By Charles Baskerville, Ph.D.,
Professor of Chemistry, the College of the City of New York.
Dr. Charles Baskerville, whom we present this month to our readers,
belongs to the younger generation of Southern men who are giving
evidence of their capacity for leadership in fields other than political
and forensic. Born in Mississippi in 1870, he is now, at the age of
thirty-five, head of the Department of Chemistry in the College of the
City of New York. After his graduation at the University of Virginia,
he spent some time studying in Germany, and was called upon his return
to the University of North Carolina, where he occupied the chair of
chemistry. He is the author of a text-book on chemistry, and has written
numerous articles on scientific, educational and technological subjects.
He has distinguished himself in the field of original research and
experiment, and belongs of right to the select band of scientific men who
in these latter days, are so eagerly bringing to the light the laws that
govern phenomena in the wonderful world of Nature.
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The world to the human interpreter appears as a paradox of complexes.
Scientific progress, during late years, has not been along the lines of
the least resistance. One who has to do with the problems of nature is
fascinated by the difficulties. Lord Rayleigh attached this motto to his
recently issued, but already famous, “Collected Papers:”
“The works of the Lord are great
Sought out of all them that have pleasure therein.”
To be sure, the gratification of overcoming obstacles is often the only
compensation.
Science has a wide range in the size and nature of the things with which
it deals. With the microscope, it enlarges for vision the unseen world of
bacterial life; with the telescope it draws the celestial bodies near and
interrogates them with the spectroscope; it drags the lifeless element
from the inanimate world, curiously plays with it and then puts it to
man’s use, while seeking his origin and forcing him ever to show cause
for his existence and right to question.
Much of the very recent work in physical science has distinct leanings
towards metaphysics. It is scarcely to be wondered at, when the
experimental data obtained appear to question tenets which devotees
have become accustomed to regard as immutable. Facts are stubborn,
however. When they cause the giving away of the least portion of the
boundaries of our cherished systems, the imagination is unchained. The
discovery and development of our knowledge of the wonderful phenomena
of radio-activity, about which much that is true and more that is false
have appeared in reputable journals of a not remote date, ensample the
groping of our restlessness. These marvels, according to those who have
worked with them most and whose opinions deserve the first consideration,
spontaneously and continuously give out energy appreciable to the senses.
Where does this energy come from? Where does it go? One mudsill of
science is the law of the conservation of energy. This division of
science has a host of investigators busy with the problem of sustaining
this fundamental. The harvest, which is not all grain but contains some
tares, indicates that substances, which we have been pleased to regard
as elemental constituents of nature, undergo voluntary alterations. Some
appear to be breaking down into simpler matter, while others are building
up. This virtually carries us back to the days of the alchemist.
It is a long story, which may not be related here, the deep-seated belief
of most chemists in the unity, hence transmutation, of the elements. It
is a far cry to its accomplishment, however. We need not go back to the
time of the black-art for other examples of efforts to transform one
element into another. Victor Meyer sought to build up thallium shortly
after Crookes found it. Winkler dissipated Fittica’s transformation of
phosphorus to arsenic. So chemists will be busy asking questions of
Ramsay’s formation of a body like lead, through the agency of penetrating
rays of radium.
Another foundation stone of science is the law of the conservation
of matter. J. J. Thompson, from experimental work, explains certain
observations by the existence of substances called electrons, a thousand
times smaller than hydrogen, which we have regarded the lightest chemical
element. The electrons appear to carry an electric charge. One farther
step is then taken by the Cambridge professor, who says these corpuscles
are electricity. They are attenuated matter. Electricity is a form of
energy. We need no law for the conservation of the matter. Ostwald has
taught that when one struck his shin on a chair in the dark, it was not
the solid wood, but the force involved which produced the sensation. One
would not have been conscious of the existence of the obstacle, but for
the energy. Matter is energy.
Here one is on the boundary lines of experimental science and dealing
with a metaphysical problem. It must not be forgotten, however, that two
hundred years ago any suggestion of the Röntgen rays could well have been
placed in a similar category.
Whether the explanations be accepted or not, it may be noted that
Lodge has already illustrated, by beautiful lecture experiments, the
possibility of a practical utilization of the facts of some of the
observations. Fog is easily dissipated through the agency of electricity.
The application of the principle on a gigantic scale, to a city like
London, may yet be realized.
There are in the world, as is well known, numerous organisms belonging
to the vegetable kingdom that do not resemble at all any of those things
we are accustomed to look upon as plants. These bacteria are extremely
small. They are from .00002 to .00004 inch in diameter. They are studied,
not by ordinary vision, but by means of microscopes and by microscopes
of only the very best kinds. They are, also, studied by their effects.
They propagate very rapidly. Starting with one organism they may grow,
within twenty-four hours, to 281,470,000,000 individuals. This rapidity
of growth does not actually take place in nature; it is checked through
natural conditions, or through excretions of the organism inhibiting such
propagation.
