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Title: The Popular Science Monthly, October, 1900

Author: Various

Editor: James McKeen Cattell

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Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE POPULAR
SCIENCE MONTHLY, OCTOBER, 1900 ***

Transcriber’s note: Table of Contents added by
Transcriber.

CONTENTS

Address of the President Before the British
Association 561
The Bubonic Plague 576
Gasoline Automobiles 593
Some Scientific Principles of Warfare 605
Modern Mongols 618
Religious Beliefs of the Central Eskimo 624
Mental Energy 632
Chapters on the Stars 638
Discussion and Correspondence 660
Scientific Literature 662
The Progress of Science 664
Index 669

THE
POPULAR SCIENCE
M O N T H LY

EDITED BY
J. McKEEN CATTELL

VOL. LVII
MAY TO OCTOBER, 1900

NEW YORK AND LONDON
McCLURE, PHILLIPS AND COMPANY
1900

Copyright, 1900,
By McCLURE, PHILLIPS AND COMPANY.

THE
POPULAR SCIENCE
M O N T H LY.

OCTOBER, 1900.

ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT BEFORE THE
BRITISH ASSOCIATION.A
By Sir WILLIAM TURNER, F. R. S.,
UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH.

A
Given at Bradford on September 5, 1900.

T wenty-seven years ago the British Association met in Bradford,
not at that time raised to the dignity of a city. The meeting was very
successful, and was attended by about two thousand persons—a forecast, let
us hope, of what we may expect at the present assembly. A distinguished
chemist, Prof. A. W. Williamson, presided. On this occasion the association
has elected for the presidential chair one whose attention has been given to
the study of an important department of biological science. His claim to
occupy, however unworthily, the distinguished position in which he has
been placed, rests, doubtless, on the fact that, in the midst of the engrossing
duties devolving on a teacher in a great university and school of medicine,
he has endeavored to contribute to the sum of knowledge of the science
which he professes. It is a matter of satisfaction to feel that the success of a
meeting of this kind does not rest upon the shoulders of the occupant of the
presidential chair, but is due to the eminence and active coöperation of the
men of science who either preside over or engage in the work of the nine or
ten sections into which the association is divided, and to the energy and
ability for organization displayed by the local secretaries and committees.
The programme prepared by the general and local officers of the association
shows that no efforts have been spared to provide an ample bill of fare, both
in its scientific and social aspects. Members and associates will, I feel sure,
take away from the Bradford meeting as pleasant memories as did our

colleagues of the corresponding Association Française, when, in friendly
collaboration at Dover last year, they testified to the common citizenship of
the Universal Republic of Science. As befits a leading center of industry in
the great county of York, the applications of science to the industrial arts
and to agriculture will form subjects of discussion in the papers to be read at
the meeting.
Since the association was at Dover a year ago, two of its former
presidents have joined the majority. The Duke of Argyll presided at the
meeting in Glasgow so far back as 1855. Throughout his long and energetic
life, he proved himself to be an eloquent and earnest speaker, one who gave
to the consideration of public affairs a mind of singular independence, and a
thinker and writer in a wide range of human knowledge. Sir J. Wm. Dawson
was president at the meeting in Birmingham in 1886. Born in Nova Scotia
in 1820, he devoted himself to the study of the Geology of Canada, and
became the leading authority on the subject. He took also an active and
influential part in promoting the spread of scientific education in the
Dominion, and for a number of years he was Principal and Vice-Chancellor
of the McGill University, Montreal.

SCIENTIFIC METHOD.

Edward Gibbon has told us that diligence and accuracy are the only
merits which an historical writer can ascribe to himself. Without doubt they
are fundamental qualities necessary for historical research, but in order to
bear fruit they require to be exercised by one whose mental qualities are
such as to enable him to analyze the data brought together by his diligence,
to discriminate between the false and the true, to possess an insight into the
complex motives that determine human action, to be able to recognize those
facts and incidents which had exercised either a primary or only a secondary
influence on the affairs of nations, or on the thoughts and doings of the
person whose character he is depicting.
In scientific research, also, diligence and accuracy are fundamental
qualities. By their application new facts are discovered and tabulated, their
order of succession is ascertained and a wider and more intimate knowledge
of the processes of nature is acquired. But to decide on their true

significance a well-balanced mind and the exercise of prolonged thought
and reflection are needed. William Harvey, the father of exact research in
physiology, in his memorable work, ‘De Motu Cordis et Sanguinis,’
published more than two centuries ago, tells us of the great and daily
diligence which he exercised in the course of his investigations, and the
numerous observations and experiments which he collated. At the same time
he refers repeatedly to his cogitations and reflections on the meaning of
what he had observed, without which the complicated movements of the
heart could not have been analyzed, their significance determined and the
circulation of the blood in a continuous stream definitely established. Early
in the present century, Carl Ernst von Baer, the father of embryological
research, showed the importance which he attached to the combination of
observation with meditation by placing side by side on the title page of his
famous treatise ‘Ueber Entwickelungsgeschichte der Thiere’ (1828) the
words Beobachtung und Reflexion.
Though I have drawn from biological science my illustrations of the
need of this combination, it must not be inferred that it applies exclusively
to one branch of scientific inquiry; the conjunction influences and
determines progress in all the sciences, and when associated with a
sufficient touch of imagination, when the power of seeing is conjoined with
the faculty of foreseeing, of projecting the mind into the future, we may
expect something more than the discovery of isolated facts; their
coördination and the enunciation of new principles and laws will necessarily
follow.
Scientific method consists, therefore, in close observation, frequently
repeated so as to eliminate the possibility of erroneous seeing; in
experiments checked and controlled in every direction in which fallacies
might arise; in continuous reflection on the appearances and phenomena
observed, and in logically reasoning out their meaning and the conclusions
to be drawn from them. Were the method followed out in its integrity by all
who are engaged in scientific investigations, the time and labor expended in
correcting errors committed by ourselves or by other observers and
experimentalists would be saved, and the volumes devoted annually to
scientific literature would be materially diminished in size. Were it applied,
as far as the conditions of life admit, to the conduct and management of
human affairs, we should not require to be told, when critical periods in our

welfare as a nation arise, that we shall muddle through somehow. Recent
experience has taught us that wise discretion and careful provision are as
necessary in the direction of public affairs as in the pursuit of science, and
in both instances, when properly exercised, they enable us to reach with
comparative certainty the goal which we strive to attain.

IMPROVEMENTS IN MEANS OF OBSERVATION.

While certain principles of research are common to all the sciences,
each great division requires for its investigation specialized arrangements to
insure its progress. Nothing contributes so much to the advancement of
knowledge as improvements in the means of observation, either by the
discovery of new adjuncts to research, or by a fresh adaptation of old
methods. In the industrial arts, the introduction of a new kind of raw
material, the recognition that a mixture or blending is often more
serviceable than when the substances employed are uncombined, the
discovery of new processes of treating the articles used in manufactures, the
invention of improved machinery, all lead to the expansion of trade to the
occupation of the people, and to the development of great industrial centers.
In science, also, the invention and employment of new and more precise
instruments and appliances enable us to appreciate more clearly the
signification of facts and phenomena which were previously obscure, and to
penetrate more deeply into the mysteries of nature. They mark fresh
departures in the history of science, and provide a firm base of support from
which a continuous advance may be made and fresh conceptions of nature
can be evolved.
It is not my intention, even had I possessed the requisite knowledge, to
undertake so arduous a task as to review the progress which has recently
been made in the great body of sciences which lie within the domain of the
British Association. As my occupation in life has required me to give
attention to the science which deals with the structure and organization of
the bodies of man and animals—a science which either includes within its
scope or has intimate and widespread relations to comparative anatomy,
embryology, morphology, zoölogy, physiology and anthropology—I shall
limit myself to the attempt to bring before you some of the more important

observations and conclusions which have a bearing on the present position
of the subject. As this is the closing year of the century it will not, I think,
be out of place to refer to the changes which a hundred years have brought
about in our fundamental conceptions of the structure of animals. In science,
as in business, it is well from time to time to take stock of what we have
been doing, so that we may realize where we stand and ascertain the balance
to our credit in the scientific ledger.
So far back as the time of the ancient Greeks it was known that the
human body and those of the more highly organized animals were not
homogeneous, but were built up of parts, the partes dissimilares (τὰ
ἀνόμοια μέρη {ta anomoia merê}) of Aristotle, which differed from each
other in form, color, texture, consistency and properties. These parts were
familiarly known as the bones, muscles, sinews, blood-vessels, glands,
brain, nerves and so on. As the centuries rolled on, and as observers and
observations multiplied, a more and more precise knowledge of these parts
throughout the animal kingdom was obtained, and various attempts were
made to classify animals in accordance with their forms and structure.
During the concluding years of the last century and the earlier part of the
present, the Hunters, William and John, in our country, the Meckels in
Germany, Cuvier and St. Hilaire in France, gave an enormous impetus to
anatomical studies, and contributed largely to our knowledge of the
construction of the bodies of animals. But whilst by these and other
observers the most salient and, if I may use the expression, the grosser
characters of animal organization had been recognized, little was known of
the more intimate structure or texture of the parts. So far as could be
determined by the unassisted vision, and so much as could be recognized by
the use of a simple lens, had indeed been ascertained, and it was known that
muscles, nerves and tendons were composed of threads or fibers, and the
blood and lymph-vessels were tubes, that the parts which we call fasciæ and
aponeuroses were thin membranes and so on.
Early in the present century, Xavier Bichat, one of the most brilliant
men of science during the Napoleonic era in France, published his
‘Anatomie Générale,’ in which he formulated important general principles.
Every animal is an assemblage of different organs, each of which discharges
a function, and acting together, each in its own way, assists in the
preservation of the whole. The organs are, as it were, special machines

situated in the general building which constitutes the factory or body of the
individual. But, further, each organ or special machine is itself formed of
tissues which possess different properties. Some, as the blood-vessels,
nerves, fibrous tissues, etc., are generally distributed throughout the animal
body, whilst others, as bones, muscles, and cartilage, etc., are found only in
certain definite localities. While Bichat had acquired a definite
philosophical conception of the general principles of construction and of the
distribution of the tissues, neither he nor his pupil Béclard was in a position
to determine the essential nature of the structural elements. The means and
appliances at their disposal and at that of other observers in their generation
were not sufficiently potent to complete the analysis.
Attempts were made in the third decennium of this century to improve
the methods of examining minute objects by the manufacture of compound
lenses, and, by doing away with chromatic and spherical aberration, to
obtain, in addition to magnification of the object, a relatively large flat field
of vision with clearness and sharpness of definition. When in January, 1830,
Joseph Jackson Lister read to the Royal Society his memoir “On Some
Properties in Achromatic Object-Glasses Applicable to the Improvement of
Microscopes,” he announced the principles on which combinations of lenses
could be arranged, which would possess these qualities. By the skill of our
opticians, microscopes have now for more than half a century been
constructed which, in the hands of competent observers, have influenced
and extended biological science with results comparable to those obtained
by the astronomer through improvements in the telescope.
In the study of the minute structure of plants and animals, the observer
has frequently to deal with tissues and organs, most of which possess such
softness and delicacy of substance and outline that, even when microscopes
of the best construction are employed, the determination of the intimate
nature of the tissue, and the precise relation which one element of an organ
bears to the other constituent elements, is, in many instances, a matter of
difficulty. Hence additional methods have had to be devised in order to
facilitate study and to give precision and accuracy to our observations. It is
difficult for one of the younger generation of biologists, with all the
appliances of a well-equipped laboratory at his command, with experienced
teachers to direct him in his work, and with excellent text-books, in which
the modern methods are described, to realize the conditions under which his

predecessors worked half a century ago. Laboratories for minute biological
research had not been constructed, the practical teaching of histology and
embryology had not been organized, experience in methods of work had not
accumulated; each man was left to his individual efforts, and had to puzzle
his way through the complications of structure to the best of his power.
Staining and hardening reagents were unknown. The double-bladed knife
invented by Valentin, held in the hand, was the only improvement on the
scalpel or razor for cutting thin, more or less translucent slices suitable for
microscopic examination; mechanical section-cutters and freezing
arrangements had not been devised. The tools at the disposal of the
microscopist were little more than knife, forceps, scissors, needles; with
acetic acid, glycerine and Canada balsam as reagents. But in the
employment of the newer methods of research care has to be taken, more
especially when hardening and staining reagents are used, to discriminate
between appearances which are to be interpreted as indicating natural
characters, and those which are only artificial productions.
Notwithstanding the difficulties attendant on the study of the more
delicate tissues, the compound achromatic microscope provided anatomists
with an instrument of great penetrative power. Between the years 1830 and
1850 a number of acute observers applied themselves with much energy and
enthusiasm to the examination of the minute structure of the tissues and
organs in plants and animals.

CELL THEORY.

It had, indeed, long been recognized that the tissues of plants were to a
large extent composed of minute vesicular bodies, technically called cells
(Hooke, Malpighi, Grew). In 1831 the discovery was made by the great
botanist, Robert Brown, that in many families of plants a circular spot,
which he named areola or nucleus, was present in each cell; and in 1838
M. J. Schleiden published the fact that a similar spot or nucleus was a
universal elementary organ in vegetables. In the tissues of animals also
structures had begun to be recognized comparable with the cells and nuclei
of the vegetable tissues, and in 1839 Theodore Schwann announced the
important generalization that there is one universal principle of development

for the elementary part of organisms, however different they may be in
appearance, and that this principle is the formation of cells. The enunciation
of the fundamental principle that the elementary tissues consisted of cells
constituted a step in the progress of biological science which will forever
stamp the century now drawing to a close with a character and renown
equalling those which it has derived from the most brilliant discoveries in
the physical sciences. It provided biologists with the visible anatomical
units through which the external forces operating on, and the energy
generated in, living matter come into play. It dispelled forever the old
mystical idea of the influence exercised by vapors or spirits in living
organisms. It supplied the physiologist and pathologist with the specific
structures through the agency of which the functions of organisms are
discharged in health and disease. It exerted an enormous influence on the
progress of practical medicine. A review of the progress of knowledge of the
cell may appropriately enter into an address on this occasion.

STRUCTURE OF CELLS.

A cell is a living particle, so minute that it needs a microscope for its
examination; it grows in size, maintains itself in a state of activity, responds
to the action of stimuli, reproduces its kind and in the course of time it
degenerates and dies.
Let us glance at the structure of a cell to determine its constituent parts
and the rôle which each plays in the function to be discharged. The original
conception of a cell, based upon the study of the vegetable tissues, was a
minute vesicle inclosed by a definite wall, which exercised chemical or
metabolic changes on the surrounding material and secreted into the vesicle
its characteristic contents. A similar conception was at first also entertained
regarding the cells of animal tissues; but as observations multiplied, it was
seen that numerous elementary particles, which were obviously in their
nature cells, did not possess an inclosing envelope. A wall ceased to have a
primary value as a constituent part of a cell, the necessary vesicular
character of which therefore could no longer be entertained.
The other constituent parts of a cell are the cell plasm, which forms the
body of the cell, and the nucleus embedded in its substance.

Notwithstanding the very minute size of the nucleus, which even in the
largest cells is not more than one-five-hundredth of an inch in diameter, and
usually is considerably smaller, its almost constant form, its well-defined
sharp outline and its power of resisting the action of strong reagents when
applied to the cell, have from the period of its discovery by Robert Brown
caused histologists to bestow on it much attention. Its structure and
chemical composition; its mode of origin; the part which it plays in the
formation of new cells, and its function in nutrition and secretion have been
investigated.
When examined under favorable conditions in its passive or resting
state, the nucleus is seen to be bounded by a membrane which separates it
from the cell plasm and gives it the characteristic sharp contour. It contains
an apparently structureless nuclear substance, nucleoplasm or enchylema, in
which are embedded one or more extremely minute particles called nucleoli,
along with a network of exceedingly fine threads or fibers, which in the
active living cell play an essential part in the production of new nuclei
within the cell. In its chemical composition the nuclear substance consists of
albuminous plastin and globulin; and of a special material named nuclein,
rich in phosphorus and with an acid reaction. The delicate network within
the nucleus consists apparently of the nuclein, a substance which stains with
carmine and other dyes, a property which enables the changes, which take
place in the network in the production of young cells, to be more readily
seen and followed out by the observer.
The mode of origin of the nucleus and the part which it plays in the
production of new cells have been the subject of much discussion.
Schleiden, whose observations, published in 1838, were made on the cells
of plants, believed that within the cell a nucleolus first appeared, and that
around it molecules aggregated to form the nucleus. Schwann again, whose
observations were mostly made on the cells of animals, considered that an
amorphous material existed in organized bodies, which he called
cytoblastema. It formed the contents of cells, or it might be situated free or
external to them. He figuratively compared it to a mother liquor in which
crystals are formed. Either in the cytoblastema within the cells or in that
situated external to them, the aggregation of molecules around a nucleolus
to form a nucleus might occur, and, when once the nucleus had been
formed, in its turn it would serve as a center of aggregation of additional

molecules from which a new cell would be produced. He regarded,
therefore, the formation of nuclei and cells as possible in two ways—one
within preëxisting cells (endogenous cell-formation), the other in a free
blastema lying external to cells (free cell-formation). In animals, he says,
the endogenous method is rare, and the customary origin is in an external
blastema. Both Schleiden and Schwann considered that after the cell was
formed the nucleus had no permanent influence on the life of the cell, and
usually disappeared.
Under the teaching principally of Henle, the famous Professor of
Anatomy in Göttingen, the conception of the free formation of nuclei and
cells in a more or less fluid blastema, by an aggregation of elementary
granules and molecules, obtained so much credence, especially amongst
those who were engaged in the study of pathological processes, that the
origin of cells within preëxisting cells was to a large extent lost sight of.
That a parent cell was requisite for the production of new cells seemed to
many investigators to be no longer needed. Without doubt this conception of
free cell-formation contributed in no small degree to the belief, entertained
by various observers, that the simplest plants and animals might arise,
without preëxisting parents, in organic fluids destitute of life, by a process
of spontaneous generation; a belief which prevailed in many minds almost
to the present day. If, as has been stated, the doctrine of abiogenesis cannot
be experimentally refuted, on the other hand it has not been experimentally
proved. The burden of proof lies with those who hold the doctrine, and the
evidence that we possess is all the other way.

MULTIPLICATION OF CELLS.

Although von Mohl, the botanist, seems to have been the first to
recognize (1835) in plants a multiplication of cells by division, it was not
until attention was given to the study of the egg in various animals and to
the changes which take place in it, attendant on fertilization, that in the
course of time a much more correct conception of the origin of the nucleus
and of the part which it plays in the formation of new cells was obtained.
Before Schwann had published his classical memoir in 1839, von Baer and
other observers had recognized within the animal ovum the germinal

vesicle, which obviously bore to the ovum the relation of a nucleus to a cell.
As the methods of observation improved, it was recognized that, within the
developing egg, two vesicles appeared where one only had previously
existed, to be followed by four vesicles, then eight, and so on in multiple
progression until the ovum contained a multitude of vesicles, each of which
possessed a nucleus. The vesicles were obviously cells which had arisen
within the original germ-cell or ovum. These changes were systematically
described by Martin Barry so long ago as 1839 and 1840 in two memoirs
communicated to the Royal Society of London, and the appearance
produced, on account of the irregularities of the surface occasioned by the
production of new vesicles, was named by him the mulberry-like structure.
He further pointed out that the vesicles arranged themselves as a layer
within the envelope of the egg or zona pellucida, and that the whole embryo
was composed of cells filled with the foundations of other cells. He
recognized that the new cells were derived from the germinal vesicle or
nucleus of the ovum, the contents of which entered into the formation of the
first two cells, each of which had its nucleus, which in its turn resolved
itself into other cells, and by a repetition of the process into a greater
number. The endogenous origin of new cells within a preëxisting cell and
the process which we now term the segmentation of the yolk were
successfully demonstrated. In a third memoir, published in 1841, Barry
definitely stated that young cells originated through division of the nucleus
of the parent cell, instead of arising, as a product of crystallization, in the
fluid cytoblastema of the parent cell or in a blastema situated external to the
cell.
In a memoir published in 1842, John Goodsir advocated the view that
the nucleus is the reproductive organ of the cell, and that from it, as from a
germinal spot, new cells were formed. In a paper, published three years
later, on nutritive centers, he described cells, the nuclei of which were the
permanent source of successive broods of young cells, which from time to
time occupied the cavity of the parent cell. He extended also his
observations on the endogenous formation of cells to the cartilage cells in
the process of inflammation and to other tissues undergoing pathological
changes. Corroborative observations on endogenous formation were also
given by his brother, Harry Goodsir, in 1845. These observations on the part
which the nucleus plays by cleavage in the formation of young cells by
endogenous development from a parent center—that an organic continuity

existed between a mother cell and its descendants through the nucleus—
constituted a great step in advance of the views entertained by Schleiden
and Schwann, and showed that Barry and the Goodsirs had a deeper insight
into the nature and functions of cells than was possessed by most of their
contemporaries, and are of the highest importance when viewed in the light
of recent observations.
In 1841 Robert Remak published an account of the presence of two
nuclei in the blood corpuscles of the chick and the pig, which he regarded as
evidence of the production of new corpuscles by division of the nucleus
within a parent cell; but it was not until some years afterwards (1850 to
1855) that he recorded additional observations and recognized that division
of the nucleus was the starting-point for the multiplication of cells in the
ovum and in the tissues generally. Remak’s view was that the process of cell
division began with the cleavage of the nucleolus, followed by that of the
nucleus, and that again by cleavage of the body of the cell and its
membrane. Kölliker had previously, in 1843, described the multiplication of
nuclei in the ova of parasitic worms, and drew the inference that in the
formation of young cells within the egg the nucleus underwent cleavage,
and that each of its divisions entered into the formation of a new cell. By
these observations, and by others subsequently made, it became obvious
that the multiplication of animal cells, either by division of the nucleus
within the cell, or by the budding off of a part of the protoplasm of the cell,
was to be regarded as a widely spread and probably a universal process, and
that each new cell arose from a parent cell.
Pathological observers were, however, for the most part inclined to
consider free cell-formation in a blastema or exudation by an aggregation of
molecules, in accordance with the views of Henle, as a common
phenomenon. This proposition was attacked with great energy by Virchow
in a series of memoirs published in his ‘Archiv,’ commencing in Vol. 1,
1847, and finally received its death-blow in his published lectures on
Cellular Pathology, 1858. He maintained that in pathological structures
there was no instance of cell development de novo; where a cell existed,
there one must have been before. Cell-formation was a continuous
development by descent, which he formulated in the expression omnis
cellula e cellulâ.

KARYOKINESIS.

While the descent of cells from preëxisting cells by division of the
nucleus during the development of the egg, in the embryos of plants and
animals, and in adult vegetable and animal tissues, both in healthy and
diseased conditions, had now become generally recognized, the mechanism
of the process by which the cleavage of the nucleus took place was for a
long time unknown. The discovery had to be deferred until the optician had
been able to construct lenses of a higher penetrative power, and the
microscopist had learned the use of coloring agents capable of dyeing the
finest elements of the tissues. There was reason to believe that in some
cases a direct cleavage of the nucleus, to be followed by a corresponding
division of the cell into two parts, did occur. In the period between 1870 and
1880 observations were made by Schneider, Strasburger, Bütschli, Fol, van
Beneden and Flemming, which showed that the division of the nucleus and
the cell was due to a series of very remarkable changes, now known as
indirect nuclear and cell division, or karyokinesis. The changes within the
nucleus are of so complex a character that it is impossible to follow them in
detail without the use of appropriate illustrations. I shall have to content
myself, therefore, with an elementary sketch of the process.
I have previously stated that the nucleus in its passive or resting stage
contains a very delicate network of threads or fibers. The first stage in the
process of nuclear division consists in the threads arranging themselves in
loops and forming a compact coil within the nucleus. The coil then becomes
looser, the loops of threads shorten and thicken, and somewhat later each
looped thread splits longitudinally into two portions. As the threads stain
when coloring agents are applied to them, they are called chromatin fibers,
and the loose coil is the chromosome (Waldeyer).
As the process continues, the investing membrane of the nucleus
disappears, and the loops of threads arrange themselves within the nucleus
so that the closed ends of the loops are directed to a common center, from
which the loops radiate outwards and produce a starlike figure (aster). At the
same time clusters of extremely delicate lines appear both in the
nucleoplasm and in the body of the cell, named the achromatic figure,
which has a spindle-like form with two opposite poles, and stains much
more feebly than the chromatic fibers. The loops of the chromatic star then

arrange themselves in the equatorial plane of the spindle, and bending round
turn their closed ends towards the periphery of the nucleus and the cell.
The next stage marks an important step in the process of division of the
nucleus. The two longitudinal portions, into which each looped thread had
previously split, now separate from each other, and whilst one part migrates
to one pole of the spindle, the other moves to the opposite pole, and the free
ends of each loop are directed toward its equator (metakinesis). By this
division of the chromatin fibers, and their separation from each other to
opposite poles of the spindle, two starlike chromatin figures are produced
(dyaster).
Each group of fibers thickens, shortens, becomes surrounded by a
membrane, and forms a new or daughter nucleus (dispirem). Two nuclei
therefore have arisen within the cell by the division of that which had
previously existed, and the expression formulated by Flemming—omnis
nucleus e nucleo—is justified. Whilst this stage is in course of being
completed, the body of the cell becomes constricted in the equatorial plane
of the spindle, and, as the constriction deepens, it separates into two parts,
each containing a daughter nucleus, so that two nucleated cells have arisen
out of a preëxisting cell.
A repetition of the process in each of these cells leads to the formation
of other cells, and, although modifications in details are found in different
species of plants and animals, the multiplication of cells in the egg and in
the tissues generally on similar lines is now a thoroughly established fact in
biological science.
In the study of karyokinesis, importance has been attached to the
number of chromosomes in the nucleus of the cell. Flemming had seen in
the Salamander twenty-four chromosome fibers, which seems to be a
constant number in the cells of epithelium and connective tissues. In other
cells, again, especially in the ova of certain animals, the number is smaller,
and fourteen, twelve, four and even two only have been described. The
theory formulated by Boveri that the number of chromosomes is constant
for each species, and that in the karyokinetic figures corresponding numbers
are found in homologous cells, seems to be not improbable.
In the preceding description I have incidentally referred to the
appearance in the proliferating cell of an achromatic spindle-like figure.

Although this was recognized by Fol in 1873, it is only during the last ten or
twelve years that attention has been paid to its more minute arrangements
and possible signification in cell-division.
The pole at each end of the spindle lies in the cell plasm which
surrounds the nucleus. In the center of each pole is a somewhat opaque spot
(central body) surrounded by a clear space, which, along with the spot,
constitutes the centrosome of the sphere of attraction. From each
centrosome extremely delicate lines may be seen to radiate in two
directions. One set extends towards the pole at the opposite end of the
spindle, and, meeting or coming into close proximity with radiations from
it, constitutes the body of the spindle, which, like a perforated mantle, forms
an imperfect envelope around the nucleus during the process of division.
The other set of radiations is called the polar and extends in the region of
the pole towards the periphery of the cell.
The question has been much discussed whether any constituent part of
the achromatic figure, or the entire figure, exists in the cell as a permanent
structure in its resting phase; or if it is only present during the process of
karyokinesis. During the development of the egg the formation of young
cells, by division of the segmentation nucleus, is so rapid and continuous
that the achromatic figure, with the centrosome in the pole of the spindle, is
a readily recognizable object in each cell. The polar and spindle-like
radiations are in evidence during karyokinesis, and have apparently a
temporary endurance and function. On the other hand, van Beneden and
Boveri were of opinion that the central body of the centrosome did not
disappear when the division of the nucleus came to an end, but that it
remained as a constituent part of a cell lying in the cell plasm, near to the
nucleus. Flemming has seen the central body with its sphere in leucocytes,
as well as in epithelial cells and those of other tissues. Subsequently
Heidenhain and other histologists have recorded similar observations. It
would seem, therefore, as if there were reason to regard the centrosome, like
the nucleus, as a permanent constituent of a cell. This view, however, is not
universally entertained. If not always capable of demonstration in the
resting stage of a cell, it is doubtless to be regarded as potentially present,
and ready to assume, along with the radiations, a characteristic appearance
when the process of nuclear division is about to begin.

