
gained and held by individuals, as by the positions attained and real-
ized by the masses, of our race. The average position of civilized man
now is probably below the mean of the positions attained by the natu-
ralist Huxley and the statesman Gladstone, or below the mean of the
positions attained by the physicist von Helmholtz and His Holiness the
Pope. When measured in this manner, the rate of progress in the
past twenty centuries is not altogether flattering or encouraging to us,

520 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

especially in view of the possibility that some of the more recently de-
veloped sciences may suffer relapses similar to those which so long
eclipsed geography and astronomy.

It must be confessed, therefore, when we look backward over the
events of the past two thousand years, and when we consider the scien-
tific contents of the mind of the average denizen of this planet, that
it is not wholly rational to entertain millennial anticipations of prog-
ress in the immediate future. The fact that some of the prime dis-
coveries of science have so recently appeared to many earnest thinkers
to threaten the very foundations of society is one which should not be
overlooked in these confident times of prosperity. And the equally im-
portant fact that entire innocence with respect to the elements of science
and dense ignorance with respect to its methods, have not been hitherto
incompatible vdth justly esteemed eminence in the divine, the states-
man, the jurist and the man of letters, is one which should be reckoned
with in making up any forecast. It may be seriously doubted, indeed,
whether the progress of the individual is not essentially limited by the
progress of the race.

But this obverse and darker side of the picture which confronts
us from the past has its reverse and brighter side ; and I am constrained
to believe that the present status of science and the general enlighten-
ment of humanity justify ardent hopefulness if not sanguine optimism
with respect to the future of scientific achievement. The reasons
for this hopefulness are numerous; some of them arising out of the
commercial and political conditions of the world, and others arising
out of the conditions of science itself.

Perhaps the most important of all these reasons is found in the
general enlargement of ideas which has come, and is coming, with the
extension of trade and commerce to the uttermost parts of the earth.
We are no longer citizens of this or that country, simply. Whether
we wish it or not we are citizens of the world, with increased opportu-
nities and with increased duties. We may not approve — few men of
science would approve, I think — that sort of 'expansion' which works
'benevolent assimilation' of inferior races by means of a bible in one
hand and a gun in the other; but nothing can help so much, it seems
to me, to remove the stumbling blocks in the way of the progress of
science as actual contact with the manners, the customs, the relations
and the resulting questions for thought, now thrust upon all civilized
nations by the events of the day. That sort of competition which is
the life of trade, that sort of rivalry which is the stimulus to national
effort, and that sort of cooperation which is essential for mutual protec-
tion, all make for the cosmopolitan dissemination of scientific truth
and for the appreciation of scientific investigation. I would not dis-

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 521

parage the elevated aspirations and the noble efforts of the evangelists
and the humanists who seek to raise the lower to the plane of the higher
elements of our race ; but it is now plain as a matter of fact, however
repulsive it may seem to some of our inherited opinions, that the rail-
wa}^ the steamship, the telegraph and the daily press will do more to
illumine the dark places of the earth than all the apostles of creeds and
all the messengers of the gospel of 'sweetness and light.'

A question of profound significance growing out of the extension
of commercial relations in our time is what may be called the question
of international health. An outbreak of cholera in Hamburg, the prev-
alence of yellow fever in Havana or an epidemic of bubonic plague
in India is no longer a matter of local import, as nations with which
we are well acquainted have learned recently in an expensive manner.
The management of this great international question calls for the ap-
plication of the most advanced scientific knowledge and for the most
intricate scientific investigation. Large sums of money must be de-
voted to this work, and many heroic lives will be lost, doubtless, in its
execution; but it is now evident, as a mere matter of international
political economy, that the cost of sound sanitation will be trifling in
comparison with the cost of no sanitation; while further careful study
of the natural history of diseases promises practical immunity from
many of them at no distant day. International associations of all
kinds must aid greatly also in the promotion of progress. Many such
organizations have, indeed, already undertaken scientific projects with
the highest success. Comparison and criticism of methods and results
not only lead rapidly and effectively to improvements and advances, but
they lead also to a whole-hearted recognition of good work which puts
the fraternalism of men of science on a plane far above the level of the
amenities of merely diplomatic life.

When we turn to the general status of science itself, there is seen
to be equal justification for hopefulness founded on an abundance of
favorable conditions. The methods of science may be said to have
gained a footing of respectability in almost every department of thought,
where, a half -century ago, or even twenty years ago, their entry was
either barred out or stoutly opposed. The 'Conflict between Eeligion
and Science' — jnore precisely called the conflict between theology
and science — which disturbed so many eminent though timid minds,
including not a few men of science a quarter of a century ago, has
now been transferred almost wholly to the field of the theological con-
testants; and science may safely leave them to determine the issue,
?ince it is evidently coming by means of scientific methods. The grave
fears entertained a few decades ago by distinguished theologians and
publicists as to the stability of the social fabric under the stress put
upon it by the rising tide of scientific ideas, have not been realized.

522 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

And, on the other hand, the grave doubts entertained by the distin-
guished men of science a few decades ago as to the permeability and
ready response of modern society to that influx of new ideas, have like-
wise not been realized. It is true that we still sometimes read of the-
ological tests being applied to teachers of biology, and hear, occasionally,
of an earnest search for a good methodist or a good presbyterian math-
ematician; but such cases may be left for settlement out of court
by means of the arbitration of our sense of humor. It seems not un-
likely, also, that there may persist, for a long time to come, a more or
less guerrilla 'warfare of science' with our friends the dogmatists and
humanists. Some consider this conflict to be, in the nature of things,
irrepressible. But I think we may hope, if we may not confidently
expect, that the collisions of the future will occur more manifestly
than they have in the past in accordance with the law of the conserva-
tion of energy ; so that the heat evolved may reappear as potential en-
ergy in the warmth of a kindly reasonableness on both sides, rather than
suffer degradation to the level of cosmic frigidity.

Great questions, also, of education, of economic, industrial and
social conditions, and of legal and political relations are now demanding
all the light which science can bring to bear upon them. Though
tardily perceived, it is now admitted, generally, that science must not
only participate in the development of these questions, but that it alone
can point the way to the solutions of many of them. But there is no
halting ground here. Science must likewise enter and explore the
domain of manners and morals; and these, though already largely
modified unconsciously, must now be modified consciously to a still
greater extent by the advance of science. Only within quite recent
times have we come to realize an approximation to the real meaning
of the trite saying that the proper study of man is man. So long as the
most favored individuals of his race, in accordance with the hypothesis
of the first centuries, looked upon him as a fallen, if not a doomed,
resident of an abandoned reservation, there could be roused little en-
thusiasm with respect to his present condition ; all thought was concen-
trated on his future prospects. How incomparably different does he
appear to the anthropologist and the psychologist at the beginning
of the twentieth century ! In the light of evolution he is seen to be a
part of, and not apart from, the rest of the universe. The transcendent
interest of this later view of man lies in the fact that he can not only
investigate the other parts of the universe, but that he can, liy means
of the same methods, investigate himself.

I would be the last to look upon science as furnishing a speedy or
a complete panacea for the sins and sorrows of mankind;, the'' destiny
of our race is entangled in a cosmic process whose working is thus far
only dimly outlined to us; but it is nevertheless clear that there are

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 523

available to us immense opportunities for the betterment of man's es-
tate. For example, to mention only one of the lines along which im-
provement is plainly practicable, what is to hinder an indefinite mitiga-
tion, if not a definite extinction, of the ravages of such dread diseases
as consumption and typhoid fever? Or what, we may ask, is to hinder
the application to New York, Philadelphia and Chicago of as effective
health regulations as those now applied to Havana? Nothing, appar-
ently, except vested interests and general apathy. We read, not many
years ago, that a city of about one million inhabitants had, during one
year, more than six thousand cases of typhoid fever. The cost to the
city of a single case may be estimated as not less, on the average, than
one thousand dollars, making an aggregate cost to that city, for one
year, of more than six millions of dollars. Such a waste of financial
resources ought to appeal to vested interests and general apathy even
though they cannot be moved by any higher motives. Thanks to the
penetration of the enlightenment of our times, distinct advances have
already been made in the line of effective domestic and public sanita-
tion; but the good work accomplished is infinitesimal in comparison
with that which can be, and ought to be, done. It is along this and
along allied lines of social and industrial economy, that we should
look, I think, for the alleviation of the miseries of mankind. No
amount of contemplation of the beatitudes, human or divine, will pre-
vent men from drinking contaminated water or milk; and no fear of
future punishments, which may be in the meantime atoned for, will
much deter men from wasting their substance in riotous living. The
moral certainty of speedy and inexorable earthly annihilation is alone
adequate to bring man into conformity with the cosmic rules and reg-
ulations of the drama of life.

And finally we must reckon amongst the most important of the
conditions favorable to the progress of science, the unexampled activity
in our times of the scientific spirit as manifested in the work of all
kinds of organizations, from the semi-religious Chautauquan assemblies
up to those technical societies whose programs are Greek to all the world
beside. Literature, linguistics, history, economics, law and theology
are now permeated by the scientific spirit if not animated by the sci-
entific method. Curiously enough, also, the terminology, the figures
of speech and the points of view of science are now quite common in
realms of thought hitherto held somewhat scornfully above the plane of
materialistic phenomena. Tyndall's Belfast address, which, twenty-
seven years ago, was generally anathematized, is now quoted with ap-
proval by some of the successors of those who bitterly denounced him
and all his kind. Thus the mere lapse of time is working great changes
and smoothing out grave differences of opinion in favor of the progress

524 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of science in all the neighboring provinces with which we have been able
hitherto to maintain only rather strained diplomatic relations.

Still more immediately important to us are the evidences of progress
manifested in recent years by this Association and by its affiliated so-
cieties. Our parent organization, though a half century old, is still young
as regards the extent in time of the functions it has undertaken to per-
form. It has accomplished a great work; but in the vigor and en-
thusiasm of its youth a far greater work is easily attainable. Exactly
how these functions are to be developed, no man can foresee. We may
learn, however, in this, as in other lines of research, by methods with
which we are well acquainted, namely, by the methods of carefully
planned and patiently executed observation and experiment. The field
for energetic and painstaking effort is wider and more attractive than
ever before. Science is now truly cosmopolitan; it can be limited by
no close corporations; and no domain of scientific investigation can be
advantageously fenced off, either in time or in space, from the rest.
While every active worker of this or of any affiliated society is, in a
sense, a specialist, there are occasions when he should unite with his
colleagues for the promotion of the interests of science as a whole. The
results of the specialists need to be popularized and to be disseminated
among the people at large. The advance of knowledge, to be effect-
ive with the masses of our race, must be sustained on its merits by a
popular verdict. To bring the diverse scientific activities of the Ameri-
can Continent into harmony for common needs; to secure cooperation
for common purposes; and to disseminate the results of scientific in-
vestigation among our fellow-men, are not less, but rather much more,
than in the past, the privilege and the duty of The American Associa-
tion for the Advancement of Science.

Viewed, then, in its broader aspects, the progress of science is in-
volved in the general progress of our race ; and those who are interested
in promoting the former should be equally earnest in securing the
latter. However much we may be absorbed in the details of our
specialties, when we stop to think of science in its entirety, we are led,
in the last analysis, back to'^he problem of problems — the meaning of
the universe. All men ^gifted with the sad endowment of a contem-
plative mind' must recur again and again to this riddle of the centuries.
We are, so to speak, whatever our prepossessions, all sailing in the same
boat on an unknown sea for a destination at best not fully determined.
Some there are who have, or think they have, the Pole Star always
in sight. Others, though less confident of their bearings, are willing to
assume nothing short of second place in the conduct of the ship. Others,
still less confident of their bearings, are disposed to depend chiefly on
their knowledge of the compass and on their skill in dead reckoning.
We of the last class may not impugn the motives or doubt the sincerity

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 525

of the first two classes. We should find it difficult, probably, to dispense
with their company in so long a journey after becoming so well ac-
quainted with them ; for among them we may each recall not a few of
those rarer individuals of the genus homo called angels on earth. But
it must be said in all truth, to resume the figure, that they have neither
improved much the means of transportation nor perfected much the art
of navigation. They have been sufficiently occupied, perhaps, in allay-
ing the fears of the timid and in restraining the follies of the mutinous.
Other types of mind and other modes of thought than theirs have been
essential to work out the improvements which separate the earlier from
the later nautical equipments of men ; such improvements, for example,
as mark the distinction between the dug-out of our lately acknowledged
relatives, the Moros and the Tagalogs, and the Atlantic-liner of to-day.
At any rate, we are confronted by the fact that man's conceptions
of the universe have undergone slow but certain enlargement. His
early anthropocentric and anthropomorphic views have been replaced,
in so far as he has attained measurable advancement, by views that
will bear the tests of astronomy and anthropology. He has learned,
slowly and painfully, after repeated failures and many steps backward,
to distinguish, in some regions of thought, the real and the permanent
from the fanciful and fleeting phenomena of which he forms a part.
His pursuit of knowledge, in so far as it has led him to certainty, has
been chiefly a discipline of disillusionment. He has arrived at the
truth not so much by the genius of direct discovery as by the laborious
process of the elimination of error. Hence he who has learned wis-
dom from experience must look out on the problem of the universe
at the beginning of the twentieth century with far less confidence
in his ability to speedily solve it and with far less exaggerated notions
of his own importance in the grand aggregate of Nature, than man
entertained at the beginning of our era. But no devotee to science
finds humiliation in this departure from the primitive concepts of
humanity. On the contrary, he has learned that this apparent hu-
miliation is the real source of enlightenment and encouragement;
for notwithstanding the relative minuteness of the speck of cosmic
dust on which we reside, and notwithstanding the relative incom-
petency of the mind to discover our exact relations to the rest of the
universe, it has yet been possible to measure that minuteness and to
determine that incompetency. These, in brief, are the elements of posi-
tive knowledge at which we have arrived through the long course of
unconscious, or only half -conscious, experience of mankind. All lines
of investigation converge toward or diverge from these elements. It
is along such lines that progress has been attained in the past, and it
is along the same lines that we may expect progress to proceed in the
future.

526 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

'FEEE-WILL' AND THE CREDIT FOE GOOD ACTIONS.

By Professor GEORGE STUART FULLERTON,

UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA.

WE can imagine what would be the emotion of a college professor
if the president of the institution were to shake him warmly by
the hand and congratulate him upon the fact that, although he had been
freely admitted for a year to the book-stack of the college library, he
had not stolen so much as a single volume. We can conceive the em-
barrassment of a clerg3'man whose bishop would feel impelled to give
expression to his satisfaction at the fact that, during a visit extending
over a week or more, he had not been distressed by hearing any word of
profanity or observing any act of violence. 'What in the world can the
man have been expecting of me?' exclaims the indignant recipient of
such a compliment. 'Does he take me for a blackleg? Perhaps the
next time he sees me he will take it upon himself to felicitate me on
having so far escaped the gallows.'

The fact is that whenever we speak of a man as deserving credit for
this or that worthy action, our compliment is accompanied by some-
thing very like a criticism. It is implied that the action is one not easy
to perform, at least in the given instance. We do not ordinarily tliink
a mother deserves great credit for taking good care of her infant, or a
father for supporting his family when he has it in his power to do so.
We assume that these things are easy and natural, and quite in accord
with the impulses which control the individual. But we do think a wo-
man deserves credit for adopting and lavishing her care upon mother-
less children that have no special claim upon her, and a man for labor-
ing to feed those who are not bound to him by the closest of natural
ties. Were it as easy to care for the children of others as to care for
one's own, were the impulse to do so just as strong, we should never
think of such actions as especially creditable. They would undoubtedly
be good actions, but it is one thing to recognize actions as good and
quite another to single them out as deserving of credit. It is a good
thing for a college professor not to steal, and for a clergyman to avoid
acts of violence, but we never think of remarking upon the fact that
their conduct is creditable, when we have nothing better to say of them
than that they possess these negative virtues.

Some virtues we expect of men generally. We assume that the
right course is the easy one to take, or, at least, is relatively easy, and we

THE CREDIT FOR GOOD ACTIONS. 527

scarcely think of praising the average man for coming up to this stand-
ard. Some virtues we expect of certain classes of men, and not in the
same degree of others. We expect, for example, a greater foresight and
power of self-control in those who have enjoyed educational advantages
and whose horizoi^ has been widened. And we expect a much greater
sensitiveness to moral considerations on the part of those who have had
the inestimable advantage of good moral training, and have been
brought up in a good home. We Judge a man according to the class in
which we find him ; if he falls below the expected standard of excellence,
we blame him, and if he rises above it, we regard him as worthy of
credit. But besides these class-standards, which may be very numerous,
we have individual standards which we apply when we come to know
individual men well, and these express our judgment of the actual
moral condition of the individual.

We have, perhaps, kno^Ti our friend Smith for ten years or more,
and have clearly perceived that he readily falls a prey to irascible im-
pulses. He himself deplores the fact, and resolves to express himself
more temperately when things happen to ruffle him. We see him on
some trying occasion with flushed cheek and the flash in his eye that has
heretofore heralded the tempest. But the expected storm does not
come; the good resolution has triumphed, and the clouds roll away
without emptying themselves as the weather-wise had fully expected
them to do. Of course we give Smith no little credit for this victory,
and if we really know him intimately we probably endeavor to let him
know, in some tactful way, that we admire his magnanimity and self-
control. Or perhaps the individual to whom we give credit for a rather
unexpected act of self-denial is our son Tommy, whom we have known
rather intimately for a number of years, and with whose impulses and
capabilities we think we are fairly well acquainted. The boy has on
various occasions found stolen jam irresistibly sweet, and neither re-
flections upon the possibilities of detection and punishment nor the
feeble stings of an immature conscience have sufficed to deter him from
tasting that sweetness. But we discover that, on a certain occasion, op-
portunity has not been lacking. There has been a prolonged conflict
between the law in his members and the law in his mind, and the latter
has come off victorious. We praise Tommy for his continence, make
him feel that he has left the field covered with glory, and we devise
means of implanting in his small mind the conviction that honesty is
not a thing to be regretted.

In this last instance we have, I think, a good indication of what we
really mean by the credit that is given to this or that good action, and of
the standard by which we measure it. We think of an action as credit-
able when we recognize the presence of warring impulses, and regard the
good decision as a victory over a more or less redoubtable enemy. The

528 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

more evenly balanced the force in the field, the more creditable we con-
sider a choice of the right. When we feel personally responsible for the
conduct of the individual concerned, we recognize the degree of credit
he has earned as a moral claim upon us for payment in coin of some sort.
The payment may consist in expressions of approval, in evidences of
confidence or of affection, in marks of respect; or it may consist in a
large portion of jam at the next distribution, a visit to the circus or a
trip to the country. This payment, which parents and teachers do not
fail to make if they properly realize their responsibilities, is not made
because the child is good, for good actions performed easily and without
a struggle are not singled out for reward in this way. It is made be-
cause the child needs to he made good, and we roughly proportion the
reward to the amount of encouragement needed to keep the child mov-
ing along the path of moral development.

In the larger world beyond the nursery and the school, rewards for
creditable behavior are not always distributed in the same unmistak-
able way. A good deal of creditable behavior appears to be unre-
warded. The reason is not far to seek. Men generally are not occu-
pied in educating each other just as parents and teachers educate those
under their charge. They have not the same sense of responsibility;
and, further, they have not, in many cases, the power to grant rewards.
But it is easy to see that, where men are at all sensitive, as civilized hu-
man beings surely ought to be, to the moral or immoral character of the
actions of their fellows, they are quick to judge of actions as creditable
or discreditable, and they have the disposition to mete out to the doer
some sort of reward or some sort of penalty. The reward may be no more
than a look of admiration or a word of appreciation, and the penalty no
more than a slight coldness of manner; but love of approbation is a
strong motive to action, and just such rewards and penalties as these
may have an enormous influence in determining to right conduct.
And where certain men exercise over others a control at all analogous
to that exercised by the parent or teacher, we find that they are very apt
to reward creditable behavior much as these do. The unusual devotion
of this or that employee, the conspicuous bravery of the soldier, are not
commonly passed over as matters that deserve no substantial recogni-
tion. The good behavior of the convict is accounted as sufficient reason
for shortening the term of his imprisonment. Look where we will, we
find that there is a general tendency among men to regard the credit-
able actions of their fellows as having some sort of a claim to reward,
and when we look into the nature of this claim, we find that its force
rests upon the fact that we instinctively regard ourselves as in some way
responsible for the behavior of others, and, consciously or uncon-
sciously, take it upon ourselves to encourage them to act as they should
act.

THE CREDIT FOR GOOD ACTIONS. 529

Now we not infrequently hear that, if the position taken by the
determinist is right, our notions of the creditable or discreditable
character of actions must be wholly erroneous. What the determinist
really holds I have tried to make clear in an earlier number of this
magazine.* He holds that human actions could be completely ac-
counted for if we really knew all their antecedents. Among these
antecedents he reckons the character, the inherent or acquired impulses,
of the individual. It is only the fatalist that overlooks these, and
fatalism is something very different indeed from determinism. The
determinst maintains that the question : 'Why did this man act in this
particular manner?' is never a foolish question, although we may in
any particular instance be ignorant of the answer. He assumes that
there is always some cause or causes that can account for the result.
The 'free-willist,' on the other hand, maintains that no complete answer
to such a question can be given, not because we are ignorant, but be-
cause human actions are not necessarily the results of causes. If we
ask him : 'Why did this man elect to put his hand in his pocket and take
out a copper for the beggar on the street ?' he is capable of answering :
Must because he did,' and tliis 'because' is no better than a 'woman's
reason,' i. e., it is no reason at all. It amounts to asserting that, in so
far as human actions are 'free,' they have no cause whatever, and the
search for an explanation of their occurrence is wholly futile.

But what can induce any man to hold that we cannot regard actions
as creditable in so far as they can be accounted for by antecedents of
some sort, and that we must regard them as creditable only in so far as
they are causeless? The position is one often enough taken, and prob-
ably there is no one of my readers who has done some reading in ethics
who has not met with this opinion. It is clear that there is nothing
in what I have said above about the credit we allow to good actions, that
cannot be assented to by a determinist. He admits that men differ
greatly in character, and that, in the same circumstances, two different
men may act in very different ways. He admits that men's characters
may change, and thinks it his duty to influence them to change in the
proper direction. Eewards and punishments he regards as a part of the
machinery which brings about the gradual moralization of the race. He
sees no objections to distributing rewards where they will do the most
good and the least harm ; and he points to the actual practise of man-
kind in evidence of the fact that men generally have unconsciously em-
braced the principle upon which he insists, and do constantly act upon
it. Yet the 'free-willist' maintains that he is wholly in error, and that
credit and discredit must be allowed upon a very different principle.
Does the 'free-willist' take this position 'freely,' i. e., for no reason at

* December, 1900.
VOL. Lix. — 37

530 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

all ? or may we assume that he does so because it seems to him at least
a plausible one ? If he says what he does just 'because he does,' it is, of
course, useless to argue with him. He is not what we call a rational
being, and is not moved to embrace this or that conviction by evidence.
But^ being myself a determinist, I will be more generous with him
than he is with himself, and Avill maintain that he is not so wholly un-
reasonable as he represents himself to be. I will look for some motive
which may explain why he takes so strange a position.

A very little reflection upon what 'free-willists' have written reveals
that that motive is not far to seek. It is the old confusion of indeter-
minism, or 'freedom' in a special sense of the word, with freedom in the
usual sense, freedom from compulsion. No man in his senses thinks of
praising or blaming any one for acts performed under compulsion. If a
stronger than Tommy seizes his small hand, forces his fingers to close
upon a key and turn it, pries open his mouth and fills it with jam, no
sane parent would dream of punishing the involuntary offender. And
if a stronger hand catches the boy as his fingers are stealing towards
the lock, and drags him forcibly away from the fascinating spot, no
one but a fool would regard the precipitate retreat as a triumph of
virtue that calls for the crown of some substantial reward. It may
or may not be a desirable thing to be born with red hair, but surely no
one will maintain that it is a creditable thing. When he is acting under
compulsion, Tommy's actions are no more a matter of choice than
is the color of his hair, and we recognize this fact in judging him.
On this point all classes of moralists are agreed — actions can be credit-
able or discreditable only if they are voluntary, or only if the actor
is free.

