a view of science is timely and judicious. We do not believe the
intention of the author is to encourage the prosecution of alleged
scientific researches independently of all assignable human motive;
but he would have all the main lines of scientific inquiry pursued in
a liberal and disinterested spirit, in the belief that the enlargement
of knowledge can not but subserve in some way or another, and sooner
or later, the interests of the human race. He feels that the true
scientific spirit is not one that makes pecuniary gain its chief
object. True types of the scientific worker are to be found in Michael
Faraday and the elder Agassiz, who was "too busy to make money"; and
the student of science who can not to some extent work in the spirit
of these men may as well recognize that it is not scientific truth he
is after but money. The greatest advances in Science, it is almost
needless to say, have been made by those who were serving her not for
the lust of gain, but for the love of discovery--that is to say, by
men like Copernicus, Galileo, Harvey, Cavendish, Newton, Franklin,
Jenner, Watt, Darwin, and Pasteur; and if we would know what science
is, it is the lives, characters, and labors of such men as these that
we should study, and not the achievements of merely successful
patentees.
Another danger to which the student of science is exposed is that of
paying little or no attention to any department of science save that
of which he is making a specialty. It is therefore of great importance
that the courses of study laid out in science colleges should at the
outset be sufficiently broad to afford a thorough grounding in the
leading principles of all the sciences and in the application of
scientific method to every field of inquiry. Only in this way can a
true sense of the power and universality of science as a method of
thought and an engine of the human mind be obtained. Why is it that we
are often so little impressed with the intellectual character of this
or that noted specialist? The reason, we take it, is that his mind
lacks breadth; he knows his own field of observation, but seems to
have little sense or appreciation of what lies beyond it. It may have
been some one of this type who suggested to Wordsworth his idea of an
"ever-dwindling soul"; certain it is that a man may, by the too
exclusive pursuit of a narrow line of thought and inquiry, fatally
cramp his mind and dim his spiritual vision.
The foundation of all science is observation, and Sir Archibald
rightly dwells upon the supreme importance of cultivating and
developing the observing faculty to the utmost extent. He states that
a man may possess a colossal intellect while his faculty of
observation may be of the feeblest kind, and gives as an example a
very eminent mathematician, lately deceased, who used to make the most
ludicrous mistakes as to time and place. Upon this point we feel like
venturing a little dissent. We doubt whether there ever was a colossal
intellect apart from a considerable development of the power of
observation; and that a great mathematician should take very little
notice of what was going on in the world about him would only show
that his powers of observation were otherwise engaged. Take him in his
own field, and what a multitude of things he would observe which a man
of inferior intellect, occupied with the same studies, would overlook!
It would be a somewhat rash thing to undertake to cure an Archimedes
or a Newton of that absent-mindedness which, to the world at large,
looks like a deficiency of observation. In such cases as these the
mind that is absent here is present elsewhere; and what it is doing
there the world will in due time find out. It is impossible, we hold,
for any one man to be observant in all directions; if he is, it is
certain he will not have a colossal intellect. Still, the truth which
should be borne in upon every student's mind is that if he would make
independent progress he must be an independent observer. He must take
in once for all the truth that the materials needed for scientific
construction lie afield, and that he must keep his eyes open in order
to see and distinguish them. At every moment the man of science may
say, "There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of" in
any philosophy yet formulated; and some of those things he should aim
at discovering for himself. Any mind that is once thoroughly
interested in any branch of study will be observant, and conversely a
certain practice in observation may create an interest not before felt
in a certain department of study. It may also be remarked that the
dividing line between observation and deduction is very narrow and
more or less shadowy; and therefore to cultivate the logical faculty
is to create an appetite for observations, or at least for facts. The
logical mind sees where facts are _wanting_, and will not be happy
till it gets them.
As might be expected, Sir Archibald Geikie makes a special application
of what he has to say on the need of observation to his own science of
geology--a study which is a constant challenge to the observing eye
and the constructive intellect. He dwells impressively on the delight
which the rational contemplation of Nature imparts to the student
whose higher faculties have been awakened, and who has been taught
what to see and how to consider it. "The movements of the clouds, the
fall of rain, the flow of brook and river, the changes of the seasons,
the succession of calm and storm, do not pass before your eyes now as
once they did. While they minister to the joy of life, they speak to
you of that all-embracing system of process and law that governs the
world." Certainly this capacity for the higher enjoyment of Nature is
the happiest result of scientific culture; and were it an invariable
or even a very general result, there could never be any question as to
the humanizing and liberalizing effect of devotion to scientific
studies. If the result in question is not always attained, it is
simply because the study of science has not been approached in a right
spirit. It is not science that is at fault.