One can scarcely regard the presence of so remarkable an appearance as
the achromatic figure without associating with it an important function in
the economy of the cell. As from the centrosome at the pole of the spindle
both sets of radiations diverge, it is not unlikely that it acts as a center or
sphere of energy and attraction. By some observers the radiations are
regarded as substantive fibrillar structures, elastic or even contractile in their
properties. Others, again, look upon them as morphological expressions of
chemical and dynamical energy in the protoplasm of the cell body. On either
theory we may assume that they indicate an influence, emanating, it may be,
from the centrosome and capable of being exercised both on the cell plasm
and on the nucleus contained in it. On the contractile theory, the radiations
which form the body of the spindle, either by actual traction of the supposed
fibrillæ or by their pressure on the nucleus which they surround, might
impel during karyokinesis the dividing chromosome elements toward the
poles of the spindle, to form there the daughter nuclei. On the dynamical
theory, the chemical and physical energy in the centrosome might influence
the cell plasm and the nucleus and attract the chromosome elements of the
nucleus to the poles of the spindle. The radiated appearance would therefore
be consequent and attendant on the physico-chemical activity of the
centrosome. One or other of these theories may also be applied to the
interpretation of the significance of the polar radiations.

CELL PLASM.

In the cells of plants, in addition to the cell wall, the cell body and the
cell juice require to be examined. The material of the cell body, or the cell
contents, was named by von Mohl (1846) protoplasm, and consisted of a
colorless tenacious substance which partly lined the cell wall (primordial
utricle) and partly traversed the interior of the cell as delicate threads
inclosing spaces (vacuoles) in which the cell juice was contained. In the
protoplasm the nucleus was embedded. Nägeli, about the same time, had
also recognized the difference between the protoplasm and the other
contents of vegetable cells, and had noticed its nitrogenous composition.
Though the analogy with a closed bladder or vesicle could no longer be
sustained in the animal tissues, the name ‘cell’ continued to be retained for

descriptive purposes, and the body of the cell was spoken of as a more or
less soft substance inclosing a nucleus (Leydig). In 1861 Max Schultze
adopted for the substance forming the body of the animal cell the term
‘protoplasm.’ He defined a cell to be a particle of protoplasm in the
substance of which a nucleus was situated. He regarded the protoplasm, as
indeed had previously been pointed out by the botanist Unger, as essentially
the same as the contractile sarcode which constitutes the body and
pseudopodia of the Amœba and other Rhizopoda. As the term ‘protoplasm,’
as well as that of ‘bioplasm’ employed by Lionel Beale in a somewhat
similar though not precisely identical sense, involves certain theoretical
views of the origin and function of the body of the cell, it would be better to
apply to it the more purely descriptive term ‘cytoplasm’ or ‘cell plasm.’
Schultze defined protoplasm as a homogeneous, glassy, tenacious
material, of a jelly-like or somewhat firmer consistency, in which numerous
minute granules were embedded. He regarded it as the part of the cell
especially endowed with vital energy, whilst the exact function of the
nucleus could not be defined. Based upon this conception of the jelly-like
character of protoplasm, the idea for a time prevailed that a structureless,
dimly granular, jelly or slime destitute of organization, possessed great
physiological activity, and was the medium through which the phenomena
of life were displayed.
More accurate conceptions of the nature of the cell plasm soon began to
be entertained. Brücke recognized that the body of the cell was not simple,
but had a complex organization. Hemming observed that the cell plasm
contained extremely delicate threads, which frequently formed a network,
the interspaces of which were occupied by a more homogeneous substance.
Where the threads crossed each other, granular particles (milkrosomen)
were situated. Bütschli considered that he could recognize in the cell plasm
a honeycomb-like appearance, as if it consisted of excessively minute
chambers in which a homogeneous more or less fluid material was
contained. The polar and spindle-like radiations visible during the process
of karyokinesis, which have already been referred to, and the presence of
the centrosome, possibly even during the resting stage of the cell, furnished
additional illustrations of differentiation within the cell plasm. In many cells
there appears also to be a difference in the character of the cell plasm which
immediately surrounds the nucleus and that which lies at and near the

periphery of the cell. The peripheral part (ektoplasma) is more compact and
gives a definite outline to the cell, although not necessarily differentiating
into a cell membrane. The inner part (endoplasma) is softer and is
distinguished by a more distinct granular appearance and by containing the
products specially formed in each particular kind of cell during the nutritive
process.
By the researches of numerous investigators on the internal
organization of cells in plants and animals, a large body of evidence has
now been accumulated, which shows that both the nucleus and the cell
plasm consist of something more than a homogeneous, more or less viscid,
slimy material. Recognizable objects in the form of granules, threads, or
fibers can be distinguished in each. The cell plasm and the nucleus
respectively are therefore not of the same constitution throughout, but
possess polymorphic characters, the study of which in health and the
changes produced by disease will for many years to come form important
matters for investigation.

(To be concluded.)

THE BUBONIC PLAGUE.
By FREDERICK G. NOVY, Sc.D., M.D.,
JUNIOR PROFESSOR OF HYGIENE AND PHYSIOLOGICAL CHEMISTRY IN THE
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN.

T he province of Yunnan in China adjoins French Tonkin and British
Burmah. It is of interest to the student of epidemiology because from
this mountainous and difficultly accessible region there has issued but
recently a disease which has been considered as practically extinct. Frightful
as have been the ravages of the pest in the middle ages, it is noteworthy that
during the past hundred years, with the exception of two slight outbreaks
(Noja in Italy in 1815, and Vetlianka in Russia in 1878), the disease has
been unknown in Europe. During this time the pest has not been extinct, but
has existed to a greater or less extent in certain parts of Asia and in Africa.
Four and possibly five of these endemic foci are known to-day. The
province of Yunnan is one of these regions. The mountainous district of
Gurhwal, lying along the southern slope of the Himalayas, is another center
where the pest has continued to prevail. The recent travels of Koch in
eastern Africa have brought to light a third region about Lake Victoria, in
the British province of Uganda, and the German Kisiba, where the plague
has existed from time immemorial, cut off as it were from the outer world.
Only last year Sakharoff called attention to a fourth focus in northeastern
China, and it is quite likely that a fifth focus exists in Arabia. These regions
are of great importance in so far as the existence of permanent endemic foci
sheds not a little light upon the development and spread of those great
epidemics which, like great tidal waves, have in the past swept over whole
countries and even continents.
It is not known when or from whence the pest was first introduced into
Yunnan. Unquestionably, it has existed in the extreme western parts of the
province for many decades. Eventually the disease spread throughout the

province, and frightful ravages are known to have occurred in 1871–73.
Repeated visitations of this dread disease have taught the natives of Yunnan,
as well as those of Gurhwal and of Uganda, to desert their villages as soon
as an unusual mortality is found to prevail among the rats. In spite of the
frequent recurrence of the plague, it did not spread to neighboring
provinces, largely because of the fact that little or no communication exists
between Yunnan and the adjoining Chinese states. Recently, however, the
plague did succeed in crossing the frontier, and, in so doing, it has given rise
to an epidemic which, as will be presently seen, has already made an
unenviable record and has a future that no one can foretell.
The way in which the disease spread from Yunnan has been quite
clearly established. Along the Tonkin frontier, throughout the provinces of
Quan-si and Yunnan, the Chinese maintain a large number of military posts.
Mule supply-trains for these posts passed from province to province over
the difficult mountain paths. The mule-drivers were natives of Yunnan. In
1892 the plague existed in Yunnan, and it was in the summer of 1893 that
the disease appeared at Long-Cheou in Quansi among the Yunnan mule-
drivers. These drivers arriving at the post of Lieng-Cheng, after one of their
journeys from Yunnan, repaired to the city of Long-Cheou, about ten miles
distant. During their sojourn in this city the muleteers developed the first
known cases of the plague. From these men the disease spread throughout
the city and to the neighboring posts and villages.
From Long-Cheou the plague descended the Canton River and reached
Naning-Phu. From thence it followed overland to the seaport Pakhoi, some
hundred and fifty miles distant. A few months later, in February, 1894, it
reached Canton, either by descending the river from Naning-Phu or by boat
from Pakhoi. That the plague at Canton, in 1894, had not lost any of its old-
time destructiveness is seen in the fact that it is estimated to have caused not
less than one hundred thousand deaths in Canton in the short space of two
months.
From Canton the plague spread to Hong Kong in April, 1894. It was
during the existence of this epidemic that the first bacteriological studies of
the disease were made and resulted in the discovery of the plague bacillus.
In the fall of 1894, the disease died out in Hong Kong, but it reappeared in
1895 and 1896. Considering the fact that Hong Kong is one of the most
important maritime centers, it is not surprising to find that in the spring of

1896 the plague was carried by shipping to the Island of Formosa. It is quite
certain that about the same time the plague was carried from Hong Kong to
Bombay. At all events, the existence of this disease was recognized in
Bombay in September, 1896, by Doctor Viegas. Previous to this date, the
mortality in Bombay was abnormally high, undoubtedly due to the very
unsanitary condition of the overcrowded city.
The existence of famine in India, together with the filthy, overcrowded
condition of the population, enabled the plague to gain a firm foothold in a
relatively short time. Indeed, there can be no doubt but that the disease was
well established at the time it was first recognized. It is no wonder, then,
that in spite of the most stringent precautions, it spread like wildfire, so that
in a short time the weekly deaths from the plague rose to nearly 2,000. In
the face of such a relentless enemy, it is but natural that a large proportion of
the population should seek safety in flight. It is believed that fully 300,000
people left Bombay shortly after the plague developed. There can be no
doubt but that these refugees, directly or indirectly, carried the disease to the
neighboring villages, and thus contributed to the enormous dissemination of
the pest throughout Western India. In the Presidency of Bombay there were
reported, in less than three years, more than 220,000 cases, with more than
164,000 deaths. When it is furthermore recognized that the natives
concealed the existence of the disease as much as possible, it will be evident
that these figures reveal a partial but, nevertheless, a grim truth.
With Bombay and the surrounding country thus seriously infected, it
became merely a question of time when the disease would be carried to
other ports and countries, by vessels and by overland routes. In spite of the
sanitary perfection which we may flatter ourselves on having attained in
recent years, it is nevertheless a fact that the disease is slowly but steadily
and, as it were, stealthily invading port after port. That the sanitary methods,
however, are not at fault is seen in the fact that when an early and prompt
recognition occurred, the disease has been held in check. The insidious
spread of the disease is rather due to the enormous development of
commerce and to the rapid means of communication with distant countries.
From Bombay the plague has spread to ports on the Persian Gulf, on the
Red Sea, and has reached Alexandria. Aden, Djeddah, Port Said, Cairo, have
all had outbreaks of the disease. Beirut and Smyrna have each developed
straggling cases. Isolated cases have been met with in London, at St.

Petersburg and in Vienna. However, only three appreciable outbreaks have
as yet occurred on European soil. The first was that at Oporto in Portugal,
where one hundred and sixty cases, with fifty-five deaths, have developed
up to the present time. The second outbreak occurred at Kolobovka, a
village near Astrakhan. Of the twenty-four cases that developed there in
July and August, 1899, twenty-three died. The last outbreak is that at
Glasgow, where the disease made its appearance but a few weeks ago.
In addition to following the great international highway of Suez, the
disease has insidiously spread to the countries of East Africa. Mauritius and
Madagascar, with the adjoining mainland of Mozambique and Lorenzo
Marquez, have become more or less infected, and, if reports are to be
credited, it has also appeared in one of the Boer towns and also on the Ivory
Coast in Western Africa. Last fall the disease reached South America. It
apparently was first recognized at Santos, in Brazil, during October,
although early in September, according to reports, a peculiar disease,
causing swelling of the glands and death within forty-eight hours, was
reported at Asunçion, the capital of Paraguay. At the present time Rio
Janeiro is infected. The sanitary condition of these South American cities is
far from being the best, and, consequently, there is but little hope that the
disease will be eradicated or even held in check. With South America more
or less thoroughly infected, it is evident that the United States, as well as
Europe, are now threatened from all sides. The gravity of the situation is
seen in the fact that already last November two cases of the plague were
found in New York harbor aboard a coffee ship from Santos. Several cases
have also developed on ships bound from the latter city for Mediterranean
ports.
The United States is threatened not merely from the East Atlantic and
South Atlantic, but also from the Pacific. As a matter of fact, the danger to
our Pacific ports is greater, owing to the direct communication with the
Orient. It has been already indicated that Hong Kong has continued to be
infected ever since 1894. On several occasions it disappeared during the
winter months, only to reappear in spring. With the more or less constant
prevalence of the plague at this great seaport, it necessarily will lead directly
or indirectly to a dissemination of the disease along the entire Pacific.
Already it has prevailed at Amoy, and has even extended to other Chinese
ports as far as Niu-Chwang. For several years it has already persisted on the

island of Formosa. Japan was invaded last fall at Kobe and at Osaka, and
although it disappeared during the winter, yet only a few weeks ago it has
reappeared at the latter city. Sidney in Australia, and Noumea in New
Caledonia, are also infected at the present time.
Manila, Honolulu and San Francisco have successively become
infected. In all these places the disease, with but very few exceptions, has
attacked the native or Oriental population. The extinction of the plague in
the Hawaiian Islands since the end of March is a splendid demonstration of
what energetic, vigorous measures can accomplish. The presence of the
plague since March 8 in Chinatown, in San Francisco, is readily recognized
as a most serious condition, especially after the courts have granted an
injunction restraining the health officers from carrying out the necessary
vigorous preventive measures.
A few words should be given here to the overland dissemination of the
disease. Europe is not merely threatened by infected ships which may come
from China, India, Eastern Africa or South America. The overland routes
from China and India are fully as grave a source of danger. Indeed, as will
be presently shown, these are the routes along which the great epidemics of
cholera and plague have always traveled in the past.
One of these great caravan routes leads from Lahore in Punjab through
Afghanistan into the Russian province of Turkestan, where it meets the
Trans-Caspian railway. This railway begins at Samarcand in Turkestan, and
passes through Bokhara, Merv, Askabad and ends at Uzun Ada on the
Caspian Sea opposite Baku. Early in 1899 an outbreak of the plague
occurred near Samarcand, undoubtedly brought up from India. The
precautions taken to prevent the spread were entirely successful, and
although no accounts have been officially published as to the means
employed, nevertheless it will be seen that the radical procedure employed
by Loris Melikoff some twenty years ago was again resorted to. Inasmuch
as the entire village was said to be afflicted it was surrounded by troops, and
no one was allowed to enter or leave. The village and all that it contained
was destroyed by fire. With this route open continually it is evident that
fresh importation must be expected sooner or later.
Apparently a new plague focus, independent of that in Yunnan and
Hong Kong, has been recently discovered in Manchuria. The plague seems

to have existed in this province for more than ten years under the name of
Tarabagan plague, and is believed to be spread by a rodent, the Arctomis
cobuc, which is subject to a hemorrhagic pneumonia. The presence of such
an independent endemic focus in Manchuria indicates the possibility of the
spread of the disease by caravan to Lake Baikal, and thence by the Siberian
railroad to Russia. Indeed, the epidemic of pneumonic type which began
July, 1899, at Kolobovka, in Astrakhan, while it may have been imported
from Persia, might also owe its origin to the Mongolian focus.
Russia, however, is not the only country endangered by the overland
transmission of the disease. There are commercial highways which lead
from Northwestern India through Baluchistan and Persia to the Caucasus,
and through Turkey to Constantinople. Grave danger threatens from this
source, and more especially from the cities along the Persian Gulf. Two
important cities here are already infected, namely, Bushire, in Persia, and
Bassorah on the Tigris, in Turkey. It would appear as if Turkey and Persia
would escape with difficulty from a visitation of this dread disease.
Such, then, is the geographical distribution of the present outbreak of
the plague. This, an apparently extinct disease, has suddenly reappeared and
given evidence of its power to spread death and desolation. Fortunately,
however, modern sanitary precautions are quite able to restrict its progress,
provided they be applied at the proper time and place. Filth and
overcrowding, protracted wars and famine, have been the powerful allies of
the plague in the past. Through their aid this disease has made a deep
impression upon the pages of history. It may not be out of place, therefore,
to turn from the present outbreak of the disease and trace its grewsome past.
In ancient writings references are found which would seem to indicate
the existence of the plague at a very early date. The Bible contains several
such references (Deuteronomy, Chapter 28, paragraph 27. Samuel I, Chapter
5, paragraphs 6, 9). The latter especially deals with the plague which
attacked the Philistines after they took the ark. The rôle of rats in the
dissemination of the disease is, as some believe, apparently referred to in
the trespass offering of “five golden emerods and five golden mice.” The
return of the ark, together with this trespass offering, brought also the
plague, “because they had looked into the ark of the Lord, even he smote of
the people fifty thousand and threescore and ten men.” Poussin’s painting of
this Philistine plague, exhibited in the Louvre, shows several dead rats on

the streets. It is evident that the susceptibility of the rat to the plague had
been noticed even at this early date. The plague of boils visited upon the
Egyptians as related in Exodus (Chapter 9, paragraphs 9 and 10) has also
been taken to indicate the pest of today, but neither of these scriptural
references can be said to be sufficiently definite.
The Attic plague, which ravaged the Peloponnesus 430 years before
Christ, has been accurately described by an eye-witness, the historian
Thucydides. His narration may be considered the earliest exact record of an
epidemic. Like all the great epidemics of subsequent ages, it was ushered in
by the overcrowding, the misery and the famine consequent upon prolonged
wars. The combustible material was there, and all that necessary was the
spark to begin the work of death and devastation. It is noteworthy that the
origin of the pest was traced by Thucydides to Egypt or Ethiopia, from
whence it spread gradually overland to Asia Minor and thence by boat to
Athens. The nature of this first great historic epidemic is and will remain
uncertain. There are those who consider the Attic pestilence as one of
bubonic plague, but the fact that in the very careful description of the
disease no mention is made of buboes and the statement that death occurred
from the seventh to the ninth day would indicate that the disease was
something else. Buboes are characteristic, it is true, of the plague, but it
should be remembered that outbreaks of the pneumonic form, with little or
no glandular enlargement are not uncommon. Death, however, in the case of
plague is very common on the second or third day, and is less liable to occur
in more protracted cases. These facts lead to the commonly accepted belief
that the Attic pest was not the bubonic plague. It may have been typhus
fever, possibly smallpox.
The great pestilence which devastated Rome and its dependencies in
166, Anno Domini, is known as the plague of Antoninus or of Galen. This
prolonged epidemic was brought to Rome by the returning legions from
Seleucia. It was not characterized by buboes, and it is very probable that it
was largely smallpox. On the other hand, the plague of Saint Cyprian, which
prevailed from 251 to 266 Anno Domini, may have been partly bubonic in
nature, since, it prevailed during the fall and winter months and ceased
during the hot summer. The disease was said to be communicated by means
of clothing and by the look. It spread from Ethiopia to Egypt and thence
through the known world.

Although the above early epidemics cannot be identified with the
bubonic plague, there is nevertheless excellent evidence of the existence of
this disease in remote antiquity. The first undoubted testimony on this point
is that furnished by Rufus of Ephesus, who lived in the first century of the
Christian era. The writings of this author are no longer extant, but they are
quoted by Oribasius, the physician and friend of Julian the Apostate, who
lived in the fourth century. The writings of Oribasius were discovered in the
Vatican Library and were published early in this century by Cardinal Mai. In
the forty-fourth “Book of Oribasius” occurs the extract taken from Rufus of
Ephesus, from which it appears that “the so-called pestilential buboes are all
fatal and have a very acute course, especially when observed in Libya,
Egypt and in Syria. Dionysius mentions it. Dioscorides and Posidonius have
described it at length in their treatise upon the plague which prevailed
during their time in Libya.” The description which then follows of the
buboes and of the disease is an exact counterpart of the present plague. The
writings of the authors quoted by Rufus are no longer extant, but one thing
is certain, and that is that the Dionysius referred to lived not later than 300
years before Christ. The other two physicians lived in Alexandria
contemporaneous with the birth of Christ. It may, therefore, be considered
as an established fact that the plague existed in Egypt, Libya and Syria as
early as 300 years before Christ. This is of especial interest in view of the
recent discovery by Koch of an endemic plague focus in British Uganda and
German Kisiba, at the headwaters of the Nile. Whether it ever invaded
European territory prior to the sixth century is unknown.
The great plague of Justinian which broke out in 542, Anno Domini,
appeared first in Egypt, and from thence it spread east and west throughout
the known world and persisted for more than a half century. So unknown
was the plague in Europe at that time that the physicians of Constantinople
considered it a new disease. Procopius, who was an eye-witness of the
plague at Constantinople, states that the daily mortality in that city was at
times over 10,000.
The pandemic of Justinian resulted in the distribution of the plague for
the first time throughout the length and breadth of known Europe. From that
time on the early chroniclers make repeated mention of devastating plagues
consequent upon the miseries of war and famine. The descriptions of these
pestilences are, as a rule, insufficient to identify them with the bubonic

plague. Typhus, scurvy, smallpox and other diseases undoubtedly alternated
in the work of destruction. Of the scores of epidemics thus recorded during
the eight centuries following this first visitation few, indeed, can be
identified to a certainty with the bubonic plague, and yet there can be no
doubt but that this disease occupied no second rank during the dreary
darkness of the middle ages. This era in history may be said to have been
ushered in by the Justinian plague, and it was closed by an even more
disastrous outbreak of this same disease. All the ravages and slaughter
consequent upon the great historic battles, when taken together, pale into
insignificance on comparison with that dread visitation of the fourteenth
century, the ‘black death’.
It is noteworthy that this great historic epidemic did not originate in
Egypt, as did many of its predecessors. Without exception the
contemporaneous writers ascribe its origin to Cathay, or the China of today.
This fact is of interest when it is borne in mind that at the present time we
know of the existence of two endemic foci in China, besides that of
Gurhwal in India, of Beni Cheir in Arabia and of Uganda and Kisiba in
Africa. Whatever may have been its source, the fact is that it advanced from
the Orient along the three principal routes of travel. One of these led from
the Persian Gulf through Bassorah and Bagdad along the Euphrates, across
Arabia to Egypt and Northern Africa. Another route passed from India
through Afghanistan, and skirting the southern borders of the Caspian and
Black Seas, eventually reached Asia Minor. A third route from Turkestan
and China led around the northern shore of the Caspian Sea to Crimea, and
thence to Constantinople. It was along these several routes that the plague
advanced and spread over most of Western Asia and Northern Africa.
The European black death, however, can be traced with accuracy to the
Crimean peninsula. Gaffa, a town in Crimea, now known as Theodosia, had
been founded and fortified by the Genoese. It, as well as other cities along
the Black Sea, was largely populated by Italians. One of these, Gabriel de
Mussis, a lawyer in Gaffa, has left a faithful account of his experience and
share in the introduction of the plague into Europe. In 1346 in the Orient
numberless Tartars and Saracens were attacked with an unknown disease
and sudden death. In the city of Tanais, through some excess, a racial
struggle ensued between the Tartars and the Italian merchants. The latter
eventually escaped and took refuge in Gaffa, which in time was besieged by

the Tartars. During the siege, which lasted three years, the Tartar hordes
were attacked by the plague, which daily carried off many thousands. The
besiegers, despairing of reducing the city by direct attack, attempted to do
so in another way. By means of their engines of war they projected the dead
bodies into the beleaguered city, which, as a result, soon became infected.
The Christian defenders took to their ships, and abandoning Gaffa, sailed
westward, touching at Constantinople, Greece, Italy and France.
Wherever the infected vessels touched they left the plague.
Constantinople thus became infected early in 1347. During the summer
Greece, Sardinia, Corsica and parts of the Italian coast developed the
disease. In the fall it reached Marseilles. The following year it spread inland
into Italy, France, Spain, and even into England. In another year or two it
spread over Germany, Russia, and crossed to the Scandinavian peninsula.
Within four years it had completed the circuit of Europe, spreading untold
death and misery. No greater catastrophe has been recorded in the history of
the world.
The rapidity with which the disease spread among the fugitives from
Gaffa, and in the cities visited by their ships, is despairingly narrated by De
Mussis, who, returning in one of the ships to Genoa, says: “After landing
we entered our homes. Inasmuch as a grave disease had befallen us, and of
the thousands that journeyed with us scarcely ten remained, the relatives,
friends and neighbors hastened to greet us. Woe to us who brought with us
the darts of death, who scattered the deadly poison through the breath of our
words.” According to this writer 40,000 died in Genoa, leaving scarcely a
seventh of the original population. Venice was said to have lost 100,000,
Naples 60,000, Sienna 70,000, Florence 100,000. All told, Italy lost half of
its population.
Of the contemporaneous writers none has printed the horrors of the
plague more vividly than does Boccaccio in his introduction to the
‘Decameron.’
“What magnificent dwellings, what notable palaces were then
depopulated to the last person! What families extinct! What riches and vast
possessions left, and no known heir to inherit! What numbers of both sexes
in the prime and vigor of youth, whom in the morning either Galen,
Hippocrates, or Æsculapius himself but would have declared in perfect

health, after dining with their friends here have supped with their departed
friends in the other world!”
From Marseilles the plague spread through Provence with disastrous
results. In some monasteries not even a single survivor was left. In one of
these Petrarch’s brother buried thirty-four of his companions. At Avignon,
the seat of the Pope, 1,800 deaths occurred in three days. In Paris more than
fifty thousand died of the plague.
In England the black death appeared in August, 1348, and continued till
the autumn of 1349, when it disappeared. London, which at that time
probably had a population of 45,000, had a mortality of about 20,000. No
exact statement can be made of the relative mortality in England, although
many undoubtedly extravagant guesses are recorded by contemporaneous
writers.
It is estimated that the population of Europe previous to the outbreak of
the black death was about one hundred and five millions. One quarter of the
population, or about twenty-five millions, are said to have died of the
plague. This may be but a mere estimate, it may be grossly inaccurate, but it
nevertheless indicates the deadly character of the pestilence. According to a
report made to Pope Clement VI, the total mortality for the known world
was placed at forty-three millions. One-half the population of Italy
succumbed. The Order of Minorites in Italy lost 300,000 members. The
Order of Capuchins in Germany lost 126,000 members, while the total of
deaths in Germany was placed at 1,200,000.
The invasion of Europe by the black death was sudden and rapid. The
seeds of the disease, once planted on European soil, persisted, as might be
expected, for no little time. Although the great epidemic was said to have
lasted till 1360, it must not be inferred that it then ceased altogether. Diverse
localities retained the infection, and, as a result, new outbreaks, though to a
less extent, continued to outcrop during the following years. From that time
on every decade or two witnessed more or less pronounced outbreaks of the
disease in France, England and Italy. The chroniclers of those local
outbreaks during the latter half of the fourteenth and during the entire
fifteenth century did not always make it clear that the pestilence described
was the real plague. It was but natural to include typhus and other diseases
under the dreaded term of pest. Nevertheless, the frequency of these

outbreaks indicates the persistence and the wide dissemination of the plague
during those years.
During the sixteenth century the plague apparently began to show a
decrease in its frequency, although during this period, as before, other
epidemic diseases were mistaken for it. Germany, Holland, certain cities in
France, and especially in Italy were scourged by the plague during this
century. The noteworthy outbreak in Italy in 1575–77 was due to fresh
importation from the Orient. The disease spread throughout Italy, and the
devastation it caused was not inferior to that of the great plague two
centuries before. For example, in 1576 in Venice 70,000 died of the disease.
During the seventeenth century the plague asserted itself with great
severity. Following a famine, it prevailed in Russia in 1601–1603, and some
idea of its destructiveness may be gained when it is stated that in Moscow
alone 127,000 lives were taken. During the following decade even greater
epidemics prevailed in Western Europe. France and England were invaded,
and in Switzerland it even penetrated to the highest Alps. Basel in 1609–
1611 had 4,000 deaths, while London in 1603 yielded 33,000.
The terrible epidemic which ravaged Northern Italy in 1629–1631
deserves more than a passing notice. During those years more than a million
died of the disease. Scarcely a town in Northern Italy escaped. The city
which, perhaps, suffered the most was Milan, where, in 1630, the deaths
from all diseases are said to have amounted to 186,000. The Milan outbreak
has been graphically described by Manzoni, in his celebrated ‘I Promessi
Sposi.’ Unrecognized, the disease entered Milan in October, 1629. The mild
cases which were met with during the winter months lulled the fears of the
people and encouraged the mass of physicians to deny the existence of the
plague. But in April the disease began to assert itself in terrible earnest. The
frenzied populace, blind to the contagiousness of the disease, were
possessed with the strange hallucination that obtained during former plague
epidemics in other Italian cities, that the pest spread because of poison
scattered about by evil-minded persons. Suspicious strangers were, as a
result, stoned in the streets, imprisoned and even put to death by legal
process because of such fanatical beliefs. To offset the growing pestilence,
the people demanded of the Archbishop that a solemn religious procession
be held, and that the holy relics of Saint Charles be exposed. At first this
was refused, but eventually it was granted. The procession bearing the

saintly body was solemnly held on the 11th of June. The fanatical security
which these devotions engendered was rudely shattered when, a few days
later, the disease burst forth with renewed activity among all classes in all
parts of the city. Nevertheless, as Manzoni observes, the faith was such that
none recognized that the procession itself was directly the cause of the new
outburst of the disease by facilitating the spread of the contagion. Again the
belief asserted itself that the ‘untori,’ or poisoners, mixed with the crowd
and with their unguents and powders had infected as many as possible.
From that day the fury of the contagion continued to grow to such an extent
that scarcely a house remained exempt from the disease. The number of
patients in the pesthouse rose from 2,000 to 12,000, and later reached
17,000. The daily mortality rose from 500 to 1,200, then 1,500, and is even
said to have reached 3,500. Milan, before the epidemic, was said to have
had a population of from 200,000 to 250,000. The loss by death has been
variously estimated at from 140,000 to 186,000. All these deaths were not
due to the plague. Thus, large numbers of children died as a result of
starvation consequent upon the death of their parents from the plague.
The horrors attendant upon such a dreadful visitation can well be
imagined. Scarcity of help in removing the dead and in taking care of the
sick made itself felt, to say nothing of the lack of food. Enormous trenches,
one after another, were filled with the bodies of the victims, carried thither
by the hardened monatti, the counterpart of the Florentine becchini, so well
portrayed by Lord Lytton in his ‘Rienzi.’ These bearers of the sick and dead
were naturally recruited from the lowest criminal classes, and it can,
therefore, cause but little wonder that an epidemic of the worst of crimes
was associated with that of the plague.
In 1656 Italy was again invaded by the plague, and on that occasion
Genoa lost 65,000 of its population by death. About the same time terrible
epidemics of the disease ravaged Russia, Turkey and Hungary.
London, in 1665, suffered dreadfully from the plague. The disease
appears to have been imported from Holland, where it was known to have
existed for some time. The progress of the disease in London has been
vividly portrayed by Defoe in the ‘Journal of the Plague Year’ and in the
‘Due Preparations for the Plague.’