We ought never to forget, however, that freedom in this sense of the
word means only freedom from compulsion, a freedom to act out the
impulses inherent in one's own nature. It is a totally different thing
from 'freedom,' that philosophical fiction that has played so large a
part in polemical literature. But it is easy to confuse things that pass
by the same name, and when the 'free-willist' hurls at us the contemp-
tuous question : 'Do you mean to assert that there can be any credit for
actions which we do not freely do?' we too often make haste to affirm
that there cannot be, without stopping to ask him whether he means the
word freely to be understood with or without the quotation marks. He
himself fails to perceive that the word is ambiguous; and seeing, as
we all do, that only free actions are deserving of credit, he makes this
true of 'free' actions. He thus comes to deny credit to every action that
is not causeless. It is evident that he has no good reason for such an
assertion, but he has at least a reason ; he has simply fallen into a con-
fusion, and to do this is human, while to embrace a doctrine 'freely,'
or for no reason at all, appears positively inhuman.

THE CREDIT FOR GOOD ACTIONS. 531

We have seen that, from the point of view of the deterniinist, it
seems an eminently reasonable thing to regard certain good actions as
deserving of credit rather than others, and to strive to reward them. We
have seen also that we can estimate roughly, at least, the amount of the
reward that it is desirable to give. There appears to be nothing absurd,
and nothing hopelessly mysterious in the whole matter, although our
ignorance of human character, its impulses, the motives that can be ex-
pected to lead to this or that action, and, indeed, of the whole machinery
•of human life, is and must remain very great. But what if we adopt
tJie hypothesis of the 'free-willist' ? Let us suppose for the moment
that actions can be regarded as creditable only in so far as they are 'free'
•or causeless, and let us see whether this will cast a brighter light upon
the corner of ethics with which we are concerned.

The first difficulty which meets us is a seemingly hopeless uncertainty
iis to what actions are 'free' and the degree of their 'freedom.' We
M'atch Tommy from a distance as he loiters about in the region of the
pantr}'. Evidently there is a struggle going on within him. He
advances his hand ; he withdraws it ; he takes a step forward ; he looks
about apjorehensively ; he touches the key ; he stops to reflect. Finally
he sighs, and walks away without having done the deed. Of what war-
ring forces has his little mind been tJie theater? Were the combatants
but two — love of jam and 'free-will' ? Can we measure the amount of the
latter by the degree of opposition which it has met and overcome in the
former? Certainly not. Tommy has been whipped before for this
ofi'ense. He has been talked to seriously on many occasions, and he is
not a bad-hearted boy. Fear of detection may influence him more or
lt}ss; the beginning of a love for virtue and a rather well-developed
love of approbation count for something. He has within him a germ of
■self-respect. All these things are enlisted on the side of right conduct,
and the potent influence of just such forces as these even a 'free-will'
parent frankly recognizes, ^o philosopher who has had the fortune to
have a son, and who has cared anything about him, has ever delivered
him over bodily to the tender mercies of 'free-will.' He keeps prodding
at 'free-will,' so to speak, in a more or less deterministic way. It may
be his trump card, but he is never willing to throw away the rest of his
hand. Accordingly, we must assume that the battle has not been a
duel, but a general melee. What measure of credit can 'free-will' as-
sume for the result? How shall we apportion our reward for the
victory? Does the boy deserve no credit except in so far as be has
iicted 'freely' ?

Moreover, how are we even to know which action should be re-
warded? The deterniinist has no great difficulty in picking it out,
for the mere sight of the struggle is to him an indicatioon that encour-
agement is needed and should be given. The 'f ree-willist' can, of

532 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

course, not regard the reward as an encouragement, for it is foolish to
attempt to encourage 'free-will.' Could it be 'encouraged' it would
evidently not be 'free.' And if this notion of encouragement wholly
drops out, there appears no reason why actions performed after a
struggle should be regarded as creditable rather than actions performed
without any struggle at all. Suppose that Tommy has attained such
a fixity of character that he can pass the pantry door twenty times with-
out apparent effort. Does this mean that he has lost his love of jam ?
May it not mean that he is subject to such generous bursts of 'free-will'
that all fleshly inclinations are overcome as soon as they are born ?
Then why should he not be rewarded more generously than before, when
he had such dribblings of 'free-will' as scarce sufficed to bring him out
of the combat alive ?

It appears, then, that it is impossible to ascertain how much credit
is to be allowed for any action, and that it is impossible to discover
what actions are to be regarded as creditable. This does not seem en-
couraging, and may well tend to dampen our 'free-will' ardor. But we
must pluck up our courage, for we are compelled to face a difficulty
which is, if possible, more disheartening, Eeflection discloses the fact
that our theory forces us to deny the validity of the moral judgments
that we have all our lives been passing upon our own actions and those
of our fellows. This is so important a point that I must try to make
it quite clear. It is a point passed over in silence by the 'free-willist.'

Let us suppose that Smith sees Jones struggling in the water, and
makes desperate efforts to save him from drowning. His efforts are
crowned with success, and Jones sits dripping on the bank, with a heart
overflowing with gratitude. But he speedily discovers in Smith a
creditor whose sole interest in the transaction was a pecuniary one. He
saw his money drowning before his eyes, and he di^ihis best to secure it.
Does Jones now owe the man both money and gra,tit)Ude, or does he owe
him money alone? Let us suppose again that we ' have contemplated
with satisfaction the temperate and orderly conduct, of a young man
whom we have regarded as exposed to divers temptations. We feared
he was going to be dissipated, and we have been agreeably disappointed.
We give expression to our pleasure, and he informs us irankly that the
least rumor of misconduct would lead his uncle to disinherit him.
'Wait,' he says 'until the old man dies, and you will see my good time
begin.' Do we, after this avowal, regard him as a model, of virtue, and
a youth to be held up as a pattern ? No man rates as a philanthropist
the scientific enthusiast who visits the sick with assiduity only in order
to secure materials for his contemplated monograph on pain. Before
we judge of human actions we try to find out something about their
setting. We pry into motives and inquire regarding intentions. Pre-
cisely the same act may be good or bad, according to its context. It

THE CREDIT FOR GOOD ACTIONS. 533

iir not a moral act for a savage to save a man alive if he is spared with
the intention of fattening and eating him later.

Now let us suppose that the action under discussion is my contribu-
tion of a dollar to the hoard of the beggar on the corner. Is it a credit-
able action? Is it even a moral action? Only the unreflective will
undertake to answer off-hand that it is. I may have given that dollar
in the hope that one more drinking-bout would finish the beggar, and
relieve me of his unfesthetic presence when I take my daily walk. I may
have given it out of pure vanity, and to compel the admiration of the
pleasing young person who is waiting for the tram. On the other hand,
I may have given it because I was touched by the sight of suffering, and
was willing to make a sacrifice for the sake of relieving it. It seems the
most natural thing in the world to judge that the action was, in the
last case, a creditable one, but was not creditable in the others. We
have been judging of actions in this way all our lives.

But what if the act was a 'free' one ? What if it was not determined
by my character and impulses and the peculiar circumstances in which
I was placed? In this case it cannot be explained by my desire to be
rid of the beggar's presence. The impression made upon me by the fair
onlooker cannot account for it. The sight of the beggar's misery
furnishes no explanation. We cannot ask tvhy the act was done. It
was a 'free' act. It simply appeared. It was not done for the sake of
removing the beggar, tickling my vanity or relieving suffering; for
just in so far as an act is 'free' it cannot be accounted for by any ideas
antecedently in my mind or by my natural tendency to selfishness, to
vanity or to generous movements of sympathy. It is, hence, an act
without a setting — causeless, purposeless, blind. Is it a creditable act?
Are such acts the only creditable acts? Surely we have turned our
face resolutely away from the moral judgments of mankind when we
have committed ourselves to the unnatural doctrine that only 'free' acts
are deserving of credit.

It is quite inconceivable that men should with open eyes defend the
doctrine of 'freedom' on moral grounds. When they attempt to do so,
h is clear that they are really arguing in favor of freedom, a thing well
worth fighting for, and dear to the heart of determinist and 'free-willist'
alike. They have simply fallen into a confusion, and have confounded
two things that are extremely unlike. I should be the last to maintain
that the world could get on properly without philosophers, but I must
frankly admit that the philosopher sometimes falls into error, and is
very apt to take with him in his fall certain of the by-standers who, if
k''t to themselves, would never have thought of tumbling into that par-
ticular ditch.

534

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

'A

O

c
r.

o
o

a
a

en
(n

&
o

o

•A

H
O

a

W

O

o

03

o

"A
o

w

o

o

o
o

f-1
o

a

FOG STUDIES ON MOUNT TAMALPAIS.

535

FOG STUDIES OX MOUNT TAMALPAIS.

By ALEXANDER McADIE.

nr ATE on a February afternoon the passengers on a large Pacific
-L^ Mail steamship sighted the Farallones and doubtless thought as
the pilot came aboard that the long run across the broad ocean not
always true to its name was safely over and danger past. The 'Rio de
Janeiro' came to anchor a little before six o'clock on Thursday night,
February 21, 1901, and the weather being foggy, the captain wisely
remained at anchor until about 4 a. m. when the fog lifted. The lights
of the Cliff House two or three miles away could be seen and the vessel
started on a northeast course with Lime Point dead ahead. There is
some difference of testimony as to whether the Captain or Pilot gave
the order to go ahead. The fog closed down again and the Pilot steered
by the whistle hoping to get the echo from Point Diablo. Xo echo
was heard. The vessel was not moving at full speed, the First Officer
was standing on the starboard side listening for the Fort Point bell and
the Captain and Pilot were on the bridge. No soundings however
were taken. At about 5 :30 a. m. the vessel struck the Fort Point
Reef, backed off and within twenty minutes had gone from sight with
130 of the 210 persons aboard.

The two diagrams herewith show the general approach to the Bay
of San Francisco and in more detail the probable path steered by the
'Rio' with zones of inaudibility of the fog signals.

When all is said and done it appears that the fog was the prime
cause of this appalling accident. Now, while an accident of such
magnitude gives startling emphasis to the need of studying fog, a sum-
mation of the minor accidents for a single year due to fog in any large
seaport would be equally impressive. One cannot cross the sea, run
down the coast or even go over a bay upon a ferry-boat without experi-
encing at times this troublesome condition. Nor is it only when on
the water that we are at the mercy of the fog. Study the statistics of
railway accidents and you will be surprised how often, in the column
giving the cause of collision or other accident, the word fog appears.
Can we help ourselves? Yes; and the first step is to study patiently
and systematically the various types of fog formation. Already the
ability to communicate by means of wireless telegraphy between vessels
at sea and the land removes the greatest element of danger to vessels
caught in fog. The 'Rio de Janeiro' was lost at the entrance to

536

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

7~ama/pa i3

i^oo /o 2S00 fy

The region about San Francisco and Probvble Conditions at Time of Wreck.

Probable Course of 'Rio de Janeiro.'

FOG STUDIES ON MOUNT TAMALPAIS.

537

/(?

what might have been thought to be a well-protected harbor. That is,

there were light-houses and fog whistles along the shore, but the vessel

was helpless, nevertheless, when the fog closed down, for all guiding
points were lost and, owing to the peculiar reflections and refractions of

sound waves in the air, the whistles and bells, as (he accident too sadly
proved, w^ere inaudible.

In the vicinity of San

Francisco the processes of

cloudy condensation in the

free air are very active. It

is no uncommon occurrence

on summer afternoons, when

the wind is blowing at the

rate of twenty-two miles an

hour, to see sharply marked

fog drifts hang like Avhite

blankets over the city hills

or stream through the

Golden Gate like a spectral

army. From the U. S.

Weather Bureau Observa-
tory on Mount Tamalpais,

elevation about 2,400 feet,

one looks down upon such

remarkable fog formations

as are shown in the accom-
panying illustrations.

Now fog, like frost, may be considered to be largely a problem in
air drainage. The condensed vapor, like the frozen vapor, indicates air
motion with certain accompanying changes in temperature. There-
fore the first line of study in connection with fog formation is con-
cerned with temperature gradients; and chiefly the vertical gradient.
Instead of the usual fall in temperature of 1° for each 183 feet eleva-
tion, we find in these San Francisco fogs an increase of temperature
from sea-level upwards. In a given summer month the mean daily
temperature at the upper station was eleven degrees or more warmer
than at the lower station. If the rate of increase were uniform
throughout the 2,500 feet, this would mean a rise of one degree for two
hundred feet elevation. The rate is not uniform, and between the
1,500 feet and 2,000 feet levels is probably often as much as one degree
for fifty feet. Days without fog are as a rule days without this steep in-
verted gradient, and it would seem as if the temperature throughout the
entire mass of air was more uniform. Some approximate vertical sec-
tions of the temperature in a fog bank were obtained by carrying a Mar-

1

1

1

^1

2Z

^^ r.

/■

/

/

\

/

V

-

1

^

/

\

/

\

\

N

\

^1

/

\

<

^l

\

1.

k

\

5

#

\

\

\

'V

\

/

\

\

\

/

nt

If-

r^

/

V

k

^

^

K

0

!h

^

s

S,

k
>.

-

J

ii

y

s

S

"ki

^

>/

111

ri

V

1

!»'

'in

3.

k

it

/<

ie

.t

V

a

£

\

%

th

I

ra

nt

./,<

538

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fog Studies from Mount Tamalpais.

FOG STUDIES ON MOUNT TAMALPAIS.

539

vin meteorograph from the summit to the valley and back, the descent
and ascent requiring about 100 minutes, the distance being about 16
miles. The instrument was hung at the top of an open canopied car in
such a way as to secure a good air circulation. The average dew-point
was 50° F. (10° C.) and the maximum weight of a cubic foot of water
vapor at this temperature and saturation 100 per cent, is a little over 4
grains. Estimating an average fog bank as covering an area of fifty
square miles and extending from the 500-foot level to the 1,500-foot
level, the maximum weight of the water vapor would be about 400,000
tons; and if this condensed vapor could be suddenly precipitated it
would be the equivalent of a rainfall of about one-tenth of an inch.
But condensation and precipitation are not identical. The processes

Mond§y2Z. 1893. Tuesday 23.

Temperature Records.

wbich cause the collapse, if it may be so called, of a cloud of fog are
obscure. Elaborate experimentation is needed at this point before the
problems of fog dissipation or rain-making can be solved. With the
fogs of the San Francisco Bay district and indeed with every dense
cumulo-nimbus or cumulus cloud, the condensation is considerable and it
w^ould seem at times as if but a very gentle initiative would lead to pre-
cipitation. Various methods of removing dust particles from the at-
mosphere have been suggested within the past few years, and possibly in
thus removing the dust the essential nuclei of condensation may be re-
moved. Conversely, in order to bring about precipitation, it may be
fcund necessary to supply at the proper time the proper nuclei. At any
rate, it is known that by various methods, of which may be mentioned
filtering, clarifying, recondensing, calcining and electrifying, smoke,
fog, dust and condensed vapor may be removed from limited spaces. The

540 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

removal of the fog for even a small distance in the neighborhood of a
fog-bound vessel might be of advantage. The chief difficulty at present
would seem to be the quick influx of the circumjacent fog. The supply
of fog might be so great that our dissipators would seemingly produce
no effect. The dissipation of fog and smoke in enclosed areas by
electrical agencies, as strikingly shown in Dr. Lodge's experiments,
leads to the wish to reproduce these experiments in the free air and
upon a large scale. Moreover within the past two years there has been
growing up a theory due chiefl}^ to Zeleny, Elster, Geitel and T. C. K.
Wilson concerning the part played by ions in causing rain. It is known
that the negative ions move more rapidly than the positive ions and that
water vapor will condense more readily on the negative ions. It may

Sunset over a Sea of Fog.

be that under certain unstable conditions some of the more energetic
ions, by relieving the electric tension, inaugurate the formation of the
rain-drop. In studying the electrical potential of the atmosphere, it
has been shown that the approach or retrocession of clouds, especially
cumulus and cumulo-nimbus, could be determined by the changes in
tlie potential values. There was also good reason for believing that
the electrometer gave in certain fluctuations indications of the prox-
imity of invisible vapor masses. Certainly the one instrument upon
which we now rely in studies of fog formation and influence, the mer-
curial thermometer, is far from being a sufficiently sensitive instrument.
Optical methods may furnish apparatus sufficiently delicate. It has

FOG STUDIES ON MOUNT TAMALPAIS. 541

been claimed by some that the polarization of blue sky light can be
used in studying the vertical distribution of fog, and that changes in
atmospheric conditions are shown by this means several hours in ad-
vance of other precursory appearances.

Strangely enough within the past 3'ear and from an unexpected
source, suggestions have been made which should be considered witli
some care and then tested. In discussing the mortar batteries used at
Windisch Feistritz, Dr. Pernter has given us some data concerning
vortex rings. These are the rings which, according to Burgermeister
Stiger and his associates, successfully protect their vineyards from hail.
Whatever the real cause may be regarding hail, we are thankful for the
opportunity to study such large and energetic vortices. These rings are
powerful enough to tear a thick paper screen to pieces at a distance of
]00 meters. On leaving the mortars in a horizontal direction the
whirls have a velocity of about 170 miles per hour or eight times the
velocity of the stiff surface indraft of air on summer afternoons through
the Golden Gate. iVt a distance of 100 meters the velocity was reduced
nearly 50 per cent. With the Suschnig apparatus, the charge of
powder being 250 grammes, Dr. Pernter found an initial velocity of
about 55 meters per second. The probable limit of upward movement
was 400 meters. Dr. Hann has suggested that the results obtained by
shooting these rings into winter fogs should be carefully studied. The
suggestion is pertinent. At Mt. Tamalpais, as we have tried to show,
unusually good opportunities exist for experimenting upon fog. Many
varieties of formation occur. The tule fogs of winter, in one of which
the 'Sio de Janeiro' was lost, sometimes do not exceed 100 feet in depth.
The summer afternoon sea fogs are more dense and more sharply de-
lined. Sonic of the fogs are due to direct cooling by contact; in some
the cooling is due to radiation, and, in the great majority of cases, the
cooling is due to mixture. The differences in temperature, humidity
and air motion are so marked that it is likely that differences in electri-
cal potential, dust-content and ionization also exist. There is urgent
need of bettering our knowledge of these matters. Practical applica-
tions will speedily follow.

The sacrifice of life on that ill-fated steamship on the morning of
February 23 will not have been altogether in vain, if it leads to a
thorough study of the conditions governing fog.

542 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE FRENCH SARDINE INDUSTRY.

By Dr. HUGH M. SMITH,

U. S. COMMISSION OF FISH AND FISHERIE-i.

A MONG the foreign fishery industries on which Americans are
-^-*- dependent for a part of their food supply, few exceed in in-
terest or importance the sardine industry of France. The value of the
French sardines imported into the United States is about one million
dollars annually, and the wholesome, palatable and convenient canned
sardine is consumed in nearly every community. The accompanying
notes on the sardijie and the industries to which it gives rise are ex-
tracted from an article in the 'Bulletin' of the United States Fish Com-
mission for 1901, based on the writer's personal observations in Brit-
tany, the i^rincipal center of the sardine fishery.

The sardine is the leading fishery product taken in the waters of
France. From official statistics it appears that in 1898 the sardine
fishery gave employment to 31,871 fishermen; the number of boats
used was 8,164, valued at 5,934,633 francs; the apparatus employed
was worth 7,030,945 francs; the quantity of sardines taken was 53,924,-
275 kilograms (or 118,633,400 pounds) ; and the selling price of the
fresh fish was 9,204,988 francs (or about $1,840,997).

There exists considerable uncertainty among the fishing interests
and the general public in America and Europe regarding the sardine
of the Bay of Biscay and the Mediterranean Sea. Some persons have
believed that the sardine canned in France is a distinct species, while
others have held that the French sardine, like the sardine of New Eng-
land, is simply the young of some herring-like fish. The term sardine
is a general one, applied to various clupeoid fishes, mostly of small
size, in different parts of the world, and can not be restricted to any
particular fish. Thus, there are the Spanish sardine of the West In-
dies and Florida; the California sardine, found along the entire west
coast of the United States; the Chile sardine; the oil sardine of
India; and the sardines of Japan and New Zealand. But the sardine
par excellence is the French sardine, called also celeren, celan, royan,
galice and cradeau on various parts of the French coast. The name
sardine has reference to the island of Sardinia, in the Mediterranean,
about whose shores the fish is abundant.

As early as 1553, Pierre Belon, a French naturalist, asserted that
the sardine is the young of the pilchard ; and this is the view now held

THE FRENCH SARDINE INDUSTRY.

543

by nearly all authorities. The pilchard, as is well known, is one of the
most important fishes of the southern coast of England, being especially
abundant in Cornwall. Young pilchards or '^sardines' are found on the
Cornish coast, but arc apparently not so numerous as in France and are
in little demand, as canning is very limited in extent; on the other
hand, large sardines or pilchards are caught on the French coast, but
are much less abundant and less important than the small fish.

In allusion to the small sardine being caught almost wholly by
means of bait consisting of fish roe (rogue), the French call it sardine
de rogue, in contradistinction to the large fish which is taken without
bait by-means of drift nets, and hence called sardine de derive. Modern
French Avriters on the sardine fishery seem averse to acknowledging
the specific identity of the sardine and the pilchard; some even fail
to explain or suggest the relation between the large and small fishes of
the west coast of France.

The pilchard is a well-marked species, easily distinguished by prom-
inent radiating lines on the operculum and by large scales, as well as
by other features. The usual length is eight or nine inches; the
length of the largest recorded specimen was fourteen inches (taken in
Cornwall). The sardine of the French coast is a handsome little fish,
whose beauty is not entirely lost in canning. In the water the back is
of a greenish color, but out of the water the upper parts are rich dark
bluish, contrasting strongly with the silver and white of the sides and
abdomen. The scales are very easily detached, but their loss does not
detract seriously from the appearance of the fish, when either fresh
or canned, as the skin is ; ather thick and has a brilliant uniform sil-
very color.

Pilchard or Sardine {Clupea pilchardus.)

The range of the sardine extends from Sweden to the Madeira
Islands. The southern coast of England, the Atlantic coast of France,
and the Mediterranean Sea are the chief centers of abundance.

On the coast of Brittany the sardine de rogue is found about nine
months of the year, being absent from the inshore waters most of the
winter. When the fishing season opens, the fish are reported first at
Arcachon and other southern points on the west coast, and gradually
reach the districts toward the north. During the winter, however, the

544 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

large fish — some a foot in length — are observed at various places on the
coast.

The immature sardines frequent the coast waters throughout the
summer and remain in Brittany until late in fall. Some years, if
the season is mild, they are caught until the first or second week in
Decern licr, but a storm coming any time in November is likely to drive
them away and terminate fishing for the season. In 1900 sardine fish-
ing at Concarneau was ended November 5 — the same date as in 1899
— by a southwest storm, which swept away all the sardines in the bay.

The spawning time on the coasts of England and France is from
June to October. Spawning takes place at a considerable distance
from the land, and ripe or spawning fish are seldom caught, as fishing
is done mostly in the inshore waters. The small fish used for canning
purposes on the French coast are never found with ripe eggs or milt,
and are now known to be immature fish hatched in the summer and
fall of the previous year. The eggs are buoyant, and the average num-
ber extruded is reported as 60,000. In the Mediterranean the sardine
apparently belongs to a difl^erent race, which is smaller than the oceanic
form and reaches maturity when under 7 inches in length.