Sir Archibald dwells finally on the need for _accuracy_,
_thoroughness_, _breadth_, and _patience_ on the part of those who
would worthily pursue a scientific career. If his words were duly
heeded we should have more of generous co-operation and sympathy among
scientific investigators, and less of selfish petty rivalry and
clamorous contention in regard to questions of priority. The eminent
author has nobly conceived the character and function of the man of
science in the present age; and we can not but hope that his sage and
earnest counsels to the rising generation of scientific workers will
bear abundant fruit in days to come.
_FADS AND FRAUDS._
We notice that a magistrate in a Canadian city has inflicted fines,
under a "vagrant" act, upon two individuals who had been practicing
the alleged art of palmistry. Both of these parties were proved to
have told fortunes from the hand for pay; and, though one styled
himself "professor" and the other was a "madame" and not a common
wayside gypsy, they were both held guilty of common juggling and were
punished accordingly. The public prosecutor said that he did not lay
any stress on the fact that pay had been taken; he asked for a
conviction simply on the ground that fortune-telling was against the
law, and he carried his point. The judge observed that similar
proceedings might be taken against young ladies who tell fortunes at
church and charity bazaars; and the prosecutor admitted that such was
very likely the case. These young ladies, he said, would have to look
out for themselves.
We must say that this action on the part of the Canadian authorities
strikes us very favorably, and we should be greatly pleased if we
could see similar proceedings taken nearer home. It is a lamentable
fact that hundreds of persons who ought to know better amuse
themselves by lending their countenance to the practitioners of all
kinds of silly and dishonest arts, and so far assist them in
practicing their frauds upon a more ignorant and helpless class. We
are all familiar with the stories which pass current in private
circles of the extraordinary revelations and predictions made by
ladies and gentlemen who go off in trances and see the past and future
unrolled before their upturned eyes with all the distinctness of an
actual panorama. But there is one thing which these interesting and
highly gifted individuals do not like, and that is to get into the
courts, or anywhere where they can be called upon to give a succinct
and definite account of their doings and pretensions. They are not
ambitious of going into a trance before the magistrate, and giving an
exhibition of the powers to which they lay claim in their
advertisements, much as that might be expected to help their
reputation and their business. For that very reason it would be an
excellent thing to bring them where the light of common day could be
thrown upon their performances; and, if there is no law under which
this could be done, our legislators, who make so many needless laws,
might very well pass one, the general effect of which would be to
enforce the responsibility of all persons publicly pretending to the
possession of any kind of supernatural power. It would tend to cool
the faith of even the most benighted dupes to see their favorite seer
cutting a foolish figure before a judge who simply wanted to know what
it really was for which he charged money. In the Canadian cases both
operators, when they got into court, showed a great disposition to
minimize their claims to any power of foretelling events by palmistry
or otherwise, and so it would be in every similar case. It is one
thing to deal with a gullible maiden who wants to know the color of
her future husband's hair, and quite another to converse with the
officers of the law.
Most of the frauds which have any continued success owe it, in part at
least, to an undue faith in the personal integrity of the
practitioner. It seems a rude as well as an unkind thing to suppose
that So-and-so, whose demeanor is so modest and frank and simple,
whose sentiments are so elevated, whose whole personality seems
calculated to inspire confidence, is really an outrageous deceiver. In
many cases people have said in effect that, if they had to choose
between believing a miracle and doubting the veracity of this or that
engaging individual, they would believe the miracle. Yet time and
again the engaging individual has been proved to be an impostor, and
the miracle has fallen to the ground. One of the most remarkable cases
of the kind is furnished by the history of the Keeley motor, the
absolutely fraudulent character of which has lately been brought to
light. Keeley professed to transcend all the known laws of physics and
mechanics, and he talked a jargon which all acknowledged to be
unintelligible, but the unintelligibility of which was ascribed by his
devotees to the fact that he was really working outside of known laws,
and could not be expected to translate his ideas into the language of
everyday science. In this way what was really an adjunct to the
imposture he was practicing was counted as a proof of the truth of his
ideas and the reality of his work. Yet now we know that the whole
business was a matter of hidden tubes and wires and pulleys and double
axles, one concealed within the other, with a water motor hidden under
the floor. Thus it was that the "ætheric vibrations" and all the other
mysterious phenomena were produced. We remember a sermon that was
preached some years ago by an earnest divine, who professed to see in
the alleged effects produced by Keeley an explanation of the miracle
of the casting down of the walls of Jericho. Keeley would take his
harmonium and, striking a certain chord, would cause his motor to
revolve. In like manner Joshua with his trumpets and pitchers made
precisely the kind of noise required to produce the ætheric vibrations
necessary to level the walls of the beleaguered city--a wonderful case
of the most advanced science coming to the support of a venerable
religious tradition! Unfortunately, the walls of Jericho must now be
got down in some other way, since it is proved that when Keeley worked
the harmonium he also worked the bulb of an air tube placed under his
foot in the floor. But Keeley was so honest a man, so devoted to his
profound researches, so true a type of the indomitable experimenter,
that it was impossible for his friends and admirers to doubt him, even
when he spoke of "the sympathetic negative attraction of the triune
polar stream."