It is supposed that the pest had been imported in bales of goods from
Smyrna into Holland in 1663. From thence it crossed over to London, where
the first deaths were reported about the first of December in 1664. Toward
the end of that month another death occurred in the same house, but during
the following six weeks no new case developed. About the middle of
February, however, a person died of the plague in another house. From that
time only occasional cases of plague were reported, although the weekly
mortality was rapidly rising and was greatly in excess of the usual rate.
Thus, while the ordinary weekly mortality ranged from two hundred and
forty to three hundred, this was gradually increased, so that in the third
week in January it had risen to four hundred and seventy-four. After a slight
remission, the mortality again rose, so that early in May plague cases were
reported more frequently. It soon became evident that the plague, as in
Milan in 1630, had slowly but surely gained a firm foothold. The increased
mortality was undoubtedly due to unsuspected plague cases of either the
pneumonic or the septicemic type.
During May, and especially during the hot weather in June, the disease
continued to spread. At the same time, the panic-stricken people began to
leave the city in large numbers. In July the condition was truly deplorable.
To quote Defoe:

“London might well be said to be all in tears; the mourners did
not go about the streets, indeed, for nobody put on black or made a
formal dress of mourning for their nearest friends; but the voice of
mourning was truly heard in the streets. The shrieks of women and
children at the windows and doors of their houses, where their
dearest relations were perhaps dying, or just dead, were so frequent
to be heard as we passed in the streets, that it was enough to pierce
the stoutest heart in the world to hear them. Tears and lamentations
were seen almost in every house, especially in the first part of the
visitation; for toward the latter end men’s hearts were hardened, and
death was so always before their eyes, that they did not so much
concern themselves for the loss of their friends, expecting that
themselves should be summoned the next hour.”

London at this time had a population of nearly half a million. The
deaths from the plague during 1665, as reported in the bills of mortality, are

68,596. By far the larger number of these occurred in August, September
and October. The weekly mortality from the disease rose from a few cases
in May to over 7,000 per week in September. It may, indeed, be close to the
truth when Defoe states that 3,000 were said to have been buried in one
night.
The great plague of London in 1665 was by no means the only
visitation of that kind. From the time of the black death in 1348, London
had a continuous record of plague infection. On an average it had an
epidemic of plague every fifteen years. Some of these were fully as severe
as that of 1665. Thus, in 1603, with a population of 250,000, there were
over 33,000 reported deaths from the plague. In 1625, 41,000 died of pest
out of a population of 320,000.
One of the most remarkable facts in connection with the great plague is
this—that it was the last in England. The great fire of 1666 is supposed to
have extinguished the plague, but this cannot be said to be true. The disease
continued to a slight extent in 1666 and isolated cases were reported as late
as 1679, but after that date it disappeared completely and from that time
until this year England has been absolutely free from the plague. The
sudden extinction of the plague in England after it had become
domesticated, so to speak, for nearly three centuries, is indeed difficult to
explain. Creighton sees an inhibiting influence in the growth of the practice
of burial in coffins. But the absence of famine, together with the cessation
of domestic wars and strife and the abeyance of want and misery, had not a
little effect. As will presently be seen, the extinction of the plague in
England was no more remarkable than its disappearance from Western
Europe.
The history of plague in the seventeenth century does not close with the
London epidemic. From 1675–1684 the disease ravaged Northern Africa,
Turkey, and from thence invaded Austria and even reached Southern
Germany. The Vienna outbreak of 1679 can be said to have been no less
terrible than that of Milan or of London. The deaths from the plague in
Vienna in that year have been variously estimated at from 70,000 to double
that number.
From Vienna the plague reached Prague, where in 1861 it is said to
have caused no less than 83,000 deaths. It is not to be wondered at that a

nation scourged by thirty years of relentless warfare, by religious
persecution and finally tried thus severely by the plague should inscribe
upon the equestrian statue of their patron saint the heart-rending appeal,
‘Lord, grant that we do not perish.’
The close of the seventeenth century saw the disappearance of the
plague from Western Europe. In Eastern Europe, however, the disease
continued to exist even during the eighteenth century. Nevertheless, a
change had taken place for the better, and as the years went on the
retrogression of the plague became more and more distinct.
During the first two decades of the eighteenth century the plague was
widely distributed in Eastern Europe. It was present especially in
Constantinople and in the Danubian provinces. From the latter it extended
to Russia (Ukraine), and from thence to Poland. The disastrous invasion of
Russia by Charles XII. of Sweden, ending in his defeat at Poltawa in 1709,
led to its further dissemination to Silesia, Eastern Prussia, the Baltic
provinces and seaports, and even to Scandinavia. It was during this
epidemic that Dantzic, in 1709, lost 33,000, and Stockholm 40,000 by the
plague. During the years 1709 and 1710 the plague mortality in the Baltic
provinces exceeded 300,000. Three years later, in 1713, the plague spread
up the Danube and reached Vienna, Prague and even Bavaria.
During these two decades Western Europe was entirely free from the
dread disease. In 1720 the disease suddenly developed in Marseilles and
extended from thence to neighboring towns and the country districts of
Provence. Terrible as was this visitation it is of interest, inasmuch as it was
the last occurrence of the plague on French soil, and the last in Western
Europe until the recent outbreak in Portugal.
The plague was said to have been imported into Marseilles by a
merchant vessel, the ‘Grand Saint Antoine’, from Syria. On its way to
Marseilles several deaths occurred on shipboard, but the cause was
overlooked. On the 25th of May, 1720, two days after the arrival of the
vessel, another death occurred among the crew. The disease was still not
believed to be the plague, and although quarantine was instituted, new cases
appeared among the crew and the dock laborers employed in unloading the
vessel, and it was not until the disease reached the city that its true nature
was recognized. The germs of the disease had then been scattered broadcast.

Unsanitary a city as Marseilles is to-day, it must have been vastly more so in
1720. The result of the addition of plague germs to the want, misery and
filthy condition was at once evident. During August the mortality averaged
four and even five hundred per day. In September the daily mortality rose to
1,000. So great was the terror of the populace that it became impossible to
secure bearers of the dead, to obtain nurses and attendants. The dead were
left in heaps upon the streets, so that it became necessary to transfer to the
city 700 galley slaves, who were required to remove the bodies. These same
galley slaves were even pressed into service as nurses. The diseased were
abandoned by friends and relatives, and under such conditions it need not be
wondered at that they received little or no attention from others. Food and
water were denied to the unfortunates, and when food was administered to
the pesthouses it was thrown into the windows by machinery.
The disease continued in Marseilles until December, 1721, but isolated
cases persisted until April, 1722. During the fifteen months of its duration it
carried off 40,000 of the population. According to Defoe, there died of the
plague in Marseilles and within a league of its walls 60,000.
From Marseilles the plague reached Aix, and in the winter of 1720 and
1721 it carried off 18,000 of its people. It also reached Arles, where, in
1721, out of a population of 23,000, 10,000 died (forty-five per cent). The
same year, in Toulon, which had a population of 26,000, the plague attacked
20,000 of the population, and of these 13,000, or about one-half of the
original population, died.
The country districts about Marseilles were likewise invaded. Out of a
population of 248,000, there died of the plague 88,000, or fully thirty-five
per cent.
It is evident from this description that the plague of 1720 was in nowise
inferior to that of 1348. Fortunately, the disease did not spread beyond
Provence. It is noteworthy that in many instances, in Marseilles, people
secluded themselves in their houses, avoiding all communication with the
outer world, and in this way escaped. Similar isolation of cloisters, insane
asylums, likewise resulted in freedom from the disease which stalked so
freely throughout the stricken city. It was experience of this kind in isolation
of the healthy which led Defoe to write his ‘Due Preparations for the
Plague.’

Toward the middle of the century the plague reasserted itself in the
Danubian provinces, the constant battleground between the Turks and
Russians and Austrians. In 1738 it not only prevailed in Russia but also
invaded Hungary. Of more importance than this occurrence is the outbreak
of the plague in 1743 in Sicily. The last epidemic of plague had occurred in
Messina in 1624. After a lapse of one hundred and twenty years, it
reappeared with terrible results. In Messina, as in Marseilles and in London,
the first cases were not recognized as plague cases and, as a result, the
infection spread until, like a veritable explosion, the disease developed all
over the city. The plague, with its attendant misery of lack of food, and even
of water, was in vain combated by religious processions. The plague corpses
were in heaps in the streets, as in Marseilles, and cremation was resorted to
in order to effect their removal. That year 30,000 died of plague in the city
of Messina. With the exception of a slight epidemic at Noja in 1815, this
outbreak in Messina in 1743 was the last one to appear in Italy.
In 1755, the plague was introduced into Transylvania by an Armenian
merchant from the Black Sea. Before it was extinguished, 4,300 deaths were
recorded.
Next to that of Marseilles and of Messina, the most noteworthy
outbreak of plague was that which occurred in 1771 in Moscow. The disease
was introduced by troops returning from the Danubian provinces. As so
often has been the history of plague, the first cases were not recognized, and
the existence of pest was denied. When the plague was demonstrated to be
present, it is said by Haeser that three-fourths of the populace deserted the
city. The disease began early in March and increased during the early
summer months. In August over 7,000 deaths resulted, while in September
the records show that 21,000 died. In October the plague decreased, but still
17,000 deaths attested to its fearful power. Early in January it became
extinct, after a duration of ten months, and after having caused the death of
more than 52,000 people.
Toward the close of the eighteenth century, at the time of the
Napoleonic invasion of Egypt and Syria, the French armies came into
contact with the plague. Bonaparte’s visit to the pest-stricken soldiers at
Jaffa has been perpetuated in the historic canvas which is to be seen at
Versailles.

During the nineteenth century the plague ravaged Northern Africa on
diverse occasions. Constantinople was invaded in 1802, 1803, 1808. It was
also present to a slight extent in the Caucasus and in Astrakhan. A notable
plague epidemic appeared in Egypt in 1812, and soon spread through
Turkey and Southern Russia. Constantinople and Odessa were severely
scourged. In Odessa out of a population of 28,000 there died 12,000.
It is a noteworthy fact that the Napoleonic wars, with all their incident
hardships and misery, did not develop or spread the plague in Europe. The
outbreaks of the disease were limited during this period to Africa and to
Turkey, Bosnia, Roumania, Dalmatia and to Southern Russia. Two
exceptions, however, are to be noted. In 1812 the Island of Malta was
infected and more than 6,000 of its people yielded to the disease. The
epidemic of 1815 at Noja, in Apulia, was the first recurrence of the plague
on Italian soil since 1743, and thus far it has been the last.
The Balkan Peninsula and Southern Russia were visited from time to
time by the plague up to about 1841. For nearly forty years Europe was
wholly free from the disease, which, however, continued its existence in
Northern Africa, in Mesopotamia and in India. The Russo-Turkish war of
1878 brought the Russian troops into contact with the disease in the
Caucasus, and the epidemic at Vetlianka on the lower Volga was
unquestionably introduced by such returning soldiers.
Such, then, has been the history of the bubonic plague. No other
epidemic disease can be traced authentically as far back as the ‘Black
Death.’ The characteristic symptoms, the rapid death, the excessive
mortality are all features which have been noted through more than twenty
centuries. The plague bacillus discovered in 1894 by Yersin, judged by its
effect, is neither more nor less virulent than its early progenitors. It has
often died out in a given locality or country, it has even been forced back to
its original ancestral home, but still the same type, the same species has
perpetuated itself unchanged. If the plague on its present world-wide
journey does not cause such terrible outbreaks as it has in the past, it will be
not because the germ has been altered by time, but because man has
changed in so far as he has slowly learned and profited by the lessons of
previous epidemics.

GASOLINE AUTOMOBILES.
By WILLIAM BAXTER, Jr.

T o understand the operation of a gasoline vehicle it is necessary to be
somewhat familiar with the principle on which gasoline motors act.
Briefly stated, it is as follows: The gasoline is converted into a vapor, and in
this state is mixed with a sufficient amount of air to cause it to ignite when
heated to a proper temperature. This mixture of air and vapor is admitted
into a cylinder in which a piston moves freely, this part being substantially
the same as in a steam engine. By means of an electric spark or a hot tube,
the mixture is ignited, burning so violently as to expand the products of the
combustion with such rapidity as virtually to become an explosion. The
force of this explosion pushes the piston to the further end of the cylinder,
and by means of a connecting rod and a crank this movement imparts a
rotary motion to a shaft.

Fig. 1. Gasoline Motor.

The entire operation is made perfectly clear by the aid of Fig. 1, which
is a simple diagram of a single cylinder motor. The chamber R contains the
gasoline. Air enters this chamber through tube b, as indicated by the arrow,
and passes out between the plate c and the surface of the gasoline. The float
d keeps the plate c in the proper position regardless of the amount of liquid
in the reservoir. The heated gases exhausted from the cylinder pass through
the pipe r, and thus heat the gasoline so that it vaporizes freely and the air
passing under c becomes charged with the necessary proportion of vapor.
The mixed air and vapor enter a valve chamber S, from which the flow into

pipe e is regulated by the movement of handle a. In this chamber there is
another valve, operated by an independent handle, and by means of this
more air can be admitted into the mixture when desired. Through the pipe e
and the valve f the vapor enters chamber Q, which connects with the top of
the cylinder. Suppose the shaft G is rotating, then the piston will be drawn
down from the position in which it is shown and thus a vacuum will tend to
form in chamber Q. This action will cause the valve f to open and the
mixture of air and vapor will flow into Q until the piston reaches its lowest
position and begins to ascend. At this instant the valve f will close, and then
the upward movement of the piston will compress the mixture in the
chamber Q. When the piston reaches the upper position, after completing
the down and up strokes, the lever l and the contact point p will come
together, and an electric current developed in the induction coil M will pass
through the wires j and k and produce a spark at i between the ends of the
metallic terminals passing through the plug of insulating material, which is
shown in dark shading. This spark will cause the mixed air and vapor to
ignite, producing an explosion that will force the piston down for the second
time. On the second upward movement of the piston the gases produced by
the combustion of the vapor will be forced out through the valve h into the
chamber T and the pipe r. The valve h and the lever l are operated by cams
mounted on the shaft m, and they are so set that the spark at i occurs when
the chamber Q is full of the explosive mixture and the piston is at the top of
the cylinder. The valve opens when the piston begins to move upward after
the explosion has forced it to the bottom position.
As will be seen, the piston must move down to draw in a supply of the
explosive mixture; it then moves upward to compress it, and on the second
down stroke it is pushed by the force of the explosion. From this action it
can be clearly realized that the power developed by the motor comes from
the force exerted by explosions at every alternate revolution of the shaft. On
that account the cams that move the valve h and the lever l are placed on a
separate shaft, which is geared to the main shaft in the ratio of two to one;
that is, the wheel K is twice the diameter of the wheel J. As the force of the
piston acts on the shaft only once in every two revolutions it is necessary to
provide a heavy fly wheel O, which will store up enough momentum to
continue the rotation of the motor through the ineffective revolution. Before
the motor can put forth an effort it is necessary for the piston to move
downward so as to draw in a supply of explosive gases and then to move up

so as to compress them and produce an explosion; therefore, the motor will
not start of its own accord, but must be set in motion. In the act of starting
the wheel O is turned by hand.
The combustion of the gasoline vapor within the chamber Q and the
upper end of the cylinder develops a large amount of heat, and unless means
are provided for dissipating it the temperature will soon rise to a point that
will interfere with the proper action of the motor. Two ways are employed to
carry off the heat. One is by surrounding the cylinder with a water jacket, as
shown in the diagram at NN; and the other is to provide the exterior of the
cylinder with numerous thin ribs so as to increase the surface exposed to the
air and thus increase the radiation.

Fig. 2. Petroleum Spirit Motor.

The electric spark is a very effective igniter for the explosive mixture,
and, by properly setting cam n the explosion can be made to take place just
at the position of the piston that may be found the most desirable; but the
points at i are liable to get out of order, and the battery that actuates the
induction coil M and the coil itself can become a source of more or less

trouble, and on that account the igniting is effected in some motors by
means of a hot tube. When this is used the cam n, the lever l and the
electrical parts of the apparatus are not required. In their stead a tube is
placed on the upper side of the chamber Q and this tube is maintained at a
red heat by means of a flame impinging against its outer surface. When the
explosive mixture is compressed it rises in the interior of the hot tube, and
when it reaches the portion that is hot enough to produce combustion an
explosion takes place. By many engineers this arrangement is regarded as
superior to the electric spark on account of its simplicity.
Gasoline motors are made with one, two or more cylinders, but in each
cylinder the action that takes place is that described above. The actual
construction of a motor is not so simple as might be assumed from the
appearance of Fig. 1; many details are required which are not here shown. A
more perfect idea of the actual construction of a gasoline motor can be had
from Fig. 2, which is a working drawing of a recent European invention. In
this design it will be noticed that the cylinder is cooled by radiation into the
surrounding air, the exterior surface being increased by numerous circular
ribs and also by extending a hollow trunk from the upper side of the piston,
so as not only to increase the radiating surface, but also to allow the hot air
to escape from the chamber T in which the crank discs revolve. In this
drawing E is the explosion chamber, corresponding to Q in Fig. 1, and the
valve s is the counterpart of f, while s’ corresponds to the valve h. The upper
pipe t is the pipe e of Fig. 1 and the lower pipe t’ is the pipe r of the same
figure. Although the crank discs, connecting rods and other details are
different in shape, it will readily be seen that their relation to each other is
the same.

Fig. 3. Reversing Mechanism.

Since a gasoline motor cannot start of its own accord, it is necessary in
vehicles in which they are used so to arrange the driving gear that the motor
may be kept in motion all the time and always in the same direction, hence,
to reverse the direction of the carriage, reversing mechanism, independent
of the motor, must be provided. The most simple mechanism for a gasoline
vehicle employing spur gearing exclusively is shown in diagrammatic form
in Fig. 3. In this figure A represents the cylinder of the motor, B the crank
disc chamber and M the vaporizing receptacle, which is generally called the
carburator. The pinion C, on the end of the motor shaft, meshes into a gear
D which is mounted upon a sleeve E which revolves freely round shaft G.
This sleeve has its ends formed so as to engage with the gears mounted
upon shaft G, and by means of a lever, which is not shown, but which works
in groove a, the clutch either s or ss can be thrown into engagement with its
corresponding gear. If s is thrown into gear, as shown in the drawing, the
wheel F will turn H and the pinion I will rotate the gear J which is mounted
upon the axle of the carriage. If the clutch ss is thrown into engagement, the
gear G will turn K and this wheel will turn l; but, as can be clearly seen, the
direction in which l will revolve will be opposite to its motion when driven
through F and H, therefore, if when F drives the carriage runs forward,
when G drives it will run backward, and when E is moved to the central

position, so that neither s nor ss engages with their respective gears, the
vehicle will stand still, but the motor will continue to revolve.

Fig. 4. Plan and Elevation of Underberg Motor
Voiturette.

This diagrammatic arrangement is more simple than the gearing
actually used and is not as complete in action as many of the devices, as it
only provides means whereby the direction of rotation of the axle may be

changed, while in many carriages the gearing also varies the ratio between
the speed of the motor and the driving wheels. It is also quite common to
combine in the train of gearing spur gears and sprocket wheels, and in some
instances even belts. Fig. 4 illustrates a French gasoline automobile made by
Underberg, of Nantes. The first figure is a side view, and the second is a
plan of the truck and driving mechanism.

Fig. 5. Cherrier Two-speed Gear.

The motor, which is of the single cylinder type, cooled by radiation into
the air, is located at N. The pinion on the end of the motor shaft engages
with the wheel on the end of shaft A. This shaft carries four gears, which
can be moved by means of lever C, so as to engage with corresponding
gears on shaft B, thus providing four different speeds. The motion of B is
transmitted to the rear axle by means of a belt that runs over the pulleys p
and P, the latter being carried by a differential gear, so as to run the two
driving wheels at proper velocities. The circular ribs surrounding the motor
cylinder are well shown in the figure, in which the carburator of C is also
seen. The housing for the motor is open at the sides so as to give air currents
free access. In Fig. 4 the speed changing gears are shown, the reversing
train being omitted; but if it were also drawn in, the diagram would be far
more elaborate than Fig. 3.

Another form of variable speed gear is shown in Fig. 5. This provides
for two speeds. The large wheel E is on the carriage axle, and it is driven
either by a pinion F, or by J. Upon the shaft O there are two friction
clutches C D, and when C acts the pinion F drives E, and when D acts the
pinion G drives H, which in turn drives I, and this wheel is mounted on the
same shaft as J.
Some of the best-known makers of gasoline vehicles do not employ
variable gears and depend for changes in the speed wholly upon variation in
the velocity of the motor. The De Dion carriages are made in this way, the
gearing being substantially as illustrated in Fig. 3.

Fig. 6. Panhard & Levassor Vehicle.

Fig. 7. Motor of Vehicle.

Fig. 6 shows a gasoline vehicle made by Panhard & Levassor, who are
perhaps the best known French manufacturers of automobiles, as their
vehicles have been the winners in all the notable races held within the past
few years. The motor they use is shown in Fig. 7, and, as can be readily
seen, is of the two-cylinder type, cooled by a water jacket, just as in Fig. 1.
The explosion is produced by means of a hot tube, as explained in
connection with the last-named figure. This motor is placed under the body
of the vehicle, and is connected with the rear axle by means of a train of
gearing which terminates in sprocket wheels and chains that connect with
driving wheels, each one being operated by a separate chain. In Fig. 6 the
sprocket wheel and chain are well defined, and forward of these can be seen
the outline of the casing enclosing the gearing.

Fig. 8. General View of Renault Voiturette.

Fig. 9. Plan of the Truck.

Fig. 10. Variable Speed Gear.

Fig. 8 shows another European design, in which a variable-speed gear
is used. The plan of the truck, showing the general arrangement of the
mechanism, is presented in Fig. 9, and the details of the variable-speed gear
are shown in Fig. 10. The motor is located at A, and through a friction
clutch B, and the variable speed gear C, it rotates the shaft H, which runs
lengthwise of the vehicle. Motion is imparted to the hind axle by means of
bevel gears contained within the casing D. The large bevel gear on the axle
is of the differential type, so as to drive the wheels R R at the proper
velocities.
When a high speed is desired, the variable speed gear, Fig. 10, is set so
that shaft M drives N direct, the clutch at E being moved so as to interlock.
N is the end of shaft H, so that with this connection the bevel pinion, which
meshes into the axle gear at D, revolves at the same velocity as the motor

shaft. By moving the handle V, Fig. 9, to the right, an intermediate speed is
obtained, and by moving it to the left, the carriage is run at the lowest
velocity. When the handle V is turned to the right, the ends M and N, which
form the clutch E, Fig. 10, are separated, and at the same time the lower
shaft H is moved toward M, so as to cause gear 1 to mesh into gear 2, and
also 3 into 7. By this means the end N of the axle-driving shaft is rotated
through the train of gears 1, 2, 3 and 7. If the handle V is turned to the left,
the shaft I is moved toward M, so as to cause gear 1 to mesh into gear 4, and
gear 6 into 8, the latter being secured to end N of the axle-driving shaft. The
speeds obtained by these changes are in the ratio of nearly 1, 2 and 4.

Fig. 11. Plan of the Türgan-Foy Voiturette.

Fig. 11 shows the plan of a light French carriage, which is equipped
with a double cylinder motor, set in a horizontal position above the front
axle, and arranged to impart motion to the hind axle by means of belts. The
motor, which is located at A, turns a vertical shaft, and this, through spur

gears, rotates a horizontal fly wheel, B. Two pulleys are mounted upon the
motor shaft, and from these belts run to tight and loose pulleys on a
countershaft, S. From the latter the rear axle is driven through two sets of
spur gearing, which give two different speeds. By means of the belts, two
other speeds are obtained, thus giving, in all, four different velocities. To
stop and start, the belts are shifted from the tight to the loose pulleys by a
belt-shifter, f. At h, a muffling chamber is located, into which the motor
exhausts, so as to reduce the noise.
The elevation and plan of one of the celebrated French racing-
machines, the Vallée car, is shown in Fig. 12. The motor of this machine is
of sixteen horse-power capacity, has four cylinders, and is connected so as
to impart motion to the hind axle by means of a single wide belt, which is
marked G in both the line drawings. The driving-pulley on the motor shaft
is located at H, and the axle pulley at H’. Within the latter there is a train of
gears for reversing the direction of rotation of the axle, and also for
obtaining the differential velocities of the two driving wheels. There is no
mechanism for variable speed, this being obtained wholly by changes in the
velocity of the motor. The motor speed can be made to vary through a wide
range by using four cylinders, with which it is possible to reduce the
velocity so low that it would be likely to bring the machine to a standstill if
provided with one, or even two, cylinders. The change in the motor velocity
is obtained in part by the action of a governor located in a chamber at A, and
in part by the action of the electric ignition device which is arranged so that
the time when the spark is produced can be varied. The rear axle is so held
that it can be moved through a short distance, horizontally, by manipulating
the lever D, and in this way the belt G can be made tight or loose, thus
affording another means for varying the speed. A brake is provided which
presses against the inner side of the axle pulley, H. This brake is used
ordinarily, but in the case of an emergency another brake can be operated
which presses against the outside of the wheel in the space between the two
sides of the belt. It is claimed for this vehicle that by the elimination of
mechanical speed-changing devices, a great deal of weight is saved, and that
this is more than enough to compensate for the extra weight of the motor,
arising from the use of four cylinders. In most gasoline carriages it is
necessary to provide a slow-speed gear for hill-climbing, as the motor
cannot put forth a sufficient effort to ascend a steep grade at the normal

velocity. With this racing-machine such a gear is not required owing to the
enormous power of the motor.