When sardines first arrive they are poor and unsuitable for canning ;
but as the season advances they improve in quality, and are fatter in
September than in June and in December than in September. Their
food consists mainly of copepods and other small Crustacea. Small
fish eggs are also a favorite food. The fondness of the sardine for such
eggs plays an important part in the fishery.

The sardines go in schools and swim at or near the surface. As
many as 100,000 fish have been taken in one net from one school, but
the usual catch is much less. They are preyed upon by cetaceans and
by many fish — the mackerel, the haddock and the dolphin being
especially destructive on the French coast.

Like other free-swimming oceanic fish, the sardine varies in abun-
dance from year to jcrt; but there is no evidence that the fishing is
effecting any permanent reduction of the supply. During the years
1887 to 1890 there was an alarming scarcity of sardines on the French
coast, and the outlook for the industry was serious, but after four
years the fish returned in their former numbers. The history of the
sardine fishery shows what extensive operations may be supported an-
nually when the natural conditions permit the fish to spawn un-
molested, the spawning grounds in this case being many miles offshore.

Several American fishes resemble the pilchard, among them the sea
herring and the California sardine. The former is extensively canned
on the coast of Maine, and often placed on the market as 'genuine
French sardines in pure olive oil'; the latter is canned to a limited
extent in southern California.

TEE FRENCH SARDINE INDUSTRY.

545

The sardine fishery of France dates back many years, and even in
the early part of the eighteenth century was an important industry, but
it has become much more extensive since the introduction of canning.
The buikling of railroads has also benefited the fishery by providing
means of shipping to the inland points that part of the catch which
can not be disposed of locally.

Sardine Fisherman's House, Brittany.

The province of Brittany supports by far the most productive fish-
eries and is the center of the canning industry. Here in 1898 were
21,684 fishermen, with 4,611 boats, and here were caught 49,478,365
kilograms of sardines, selling at 7,572,347 francs. The leading center
is Douarnenez, wliich is credited with 4,200 fisherman, 710 boats, and
over 18,000,000 kilograms of sardines, valued at 2,442,000 francs.
Next in importance is Concarneau, with 2,695 fisherman, 490 boats,
and 9,163,000 kilograms of sardines, worth 1,719,890 francs. Other
important places in Brittany are Audierne, Quimper, Port Louis, Etel,
Quiberon, La Turballe and Le Croisic. Outside of Brittany the fishery
is most extensive at Sables-d'Olonne, St. Gilles-sur-Vie and Arcachon.
On the Mediterranean coast of France sardines are caught at numerous
places and by many fisherman, but only in relatively small quantities.
The fisheries here in 1898 gave emplo}Tnent to 7,794 men, using 2,861
boats, the catch being 2,129,519 kilograms, valued at 987,738 francs.

Formerly in parts of Brittany nets were used to surround the
schools and tlien stones were thrown in to frighten the fish into the

VOL. LIX. — 38

546 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

meshes. In this w&y large catches were often made and the market
was glutted ; but the method came into disrepute and is no longer fol-
lowed. Fishing is now carried on exclusively with gill nets, made of
very fine cotton twine; they are 45 yards long and 500 meshes deep,
and are kept in position in the water by numerous cork floats and a
few stone sinkers. The mesh is necessarily very small, as it is intended
to gill the tiny sardines. The nets vary in fineness to suit the different
runs of sardines, and are of about three standard sizes. The largest
mesh is equal, in America, to 0.66 inch, bar measure, while the smallest
size equals 0.40 inch. The complement of each boat is 10 nets,
representing the three sizes of mesh.

The nets are dyed a bright greenish blue, and when suspended
from the masts to dry add to the picturesqueness of the fishing boats
and the wharf scenes. The dyeing is for the twofold purpose of preserv-
ing the nets and rendering them less conspicuous when in the water.

In the fishery for sardines for canning, bait is almost as important
as the boats and nets. In no other net fishery in the world is bait so
extensively employed and so essential to the success of the industry.
The scarcity of bait is always a serious matter in the fishing districts,
curtailing the catch, reducing the income of the fisherman, and often
producing distress among the fisherfolk. It is therefore remarkable
that for this indispensable article the French should be absolutely
dependent on other countries and that the success of the fishery for
sardines should be intimately related to the fisheries for other species
in distant lands.

In the early days of the sardine fishery, especially prior to the estab-
lishment of canneries, small shrimp-like animals, about half an inch in
length, were much used as bait. The gathering of this kind of bait
was an occupation of the women, who sought the schools in the bays
and coves, catching them in large canvas bag-nets. They frequently
made their best catches in water up to their necks, when the weather
was bad and the water along the shores was thick. The taking of these
little creatures appears to have been prohibited many years ago, because
of the supposed destruction of the eggs at the time of catching the
shrimps. Although the interdiction is now removed, little effort is
made to secure this form of bait.

The bait now in general use is the salted eggs of the cod, though
the eggs of hake, haddock, pollock, cusk, herring, mackerel and many
other fishes are also employed. Cod eggs are not known to possess any
properties which make them superior to the eggs of several other species,
but owe their prominence to the abundance of cod in regions on which
the sardine fishermen depend for their bait supply. The annual con-
sumption of roe in France at present is 40,000 to 45,000 barrels, for
which the fishermen pay about $300,000. It is reported that in favor-

THE FRENCH SARDINE INDUSTRY.

547

able seasons as many as 25,000 barrels of roe have been expended in
Concarneau alone.

For at least two centuries cod roe has been imported from Norway,
which country has always furnished the greater part of the sardine bait.
Other countries which have contributed supplies are Holland, New-
foundland and the United States. From time to time the French
Government has encouraged its own cod fishermen (at St. Pierre and
Miquelon; on the Grand Banks; in the waters of Iceland, and in the
North Sea) to preserve the roes of cod and other fish, and in 1816
offered a bounty of $4.00 a barrel for roe made from fish caught by
them; but this and other inducements have had little effect on the
supply from native sources.

Sardine Boats in the Harbor of Concarneau.

The price of roe has varied greatly from year to year. In the early
jjart of the eighteenth century, bait was bought for 50 cents to $1.00
a barrel, and throughout that century prices were comparatively low.
In the second decade of the last century prices reached their highest
point; they were apparently never less than $32.00, and ranged from
that to $60.00 per barrel. By 1822 the price had fallen as low as
85.00 or $6.00, and since then has seldom been as high as $25.00 or
$26.00, averaging $12.00 or $15.00 The average price for Norwegian
roe recently has been about $7.00 per barrel. In 1900, owing to the
failure of the Norwegian cod fishery and the resulting scarcity of roe,
the price for Norwegian bait rose to $24.00 per barrel. The price of

548 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

American and Newfoundland roe is but little more than half that of
Norwegian. In 1900 the best American roe was selling at $8.60 a
barrel and in the previous year at only $4.60.

The sardine fishermen use peanut meal or flour to mix with the
roe, it being much cheaper. Floating lightly and being quite con-
spicuous, it attracts the attention of the sardines, wliich readily de-
vour it.

In the Mediterranean sardines are caught during every month of
the year. On the west coast, however, the fishing season opens in Feb-
ruary and continues to November, rarely extending into December.
Fishing in the canning districts is continued as late as practicable,
usually as long as the fish remain in abundance, as their condition at
that time is good.

The sardine fishery is emphatically a shore fishery, and most of it
is done within a very short distance of the home ports. This permits
the use of smaller and less expensive boats than would otherwise be re-
quired, and insures the landing of the fish a short time after capture.
The early fishing for the sardines de derive is mostly within 1 or 2
miles of the shore and rarely beyond 5 or 6 miles. In the summer and
fall fishing with bait, the boats may go 10 miles to sea, but the largest
part of the catch is taken within 3 or 4 miles of shore, and a very con-
siderable proportion close inshore in the bays.

The fishing in the early part of the season — that is, in March, April
and May — is done mostly with old nets and is conducted only at night.
WTiile the boats are lying near by and the men sleeping, the nets are
allowed to drift. No bait is used. The fish thus caught are not fat
and are not used for canning, but are salted or sold for immediate con-
sumption. The regular fishing is carried on only by day. The boats
start for the fishing-grounds early in the morning (2 to 4 o'clock), so
as to be there when day breaks. They may also have to leave earlier
if the tide would otherwise beach them. The best fishing is in the early
morning, and the boats are often back to port by 9 or 10 o'clock with
full fares.

When a boat arrives on the fishing-grounds, a net is shot and slowly
towed by means of a short line attached to the cork line and fastened
in the stem of the boat. In summer fishing, when sardines are abun-
dant, the fishermen often let one net go adrift when it is full of fish,
trusting to pick it up later, and put out another net. Indeed, a boat
may have fish in three nets at one time, though this is rarely the case.

Bait is always used in the day fishing, being necessary in order to
attract the fish to the vicinity of the boats and into the nets. The cast-
ing of the bait, on the proper use of which a great deal of the success
of fishing depends, is always done by the master or 'patron,' who stands
in the stern of the boat on a little platform and uses the flour and roe

THE FRENCH SARDINE INDUSTRY.

549

Sardine Boats sailing for the Fishing-grounds.

A Glimpse of the Concarneau Sardine iLEET, discharging the Day's Catch.

55°

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

as required. When the fish have come toward the surface and are
on one side or the other of the net, his object is to cast the bait in such
a way that they will rush against the net and become gilled.

Considerable skill and experience are of course necessary in man-
aging the net and in having it hang properly in the water and not be-
come folded or wavy owing to currents or tide. Unless the net is
straight or gently curved, the fish will see and avoid it. When a net
contains fish and is ready for hauling, it is taken in the boat and the fish
are removed from the meshes by gently shaking the net.

The sardines are often found in a compact body, and the boats will
be concentrated in a comparatively small area, at times so close together
that the operation of the net would seem almost impossible and the
chance of catching fish very improbable. The entire fleet of a given

Fishing Boats on the Shoke, Concaknkau.

port — consisting of several hundred boats — may be at work on one
school and fishing literally ew masse instead of individually.

No ice or other preservative is used on the fish, which are landed a
short time after gilling. The fish reach port in good condition, and
are often at the canneries within one or two hours after capture.
Should the failure or unfavorable direction of the wind threaten to de-
lay the arrival of the boats, and hence impair the quality of the fish, the
crews row leisurely back to the port.

Soon after reaching port the nets are spread for drying, being hauled
to the top of the masts and suspended between them for this purpose.
When all the fieet has arrived and the nets are spread, the view of the
maze of blue nets, sails and masts is most interesting and unique.

THE FRENCH SARDINE INDUSTRY. 551

When the fishing boats begin to arrive, the wharves, which have
practically been deserted, assume a very busy and animated appearance,
and as the arrivals increase in number the bustle among the different
classes of people becomes intense, although good nature and good order
prevail. The foreign visitor here witnesses some exceedingly interest-
ing and picturesque fishing scenes — thousands of fishermen in their
coarse blouses and flat cloth caps, with trousers rolled up and their
feet bare or in the huge wooden shoes of the country, unloading their
fish and carrying them to the canneries; hundreds of women and girls
in short dark skirts, white caps and collars, and wooden shoes, negotia-
ting for sardines, receiving the fish from the fishermen, and dispatching
them to the canneries; sardine boats, either rowed or sailed, entering
the harbor in groups or singly and coming up to the already congested
docks ; fish wagons going to and from the factories, and a mixed crowd
of merchants, sight-seers, artists and idlers. The commingled noise
of waves, boats, wagons and tongues is underlain by the incessant
lattle of wooden shoes on the stony pavements.

The prices received by the fishermen are regulated by the factory
operators, and depend on the supply, the size and quality of the fish, the
weather and other considerations. The fish of each boat are virtually
sold at auction, only there is as a rule no counter bidding, the prices
offered by one or two factories being adopted by the others and accepted
by the fishermen. If a fisherman is not satisfied with the price offered
by one factory, he is at liberty to seek a higher price elsewhere. Some
boats always sell their catch to the same factory, and all of them, to a
greater or less extent, deal with particular factories. The maximum
price which factory operators can profitably pay for sardines is $5.00
per 1,000 fish. The dealers in fresh sardines can pay as much as $7.00
per 1,000. At times the demand for sardines to be sold fresh (au vert)
tends to keep up the prices ; but this use is limited and does not inter-
fere greatly with the cannery demands.

Women usually represent the factories as purchasing agents. They
are given considerable discretion by their employers and are very sharp
in making bargains. Payments are not made in money, but in tokens
or tickets which are redeemed weekly. As the fishermen deliver their
fish, two baskets full at a time, to the agents of the canneries, they
receive a metal tag or token with the name of the buyer on it. When
all the fish are landed the metal pieces are counted and surrendered,
and a claim check is issued in their place. At the end of each week
the master or the owner of the boat (sometimes the same person) goes
to the factory, receives the money due, and apportions the earnings of
the crew.

The division of the proceeds of fishing is rather complicated. The
boat, nets, equipment and bait usually belong to a nonfisherman (who

552 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

may own a number of boats). The men of the crew furnish their own
food, fuel and clothing. The owner is entitled to half the sales of fish,
and 'the remainder goes to the crew in the following proportions:
There being 6 men in the crew, 4 of them get equal parts, the captain
receives the share of one man plus 10 per cent, and the cook half a
share. Dividing the proceeds into 23 parts, the boat owner is entitled
to 11 parts, 4 members of the crew to 8 parts, the master to 2 parts and
tlie cook to 1 part; the share of the master being increased by 10 per
cent, of 2 parts and that of each member of the crew diminished by
21/2 per cent.

From the time the men begin to fish until the close of the season,
they pay to the government 1.10 francs per month, in consideration
of which they are pensioned on attaining the age of 50, provided they
have served 300 months on sea duty (either in fishing or in any other
maritime occupation). They also pay 1.50 francs per month as
premium on an insurance fund which the government allows for in-
jury due to the vicissitudes of sea life. In case of death, the family
of the fisherman receives an annual pension depending on the size of
the family and on age and length of sea service of the deceased, the
minimum sum being 300 francs; naval service increases the pension.

The average stock per boat in a given season varies greatly on
different parts of the French coast, depending on various local causes
besides the abundance of fish, such as weather, bait supply, local de-
mand, shipping facilities, energy with which fishing is prosecuted
and other evident factors. The boats fishing out of Brittany ports
have a larger average yield than those of other ports of the west
coast; and those in the Mediterranean have by far the smallest stocks.
Thus, in 1898, the average catch per boat was about 10,700 kilograms
of sardines in Brittany, 3,300 kilograms in the southern part of the
Bay of Biscay and only 745 kilograms in the Mediterranean.

The construction of the first sardine canning establishment dates
from about 1845, since which time the growth of the business has been
almost uninterrupted. The factories gave to the sardine fishery a
great impetus, and to-day are the chief supporters of the very extensive
fishing operations in the Bay of Biscay. They employ many thousand
persons, at what are considered good wages, and in some of the fishing
towns give work to practically all able-bodied persons who are not en-
gaged in fishing. In Concarneau, a town of 10,000 people, fully 3,000
men, women and children are directly connected with the sardine
canning business, besides the fishermen. Most of the work in connec-
tion with the canning of sardines is done by women and girls, a few
men being employed for special duties for which women are not
adapted. The factories are generally large stone structures surrounded
by a stone wall and inclosing a courtyard. Some are able to utilize

THE FRENCH SARDINE INDUSTRY. 553

upward of a quarter of a million of fish daily. The yearly output
of individual establishments is from 300,000 to 4,000,000 or 5,000,000
boxes. No complete statistics for the canning indvistry are available,
but over 100 factories are operated and not less than 15,000 persons
are employed therein. Concarneau and Douarnenez have more fac-
tories than any other localities, the number operated in 1900 being
29 and 25, respectively. A large number of the canning establish-
ments are owned or leased by companies having headquarters at
Bordeaux and Nantes.

The various processes to which the sardines are subjected in the
course of canning may now briefly be noticed. As soon as the fish
reach the factories, their heads and viscera are removed by women, who
perform their work with great rapidity. The fish are then sorted by
size into large tubs of strong brine, where they remain for about an
hour. They are then placed in small wicker baskets and washed in
either fresh or salt water for a few seconds, to remove loose scales, dirt
and undissolved salt.

Drying, the next step, is done preferably in the open air, and a large
part of the product is so treated. For open-air drying the fish are ar-
ranged by hand, one by one, in wire baskets or trays, holding about
150 fish of medium size, placed on wooden frames or flakes. The
distinctive feature of the trays is their division into about 7 V-shaped
crosswise compartments, in which the sardines are placed in regular
rows, with their tails upward, so as to promote the escape of water
from the abdominal cavity. The sardines remain out for a variable
time, depending on their size, the state of the atmosphere, etc. The
usual time in favorable weather is one hour. In damp, foggy or rainy
weather the sardines must be dried indoors by artificial heat, and dry-
ing ensues much sooner than in the open air. Some factories, not
being provided with driers, are unable to operate ifi such weather. In
most of the factories, especially those more recently constructed, arti-
ficial heat is supplied in a special drying chamber by means of steam
pipes.

From the drying fiakes the fish are taken in the same wire baskets to
the cooking room and immersed in boiling oil, in open vats of various
sizes and construction. As the fish are quite dry, much of the oil
is taken up in cooking and has to be replaced from time to time by
fresh oil. The immersion in oil usually lasts about two minutes, but
varies with the size of the fish and is best gauged by experience. The
baskets are first removed to a table or platform with an inclined metal
top, where the surplus oil is allowed to drain from the fish, and then
taken to the packing room. There the sardines are carefully placed
in tin cans. After the cans are sealed, they are immersed in boiling
water for several hours ; this accomplishes a fourfold purpose : ( 1 ) The

554

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Group of Employees in Yard of a Cannery, Brittany.

Sardines drying on Grills in Yard of Cannery.

THE FRENCH SARDINE INDUSTRY. 555

cooking of the fish is completed; (2) the bones are softened; (3)
the bacteria in the oil and fish are killed; (4) the presence of leaks
in the cans is disclosed. After cooling, the cans are placed in dry saw-
dust and stirred from time to time; this absorbs the oil and moisture
on the surface, and renders the cans, clean and ready for packing.

The sardine manufacturers ostensibly employ only two kinds of oil
in their canning operations — olive oil and arachide or peanut oil. Na-
tive olive oil is used with the best quality of sardines. Fish packed in
it will remain in good condition ten years or longer, and are reported
to be better the second year after packing than earlier. Arachide oil
i? extensively employed. It is made in Bordeaux, Fecamp and Mar-
seilles from peanuts imported from India, Senegal and other parts of
Africa, and other countries. It comes in three grades, the best quality
costino; less than one-third as much as the best olive oil. Peanut oil is
largely used to meet the American demand for a low-priced sardine.
Most of the cheaper French sardines exported to America are packed
in peanut oil, which is practically tasteless. While it is reported that
the manufacturers knowingly handle only the oils named, it is under-
stood that cottonseed oil, being tasteless and cheap, is used by the
French oil-dealers for adulterating both olive and peanut oils. A can-
ner may fry his sardines in peanut oil and fill the cans with olive oil,
or vice versa; or one oil, with or without the admixture of cottonseed
oil, may be used throughout the process.

There are various other ingredients with which or in which the
sardines are packed to give them flavor or piquancy. Some of the very
best goods are prepared with melted butter instead of oil; these are
mostly for special French trade. Tomato sauce, pickles and truffles
are also used. With most of the oil sardines a small quantity of
spices is added in order to impart a flavor. The usual ingredients
for each can are 1 or 2 cloves, quarter or half of a laurel leaf, and a
small piece of thyme ; these are put in the can before the fish, so that
they will be on top when the can is opened. The fresh leaves of tar-
ragon are sometimes used.

Americans need hardly be told that French sardines, when of the
best quality, have a flavor and richness which make them preferable
to the sardines prepared on the Atlantic coast of the United States
from the young of the sea herring. French sardines of average grade,
even when canned in peanut and cottonseed oil, are superior in pala-
tability to the great bulk of the American output; while the cheaper
grades of French sardines — which unfortunately find a ready market
in the United States— are certainly not preferable to much of the
native pack.

The conditions which underlie the general superiority of the French
canned sardines, and the steps which may be followed in America for

556 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

narrowing the gap which now sej^arates the products of the two coun-
tries, appear to the writer to he chiefly as follows: (1) The methods
adopted in the French sardine fishery result in the landing of the fish in
excellent condition. This is the main object and is never lost sight of.
The fish are caught singly in a delicate mesh, removed by hand, care-
fully kept on board the boats so as to avoid crowding and mashing,
counted by hand into small baskets, taken to the factories within a few
hours after being caught, and promptly put through the preserving
process, so that ordinarily the deterioration which ensues is not worthy
of mention. (2) In France the sardines caught in the early part of
the season are not canned, because they are not in the best condition.
It is only after the fish have become fat that they are considered suit-
able for canning. The fattening depends on an abundance of proper
food, and along with it is an improvement in the flavor and general
quality of the flesh.

While the young sea herring is an excellent fish, it may be admitted
that even when at its best its meat is inferior to that of the fq,t young
pilchard in richness. The latter has a peculiar flavor which, to a
considerable degree, is preserved in canning and which probably can
not be successfully imitated in the sea herring. However, the differ-
ence in flavor between the French and the American sardines on which
many persons lay much stress appears to the writer to be of only sec-
ondary importance. The taste for French sardines has been acquired
and perpetuated in the United States because of the long-continued
unsatisfactory quality of American sardines. The herring is naturally
no less wholesome than the pilchard. If it is caught for canning only
when in prime condition, and if, in the form of canned sardines, it
is placed on the markets with the minimum amount of deterioration
and with such adjuvants in the way of oil, spices, etc., as may be suit-
able, it should and will receive ample recognition at home, and meet
with a constantly increasing demand at prices that are now hardly
dreamed of.

The history of a few canneries on our east coast during recent
years has shown that a very marked improvement in the quality of
American sardines is entirely practicable, and, furthermore, is highly
appreciated by consumers, as evidenced by the much higher prices they
are willing to pay and the steady demand beyond the capacity of the
factories. With regard to the sardines of the Pacific coast of the
United States, there is no reason why they should not, when properly
canned, prove equal to the French fish in every respect. The high
reputation which has been acquired by the comparatively small quanti-
ties packed in California during the past five or six years, and the ex-
cellent prices which they have commanded, argue well for the success
of an extensive business.

THE LATE EPIDEMIC OF SMALLPOX. SSI

THE LATE EPIDEMIC OF SMALLPOX IN THE

UNITED STATES.

By Dr. JAMES KEVINS HYDE,

RUSH MEDICAL COLLEGE.

rriHE adaptability of man to his environment is one of many gen-
-*- eroiis provisions for his welfare. But it is a provision with condi-
tions. The adaptation once secure, even a temporary failure of com-
plete adjustment to the environment may be perilous.

The commercial travelers of all countries are accounted, on the
whole, as of a healthy class; they breathe all airs, they drink all
waters, they consume all foods with impunity. They are rarely adjusted
to a single environment for any length of time. The farmer, on the
other hand, long habituated to his narrow circle of surroundings,
would often become seriously ill if for a time he should leave his
farm and village to breathe the air and drinlc the water and consume
the food that are familiars of the traveling salesman who would sell
a lightning-rod for the protection of the farmhouse.

This adaptability extends to a surprising degree . toward the limit
of endurance of toxic agencies. The farmer whose case has been supposed
may year after year drink with impunity the water from a well con-
taminated with germs that would promptly induce typhoid fever in one
wholly unaccustomed to a daily dosage of the poison. But the same
farmer may lose his immunity if for any length of time he removes to
another residence and afterward, returning to his own place, makes use
of the contaminated water to which he was once habituated.