The lesson of it all is--investigate! _investigate!_ INVESTIGATE! The
more honest a man is, the more he will court investigation. It is to
the credit of humanity perhaps that so much reliance is placed upon
estimates of personal character in these extraordinary cases; but
where belief is demanded for anything that is absolutely beyond
comprehension, character should be put out of court altogether, and
the one question should be, What are the facts? In the Keeley case,
unfortunately, men of science as well as others were among the
deluded. They should have suspected fraud; at least they should have
insisted on making such investigations as a suspicion of fraud would
have suggested; and, if they were not allowed to make them, they
should have refused all countenance to the business. As it is, many
ignorant persons who lost money through Keeley's imposture will very
properly cast blame on the presumedly competent mechanicians and
physicists who went through the form of examining Keeley's apparatus
and afterward spoke, however guardedly, of his extraordinary results.
As an object lesson in regard to the need for uncompromising
skepticism when facts which can not be accounted for on understood
principles are presented for acceptance, the history of the Keeley
motor should not soon be forgotten.
Scientific Literature.
SPECIAL BOOKS.
Professor _Bailey_ shows, in his book on the _Evolution of Our Native
Fruits_,[43] that the value of the native American species has not yet
begun to be adequately estimated, and his narrative carries the
conviction that the possibilities to be realized from their
development are totally undreamed of. De Candolle made the astounding
assertion, in his book on The Origin of Cultivated Plants, that the
United States only yields as nutritious plants worth cultivating the
Jerusalem artichoke and the gourds. "They had a few bulbs and edible
berries, but have not tried to cultivate them, having early received
the maize, which was worth far more." "And yet," Professor Bailey
answers, "the American grapes have given rise to eight hundred
domestic varieties, the American plums to more than two hundred, the
raspberries to three hundred, and various other native fruits have a
large progeny." Three motives, the author says, run through his book:
An attempt to expound the progress of evolution in objects which are
familiar and have not yet been greatly modified by man; an effort to
make a simple historical record from unexplored fields; and a desire
to suggest the treasures of experience and narrative which are a part
of the development of agriculture. The studies of which the book is a
fruit were begun more than ten years ago, and were pursued with
original sources where they were accessible, and at the cost of much
labor and travel. The story begins with the grapes. The cultivation of
native grapes, which are singularly abundant and various in the wild
condition, began after several attempts on the large and on the small
scale to make foreign grapes profitable had failed. Nicholas
Longworth, of Cincinnati, who did more than any other one man to
promote it, sought for wine grapes. After several varieties had been
tried with more or less success, the Catawba and the Concord were
introduced, and the cultivation was established and became important,
but no longer with wine-making as its chief object. Now we have a
large variety of grapes--characteristic, finely flavored, and adapted
to numerous uses in wines and desserts. Plums are mentioned in the
early records nearly as frequently as grapes. There are five native
types from which diverse varieties have arisen, the greater part of
them of fortuitous origin. The native cherries have not yet been very
hopeful of promise, except the dwarf species, which seem "destined to
play an important part in the evolution of American fruit." Five types
of native apples are known, from which a number of named and worthy
varieties have arisen, by Nature's propagation, not man's; and the
author anticipates great benefits to be derived from the very gradual
and undemonstrative insinuation of native blood into the domestic
sorts. The story of the cultivation of the raspberries, blackberries,
dewberries, strawberries, gooseberries, currants, and mulberries tells
of much patience and skill applied to the production of results in the
benefits of which all may share, and which have undoubtedly added to
the sum of human well-being. There remain still many fruits, the
improvement of which has hardly begun, and which offer a promising
field for experiment--the persimmon, pawpaw, whortleberry, buffalo
berry, barberry, and nuts. The whole history of the improvement of
American fruit is interpreted by Professor Bailey as showing that in
nearly every case the amelioration has come from the force of
circumstances, and not from the choice or design of man, principally
because foreign species did not do well and something adapted to
American conditions had to be found. Yet much skill has been shown in
recognizing the good qualities of the native species, and in giving
them conditions favorable to improvement. For the future the author
believes that the best results at the amelioration of any species are
to be expected by working with the highly improved forms rather than
with the original wild stock. We need, he says, a greater range of
variation, more divergent and widely unlike varieties, and more
incidental or minor strains of the most popular and cosmopolitan
sorts. Professor Bailey finds the greatest satisfaction in his book in
the record of the men who have been instrumental in introducing the
improved fruits. No men have been greater benefactors to our country
than these, who have done the equivalent of making two blades of grass
grow where only one grew before, and have added to the healthful sum
of pleasure and content.