Fig. 12. Elevation and Plan of Vallee Car.

There are quite a number of gasoline automobiles manufactured in this
country, and, as in the case of the steam and the electric carriages, they
compare most favorably with the best European products, in so far as the
artistic effect is concerned. That such is the case can be realized at once by
an examination of Figs. 13 and 14. We regret our inability to illustrate the
mechanism of these vehicles, but the truth is, that the manufacturers appear
to be unwilling to make public the details of their designs. In the phaeton
shown in Fig. 13, a single-cylinder motor is used, and it is so arranged that
it can run at different velocities, so that no variable speed mechanism is
required, except a single train of gears, which is thrown into action when
running uphill. The motor itself can be run at any velocity from 200 to 800
revolutions per minute, thus giving a speed variation of four to one. A
carriage of this make competed in the last international automobile race
from Paris to Lyons, France, and although it failed to come in first, it made
a remarkable showing, which might have been considerably improved if it
had not been for an accident which compelled it to retire from the contest.

Fig. 13. Winton Phaeton.

Fig. 14. Oakman Vehicle.

The vehicle shown in Fig. 14 is of small size and light construction,
although amply strong for the purpose for which it is intended. The power
of the motor, which is located under the seat, is transmitted through friction

wheels. In looking at the illustration it will be noticed that the hind wheels
have a circular rim attached to the inner side, and of a diameter somewhat
smaller than the wheel itself. Two small friction wheels are placed so that
either one may be pressed against the inner surface of this rim. The shape of
the rim, as well as that of the small wheels, is such that they hug each other
firmly, so that the rim is carried around in a direction which corresponds
with the direction of rotation of the friction wheel. In operating the carriage
the motor is set in motion, and then one or the other of the two friction
wheels is pressed against the rim on the driving wheel, according to whether
it is desired to run forward or backward. While this arrangement might not
operate with entire success if applied to a heavy vehicle, it appears to be all
that could be desired for a light carriage.
Three-wheel vehicles have been used, but there is a difference of
opinion as to their value, as the construction has disadvantages as well as
advantages. It is evident that such a vehicle can be steered with greater ease
than one running on four wheels, but on country roads, where the wagon
wheels roll down a smooth surface, and leave the space between in a rough
condition, it is equally evident that the third wheel, in passing over this
uneven surface, would jolt the vehicle to a considerable extent. On a smooth
pavement the three-wheel vehicle will run fully as well as the four-wheel;
but, on the other hand, on such a pavement the latter can be steered with as
little effort as the former, so that the question of superiority of design is one
that probably depends upon individual taste.
From the descriptions of automobiles given in this and the two
preceding articles, it will be seen that although many of them are used,
especially in France, they are not entirely free from objectionable features.
The electrical vehicles are provided with the most simple and durable
machinery, and, being noiseless, odorless and free from smoke, are all that
could be desired in so far as their operation is concerned; but they are heavy
and can only be used in places where the batteries can be recharged. The
steam vehicles are light, have simple mechanism and can run anywhere; but
they exhaust steam into the air, which is clearly visible in cold or wet
weather, and the heat from the engine and boiler is an objection, at least in
summer time. The gasoline vehicles run well, but are noisy, and the odor of
the gasoline is disagreeable as well.

SOME SCIENTIFIC PRINCIPLES OF
WARFARE.
By WILLIAM J. ROE.

A s in boxing, fencing, saber and bayonet exercises, there are
comparatively few postures, guards, thrusts and strokes, so in
warfare, whether the numbers be large or small, the arms most modern or
ancient, there are just a few principles to whose steady adherence and skilful
manipulation all success is due. In order that these may become apparent
without irksome study of military details, let us imagine a command of say
a thousand men, fairly well drilled, of good ordinary intelligence and
engaged in a cause worthy of being fought for. We have been in camp for
some time, but an order has now come to join the main army. This is a long
distance off, the railway communications have been broken, and the
intervening country, though possessed of good roads, is more or less in the
hands of the enemy.
Our scouts have kept us informed as to the condition of the country for
several miles around; our first day’s march is, therefore, not hampered with
any especial dread of surprise. We move quickly and at ease. Safe as
everything appears to be, the commander relaxes none of the needful
precautions; at least fifty men, under command of an experienced officer,
are sent quite far to the front, the distance varying with the nature of the
country—the farther, the more broken it may be. The best roads are
followed; the men are allowed to march at ease, though always preserving-
their company organization, while the officers are always more or less on
the alert. There is a small rear guard, but it is upon the advance that the
main responsibility falls. Of the fifty thrown forward, about half will remain
together; the rest are scattered; some far to the front along the highway;
others on either side of the route, riding up the hills on either hand, making
sure that no deep gorge, dense growth of forest or thicket, nor even a field

of grain conceals an enemy. It is upon the alertness of those vedettes on
front and flanks that the safety of the force in great measure depends.
History records many relaxations of this principle of precaution, and for
lack of it sudden ambushes and deplorable disasters. It was thus, in spite of
Washington’s repeated warnings, that Braddock fell into a cunning
ambuscade, and thus (not to multiply examples) that Custer and his
command were massacred to a man among the high Rockies.
On the annexed map the men may be located at ‘A’ marching from ‘D’
in the direction of the village, ‘F’. The advance is at ‘B’, the rear guard at
‘C’. The commander rides with the main column, near the front. The black
dots, with pennons, indicate the general position of the vedettes at this point,
though, of course, they are continually advancing. The commander has
noted on his map a foot path, beginning at ‘D’, leading over the rugged
hills. By taking this path a considerable distance could be saved; but it is
quite impracticable for the wagons, and the troops, therefore, continue along
the high road. The valley is gently undulating, with a gradual slope from the
low hills towards the stream.

The projecting hills near the head of the column form an especially
dangerous point. What easier than for an enemy to plant batteries here on
either side of the road. A sudden, heavy fire would throw a negligent force
at once into disorder; a situation to be taken instant advantage of by a
vigorous adversary; a charge of horse concealed behind the hill at ‘O’, and
nothing might be left except flight, with great loss of life, and surrender
with loss—if not of honor, at least of reputation as a safe leader.
Happily, we shall avoid both alternatives. Our scouts have explored
most thoroughly every possible vantage ground. They have not been content
with any mere glances; their instructions are to take nothing for granted.
That field, marked ‘G’, looks innocent enough, but the tall, thick rye or corn
may cover a skilfully placed battery. The plot marked ‘M’ may be simply a
vineyard; but it does no harm to inquire. The inhabitants of the country are
friendly, and, therefore, the chances are not favorable to this sort of surprise;
but in war it is often not the likely, but the unexpected that happens; the
commander who knows his business guards against the remote possibility.
Though we have imagined a force of a thousand, it must not be lost
sight of that the same kind of precautions should be employed for very
much larger numbers; indeed, you need only alter the scale of the map,
imagine additional roads, a railway line or two, increase to thousands, if
necessary, the fifty of our vanguard, and the result is but an application of
the very first principle of warfare: Eternal vigilance is the price of safety as
well as of liberty.
The troops have been in camp for some time; their condition is
excellent for a long march. As the corn and rye are not yet gathered, the
time is early summer. The roads are in prime condition. They set out by
sunrise and halted for perhaps two hours at noon. It is by thus sparing his
troops during the heat of the day that the colonel will have a body of men
fresh enough at nightfall to march, if necessary, all night. But no such
urgency exists; it is nearing sunset, and preparations are now being made to
encamp. By his map the colonel has informed himself in the matter of
distances, and has decided that they shall pitch their tents somewhere in the
vicinity of the village (‘F’). The scouts report an eligible location for camp
at ‘S’, and this is finally chosen. It has several advantages, being
comparatively level, and yet upon high ground, and has in close proximity
several wells of good water. The train containing provisions and

ammunition is parked in the safest locality, the horses picketed, and the
guns—perhaps two or three field pieces and machine guns—placed where
they can be most easily handled.
By all means, give the men as good a supper as the neighborhood
affords. It will be wise not to encroach upon the rations, but rather draw
supplies from the village; there are, no doubt, purveyors of one sort or
another to be found ready enough to supply us, the more so that they will be
amply paid.
Refreshed by their supper the men are ready to turn in at tattoo; by the
time ‘taps’ have sounded most are soundly sleeping. But some are awake; if
doing their full duty, wider awake than ever they are likely to be in times of
peace. The same attention to the bodily comfort of his men which impelled
the colonel to give them a long rest at midday and a comfortable meal,
applies with increased force to those detailed early in the morning for the
night’s guard; during the march these have been spared as far as possible,
even being allowed a lift now and then in an ambulance. Such privileges are
not granted by a commander who knows his craft as a concession to the
laziness, but rather as a preparation for the effectiveness of his men. This is
a principle of action, and may apply to business as well as war, that the
strong head never withholds reasonable and proper indulgence; the better, it
may be said, to enforce at needful times reasonable and proper exertions.
As soon as the camp is established the guards are posted. If great
precautions were needed during the day, much more are they by night. If
fifty were sufficient on the march we need a hundred during the hours of
darkness. In the case of a large army an elaborate system of night guards is
necessary: First, ‘advanced guards’, occupying strong positions at some
distance from the main body; beyond these are the picket guards; further
still towards the front what are called ‘grand guards’, from which are
thrown forward the outposts, to which the line of sentinels is directly
attached. In case of alarm, the sentinels fall back upon the outposts; these
upon the grand guards; they, in turn, if necessary, upon the pickets; the
necessities of the case and the strength of the enemy’s demonstration
determining the movements of the defense, even perhaps to the ‘long roll’
and rousing of the entire army.

In our case, no such elaborate system is possible; we content ourselves
with outposts and the line of sentinels, all that will be needed, if vigilant, to
guard against surprise. The colonel, attended by the officer in command of
the guard, will select the sites for outposts. These, five in number, are
marked by stars upon the map. The direction from which an attack is most
probable is from the ridge (‘R’, ‘R’).
The men are usually on the sentinel line for two hours at a time, with
opportunity for four hours’ sleep; that is, with shifts, or, as they are called,
‘reliefs’ of three parties, two hours on and four off. This is not, however,
invariable, it being sometimes wiser to relieve the men oftener or not so
often, this being regulated by circumstances—the state of weather, distance
of posts apart, fatigue of the men, etc., etc. The sentinels will be posted on
clear nights generally upon high ground; in bad or foggy weather the foot of
the slope is preferable. The officer will see that no obstacle prevents the
sentinel from retreating upon his outpost if attacked. The men will be
directed to take advantage of any cover that offers, always to keep in easy
touch with one another and watchful, never to raise a false alarm, but
quickly and decidedly a real one, and while not failing to discover the
meaning of anything unusual in their front, never to expose themselves from
mere bravado.
What measures shall be taken in case of an attack in force must, of
course, depend entirely upon circumstances. A night attack, intended merely
as an annoyance, or ‘feeler’, or at most to stampede some of the cattle, or to
gather information as to strength, resources, etc., is quite a different affair
from one planned for the purpose of complete victory, either the destruction,
dispersal or capture of the command.
A mere night foray is generally executed by comparatively few. The
opposing chief may be desirous of getting information concerning the force
that his scouts have reported is advancing down the valley. A little
expedition like ours sometimes serves as a disguise for a momentous
strategical movement. The chief determines to find out all he can as to our
purpose. He has found us vigilant by day; he resolves to try what the night
may disclose. This sort of surprise is apt to produce better results than the
project of some dashing subaltern, anxious for the bauble reputation.

For such an attack an hour near midnight is usually selected, that the
information may be gathered or the mischief done and a retreat effected
under cover of darkness. A dark, wet, blustering, or—if the time be winter—
an especially cold night is chosen. The degree of success to be attained
depends naturally upon the element of surprise. Unless this be complete the
attacking party will find their attempt usually quite futile.
The other sort of attack—that which has for its object the capture of the
position—is usually planned to take place during the extreme darkness just
preceding daybreak. The enemy has perhaps crawled on hands and knees up
the slopes towards the line of sentinels. The van of this force is composed
entirely of picked men, officered by the coolest heads. Signals are agreed
upon, exact times for action arranged, and everything calculated to a nicety
to insure that suddenness which is the very soul of success.
It is in the planning of such an expedition that true qualities of
generalship are shown. It is the fashion rather to decry the military merits of
Washington; yet I know of few events in history that show more sagacity
than the swift crossing of the wintry Delaware and the surprise of Trenton.
It was sagacious chiefly for the accurate comprehension of the probabilities.
Washington knew the convivial habits of Rahl’s Hessians, especially at
Christmas-tide; he reckoned upon finding them in the midst of carousals,
and the result proved the value of his forethought.
Under ordinary circumstances, on the march, to quarter a command
inside four walls is never advisable. The men are not as readily under the
eye of their officers; in case of surprise they cannot be called into the ranks
as quickly; discipline insensibly relaxes, and the machine (for an armed
force ought to be that, however intelligent its units) fails to respond
instantaneously to the word of the chief. In case of a serious attack,
however, the village may serve a most important purpose. Should the
houses be substantial ones of stone or brick, each may become a most
efficient, if temporary fortification. One consideration which might have
prevented its occupation has now no longer any weight. Apart from any
natural feeling of good will for our fellow citizens, how unwise it would be
to unnecessarily exasperate them. But now in the face of the enemy, it will
be surprising if any soul is churl enough to grudge a patriotic hospitality.
Most of the denizens will, indeed, make haste to hide their precious persons
in the cellar, but will seldom grumble at the necessity.

With the utmost celerity the baggage and horses are moved to the most
sheltered spot; the guns, under strong guards, posted where they may be
best utilized; some of the men, previously detailed for just such an
emergency, are engaged in throwing up earthworks, piling logs, stones,
anything that can be utilized for barricades. The officer charged with that
duty, if possible a skilled engineer, goes quickly from place to place,
hurriedly indicating the lines of defense; these connecting the several
buildings in such a manner as to enclose the entire command within lines of
quite formidable intrenchments. All this time the troops, having taken
possession of the houses, have poured an uninterrupted fire upon the
assailants, obliging them to retire, or at least giving the diggers—or sappers,
as they are called—time to complete their labor of defense. Surrounded by a
force sufficiently large to make resistance in the field quite hopeless, we are
at least in position to protract the struggle, and one capable of defense,
except against an assault in overwhelming numbers, or against heavy
artillery. The latter they are not provided with, or the measures we are
taking might all go in the end for nothing. Several assaults are attempted
during the day, but are easily repulsed with no small loss. The enemy at last
withdraws, and we now see that he is busy throwing up intrenchments.
Meanwhile, we have not been idle. To facilitate communication, and to
enable us to concentrate our forces under cover, passageways have been
constructed between the various buildings, inner partitions preventing free
access from room to room within the houses have been broken through, and
the débris, together with beds broken up, mattresses and ‘any old thing’
capable of arguing with a bullet, piled in the window embrasures, leaving
loopholes here and there, as occasion offers, while galleries may be
constructed with loopholes in the floor to fire downwards.

One of the most important matters to be attended to is the securing of as
many good positions as possible, from which fire may be concentrated upon
exposed points. In a regular siege the points of attack selected will always
be those most exposed, on account of their projecting beyond the line of
defense. In the case of a village like this resisting an attempt at capture the
principles are identical; it will certainly be the points that project that will be
danger spots and which will therefore require especial attention.

You observe on the enlarged map of the village that there are double
lines between the outer buildings; these are the improvised intrenchments.
Notice that they have not been constructed flush with the face of the outer
walls in any instance; but always considerably retired. The object of this
arrangement is more effectually to defend the barricades. In the annexed
sketch (No. 3) ‘A’ and ‘B’ represent the two adjacent buildings and the lines
‘CD’ the breastwork. In the buildings are windows—‘E’ and ‘F’—from
which a heavy fire can be concentrated upon the assailants, as may be seen
from the direction of the arrow heads. On the outer line are several
projecting, and, therefore, especially exposed points; such as those at ‘A’,
‘B’ and ‘C’. The arrow heads show the direction of protective fire. As
additional protection, it might be wise to hold the two buildings (‘H’, ‘H’)
outside the village. If not held, they ought, if possible to be destroyed, as
also those marked ‘JJ’, not included in the defensive lines, as they offer
excellent cover for the enemy. The utmost care should be taken to provide a
safe magazine for the ammunition and to cover well the place selected for a
hospital. The wagons and horses would be best protected in the space
marked ‘LLL’.
Should our defense prove too obstinate for direct assault, it may be that
the enemy will construct regular intrenchments from which to dig a trench
deep enough to protect, and large enough to hold a body of troops, thus
enabling them to approach sufficiently near to assail some weak point,
without too great risk. The modern repeating rifle, dangerous at a thousand
yards, and fatal at a hundred, has given the defense so great preponderance

that it requires quick work indeed to capture a stronghold. Observe the
broken lines ‘OF and ‘PF’; these show the direction of possible trenches
dug by the enemy. But ‘OF’ would be raked by the fire from the outlying
house, ‘H’; the other is, therefore, the only feasible mode of approach.
The principle of defense, shown by the direction of the arrow heads in
the case of the beleaguered village, is applicable to all conditions where
ramparts are used. Suppose the command whose fortunes we have followed
had been attacked while on the march at the point ‘A’ on Map 1. The
opposing force was manifestly too strong for resistance in the field; they
retreat to the rocky eminence ‘K’ and there proceed to fortify the position. A
glance at Diagram 4 will show what they will try at least to accomplish. In
military language that shaded portion of the work to be constructed is called
a bastion; it consists of two faces (‘AX’ and ‘AY’), and the two flanks (‘JY’
and ‘HX’). The faces of this bastion are defended (as the arrow heads
indicate) by the flanks of adjacent bastions; that is, the face ‘AY’ is swept
by a raking fire from ‘ZE’, and the face ‘AX’ from ‘FG’. Reciprocally,
‘HX’ rakes the face ‘BG’, and ‘JY’ the face ‘ED’, and so on round the
intrenchment.

All that has been said as to protecting the ammunition and stores will
apply to this work as it did to the village. If a spring of water can be
included, as at ‘O’, this will be found of incalculable advantage. Of all
forms of defensive ramparts the straight line is the worst; if time does not
permit a work with bastions, however irregular, an enclosure shaped
somewhat like a star is serviceable (shown in Diagram 6, Figs. ‘A’, ‘B’ and
‘C’). Should an enclosed work be impracticable, the line should have its
ends (or ‘flanks’) strongly guarded, and be broken up, as in Diagram 5 ‘D’
into short straight lines nearly at right angles, to serve for mutual support.
This principle of mutual support, however achieved, is called that of
‘defensive relations’, and is capable of adaptation to all kinds of defensive
works, whether of a few men beleaguered in an improvised fortification, a
considerable number in a scientifically constructed work—permanent or
field fortification—a fortress with an entire army behind its ramparts, or a
cordon of forts surrounding a great city.

The ground plan of the work having been decided upon and staked out
the men start in with pick and shovel, digging, if possible, a ditch, and
throwing the material into the shape of the shaded portion of Diagram 7.
The ditch, outside the fort, indicated by the figure ‘FGHJ’ serves the
twofold purpose of getting material for the parapet ‘ABCDEF’, and for
embarrassing an enemy in any attempt at assault. To further embarrass him
every sort of obstacle that may be at hand should be put to use—trees, butts
turned our way, boughs interlacing; stakes driven deep into the soil close
together; barbed wires wound in and out; in short, every expedient that may
delay his advance and keep him as long as possible exposed to our most
effective fire.

The drawing (7) was made with no attempt at exactness of proportion,
and simply to show the essentials; the slope ‘EF’ is made as steep as the
nature of the soil will permit; ‘DE’ slopes enough to enable a soldier
standing upon ‘BC’ to fire upon an enemy entangled among the obstacles at
‘J’, but never enough to weaken the mass of earth at and near ‘D’.

Observe how common-sensible all these arrangements are; not one too
many or too few; just the things that a practical man, if he could think as he
felt, would do if suddenly called to command with an enemy advancing
upon him. Unfortunately, perhaps, for the purposes of a patriotic and
peaceful people, men are inclined, even though brave as courage itself, to
get nervous or nerveless in the immediate presence of danger. This is the
reason, rather than for any especial erudition involved in war’s art, that we
need trained soldiers—men trained to think mechanically and to act
automatically amid the uproar of battle.

We have carefully, if briefly, considered the requirements of the first
maxim of strategy—CAUTION—the need of it, and the practical methods of
securing it; and also of the second maxim—DEFENSIVE RELATIONS—their
necessity, and how to secure them. It now remains to consider the meaning
of that phrase, ‘turning a position’, or ‘flanking’ an enemy, as to which of
late we read so much in the daily press. The map (marked 8) gives an idea
of a section of country where two armed bodies meet under conditions that
permit one flank to be completely guarded from attack; these are the left

flank of the force ‘A’, and the right flank of ‘B’. Both rest upon a lake or
broad river. A steep precipice or deep morass, as at ‘H’, would serve as
well. Suppose our force has advanced from the direction ‘C’, the enemy
down the road from ‘E’ to ‘G’. Soon they form opposed lines facing each
other, the reserve somewhat to the rear and sheltered by some inequality of
ground, the ‘thin blue line’, almost, but not quite, touching elbows,
stretched along the crest of the ridge in front, taking advantage of every
chance to protect themselves—trees, stone walls, ditches; kneeling,
crawling, lying face down, eyes along the rifle barrel, finger on trigger,
keen and murderous, but prudent, and parsimonious of life. The solid
formations, such as went out of vogue with old-time weapons, would melt
away before machine guns and Krag-Jörgensens like frost before an August
sun. It seems as if all chivalry had departed; it has but changed its ways.
The object of ‘flanking’ a position is to so manage as to turn that
attenuated line into a mass of men upon which to let loose with dire effect
either the quick-firing guns or the sharp edges of our horsemen’s sabers.
Notice those long, bent, black lines, bending like fish hooks. The arrow
heads indicate the direction of a flanking attack; from ‘F’, through the
woods, up the ravine, to fall upon the exposed end of the enemy’s front at
‘K’. Such would be our most feasible method of flanking; the foe might,
however, have anticipated us, either by providing a bloody hospitality
somewhere in that ravine, or by a flank movement of his own, as the bent
black line shows, around the woods, to fall upon our right flank at ‘F’. Such
an operation, if successful for them, would be utterly disastrous to us.
Surprised by a sudden and unexpected attack upon the weakest point
and unable to change front in time, men lose heart, forget discipline, huddle
in masses, confused and disorganized, or fly like sheep, in either case food
for firearms, gluttonous of such occasions. It requires sometimes but a very
small force upon a flank to produce great results; the appearance upon the
field, even at a distance, of Joseph E. Johnston’s corps at the first Bull Run
was sufficient to demoralize the whole Union army, and at the battle of
Arcola, Bonaparte completely flanked the Austrians with a few flourishes of
his trumpets.
So we have for a third maxim of war the necessity of PROTECTED
FLANKS. If we know or think that a Johnston lurks on either hand, we ought

to be sure of our Pattersons; if we apprehend an unfriendly visit from a
Blucher, we should see to it that our Grouchy is trustworthy.
Let us now broaden our view of operations, that we may see how the
principles established for a limited number of men on the march, in the
field, or behind fortifications, may apply upon a larger scale. To this end a
brief study of the map (9) will show four contiguous countries—‘A’, very
populous, powerful and wealthy, having a navy capable of control of the
high seas, and a large and efficient army; ‘C’ represents a country even
more populous, but not aggressive, ‘D’ an insignificant power, while ‘B’ is
a country considerable in extent, but largely mountainous, and sparsely
inhabited by a rude but warlike people.
A cause of war comes up between ‘A’ and ‘B’. In ancient times the
ruder nation would have been the aggressor, tempted by the wealth and
invited by the enervated populace of the larger civilization. Now the
conditions are likely to be reversed. However, war begins; the forces of ‘A’
move hastily towards the frontier, while his fleet blockades ‘B’s’ solitary
seaport at the point ‘E’. The maxim of CAUTION now naturally expands;
instead of information culled by a few daring riders from a narrow circuit, it
should be made to embrace the widest area of country and the utmost
latitude of information—the condition of the enemy as to armament,
resources, position of forces, possible disaffection among the people—
everything. In war no item comes amiss. The wealthier country will here
have a manifest advantage; it can afford to hire spies, and can even (as
England did during the Revolution) purchase the treason of some
disaffected chief. Caution for the lesser country will—if good generalship
prevails—take the shape of occupying and strengthening the natural
strategic positions. These are nothing but flanks of a bastion on a large
scale. Upon the map round black dots represent strategic positions along the
frontier. They are points susceptible of thorough fortification which control
the several passes in the mountain range between the two nations; also
heads of valleys, where several meet, and from which attacks could be
made at will in a number of directions. This entire frontier, which may be
hundreds of miles broad, is mountainous, capable of being fortified at
countless points, and having natural ‘defensive relations’ needing only the
art of warcraft to render them almost impregnable. Modern murderous arms
lend their services more readily to defense than to offense. It is even

possible that the country ‘B’, warned in due season of the purposes of her
powerful rival, may have plotted out each rod of ground among those
mountain passes, and that artillery service, once a matter of gunnery, has
now become a matter of mathematics.

We now come to the fourth maxim of war; it is that of efficient SUPPLY.
An army, as the saying is, moves on its belly. An invading force must
ordinarily provide for all its needs from some safe place in the rear, called a
‘base of operations’; it must also provide that the line of transit of its
provisions and ammunition to the front shall not be liable to interference.
Assuming that at ‘F’ is a strongly fortified city, the railway line or the
adjacent rivers would furnish ‘A’ with a practical base; his line of advance
would be in the direction ‘FG’, called the ‘line of operations’; ‘G’, a
fortified pass, the proximate, and ‘J’, the capital of ‘B’, the ultimate
objective point of the campaign. But it will be noted with what facility a
determined enemy could fall upon ‘A’s’ communications from the point

‘H’, which would also be the case were the advance made from ‘K’ towards
‘L’.
Of course, in the end, the larger resources will prevail; but it may be
that ‘A’, baffled and exasperated by a stubborn resistance, and finding that
‘B’ is being supplied through the neutral and insignificant country ‘D’, may
finally conclude, “in the interests of a higher civilization,” to violate their
territory, seize the port ‘M’, and thus, by a far-reaching and bold flank
movement, gain entrance into ‘B’s’ country. Such devices are not unknown
in the history of war. Such a course would be a distinct violation of the ‘law
of nations’; but there would be apologies and ample indemnity to ‘D’, with
which, doubtless, she would be satisfied.
In imagining such a campaign no account has been taken of the attitude
of the country ‘C’, or of that of any foreign nation. In war these things must
be reckoned with. Neutral nations are always liable, however disposed to
maintain neutrality, to be touched at some sensitive point by one or the
other of the contending parties.

MODERN MONGOLS.
By F. L. OSWALD, M.D., A.M.

T he political supremacy of the Caucasian race was supposed to have
been decided by the fall of Carthage, more than two thousand years
ago, but was thrice afterwards imperiled by an encounter with a rival of
long-unsuspected resources.
The Scythians of Strabo were probably not Tartars, but Slavs
(‘Sarmatians’), or, like their allies, the Getæ, Slavs, mingled with Teutons.
Parthia, too, had a semi-Aryan population; but the campaign of Attila gave
the champions of Europe a chance to measure their strength with that of a
new foe, as shifty as the Semites, and of far greater staying-power. His
Huns were undoubtedly Mongols, and came so near overpowering the
inheritors of Roman strategy that at one time the fate of western civilization
hung upon the issue of a single battle. The western coalition triumphed, yet
its victory on the plains of Chalons (October, 451), was due to the
numerical inferiority of their enemies as much as to the predominance of
their own skill or valor. The very retreat of the vanquished chief established
his claim to the prestige of a superlative tactician.
Again, in 1402, only the accidental quarrel of two Mongol conquerors
saved Europe from the fate of its ravaged borders. Sultan Bajazet had
vanquished all his western foes, and the union of his forces with those of
Tamerlane would undoubtedly have sealed the doom of the Mediterranean
coast lands, if not all of Christendom.
A hundred years later the generals of Solyman II. came very near
retrieving the neglected chance. They vanquished Austrian, Hungarian and
Italian armies, and in 1560 defeated the combined armadas of the Christian
sea-power at Port Jerbeh—so completely, indeed, that the allies were eager
to make peace by betraying each other.