The greatest peril from loss of adaptation to environment lies in
the changes wrought by the sudden removal of a man from his coun-
try home, or even from a less salubrious city residence, to a situation
where men are massed together in considerable number. Here a new
and complex problem is presented. If every man of those thus suddenly
congregated had recently surrendered his adaptation to a special en-
vironment, the chances of thus begetting disease are enormously multi-
plied. Such a condition is presented in prisons, hospitals, great fairs
(such as those at Nijni-Novgorod, Chicago and Paris), and especially
in the camps of soldiers. The camp as a focus of disease is more potent
than all others; for one reason, among others, that even though previ-
ously subjected to selection by physical examination, and supposedly
under the direction of sanitarians, the recruits are not free to select for

558 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

themselves their sleeping places, food and clothing, but are at many
points under subjection. Not only are they densely massed together,
but they are not adapted to the new environment, even after they be-
come veterans, who may be classed as respects immunity with the com-
mercial traveler and the 'globe-trotter.'

War and pestilence are twin brothers, but they do not always work
side by side. Often pestilence follows war ; more rarely they reap their
dreadful harvest on the same day. The word 'pestilence' should be
understood to include not merely the grave plagues that have decimated
the human race, but the less severe epidemics of disease which have
spread over large areas of space and affected to a less extent great
numbers of the human family. Even thus, however, in comparison,
the deadliness of war is far surpassed by its grim camp-follower.
Where the one slays its thousands, the other destroys its ten thousands.

In this country, the epidemic visitations following war have been
both mitigated and severe. We fought Great Britain in the Eevolution,
and soon after were afflicted with maladies some of which had not
before tormented our people. Soon after 1780 the daily papers of Bos-
ton, New York and Philadelphia were filled with advertisements of
remedies for the itch, a malady which had never before so multiplied on
our soil, water being abundant, soap cheap and the habits of our fore-
fathers cleanly. The War of 1812 was chiefly naval and its aftermath
of disease insignificant, for the reason that of all afloat the American
war vessel has ever been the most scrupulously clean. But the Mexican
War was followed by an epidemic of cholera of severe grade; and the
late Civil War was the precursor of a succession of typho-malarial fevers
that were previously almost unknown save in certain special locali-
ties and to physicians there resident. In a similar way the plague fol-
lowed the Saracen armies under Mahomet in 622; syphilis spread
through Europe after the campaign of the dissolute Frenchmen who
followed to Italy the standard of Charles VIII. ; and the English paid
a price for the crushing of the last of the Plantagenets on Bosworth
field in the epidemic of 'sweating sickness' that ensued.

Our late war with Spain was followed by an epidemic disorder
which spread extensively throughout the United States, and which has
attracted but little attention from our public economists, for the
Teason that it has been suggested to few to see the results in a com-
prehensive survey of the broad area involved in the extension of the
disease. The malady spread from the eastern and southern borders
of the United States to the Middle West, and thence in regular progres-
sion to the Pacific Slope, including in its progress not merely the
States where there are efficient health boards, possessing ample powers
and trained officials, operating with modern methods, such as New
York, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Illinois; but also the as yet partially

TEE LATE EFIDEMIC OF SMALLPOX. 559

settled districts of the further West as far as Idaho, Oregon and Cali-
fornia. The sweep of the malady has included individuals of the
white race,, the Indians and the negroes, the well-to-do and the poor,
the filthy and the cleanl}^, people of all sorts and conditions. If the
results had been in any considerable proportion grave, the entire
country would have been alarmed, and the attention of all classes con-
centrated with a profound interest upon the earliest invasion and prog-
ress of the disease in the several localities where it spread. But, for-
tunately, the results were mild, so mild, indeed, that the nature of the
epidemic, certainly at first, was misunderstood in almost all the places
where its victims were discovered. Medical men, well trained in their
profession, in many cases could not recognize the nature of the malady
by reason of the special features it now for the first time presented. Some
physicians, even after demonstration by experts of the character of the
symptoms before their eyes, refused to accept the inevitable conclusions.
Though obviously a contagious disease and one spreading in epidemic
form in an astonishingly large number of villages and towns. East and
West, the victims of the disease, because of the very general misappre-
hension respecting its nature, were permitted free access to those not
affected. In many such centers of population, persons betraying all the
external evidences of the disease attended churches, schools and thea-
ters; delivered milk, groceries and other provisions at the houses of
their customers; officiated in public stations; and even slept in beds
occupied by other non-infected members of the same family. A study
of the special character of this epidemic possesses interest, because,
as a matter of fact, the malady was smallpox.

The history of smallpox in classical career has been studied with
a patient faithfulness and with an attention to every detail that is set
forth fully in most of the text-books. Few trained physicians are
ignorant of the essential facts thus collated. In the late epidemic
visiting this country, confusion in many cases arose from the total
failure of the symptoms of the disease to correspond with the classical
types previously portrayed in the books and encountered in practice.
Almost all the histories of smallpox in the past have been descriptive
of epidemics that spread among a people either previously unpro-
tected from the disease by modem methods, or through the medium
of individuals not so protected. It might, however, have been ex-
pected that an epidemic of disease occurring during the last century
and another at the beginning of the present, operating on a different
soil and under different conditions, would exhibit differences in type.

That smallpox may be so modified as to be stripped of every one of
its formidable features has long been known. The so-called variola
sine variolis (smallpox without pocks) is not a fiction of the schools,
but a fact of experience. In these instances, after a day or two in

56o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

which there may be slight sensations of chilliness and possibly moder-
ate fever, the disease actually not preventing the patient from attend-
ing to his or her usual vocation, the end is reached, and without the
occurrence of eruptive symptoms. These cases are sufficiently common,
and the proof of the reality of the variolous process in one class, where
the patient afterward is not capable of receiving disease in an epidemic,
is substantiated by the proofs furnished by another class of cases, in
Avhich, for example, a pregnant woman, having suffered no more than
in the instance cited, later brings into the world a child covered with
unmistakable symptoms of the disease.

From the extreme of benignancy illustrated in such a group of cases
to another in which symptoms are exhibited of a severity just short
of the pronounced features of classical smallpox, there is every
gradation and not a few excursions to the one side or the other
of oddity and apparent caprice. In the late epidemic, physicians were
often at sea respecting the nature of the disease, because, perhaps,
after a regular onset of classical and threatening symptoms, there
followed an almost absurd abortion of the morbid process, which
in twenty- four hours or more lost every menacing feature; or the
eruptive phenomena failed to develop the characteristic fluting or
puckering of the vesico-pustules known technically as 'umbilication' ;
or the peculiar odor of the disease was lacking; or the mouth failed to
exhibit symptoms; or the progression of the eruptive phenomena from
point to point of the body-surface was not according to rule.

The question of the influence of vaccination upon the victims of the
epidemic and others aroused special interest. It was claimed in many
of the localities where the disease prevailed that the vaccinated and
unvaccinated suffered alike; and hence that vaccination did not pro-
tect. It was further claimed that in some cases vaccination had been
effective in those who were convalescent from the new disease. And
thus blunders innumerable complicated the question, the answer to
which was of the highest moment to the welfare of the commonwealth.
The disease was variously called 'Cuban itch,' 'Porto Eico scratches,'
'Cuban measles,' 'chicken-pox,' 'Porto Kican chicken-pox,' 'Spanish
measels,' etc. These popular names constituted the jargon of the igno-
rant. There are no maladies in Cuba, Porto Eico or Spain recognized
by any such terms or others like them.

Greed is among the most potent of human motives, and it must be
admitted that in the presence of the late epidemic, among those who
were ignorant of its nature, there were to be found others who pre-
ferred to close their eyes to the facts. Merchants did not care to suffer
the paralysis of their local trade which usually is wrought by the panic
that flees before a pestilence. Editors of papers in the smaller towns
were unwilling to spread the news to their immediate rivals in the

THE LATE EPIDEMIC OF SMALLPOX. 561

adjacent county that their readers were victims of a disease which
should be fought by quarantine. School boards did not care to dislo-
cate the machinery of their system. Manufacturers pleaded for the
families likely to be ruined if their works were shut down. In the
minds of many there were a shame and a disgrace associated with the
fact that they were singled out for the explosions of the pest; and
there was some reason for this. Hence, in a considerable proportion of
cases, the officers of local government, the large employers of labor,
school superintendents and others refused to accept the facts, basing
their belief on the evident mildness of the malady, and often upon
the remarkable result that after a fortnight or more of the prevalence
of the disease in their community there had been either no fatal results
or so few that in several hundreds of cases the disproportionate mor-
tality was so small as to disprove the accusation that smallpox was
prevalent.

And yet smallpox indeed it was; mitigated, it is true, but still
capable of awaking to a frightful activity in a favorable field and at an
opportune moment. For it is among the facts established by a bitter
experience that the mildest and most modified type of the disease,
varioloid, for example, of insignificant features, may be the source of
one of those epidemics of smallpox which rival in their mortality the
most direful of the scourges that have afflicted the race.

Why was the late epidemic the mildest in its tjrpe and consequences
of any of the same nature that have preceded it ? Why were its features
so masked that even physicians of experience failed to recognize them ?
Why was the resulting mortality so slight that the malady awakened
little dread in the communities which it invaded, the people, made
familiar by contact with its manifestations, failing to exhibit the
horror which has usually been excited by its presence ?

The answer is inwrought with the solution of some of the tre-
mendous problems of the future of the human race. If devastating
plagues cannot be wholly obliterated, can they be so modified by scien-
tific methods that they are gradually converted into trifling ailments,
productive of minimized danger and followed by trifling sequels? The
culture-tubes and culture-plates of our bacteriological laboratories have
spelled out the answer in sterilized media. The potency of almost all
germs may be first gradually weakened and later annihilated by cultiva-
tion in special soils. Fraenkel has demonstrated that an enduring de-
crease, even a complete and irrevocable loss of virulence, has been pro-
duced by artificial cultivation of most of the different species of patho-
genic bacteria, among which may be cited as conspicuous examples the
germs of swine-erysipelas, of symptomatic anthrax and of pneumonia.
Thus a minute organism, descended from a death-dealing source, may

VOL. LIX. — 39

562 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

become in the culture-tubes of the experimenter as harmless as those
found in an ordinary infusion of hay, such as the bacillus suhtilis.
Even thus the wild boar is proven the ancestor of the domestic hog, and
the wild-cat the remote progenitor of the Angora kitten.

Even scarlet fever, under the impulse of some such causes as those
under discussion, has evolved a 'new type,' which has been set forth by
a competent health officer. Dr. William Eobertson, of Leith. He re-
ports that compulsory notification has not only lowered the mortality
of scarlet fever, but actually modified its type, so much so that it
is now difficult to tell when one has or has not to deal with the
suspected disorder. On every side one hears it repeated that epidemics
are now characterized by a want of symptoms and signs. The bright
red rash is seldom seen, and when there is a rash it disappears before
the arrival of the medical attendant. If one looks for throat-signs,
they, too, may have been transitory. The symptoms of onset are so slight
that even an anxious parent takes no notice of a passing indisposition.

These are the evidences, oftentimes somewhat vague, but again both
significant and unmistakable, that the dream of the scientist is to have
its realization in the future. Few believe that the great pests of the
himian family will be suddenly jugulated or annihilated. The gradual
extinction of each by modification, by attenuation of virus, and by
elimination of grave symptoms, is the aim of scientific medicine, and
its disciples can thank God and take courage for the fruits of their
labor, realized each year in larger measure and with fuller promise.

The germ of all epidemics of smallpox is one, but the soils on
which it has grown are many. The culture-tubes and culture-plates on
which it has been propagated until it has lost much of its potency and
even many of its features are the bodies of the men and women of the
last quarter of the nineteenth and the early part of the twentieth cen-
turies.

The late epidemic of smallpox in the United States was the legiti-
mate fruit of the Spanish- American War, and the popular terms by
which it was designated among the common people, like almost all folk-
words, contained a kernel of truth. Cuba and Porto Eico, before our
armies descended upon their shores, were like the Philippine Islands,
very abiding-places and citadels of smallpox. Our returning troops
brought back with them the effective elements which lighted up the
late epidemic in the United States. But the germ-carriers in this in-
stance were our own previously vaccinated soldiers. The germ was
attenuated in its potency at the outset. When it gathered to itself the
added power by which it was enabled to spread from community to
community, its extension was not through a population virgin of pro-
tection by previous vaccination, but for the most part constituted either
of the vaccinated or of the children of the vaccinated.

THE LATE EPIDEMIC OF SMALLPOX. 563

Unvaccinated but yet 'children of the vaccinated' — is any degree
of immunity conferred by inheritance? However difficult of exact
demonstration, the affirmative must be accepted not merely as a logical
sequence of the experiments in the laboratory to which reference
has been made, but by certain clinical phenomena of striking impor-
tance. For example, it is well known that among some of the immi-
grants touching our shores for the first time, who come from countries
where the mosquito is not found, notably from English homes, the
ravages produced in midsummer, when women and children especially
are lodged in cheap boarding-houses, with windows unprotected by
screens, the results of the attacks of the American insect upon their
exposed skins are of a grade of severity unparalleled among natives of
our soil. Generations of Americans have succeeded in establishing a
partial immunity by the mere succession of these accidents in a long
series of summers ; so that while they may, and actually do, suffer from
mosquito bites, the effects are far milder and without any proportion
to those experienced by the immigrant. A striking illustration of this
fact is recorded in the history of the Eevolutionary War, when in the
midst of their first summer on this soil the mercenary troops from
Hesse-Darmstadt and Hesse-Cassel were so savagely attacked on their
march from Trenton that whole platoons of troops were unable to dis-
tinguish objects through their swollen eye-lids, and were thus rendered
wholly unfit for duty. Looking at the obverse of this proposition, every
student of public hygiene is aware of the fact that truly formidable
ravages of smallpox occur in epidemics attacking virgin populations,
as, for example, islanders long unvisited by Europeans, where neither
the individuals themselves nor their ancestors for generations have en-
joyed the immunizing protection of vaccination. In these cases it is
often not merely a decimation which results, but it may be a destruc-
tion of more than half of the entire population. In a few isolated
instances almost every individual of a tribe or village has been cut off.
Not the sins alone of the fathers but some of their safeguards are
visited upon the children. The clean living that drove away leprosy
from English soil and that so widely substituted the gout for the
'King's evil,' has tinctured the blood of the children of the men who
fought at Naseby and learned a lesson in humanity from Howard.

It will be seen that the whole question pivots upon vaccination. It
is necessary to look critically upon this means of securing immunity,
for the procedure is again under the searchlight.

All said and done, vaccination is an invaluable means of securing
immunity against smallpox, but it is not a perfect means. What
artificial conquests of man are rounded to the perfection-point? Every
one knows that the finest double-screw steel vessel that steams across
the Atlantic can be crushed by a single blow of the arm of the sea if

564 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the gale be sufficiently furious and the billows sufficiently huge. As
it is necessary to admit that even one attack of smallpox does not
confer absolute immunity against a second, seeing that some men
have had two and even more of such attacks in a lifetime, equally
must it be admitted that vaccinated persons, and even many times re-
vaccinated persons, have had attacks of smallpox. In ordinary seasons
when smallpox is not prevalent a larger protection is conferred by
vaccination than that conferred by the lightning-rod upon the dweller
beneath the roof above which it rises. But in seasons of epidemic in-
fluence, even though the epidemic be as mild as that which furnishes
the theme of this paper, such an influence is appreciable and in many
cases highly effective. At these times those who previously were in-
capable of being vaccinated (even the vaccini culturists occasionally find
heifers which cannot be made to serve as vaccinifers) are inoculated
with ease; at such times also vaccination can be made effective even
after the onset of unmistakable symptoms of smallpox; at such times
also even those who have had smallpox can be vaccinated, and that
after the recent establishment of convalescence. The ardent advocates
of the position that the mild epidemic through which this country has
just passed was not one of smallpox pointed with what seemed to them
convincing force to the fact that they had successfully vaccinated
the victims of the disease immediately after recovery. But the argu-
ment was without force. The skin of a person convalescent from
smallpox is in an exceedingly irritable state and readily is excited to
the production of local symptoms at the point where the needle of the
vaccinator has been at play. It has to be borne in mind that the
actual introduction of a disease by inoculation is a far more rigid test
than mere exposure to a volatile poison, the kind of exposure tlirough
which, as a rule, smallpox is acquired. What physician, for example,
would dare to inoculate a patient with the virus of smallpox after
the most classically perfect vaccination? He would be held criminally
liable for the result if, as might happen, in this way he should dissemi-
nate the disease throughout the community in which he lived.

But the spurious results cited of vaccination of convalescents from
modified smallpox prove nothing. Even highly typical results would
not disprove the fact of a previous attack of modified or unmodified
smallpox. It has been shown that both the vaccination process and
the variolous process may pursue their career at one and the same
time in the same body. But Dr. Mosely, of Kentucky, put the
question to a decisive test last year when he vaccinated three negroes,
each convalescent from smallpox, immediately on his release from
quarantine. Each subsequently exhibited classical results of successful
vaccination in due time and course.

Eespecting the enormous value of vaccination to the human race, it

THE LATE EPIDEMIC OF SMALLPOX. 565

would seem scarcely necessary to appeal to statistics at this late hour
of the scientific day. But surely so long as we have the poor with us, we
shall have with them a class of men whose minds are so curiously con-
stituted that they will select for study the nether side of the social
fabric, the weakness of the best of governments, and the minor defects
in the character of the world's heroes.

Even as late as the month of April in the first year of the new
century one of the largest and most widely read of the daily papers
of the country published over the name of a well-known anti-vaccina-
tionist a statement apparently made in good faith to the effect that
vaccination counted more victims than smallpox, and that the prac-
tice was a relic of barbarism, asking that a halt be called upon the
passage of compulsory laws looking to the protection of the people by
any such measures. These singular protests against the operation of
the most beneficent of life-saving devices will probably be repeated so
long as there is a law on any statute book. Their starveling and dis-
torted figures, garnered from the refuse heaps of mortality, must ever
and again furnish forth the tables on which these purblind reasoners
rely. They close their eyes to the latest signal victory of science in
this field. The Island of Porto Eico, according to the report of
Surgeon-General Hoff, in the year 1896 harbored no fewer than three
thousand cases of smallpox. Imagine a State of the Union of similar
size exposed to such an extent to the ravages of the disease ! After the
establishment, however, of a government vaccine-farm, "eight hundred
thousand natives were vaccinated, at a cost of about four cents for each
individual, with the result that by October, 1899, no case of smallpox
was known either to the military or civil authorities anywhere in the
island." This was a fine illustration of the carrying of '^the white
man's burden.' Porto Eico bombarded us with a filth-germ and in
revenge we made her clean !

In the year 1867 vaccination was made compulsory for school chil-
dren in the city of Chicago, and for twenty years after there
was practical immunity from smallpox for this important class of the
population; while the police of the same city, exposed to every form
of infectious disease in their surveillance of its several districts, since
vaccination was made compulsory also for them, have never developed a
case of the disease.

Dr. Buchanan, medical officer of the local government board (Eng-
land), in 1881 prepared a table of comparative smallpox death rates
among Londoners, vaccinated and unvaccinated respectively, for the
fifty-two weeks ending May 29, 1881, calculating that the vaccinated
persons of all ages living in London, in the twelve months concerned,
Avere 3,620,000, and the unvaccinated of all ages 190,000 in number.
Tliis table reads:

566

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Death rate of people of
subjoined ages

Per million of each age

of the vaccinated

class.

Per million of each age

of the unvaccinated

class.

All aees

90
61

40^

3 350

Under twenty vears

4,520
5 950

Under five vears

Statistics of this sort might be piled mountains high; but they
mean nothing and they count for nothing with the prejudiced. It is
well to remember at times that any agency and influence operating at
any one moment upon large masses of human beings of both sexes and
of all ages has to bear its percentage of damage and death. The killed
on the day of the passing of the funeral cortege of Queen Victoria, the
fatality attending ocean and railway travel, even the victims of the
awful fire-tragedies lately occurring in Paris and New York, which
shocked every reader of the public press, have not deterred men and wo-
men of ordinary common sense from going to fairs, sleeping in hotels,
or crossing the continent by rail or the ocean steamer. Vaccination of
every member of any community, including men, women and, in partic-
ular, infants will, without any question, be followed by untoward re-
sults in a proportion of cases. The mere statistics of common accidents
and ordinary disease account for a large part of the list in the relatively
slender catalogue of vaccination accidents. Men, women and children
perish annually from the stings of bees, from the bites of flies, from
the prick of a pin, and from the accidental impaction of a bit of food
in the larynx. Lately a physician reported a disease not due to vacci-
nation. An infant was brought by appointment to his office in order to
be inoculated, but the physician chanced to be called away from the
city, and the date of the trifling operation was postponed for a week.
In that week the child developed symptoms of syphilis, which would
probably have been laid to the account of the vaccination if the latter
had been performed.

It has been said that if the modern tourist could be transported
to the streets of London in the eighteenth century, before the general
adoption of the practice of vaccination, he would be immensely aston-
ished, not so much by the quaintness of the dress and the speech of the
people, by the aspect of their shops, and by the odd-looking vehicles
on their streets, as by the extraordinary number of pock-marked faces
he would encounter on every hand. Even as early as the year 1778,
the officers of foreign troops on American soil wrote back to their
countrymen in the old world that the American women were sur-
passingly beautiful and were very ^seldom pock-marked.' Macaulay,
describing the distress in London in 1694, wrote as follows: "That
disease over which science has since achieved a succession of glorious
and beneficent victories was then the most terrible of all the ministers

THE LATE EPIDEMIC OF SMALLPOX. 567

of death. The havoc of the plague had been more rapid; but the
plague had visited our shores only once or twice within living memory,
and the smallpox was always present, filling the churchyards with
corpses, tormenting with constant fears all whom it had not yet
stricken, leaving on those whose lives it spared the hideous traces of its
power, turning the babe into a changeling at which the mother shud-
dered, and making the eyes and cheeks of the betrothed maid objects
of horror to the lover."

At last our English brethren have learned the lesson and learned it
well. They have had bitter experience of the devastation which
smallpox is capable of working among their kindred, whether in the
hovel or in the palace. They have mourned the loss of a gracious sover-
eign smitten with the pestilence on the very throne of their kingdom.
While we may not wish to follow them in all matters, they have set us a
worthy example in the patience with which they have buttressed their
bulwarks of immunity. The germs of this pestilence are powerless
against the army of their humble villagers and peasantry, ranks jipon
ranks of whom bear upon the arms of each no fewer than four, and
often as many as six and eight, simultaneously produced scars of suc-
cessful inoculation of cow-pox. Vaccination should be the seal on the
passport of entrance to the public schools, to the voters' booth, to the
box of the juryman, and to every position of duty, privilege, profit or
honor in the gift of either the State or the Nation.

568

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

FOOD AND LAND TENURE.*

By EDWARD ATKINSON.

nr^HE conditions of Europe in the present year compel attention
-L to the food supply of what is called the civilized world. The
principal supply of grain exported and a large part of the supply of
meat are derived from the central United States, in the northern
section of the Mississippi Valley.

The area of the twelve States of the northern Mississippi Valley,
on which main dependence is placed, is given in the subsequent table;
also the proportion of each State which is now devoted to the crops of
Indian com or maize, wheat and oats, which are the chief dependence
for the grain supply of man and beast; rye, barley and buckwheat
being of minor importance. In another table the proportion of the area
of each State which is devoted to each of the three principal grains is
indicated graphically.

Land,
Square Mile.

40,760
35,910
56,000
57,430
54,450
79,205
55,475
76,840
48,735
81,700
70,195
76,850

Wheat.

Area Devoted
to Maize.

Oats.