We hear a great deal as to the production of virulent diseases through
the agency of bacteria; but, while there are evil bacteria, there are,
also, bacteria that are good. In short, we may understand, that all
good bacteria are not dead bacteria. These bacteria exist in very large
numbers in the soil. The upper portion of rich garden soil may contain,
on an average, from one to five millions per cubic centimetre. This
number may be very much greater, depending upon the amount of decomposed
matter that is present and the favorable conditions for their propagation.
We are accustomed to think of bacteria as living only on the richest food
and being the cause solely of putrefaction. This is not true. There are
bacteria that live on the bare rocks and get their sustenance from those
rocks and the surrounding air. Under these conditions they actually store
up food material. They are really miracle workers. They render the soil
fertile and the farmer is largely dependent upon them for the growth of
his crops. They reduce mineral substance to the powdered form, assist in
storing up organic matter for the soil and thus render it suitable for
the growth of higher plants.
Under the influence of sunlight the green portions of plants, by
absorbing carbon dioxide from the air and water from the soil, produce
starch, which is one of the important foods for animals. This is not
the work of bacteria, yet some of these organisms are capable of
accomplishing similar work in the dark. It has been suggested that they
derive their energy directly from the oxidizing processes that they set
up. This is one of the problems of the soil bacteriologist.
Many micro-organisms act upon nitrogenous matters and destroy them, in
that the substances are rendered less available for higher plants. These
are denitrifying agents. There is another class of these micro-organisms,
however, that takes nitrogenous food, which is only a little or not at
all utilized by higher vegetables, and makes it available plant food.
These micro-organisms thus contribute to the fertility of the soil. They
oxidize ammonium compounds, from whatever sources they may be had, and
form nitrites first and then nitrates. The nitrates are used by common
plants. The nitrifying bacteria are composed of two groups of active
agents: one group serves to make the first change, namely from ammonium
compounds to nitrites; and the other, to change the nitrites to nitrates.
The conditions most favorable for their activity are just the opposite
for most other micro-organisms. In a soil having much organic matter
already decomposed, these bacteria may be practically inactive until
the decomposition has passed certain stages. During this transition,
the soil is barely suited for crops. Nitrification requires the oxygen
of the air; denitrification can go on in a compact soil with the least
portion of the atmosphere. So really the soil is cultivated largely to
favor the growth and propagation of the nitrifying bacteria. The result
of experimentation has shown that this may be facilitated in some cases
by denitrification first, and in other cases by stirring the soil for
the penetration of the air, and again by applying lime to the soil to
overcome the acidity. Professor Burrill recently said, “Some day farmers
will come to understand that specialists working in the laboratory, and
for years gazing through microscopes, are gaining knowledge for them.”
While many bacteria do not necessarily render food available for plants,
they are most valuable in putting useless matters out of the way. One of
the absolutely essential chemical elements for the growth of plants is
nitrogen. It is most expensive. It is present in the greatest unavailable
abundance, constituting three-fourths by weight of our entire atmosphere,
and it is, also, the one element most likely to be deficient in the soil.
It constitutes an essential constituent of albumenoid material. Under the
influence of the denitrifying bacteria, it is converted into ammonium
compounds, which are converted then through the nitrifying agents into
nitrates. The nitrates are extremely soluble in water; consequently,
there is no tendency towards the accumulation of the valuable food
matter in the soil, as the same is leached out. The growing green plant
is surrounded by the food that it wants but, as with the Ancient Mariner,
there is not a drop to drink. Green vegetation cannot, or only to a
limited extent can, absorb and utilize directly the free nitrogen of the
air.
As a result of a long series of experiments, it has been learned that
there grow excrescences, somewhat similar to galls, on the roots of
certain plants. These natural structures have a character peculiar to the
species of plants on which they occur. In a manner not understood, these
tubercles, inhabited by bacteria, are capable of securing sufficient
nitrogen from the air for their own growth, when the soil is practically
able to furnish none. Other plants, next door, without these nodules,
will die of starvation.
The number of bacteria in these nodules is very great but, although
countless, they are insignificant compared with those in the soil
outside. Those within the nodules, however, are specifically different
from those without, perform different functions, and appear to be
characteristic of the particular plant in which they exist. The
leguminous plants, as peas, beans, clover, have these peculiar nodules.
Other plants, however, like maize, cotton, wheat, are devoid of these
assistants.
It has been known for a long time that the fertility of the soil could
be augmented by rotating the crops and thus adding nitrogen to the soil
by means of these leguminous plants. One of the problems engaging the
attention of scientific agriculturists at present is to learn whether or
not these leguminous organisms may be made to form tubercles on other
plants, as for example corn or wheat. The importance of the successful
issue of such experimentation requires no emphasis. While successful
results have not yet been reported, something has been learned: namely,
the fruit of corn may be very much modified in its chemical composition
by breeding. Grain very much richer in nitrogenous matter has been grown
by changes in the breeding. Such grain is a better food.
This is indeed a day of almost excessive specialization in science: Great
things have been accomplished by the intense method. Some have thought,
and spoken their thoughts, that such tended to carry men of science away
from the contemplation of a unit or the system as a whole. Not a few
have argued, perhaps with reason, that the great generalizations, as for
example Darwin’s theory of evolution, were no longer to be hoped for. It
is impossible for any single brain to follow the details of the varied
branches of science. It is rare that one man pretends to know the detail
of that division of science to which he gives attention. It is equally
true, however, that many systematic minds are gathering, collating and
publishing in readable form accurate summaries of details in the several
branches. Men of broader vision are gathering these authentic digests and
offering concepts, which encompass the phenomena of the Universe.