And it would be a great mistake to ascribe these victories to a mere
triumph of brute strength. That same Solyman, with all his fanaticism, was
a patron of every secular science, and at a time when western princes had to
sign their names by proxy, Mohammed Baber Khan, the conqueror of India,
wrote essays in four different languages and published memoirs abounding
with shrewd comments on social and ethical questions and problems of
political economy. He was a poet, too, and liberal enough to compose a
dirge in memory of a prince whom he had slain in single combat.
Ethnologically, there is, therefore, nothing abnormal in the outburst of
intellectual vigor that has lifted Japan to the front rank of civilized nations.
It is merely a revival, analogous to the dambreak of pent-up energies that
followed the collapse of mediæval despotism. Instead of having to work out
their salvation by tentative efforts, the Japanese, it is true, had the advantage
of ready-made patterns, but that difference has perhaps been more than
offset by achievements affecting the reforms of four centuries in as many
decades, and by modifications which, in more than one instance, have
improved upon Caucasian models.
“The organization of the Japanese transport system,” says a press
dispatch from Taku, “was a revelation to western staff officers; bodies of
troops, with their equipments of stores and camping outfit, were landed
without a hitch, in quick succession, and moved to the front without a
moment’s loss of time. No delay, no confusion, no blockades of wharf-boats
and baggage carts; everything worked in smooth grooves and in evident
conformity with a prearranged and oft-rehearsed plan.”
And in 1897, after the affront of the Russian intervention, the victorious
islanders, compelled to forfeit half the rewards of their valor, proceeded to
make the very best of the other half, and their provoked diplomats managed
to preserve their dignity, as well as their complete presence of mind. The
Japanese police enforces law and order without waging Blue-Law wars
against harmless amusements; there are no associations for the prosecution
of bathing youngsters, no anti-concert crusades, no suppression of outdoor
sports on the day when ninety-nine of a hundred wage-earners find their
only chance for leisure.
The ‘Yankees of the Orient’ have a code of honor without duellos, trade
syndicates without ‘trusts’, giant cities and ghetto suburbs without

anarchists. Their labor riots are settled by a dispassionate court of appeal.
Their schools, Professor Arnold informs us, are hampered by ‘fads’ and
experiment committees, but not by boards of bigot trustees. In spite of
Buddhist conventicles, the emergence of the educated classes from the
shadows of religious feudalism is a complete emancipation. The Japanese
‘Council of Finance’ has adopted American custom-house methods and
Belgian systems of graded taxation. There is, indeed, a good deal of
eclecticism in the supposed surrender of indigenous institutions; foreign
methods have been adopted only on the evidence of their efficiency, and
always with a view to making them subservient to national purposes. The
key to the distinctive characteristics of the North Mongols can be found in
Sir Edwin Randall’s definition of ‘Perseverance combined with shiftiness.’
The Asiatic Yankees can turn, dodge and deviate while keeping a pre-
determined aim steadily in view, and it is by no means improbable that
Mongol influences have impressed similar peculiarities on the character of
the northeastern Slavs. Muscovy was a Tartar Khanate for a number of
centuries, and Russian diplomats, since the days of Czarina Katherine, have
accommodated themselves to emerging circumstances by crawling or
strutting, without ever losing sight of the road to Constantinople.
In the shaggy Ainos of Yesso (probably the original home of our
‘Shetland’ ponies), that perseverance takes the form of mulish stubbornness.
They strenuously object to foreign imports and stick to their sheepskin
cloaks like Scotch Highlanders to their kilts, but in stress of famine seem
now to take an interest in the harpoon-guns of their Russian neighbors, and
now and then sell specimens of their poodle-faced youngsters to the agents
of a transpacific museum.
Japan still produces athletes, as well as unrivaled acrobats, partly, no
doubt, on account of bracing climatic influences, but partly, also, of a vice-
resisting worship of physical prowess. About sixty years ago the slums of
the large seaport towns were expurgated by a national revolt against the
spread of the opium habit, and the consequent reform movement appears to
have kept step with the Swedish crusade against the spread of the alcohol
curse.
China may be forced into the arena of regeneration, but thus far seems
to view the collapse of her ring-wall only as a blessing in a rather effective
disguise. The policy of non-intercourse, indeed, had the sanction of a

physical necessity in the opinion of as shrewd a statesman as the vizier of
the great Kooblai Khan, who conquered rebels from Mantchooria to Siam,
but recognized the hopelessness of ordinary measures for protecting the
peaceful toilers of the eastern provinces against the predatory hordes of the
northwest. A standard army of home-guards, he argued, would have to be
composed either of natives who could not fight, or of foreign auxiliaries
who might revolt; so, all things considered, it was deemed best to bar a foe
that could not be beaten. Strategically, the plan succeeded, stone walls
being then so inexpugnable to spear-armed besiegers that the proprietors of
a stone-built robber castle could defy the wrath of the public for a series of
generations. The Tartar marauders were kept at bay, but so were trading
caravans and traveling philosophers; the disadvantages of all obstacles to
free competition began to assert themselves. The nation, as it were,
sickened in a marasmus of intellectual inbreeding. Protected incompetence
propagated its species; monopolies flourished. The survival of the fittest no
longer favored the brave; cowards and weaklings could find refuge under
the telamonian shield of the big wall.
Within the last hundred years that process of degeneration has been
hastened by two incidental afflictions—spring floods and summer droughts.
The rapid increase of population has driven home-seekers into the
highlands of the far west, and the destruction of land-protecting forests
avenged itself in the usual manner. Every heavy snowfall in the mountains
became a menace to the settlers of the lowlands; a sudden thaw was always
apt to turn brooks into rivers and rivers into raging seas. The summers, at
the same time, became warmer and drier. Famines, such as only India had
seen before, crowded the cities with refugees. Charitable institutions were
managed by agents of a paternal government, and paupers were rarely
suffered to perish in wayside ditches, but hundreds of thousands were
huddled together in parish suburbs and fed on minimum rations of the
cheapest available food.
It was then that the masses were forced to apostatize from the dietetic
tenets of Buddhism; abstinence from animal food became impossible;
sanitary scruples had to be disregarded; whole settlements of famine
victims were compelled to subsist exclusively on offal.
Millions of mechanics had to fight to struggle for existence by reducing
their wants. The prices of food had doubled, and in order to pay the cost of

one daily meal all luxuries had to be relinquished. Sleep and oblivion of
misery became the only alternatives of hopeless toil, and those who could
save a few taels yielded to the temptation of supplementing those blessings
by means of chemical anodynes. Opium-smoking became a national vice.
The ‘opium war’ did not rivet the yoke of that curse. It merely clinched
the grip of a British trading company. The Chinese government had
attempted to cancel their franchise, but only with a view to diverting its
profits into the pockets of their own speculators. The total suppression of
the traffic would have been not only difficult, but practically impossible.
We might as well try to prohibit tobacco in North America.
Yet the results of these coöperating factors of degeneracy have stopped
short of the extremes that might have been expected in a land of earth-
despisers. Buddhism in its orthodox Chinese form is radically pessimistic. It
inculcates a belief in the worthlessness of all terrestrial blessings, and
considers life a disease, with no cure but death. And not death by suicide,
either; the victims of misery must drain life’s cup to the dregs, to cure the
very love of existence, and thus prevent the risk of re-birth.
The value of health and wealth is thus depreciated in a manner that
might tend to aggravate the recklessness of life-weariness; yet the South
Mongol is conservative, even in his vices. An inalienable instinct of thrift
makes him shrink from senseless excesses. Tavern brawls are less frequent
in Canton than in Edinburgh; the topers of the Flowery Kingdom get less
efflorescent than ours, their love-crazed swains less extravagant. Absolute
imbecility, as a consequence of poison habits, is a rare phenomenon in
Mongoldom; nine out of ten sots remain self-supporting; the heritage of
industrial habits is hardly ever lost altogether.
Nor should we forget to distinguish the primitive rustics of the inland
provinces from the vice-worn population of the coast plains. Degeneration
has not left its marks far above tide-water, and has hardly begun to affect
the natives of the highlands, the Yunan hunting tribes, for instance, who,
though South Mongols, have renounced the tenets of Buddha and adopted
those of militant Mohammed.
Their chieftains welcomed war for its own sake, while the lowland
conscripts were in the predicament of desert dwellers, caught in the flood of
a sudden cloudburst. Thousands at first succumbed almost without a

struggle; the levies drilled to oppose the Japanese invasion stood to be
slaughtered like sheep, being, moreover, morally handicapped by a
misgiving that the war with the champions of the north had been wantonly
provoked.
Discipline has begun to break the spell of that apathy, but the desperate
valor that surprised the veterans of the allies at Taku and Yangtsun had a
very different significance. Fury supplied the defects of military training;
the listless life-renouncers had at last been goaded into a frenzy of
nationalistic resentment. It was the same delirium of retributive wrath that
rallied a million Frenchmen around the standards of the invaded Republic,
and hurled a horde of Russian volunteers into the bullet-storm of Borodino.
‘A united nation of fifteen millions is not vincible’, wrote Jean Jacques
Rousseau, in reply to an appeal of the Polish patriots. South Mongols were
supposed to be hardly worth an expedition of Caucasian regulars, but even a
world coalition might find use for intrenchments if the vendetta rage of a
war for national existence should arouse a land of 385,000,000 inhabitants.
Whether that storm will purify the social atmosphere of the vast empire
or subside into the calm of exhaustion, is a different question. It would even
be premature to accept the appearance of a few able leaders as a propitious
omen of regeneration. In a land ten times the size of France the crisis of a
fearful peril will always evolve a Carnot, a Danton and a Dumouriez, if not
a storm-compelling Bonaparte.
The days of the West Mongol Empire, the dominion of the turbaned
Turk, are undoubtedly numbered, but not as a result of national decrepitude.
The successor of Sultan Bajazet will succumb, not as a ‘sick man’, but as a
cripple; an invalid worn out in a fight against hopeless odds. Within the last
hundred years the stadtholders of the Prophet had to defend their throne
against Russian, Austrian, Greek, French and British attacks, and more than
once against a West-European alliance, backed by African and Asiatic
insurgents. Within that period 3,000,000 Mongol Mussulmans have
perished on the battlefield, a million for every generation of an
impoverished and not specially reproductive race. Their empire will
collapse, but its defenders are still the hardiest soldiers of Europe, the most
unconquerable by hardships, wounds and hunger. The burden-carriers of
Constantinople are still the stoutest men of our latter-day world. We might

as well impeach the degeneracy of the Circassian highlanders, who resisted
the power of the Russian monarchy for sixty-five years, and in their last
stronghold stood at bay with drawn hunting knives—after blunting their
sabres and exhausting a stock of ammunition purchased by the sacrifice of
their herds and harvests. For these heroic mountaineers, too, were Mongols,
kinsmen of the martial Turkomans and chivalrous Magyars. The Turanian
race—a synonym of the Pan-Mongolians—comprises as many different
types as the Aryans and Semites taken together.
In 1863 some twenty clans of the vanquished highlanders left the
Caucasus en masse to settle in the mountains of the Turkish province of
Adrianople. They will share the fate of their protectors, and may soon be
obliged to follow their flight across the Hellespont.
But the final expulsion of the West Mongols will, after all, mean only
that the Caucasians have recovered lost ground, and freed at least Europe
from an intrusive tribe of their most persistent and most formidable rivals.

RELIGIOUS BELIEFS OF THE CENTRAL
ESKIMO.B
By Professor FRANZ BOAS.

B
A description of the religious beliefs of the Central
Eskimo, based upon observations made by the writer,
was published in the Sixth Annual Report of the
Bureau of Ethnology. The following account embodies
observations which Capt. James S. Mutch, of
Peterhead, Scotland, following a suggestion of the
writer, had the kindness to make. The material for this
study was collected by Capt. Mutch during a long-
continued stay in Cumberland Sound.

T he Eskimo who inhabit the coasts of Arctic America subsist mainly by
the chase of sea-mammals, such as seals of various kinds, walruses
and whales. Whenever this source of supply is curtailed, want and famine
set in. The huts are cold and dark—for heat and light are obtained by
burning the blubber of seals and whales—and soon the people succumb to
hunger and to the terrors of the rigorous climate. For this reason the native
does everything in his power to gain the good-will of the sea-mammals and
to insure success in hunting. All his thoughts are bent upon treating them in
such a manner that they may allow themselves to be caught. On this
account they form one of the main subjects of his religious beliefs and
customs. They play a most important part in his mythology, and a well-nigh
endless series of observances regulates their treatment.
The mythological explanation of all the prevailing customs in regard to
sea-mammals is contained in a tale which describes their origin:

“A girl named Avilayuk refused all her suitors, and for this reason she
was also called ‘She who does not want to marry.’ There was a stone near
the village where she lived. It was speckled white and red. The stone
transformed itself into a dog and took the girl to wife.
“She had many children, some of whom became the ancestors of
various fabulous tribes. The children made a great deal of noise, which
annoyed Avilayuk’s father, so that he finally took them across the water to a
small island. Every day the dog swam across to the old man’s hut to get
meat for his family. His wife hung around his neck a pair of boots that were
fastened to a string. The old man filled the boots with meat, and the dog
took them back to the island.
“One day, while the dog was gone for meat, a man came to the island in
C
his kayak and called the young woman. ‘Take your bag and come with
me,’ he shouted. He had the appearance of a good-looking, tall man, and the
woman was well pleased with him. She took her bag, went down to the
kayak, and the man paddled away with her. After they had gone some
distance, they came to a cake of floating ice. The man stepped out of the
kayak on to the ice. Then she noticed that he was quite a small man, and
that he appeared large only because he had been sitting on a high seat. Then
she began to cry, while he laughed and said, ‘Oh, you have seen my seat,
have you?’ [According to another version, he wore snow-goggles made of
walrus-ivory, and he said, ‘Do you see my snow-goggles?’ and then laughed
at her because she began to cry.] Then he went back into his kayak, and
they proceeded on their journey.

C
The one-man hunting canoe of the Eskimo.

“Finally they came to a place where there were many people and many
huts. He pointed out to her a certain hut made of the skins of yearling seals,
and told her that it was his, and that she was to go there. They landed. The
woman went up to the hut, while he attended to his kayak. Soon he joined
her in the hut, and staid with her for three or four days before going out
sealing again. Her new husband was a petrel.

“Meanwhile her father had left the dog, her former husband, at his
house, and had gone to look for her on the island. When he did not find her,
he returned home, and told the dog to wait for him, as he was going in
search of his daughter. He set out in a large boat, traveled about for a long
time, and visited many a place before he succeeded in finding her. Finally
he came to the place where she lived. He saw many huts, and, without
leaving his boat, he shouted and called his daughter to return home with
him. She came down from her hut, and went aboard her father’s boat, where
he hid her among some skins.
“They had not been gone long when they saw a man in a kayak
following them. It was her new husband. Soon he overtook them, and when
he came alongside he asked the young woman to show her hand, as he was
very anxious to see at least part of her body, but she did not move. Then he
asked her to show her mitten, but she did not respond to his request. In vain
he tried in many ways to induce her to show herself; she kept in hiding.
Then he began to cry, resting his head on his arms, that were crossed in
front of the manhole of the kayak. Avilayuk’s father paddled on as fast as he
could, and the man fell far behind. It was calm at that time and they
continued on their way home. After some time they saw something coming
from behind toward their boat. They could not clearly discern it. Sometimes
it looked like a man in a kayak. Sometimes it looked like a petrel. It flew up
and down, then skimmed over the water, and finally came up to their boat
and went round and round it several times and then disappeared again.
Suddenly ripples came up, the waters began to rise, and after a short time a
gale was raging. The boat was quite a distance away from shore. The old
man became afraid lest they might be drowned; and, fearing the revenge of
his daughter’s husband, he threw her into the water. She held on to the
gunwale; then the father took his hatchet and chopped off the first joints of
her fingers. When they fell into the water they were transformed into
whales, the nails becoming the whalebone. Still she clung to the boat; again
he took his hatchet and chopped off the second joints of her fingers. They
became transformed into ground seals. Still she clung to the boat; then he
chopped off the last joints of her fingers, which became transformed into
seals. Now she clung on to the boat with the stumps of her hands, and her
father took his steering-oar and knocked out her left eye. She fell backward
into the water and he paddled ashore.

“Then he filled with stones the boots in which the dog was accustomed
to carry meat to his family, and only covered the top with meat. The dog
started to swim across, but when he was halfway the heavy stones dragged
him down. He began to sink and was drowned. A great noise was heard
while he was drowning. The father took down his tent and went down to the
beach at the time of low water. There he lay down and covered himself with
the tent. The flood tide rose and covered him, and when the waters receded
he had disappeared.”
This woman, the mother of the sea-mammals, may be considered the
principal deity of the Central Eskimo. She has supreme sway over the
destinies of mankind, and almost all the observances of these tribes are for
the purpose of retaining her good-will or of propitiating her if she has been
offended. Among the eastern tribes of this region she is called Sedna, while
the tribes west of Hudson Bay call her Nuliayuk. She is believed to live in a
lower world, in a house built of stone and whale-ribs. In accordance with
the myth, she is said to have but one eye. She cannot walk, but slides along,
one leg bent under, the other stretched forward. Her father lives with her in
this house, and lies covered up with his tent. The dog watches the entrance,
being stationed on the floor of the house.
The souls of seals, ground seals and whales are believed to proceed
from her house. After one of these animals has been killed its soul stays
with the body for three days. Then it goes back to Sedna’s abode, to be sent
forth again by her. If, during the three days that the soul stays with the body,
any taboo or prescribed custom is violated, the violation becomes attached
to the animal’s soul. Although the latter strives to free itself of these
attachments, which give it pain, it is unable to do so, and takes them down
to Sedna. The attachments, in some manner that is not explained, make her
hands sore, and she punishes the people who are the cause of her pains by
sending to them sickness, bad weather and starvation. The object of the
innumerable taboos that are in force after the killing of these sea animals is
therefore to keep their souls free from attachments that would hurt their
souls as well as Sedna.
The souls of the sea animals are endowed with greater powers than
those of ordinary human beings. They can see the effect of the contact with
a corpse, which causes objects touched by it to appear of a dark color; and
they can see the effect of flowing blood, from which a vapor rises that

surrounds the bleeding person and is communicated to every one and every
thing that comes in contact with such a person. This vapor and the dark
color of death are exceedingly unpleasant to the souls of the sea animals,
that will not come near a hunter thus affected. The hunter must therefore
avoid contact with people who have touched a body, or with such as are
bleeding. If any one who has touched a body or who is bleeding should
allow others to come in contact with him he would cause them to become
distasteful to the seals and therefore also to Sedna. For this reason the
custom demands that every person must at once announce if he has touched
a body or if he is bleeding. If he does not do so, he will bring ill luck to all
the hunters.
These ideas have given rise to the belief that it is necessary to announce
the transgression of any taboo. The transgressor of a custom is distasteful to
Sedna and to the animals, and those who abide with him will become
equally distasteful through contact with him. For this reason it has come to
be an act required by custom and morals to confess any and every
transgression of a taboo, in order to protect the community from the evil
influences of contact with the evil-doer. The descriptions of Eskimo life
given by many observers contain records of starvation which, according to
the belief of the natives, was brought about by some one transgressing a law
and not announcing what he had done.
I presume this importance of the confession of a transgression with a
view to warning others to keep at a distance from the transgressor has
gradually led to the idea that a transgression, or we might say a sin, can be
atoned for by confession. This is one of the most remarkable religious
beliefs of the Central Eskimo. There are innumerable tales of starvation
brought about by the transgression of a taboo. In vain the hunters try to
supply their families with food; gales and drifting snow make their
D
endeavors fruitless. Finally the help of the angakok is invoked, and he
discovers that the cause of the misfortune of the people is due to the
transgression of a taboo. Then the guilty one is searched for. If he confesses,
all is well, the weather moderates, and the seals will allow themselves to be
caught; but if he obstinately maintains his innocence, his death alone will
soothe the wrath of the offended deity.

D
The medicine-man or shaman of the Eskimo.

While thus the reason appears clear why the taboos are rigorously
enforced by public opinion, the origin of the taboos themselves is quite
obscure. It is forbidden, after the death of a sea mammal or after the death
of a person, to scrape the frost from the window, to shake the beds, or to
disturb the shrubs under the bed, to remove oil-drippings from under the
lamp, to scrape hair from skins, to cut snow for the purpose of melting it, to
work on iron, wood, stone, or ivory. Women are, furthermore, forbidden to
comb their hair, to wash their faces and to dry their boots and stockings.
A number of customs, however, may be explained by the endeavors of
the natives to keep the sea mammals free from contaminating influences.
All the clothing of a dead person, more particularly the tent in which he
died, must be discarded; for if a hunter should wear clothing made of skins
that had been in contact with the deceased, these would appear dark and the
seal would avoid him. Neither would a seal allow itself to be taken into a
hut darkened by a dead body, and all those who entered such a hut would
appear dark to it and would be avoided.
While it is customary for a successful hunter to invite all the men of the
village to eat of the seal that he has caught, they must not take any of the
seal meat out of the hut, because it might come in contact with persons who
are under taboo, and thus the hunter might incur the displeasure of the seal
and of Sedna.
It is very remarkable that the walrus is not included in this series of
regulations. It is explicitly stated that the walrus, the white whale and the
narwhal are not subject to these laws, which affect only the sea animals that
originated from Sedna’s fingers. There is, however, a series of laws that
forbid contact between walrus, seal and caribou. It is not quite clear in what
mythical concept these customs originate. There is a tradition regarding the
origin of walrus and caribou which is made to account for a dislike between
these two animals. A woman created both these animals from parts of her
clothing. She gave the walrus antlers and the caribou tusks. When man
began to hunt them, the walrus upset the boats with his antlers and the
caribou killed the hunter with his tusks. Therefore the woman called both

animals back and took the tusks from the caribou and gave them to the
walrus. She took the antlers, kicked the caribou’s forehead flat and put the
antlers on to it. Ever since that time, it is said, walrus and caribou avoid
each other, and the people must not bring their meat into contact. They are
not allowed to eat caribou and walrus meat on the same day except after
changing their clothing. The winter clothing which is made of caribou-skin
must be entirely completed before the men will go to hunt walrus. As soon
as the first walrus has been killed, a messenger goes from village to village
and announces the news. All work on caribou-skins must cease
immediately. When the caribou-hunting season begins, all the winter
clothing, and the tent that has been in use during the walrus-hunting season,
are buried, and not used again until the following walrus-hunting season.
No walrus hide, or thongs made of such hide, must be taken inland, where
is the abode of the caribou.
Similar laws, although not quite so stringent, hold good in regard to
contact between seal and walrus. The natives always change their clothing
or strip naked before eating seal during the walrus season.
The soul of the salmon is considered to be very powerful. Salmon must
not be cooked in a pot that has been used for boiling other kinds of meat. It
is always cooked at some distance from the hut. Boots that were used while
hunting walrus must not be worn when fishing salmon, and no work on
boot-legs is allowed until the first salmon has been caught and placed on a
boot-leg.
The fact that these taboos are not restricted to caribou and walrus
suggests that the mythical explanation given above does not account for the
origin of these customs, but must be considered as a later effort to explain
their existence.
The transgressions of taboos do not affect the souls of game alone. It
has already been stated that the sea mammals see their effect upon man
also, who appears to them of a dark color, or surrounded by a vapor which
is invisible to ordinary man. This means, of course, that the transgression
also affects the soul of the evil-doer. It becomes attached to it and makes
him sick. The shaman is able to see, by the help of his guardian spirit, these
attachments, and is able to free the soul from them. If this is not done the
person must die. In many cases the transgressions become attached also to

persons who come in contact with the evil-doer. This is especially true of
children, to whose souls the sins of their parents, and particularly of their
mothers, become readily attached. Therefore when a child is sick the
shaman, first of all, asks its mother if she has transgressed any taboos. The
attachment seems to have a different appearance, according to the taboo that
has been violated. A black attachment is due to removing oil-drippings from
under the lamp. As soon as the mother acknowledges the transgression of a
taboo, the attachment leaves the child’s soul and the child recovers.
The souls of the deceased stay with the body for three days. If a taboo
is violated during this time the transgression becomes attached to the soul
of the deceased. The weight of the transgression causes the soul pain, and it
roams about the village, endeavoring to free itself of its burden. It seeks to
harm the people who, by their disobedience to custom, are causing its
sufferings. It causes heavy snows to fall and brings sickness and death.
Such a soul is called a tupilak. Toward the middle of autumn it hovers
around the doors of the huts. When a shaman discovers the tupilak he
advises the people, who assemble, and prepare to free it of its burden. All
the shamans go in search of it, each a knife in hand. As soon as they find it,
they stab it with their knives, and thus cut off the transgressions. Then the
tupilak becomes a soul again. The knives with which it was stabbed are
seen by the people to be covered with blood.
The Central Eskimo believe that man has two souls. One of these stays
with the body, and may enter temporarily the body of a child which is given
the name of the departed. The other soul goes to one of the lands of the
souls. Of these there are several. There are three heavens, one above
another, of which the highest is the brightest and best. Those who die by
violence go to the lowest heaven. Those who die by disease go to Sedna’s
house first, where they stay for a year. Sedna restores their souls to full
health and then she sends them up to the second heaven. Those who die by
drowning go to the third heaven. People who commit suicide go to a place
in which it is always dark and where they go about with their tongues
lolling. Women who have had premature births go to Sedna’s abode and
stay in the lowest world.
The other soul stays with the body. When a child has been named after
the deceased, the soul enters its body and remains there for about four
months. It is believed that its presence strengthens the child’s soul, which is

very light and apt to escape from the body. After leaving the body of the
infant, the soul of the departed stays nearby, in order to re-enter its body in
case of need. When a year has elapsed since the death of the person, his
soul leaves the grave temporarily and goes hunting, but returns frequently
to the grave. When the body has entirely decayed it may remain away for a
long time.
Evidently the Eskimo also believe in the transmigration of souls. There
is one tradition in which it is told how the soul of a woman passed through
the bodies of a great many animals, until finally it was born again as an
infant. In another story it is told how a hunter caught a fox in a trap and
recognized in it the soul of his departed mother. In still another tale the soul
of a woman, after her death, entered the body of a huge polar bear in order
to avenge wrongs done to her during her lifetime.
Almost the sole object of the religious ceremonies of the Eskimo is to
appease the wrath of Sedna, of the souls of animals, or of the souls of the
dead, that have been offended by the transgressions of taboos. This is
accomplished by the help of the guardian spirits of the angakut. The most
important ceremony of the Eskimo is celebrated in the fall. At this time of
the year the angakut, by the help of their guardian spirits, visit Sedna and
induce her to visit the village, and they endeavor to free her of the
transgressions that became attached to her during the preceding year. One
angakok throws her with his harpoon, another one stabs her, and by this
means they cut off all the transgressions. The ceremony is performed in a
darkened snow-house. After the ceremony the lamps are lighted again and
the people see the harpoon and the knife that were used in the ceremony
covered with blood. If the angakut should fail to free Sedna from the
transgressions, bad weather and hunger would prevail during the ensuing
winter. On the following day Sedna sends her servant, who is called
Kaileteta, to visit the tribe. She is represented by a man dressed in a
woman’s costume and wearing a mask made of seal-skin. On this day the
people wear attached to their hoods pieces of skin of that animal of which
their first clothing was made after they were born. It seems that the skins of
certain animals are used for this purpose, each month having one animal of
its own. It is said that if they should not wear the skin of the proper animal,
Sedna would be offended and would punish them.