Ohio

2,220
1,890
2,161
1,906
1,327
7,665
2,183
3,229
2,356
7,282
4,202
4,563

4,514

6,299

11,156

1,688

1,936

1,505

12,577

12,646

10,084

13,476

37

1,876

1,659
2,144
5,495

Indiana

Illinois

Michiffan

1,434
3,026

Wisconsin

Minnesota

Iowa

2,598
6,001
2,708
1,408

Nebraska

Missouri

K^ansas

2 129

North Dakota

956

South Dakota

920

753,550

40,984

77,794

30,478

By far the larger proportion of all these States is arable land,
portions of the western section being for the present uncertain in their
product, because of semi-arid conditions. Ere long, however, these
sections may become the most productive, irrigation on a national scale
being under way.

* Read at the meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of
Science, Glasgow, September 11-19.

FOOD AND LAND TENURE.

569

Proportion of Area to Each Grain.

Ohio.

Ind.

111.

Mich.

Wis.
Minn.
Iowa
Neb.
Mo.
Kan.
N. Dak.
S. Dak.

EH

liiiiiiiiiiiiiii^-

IE

SBI

Grain growing States of the Northern Mississippi Valley.

Total Area of Land of the United States Devoted to

Maize (Indian Corn), Wheat and Oats.

Crop of 1900.

Square Miles.
All States.

125,500
66,400
42,754

12 Mississippi
Valley States.

All other
States.

Crop Bushels.

Maize

77,794
40,984
30,478

47,706
25,416
12,276

2,105,102,516
522,229,505

Wheat

Oats

809,125,989

Total

234,654

149,256

85,398

3,436,458,010

Crop of 1900.

Acreage.

Product.

Average per Acre.

Ohio

1,420,646
1,209,755
1,383,230
1,219,969
849,458
4,905,643
1,397,322
2,066,825
1,507,737
4,660,376
2,689,023
2,920,244

8,523,876
6,411,702
17,982,068
9,271,764
13,166,599
51,509,252
21,798,223
24,801,900
18,846,713
82,488,655
13,176,213
20,149,684

The crop of 1900 was below

Indiana

the average per acre of the last

Illinois

ten years. The crop of 1898

Michisran

was 675,148,705 bushels at

Wisconsin

15.3 bushels per acre. The

Minnesota

crop of 1901 is oflSeially esti-

Iowa

mated at 704,000,000 bushels

Nebraska

and will probably be more.

Missouri

In 1900 the product of the

Kansas

Un ited States, 522, 229, 505, was

North Dakota

substantially 20 per cent, of

South Dakota

world's product of 2,586,025,-

All other States

26,230,234
16,265,151

288,126,649
234,102,856

000 bushels. The land devoted
to wheat was 2.3 per cent, of
the total area, omitting Alaska.

42,495,385

522,229,505

12.29 bushels per acre.

570

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Maize or

Indian Corn.

\\?. ,' rf.

3

O .:>
Rye.

Z!

Barley.

1

Buckwheat.

Acreage and Pnxiuct, 1000.

83,820,872

B.ishels.

;, 103, 102, 516

Potatoes.

42.495.3S5

522,229,503

27.3^4.793

80.9,125,989

x.5?';362

23.99S.927

2,894,282

58.925.833

637.930

9,566,96(5

2,61 1, OS t

210,926,897

Hay.

39,132.890

25,521,000

5o,iio,9'i6

E itc:a Estimated.
10,000,000

The area of the United States (omitting Alaska), a little less than 3,000,-
000 square miles, is represented by the outer square. The proportion of land
cultivated in all the principal crops that count for much in acreage is indicated
by the smaller areas computed on the same scale. The total area in the above
crops in the year 1900 numbered 353,275 square miles, or about twelve per
cent, of the total area.

JwLY, 1900. Computed by Edward Atkinson, Boston, Mass.

The proportion of land in the twelve Mississippi Valley States
listed which is devoted to wheat is five and a half per cent, of their land
area.

The change which has come over this section can be put before the
imagination in no better way than for the writer to state that
he himself witnessed and clearly remembers the war dance of the
Blackhawk Indians on Boston Common, when the chiefs were sent
around the country by the Government after they had been subdued
in the last great Indian war, which occurred in central Illinois, at the
very heart of the section with which we are dealing, and very near the
present center of population of the country.

The question arises: What is the basis or fundamental principle
underlying the change from occupation by the wild or Tjlankef

FOOD AND LAND TENURE. 571

Indians, as they are called in our country, to the present system of
intensive agriculture in a period of less than two generations? I ven-
ture to indicate freedom of restriction in custom or law in the purchase
and sale and mortgaging of lands as the basis of this great change.
The underlying principle, now being rapidly developed, is the gradual
change from working land as a mine, subject to exhaustion, and using
it as a tool or instrument of production, responding in its product to

12 States Upper Mississippi Valley,

753,550 square miles of land.

In Maize, Wheat, and Oats,
149,256 square miles.

All other States an

d Territories, over 2,000,000 square miles of land.

In Maize, Wheat and Oats,
85,398 square miles.

Total area of the United States, omitting Alaska, a fraction under 3,000,000
square miles. Area under cultivation in maize, wheat and oats in 1900, 234,-
(154 square miles, or a fraction under eight per cent, of the area of land and
inland waters. The latter should be included in the food-producing area.

the measure of mental energy and mechanical aptitude applied to its
use. These factors are generated in the free common schools now
being supplemented by the addition of manual training schools in all
the principal towns and cities.

Dealing in a broad and general way, all are aware that the titles
to the vaster portion of the land in these States are derived from the
government, mainly since the lay-out of land in sections of six hundred
and forty (640) acres each, and quarter sections of one hundred and
sixty (160) acres. This land has been disposed of in various ways —
to railroad companies as bounties to aid in the construction of railways,
and to individual purchasers and settlers under various laws. The

572 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

lands granted to private individuals have been, since 1860, usually in
small tracts, varying from eighty (80) to one thousand (1,000) acres,
the greater share being in tracts known as quarter sections of one
hundred and sixty (160) acres. This is the one always required under
the Homestead and preemption laws. The lands of railroads were
originally granted to them in large tracts. Some of it has been dis-
posed of by them in large tracts to wealthy corporations and individuals
and by them converted to vast farms, known usually as 'bonanza'
farms. The balance has been sold or is in the process of sale, in smaller
tracts on long-time credit to poor settlers. The usual method of sale
is one tenth cash and the balance in nine annual payments with inter-
est. The ordinary sale of this railroad land is a tract of one hundred
and sixty (160) acres, the one on which the poor settler, as a rule,
begins his career on the frontier.

The first settlement of the frontier, as now described, is accom-
panied with many transfers of land title, owing to the facilities of such
transfer and by reason of the benefits that all parties can find in the
same. Many who have acquired land under the Homestead law sell it
to their neighbors or to a newcomer with ready money. They then
take up a new farm under the preemption law, and use the money re-
ceived for the sale of the first farm to improve the second. The
divisions of the bonanza farm, the land of which is usually purchased
from the railroads, combined with the results of those transferred
among the original settlers, give to the farmer on the frontier an aver-
age size of from two hundred and forty (240) to three hundred and
twenty (320) acres, the largest containing thousands of acres and the
smallest from twenty (20) to forty (40) acres.

When first settled, these large and small farms in the grain-growing
sections are always cultivated on an extensive system, largely in grain.
The original occupants, whether of large or small farms, turned over
the sod and planted their grain with the application of very hard labor
and without fertilizers and, as a rule, without any very gen-
eral comprehension of the art of agriculture. This was the
necessity of the case, and it has been and is still a success un-
der the conditions of the frontier. Under these conditions a
vast body of pioneers have become prosperous, some of them
attaining large wealth, and with their wealth buying out their
less successful neighbors and adding to the area of the great farms.
That phase has nearly passed by in the great Mississippi Valley and
in the States named. With the passage of years, in every part of these-
twelve States, this extensive system of cultivation comes to an end and
the intensive system of working the land in various crops takes its
place. With this change the large bonanza farms are broken up and
the smaller farm becomes the rule. This change is a progressive one,.

FOOD AND LAND TENURE. 573

as can be seen by the average size of farms in the twelve States. In
1890, this was 86 acres in Michigan, 93 in Oliio, 103 in Indiana, 115
in Wisconsin, 127 in Illinois, 139 in Missouri, 151 in Iowa, 160 in
Minnesota, 181 in Kansas, 190 in Nebraska, 237 in South Dakota and
277 in North Dakota. Ohio and Michigan have been the longest
settled, while the two Dakotas are not yet wholly occupied by farmers.

On the frontier, the wild land from the government has a value
of $1.35 per acre. The railroad grant lands have been usually pur-
chased by farmers at from $4 to $7 per acre and are now being sold at
these figures. The average value of farms with improvements in the
old settled States, such as Ohio, is not far from $50 per acre. The
difference measures the improvements made to the land. To open up
new land and make these improvements requires capital. The original
settlers, being without capital, were under the necessity of securing
credit, either from the railroad companies from whom they pur-
chjised the land or from money lenders; hence there grew up in these
western States a very extensive system of borrowing on mortgages,
beneficial both to borrower and lender, until the speculative mortgage
companies promoted the taking up of great areas of land in the semi-
arid regions, negotiating mortgages thereon, and thus brought disaster
to many lenders, culminating in bankruptcy of many mortgage com-
panies.

The average term of mortgages made for land improvements, as
above outlined, has been in the past from three to nine years, and that
period of time has usually, except in the semi-arid lands, sufficed to
enable the settlers to pay off their debts and to acquire valuable farms
from their neighbors.

These figures are sustained by the judgment of the experts now
occupied in compiling the census of the year 1900, in which the de-
partments of agriculture and of wealth, debt and taxation are imder
the supervision of the most competent man in the United States, Mr. L.
G. Powers.

It will be plain to any Englishman that unless this land had been
free land, bought, sold and conveyed with the least amount of expense
and difficulty, and free of any conditions as to the kind of crop to be
planted or the disposal of the product, no such great economic revolu-
tion could have occurred. Yet the conveyance of land is now being
made more simple than ever before by the adoption, in State after
State, of a reform which we owe to our intelligent and progressive
kindred in Australasia, the registry of titles known as the Torrens
System, in place of the registry of deeds. Under this system convey-
ance of a title to land under absolutely safe conditions has become as
simple and as easy as an assignment of a note of hand or a share of
stock.

574 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Under these conditions in these and other States 5,700,000 farmers
are now working land either as owners or tenants, the only limit in
recent years to a further expansion of crops having been the lack of
farm laborers. At the present time (July 9th) farm laborers are in
most urgent demand to harvest the great crop of wheat, without any
sutficient supply.

During the last decade there has been in these States a small
lessening in the average area of the farm, coupled with a moderate
increase in the number of tenants. The owners have increased faster
than the agricultural population, and the greater increase in the num-
ber of tenants has been recruited from former farm laborers or
from emigrants. Landlordism in the sense of ownership of very large
areas to be worked permanently by tenants, covers a very small part
of this whole area. It is inconsistent with the whole spirit of the
people and will never assume any great importance.

In the new States, such as Minnesota and the Dakotas, it is still
possible to buy cheap land from the railroad, from large timber com-
panies and from the State and general government, and to repeat the
old process of a poor man acquiring a good farm free from debt in
from three to ten years by the aid of a small mortgage loan or the credit
of the land companies. In the older settled communities, with land
worth on an average from $40 to $50 per acre and in many cases
selling for $100 per acre, the road to farm ownership for the poor man
is somewhat different. He must as a laborer have acquired money
enough to become a farm tenant and as a tenant have obtained sufficient
capital to make a reasonable payment on the purchase price of the
farm. This gradual rise of a farm laborer to farm ownership through
farm tenancy is being witnessed all over the States to which I have
referred. Mortgage assists, as on the frontier, in helping the men with
small capital to control farms worth more than their resources over
and above their liabilities. These men, rising in the older settled
States to farm ownership, through farm tenancy and by the aid of
mortgage loans, in a large measure succeed in paying off their debts as
does the settler on the frontier. With a large debt due on the more
valuable farms, it may require a longer time, but the end is reasonably
sure with those of any business sagacity.

Another class of farm tenants in America is composed of the
children of the farm owners who cultivate their fathers' lands as
tenants until they succeed them as owners. No farm laborer who is
not a good farmer succeeds in rising, and the sons of wealthy land
owners, without good management, often lose all their inherited wealth.
Freedom to buy and sell and manage land kills off the incom-
petent, and gives the field to the competent, be he poor or
rich. This freedom of land sales prevents the tenant or owner

FOOD AND LAND TENURE. 575

from adopting methods formerly described by Governor Wise of
Virginia, as that of slavery, when he said that 'the white men skinned
the nigger and the nigger skinned the land/ There is an element of ,
skinning in every system relating to land not born of perfect freedom.
Perfect freedom in the purchase and rental of American land leads to
constant improvement.

Under the freedom of sale which prevails in the United States, with
the facility of mortgage loans which permits the poor man to use the
capital of the rich to secure for himself a farm, there will always be
a large mortgage debt in the rural sections of the United States.
That debt marks, as a rule, the upward movement of the poor laborer
on the road of farm ownership. One class of men incur debt for land
purchased or for improvements, and pay off the same, and as they
retire in old age another and younger set repeat the process of rising
to independence by the same road. The relative number of those who
have attained their goal and of those on the way may be seen by the
following figures :

Of the farms in the twelve States named, about sixty to sixty-
five per cent, are now free from mortgage debt, and thirty-five to forty
per cent, are mortgaged. The debt on the mortgaged farms does not
exceed thirty-five per cent, of their value, and the total mortgage debt of
the States is not in excess of about twelve to fifteen per cent, of the
whole farm value.

Under these conditions the area of land devoted to the several grain
crops diminishes in ratio to that given to other crops, varied farming
taking the place of the all-wheat or all-corn system. But by the intro-
duction of intensive farming there is a steady improvement and in-
crease in the quantity and the quality of the crops derived from a given
area of soil. The wheat needed for home use will keep even with popu-
lation for many years without any increase in area.

The most potent agency in this revolution in agriculture may be
but little known in Europe, especially in England. I refer to the so-
called Agricultural Experiment Stations, which have grown in a
rather singular manner, of which no very definite record has yet been
given. The general government appropriates annually $720,000, and
the State governments $440,000, more or less, in addition, to be ex-
pended by the Agricultural Experiment Stations, under the general
supervision of a special department in the Department of Agriculture,
of which Professor A. C. True is now the director. But the general
government has no very definite control over the expenditure of this
money. The stations are established by the several States. They are
now thirty-six in number — one in nearly every State; two or three in
some of them. Each one is under the direction of a trained student of
the science of dealing with land as an instrument or tool of produc-

576 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tion. The employees are all thoroughbred experts, graduates of uni-
versities, colleges or technical schools. A more devoted set of men
cannot be found in the whole country. Their influence is raising the
standard of farming in almost every State. One of the great railway
promoters in the Northwest long since realized the importance of this
matter, and in order to promote the interests of his railroad he made
arrangements with every town throughout the great State near the line
to send two men every year to the capital, where the Agricultural
College and Experiment Station were situated. He gave them a free
pass, liberty to remain four days, the State giving them a banquet —
the only condition being that one day out of the four should be devoted
to the study of the work of the Agricultural Experiment Station; and
for a number of years one thousand (1,000) to fifteeen hundred
(1,500) men enjoyed this benefit every year.

Each Experiment Station devotes itself to the special conditions of
the State in which it is placed. For instance, in Minnesota the whole
standard of wheat cultivation and of dairy product has been raised
to a very high point. In Michigan the market value of a large prod-
vict of butter has been raised to a more profitable point by improve-
ment in stock, in the establishment of creameries, and in other ways.
The application of the bacterium of June butter in the creameries has
become common.

Professor Kohn, who made this discovery at the Columbian Ex-
hibition in Chicago, in 1893, has established a bacterium factory
which, at the last advices known to me, supplied one hundred and fifty
(150) creameries with the ferment.

In Kansas attention has been given to the improvement in the
quality of maize or Indian corn. The ordinary maize is deficient in
the nitrogen or protein elements as compared to the starch and fats.
Varieties have been bred, bringing maize even with wheat in the
protein element, which may end in making maize as complete a food
as either wheat or oatmeal.

In the South the greatest attention is given to renovating plants
of the leguminous type — beans, peas, alfalfa and others. The slave-
stricken lands are being regenerated, and gradually but slowly stock
suited to the climate and conditions of the Atlantic cotton States is
being introduced.

Of course all these changes imply the use of fertilizers in larger
and larger measure. That need is being met. The vast deposits of
phosphatic material in Kentucky, Tennessee, Florida and the Carolinas,
coupled with the use of the ground slag from basic steel furnaces, give
an assurance of an abundant supply of that necessary element for all
time to come.

The discovery of the function of the bacteria attached to the stalks

FOOD AND LAND TENURE. 577

of leguminous plants, dissociating the nitrogen of the atmosphere and
converting it through the plant to the renovation of the soil, coupled
with artificial sources, give assurance of adequate supply of that
necessary element, while discoveries in science promise yet greater
abundance in the conversion of the secondary products of gas plants to
fertilizers.

The last element which is necessary, potash, of course exists in
great abundance throughout many sections of the country, but the
solubility of potash capable of being assimilated by plants and the
cost of deriving it from its original source in the rocks, have rendered
the country for the time being largely dependent on the Stassfurt
Mines of Saxony, where the existence of a pan underlying the salt in
which the potash has accumulated, has rendered that place the source
of this necessary element in fertilizers at the lowest cost. It is, how-
ever, hardly to be doubted that in the great range of alkali soils and
deserts extending from British Columbia around the circle far into
Texas, deposits of potash will soon be discovered which can be worked.
Permanent potash springs are very numerous, and in the arid country
it may be assumed that while the potash may have leached down to a
moderate distance, it has not been carried away. A strong company,
with abundant capital, under competent engineers, has lately been
organized for following the surface indications of potash by boring at
many points.

In a broad and general way it may be safely affirmed that the
great farming States of the Mississippi Valley which have been named,
will produce this year within a fraction of all the wheat now required
for the consumption of the people of the United States, and that by
improvement in the methods of agriculture their product will keep
even with the increase of population without calling for more land.
Outside this area are vast sections from which the quantity of wheat
now available for export may be derived. In these sections the in-
tensive system has not yet taken the place of the former methods of
cultivation. It may be safely affirmed that Montana, Washington,
Oregon, California and other sections of the Korthwest and of the
Pacific coast, can produce all the wheat that Europe can possibly pay
for during the present generation. It is only a question of price. Our
crop now being marketed officially estimated at 704,000,000 is probably
750,000,000 bushels or about 95,000,000 quarters. The prevailing
drought did not come until the winter wheat was harvested and the
spring wheat fairly secure ; it will reduce the com or maize crop. At a
dollar a bushel or at thirty-two shillings per quarter in Mark Lane,
we could add 20,000,000 quarters in a year or two if we had the farm
laborers to do the work not yet done by machinery.

VOL. LIX. — 40

578 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Again, although the cotton States of the Atlantic coast will not be
great producers of grain, especially of wheat, yet in the Southwest —
in Texas, Oklahoma, the Indian Territory and Louisiana — we could
readily produce the entire wheat crop of the United States upon un-
occupied land, whenever labor and capital can be found sufficient to
develop the product. As our country people say, a dollar a bushel would
fetch it. Some of the best hard or macaroni wheat in the world is
already produced in this section.

I have called the attention of economists to the basis of this
development of agriculture, namely, what may be called the free
land tenure established in the United States. An outsider should
deal with the conditions of other countries with great caution,
but in the study which I have given to the subject it has seemed to me
very plain that the feudal land system of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland had come to its necessary end, witnessed by the
present movement for the practical confiscation of land titles in Ireland.
One may ask, what would be the potential of the land of the United
Kingdom in the production of food for its own population, if the pur-
chase and sale of land were as free as it is in the United States ?

Again, it appears to an outsider as if the revulsion from the feudal
system in France and large parts of Germany, where the land is cut up
in little patches, had also failed in developing the potential of the soil,
the application of modern mechanism to its full effect being rendered
impossible by the great subdivision of the soil.

You will remark that the area of the United States, omitting Alaska,
covers three million (3,000,000) square miles; the habitable part of
Canada may be computed at over two million (2,000,000), to which we
may add Mexico, giving in all, say over five million (5,000,000) square
miles, of which more than one-half is available for cultivation. At
nine thousand (9,000) to ten thousand (10,000) bushels to a square
mile, which is rather a low standard of intelligent cultivation, ten (10)
per cent, of this area, or two hundred and fifty thousand (250,000)
square miles, would yield about the present wheat crop of the world. I
think we could spare that area without missing it, even within the
limits of the United States, if we could make a contract for a term of
years at thirty- two (32) shillings a quarter in London for all the
wheat Europe could possibly buy.

Even if this forecast be considered visionary, it may be surely held
that the United States can supply for many years to come the
entire deficiency in the wheat crop of the United Kingdom, twenty-five
million (25,000,000) to thirty million (30,000,000) quarters a year,
probably by improvement in intensive farming, without adding ma-
terially to the land which may be devoted to the wheat crop.

In this paper I have given the details of the grain problem. Cotton

FOOD AND LAND TENURE. 579

comes next in importance, especially to the people of Great Britain.
The all-cotton, old plantation system is extinct. A mere fraction of
the present cotton crop is growing in the old way; almost the whole
comes from the small farmers, black as well as white. The tenant sys-
tem was almost universally adopted in the process of reconstruction;
improvement in agriculture is slow but sure. The dream of the freed-
man was forty acres and a mule, and in fact great numbers are attaining
that end.

For many ;^ears after the end of the Civil War the cotton States
still depended upon the North for hay and upon the West for corn and
meat. There is probably no great force of laborers in the world who
can fully subsist at so low a cost as the Southern negroes. 'Hog and
hominy,' as it is called, bacon and cracked corn, are their choice above
all other kinds of food. On this ration, coupled with such fruits and
vegetables as they can secure, they are content. A peck of corn meal,
three and one-half pounds of bacon and a quart of molasses or sorghum
syrup is the customary ration for one week, costing six to nine cents a
day. All that is changing. The intelligent farmers now produce their
own bread and meat; some of them in excess. They are developing
leguminous plants — pea vines, beans, alfalfa, crimson clover and the
like; gradually introducing stock, and soon to fold sheep upon the
cotton fields, to the renovation of the soil.

The very large proportionate number of tenants which has been
disclosed by the former census and will be yet more marked in the
present census is mainly the result of the changing conditions in the
cotton States; a passing phase in the South, as it is in the West; not of
long duration, and not implying any permanent condition of land-
lordism.

In fact, in conclusion it may be dogmatically stated that both
wheat and cotton are becoming the excess, surplus or money crops of
farmers whose products otherwise suffice to sustain the farm. It is
therefore difficult to measure the exact cost of raising wheat. It has
been produced at less than one shilling per bushel, including use and
repairs of machinery and interest thereon, but not including any charge
for the rental of land, which forms a part of the income or profit of
the farmer. It may be dogmatically affirmed that so long as the
farmer in the Mississippi grain-growing States can secure to his own
use and enjoyment one cent a pound, sixty cents a bushel, four dollars
and eighty cents, or twenty shillings a quarter, the present average prod-
uct of wheat will be maintained, subject to variation in quantity ac-
cording to the season. At seventy cents a bushel new land will be put
under cultivation in wheat to any extent of the demand, and capital
will be found. The difficulty will be to procure even the necessary labor
still required, notwithstanding the increasing use of machinery and

58o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the common practice of small farmers in combining for the ownership
of mowers and reapers or in contracting for the harvest.

No subject of greater importance could be brought before the Eng-
lish-speaking people; none of greater weight in maintaining our inter-
dependence with our kin beyond the seas. The right comprehension of
this problem will give assurance of peace, good-will and plenty.