* * * * *
As Professor Darwin truly says, a mathematical argument is, after all,
only organized common sense; but, unfortunately, it is usually in such
a highly organized form as to be beyond the intelligence of the
average reader. In the present volume,[44] however, the author has
wonderfully simplified a most intricate and difficult mathematical
subject, and really seems to give some justification for the above
generalization.
The first chapter of _The Tides_ is devoted to defining them and
describing methods of observation and study. The curious tidal
movements in lakes, called _seiches_, which were first systematically
studied by Professor Forel on the Lake of Geneva, are taken up in the
second chapter; an account of Forel's work is given, and the statement
made that similar researches are now under way on other lakes, notably
that of Mr. Denison on Lake Huron in this country. Tides in rivers,
including an account of the curious tidal phenomenon known as a
"bore," are next described, the laws governing their variation and the
ways in which they differ from the tides of the open sea being
carefully laid down. A brief historical chapter, containing some
curious extracts from Chinese and Icelandic literature, is rather
instructive anthropologically than tidally. The three following
sections are taken up by a study of tide generating and modifying
forces, and include an interesting account of the experiments made
some years ago by Dr. Darwin and his brother, in an effort to measure
tidal forces by means of the bifilar pendulum, which is now such an
important agent in seismological investigation. Chapters IX and X give
an account of the equilibrium, and the dynamical theories of the
tide-generating forces, and are chiefly accounts of the devices by
which mathematicians have endeavored to bring artificial order out of
the actual chaos. The great complexity of this portion of the subject;
the variety of forces operating to produce the tides, the sun, the
moon, the earth's rotation, etc.; and the number of retarding and
confusing elements, friction, interposed land masses, river currents,
air movements, depth of water, etc., render these theories practically
valueless for use in tidal calculations.
In the following section Dr. Draper shows how, by means of Lord
Kelvin's "harmonic analysis," which separates the tide-generating
forces of each kind into a number of ideal components, results of
practical value are obtained. In Chapter XIII a very ingenious
instrument for tide prediction which has been in use for some time by
the Indian Government is described. The recording part of the machine
is simply a paper-wound drum, on which a pencil point makes a graphic
record. When the tides of a given port are desired, it is only
necessary to set the instrument according to the tidal components,
obtained by harmonic analysis and the time chosen for the beginning of
the tide table, and then start it at the proper moment. It takes about
four hours to run off the tidal curve for a year. This curve is then
measured, and the year's tide table readily made out. Dr. Darwin
informs us that a very similar instrument is now in course of
construction for the United States Government. The remainder of the
work consists of a more detailed discussion of the various disturbing
influences which interfere with the simplicity of tidal
movements--displacement of the earth's axis, earthquakes, etc, a long
discussion of tidal friction, a study of the laws of rotating liquid
masses, the nebular hypothesis, and finally a chapter on Saturn's
rings. The text in many places will be found difficult to understand
by the general reader, despite the author's efforts to fully and
simply explain every point, and it seems questionable whether a
thorough discussion of tidal phenomena can be made simple enough for
the layman's comprehension. The volume can not be read by any one,
however, without instruction, and is much the best general discussion
of tidal phenomena which we have seen.
FOOTNOTES:
[43] Sketch of the Evolution of our Native Fruits. By L. H. Bailey,
New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 472. Price, $2.
[44] The Tides; and Kindred Phenomena in the Solar System. The Lowell
Institute Lectures for 1898. By George Howard Darwin. New York:
Houghton, Mifflin & Co. Pp. 378. $2.
GENERAL NOTICES.
The _Elementary Zoölogy_ of _Frank E. Beddard_[45] contains an account
of a few types selected from the chief groups of the animal kingdom,
followed and accompanied by a consideration of some of the more
general conclusions of biology. A type system has to be used, but the
author has endeavored to obviate the great fault of that method--the
liability of the students conceiving that the characters of the
species selected for description are distinctive of a wider assemblage
of forms--by emphasizing here and there the differences between allied
groups. The question arises whether to begin with the higher forms and
go down to the lower, which some authorities believe to be the course
easier of comprehension by the student, or to follow the inverse
method. The author prefers to begin with the lower forms and gradually
work to the higher as the course having the undoubted advantage of
presenting the facts in a logical sequence. He accordingly begins with
the amoeba and proceeds upward. The treatment is simple and lucid.
Novelty has not been sought in the illustrations, though there are
several new ones, but selections have been made from the best already
drawn.