The angakut also cure sick persons and make good weather with the
help of their guardian spirits. They discover transgressions of taboos and
other causes of ill luck. One of the most curious methods of divination
applied by the angakut is that of ‘head-lifting.’ A thong is placed around the
head of a person who lies down next to the patient. The thong is attached to
the end of a stick which is held in hand by the angakok. Then the latter asks
questions as to the nature and outcome of the disease, which are supposed
to be answered by the soul of a dead person, which makes it impossible for
the head to be lifted if the answer is affirmative, while the head is raised
easily if the answer is negative. As soon as the soul of the departed leaves,
the head can be moved without difficulty.
Amulets are extensively used as a protection against evil influences and
to secure good luck. Pregnant women wear the teeth of wolves on the backs
of their shirts. These same teeth are fastened to the edge of the infant’s
hood. The string which passes under the large hood of the woman who
carries her child on her back is fastened at one end to a bear’s tooth, which
serves to strengthen the child’s soul. When the child begins to walk about,
this string and the bear’s tooth are attached to its shirt and worn as amulets.
Pyrites, when thrown upon a spirit, are believed to drive it away.
As compared with the beliefs of the Greenlanders, the beliefs of the
Central Eskimo are characterized by the great importance of the Sedna
myth and the entire absence of the belief in a powerful spirit called
Tonarssuk, which seems to have been one of the principal features of
Greenland beliefs. There is an evident tendency among the Central Eskimo
to affiliate all customs and beliefs with the myth of the origin of sea
animals. This tendency seems to have been one of the principal causes that
molded the customs and beliefs of the people into the form in which they
appear at the present time.

MENTAL ENERGY.E
By EDWARD ATKINSON.

E
Presented before the New York meeting of the
American Association for the Advancement of Science.

A ccording to the common conception, political economy is held to
deal with material forces only; with land, labor and capital; with the
production, distribution and consumption of the materials of human
existence. These are food, clothing and shelter. It, therefore, bears the aspect
of a purely material study of material forces. Yet no more purely
metaphysical science exists, and there can be, in my view of the subject, no
more ideal conceptions than those which are derived from the study of these
purely material forces. Many of the errors commonly presented under the
name of the ‘claims of labor’ have arisen from the limited and partial
conception of the function of economic science.
We have become accustomed to deal with the so-called material forces
of nature and with the physical work and labor of man under the general
term of ‘Energy’. What man does by his own labor or physical energy is to
convert the products of land and sea, of mine and forest, into new forms
from which he derives shelter, food and clothing. In a material sense all that
any one can get in or out of life, be he rich or poor, is what we call our
board and clothing. Such being the fact, what a man consumes is his cost to
the community; what he spends yields to others the means of buying the
supplies for their own wants; their consumption is then their cost to the
community.
The physical forces of nature are limited. The earth is endowed with a
fixed quantity of materials that we call gaseous, liquid and solid. It receives

a certain amount of heat from the sun which, for all practical purposes, may
be considered a fixed quantity of energy, even if in eons it may be
exhausted. The physical energy of man is devoted to the transformation of
these physical forces under the law of conservation; he can neither add to
nor diminish the quantity. He can transform solid into gas and gas into
liquid. He can, according to common speech, consume some of these
products, but his consumption is only another transformation. His own body
is but one of the forms of physical energy on the way toward another form.
These elements of nature, formerly limited to earth, air and water, are now
listed under many titles of what are called elements; I believe over sixty that
have not yet been differentiated, but all may yet be resolved into a unit of
force.
You will observe that in our arithmetic we have ten numerals which can
be divided into fractions. In our music we deal with seven notes and their
variants. In our alphabet we have twenty-six letters. These factors
correspond in some measure to what we call elements in nature. There is a
limit to the number of combinations that can be made of the numerals and
their fractions, to the notes of music and their variants, and of the letters of
the alphabet; but in each case this limit is so remote as to be negligible, like
the exhaustion of the heat of the sun. May we not deal with the elements of
nature in the same way? Can any one prescribe a limit to their conversion
and reconversion to the use of mankind? Is it not in these processes of
conversion that we derive our subsistence?
We make nothing. All that we can do is to move something. We move
the soil and we move the seed; nature gives the harvest. We direct the
currents of falling water, of heat and of steam; nature imparts the force or
energy to which man has only given a new direction. We are now imparting
new directions to the force that we call electricity, and to what we call cold.
What is the force from which we derive this power of transforming physical
energy? May we not call it mental energy? Is not mental energy the factor
in mankind by which he is differentiated from the beast? Does not man only
accumulate experience, and is there any limit to the power of mind over
matter?
If these points are well taken, mental energy is the fourth and
paramount factor in providing for material existence, and the science of
political economy, which deals with land, labor and capital, becomes a

purely metaphysical science when we admit the force of mental energy into
the combination.
We deal, as I have said, with sixty elements, so-called, more or less, but
the unity of nature is the most important fact ever proved by science; the
correlation of all forms of physical energy leading logically from the idea of
manifold forces or gods to the unity of creation, necessarily ending in the
conception of unity of a creator, or the one God. This modern development
of mental science is but the Hebrew concept of the creation in a new form.
The Hebrew race was the first one of the historic races with whom the unity
of creation and the unity of the creator became an article of faith. I doubt
not that it was in that concept and the power derived from it that the
Hebrew intellect asserted its preëminence in the history of the world.
According to that concept, to man is given “dominion over the fish of the
sea and over the fowl of the air and over every living thing that moveth
upon the earth.” By what force does man hold dominion unless it is through
his mental energy and his capacity to accumulate experience?
All the industrial arts are antedated by the industries of animals. The
tailor finds his prototype in the tailor bird; the mason in the wasp; the
farmer in the agricultural ant; the bridge-builder in the spider; the weaver in
the weaver bird; the creator of water power in the beaver, and so on. Yet no
other animal except man has developed or extended any of these arts. No
other animal except man has learned to make and use fire and not to run
away from it.
If, then, man by his power of mental energy converts the original and
crude forces with which the earth is endowed into new forms, and by giving
them new direction increases his power of production of the means of his
own subsistence and enjoyment of life, does it not follow that creation is a
continuous procession in which man is a factor? “There is a divinity that
shapes our ends, rough hew them as we may.” The ideal of ‘an honest God
the noblest concept of man’ becomes the converse of an honest man the
noblest work of God—honest in a broad sense in his dealings with the
forces of nature; true to his function.
There is a painful side to statistical and economic study. The penalty of
being able to read what is written between the lines and the columns of the
figures is the conclusion that after we have all done the best work that the

present conditions of science will permit, the entire product barely suffices
to keep mankind in existence; his fixed capital, so-called, is at the mercy
both of time and of the inventor who substitutes better methods which at
less cost of effort or labor yield more abundance to the community as a
whole. But on the other hand, no matter how hard the struggle for existence
may be, we find the promise of future abundance even in the insufficient
product which has been derived from the application of science and
invention up to date. Witness the relative progress of the last century as
compared with all the previous centuries; then attempt to conceive what
will be the condition of humanity a century hence, knowing, as we do, that
the applications of science through mental energy now proceed in geometric
progression, reversing the dogma of Malthus and leading to the concept of
production unlimited, consumption limited.
If it be true that there is no conceivable limit to the power of mind over
matter or to the number of conversions of force that can be developed,
providing in increasing measure for the wants of the human body, it follows
that pauperism is due to poverty of mental energy, not of material resources.
The next step in the development of this theory may be presented in
this form: No man is paid by the measure in time or physical effort, for the
work or labor that he performs. No man can claim payment in money or in
kind on the ground that he has done a day’s work of a greater or less
number of hours. In all civilized countries we are members one of another;
rich or poor; whether we work with our hands or our heads, or both
combined. Material existence is supported by conversion of one form of
physical energy into another. Social energy is maintained by the exchange
of one form of service for another. The measure of compensation is not the
number of hours of labor put into the product or service. The standard by
which services are measured is what the buyer is saved from doing, not
what the seller does. Each of us might possibly be able to house, clothe and
feed ourselves if we were cast upon an island possessing sufficient natural
resources. If a hundred persons representing all the classes in society were
wrecked upon such an island, each adult or each person above ten years old
would probably find a way to house, feed and clothe himself. Why do we
not house, feed and clothe ourselves, and why would not the hundred
representatives of different classes wrecked on an island each do his own
part of the work for himself only? Simply for the reason that men are either

endowed from birth with different aptitudes, or different aptitudes are
developed in their environment. Each one finds out that by delegating to
another certain kinds of work he saves his own time and energy. Each one
finds out what he can do for the next man, while the next man finds out
what he can do for him.
There is in every transaction of life an unconscious cerebration or
estimate of the services rendered to us, saving each of us mental or manual
energy, whenever we buy any product or service from another. That
unconscious cerebration affects the minds or habits or acts of both parties in
every purchase and sale. There may be errors in regard to the service itself.
The ignorant man will buy quack medicines that he had better let alone, but
what he pays under the false impression of benefit to himself is his measure
of what he hopes to save; while the quack medicine vender, taking
advantage of the ignorance of others, filches from them the means of
subsistence, even of wealth, under the pretext of service. As time goes on,
however, false measures of service are eliminated with increasing
intelligence, and true benefits constitute more and more the vast proportion
of the exchanges.
The same ignorance which leads the masses of the people of every
country to submit to military dictation, even in a bad cause, also leads to the
wars of tariffs among nations by which prejudice and animosity are kept up.
The false conception that in international commerce what one nation gains
another must lose, is promoted by the advocates of protection, many of
whom very honestly believe that through the exclusion of foreign goods
domestic industry may be promoted, wholly ignoring the fact that arts and
industries are developed by intelligence and not by legislation.
The advocates of bounties and of special legislation also ignore the fact
that in this country, where mental energy is more nearly free in its action
than in any other, manufactures and the mechanic arts develop in due
proportion according to the age and the natural resources of the territory or
state, nine-tenths or more of the occupations which are listed under these
titles being free in the nature of things from any possibility of foreign
competition through the import of a product of like kind.
There may be nothing new in this essay, but until my own observation
had led me to the conclusion that land, labor and capital were alike inert and

incapable without the cöordinating power of mental energy, the doubt
continued to exist in my mind which is often expressed about the possibility
of economic science having any real existence or right to the title. Also,
until my own observation led me to the conclusion that the cost of a man to
the community is what he consumes, and not what he secures in the way of
income, the correlation of wealth and welfare had not been satisfactorily
reconciled. I think that a very large part of what is written under the title of
political economy would be greatly modified, and perhaps never have been
written, had these concepts been derived by the writers from experience, as
they have been in my own observation.
I have not much patience with abstract or à priori theories, my own
method being one of observation, then referring to the various authorities in
order to find out whether my observations or their abstract theories have
been shallow and superficial.
Again, I find in the ideal of the continuous miracle of creation in which
man is a factor the solution of many intellectual difficulties. In the face of
such a perception of the methods of the universe, the larger part of the
dogmas that have been put forth under the name of religion take their place
with much of the historic rubbish which passes under the name of history.
When it becomes plain that every man has his place in the progress of
continuous creation, and is a factor in it; that nothing is constant but
change; that there is no such thing as fixed capital; all the doubts and fears
regarding the future of humanity vanish in the light of sure progress.
What greater stimulus can there be than for every man each in his own
way rendering service for service, his objective point being only the welfare
of himself and his family, when he attains the conviction that by so much as
his mental energy adds to the sum of the utilities by which mankind lives,
so may that part which he consumes and which represents his cost to the
community be fully justified, even though it is earned with more apparent
ease and less physical exertion than are called for from his poorer
neighbors.
Incomplete as his studies were, I have always found in the ‘Harmonies’
of Frederic Bastiat the greatest encouragement and the greatest incentive to
the work which I have undertaken under the name of political economy,
leading more and more to the conviction that war and warfare, whatever

influence they may have had in developing progress in the past, are now
due to ignorance and greed; the war of tariffs due to selfishness and
stupidity; and the contest of labor and capital due to the errors of the
ignorant workman and the ignorant capitalist alike. All interests are
harmonious. The evolution of science and invention will surely bring them
together on the lines of righteousness, peace and material abundance.
This essay has been condensed from a lecture prepared and given
before a Clergymen’s Club some months ago. In it I tried to show the
necessary connection of religion and life as developed by economic study,
the law of mutual service being the rule by which commerce lives and
moves and has its being. This lecture has since been read to several clubs of
very different types of men, and from the great interest excited I am led to
think there is something in it fit for the student of facts and figures to say.
I may, therefore, venture to repeat the statement of two principles
which are presented in this treatise, which I think have been seldom if ever
fully developed in any of the standard works upon political economy. To my
own mind these are basic principles which when applied may profoundly
modify many of the concepts of students of economic science. I join in the
view that the family is the unit of society, the home the center. The end of
all production is consumption. Nothing is constant but change, and there is
no such thing as fixed material capital of any long duration in the progress
of time. The two principles which I have endeavored to enforce are as
follows:
First. The cost of each person or head of the family is what he and his
immediate dependents consume. His income, whether measured in terms of
money or in products, is, therefore, no measure of his cost; what he
distributes in payment for service rendered being expended by those who
receive it in procuring the commodities which constitute their cost to the
community.
Second. No person who is occupied or is in the employment or service
of others is paid for what he does. His work may occupy long hours and
may be applied to arduous manual labor, or it may be done in a short
number of hours per day, with but little physical effort. Neither the hours
nor the effort constitute any measure on which payment can be based. The

measure of payment is fixed by the measure of the work saved to him who
makes the payment, consciously or unconsciously estimated.
These two precepts or principles, coupled with the theory that there is
no conceivable limit to the power of mind over matter, or to the number of
transformations of physical energy to which direction may be given in the
material support of humanity, bring the visions of the Utopians within the
scope of a law of progress in material welfare to which no limit can be put
in time or space.

CHAPTERS ON THE STARS.
By Prof. SIMON NEWCOMB, U. S. N.
VARIABLE STARS.

I t is a curious fact that the ancient astronomers, notwithstanding the care
with which they observed the heavens, never noticed that any of the
stars changed in brightness. The earliest record of such an observation dates
from 1596, when the periodical disappearance of Omicron Ceti was
noticed. After this, nearly two centuries elapsed before another case of
variability in a star was recorded. During the first half of the nineteenth
century Argelander so systematized the study of variable stars as to make it
a new branch of astronomy. In recent years it has become of capital interest
and importance through the application of the spectroscope.
Students who are interested in the subject will find the most complete
information attainable in the catalogues of variable stars, published from
time to time by Chandler in the ‘Astronomical Journal.’ His third catalogue,
which appeared in 1896, comprises more than 300 stars whose variability
has been well established, while there is always a long list of ‘suspected
variables’—whose cases are still to be tried. The number to be included in
the established list is continually increasing at such a rate that it is
impossible to state it with any approximation to exactness. The possibility
of such a statement has been yet further curtailed by the recent discovery at
the Harvard Observatory that certain clusters of stars contain an
extraordinary proportion of variables. Altogether at the time of the latest
publication, 509 such stars were found in twenty-three clusters. The total
number of these objects in clusters, therefore, exceeds the number known in
the rest of the sky. They will be described more fully in a subsequent
chapter. For the present we are obliged to leave this rich field out of
consideration and confine our study to the isolated variable stars which are
found in every region of the heavens.

Variable stars are of several classes, which, however, run into each
other by gradations so slight that a sharp separation cannot always be made
between them. Yet there are distinguishing features, each of which marks so
considerable a number of these stars as to show some radical difference in
the causes on which the variations depend.
We have first to distinguish the two great classes of irregular and
periodic stars. The irregular ones increase and diminish in so fitful a way
that no law of their change can be laid down. To this class belong the so-
called ‘new stars’, which, at various periods in history, have blazed out in
the heavens, and then in a few weeks or months have again faded away. It is
a remarkable fact that no star of the latter class has ever been known to
blaze out more than once. This fact distinguishes new stars from other
irregularly variable ones.
Periodic stars are those which go through a regular cycle of changes in
a definite interval of time, so that, after a certain number of days,
sometimes of hours, the star returns to the same brightness. But even in the
case of periodic stars, it is found that the period is more or less variable,
and, in special cases, the amount of the variation is such that it cannot
always be said whether we should call a star periodic or irregular.
The periodic stars show wide differences, both in the length of the
period and in the character of the changes they undergo. In most cases they
rapidly increase in brightness during a few days or weeks, and then slowly
fade away, to go through the same changes again at the end of the period. In
other cases they blaze up or fade out, from time to time, like the revolving
light of a lighthouse. Some stars are distinguished more especially by their
maximum, or period of greatest brightness, while others are more sharply
marked by minima, or periods of least brightness. In some cases there are
two unequal minima in the course of a period.
Chandler’s third catalogue of variable stars gives the periods of 280 of
these objects, which seem to have been fairly well made out. A
classification of these periods, as to their length, will be interesting. There
are, of periods:

Less than 50 days 63 Stars.
Between 50 and 100 days 6 ”

” 100 ” 150 ” 9 ”
” 150 ” 200 ” 18 ”
” 200 ” 250 ” 29 ”
” 250 ” 300 ” 40 ”
” 300 ” 350 ” 44 ”
” 350 ” 400 ” 44 ”
” 400 ” 450 ” 18 ”
” 450 ” 500 ” 6 ”
” 500 ” 550 ” 1 ”
” 550 ” 600 ” 1 ”
” 600 ” 650 ” 1 ”

It will be seen from this that, leaving out the cases of very short period,
the greater number of the periods fall between 300 and 400 days. From this
value the number falls off in both directions. Only three periods exceed 500
days, and of these the longest is 610 days. We infer from this that there is
something in the constitution of these stars, or in the causes on which their
variation depends, which limits the period. This limitation establishes a
well-marked distinction between the periodic stars and the irregular
variables to be hereafter described.
Returning to the upper end of the scale, the contrast between the great
number of stars less than fifty days, and the small number between fifty and
one hundred, seems to show that we have here a sharp line of distinction
between stars of long and those of short period. But, when we examine the
matter in detail, the statistics of the periods do not enable us to draw any
such line. About eight periods are less than one day, and the number of this
class known to us is continually increasing. About forty are between one
and ten days, and from this point upwards they are scattered with a fair
approach to equality up to a period of one hundred days. There is, however,
a possible distinction, which we shall develop presently.

Fig. 1. The Law of Change in a Variable Star.

The law of change in a variable star is represented to the eye by a curve
in the following way. We draw a straight horizontal line A X to represent the
time. A series of equidistant points, a, b, c, d, etc., on this will represent
moments of time. One of the spaces, a, b, c, etc., may represent an hour, a
day, or a month, according to the rapidity of change. We take a to represent
the initial moment, and erect an ordinate aa’, of such length as to represent
the brightness of the star on some convenient scale at this moment. At the
second moment, b, which may be an hour or a day later, we erect another
ordinate bb’, representing the brightness at this moment. We continue this
process as long as may be required. Then we draw a curve, represented by
the dotted line, through the ends of all the ordinates. In the case of a
periodic star it is only necessary to draw the curve through a single period,
since its continuation will be a repetition of its form for any one period.
We readily see that if a star does not vary, all the ordinates will be of
equal length, and the curve will be a horizontal straight line. Moreover, the
curve will take this form through any portion of time during which the light
of the star is constant.
There are three of the periodic stars plainly visible to the naked eye at
maximum, of which the variations are so wide that they may easily be
noticed by any one who looks for them at the right times, and knows how to
find the stars. These stars are:

Omicron Ceti, called also Mira Ceti.
Beta Persei, or Algol.
Beta Lyræ.

It happens that each of these stars exemplifies a certain type or law of
variations.
Omicron Ceti. On August 13, 1596, David Fabricius noticed a star in
the constellation Cetus, which was not found in any catalogue. Bayer, in his
‘Uranometria’, of which the first edition was published in 1601, marked the
star Omicron, but said nothing about the fact that it was visible only at
certain times. Fabricius observed the star from time to time, until 1609, but
he does not appear to have fully and accurately recognized its periodicity.
But so extraordinary an object could not fail to command the attention of
astronomers, and the fact was soon established that the star appeared at
intervals of about eleven months, gradually fading out of sight after a few
weeks of visibility. Observations of more or less accuracy having been
made for more than two centuries, the following facts respecting it have
been brought to light:
Its variations are somewhat irregular. Sometimes, when at its brightest,
it rises nearly or quite to the second magnitude. This was the case in
October, 1898, when it was about as bright as Alpha Ceti. At other times its
maximum brightness scarcely exceeds the fifth magnitude. No law has yet
been discovered by which it can be predicted whether it shall attain one
degree of brightness or another at maximum.
Its minima are also variable. Sometimes it sinks only to the eighth
magnitude; at other times to the ninth or lower. In either case it is invisible
to the naked eye.
As with other stars of this kind, it brightens up more rapidly than it
fades away. It takes a few weeks from the time it becomes visible to reach
its greatest brightness, whatever that may be. It generally retains this
brightness for two or three weeks, then fades away, gradually at first,
afterward more rapidly. The whole time of visibility will, therefore, be two
or three months. Of course, it can be seen with a telescope at any time.
The period also is variable in a somewhat irregular way. If we calculate
when the star ought to be at its greatest brightness on the supposition that
the intervals between the maxima ought to be equal, we shall find that
sometimes the maximum will be thirty or forty days early, and at other
times thirty or forty days late. These early or late maxima follow each other
year after year, with a certain amount of regularity as regards the

progression, though no definable law can be laid down to govern them.
Thus, during the period from 1782 to 1800 it was from thirteen to twenty-
four days late. In 1812 it was thirty-nine days late. From 1845 to 1856 it
was on the average about a month too early. Several recent maxima, notably
those from 1895 to 1898, again occurred late. Formulæ have been
constructed to show these changes, but there is no certainty that they
express the actual law of the case. Indeed, the probability seems to be that
there is no invariable law that we can discover to govern it.
Argelander fixed the length of the period at 331.9 days. More recently,
Chandler fixed it at 331.6 days. It would seem, therefore, to have been
somewhat shorter in recent times. It was at its maximum toward the end of
October, 1898. We may, therefore, expect that future maxima will occur in
July, 1901; June, 1902; May, 1903; April, 1904, and so on, about a month
earlier each year. During the few years following 1903 the maxima will
probably not be visible, owing to the star being near conjunction with the
sun at the times of their occurrence. The most plausible view seems to be
that changes of a periodic character, involving the eruption of heated matter
from the interior, of the body to its surface, followed by the cooling of this
matter by radiation, are going on in the star.
The star Algol, or Beta Persei, as it is commonly called in astronomical
language, may, in northern latitudes, be seen on almost any night of the
year. In the early summer we should probably see it only after midnight, in
the northeast. In late winter it would be seen in the northwest. From August
until January one can find it at some time in the evening by becoming
acquainted with the constellations. It is nearly of the second magnitude.
One might look at it a score of times without seeing that it varied in
brilliancy. But at certain stated intervals, somewhat less than three days, it
fades away to nearly the fourth magnitude for a few hours, and then slowly
recovers its light. This fact was first discovered by Goodrick in 1783, since
which time the variations have been carefully followed. The law of
variation thus defined is expressed by a curve of the following form:

Fig. 2. Law of Variation of a Star of the
Algol Type.

The idea that what we see in the star is a partial eclipse caused by a
dark body revolving round it, was naturally suggested even to the earliest
observers. But it was impossible to test this theory until recent times.
Careful observation showed changes in the period between the eclipses,
which, although not conclusive against the theory, might have seemed to
make it somewhat unlikely. The application of the spectroscope to the
determination of radial motions, enabled Vogel, of Potsdam, in 1889, to set
the question at rest. His method of reasoning and proceeding was this:
If the fading out which we see is really due to an eclipse by a dark
body, that body must be nearly or quite as large as the star itself, else it
could not cut off so much of its light. In this case, it is probably nearly as
massive as the star itself, and therefore would affect the motion of the star.
Both bodies would, in fact, revolve around their common center of gravity.
Therefore, when after the dark body has passed in front of the star, it has
made one-fourth of a revolution, which would require about seventeen
hours, the star would be moving towards us. Again, seventeen hours before
the eclipse, it ought to be moving away from us.
The measurement of six photographs of the spectrum, of which four
were taken before the eclipses and two afterward, gives the following
results:

Before eclipses: Velocity from the sun equals 39 km. per
second.
After eclipses: Velocity toward the sun equals 47 km. per
second.

These results show that the hypothesis in question is a true one, and
afforded the first conclusive evidence of a dark body revolving around a
distant star. A study of the law of diminution and recovery of the light

during the eclipse, combined with the preceding motions, enabled Vogel to
make an approximate estimate of the size of the orbit and of the two bodies.
The star itself is somewhat more than a million of miles in diameter; the
dark companion a little less. The latter is about the size of our sun. Their
distance apart is somewhat more than three millions of miles; the respective
masses are about one-half and one-fourth that of the sun. These results,
though numerically rather uncertain, are probably near enough to the truth
to show us what an interesting system we here have to deal with. We can
say with entire certainty that the size and mass of the dark body exceed
those of any planet of our system, even Jupiter, several hundred fold.
The period of the star is also subject to variations of a somewhat
singular character. These have been attributed by Chandler to a motion of
the whole system around a third body, itself invisible. This theory is,
however, still to be proved. Quite likely the planet which causes the eclipse
is not the only one which revolves around this star. The latter may be the
center of a system like our solar system, and the other planets may, by their
action, cause changes in the motion of the body that produces the eclipses.
The most singular feature of the change is that it seems to have taken place
quite rapidly, about 1840. The motion was nearly uniform up to near this
date; then it changed, and again remained nearly uniform until 1890. Since
then no available observations have been published.
It is found that several other stars vary in the same way as Algol; that is
to say, they are invariable in brightness during the greater part of the time,
but fade away for a few days at regular intervals. This is a kind of variation
which it is most difficult to discover, because it will be overlooked unless
the observer happens to notice the star during the time when an eclipse is in
progress, and is thoroughly aware of its previous brightness. One might
observe a star of this kind very accurately a score of times, without hitting
upon a moment when the partial eclipse was in progress. On the principle
that like effects are due to like causes, we are justified in concluding that in
the cases of all stars of this type, the eclipses are caused by the revolution of
a dark body, now called ‘Algol variables,’ round the principal star.
A feature of all the Algol variables is the shortness of the periods. The
longest period is less than five days, while three are less than one day. This
is a result that we might expect from the nature of the case. The nearer a
dark planet is to the star, the more likely it will be to hide its light from an

observer at a great distance. If, for example, the planet Jupiter were nearly
as large as the sun, the chances would be hundreds to one against the plane
of the orbit being so nearly in the line of a distant observer that the latter
would ever see an eclipse of the sun by the planet. But if the planet were
close to the sun, the chances might increase to one in ten, and yet farther to
almost any extent, according to the nearness of the two bodies.
Still, we cannot set any definite limit to the period of stars of this type;
all we can say is that, as the period we seek for increases, the number of
stars varying in that period must diminish. This follows not only from the
reason just given, but from the fact that the longer the interval that separates
the partial eclipses of a star of the Algol type, the less likely they are to be
detected.

STARS OF THE BETA LYRÆ TYPE.

The star Beta Lyræ shows variations quite different in their nature from
those of Algol, yet having a certain analogy to them. Anyone who looks at
the constellation Lyræ a few nights in succession and compares Beta with
Gamma, a star of nearly the same brightness in its neighborhood, will see
that while on some evenings the stars are of equal brightness, on others
Beta will be fainter by perhaps an entire magnitude.
A careful examination of these variations shows us a very remarkable
feature. On a preliminary study, the period will seem to be six and one-half
days. But, comparing the alternate minima, we shall find them unequal.
Hence the actual period is thirteen days. In this period there are two unequal
minima, separated by equal maxima. That is to say, the partial eclipses at
intervals of six and one-half days are not equal. At the alternate minima the
star is half as bright again as at the intermediate minima.
It is impossible to explain such a change as this merely by the
interposition of a dark body, and this for two reasons. Instead of remaining
invariable between the minima, the variation is continuous during the whole
period, like the rising and falling of a tide. Moreever, the inequality of the
alternating minima is against the theory.