It may be interesting to call your attention to the fact that the
Pilgrim Fathers spent several years in Holland before they migrated
to New England. The larger part both of Pilgrims and Puritans
came from the southeastern counties of England, where institutions
had been greatly modified by Dutch, Flemish and Huguenot immi-
grants. The Dutch themselves settled New York and other colonies.
We derive our common schools, our toleration of religion, our welcome
to invention and our free division of land chiefly from the Dutch,
rather than from our English ancestors. It is true that the Puritans
were intolerant and that the Dutch attempted to establish large manors
in the State of New York, under patroons, so-called; but the more
liberal tendencies of the Pilgrims in New England, the Quakers in
Pennsylvania, the Baptists of Ehode Island, the Dutch in New York
and the Catholics in Maryland overcame the intolerance of the Puri-
tans, while the free system of land holding also displaced all other
tenures.

INERT CONSTITUENTS OF THE ATMOSPHERE. 581

THE INEET CONSTITUENTS OF THE ATMOSPHEEE.

By Professor W. RAMSAY,

UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, LONDON.

^T^HE discovery of an element always awakens interest; for the total
-*- number of the known elements does not exceed seventy-five, and
all the various forms of matter which exist on this globe are necessarily
composed of these elements. An element, as is well known, is the
ultimate constituent of a compound; and with only a limited number,
Nature has provided us with that enormous wealth of minerals, of
vegetables and of animals, all of which have as their constituents
two or more of these elements.

These elements, however, must not be regarded as isolated entities,
each self-dependent, having no relations with its compeers; on the
contrary, all the elements exhibit certain connections with their neigh-
bors; and there is to be traced an orderly progression from one class
of elements, strongly electro-positive in character, metallic in appear-
ance, very inflammable when heated in the air, and at once attacked
by water, to another class, highly electro-negative, transparent, unat-
tackable by oxygen, and without perceptible action on water, through
a number of connecting links, each of which serves to soften the
transition.

These elements have been arranged in series, and it is by consider-
ing the method of arrangement that our interest is awakened. The
earliest attempt to make such an arrangement antedates the very idea
of the conception of an element. For the division of all matter into
metal and non-metal is one which is lost in the mists of antiquity.
The word %etal' is derived from the Greek verb juezaVAco, I search;
and that verb is said to be derived from //ira and dXXa, signifying
'after other things.' As it was recognized that elements are constit-
uents of more complex matter, a conception first emphasized by Boyle,
and as the distinction became clear that matter which resists de-
composition must be classed as elementary and, after a century and
a half, a number of elements were recognized, it was obvious that a
number of them might be grouped in classes. Take, for example, the
elements chlorine, bromine and iodine, all colored, strongly smelling
substances, sparingly soluble in water and forming compounds barely
distinguishable from each other in appearance or by a cursory inspec-
tion; or take such a group as the metals of the alkalies, lithium.

582 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

sodium, potassium, rubidium and caesium, all white, soft metals, all
easily oxidizable, all at once violently attacked by water, and gen-
erally with such energy as to be inflamed at the contact. It required
no great penetration to class such elements as these into classes.

The revival of the hypothesis of the atomic constitution of matter
by Dalton and of his attempt to determine the atomic weights of the
elements was not long in provoking the guess that perhaps there could
be found some connection between the numbers representing the rela-
tive atomic weights of kindred elements. But, as is well known, the
state of knowledge in Dalton's day was not sufficiently advanced to en-
able him to attribute to elements their correct relative atomic weights;
and it was not until the eminent professor of chemistry in Eome,
Cannizzaro, whose jubilee has recently been celebrated, pointed out the
bearing on Dalton's numbers of all the facts accumulated up to the
year 1856 that the close relationship between the atomic weights and
the properties of the elements was suggested by John Newlands. Some
years later, Lothar Meyer and Dmitri Mendeleef amplified and elabo-
rated the ideas which had first been propounded by Newlands ; and the
periodicity of the atomic weights and the gradual variation of the
properties of the elements and their compounds were established on
a firm basis.

Various plans have been adopted to render this arrangement pic-
torially visible; each method has perhaps its own conveniences, but
none can be regarded as the method par excellence. Lothar Meyer's
original table is constructed on the hypothesis that a cylinder, on which
the numbers have been distributed in their order on a descending spiral
in eight main columns, has been unrolled.

Another method of representation is due to Dr. Johnstone Stoney.
The atomic weights are represented on a spiral curve, closely approxi-
mating in form to a logaritlunic spiral, and the magnitudes of the
atomic weights are represented by the volumes of concentric spheres.
Thus, the sphere in the middle stands for unity, the atomic weight of
hydrogen. The elements follow each other according to the numerical
order of their atomic weights ; and by joining the points thus obtained,
a nearly regular spiral curve is produced, resembling one derived by
aid of a logarithmic or elliptical formula. The deviations from
regularity appear also to follow a law, and if accurately mapped the
spiral is a sinuous one. But the determination of individual atomic
weights is as yet not sufficiently accurate to make it possible to calcu-
late the course of the wavy line.

A third diagram, modified from that of Meyer, has been constructed
by Professor Orme Masson, of Melbourne. The chief difference is
that instead of grouping elements of the iron, palladium and platinum
groups, they are distributed; hydrogen forms the first element of the

INERT CONSTITUENTS OF THE ATMOSPHERE. 583

fluorine column; and the long and short periods are kept separate by
a fold in the diagram. A diagonal line, too, divides the 'metallic'
from the 'non-metallic' elements.

Other devices have been suggested in order to represent diagram-
matically the relations between the atomic weights ; but it must be borne
in mind that whatever system is employed, such plans are merely aids
to thought, and have no real significance. They are on a par with the
representation of numerical relations as curves, and can convey nothing
which is not already contained in the actual numbers.

It was Mendeleef who first drew attention to the progressive alter-
ation of the valency of the elements in passing from left to right along
the table. While the metals of the alkalies, lithium, sodium, potassium,
rubidium and caesium, are all monads, in as much as one atom of any
one of these elements is able to replace one atom of hydrogen, the
typical monad, elements of the beryllium group are dyads ; hence while
the formula of sodium chloride is NaCl, that of calcium chloride is
CaClg, that of boron chloride, BCI3, for boron is a triad; the chloride
of the tetrad, carbon, CCI4, and so on. And considering the com-
pounds with hydrogen, where these exist, we have BH3, corresponding
to the chloride; CH^, NH3, OH2, and finally CIH and FH. As the
valency alters by unity in each ease, it appeared reasonable to place
the elements on the table in equidistant columns; or, as in Dr.
Stone/s diagram, on equidistant lines, dividing the spiral curve into
eight equal segments.

Meyer, however, showed that if the elements be mapped on square

0 M to iO 40. so 60 70 00 30 100 110 IZO _ liO- . 1*9

Atomic Weights.

paper, so that the vertical divisions correspond to the volumes occupied
by unit weight of the solid or liquid elements, while the horizontal
divisions correspond with the atomic weights, a certain amount of

584 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

regularity is to be noticed, as is to be seen in the accompanying dia-
gram. Tbere, it will be noticed, the elements, sodium, potassium,
rubidium and cesium, occur at the summits of somewhat irregular
curves. Such relations, among others, led him to formulate the prop-
osition that the properties of the elements are periodic functions of
their atomic weights; that is, they vary in a systematic manner,
either positively or negatively, as the scale of the atomic weights is
ascended.

The division of the elements into metals and non-metals corresponds
broadly with another well-marked division — that into basic and acidic.
Generally speaking, it is the oxides of the metallic elements which
react with water to form bases ; and those of the non-metals which form
acids with water. This distinction was recognized by Lavoisier, when
he named oxygen the acid- forming element. But what is a base ? And
what is an acid? The old definition was — two classes of substances,
which, when brought together, react to form a salt. But the definition
may now be made with greater definiteness. It was known to Cavendish
and to Priestley, that when a current of electricity was passed through
the solution of a salt in water, one portion of the salt, namely the basic
portion, came towards the negative pole; and it was believed that this
was due to the basic portion possessing a positive charge. Similarly,
the acid portion, possessing a negative charge, traveled towards the
positive pole. Hence, bases were said to be electro-negative, and acids,
electro-positive. And Sir Humphry Davy arranged the elements m a
series, of which one was supposed to be electro-positive to its neighbor
on the right, and electro-negative to its left-hand neighbor.

According to modern ideas, bases, by the mere act of solution in
water, are supposed to be split up into two portions, for which the term
ion, invented by Faraday, has been retained ; one ion is charged by the
process of solution with a positive charge, and that portion is usually
a metal; the other portion, which consists of one or more groups
of hydrogen and oxygen in combination, termed ''hydroxy 1' — OH —
has a negative charge. A base, indeed, is a compound which splits in
this manner. On the other hand, an acid, when dissolved in water,
undergoes an analogous split; but in this case the electro-positive ion
is always hydrogen, while the electro-negative ion may either be an ele-
ment such as chlorine, or a group of elements such as exist in nitric
acid (NO3).

The order of the various elements in the electric series has been
determined ; and not merely determined, but to each has been attached
a numerical value. This value is identical with what is termed 'chem-
ical affinity'; and it represents the electric potential of the element
with reference to an arbitrary starting-point, which does not differ
much from that of nickel, an element closely related to iron. Only

INERT CONSTITUENTS OF THE ATMOSPHERE. 585

a few such values have as yet been determined numerically; instances
may be chosen from the magnesium group, where the numbers run:
Magnesium = -f 1.2; Zinc = + 0.5; Cadmium = -f- 0.19; or from
the fluorine column, where the numbers are : Fluorine = — 2.0 ;
Chlorine^ — 1.6; Iodine = — 0.4. In each case the potential, posi-
tive or negative, is the highest for the element with smallest atomic
weight, and decreases with increase of atomic weight, for elements in
the same column. The order of some of the elements is: Cs Eb K
Na Li Ba Sr Ca Mg Al Mn Zn Cd Fe" Co Ni Pb H Cu Ag Hg'Pt'" '
Au'"; and for electro-negative ions, S" 0" I Br CI F; the first ele-
ment, caesium, being the most electro-positive, and the last, fluorine,
the most electro-negative.

The order given above corresponds fairly well with the order in the
periodic table, passing from left to right. But, as in the table, the
atomic weights follow each other continuously round the cylinder or
round the spiral, the abrupt change from elements of an extreme electro-
negative character, like fluorine to sodium, an element of highly electro-
positive character, or from chlorine to potassium, has always appeared
remarkable. The old dictum, Natura nihil fit per saltum, if not always
true (else we should have no elements at all, but a gradual and contin-
uous transition from one kind of matter to another — a condition of
affairs hardly possible to realize), has generally some spice of truth in
it; and it might have been predicted (and the forecast seems to have
been made obscurely by several speculators) that a series of elements
should exist which should exhibit no electric polarity whatever. Such
elements, too, should form no compounds, and, of course, should dis-
play no valency; they should be indifferent, inactive bodies, with no
chemical properties.

The discovery of argon in 1894, followed by that of terrestrial
helium in 1895, and of neon, krypton and xenon in 1898, has shown
the justice of the foregoing remarks. In as much as the methods em-
ployed for the isolation of these elements illustrate their properties
and confirm the views as to their inertness and lack of electric polarity,
I propose to sketch shortly the history of their discovery.

An accurate investigation of the density of atmospheric nitrogen
and of nitrogen prepared from its compounds led Lord Eayleigh to
inquire into the cause of the discrepancy, for the density of the nitro-
gen of the atmosphere was found to exceed that of 'chemical nitrogen'
by about one part in two hundred, whereas the accuracy of his experi-
ments was such that it would have excluded an error of one part in five
thousand. I need not here allude to the reasons which were at first put
forward to account for this anomaly ; suflBce it to say that they offered
no explanation; and that we ultimately traced the discrepancy to the
presence in 'atmospheric nitrogen' of a gas nearly half as dense again

586

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Fig. 1.

as nitrogen. Two methods were adopted for isolating this gas. One
was a repetition of a process which had been employed by Cavendish in

1785; it consisted in passing
electric sparks for a long time
through air, confined over mer-
cury, in presence of caustic
alkali. The accompanjdng
woodcut gives an idea of the
apparatus he employed. This
experiment had been made by
Priestley ten years previously,
but not with quantitative ac-
curacy. It was Cavendish's ob-
ject to inquire whether the
nitrogen of the atmosphere had
any claim to be regarded as a
homogeneous substance, but he left the question undecided. Hav-
ing continued to pass sparks through a measured volume of air, with
the occasional addition of oxygen, imtil no
further diminution in volume occurred, he
found that after the excess of oxygen had
been removed, the residue amounted to not
more than 1/1 20th part of the whole of
the nitrogen. The actual volume of the
inactive gases in the nitrogen of the atmos-
phere is one eighty-fourth. Cavendish did
not pursue the investigation further, and
the discovery of argon was postponed for
a century.

A convenient form of apparatus for re-
peating Cavendish's experiment is shown
in the accompanying figure. The gas,
air mixed with oxygen, is confined over
mercury in an inverted test-tube, in contact
with a few drops of a solution of caustic
potash; and by connecting the rings with
wires from the secondary coil of an induc-
tion apparatus, sparks pass between the
platinum terminals in the interior of the
test-tube. The volimie of the gas rapidly
diminishes; and in a few hours, the gas is
removed to a clean tube, and the excess of

oxygen absorbed by burning phosphorus ; the inert gases remain behind.
On a larger scale, the apparatus used by Lord Eayleigh, consisting

INERT CONSTITUENTS OF THE ATMOSPHERE. 587

of a balloon of six liters capacity, in the interior of which an electric
flame is kept alight by means of a transformer, while a jet of caustic
alkali forms a fountain in the interior, gives good results. By its help,
seven or eight liters of mixed gases can be made to combine per hour.

Such experiments show the inactive nature of the argon group of
gases towards an electro-negative element, oxygen. The gases are
absolutely incombustible. No other elements can withstand such
treatment, save platinum and its congeners, and gold. But even these
metals combine with fluorine or clilorine, when heated in a current of
one or other gas. Argon, however, is wholly unaffected when electric
sparks are passed through its mixture with chlorine or fluorine, the
two other most electro-negative elements. To them, too, it shows
itself completely indifferent.

A more convenient method of separating the nitrogen from its
admixture with argon in atmospheric air is by means of red-hot
magnesium. The metal magne-

sium, which is now made on a
considerable scale for photo-
graphic and signaling purposes, is
a white, silvery metal, which can
be planed or turned into shav-
ings. In the early experiments, a
measured quantity of atmospheric -;
nitrogen, dried by passing over
suitable drying agents, was ^^^- ^^

brought into contact with magnesium turnings, heated to red-
ness in a tube of hard glass. It has been found, however, by
M. Maquenne, that the metal calcium, which, for this purpose
is most easily produced by heating together a mixture of mag-
nesium filings and pure dry lime, is a more efficient absorbing agent
for nitrogen, for it does not require such a high temperature, and
can be effected without danger of melting the glass tube. Indeed, the
operation is a very easy one, and can be carried out with the very
simple apparatus shown in Figure 3. M. Guntz has also found that
lithium, an element belonging to the same colimin in the periodic
table as sodium and potassium, is an exceedingly good absorbent for
nitrogen, for it tarnishes in nitrogen even at atmospheric temperature,
owing to the formation of a nitride.

On a large scale, the magnesium turnings are contained in iron
tubes, and the gas-holders are made of copper or of galvanized iron.
By this means, fifteen liters of argon were separated from about two
cubic yards of air.

The inactivity of argon in contact with such highly electro-positive
■elements as lithium, magnesium and calcium again demonstrates its

588 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

want of electric polarity. No other elements would have resisted
such treatment, except those of the argon group. But these are not
the only data from which such a conclusion can be drawn; for it was
found that no action takes place between argon and hydrogen, phos-
phorus, sulphur, tellurium, caustic soda, potassium nitrate, sodium
peroxide, sodium persulphide, nitro-hydrochloric acid, bromine-water
and many other reagents which it would be tedious to mention, all of
which are remarkable for their chemical activity. We may therefore
take it that the name 'argon,' which means 'inactive,' has been happily
chosen.

In attempting to form compounds of argon, however, another
consideration was not lost sight of; if compounds of argon were
capable of existence, they ought to exist in nature ; and as in all prob-
ability they would be easily decomposed by heat, it ought to be pos-
sible to decompose them with evolution of argon, which could be
collected and tested. Professor Miers, in a letter which he wrote me
the day after an account of the fruitless attempts to cause argon to
combine had been given to the Koyal Society, drew my attention to
experiments by Dr. Hillebrand of the United States Geological Survey,
in course of which he obtained a gas, which he believed to be nitrogen,
by treating the rare mineral clevite, a substance found in felspathic
rocks in the south of Norway, with sulphuric acid. The chief con-
stituents of clevite are oxides of the rare elements uranium and
thorium, and of lead. The gas obtained thus, after purification from
nitrogen, was examined in a Pliicker tube with the spectroscope, and
exhibited a number of brilliant lines, of which the most remarkable
was one in the yellow part of the spectrum, similar in color to the
light given out by the glowing tube. The position of this line and of
others which accompany it established the identity of this gas, not with
argon, as was hoped, but with a supposed constituent of the sun's
chromosphere, first observed by M. Janssen of Paris, during an eclipse
which was visible in India in 1868. The late Sir Edward Frankland,
and Sir Norman Lockyer, who studied the spectrum of the chromo-
sphere, gave to the supposititious element, which they regarded as the
cause of these lines, the name 'helium,' a word derived from ^yjXco^^''
Greek for 'the sun.' Having been placed on the track, I examined,
with the assistance of Dr. Collie and Dr. Travers, no fewer than 51
minerals; while Sir Norman Lockyer examined 46 additional ones,
which we had not examined; and in 19 minerals, almost all of them
containing uranium, helium was found. Only one gave an argon
spectrum, namely malacon. We also sought for argon and helium in
meteorites, which all give off gas on heating ; but in only one specimen,
a meteorite from Augusta County, Virginia, was helium found, in this
case accompanied by argon. All natural waters contain argon, for

INERT CONSTITUENTS OF THE ATMOSPHERE. 589

that gas is somewhat soluble in water (4.1 volumes per 100 of water
at 15° C.) ; but some also contain helium, as for instance the gas from
the Bath springs, which Lord Eayleigh foimd to contain argon mixed
with about 8 per cent, of its volume of helium; and helium has also
been found in mineral springs at Wildbad, and at Cauterets, in the
Pyrenees. It would appear, then, that helium is not such a very rare
constituent of our globe; and indeed, it is probable that it is contin-
ually escaping from the earth in small quantities in certain regions.

Let us next turn our attention to the atomic weights of these ele-
ments, in order to discover what position should be assigned to them
in the periodic table. It is not difficult to ascertain their molecular
weights; that is the relative weights of equal numbers of molecules;
for, assuming Avogadro's hypothesis, that equal volumes of gases
contain equal numbers of molecules, or particles capable of independent
existence in space, the weights of equal volumes of these gases, com-
pared with that of an equal volume of oxygen taken as 16 (the usual
standard) will give the relative weights of their molecules. The
density of helium was found to be very nearly 2, or one eighth of that
of oxygen; while that of argon was 19.94, very nearly 20. It may be
interesting to spend a few minutes in a description of the method by
which the density is determined. The principle is to weigh a gtobe,
completely emptied of air by means of an air-pump ; the globe is then
filled with the gas, care being taken to observe accurately the temper-
ature and pressure of the atmosphere at the moment of closing the
globe ; and the difference in weight of the full and the empty bulb gives
the weight of a known volume of the gas. It is easy to compare it
with that of an equal volume of oxygen.

The weight of a gas is much more considerable than might be sup-
posed. Thus, a liter of oxygen weighs nearly a gram and a half; and
the air in an ordinary room twelve feet broad, long and high, weighs
over a hundred and fifty pounds. It is possible to obtain fair results
by weighing as little as 30 cubic centimeters, or about one fluid ounce
of any gas. Such a globe filled with helium weighs about one two-
hundredths of a gram ; and it is not difficult to be fairly certain to one-
hundredth part of that weight. With a heavier gas like argon, much
greater accuracy is of course possible.

Now, although the standard atomic weight with which others are
compared, that of oxygen, is taken as 16, it is believed, for reasons
which will afterwards appear, that a molecule of oxygen consists of two
atoms, the weight of which will of course be 32. And, as the weight
of helium is one eighth of that of an equal volume of oxygen, the
weight of a molecule of helium will be the eighth part of 32, or 4.
Similarly, the molecular weight of argon compared with that of an
atom of oxygen taken as 16 will be 40, But the question has stiU to

59° POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

be answered: Does a molecule of helium or of argon resemble a
molecule of oxygen in consisting of two atoms; or does it consist of
one atom or of more than two?

It is believed that when heat is put into a gas, it is expended in
causing the molecules to move. This motion may in some cases be of
two kinds; the molecules may be urged through space, each molecule
traveling in a straight path, until a collision takes place with another
molecule, when it changes its rate and direction of motion ; such motion
i? termed 'translational motion.' On the other hand, if the molecules
are themselves complex, that is, if they consist of groups of atoms, any
energy imparted to the gas in the form of heat will produce, not merely
the translational motion, but will also cause the atoms to move rela-
tively to each other within the molecule. It is only the translational
motion which is manifested as pressure, for it is only by their motion
through space that the molecules can bombard the sides of the vessel
which contains them, and so exert pressure on the walls. Hence it
will require a less amount of heat to raise pressure in a gas with simple
molecules, than in one of which the molecules are complex, for in the
former case no heat is used in causing internal motion. Now, to
measure such quantities of heat is by no means easy, although it has
been successfully accomplished in some instances. To avoid this meas-
urement, a device is adopted which produces equally satisfactory re-
sults. It consists in comparing the amounts of heat required to raise
the temperature of a gas, first, when it is not allowed to expand, and when
all the heat is used in producing molecular motion of the kind referred
to; and second, when it is allowed to expand, and consequently when
it could be made to do work ; for example, to drive a small air-engine.
In the latter case, a greater amount of heat is required to rise the tem-
perature of the gas; an amount equivalent to the work which the gas
does on expanding. This quantity, however, which is equivalent to
mechanical work, is the same for all gases, provided equal numbers of
molecules (or equal volumes) be heated through the same number of
degrees of temperature. And this renders it possible to calculate the
amount of heat required to raise the temperature of a gas, even without
a direct measurement. An example will serve to render this somewhat
difficult conception clear. For mercury-gas, for argon and for helium,
and indeed for all gases, nitrogen, oxygen and their mixture, air, if a
volume which contains the molecular weight of the gas taken in grams
be raised through one degree of temperature, allowing the gas to ex-
pand, and so to do work, the amount of heat equivalent to this work
is sufficient to raise the temperature of two grams of water through
one degree. This is termed in the language of heat-measurement 2
calories. Now, the total heat required to raise the temperature of 40
grams of argon, for example (and it must be remembered that 40 is

INERT CONSTITUENTS OF THE ATMOSPHERE. 591

the molecular weight of argon), through 1°, allowing it to expand
while it is being heated, is 5 calories. Deducting the 2 calories required
for external work, 3 calories remain as the heat required to raise the
temperature of the gas. For oxygen, on the other hand, the heat re-
quired to raise the temperature of 32 grams, its molecular weight,
through 1° is 7 calories; and deducting 2 as before, the remainder is
5, the specific heat of oxygen. Hence for argon and for oxygen, we
have the properties :

Heat Requibed.
No external work. External work.
Argon 3 : 5 :: 1 : 1%

Oxygen 5 : 7 :: 1 : 1%

The argument stands thus: The heat required to raise the tem-
perature of argon without expansion can be accounted for entirely on
the supposition that it is wholly used in causing the molecules to move
through space; on the other hand, more heat requires to be communi-
cated to oxygen than to argon in the proportion of 3 to 5. With
oxygen and similar gases, this extra heat must be doing something;
it is supposed to produce motion of the atoms within the molecule.
There is no such motion within the argon molecule; hence it is con-
cluded that the molecule consists of a single atom; and in. that case,
the molecular weight is the same as the atomic weight. The molecule
of oxygen may be considered as possessing a structure like that of a
dumb-bell; the atoms forming the knobs at each end of the bar. On
throwing a dumb-bell through space, it will not merely change its
position as a whole; but it will rotate. But a molecule of argon or
helium is imagined to have the simpler form of a sphere or ball ; when
it is thrown practically no energy is used in causing it to rotate, but
it is all expended in making it pass through space.