Such have been hinted at as the efforts of some to do away with what we
have been pleased to term axiomatic truths. Whether this be desirable,
is really of no moment. The facts point to the present movement of
efforts to simplify matters. The most beautiful things after all are the
simplest. This idea, of course, should not convey the impression of being
boldly plain.
“THE MESSAGE OF THE VIOLET.”
By G. D. G.
Down the long corridor swept the theater-goers, men in the sober black
and white of evening clothes, women in the brightest of theater gowns.
Debutantes paused to chat with college men as they found their way to
boxes and orchestra chairs; bachelors stopped to talk of the affairs of
the day before taking their places in the front rows. The old playhouse
was fast filling, for it was “The Princess of Tyrolia” that night.
With the first notes of the orchestra a young man hurried down the aisle
and dropped into a seat far back in the shadow of the balcony. His eyes
swept hastily over the audience and then became fixed on a box near the
stage.
“I knew she would be here,” he murmured softly; “she could never keep
away from this music.”
It was a pretty picture he found to gaze upon and it was little wonder
that he looked but seldom at the stage. More attractive even than the
rows of gorgeously dressed girls in the chorus was that box near the
stage. Seated toward the front was a young girl, just rounding into the
beauty of the woman—while retaining all the freshness of girlhood. Behind
her laughed and chatted a few companions of her own age, but she kept her
eyes fixed upon the stage and seemed to fairly revel in the beauty of the
ringing chorus. To her the music seemed everything, and the great bunch
of violets in her hand was beating unconscious time to the march.
Far back in the shadow the boy, for he was little more, leaned forward
and watched the rapidly changing expression on her face. He followed
the action of the play only through the varying moods which found a
reflection in her eyes. Many times had he watched her thus, haunting the
theaters only to sit unobserved and gaze longingly at her every moment
that he could, then slipping quietly away before the curtain dropped to
avoid meeting her in the throng. Never once, in all the long months, had
their eyes met, and if she had been conscious of his presence she had
given no sign.
“It has been a long time,” he muttered, moving restlessly in his seat.
“What a fool a man can be when there is a woman in the case.”
He had met her only the summer before, a summer filled with little
excursions to nearby resorts where city folk threw off the burden of
formality in the jolly little dances and moonlight strolls. How it all
came back to him now—the open pavilion with the negro musicians, the
rapturous waltzes and the swinging two-steps and the long talk on the
broad veranda afterward, talk of nothing of great importance but which
now seemed to him to be worth years away from her.
Then had followed the autumn and the return to the city. The long
evenings at her home, where the soft glow of the candles behind a crimson
shade had lent a new beauty to her clearly moulded features. She had
loved the soft light of the candles as she had loved the moonlight.
It had seemed that everything about her had breathed of softness and
quiet. Changing moods she had shown—he had often called her his “Maid of
infinite variety,” but each new mood had given her a new attraction in
his eyes; every new phase of her character had brought her closer to him.
It all passed in rapid review before him. Now he sat in the old lawn
swing beside her, now he turned her music as she sang the old songs they
both loved. He remembered the good-byes at the gate and the long walk to
the city afterward. There had never been cigars with so sweet a flavor as
those which kept him company on the long way home. Just the moonlight and
the blue smoke and thoughts of her.
But it had ended at last. Only a misunderstanding which caused a growing
coldness and then a sudden interruption of his dream. He had been too
proud to ask but once for an explanation—she was as proud as he. It had
been months since the two had met—months when the city seemed to be as
lonely as only a great city can.
“It’s hard,” he muttered, and though his lips kept their stern, almost
defiant expression, his eyes had a half appealing look as they rested
upon the girl in the box.
As the music broke into a new strain the girl leaned suddenly forward in
her chair and her face showed a new interest. Then her eyes dropped and
she seemed to be in a deep study. It was “The Message of the Violet” now,
and as the lovers on the stage began the song the audience was hushed
into silence. Over the footlights came the strains, mellow, vibrant,
charging the very air with the smell of violets and of spring. The girl
saw instead of the picture on the stage a vision of a summer night, a
quiet corner on the old veranda. The music floated toward them while the
dancers swept over the floor and he was repeating to her the story of his
love. She had listened half in joy, half in fright, and tears had mingled
with smiles before a bevy of laughing girls had called them back to the
dance.
The song ended and a great burst of applause awoke the girl from her
reverie. Her eyes turned instinctively toward the audience and far back
in the shadow she saw him, his eyes half covered with his hand. Over her
swept a new feeling, a sudden resolve. She fingered the violets on her
lap as the song rose once more into the chorus:
“I love you, love you, love you,
And my heart’s true blue.”
The young man felt a tap on his shoulder. A boyish usher was dropping a
tiny bunch of violets into his hand.
“From the young lady in the third box,” he said.