Pickering, however, found from the doubling of the spectral lines that
there were two stars revolving round each other. Then Prof. G. W. Myers, of
Indiana, worked out a very elaborate mathematical theory to explain the
variations, which is not less remarkable for its ingenuity than for the curious
nature of the system it brings to light. His conclusions are these:
Beta Lyræ consists of two bodies, gaseous in their nature, which
revolve round each other, so near as to be almost touching. They are of
unequal size. Both are self-luminous. By their mutual attraction they are
drawn out into ellipsoids. The smaller body is somewhat darker than the
other. When we see the two bodies laterally, they are at their brightest. As
they revolve, however, we see them more and more end on, and thus the
light diminishes. At a certain point one begins to cover the other and hide its
light. Thus the combined light continues to diminish until the two bodies
move across our line of sight. Then we have a minimum. At one minimum,
however, the smaller and darker of the two bodies is projected upon the
brighter one, and thus diminishes its light. At the other minimum, it is
hiding behind the other, and therefore we see the light of the larger one
alone.
This theory receives additional confirmation from the fact, shown by
the spectroscope, that these stars are either wholly gaseous, or at least have
self-luminous atmospheres. Some of Professor Myers’s conclusions
respecting the magnitudes are summarized as follows:
The larger body is about 0.4 as bright as the smaller.
The flattening of the ellipsoidal masses is about 0.17.
The distance of centers is about 1-7/8 the semi-major axis of the larger
star, or about 50,000,000 kilometers (say 30,000,000 miles).
The mass of the larger body is about twice that of the smaller, and 9½
times the mass of the sun.
F
The mean density of the system is a little less than that of air.

F
‘Astrophysical Journal’, Vol. VII, January, 1898.

It should be remarked that these numbers rest on spectroscopic results,
which need further confirmation. They are, therefore, liable to be changed
by subsequent investigation. What is most remarkable is that we have here
to deal with a case to which we have no analogy in our solar system, and
which we should never have suspected, had it not been for observations of
this star.
The gap between the variable stars of the Algol type and those of the
Beta Lyræ type is, at the present time, being filled by new discoveries in
such a way as to make a sharp distinction of the two classes difficult. It is
characteristic of the Algol type proper that the partial eclipses are due to the
interposition of a dark planet revolving round the bright star. But suppose
that we have two nearly equal stars, A and B, revolving round their common
center of gravity in a plane passing near our system. Then, A will eclipse B,
and, half a revolution later, B will eclipse A, and so on in alternation. But,
when the stars are equal, we may have no way of deciding which is being
eclipsed, and thus we shall have a star of the Algol type, so far as the law of
variation is concerned, yet, as a matter of fact, belonging rather to the Beta
Lyræ type. If the velocity in the line of sight could be measured, the
question would be settled at once. But only the brightest stars can, so far, be
thus measured, so that the spectroscope cannot help us in the majority of
cases.
The most interesting case of this kind yet brought to light is that of Tau
Cygni. The variability of this star, ordinarily of the fourth magnitude, was
discovered by Chandler in December, 1886. The minima occurred at
intervals of three days. But in the following summer he found an apparent
period of 1 d. 12 h., the alternate minima being invisible because they
occurred during daylight, or when the star was below the horizon. With this
period the times of minima during the summer of 1888 were predicted.
It was then found that the times of the alternate minima, which, as we
have just said, were the only ones visible during any one season, did not
correspond to the prediction. The period seemed to have greatly changed.
Afterward, it seemed to return to its old value. After puzzling changes of
this sort, the tangle was at length unraveled by Dunér, of Lund, who showed
that the alternate periods were unequal. The intervals between minima were
one day nine hours, one day fifteen hours, one day nine hours, one day
fifteen hours, and so on, indefinitely. This law once established, the cause of

the anomaly became evident. Two bright stars revolve round their common
center of gravity in a period of nearly three days. Each eclipses the other in
alternation. The orbit is eccentric, and, in consequence, one-half of it is
described in a less time than the other half. If we could distinguish the two
stars by telescopic vision, and note their relative positions at the four
cardinal points of their orbit, we should see the pair alternately single and
double, as shown in the following diagrams:

A B
Position (1), stars at pericenter * *
Interval, 16 hours.
Position (2), A eclipses B *
Interval, 20 hours.
B A
Position (3), stars at apocenter * *
Interval, 20 hours.
Position (4), B eclipses *
Interval, 16 hours.
Position (1) is repeated * *

U Pegasi is a star which proved as perplexing as Tau Cygni. It was first
supposed to be of the Algol type, with a period of about two days. Then it
was found that a number of minima occurred during this period, and that
the actual interval between them was only a few hours. The great difficulty
in the case arises from the minuteness of the variation, which is but little
more than half a magnitude between the extremes. The observations of
Wendell, at the Harvard Observatory, with the polarizing photometer,
enabled Pickering to reach a conclusion which, though it may still be open
to some doubt, seems to be the most likely yet attainable. The star is of the
Beta Lyræ type; its complete period is 8 hours 59 minutes 41 seconds, or 19
seconds less than nine hours; during this period it passes through two equal
maxima, each of magnitude 9.3, and two unequal minima 9.76 and 9.9,
alternately.

Fig. 3. Light Curve of U Pegasi, of the Beta Lyræ Type,
from Observations by Wendell at the Harvard
Observatory. Magnitude at Maximum, 9.32; at
Principal Minimum, 9.90; at Secondary Minimum, 9.76.
Period, 9 hours.

The difference of these minima, 0m. 14, is less than the errors which
really ordinarily affect measures of a star’s magnitude with the best
photometers. Some skepticism has, therefore, been felt as to the reality of
the difference which, if it does not exist, would reduce the periodic time
below four and one-half hours, the shortest yet known. But Pickering
maintains that, in observations of this kind upon a single star, the precision
is such that the reality of the difference, small though it be, is beyond
reasonable doubt.
Taking Pickering’s law of change as a basis, Myers has represented the
light-curve of U Pegasi on a theory similar to that which he constructed for
Beta Lyræ. His conclusion is that, in the present case, the two bodies which
form the visible star are in actual contact. A remarkable historic feature of
the case is that Poincaré has recently investigated, by purely mathematical
methods, the possible forms of revolving fluid masses in a condition of
equilibrium, bringing out a number of such forms previously unknown. One
of these, which he calls the apiodal form, consists of two bodies joined into
one, and it is this which Myers finds for U Pegasi.

Quite similar to these two cases is that of Zeta Herculis. This star,
ordinarily of the seventh magnitude, was found, at Potsdam, in 1894, to
diminish by about one magnitude. Repeated observations elsewhere
indicate a period of very nearly four days. Actually it is now found to be
only ten minutes less than four days. The result was that during any one
season of observation the minima occur at nearly the same hour every night
or day. To an observer situated in such longitude that they occur during the
day, they would, of course, be invisible.
Continued observations then showed a secondary minimum, occurring
about half-way between the principal minima hitherto observed. It was then
found that these secondary minima really occur between one and two hours
earlier than the mid-moment, so that the one interval would be between
forty-six and forty-seven hours and the other between forty-nine and fifty.
The time which it takes the star to lose its light and regain it again is about
ten hours. More recent observations, however, do not show this inequality,
so that there is probably a rapid motion of the pericenter of the orbit.
It will be seen that this star combines the Algol and Beta Lyræ types. It
is an Algol star in that its light remains constant between the eclipses. It is
of the Beta Lyræ type in the alternate minima being unequal.
From a careful study, Seliger and Hartwig derived the following
particulars respecting this system:

Diameter of principal star, 15,000,000 kilometers.
Diameter of smaller star, 12,000,000 kilometers.
Mass of the larger star, 172 times sun’s mass.
Mass of the smaller star, 94 times sun’s mass.
Distance of centers, 45,000,000 kilometers.
Time of revolution, 3d. 23h. 49m. 32.7s.

It must be added that the data for these extraordinary numbers are
rather slender and partly hypothetical.
Beta Lyræ is always of the same brightness at the same hour of its
period, and Algol has always the same magnitude at minimum. It is true that
the length of the period varies slowly in the case of these stars. But this may
arise from the action of other invisible bodies revolving around the visible
stars. This general uniformity is in accord with the theory which attributes

the apparent variations to the various aspects in which we see one and the
same system of revolving stars.
Another variable star showing some unique features is Eta Aquilæ.
What gives it special interest is that spectroscopic observations of its radial
motion show it to have a dark body revolving round it in a very eccentric
orbit, and in the same time as the period of variation. It might therefore be
supposed that we have here a star of the Algol or Beta Lyræ type. But such
is not the case. There is nothing in the law of variation to suggest an
eclipsing of the bright star, nor does it seem that the variations can readily
be represented by the varying aspects of any revolving system.
The orbit of this star has been exhaustively investigated by Wright from
Campbell’s observations of the radial motion. The laws of change in the
system are shown by the curves below, which are reproduced, in great part,
from Wright’s paper in the ‘Astrophysical Journal.’

Fig. 4. Light-Curve and Radial Velocity of Eta Aquilæ.

The lower curve is the light-curve of the star during a period of 7.167
days. Starting from a maximum of 3.5 mag., it sinks, in the course of 5
days, to a minimum of 4.7m. It was found by Schwab that the diminution is
not progressive, but that a secondary maximum of 3.8m. is reached at the
end of the second day. After reaching the principal minimum it rises rapidly
to the principal maximum in 2¼ days.
The upper curve shows the radial velocity of the star during the period
of variation. It will be seen that the epoch of greatest negative velocity,
which referred to the center of mass of the system, is 16.2 km. per second,
occurs at the time of maximum brightness. The greatest positive velocity,
23.9 km., occurs during the sixth day of the period just after the time of
minimum brightness.
Finally, the moments of inferior and superior conjunction of the dark
body with the bright one are neither of them an epoch of minimum
brightness, which takes place half-way between the two.
The most plausible conclusion we can draw is that the light of the star
is affected by the action of the dark body during its revolution. But how the
change may be produced we cannot yet say.

CLASSIFICATION OF VARIABLE STARS.

A classification of variable stars, based on the period of variation and
the law of change, was proposed by Pickering. It does not, however, seem
that a hard and fast line can yet be drawn between different types and
classes of these bodies, one type running into another, as we have found in
the case of the Algol and Beta Lyræ types. Yet the discovery of the cause of
the variation in these types makes it likely that a division into two great
classes, dependent on the cause of variation, is possible. We should then
have:
(1) Stars, or systems, constituting to vision a single star, of which the
apparent variability arises from the rotation of the system as a whole, or
from the revolution of its components around each other.

(2) Stars of which the changes arise from other and as yet unknown
causes.
The main feature of the stars of the first class is that we are under no
necessity of supposing any actual change in the amount of light which they
emit. Their apparent variations are purely the effect of perspective, arising
from the various aspects which they present to us during their revolution
round each other. If we could change our point of view so that the plane of
the orbit of Algol’s planet no longer passed near our system, Algol would
no longer be a variable star. Under the same circumstances the apparent
variations in a star of the Beta Lyræ type would cease to be noticeable, if
they did not disappear entirely.
The stars of this class are also distinguished by the uniformity and
regularity with which they go through their cycle of change.
The stars of the other class, which we may call the Omicron Ceti type,
are different not only in respect to the length of the period, but in the
character of the variation. There are certain general laws of variation and
irregularities of brightness which stars of this class go through. Starting
from the time of the minimum, the increase of light is at first very slow. It
grows more and more rapid as the maximum is approached, in which time
there may be as great an increase in two or three days as there formerly was
in a month. The diminution of light is generally slower than the increase.
The magnitude at corresponding times in different periods may be very
different. Thus, as we have already remarked, Omicron Ceti is ten times as
bright at some maxima as it is at others. The periods also, so far as they
have been made out, vary more widely than those of stars of the other type.
The idea has sometimes been entertained that these variations of light
are due to a revolution of the star on its axis. A very little consideration will,
however, show that this explanation cannot be valid. However bright a star
might be on one side, or however dark on the other, any one region of its
surface would be visible to us half the time and a change of brightness from
different degrees of brilliancy on different sides would be gradual and
regular.
It is not impossible that the variability may be in some way connected
with the action of a body revolving round the star. This seems to be the case
with Eta Aquilæ. The radial motion of this object shows the existence of a

dark body revolving round it in the same period as that of the star’s
variation.
From what has been said, it will be seen that, although a sharp line
cannot be drawn, there seems to be some distinction between the stars of
short and long periods. The number of stars which have been known to
belong to the first class is quite small, only about fifteen, all told. On the
other hand, there are still left some stars having a period less than ten days,
which are otherwise not distinguishable from the Omicron Ceti type. It
seems quite likely that the variations in the periods of these stars are, in
some way, connected with the revolution of bright or dark bodies round
them.
They also vary more widely than those of stars of the other two types.
This might easily happen in the case of stars really variable through a cycle
of changes going on in consequence of the action of interior causes.
The periodic stars of short period, which have not been recognized as
of the Algol or Beta Lyræ type, form an interesting subject of study.
Although the separation between them and the stars of long period is not
sharp, it seems likely to have some element of reality in it. But no
conclusions on the subject can be reached until the light-curves of a large
number of them are carefully drawn; and this requires an amount of patient
and accurate observation which cannot be carried out for years to come.

SUSPECTED VARIATIONS IN THE COLOR OF STARS.

The question whether certain stars vary in color without materially
changing their brightness has sometimes been raised. This was at one time
supposed to be the case with one of the stars of Ursa Major. This suspected
variation has not, however, been confirmed, and it does not seem likely that
any such changes take place in the color of stars not otherwise variable.

POSSIBLE SECULAR VARIATIONS IN THE BRILLIANCY
OF STARS.

All the variations we have hitherto considered take place with such
rapidity that they can be observed by comparisons embracing but a short
interval of time—a few days or months at the outside. A somewhat different
question of great importance is still left open. May not individual stars be
subject to a secular variation of brilliancy, meaning by this term a change
which would not be sensible in the course of only one generation of men,
but admitting of being brought out by a comparison of the brightness of the
stars at widely distant epochs? Is it certain that, in the case of stars which
we do not recognize as variable, no change has taken place since the time of
Hipparchus and Ptolemy? This question has been investigated by C. S.
Pierce and others. The conclusion reached is that no real evidence of any
change can be gathered. The discrepancies are no greater than might arise
from errors of estimates.
There is, however, an analogous question which is of great interest and
has been much discussed in recent times. In several ancient writings the
color of Sirius is described as red. This fact would, at first sight, appear to
afford very strong evidence that, within historic times, the color of the
brightest star in the heavens has actually changed from red to a bluish
white.
Two recent writers have examined the evidence on this subject most
exhaustively and reached opposite conclusions. The first of these was Dr.
T. J. J. See, who collated a great number of cases in which Sirius was
mentioned by ancient writers as red or fiery, and thus concluded that the
evidence was in favor of a red color in former times. Shortly afterwards,
Schiaparelli examined the evidence with equal care and thoroughness and
reached an opposite conclusion, showing that the terms used by the ancient
authors, which might have indicated redness of color, were susceptible of
other interpretations; they might mean fiery, blazing, etc., as well as red in
color, and were therefore probably suggested by the extraordinary
brightness of Sirius and the strangeness with which it twinkled when near
the horizon. In this position a star not only twinkles, but changes its color
rapidly. This change is not sensible in the case of a faint star, but if one
watches Sirius when on the horizon, it will be seen that it not only changes
in appearance, but seems to blaze forth in different colors.
It seems to the writer that this conclusion of Schiaparelli is the more
likely of the two. From what we know of the constitution of the stars, a

change in the color of one of these bodies in so short a period of time as that
embraced by history is so improbable as to require much stronger proofs
than any that can be adduced from ancient writers. In addition to the
possible vagueness or errors of the original writers, we have to bear in mind
the possible mistakes or misinterpretations of the copyists who reproduced
the manuscripts.

THE PARALLAXES OF THE STARS.

It needs only the most elementary conceptions of space, direction and
motion to see that, as the earth makes its vast swing from one extremity of
its orbit to the other, the stars, being fixed, must have an apparent swing in
the opposite direction. The seeming absence of such a swing was in all ages
before our own one of the great stumbling blocks of astronomy. It was the
base on which Ptolemy erected his proof that the earth was immovable in
the center of the celestial sphere. It was felt by Copernicus to be a great
difficulty in the reception of his system. It led Tycho Brahe to suggest a
grotesque combination of the Ptolemaic and Copernican systems, in which
the earth was the center of motion, round which the sun revolved, carrying
the planets with it.
With every improvement in their instruments, astronomers sought to
detect the annual swing of the stars. Each time that increased accuracy in
observations failed to show it, the difficulty in the way of the Copernican
system was heightened. How deep the feeling on the subject is shown by
the enthusiastic title, Copernicus Triumphans, given by Horrebow to the
paper in which, from observations by Roemer, he claimed to have detected
the swing. But, alas, critical examination showed that the supposed
inequality was produced by the varying effect of the warmth of the day and
the cold of the night upon the rate of the clock used by the observer, and not
by the motion of the earth.
Hooke, a contemporary of Newton, published an attempt to determine
the parallax of the stars, under the title of “An Attempt to Prove the Motion
of the Earth,” but his work was as great a failure as that of his predecessors.
Had it not been that the proofs of the Copernican system had accumulated
until they became irresistible, these repeated attempts might have led men

to think that perhaps, after all, Ptolemy and the ancients were somehow in
the right.
The difficulty was magnified by the philosophic views of the period. It
was supposed that Nature must economize in the use of space as a farmer
would in the use of valuable land. The ancient astronomers correctly placed
the sphere of the stars outside that of the planets, but did not suppose it far
outside. That Nature would squander her resources by leaving a vacant
space hundreds of thousands of times the extent of the solar system was
supposed contrary to all probability. The actual infinity of space; the
consideration that one had only to enlarge his conceptions a little to see
spaces a thousand times the size of the solar system look as insignificant as
the region of a few yards round a grain of sand, does not seem to have
occurred to anyone.
Considerations drawn from photometry were also lost sight of, because
that art was still undeveloped. Kepler saw that the sun might well be of the
nature of a star; in fact, that the stars were probably suns. Had he and his
contemporaries known that the light of the sun was more than ten thousand
million times that of a bright star, they would have seen that it must be
placed at one hundred thousand times its present distance to shine as a
bright star. If, then, the stars are as bright as the sun, they must be one
hundred thousand times as far away, and their annual parallax would then
have been too small for detection with the instruments of the time. Such
considerations as this would have removed the real difficulty.
The efforts to discover stellar parallax were, of course, still continued.
Bradley, about 1740, made observations on γ Draconis, which passed the
meridian near his zenith, with an instrument of an accuracy before
unequalled. He thus detected an annual swing of 20″ on each side of the
mean. But this swing did not have the right phase to be due to the motion of
the earth; the star appeared at one or the other extremity of its swing when it
should have been at the middle point, and vice versa. What he saw was
really the effect of aberration, depending on the ratio of the velocity of the
earth in its orbit to the velocity of light. It proved the motion of the earth,
but in a different way from what was expected. All that Bradley could prove
was that the distances of the stars must be hundreds of thousands of times
that of the sun.

An introductory remark on the use of the word parallax may preface a
statement of the results of researches now to be considered.
In a general way, the change of apparent direction of an object arising
from a change in the position of an observer is termed parallax. More
especially, the parallax of a star is the difference of its direction as seen
from the sun and from that point of the earth’s orbit from which the
apparent direction will be changed by the greatest amount. It is equal to the
angle subtended by the radius of the earth’s orbit, as seen from the star. The
simplest conception of an arc of one second is reached by thinking of it as
the angle subtended by a short line at a distance of two hundred and six
thousand times its length. To say that a star has a parallax of 1″ would
therefore be the same thing as saying that it was at a distance of a little
more than two hundred thousand times that of the earth from the sun. A
parallax of one-half a second implies a distance twice as great; one of one-
third, three times as great. A parallax of 0″20 implies a distance of more
than a million times that of our unit of measure.
The first conclusive result as to the extreme minuteness of the parallax
of the brighter stars was reached by Struve, at Dorpat, about 1830. In the
high latitude of Dorpat the right ascension of a star can be determined with
great precision, not only at the moment of its transit over the meridian, but
also at transit over the meridian below the pole, which occurs twelve hours
later. He, therefore, selected a large group of stars which could be observed
twice daily in this way at certain times of the year, and made continuous
observations on them through the year. It was not possible, by this method,
to certainly detect the parallax of any one star. What was aimed at was to
determine the limit of the average parallax of all the stars thus observed.
The conclusion reached was that this limit could not exceed one-tenth of a
second and that the average distance of the group could not, therefore, be
much less than two million times the distance of the sun; if, perchance,
some stars were nearer than this, others were more distant.
By a singular coincidence, success in detecting stellar parallax was
reached by three independent investigators almost at the same time,
observing three different stars.
To Bessel is commonly assigned the credit of having first actually
determined the parallax of a star with such certainty as to place the result

beyond question. The star having the most rapid proper motion on the
celestial sphere, so far as known to Bessel, was 61 Cygni, which is,
however, only of the fifth magnitude. This rapid motion indicated that it
was probably among the stars nearest to us, much nearer, in fact, than the
faint stars by which it is surrounded.
After several futile attempts, he undertook a series of measurements
with a heliometer, the best in his power to make, in August, 1837, and
continued them until October, 1838. The object was to determine, night
after night, the position of 61 Cygni, relative to certain small stars in its
neighborhood. Then he and his assistant, Sluter, made a second series,
which was continued until 1840. All these observations showed
conclusively that the star had a parallax of about 0″.35.
While Bessel was making these observations, Struve, at Dorpat, made a
similar attempt upon Alpha Lyræ. This star, in the high northern latitude of
Dorpat, could be accurately observed throughout almost the entire year. It is
one of the brightest stars near the Pole and has a sensible proper motion.
There was, therefore, reason to believe it among the nearest of the stars. The
observations of Struve extended from 1835 to August, 1838, and were,
therefore, almost simultaneous with the observations made by Bessel on 61
Cygni. He concluded that the parallax of Alpha Lyræ was about one-fourth
of a second. Subsequent investigations have, however, made it probable that
this result was about double the true value of the parallax.
The third successful attempt was made by Henderson, of England,
astronomer at the Cape of Good Hope. He found from meridian
observations that the star Alpha Centauri had a parallax of about 1″. This is
a double star of the first magnitude, which, being only 30° from the south
celestial pole, never rises in our latitudes. Its nearness to us was indicated
not only by its magnitude, but also by its considerable proper motion.
Although subsequent investigation has shown the parallax of this body
to be less than that found by Henderson, it is, up to the time of writing, the
nearest star whose distance has been ascertained. The extreme difficulty of
detecting movements so slight as those we have described, when they take
six months to go through their phases, will be obvious to the reader. He
would be still more impressed with it when, looking through a powerful
telescope at any star, he sees how it flickers in consequence of the continual

motions going on in the air through which it is seen and how difficult it
must be to fix any point of reference from which to measure the change of
direction.
The latter is the capital difficulty in measuring the parallax. How shall
we know that a star has changed its direction by a fraction of a second in
the course of six months? There must be for this purpose some standard
direction from which we can measure.
The most certain of these standard directions is that of the earth’s axis
of rotation. It is true that this direction varies in the course of the year, but
the amount of the variation is known with great precision, so that it can be
properly allowed for in the reduction of the observations. The angle
between the direction of a star and that of the earth’s axis, the latter
direction being represented by the celestial pole, can be measured with our
meridian instruments. It is, in fact, the north polar distance of the star, or the
complement of its declination. If, therefore, the astronomer could measure
the declination of a star with great precision throughout the entire year, he
would be able to determine its parallax by a comparison of the measures.
But it is found impossible in practice to make measures of so long an arc
with the necessary precision. The uncertain and changing effect of the
varying seasons and different temperatures of day and night upon the air
and the instrument almost masks the parallax. After several attempts with
the finest instruments, handled with the utmost skill, to determine stellar
parallax from the declinations of the stars, the method has been practically
abandoned.
The method now practiced is that of relative parallax. By this method
the standard direction is that of a small star apparently alongside one whose
parallax is to be measured, but, presumably, so much farther away that it
may be regarded as having no parallax. In this assumption lies the weak
point of the method. Can we be sure that the smaller stars are really without
appreciable parallax? Until recent times it was generally supposed that the
magnitude of the stars afforded the best index to their relative distances. If
the stars were of the same intrinsic brilliancy, the amount of light received
from them would, as already pointed out, have been inversely as the square
of the distance. Although there was no reason to suppose that any such
equality really existed, it would still remain true that, in the general average,
the brighter stars must be nearer to us than the fainter ones. But when the

proper motions of stars came to be investigated, it was found that the
amount of this motion afforded a better index to the distance than the
magnitude did.
The diversity of actual or linear motion is not so wide as that of
absolute brilliancy. Stars have, therefore, in recent times, been selected for
parallax very largely on account of their proper motion, without respect to
their brightness. It is now considered quite safe to assume that the small
stars without proper motion are so far away that their parallax is insensible.
Ever since the time of Bessel the experience of practical astronomers
has tended toward the conclusion that the best instrument for delicate
measurements like these is the heliometer. This is an equatorial telescope of
which the object glass is divided along a diameter into two semicircles,
which can slide along each other. Each half of the object glass forms a
separate image of any star at which the telescope may be pointed. By
sliding the two halves along each other, the images can be brought together
or separated to any extent. If there are two stars in proximity, the image of
one star made by one-half of the glass can be brought into coincidence with
that of the other star made by the other half. The sliding of the two halves to
bring about this coincidence affords a scale of measurement for the angular
distance of the two stars.
The most noteworthy forward steps in improving the heliometer are
due to the celebrated instrument-makers of Hamburg, the Messrs. Repsold,
aided by the suggestions of Dr. David Gill, astronomer at the Cape of Good
Hope. The latter, in connection with his coadjutor, Elkin, made an equally
important step in the art of managing the instrument and hence in
determining the parallax of stars. The best results yet attained are those of
these two observers and of Peter, of Germany.
Yet more recently, Kapteyn, of Holland, has applied what has seemed
to be the unpromising method of differences of right ascension observed
with a meridian circle. This method has also been applied by Flint, at
Madison, Wis. Through the skill of these observers, as well as that of
Brünnow and Ball, in applying the equatorial telescope to the same
purposes, the parallax of nearly 100 stars has been measured with some
approach to precision.

A rival method to that of the heliometer has been discovered in the
photographic telescope. The plan of this instrument, and its application to
such purposes as this, are extremely simple. We point a telescope at a star
and set the clock-work going, so that the telescope shall remain pointed as
exactly as possible in the direction of the star. We place a sensitized plate in
the focus and leave it long enough to form an image both of the particular
star in view and of all the stars around it. The plate being developed, we
have a permanent record of the relative positions of the stars which can be
measured with a suitable instrument at the observer’s leisure. The
advantage of the method consists in the great number of stars which may be
examined for parallax, and in the rapidity with which the work can be done.
The earliest photographs which have been utilized in this way are those
made by Rutherfurd in New York during the years 1860 to 1875. The plates
taken by him have been measured and discussed principally by Rees and
Jacoby, of Columbia University. Before their work was done, however,
Pritchard, of Oxford, applied the method and published results in the case
of a number of stars.
One of the pressing wants of astronomy at the present time is a
parallactic survey of the heavens for the purpose of discovering all the stars
whose parallax exceeds some definable limit, say 0″1. Such a survey is
possible by photography, and by that only. A commencement, which may
serve as an example of one way of conducting the survey, has been made by
Kapteyn on photographic negatives taken by Donner at Helsingfors.
These plates cover a square in the Milky Way about two degrees on the
side, extending from 35° 50′ in declination to 36° 50′, and from 20h. 1m. in
R. A. to 20h. 10m. 24s. Three plates were used, on each of which the image
of each star is formed twelve times. Three of the twelve impressions were
made at the epoch of maximum parallactic displacement, six at the
minimum six months later, and three at the following maximum. The
parallaxes found on the plates can only be relative to the general mean of all
the other stars, and must therefore be negative as often as positive. The
following positive parallaxes, amounting to 0″1, came out with some
consistency from the measures:

Star, Mag. R.A. Dec. Par.
B. D., 8.6 20h., +35°.5 +0″.11

3972 2m.
0s.
Star, Mag. R.A. Dec. Par.
B. D., 7.1 20h., +36°.1 +0″.18
3883 2m.
3s.
Star, Mag. R.A. Dec. Par.
B. D., 9.2 20h., +35°.4 +0″.10
4003 4m.
58s.
Star, Mag. R.A. Dec. Par.
B. D., 7.0 20h., +36°.3 +0″.10
3959 9m.
14s.