I must apologize for introducing such abstruse conceptions into a
popular exposition; but they are necessary to the argument; and I
am afraid that no simpler means can be found of reaching the conclu-
sion that the molecules of argon and of helium are identical with their
atoms.

As 4 is the molecular weight of helium, and as 40 is that of argon,
these numbers also stand for their atomic weights. Let us next see
how these figures fit into the periodic table.

In 1897, as president of the Chemical Section of the British Associa-
tion, I chose the title ^An Undiscovered Gas' for the address to the Sec-
tion. The arguments in favor of the existence of such a gas were briefly
these: The differences between the atomic weights of consecutive
elements in the columns of the periodic table are approximately 16 to
20; thus 16.5 is the difference between the atomic weights of fluorine
and chlorine; 16, between those of oxygen and sulphur, and so on.

592 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Again, stepping one pace down the scale, we have 19.5 as the difference
between chlorine and manganese; 20.3, between sulphur and chro-
mium; 19.8, between silicon and titanium, etc. The total difference
between manganese and fluorine is 36 ; between chromium and oxygen,
36.3; between vanadium and nitrogen, 37.4, and between titanium
and carbon, 36.1. This is approximately the difference between the
atomic weights of helium and argon, 36. I quote now from that ad-
dress: "There should, therefore, be an undiscovered element between
helium and argon, with an atomic weight 16 units higher than that of
helium, and 20 units lower than that of argon, namely 20. And if
this unknown element, like helium and argon, should prove to consist
of monatomic molecules, then its density should be half its atomic
weight, 10. And pushing the analogy still further, it is to be expected
that this element should be as indifferent to union with other elements
as the two allied elements."

Those who care to read the story of the search for this undiscovered
element may find it in the address. Minerals from all parts of the
globe, mineral waters from Britain, France and Iceland, meteorites
from interstellar space; all these were investigated without result.
Helium from various minerals was separated by long and tedious pro-
cesses of diffusion into a possibly lighter portion, diffusing more
rapidly, and a possibly heavier portion, diffusing more slowly ; but with
no positive result. The systematic diffusion of argon, however, gave a
faint indication of where to seek for the missing element, for the
density of the more rapidly diffusing portion was 19.93, while that of
the portion which diffused more slowly was 20.01.

The invention by Dr. Hampson of an apparatus by means of which
it is possible to obtain liquid air at small expense and with little trouble
placed a new instrument in our hands; and Dr. Travers and I pre-
pared 15 liters of argon from the atmosphere, with the purpose of
distilling it fractionally, after liquefaction; for we knew, from the
researches of Professor Olszewski of Cracow, who has done so much
to determine the properties of liquefied gases, that argon could be
liquefied easily by compressing it into a vessel cooled by help of liquid
air. And, moreover, we were in hope that by fractionating the air
itself, gases of even higher atomic weight than argon might possibly
be obtained. Both expectations were realized; on distilling liquid
argon, the first portions of gas to boil off were found to be lighter than
argon; and on allowing liquid air to boil slowly away, heavier gases
came off at the last. It was easy to recognize these gases by help of the
spectroscope; for the light gas, to which we gave the name, neon, or
'the new one,' when electrically excited emits a brilliant flame-colored
light; and one of the heavy gases, which we called krypton, or 'the
hidden one,' is characterized by two brilliant lines, one in the yellow

INERT CONSTITUENTS OF THE ATMOSPHERE. 593

and one in the green part of the spectrum. The third gas, named
xenon, or 'the stranger/ gives out a greenish-blue light, and is remark-
able for a very complex spectrum, in which blue lines are conspicuous.

Although neon vras first obtained by the fractional distillation of
argon, it was afterwards found convenient to prepare it direct from
air. The torpedo-compressor, which is used for compressing the air
before it enters Dr. Hampson's liquefier, was made to take in the air
v/hich had escaped liquefaction in the liquefier; the denser portions
were thus liquefied, and the lighter portions were liquefied by compress-
ing them into a vessel cooled by the denser fractions, boiling under
reduced pressure, and consequently at a specially low temperature.
This liquefied portion was again fractionated, and yielded neon; and
it was not long before we discovered that helium was also present in
the mixture. The presence of helium in atmospheric air had previously
been noted by Professor Kayser of Bonn, and by Professor Friedlander
of Berlin, on submitting the spectrum of argon to a searching ex-
amination.

The purification of this mixture of neon and helium from argon,
although a lengthy process, was not attended by any special difficulty.
It was accomplished by repeated distillation, the lighter portions being
always collected separately from the heavier portions, and again dis-
tilled by themselves. But after this separation had been accomplished,
we found that we were unable by means of liquid air to liquefy the
mixture, or indeed any portion of it. We effected a partial separation
by diffusion; but it is not possible to separate by this method two
gases of which the quantity is limited. Another attempt was made
by dissolving the gases in liquid oxygen, on the supposition that neon
might prove more soluble than helium; but without satisfactory re-
sults. It was evident that a lower temperature than that possible by
help of liquid air was necessary.

Professor Dewar had by that time succeeded in producing liquid
hydrogen in quantity, and had indicated the principle, which is identical
with that of Dr. Hampson's air-liquefier, although he has not published
any detailed account of his apparatus. Dr. Travers undertook to
investigate the subject; and after four unsuccessful trials, he made
a liquefier, with the help of Mr. Holding, the laboratory mechanician,
by means of which a hundred cubic centimeters of liquid hydrogen
could be easily and cheaply produced. There was then no difficulty
in effecting the separation of neon from helium; for, while neon is
practically non-volatile, when cooled by liquid hydrogen, remaining in
the state of solid or liquid, even that enormously low temperature is not
sufficient to convert helium into a liquid. Hence the gaseous helium
could be pumped away from the non-gaseous neon, and the latter was
obtained in a pure state.

VOL. LIX. — 41

594

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The residues obtained from the evaporation of about thirty liters
of liquid air, after being freed from oxygen and nitrogen, were liquefied
by help of liquid air, and fractionated from each other. The separa-
tion offered no special difficulty, but was long and tedious. It soon
appeared that when most of the argon had been removed, the residue
solidified when cooled ; but while it was possible to remove the krypton
by pumping, for it goes into gas slowly even at the low temperature
of liquid air, very little xenon accompanied it ; for at that temperature,
xenon is hardly at all volatile.

Having finally separated the gases, their densities and other prop-
erties were carefully determined; and it was also proved that they are
like argon and helium, in as much as their molecules consist of single
atoms. Neon, as was expected, turned out to be the missing link be-
tween helium and argon; the atomic weight of krypton was found to
be 81.6, and that of xenon, 128. The volumes occupied by equal num-
bers of molecules of the liquefied gases were determined; and also the
boiling-points and melting-points of argon, krypton and xenon. These
figures are shown in the following table:

Helium. Neon. Argon. Krypton. Xenon.

Density of gas 1.98 9.96 19.96 40.78 64.0

Atomic weight 3.96 19.92 39.92 81.56 128.0

Density of liquid 0.3 (?) 1.0(?) 1.212 2.155 3.52

Boiling-points — — — 186.1°C. — 151.7°C. — 109.1 °C.

Melting-points — — — 187.9°C. — 169.°C. — 140.°C.

Critical temperatures.. — — — 117.4°C. — 62.5°C. + 14.75°C.

Critical pressures — —(Metres.) 40.20 41.24 43.50

Refractivity of gas 0.124 0.235 0.968 1.450 2.368

In every case there is seen what is termed periodicity; that is, a
gradual alteration with rise of atomic weight, of the densities of the
liquids, of the melting-points, of the boiling-points, and of the retard-
ation of light when passed through the gas.

Let us consider, in conclusion, the position of these elements in the
periodic table; and it will be sufficient to confine our attention to the
groups of elements which form the neighboring columns. The atomic
weights are given in round numbers.

Hydrogen. Helium. Lithium. Beryllium.

14 7 9

Fluorine. Neon. Sodium. Magnesium.

19 20 23 24

Chlorine. Argon. Potassium. Calcium.

35.5 40 39 40

Bromine. Krypton. Rubidium. Strontium.

80 82 85 87

Iodine. Xenon. Caesium. Barium.

127 128 133 137

It is evident that these new elements fall into their natural places
between the strongly electro-negative elements of the fluorine group, and

INERT CONSTITUENTS OF THE ATMOSPHERE. 595

the very electro-positive elements of the lithium group ; and that, in con-
sequence of their lack of electric polarity, and their inactivity, they
form, in a certain sense, a connecting link between the two. It is
curious, too, to notice that iodine, xenon, caesium and barium form
the ends of their respective columns. It is, of course, not impossible
that other elements may be discovered, possessing similar properties,
and yet higher atomic weights than these; but as yet there is no clue
to guide us where to search for them.

It is difficult, owing to the impossibility of effecting a complete
separation of the inactive elements from each other, to do more than
hazard a guess as to their relative amount in air. As they are easily
separated from the other constituents of air, there is no doubt as to their
total amount; air contains 0.937 parts of argon and its companions
by volume in 100 parts. Perhaps the table below may be taken as
affording some indication of their relative amounts. Air contains by
volume :

0.937 parts of argon per hundred.

One or two parts of neon per hundred thousand.

One or two parts of helium per million.

About one part of krypton per million.

About one part of xenon per twenty million.

It is of course not impossible that xenon may contain an even
smaller proportion of a still heavier gas ; but it is unlikely. Sea- water
sometimes contains a grain of gold per ton; that is one part in
15,180,000; a grain of xenon is contained in about four hundred-
weights of air.

The problems suggested by the periodic table are by no means solved
by the discovery of these aerial gases; but something has been done
to throw light upon one obscure comer of the field. The gap between
the electro-positive and the electro-negative elements has been bridged.

596

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE.

A VIKING PHILOSOPHER.

In the minds of most men the name
of Adolf Erik Nordenskiold is con-
nected with the voyage of the Vega,
and with that only. That is a good
title to fame, for his circumnavigation
of the Old World, the forcing of the
northeast passage, attempted in vain
for over three centuries, was an exploit
worthy to rank with those of Vasco di
Gama and Maghelhaens. But Nor-
denskiold was a good deal more than
a great explorer, and whatever he
might have accomplished he would
always have remained a singularly in-
teresting character.

The doer of some striking deed soars
for a space to the zenith of popular
favor, and his fall is often the greater
when ousted ky the next darling of the
public. But Nordenskiold, from the day
he entered Sweden, banished from his
native Finland by the Russian govern-
ment for an over-pointed after-dinner
speech which he declined to withdraw,
to the day when he died full of honors
from all nations, was ever a hero of
the Swedes, the one man whose features
and fame were known in every village
of the land. Fifteen years after the re-
turn of the Vega I crossed Sweden in
his company. The lake steamer on
which we set foot was speedily dressed
with flags from stem to stern; as we
paced the railway platform, folk
turned to point him out to their chil-
dren; an apothecary into whose shop
we stepped drew us into his parlor to
point with pride to a medallion of the
hero hung in the place of honor; even
a drive with him through the streets
of Stockholm, where his presence was
familiar, was not without embarrass-
ment. Those who knew Nordenskiold
can imderstand this easily. He im-

pressed the popular imagination like
some grand mysterious figure of the
Middle Ages. Rarely did man so com-
bine the profound research of the stu-
dent with the decisive energy of the
geographical explorer, the remote and
even fantastic speculations of the
philosopher with the business-like
ability of a prudent organizer, the
absent-minded reverie and complete
absorption of the recluse with the wide
sympathies and practical readiness of
a liberal politician. These broad out-
lines of his character were obvious to
all, and manifest too in his outer per-
son. The deep-set far-away eyes and
the furrowed forehead above the shaggy
eyebrows proclaimed him a seer of vi-
sions and a diver into nature's secrets,
while the hard lines of the mouth and
prominent underlip told of an obstinate
patience joined to a fiery Viking tem-
per; the bowed shoulders of the book-
worm, voracious of fusty manuscripts
in the dark recesses of a library, were
belied by the firm elastic tread of the
sailor and mountaineer.

The things he did and the things he
said were striking in themselves, but
they were the outcome of his yet more
striking personality. People talked of
Nordenskiold's luck. He had the luck
of all who lay the foundations of their
plans deep, who make every prepara-
tion suggested by learning and ex-
perience, who know how to wait for
the fitting moment, and who have the
boldness to go ahead unswervingly
when the opening appears. It was the
exhaustive detail of his plans for the
northeast passage that awoke the ad-
miration, and gained the support, of
King and people; it was by fore-
thought, and not only by daring, that
he brought the Vega and her consorts

DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE,

597

from ocean to ocean, unscathed and
without the loss of a single man. It
was by readiness and prompt decision
that he steered the Sofia to what, but
for the Englishman, Parry, had then
been the farthest north, and that on
another voyage he burst the icy barrier
of southeastern Greenland, which had
defied assault for three hundred years.

These expeditions to Greenland were
inspired largely by his desire to see
the remains of the ancient Qsterby, the
settlement of the Norsemen, an in-
spiration as much sentimental as scien-
tific. On the other hand, his early voy-
ages to Siberian waters, though not
unfruitful of scientific results, were as
grossly commercial as those of his fel-
low-pioneers, Captains Carlsen and
Wiggins. But mere trade would not
have taken Nordenskiold to the mouth
of the Yennissei, and we believe that in
the night-watches there ever loomed
before him the shadow of Tchelyuskin,
the cape that he would be the first to
double.

As keeper of the minerals in the
State Museum at Stockholm, Norden-
skiold had to deal with objects that
may be thought petty in comparison
with his famous exploits. But the pro-
fessor was a poet, always seeing the
greater in the less, and thus it was that
the dust falling on Arctic snows through
the long night was for him a message
from other worlds than ours, a sug-
gestion of some primeval harbinger
that brought to a cooling planet the
germ of all life. So, too, a prolonged
study of cracks in granite, to which his
attention was first directed on Spitz-
bergen, led him, by a process of reason-
ing too complicated for repetition here,
to the belief that tliey must penetrate
to a depth of thirty to forty meters
below sea-level and no further, since
there they would meet with a system
of horizontal cracks. Water would
sink through the first set of cracks to
that depth, and there would form a
constant source of supply. The theory
was proved correct by the diamond

drill, and from it wider consequences
of geological import inevitably result.
But the practical benefits, especially in
the large granitic areas of Sweden
and Finland, are no less, and at Nor-
denskiold's instigation large numbers
of bore-holes have now been sunk, light-
houses on seagirt rocks furnished with
a never-failing spring, and factories
supplied with pure water previously
obtainable only at great expense.
'Nordenskiold's wells' will soon be
household words, and they who under-
stand neither mathematics nor geology
know at least that like the prophet of
old he has brought forth water from
the stony rock.

But it is not my purpose to discuss
the scientific labors of Nordenskiold,
so much as to illustrate his personality.
Stern and reserved in appearance, he
was often so in reality, but this arose
rather from his abstraction in deep
problems than from any aloofness of
nature. He was not high-minded, how-
ever proud his looks, and could unbend
without a trace of condescension. He
was not a good speaker, but he was an
inveterate one, and, as we have seen,
his freedom of youthful speech cost
him his post and his native land. On
the triumphal homeward voyage of the
Vega, there were banquets at every
port of call, and Nordenskiold, who of
course spoke, employed always the lan-
guage of the country. It was his cus-
tom. Even in Japan, after a few
weeks' stay, he replied to the toast of
his health in Japanese. The speech was
not reported.

Wherever he went he collected ob-
jects of interest, and the collection he
made in Japan was characteristic. He
bought up all the books and manu-
scripts he could lay hands on, and so
it is that there now exists in the Royal
Library at Stockholm perhaps the
finest collection of Japanese literature
in Europe. The catalogue by Professor
Rosny, of Paris, is well known to
Orientalists.

Nordenskiold was also a voluminous

598

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

writer. He was perhaps too fertile in
ideas to have the lucidity that makes
the good writer. Many of his sen-
tences struggle through ponderous
verbiage only to die in the folds of an
ambiguous anacoluthon. But a pic-
turesque phrase sparkles out here and
there, as when in reference to some
modern geological theories, he says,
'still the student of science is groping
here, like a child after the silvery disc
of the moon.' A sentence that an un-
kind critic might apply to some of the
philosopher's OAvn speculations.

Further illustrations of Nordens-
kiold's many-sided character might be
d^rawn from aspects of his life here
scarcely referred to. Enough has been
said to render intelligible the hero-
worship of the Swedish people. Is the
world too old for a Nordenskiold myth
to be possible? I doubt one is even
now in the making among the remote
homesteads in Scandinavian forests.

F. A. B.

Alf ITALIAN IN AMERICA.
Professor Angelo Mosso, the genial
physiologist of the University of
Turin, has written a pleasant and
plausible little book about America,
which has been praised in various
places. He duly pats us on the back
and tells of our strong and weak
points. 'Hurry up' is our national
motto, and we are a rampant plutoc-
racy. We make inventions, but democ-
racy is hostile to pure science. Our
neurasthenic tendencies are duly de-
scribed as also our 'spoils system.'

lleligious sentiment is growing, and
we are turning towards the Roman
Catholic Church. Our universities are
not progressing, owing to sectarian
control. All this will be found in the
book; but perhaps it is scarcely fair
to quote it, as there is much there
besides. Now how does Professor
Mosso know us so well? He spent a
month or two here on the . occasion of
the decennial of Clark University, and
though he can not understand an Eng-
lish sentence, he saw us from the win-
dows of the railway train. The
writer of the present note had the
pleasure of meeting Professor Mosso
when he was here. He threw his arms
about him in a warm embrace. Then
he produced a slip from his pocket and
proved by documentary evidence that
there were two Americans whom he
should kiss on both cheeks and about a
dozen whom he should cordially em-
brace. Professor Mosso said later that
he wished to write a book about Ameri-
can universities. It was explained to
him that midsummer was an unfortu-
nate time, the only university carrying
on its sessions being Chicago. He asked:
"Wliere is Chicago? Is there a uni-
versity there?" The position of Chicago
on Lake Michigan was described. He
then said: "Can I see the University of
Chicago to-day and be back in Wor-
cester this evening?" These little anec-
dotes are told in the most kindly spirit
by one who really admires Professor
Mosso. But I must protest against his
argument that there is no fundamental
difference between an American and an
Italian. K.

SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE.

599

SCIENTIFIC LITERATUEE.

PHYSICS.
'The Proceedings of the Paris Con-
gress of 1900 on Methods of Testing
Materials' have just appeared in three
large folio volumes. The first article by
M. Ricour has for its title 'The Molec-
ular Constitution of Matter/ but is
largely devoted to the discussion of the
laws of attraction and to the proper-
ties of the ether of space. This ether
he imagines to be a sphere whose
radius, though great, may perhaps be
ultimately found. The distance of our
sun from the center of this sphere of
ether he finds to be such that light
would require 140,000 years to traverse
it. The density of the ether he finds
to be such that a mass equal in size to
our earth would be equal to about one
kilogram. While much of the work
rests upon hypotheses, the article of
Kicour is interesting as showing how
the engineer as well as the physicist
finally comes to the ether as the ulti-
mate source of all energy. If the ether
is really a limited sphere, as he sup-
poses, the surface of that sphere forms
an absolute limit to our knowledge;
for should other spheres of ether exist
no waves can pass across the empty
spaces that separate them from that
sphere which contains our universe.

MOSQUITOES A?fD MALARIA.

Dr. Leland 0. Howard, the ento-
mologist to the United States Depart-
ment of Agriculture, has just given us

a little book on 'Mosquitoes' (McClure,
Phillips & Co.) that is peculiarly well
timed and important. Dr. Howard has
studied his subject for many years;
primarily, in the past, to devise
methods for the local control of an
annoying pest; but recently, since the
relation of some of the genera to the
spread of malarial and other febrile
diseases has been established, to ascer-
tain their peculiarities of habit and de-
velopment.

Public interest in the newspaper and
magazine accounts has been so marked
that a book like this which gives in
concise form and with scientific ac-
curacy just what is known of the rela-
tion between disease and insects must
be especially useful to correct the mis-
information gaining currency among
the general public. Dr. Howard gives
us in detail the life history of our
commonest species; both Culex, which
is an annoyance merely, and Anopheles,
which is the intermediate host for the
organism producing malarial diseases
in man. The breeding places of each
are discussed and the measures which
may be adopted to do away with them.
A very complete account is given of the
experiments which link the Stegomyia
fasciata with yellow fever, and a brief
statement shows the relation between
Culex ciliaris and Filariasis. A chap-
ter on classification shows fairly well
what is known of our American species
and gives some indication of what yet
remains to be learned.

6oo

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE PEOGKESS OF SCIENCE.

THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION.
The meeting of the American Asso-
ciation for the Advancement of Science
held at Denver during the last week of
August was of more than usual sig-
nificance. For the first time in its his-
tory the Association met west of the
banks of the Mississippi. California
was ceded to the United States in the
same year in which the Association
held its first meeting, and the great
western half of the country and the
Association representing science in
America have developed together. It
was Fremont, then a scientific man en-
gaged in scientific surveys, who saved
California for the Union. The western
States — dependent on railways, mines
and modern agriculture — are the chil-
dren of science. Having attained
through science their remarkable ma-
terial development, they are now pre-
pared to unite wdth the older culture
of the east in efforts for the advance-
ment of science. Extending from
the Mississippi river to the Pacific
coast we have the first civilization
based definitely on science, and we may
expect to see in this region the world's
chief centers for the diffusion and ad-
vancement of science. The first meet-
ing of the American Association in the
west is merely an announcement of
what has been accomplished already,
yet it represents an epoch in the his-
tory of science and of civilization.

The meeting at Denver was itself
full of interest. Though not quite so
large as meetings on the Atlantic sea-
board, it was larger than the recent
meetings at Madison and Detroit, and
nearly as large as the meetings at
Springfield, Buffalo and Columbus.
Further, the 306 members in attend-

ance were mostly scientific men, as is
shown by the fact that two hundred
and twenty papers were presented. The
people of Denver did everything pos-
sible to ensure the social success of the
meeting, and the scenery and resources
of the State of Colorado were of the
greatest possible interest to all visitors.
The address of the president, published
above, was worthy of the occasion, and
many interesting papers were read be-
fore the different sections. In several
respects the business transacted was of
importance in the history of American
science. The committee on the journal,
'Science,' made its first report on the
arrangement made at the New York
meeting last year, in accordance with
which this weekly journal is sent free
of charge to all members of the Asso-
ciation. It appears that the fees of
new members were sufficient to defray
the cost of sending 'Science' to all mem-
bers of the Association, and that the
plan has proved acceptable on all sides.
Another important step was the per-
fecting of the affiliation of the special
societies with the Association. Hith-
erto the national societies devoted to
the special sciences have met in-
formally with the Association; here-
after they will be an integral part of
it, being represented on the council.
The council will thus become the body
chiefly responsible for the organization
of science in America. The Association
plaimed for a winter meeting to be held
at Washington a year from next
January. Attention has already been
called here to the movement now pro-
gressing for the establishment of a con-
vocation week for the meetings of
scientific and learned societies. It is
now assured by the action of our lead-
ing universities and of the American

TEE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

6oi

Association that this week — that in
which the first day of the new year
falls — will hereafter be devoted to the
purpose designated. The meeting of
the American Association next year
will be at Pittsburg at the beginning
of July, and will be presided over by
the great astronomer, Professor Asaph
Hall. It will undoubtedly be large and
important; while the meeting at Wash-
ington will probably be the greatest
scientific congress ever held in Amer-
ica.

There was published in this Journal
for July last an article on the Ameri-
can Association for the Advancement
of Science calling attention to the great
importance and responsibility of this
institution for the development of
science. Trusts and trade unions are
an integral part of our present civiliza-
tion, and it is our duty not to protest
against them, but to direct them for
the common good. Those interests that
are most important for civilization
should have the strongest organization,
and it is gratifying to find that under
the auspices of the American Associa-
tion a union is being effected that will
adequately represent the scientific in-
terests of the country. There was a
period of disintegration when the
development of the special sciences re-
quired the formation of special socie-
ties, but we are apparently now in the
midst of a movement toward such a
concentration of authority as will not
interfere with local autonomy. Here-
with is given a curve showing the total
membership of the American Associa-
tion and the attendance at the meet-
ings since that in Washington in 1891,
when the membership reached its
maximum. It will be noticed that
there was a tendency for the member-
ship gradually to decrease, broken only
by an accession at the large Brooklyn
meeting of 1894. The curve, however,
rises in a remarkable way for the New
York and Denver meetings. This has
doubtless been largely due to the ar-

rangement with 'Science,' mentioned
above, and to the efficiency of the pres-
ent permanent secretary. Dr. L. 0.
Howard, in bringing the desirability
of membership in the Association be-
fore the scientific men of the country.
These, however, are only incidents that
have hastened the development of a
movement demanded by modern con-
ditions.

MORTALITY STATISTICS.
A BULLETIN issued from the census
bureau at the end of August gives vital
statistics of more than usual interest.
The death rates of 1900 and 1890 are
compared both as regards different
regions and as regards different causes
of death. It appears that careful
registration of deaths is undertaken in
ten States and in a large number of
cities, including about twenty-nine mil-
lion of the inhabitants of the country.

6o2

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The statistics disclose the very gratify-
ing fact that in ten years the general
death rate has decreased from 19.6 per
thousand to 17.8. This remarkable de-
crease is in the cities, where the rate
has fallen from 21 in 1890 to 18.6 last
year. The rate in the country has been
about stationary, having been 15.3 in
1890 and 15.4 in 1900. This extraordi-
nary decrease in the death rate of
cities has been due chiefly to improved
hygienic conditions. In the country a
corresponding gain has not occurred.
We may perhaps look for it in the
course of the next ten years, though
there is of course less room for im-
provement. New York City has one of
the best records of progress, its death
rate having decreased in ten years
from 25.3 to 20.4, making the city in
spite of its crowded tenement districts
as healthful as Boston and decidedly
more healthful than Philadelphia, in
which city the death rate has re-
mained practically stationary. But
there is room for further progress in
our eastern cities. Chicago has a death
rate of only 16.2, and nearly all the
cities of the northern and central
States have a low death rate, Minne-
apolis and St. Paul, for example, hav-
ing the incredibly low rates of 10.8 and
9.7, respectively. The most unfavor-
able conditions are in the south, the
death rate of New Orleans, for example,
being 28.9, an increase since 1890; and
that of Charleston, 37.5. about the same
as ten years ago. Almost as interest-
ing as the decrease in the death rate
is the decrease due to certain special
diseases. The following table deserves
to be quoted in full. It shows the
death rate due to certain diseases per
hundred thousand of population in the
registration area in 1900 and 1890
together with the increase or decrease
in the- rate.

This table shows that consumption
is no longer the most fatal of diseases,
pneumonia having taken its place.
Deaths from consumption have de-
creased over 20 per cent., while a

Causes.

Consumption

Debility, atrophy

Diphtheria

Cholera infantum

Bronchitis

Convulsions

Diarrhceal diseases...

Croup...

Typhoid fever

Dis. of the brain

Malarial fever ....

Unknown cause..

Inflammation of
the brain and
meningitis

Hydrocephalus ...

Dropsy

Whooping cough.

Paralysis

Scarlet fever

Septicaemia ,

Diabetes ,

Pneumonia

Premature birth

Old Age

Cancer

Heart disease

Apoplexy

Influenza

Dis. of the kidney.

Death Rate.

d
m
a
<u
t-*
o

a

3.9

5.0

8.5

9.1

12.1

12.2
17.6
1.7.7
24.0

1900.

1890.

190.5
45.5
35.4
47.8
48.3

33.1
85.1
9.8
33.8
18.6

8.8
16.8

41.8

11.0

6.9

12.7
32.8
11.5
10.0
9.4

191.9
33.7
54.0
60.0

134.0
66.6
23.9
83.7

245.4
88.6
70.1
79.7
74.4

56.3
104.1
27.6
46.3
30.9

19.2
24.6

49.1
15.4
10.3

15.8

35.5

13.6

7.7

7.5

186.9
25.2
44.9
47.9

121.8

49.0

6.2

59.7

Q

54.9
43.1
.34.7
31.9
26.1

23.2
19.0
17.8
12.5
12.3

10.4

7.8

7.3
4.4
3.4

3.1
2.7
2.1

greater relative decrease is recorded in
the case of diphtheria and other
diseases. The diseases that show an
increase are chiefly those incident to
advanced age, death from old age itself
showing an increase of 20 per cent.

ARCTIC EXPLORATION.
The steamship Erik has returned,
bringing welcome news of Lieutenant
Peary. It appears that he has suc-
ceeded in rounding the limit of the
Greenland Archipelago, probably the
most northern land, and has reached
the highest altitude yet attained in the
western hemisphere (83° 50'). Mr.
Robert Stein and Mr. Samuel Warm-
bath were picked up by the Windward,
but there is no news regarding Captain
Sverdrup. During the present autumn
Lieutenant Peary expects to make ex-
plorations and in the spring of next
year again to make the attempt to pro-

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

603

ceed as far north as possible. In the
meanwhile, JMr. Baldwin is making a
similar attempt from another direc-
tion, and there are a number of other
expeditions in the far north. Baron
Toll, who started from Russia in
May, 1900, was recently in the Strait
of Tarmour, while from the same
country. Admiral Markaroflf is testing
his ice-breaking steamship. From
Norway, Captain Sverdrup on the
Fram has for three years been making
explorations about Greenland and west
of Ellesmere land. From Germany,
Captain Banandahl was, when last
heard from, advancing north from
Spitzbergen. None of the expeditions
in the north are of the same scientific
importance as the national antarctic
expeditions of Great Britain and Ger-
many, but it seems certain that the
next year will add greatly to our
knowledge of the unknown regions of
the north as well as of the south.

SCIENTIFIC ITEMS.
Professor William Theodore Rich-
ards, of Harvard University, has de-
clined a call to a newly-established
research professorship of chemistry in
the University of Gottingen. It is a
special compliment to the United
States that Germany should seek here
a professor for such a chair, especially
when we remember the large number
of chemists that are trained at the
German universities. — On the applica-
tion of the Government of Victoria,
Australia, for a director of agriculture,
officers of the U. S. Department of
Agriculture have recommended Pro-
fessor B. T. Galloway, chief of the
Bureau of Plant Industry, and Pro-
fessor Willett M. Hays, agriculturist
of the Minnesota Experiment Station.

The Reale Accademia dei Lincei of
Rome has elected eight foreign mem-
bers, including from the United States
Edward C. Pickering, director of the
Harvard College Observatory; Samuel

r. Langley, Secretary of the Smith-
sonian Institution, and Chas. D. Wal-
cott, director of the U. S. Geological
Survey. — The Veitch silver medal has
been awarded to Mr. Thomas Meehan,
of Philadeli^hia, 'for distinguished ser-
vices in botany and horticulture.' Mr.
Meehan is the third American on whom
this medal has been conferred, the
others being Professor Charles S. Sar-
gent, of the Arnold Arboretum, and
Professor Liberty H. Bailey, of Cornell
University.

Professor Ed. Suess, the eminent
geologist, gave on July 13 a formal
lecture to his present and former
students on the occasion of his retire-
ment from the chair of geology. He
has reached his seventieth year and his
forty-fourth year as a university
teacher. — Dr. Ernst Mach, professor
of philosophy in the University of
Vienna, has been compelled by ill
health to retire from the active duties
of his professorship. — Professor E.
Haeckel, of Jena, has made public the
announcement that owing to the state
of his health, his advanced age and
pressure of work, he will not in future
make any pixblic addresses or attend
any scientific congresses.

A royal commission has been ap-
pointed in Great Britain to study the
relation of bovine and human tuber-
culosis, consisting of Sir Michael
Foster, Dr. Sims Woodhead, Dr. Harris
Cox Martin, Professor J. McFadyean
and Professor R. W. Boyce.

The British Association for the Ad-
vancement of Science held its meeting
at Glasgow from September 11-18 un-
der the presidency of Professor A. W.
Riicker, the eminent physicist. The
Congress of German Men of Science
and Physicians is being held at Ham-
burg from September 22-28, under the
presidency of Professor R. Hertmg,
the well-known zoologist.

6o4

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Science also mourns the death of the President of the Nation. We have
lost a good man, representing the sterling qualities of the people. We honor a
man who became great when brought face to face with circumstance. McKinley
stands with Washington and with Lincoln. He who founded the Nation,
he who preserved it, and he who gave it leadership, rank apart from those who
lacked opportunity. The diseased brain of an assassin can not alter the course
of history. When our leader falls, another is ready to take his place. But we
do not forget him over whose body we advance. He is not ill-starred in his
death who is honored and loved and mourned by a Nation.

INDEX.

605

INDEX.

NAMES OF CONTRIBUTORS ARE PRINTED IN SMALL CAPITALS.

Academic Freedom Here and Abroad,
317.

Academies, International Association
of, 217.

Academy, National, of Sciences, 217.

Agricultural Experiment Station, Wis-
consin, 222.

American Association for the Advance-
ment of Science, 218, 305; Denver
Meeting, 506, 600.

Analgesia, Cocaine, of the Spinal Cord,
Smith Ely Jeliffe, 280.

Andrg on the Planet Eros, 415.

Andrews, E. A., The Frog as a Parent,
68.

Antarctic Expeditions, British and
German, 104, 319.

Antarctica, 505.

Arctic Exploration, 602.

Arsenic in English Beer, 106.

Association, International, of Acad-
emies, 217; American, for the Ad-
vancement of Science, 218, 305; Den-
ver Meeting, 506, 600.

Atkinson, Edward, Food and Land
Tenure, 568.

Atmosphere, Hydrogen and the, 107;
Inert Constituents of the, W. Ram-
say, 581.

Atoms, Bodies Smaller than, J. J.
Thomson, 323.

Aurora Australis, as Observed from the
'Belgica,' Frederick A. Cook, 21.

B., F. a., a Viking Philosopher, 596.

Babeock on Ensilage, 222.

Beer, English, Arsenic in, 106.

Beet Sugar Industry, Progress in the
U. S., 102.

Biological Station, The Greatest in the
World, W. A. Herdman, 419.

Bird Study, Francis H. Herrick, 199.

Blood of the Nation, David Starr Jor-
dan, 90, 129.

Blue Hill Meteorological Observatory,
Frank Waldo, 290.

Bodies Smaller than Atoms, J. J.
Thomson, 323.

Body, Pose of the, George T. Stevens,
390.

Bolton on Evolution of the Thermom-
eter, 315.

Botanical, Books, 102; Garden, New
York, 219.

Botany, Fossil, Scott's Studies in, 102;
Percival's Agricultural, 102.

British, Antarctic Expedition, 104,
319; Congress of Tuberculosis, 508.

Britton's Manual of the Plants of East-
ern United States, 220.

Calkins, Gary N., Malaria-Germ and

Allied Forms of Sporozoa, 189.
Cancer, Yellow Fever and. Causes of,

319.
Carbonic Acid, Climate and, Bailey

Willis, 242.
Carnegie, Museum, W. J. Holland, 3;

Schools, 413.
Cavendish, Henry, C. K. Edmunds, 431.
Cement Industry, 409.
Ciieyney, Edward P., The Great Mor-
tality, 402.
Chicago, Celebrations at Glasgow and,

412.
Chloroform, Ether and, C. Herrman,

408.
Climate and Carbonic Acid, Bailey

Willis, 242.
Cocaine Analgesia of the Spinal Cord,

Smith Ely Jeliffe, 280.
Color Vision, Primitive, W. H. R.

Rivers, 44.
Comet, The Recent, 508.
Commission to investigate Plague in

San Francisco, 105.
Constituents, Inert, of the Atmosphere,

581.
Cook, Frederick A., Aurora Australis

as Observed from the 'Belgica,' 21.
Cremation of Towns' Refuse, 410.

Davenport, C. B., The Statistical
Study of Evolution, 447.

Death Rate, Decreased, in United
States, 601.

Deluge, Geology and the, X. Plain,
408; Again, Y. Obscure, 504.

Discussion and Correspondence, 408,
504, 596.

DuFFiELD, John T., The Discovery of
the Law of Gravitation, 475.

Dujardin-Beaumetz on the Toxic Ac-
tion of Alcohols, 107.

Eclipse, Total, of the Sun, 109.
Edmunds, C. K., Henry Cavendish, 431.

-317

6o6

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Electricity, Practical Applications of,
220.

Ellis, Havelock, A Study of British
Genius, 59, 209, 266, 373, 441.

Endowments, Scientific and Educa-
tional, 318.

Engineering, Mechanical, Progress and
Tendency in Nineteenth Century,
Robert H. Thurston, 34, 141;
Recent Contributions to, 409.

Ensilage, Investigations at the Wis-
consin Agricultural Experiment Sta-
tion, 222.

Enzymes, Soluble Ferments or, Edwin
0. Jordan, 497.

Eros, The Planet, 414.

Ether and Chloroform, C. Hebbman,
408.

Ethics as a Science, 101.

Evolution, Statistical Study of, C. B.
Davenpobt, 447.

Explorations, Recent Polar, 104, 602.

Ferments, Soluble, or Enzymes, Edwin

O. Jordan, 497.
Fog Studies on Mount Tamalpais,

Alexander McAdie, 535.
Food and Land Tenure, Edwabd

Atkinson, 568.
Forest Reservations, J. W. Toumey,

115.
Forestry, The New, Simpson's, 102.
Free-Will and the Credit for Good Ac-
tions, George Stuart Fullerton,

526.
Fricker's Antarctic Regions, 505.
Frog as a Parent, E. A. Andrews, 68.
Fullerton, George Stuart, Free-Will

and the Credit for Good Actions, 526.

Gaylord on Cause of Cancer, 319.
Genius, Study of British, Havelock

Ellis, 59, 209, 266, 373, 441.
Geographical Society, Royal, and the

British Antarctic Expedition, 319.
Geology and the Deluge, X. Plain,

408; Again, Y. Obscure, 504.
German Antarctic Expedition, 104.
Gilbert of Colchester, Brother Potam-

lAN, 337.
Glasgow and Chicago, Celebrations at,

412.
Goodrich's Economic Disposal of

Towns' Refuse, 410.
Gravitation, Discovery of the Law of,

John T. Duffield, 475.
Gregory, Professor J. W., and Polar

Explorations, 104.

Halsted, Byron D., Plants as Water-
carriers, 492.

Harvard College Observatory, 218.

Herdman, W. a., The Greatest Biolog-
ical Station in the World, 419.

Herrick, Francis H., The Wild Bird
at Arm's Length, 199.

Hebrman, C, Ether and Chloroform,
408.

Holland, W. J., The Carnegie Museum,
3.

Howard on Mosquitoes, 599.

Howe, James Lewis, Periodic Law,
152.

Hyde, James Nevins, The Late Epi-
demic of Smallpox in the United
States, 557.

Hydrogen in the Atmosphere and Boil-
ing-point of, 107.

Inert Constituents of the Atmosphere,

W. Ramsay, 581.
Injurious Constituents of Distilled

Liquors, 106.
Innis on the Recent Comet, 509.
International Association of Academies,

217.
Inventions, 505.
Irrigation, Schuyler on, 409.
Italian, An, in America, K., 598.

James, William, Frederic Meyers's
Service to Psychology, 380.

Janssen on the Cause of New Stars,
109.

Jeliffe, Smith Ely, Cocaine Analgesia
of the Spinal Cord, 280.

Johns Hopkins University and Presi-
dent Remsen, 317.

Jordan, David Starr, The Blood of the
Nation, 90, 129.

Jordan, Edwin O., The Soluble Fer-
ments or Enzymes, 497.

K., An Italian in America, 598.
Koch, Robert, The Combating of
Tuberculosis, 461.

Land Tenure, Food and, Edward

Atkinson, 568.
Law of Gravitation, Discovery of the,

John T. Duffield, 475.
Le Conte, Joseph, Death of, 415.
Lunt on the Recent Comet, 509.

McAdie, Alexander, Fog Studies on
Mount Tamalpais, 535.

MacDougal's Practical Plant Physi-
ology, 220.

McKinley, President, Death of, 604.

Malaria, and Mosquitoes, 105; Germ,
and Allied Forms of Sporozoa,
Gary N. Calkins, 189.

Manson on Mosquitoes and Malaria,
105.

Memorial Institution, Washington, 411.

Meteorological Observatory, Blue Hill,
Frank Waldo, 290.

INDEX.

607

Meteorology at Harvard Observatory,
219; Blue Hill Observatorj', 290.

Meyers, Frederic, his Service to Psy-
chology, William James, 380.

Mezes's Ethics, Descriptive and Ex-
planatory, 101.

Minot, Charles Sedgwick, Portrait of,
418.

Monkeys, Intelligence of, Edward L.
Thorndike, 273.

Monthly, The, Two Remarks concern-
ing, 510.

Mortality, The Great, Edward P.
Cheyney, 402; Statistics, 601.

Mosquitoes, Malaria and, 105, 599;
Transmission of Yellow Fever by,
George M. Sternberg, 225.

Murray's Compilation of Antarctic In-
formation, 505.

Museum, Carnegie, W. J. Holland, 3.

Naples Biological Station, W. A.

Herdman, 419.
Nation, Blood of the, David Starr

Jordan, 90.
National Academy of Sciences, 217.
New York Botanical Garden, 219.
Nipher on Exposure of Photographic

Plates, 108.

Observatory, Harvard College, 218; The
Blue Hill Meteorological, Frank
Waldo, 290.

Oppolzer on the Planet Eros, 414.

Paleobotanique, Zeiller's Elements de,
102.

Parent, The Frog as a, E. A. Andrews,
68.

Percival's Agricultural Botany, 102.

Periodic Law, James Lewis Howe,
152.

Philippines, Peopling of the, RuD.
ViRCHOW, 257, 351.

Philosopher, A Viking, F. A. B., 596.

Philosophy, Science and, R. M. Wen-
ley, 361.

Photographic Plates, Development of,
in Daylight, 108.

Photography in Total Eclipse, 109.

Physics, 599.

Physiology, Recent, G. N. Stewart, 81.

Pllsbry, Henry A., The Evidence of
Snails on Changes of Land and Sea,
284.

Plague in San Francisco, 105.

Planet Eros, 414.

Plants as Water-carriers, Byron D.
Halsted, 492.

Polar Explorations, Recent, 104.

Pose of the Body, George T. Stevens,
390.

Potamian, Brother, Gilbert of Col-
chester, 337.

Poulsen and the Telegraphone, 413.

Prelini's Tunneling, 409.

Progress of Science, 104, 217, 317, 411,
506, 600.

Psychology, Experimental, 315; Fred-
eric Meyers's Service to, William
James, 380.

Ramsay, W., The Inert Constituents

of the Atmosphere, 581.
Remarks, Two, concerning the Monthly,

510.
Remsen, President of Johns Hopkins

University, 317; Portrait of, 322.
Reservations, Our Forest, J. W.

TOUMEY, 115.
Revista de Construcciones y Agri-

mensura, 410.
Ricour's Molecular Constitution of

Matter, 599.
Rivers, W. H. R., Primitive Color

Vision, 44.
Ro%vland, Henry A., A Plea for Pure

Science, 170.
Russell on Ensilage, 222.
Russell and Turneaure on Public Water

Supplies, 410.

San Francisco, The Plague in, 105.

Sardtoe Industry, The French, Hugh
M. Smith, 542.

Schuyler's Reservoirs for Irrigation,
Water Power, and Domestic Water
Supply, 409.

Science, Pure, A Plea for, Henry A.
Rowland, 170; and Philosophy, R.
M. Wenley, 361 ; The Progress of,
R. S. Woodward, 513; Development
of, in Western States, 600.

Scientific, Courses in the Larger Uni-
versities, 110; Literature, 101, 315,
409, 505, 599; Items, 111, 223, 320,
416, 511, 603.

Scott's Studies in Fossil Botany, 102.

Silica, Vitrified, 509.

Simpson's The New Forestry, 102.

Smallpox, The Late Epidemic of, in
the United States, James Nevins
Hyde, 557.

Smith, Hugh M., The French Sardine
Industry, 542.

Snails, Evidence of, on Changes of
Land and Sea, Henry A. Pilsbry,284.

Soluble Ferments or Enzymes, Edwin
0. Jordan, 497.

Spinal Cord, Cocaine Analgesia of,
Smith Ely Jeliffe, 280.

Sporozoa and Malaria-Germ, Gary N.
Calkins, 189.

Stars, New, Cause of, 109.

Statistical Study of Evolution, C. B.
Davenport, 447.

Statistics, Mortality, 601.

Sternberg, George M., The Trans-
mission of Yellow Fever by Mos-
quitoes, 225.

6o8

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Stevens, George T., The Pose of the
Body, 390.

Stewart, G. N., Recent Physiology, 81.

Sun, Total Eclipse of the, 109.

Sunderland's Twentieth Century In-
ventions, 505.

Tamalpais, Mount, Fog Studies on,
Alexander McAdie, 535.

Telegraphone, The, 413.

Thermometer, History of, 315.

Thomson, J. J., On Bodies Smaller
than Atoms, 323.

Thorndike, Edward L., The Intelli-
gence of Monkeys, 273.

Thurston, Robert H., The Progress
and Tendency of Mechanical Engi-
neering in the Nineteenth Century,
34, 141.

Titchener's Laboratory Manual of Psy-
chology, 315.

TouMEY, J. W., Our Forest Reserva-
tions, 115.

Tuberculosis, Combating, Robert Koch,
461; British Congress of, 508.

Tunneling, Prelini on, 409.

Turneaure and Russell on Public
Water Supplies, 410.

Universities, Scientific Courses in the
Larger, 110.

Viking, A, Philosopher, F. A. B., 596.
ViRCHOW, RuD., The Peopling of the

Philippines, 257, 351.
Vision, Primitive Color, W. H. R.

Rivers, 44.
Vitrified Silica, 509.
Von Drygalski and Polar Explorations,

105.

Waldo, Frank, The Blue Hill Meteor-
ological Observatory, 290.

Washington Memorial Institution, 411.

Water, Carriers, Plants as, Byron D.
Halsted, 492; Supply, 410.

Wenley, R. M., Science and Philosophy,
361.

Willis, Bailey, Climate and Carbonic
Acid, 242.

Wisconsin Agricultural Experiment
Station, 222.

Woodward, R. S., The Progress of
Science, 513.

Yellow Fever, Transmission by Mos-
quitoes, George M. Sternberg, 225;
and Cancer, Causes of, 319.

Youmans, William Jay, Death of, 112.

Zeiller's Elements de Pal^obotanique,
102.

m\<

MBL WHOI LIBRARY

lilH lANK H

^v

• a%:ji

>^r^^^.

^'^.y^^

• ^^

^^ .^^

.*r