Against these are to be set negative parallaxes of -0″.09, -0″.08 and
several a little smaller, which are certainly unreal.
The presumption in favor of the actuality of one or more of the above
positive values, which is created by their excess over the negative values, is
offset by the following considerations: The area of the entire sky is more
than 40,000 square degrees, or 10,000 times the area covered by the
Helsingfors plates. We cannot well suppose that there are 1,000 stars in the
sky with a parallax of 0″.10, or more without violating all the probabilities
of the case. The probabilities of the case are therefore against even one star
with such a parallax being found on the plates. Yet the cases of these four
stars are worthy of further examination, if any of them are found to have a
sensible proper motion.
On an entirely different plan is a survey just concluded by Chase with
the Yale heliometer. It includes such stars having an annual proper motion
of 0″.05 or more as had not already been measured for parallax. The results,
in statistical form, are these:

2 stars have parallaxes between +9″.20 and +0″.25.
6 stars have parallaxes between +0″.15 and +0″.20.
11 stars have parallaxes between +0″.10 and +0″.15.
24 stars have parallaxes between +0″.05 and +0″.10.

34 stars have parallaxes between +0″.00 and +0″.05.
8 stars have parallaxes between -0″.05 and 0″.00.
5 stars have parallaxes between -0″.10 and -0″.05.
2 stars have parallaxes between -0″.15 and -0″.10.
92, total number of stars.

It will be understood that the negative parallaxes found for fifteen of
these stars are the result of errors of observation. Assuming that an equal
number of the smaller positive values are due to the same cause, and
subtracting these thirty stars from the total number, we shall have sixty-two
stars left of which the parallax is real and generally amounts to 0″.05, more
or less. The two values approximating to 0″.25 seem open to little doubt.
We might say the same of the six next in the list. The first two belong to the
stars 54 Piscium and Weisse, 17h., 322.

DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE.

THE MEETINGS OF THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science has a
membership ranging from 1,900 to 2,000. Of this number probably at no
one time was there an aggregate of 300 persons present at the recent annual
meeting in New York.
When the Association meets in an Eastern city the attendance is
generally twice if not three times as large as when it convenes in the West.
So little was made of the recent meeting, locally or officially, that an
intelligent resident of the city remarked: “Why, I intended to have attended
some of the meetings, but seeing no reference in the daily papers, it entirely
escaped my mind.”
Of the 2,000 members, about 800 are fellows; the 1,200 and more
registered as members are, presumably, persons devoting little or no time to
independent research along scientific lines, but persons who while not
actively so engaged are more than ordinarily interested in the discussion of
scientific topics. These have in the past paid dues and attended the meetings
of the Association with more or less regularity. It is a question in the minds
of some of the 1,200 if their attendance at the meetings is desired. Their
membership, so far as it relates to the five dollars initiation fee and three
dollars dues, is without question acceptable, and to persons reading papers
in the various sections their presence is preferable to empty seats, but in
view of the fact that during recent years the management of the Association
has eliminated, so far as possible, the popular features of the general
programme, the question is reasonably asked: “Does the management desire
the attendance of the 1,200, or is their financial support all that is desired?”

It was stated some years ago that the purpose of the Association was to
furnish not only an occasion for scientists to present original papers, but
also to interest the public by holding the meetings annually in different parts
of the country; but if attendance is not secured (by preparation and
publication of interesting features of a programme) no great interest will be
awakened by a meeting held in any part of the country.
I should like to suggest the following ways of increasing the interest of
the meetings:
The general daily sessions might be made occasions of rare interest by
the introduction of prominent men of science who would make at least brief
remarks. This would make it possible for those who have limited time to
become familiar with the faces of those whom they would like to know, and
the little ‘sample’ of scientific thought thrown out would doubtless awaken
desire for more.
It will be objected that the meetings of the council immediately
preceding the general session prevent holding an official meeting at that
hour. The public and the 1,200 would care little whether the session were
official or unofficial so it were interesting and instructive.
The officers of the several sections could easily secure distinguished
representatives of their respective sciences to give brief addresses followed
by discussion, and thus the morning hour would prove an attraction to
citizens and others who might be unable to attend the sessions following.
Again, citizens, where the meetings are held, would be pleased to
provide excursions to points of local interest and extend social courtesies, if
they were given in return the mental food in digestible form, with which the
Association is so amply supplied.
It remains with the management to decide whether attendance shall be
restricted to the few actively engaged in scientific pursuits, or whether it
shall include the 1,200 and more who would be glad to avail themselves of
the benefits of a programme suited to average scholarship and intellectual
capacity.
There is no better medium for discussion of the above views than
through the widely read pages of The Popular Science Monthly.
M. E. D. Trowbridge.

Detroit, Mich.

[The questions brought up by our correspondent have been carefully
considered by all those who are interested in the American Association for
the Advancement of Science. When the Association was founded fifty years
ago there was no division into sections; the papers and discussions were
intelligible and interesting to all members. At that time there were but few
members, the scientific life of the country was small, and it was a privilege
for a city to entertain the Association. But fifty years have brought changes
in many directions. Specialization in science has become essential for its
further progress, and it has been necessary to divide the Association into
numerous sections and to found special societies. Hospitality can now only
be provided at great expense, and Eastern cities no longer regard it as a
privilege to entertain the numerous societies that gather within their hotels.
The newspapers do not regard a meeting of the Association as an important
event and will not devote space to it.
The Association must do the best it can to adapt itself to existing
conditions. The recent meeting in New York had perhaps the largest
attendance of scientific men of any in the history of the Association with the
exception of the anniversary meeting two years ago, but New York City,
especially in the month of June, is not a desirable place for social functions.
It is not reasonable for a member interested in science as an amateur to
expect to purchase for three dollars a week’s entertainment. His dues secure
reduced railway and hotel rates; he can meet his friends and become
acquainted with scientific men; he can always find on the programme
papers that are of interest; he receives the annual volume of ‘Proceedings’
and the weekly journal, ‘Science,’ the cost of which is five dollars per year.
But apart from these direct returns, he is surely repaid for membership by
knowing that he is one of those who are united for the advancement of
science in America.—Editor, Popular Science Monthly.]

THE COLOR RED.

To the Editor of The Popular Science Monthly: Mr. Havelock Ellis,
in your August number, in ‘The Psychology of Red,’ says, ‘A great many
different colors are symbolical of mourning ... but so far as I am aware, red
never.’ The following may possibly be of interest in this connection:
“Our English Pliny, Bartholomew Glantville, who says after Isydorus,
‘Reed clothes ben layed upon deed men in remembrance of theyr hardynes
and boldnes, whyle they were in theyr bloudde.’ On which his
commentator, Batman, remarks: ‘It appereth in the time of the Saxons that
the manner over their dead was a red cloath, as we now use black. The red
of valiauncie, and that was over kings, lords, knights and valyaunt
souldiers; white over cleargie men, in token of their profession and honest
life, and over virgins and matrons.’”—(Dr. Furness’s Variorum. Merchant
of Venice, p. 56.)
Chas. E. Dana.
University of Pennsylvania.

SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE.

MENTAL AUTOMATISM.

A recent work by Prof. Th. Flournoy, entitled ‘Des Indes à la Planète
G
Mars,’ contains an account of a remarkable case of mental automatism, or
sub-conscious personality. The subject is a young woman of about thirty
years, apparently in good health, but always of a nervous and imaginative
type. She developed tendencies towards lapses of consciousness,
hallucinations and automatic actions; and these developed later, under the
inspiration of spiritualistic séances, into a series of cycles, or automatic
dramas, in which the medium speaks or writes and acts under the influence
of several diverse subordinate personalities. In one of these cycles—which,
it must be understood, are continued from one sitting to another, although in
her intermediate normal life she knows nothing of what she has said or done
in the trance—she becomes Marie Antoinette, and is said to act the part
with unusual dramatic skill. In another and far more elaborate cycle the
scene is transferred to the planet Mars, and the houses, scenery, plants and
animals, peoples, customs and goings-on of the planet are described;
sketches are made, and reproduced in the volume, of these extra-mundane
appearances. Still more remarkable is the appearance of the Martian
language, which in successive séances the subject hears, speaks, sees before
her in space, and, in the end, even writes. From the mystery of Mars we are
taken to the equally mysterious Hindu cycle; here the medium becomes an
Indian princess of the fifteenth century, reveals her history and that of her
associates in the Oriental life, tells of herself as Simandini; of Sivrouka, her
prince, who reigned over Kanara and built in 1401 the fortress of
Tschandraguiri. Wonderful to relate, these names are not fictitious, but are
mentioned by one De Marlès in a volume published in 1828; the author,
however, does not enjoy a high reputation as a historian. When occasional

utterances of the Hindu princess are taken down, they are found in part to
have close resemblance to Sanskrit words; while in her normal condition
the medium is as ignorant of Sanskrit as she is of any language except
French, and is entirely ignorant of both De Marlès and the people of India
five hundred years ago. Surely this is a tale, bristling with mystery and
improbability, which, if told carelessly or with a purpose, we should dismiss
as a willful invention! M. Flournoy has been unusually successful in
revealing the starting points of the several automatisms and of connecting
them with intelligible developments of the medium’s mental life; and the
manifestations, though they remain as remarkable examples of unconscious
memory and elaboration of ideas, nowhere transcend these limitations. The
sketches of Martian scenery are clearly Japanesque or vaguely Oriental; the
Martian language is pronounced an ‘infantile’ production, and is clearly
modeled after the French, the characters being the result of an attempt to
make them as oddly different from our own as possible; the Sanskrit goes
no farther than what one could get from a slight acquaintance with a
Sanskrit grammar; and while there is a copy of De Marlès in the Geneva
Library (where the medium lives), no connection can be established
between either De Marlès or the grammar and the subject of this study.
Most of this knowledge of these remarkable sub-conscious states would
have been impossible were it not for ‘spirit control’ of one Leopold, who, in
accordance with the doctrine of reincarnation which permeates the several
cycles, was in his life the famous Cagliostro. By suitable suggestion,
Leopold can be induced to make the entranced subject speak, write, draw,
or interpret her strange messages from other worlds; and where Leopold
says ‘nay’ all progress is stopped. This case has many analogies with other
cases that have been recorded, but goes beyond most of them in the
complexity and bizarre character of the unconscious elaborations and in the
feats of memory and creative imagination which it entails. These
accomplishments, it should be well understood, never appeared suddenly or
fully developed, but only after a considerable period of subliminal
preparation, and then only hesitatingly, and little by little, just as is the case
with the acquisitions of normal consciousness; and all these acquisitions
bear unmistakable marks of belonging to the same person. The special value
of this account thus lies in the accuracy of the description and the success
with which the account has been made thoroughly intelligible and
significant.

G
The book has just been published by the Harpers in an
English version, under the title ‘She Lived in Mars.’

THE MOSQUITOES OF THE UNITED STATES.

Dr. L. O. Howard, the entomologist of the United States Department of
Agriculture, has just published a bulletin entitled, “Notes on the Mosquitoes
of the United States: Giving some Account of their Structure and Biology,
with Remarks on Remedies.” The author has, for some years, been
interested in the general subject of the biology of mosquitoes and of
remedies to be used against them, and has brought together in this bulletin
all the published and unpublished notes which he has been collecting during
this period. The bulletin contains synoptic tables of all North American
mosquitoes, prepared by Mr. D. W. Coquillett, and gives detailed facts
regarding the geographical distribution of the different species mentioned.
All the five North American genera are illustrated and full, illustrated
accounts are given of the life history of the two principal genera, Culex and
Anopheles, as studied in Culex pungens and Anopheles quadrimaculatus.
The author calls special attention to the two genera of large mosquitoes,
Psorophora and Megarhinus, and urges the importance of the study of these
two genera, especially by physicians in the South, in regard to their possible
relation to the spread of malaria. Considerable space is given to the subject
of remedies, the principal ones considered being kerosene on breeding
pools, the introduction of fish in fishless ponds, the artificial agitation of
water and general community work. It is clearly shown not only that the
mosquito may be, in many localities, readily done away with at
comparatively slight expense, but that by careful work many malarious
localities may be made healthy. The subject of mosquitoes and malaria is
not discussed in the bulletin, which contains simply references to available
papers on this subject, like the article by Dr. Patrick Manson, published in
The Popular Science Monthly for July, the aim of the author being to bring
together all available facts about the mosquitoes of the United States, in

order to assist physicians who are studying the malarial relation from the
point of view of local conditions.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.
The British, French and German Associations for the Advancement of
Science have held their annual meetings in the course of the past month. In
each of these countries and in most other European countries, as well as in
America, there are migratory scientific congresses of the same general
character. As these have grown up somewhat independently, they evidently
meet a common need. Science cannot be advanced by a man working
independently and in isolation. The printing press was essential to the
beginnings of modern science, while at the same time it was usual for the
scientific student to travel from place to place that he might learn and teach.
Then in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as the cultivation of
science became more general, royal academies were founded. The Royal
Society was established at London in 1660 under the patronage of Charles
II., the Academy of Sciences at Paris in 1666 under Louis XIV., the Royal
Academy at Berlin in 1700 under Frederick I., the Imperial Academy at St.
Petersburg in 1724 under Peter the Great, and in other cities similar
academies were founded under similar auspices. Then in the first half of the
present century, as science continued to grow, the more democratic
organizations for the advancement of science were established. The Society
of German Scientific Men and Physicians was formed, chiefly through the
efforts of Humboldt, in 1822; the Swiss Association in 1829, and the British
Association in 1831. Our own Association was established in 1847, but was
then the intergrowth of a society dating from 1840. These associations are
significant of the spread of science among all the people. Science is no
longer the concern of a few men under royal patronage, but the two great
movements of the present century—the growth of democracy and the
growth of science—have united for their common good.

* * * * *

The British Association held its annual meeting at Bradford, beginning
on September 5, under the presidency of Sir William Turner, professor of
anatomy in the University of Edinburgh. We are able to publish, from a
copy received in advance of its delivery, his presidential address, which
traces the growth during the present century of knowledge regarding
fundamental biological problems. The addresses of the presidents before the
sections are usually written in a way that can be readily understood by those
who are not specialists, and are consequently of greater interest to a general
audience than some of the corresponding addresses before the American
Association. The addresses at Bradford were: Before the section of
mathematical and physical science Dr. Joseph Larmor discussed recent
developments of physics with special reference to the extent to which
explanation can be reduced purely to description; before the section of
chemistry Prof. H. W. Perkin argued that radical changes should be made in
the methods of teaching inorganic chemistry; before the section of geology
Prof. W. J. Sollas spoke of the development of the earth, including the
different critical periods in its history; before the section of zoölogy Dr.
R. H. Traquair chose as his subject the bearing of fossil fishes on the
doctrine of descent; before the section of geography Sir George Robertson
considered certain geographical aspects of the British Empire and the
changes brought about by improved means of intercommunication; before
the section of economic science and statistics Major P. G. Craigie spoke of
the use of statistics in agriculture; before the section of mechanical science
Sir Alexander Binnie traced the historical development of science; before
the section of anthropology Prof. John Rhys dealt with the ethnology of the
British Isles, with special reference to language and folk-lore; before the
section of botany Prof. Sidney H. Vines reviewed the development of
botany during the present century. In addition to these addresses, evening
discourses were given by Prof. Francis Gotch on ‘Animal Electricity,’ and
by Prof. W. Stroud on ‘Range Finders.’ The usual lecture to workingmen
was given by Prof. Sylvester P. Thompson, his subject being ‘Electricity in
the Industries.’

* * * * *
Bradford is situated in the coal regions, and is an industrial center
devoted especially to the manufacture of textiles. More attention was paid

to local interests than is usual at the meetings of the American Association.
An exhibit was arranged to show the development of the elaborate fabrics
from the unwashed fleeces, and another consisting of a collection of
carboniferous fossils found in the neighborhood. A joint discussion was
arranged between the sections of zoölogy and botany on the conditions
which existed during the growth of the forests which supplied material for
the coal, and there were a number of papers devoted to the coal measures
and the fossils which they contain. Another subject connected with the
place of meeting was the report of the committee on the underground water
system in the carboniferous limestone. By the use of chemicals the course
of the underground waters has been traced, including their percolation
through rock fissures, and excursions were made to the site of the
experiments. The local industries received treatment from several sides.
Among other discussions of more than usual interest was that on ‘Ions’
before the physical section and on ‘What is a Metal?’ before the chemical
section. Features of popular interest were accounts of adventures in Asia,
Africa and the Antarctic regions, by Captain Deasy, Captain George and Mr.
Borchgrevinck, respectively, and Major Ross’s paper on ‘Malaria and
Mosquitoes.’

* * * * *
The French Association met at Paris in the month of August, with the
numerous other congresses. General Sebert, in his presidential address,
reviewed the progress of the mechanical industries during the century and
devoted the last third of his time to a discussion of international
bibliography, but without mentioning the International Catalogue which
now seems to be an accomplished fact. The secretary of the Association, in
his review of the year, devoted special attention to the joint meetings of the
British and French associations last summer at Dover and Calais. The
treasurer was able to make a report that the treasurers of other national
associations will envy. The capital is over $250,000, and the income from
all sources about $17,000, of which about $3,000 was awarded for the
prosecution of research and to defray the cost of publication of scientific
monographs. The national association for the advancement of science of
Germany—the ‘Gesellschaft deutscher Naturforscher und Aerzte’—held its
annual meeting at Aachen toward the middle of September. An account of

the proceedings has not yet reached us, but the congresses are always
largely attended and the combination of addresses of general interest, of
special papers before the numerous sections and of social functions, is
perhaps more effective than in any other society. It also appears to be a
considerable advantage for medical men and scientific men to meet
together.

* * * * *
While from the scientific point of view the present century has been
notable for the development of national associations for the advancement of
science, its latter decades have witnessed a growth of international scientific
meetings which may be expected to become dominant in the twentieth
century. There are at least one hundred congresses, having more or less
reference to science, meeting at Paris during the present summer. Perhaps
the most noteworthy of these, from the point of view of the organization of
science, is the International Association of Academies, which was
established last year at a conference held at Wiesbaden. In this Association
eighteen of the great academies of the world, including our own National
Academy of Sciences, have been united to promote the interests of science.
Literature is also included—of the eighteen academies, twelve include in
their scope both science and literature, four are devoted to science only and
two to literature only. It is planned to have a general meeting every three
years, to which each academy will send as many delegates as it regards as
desirable, though each academy will have but one vote. In the interval
between the general meetings, the business of the Association is to be
directed by a committee, on which each academy is represented. The object
of the Association is to plan and promote scientific work of international
interest which may be proposed by one of the constituent academies, and
generally to promote scientific relations between different countries. The
Royal Society has proposed the measurement, by international coöperation,
of an extended arc of the meridian in the interior of Africa.

* * * * *
The International Congress of Physics marked an advance owing to the
fact that it met for the first time this year, and it appears that the
proceedings were of unusual interest. This was in a large measure due to the

arrangements of the French Physical Society, which did not simply make up
a programme from a mass of heterogeneous researches, but secured some
eighty reports on the present condition of physical science. These were
prepared by many of the leading physicists of the world and when
published—as they are about to be in three volumes—will set forth the
condition of the science with completeness and authority. There were in all
seven sections. In the first, which was concerned with measurement, in
addition to numerous reports several propositions were brought forward in
regard to units, which, being international in character, are specially fitted
for discussion at such a congress. As the members, however, were not in
most cases delegates from governments and scientific bodies, no definite
action was taken, though some recommendations were made. The
decimalization of time was not recommended, nor was the proposal to give
a name to units of velocity and acceleration. It was, however, decided that
the ‘Barrie’ be adopted as the unit of pressure. The other sections were for
mechanical physics, for optics, for electricity, for magneto-optics and radio-
activity, for cosmical physics and for biological physics. Among the reports
and papers of commanding interest only two can be mentioned—the
introductory address by M. Poincaré, discussing the relations between
experimental and mathematical physics, and one by Lord Kelvin on the
waves produced in an elastic solid traversed by a body acting on it by
attraction or repulsion, in which, from a strictly mathematical point of view,
he advanced the hypothesis of a movable atom surrounded by an
immovable ether. In addition to various receptions, a session was held at the
Sorbonne, where Messrs. Becquerel and Curie gave demonstrations with
radio-active substances, and one at the Ecole Polytechnique, where
President Cornu showed apparatus which had been used in the
determination of the velocity of light. At the close of the congress the
foreign secretaries placed a crown on the tomb of Fresnel.

* * * * *
While a physical congress was meeting at Paris this year for the first
time, the Geological Congress, which was one of the first international
congresses to be organized, held its eighth session, beginning on August 16.
America, in spite of the number and importance of the inventions it has
given to the world, has not as yet done its share for the advancement of

physical science, but in geology it occupies a foremost place. It was natural,
therefore, that while American physicists were scarcely represented on the
programme of the Physical Congress, they occupied a prominent place on
the programme of geological papers. Among the three hundred members
present, the representation from America included Messrs. Stevenson,
Hague, Osborn, Ward, Willis, White, Cross, Scott, Todd, Kunz, Choquette,
Adams, Mathew and Rice, and they presented a number of the more
important papers. M. Karpinsky, the retiring president, gave the opening
address, which was followed by an address of welcome by M. Gaudry, the
president of the congress. A geological congress can offer special attractions
in the way of excursions, and these were admirably arranged on the present
occasion—both the shorter excursions to the classic horizons in the
neighborhood of Paris and the more extended ones that followed the close
of the meeting. The guide for the twenty long excursions and numerous
shorter trips, prepared by the leading French geologists, was an elaborately
illustrated volume representing the present condition of our knowledge of
French geology. The ninth geological congress will be held at Vienna three
years hence.

* * * * *
The International Congress of Mathematics met for the second time at
Paris, though there had been a preliminary meeting on the occasion of the
Chicago Exposition. There were about two hundred and twenty-five
mathematicians in attendance, including seventeen from the United States.
M. Poincaré presided, and the vice-presidents, some of whom were not
present, were Messrs. Czuber, Gordon, Greenhill, Lindelöf, Lindemann,
Mittag-Leffler, Moore, Tikhomandritzky, Volterra, Zeuthen and Geiser. The
sections and their presiding officers were as follows: (1) Arithmetic and
Algebra: Hilbert; (2) Analysis: Painlevé; (3) Geometry: Darboux; (4)
Mechanics and Mathematical Physics: Larmor; (5) Bibliography and
History: Prince Roland Bonaparte; (6) Teaching and Methods: Cantor.
Valuable papers were presented by M. Cantor on works and methods
concerned with the history of mathematics, by Professor Hilbert on the
future problems of mathematics and by Professor Mittag-Leffler on an
episode in the life of Weierstrass, but the programme appears to have been
not very full nor particularly interesting. Time was found for a half-day’s

discussion of a universal language, but not to carry into effect the plans
begun at Zurich three years ago for a mathematical bibliography. The next
congress will meet four years hence in Germany, probably at Baden-Baden.

* * * * *
The untimely death of James Edward Keeler, director of the Lick
Observatory, is a serious blow to astronomy and to science. Born at La
Salle, Ill., forty-three years ago, he was educated at the Johns Hopkins
University and in Germany. When only twenty-one years old he observed
the solar eclipse of 1878, and drew up an excellent report. Three years later
he was a member of the expedition to Mt. Whitney under Professor
Langley, whose assistant he had become at the Allegheny Observatory, and
whose bolometric investigations owe much to him. He became astronomer
at the Lick Observatory while it was in course of erection, and in 1891 he
succeeded Professor Langley as director of the Allegheny Observatory. He
was called to the directorship of the great Lick Observatory in 1898.
Keeler’s work in astrophysics, including his photographs of the spectra of
the red stars and his spectroscopic proof of the meteoric constitution of
Saturn’s rings, demonstrated what he could accomplish at a small
observatory unfavorably situated. At Mt. Hamilton he was able in the
course of only two years to organize thoroughly the work of the
Observatory, and to adapt the Crossley reflector for his purpose, taking
photographs of the nebulæ that have never been equalled. His discovery
that most nebulæ have a spiral structure is of fundamental importance. It is
not easy to overestimate what might have been accomplished by Keeler in
the next twenty or thirty years, both by his own researches and by his rare
executive ability, for it must be remembered that his genius as an
investigator was rivaled by personal qualities which made his associates
and acquaintances his friends.

* * * * *
Henry Sidgwick, late Knightbridge professor of moral philosophy at
Cambridge, died on August 28, at the age of sixty-two years. There are
usually not many events to record in the life of a university professor, but
Sidgwick had an opportunity to prove his character when he resigned a
fellowship in Trinity College because holding it implied the acceptance of

certain theological dogmas. Liberalizing influences, however, were at work,
of which he himself was an important part, and he was later elected
honorary fellow of the same college, and in 1883 became professor of
moral philosophy in the University. Sidgwick published three large works
—‘Methods of Ethics’ (1874), ‘Principles of Political Economy’ (1883) and
‘Elements of Politics’ (1891)—in addition to a great number of separate
articles. All these works, especially the ‘Ethics,’ show an intellect to a rare
degree both subtle and scientific. There was a distinction and a personal
quality in what he wrote that made each book or essay a work of art, as well
as a contribution to knowledge. Those who knew Professor Sidgwick—and
the writer of the present note regards it as one of the fortunate
circumstances of his life that he was for several years a student under him—
realize that the qualities of the man were even more rare than those of the
author. His hesitating utterance, always ending in exactly the right word,
but represented the caution and correctness of his thought. Subtlety,
sincerity, kindliness and humor were as happily combined in his daily
conversation as in his writings. It is said that he was never ‘entrapped into
answering a question by yes or no,’ but his deeds and his influence were
positive without qualification or limitation.

* * * * *
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, who died on almost the same day as
Sidgwick, was also a writer on ethics and once a university professor, but
the life and writings of the two men present a strange contrast. Where
Sidgwick’s touch was light as an angel’s, Nietzsche trampled like a bull; the
one was the embodiment of reason, caution, consideration and kindliness,
the other represented paradox, recklessness, violence and brute force. Still
Nietzsche deserves mention here, as his ethical views, based on the
Darwinian theory of the survival of the fit, are not unlikely to be urged
hereafter by saner men, and to become an integral part of ethics when ethics
becomes a science. As a matter of fact, after resigning his professorship at
Zurich, and even while writing his remarkable books, Nietzsche suffered
from brain disease, and during the past eleven years his reason was
completely lost.

INDEX.
NAMES OF CONTRIBUTORS ARE PRINTED IN SMALL CAPITALS.

Academies, International Association of, 666.
Academy, National, Retiring President of, 219;
Work of the, 219.
Adirondacks, Birds of the, George Chahoon, 40.
Agassiz’s Investigations on Coral Islands, 103.
Agriculture, U. S. Department of, Appropriations for, 335.
Air, Liquid, 102.
Air-Ship, Count Zeppelin’s, 559.
Aluminum, How it is Made, 104.
American Association, 220;
President of the, 332;
New York Meeting of, 332;
Address of the Retiring President, 442;
President of New York Meeting, 442;
Proceedings, 443;
Officers, 446;
Meetings of the, M. E. D. Trowbridge, 660.
Animals Helping One Another, 107.
Anthropology, 217, 445.
Anthropometry, 445.
Appropriations for the U. S. Department of Agriculture, 335.
Argyll, Duke of, Death of, 223.
Assembly, International, 220.
Association, American, 220;
President of the, 332;
Address of the Retiring President, 439;
President of New York Meeting, 442;
Proceedings, 443;

Officers, 446;
Meetings of the, M. E. D. Trowbridge, 660;
British, French and German, 664.
Atkinson, Edward, Mental Energy, 632.
Atkinson’s Lessons in Botany, 215.
Automatism, Mental, 662.
Automobiles, Evolution and Present Status of, William Baxter, Jr.,
406;
Steam, 406;
Electric, 479;
Gasoline, 593.

Barisal Guns, 105.
Barnes’s Outlines of Plant Life, 215.
Baxter, Jr., William, The Evolution and Present Status of the
Automobile, Steam, 406;
Electric Automobiles, 479;
Gasoline Automobiles, 593.
Beach on the Marine Mollusca of Cold Spring Harbor, 106.
Beagle, The Fate of the, V. Marshall Law, 86.
Bertrand, Joseph, Death of, 222.
Bigelow, Frank H., The Coming Total Eclipse of the Sun, 1.
Biltz on Molecular Weights, 213.
Biographical Sketch of an Infant, Charles Darwin, 197.
Biological, Lectures from the Marine Laboratory at Wood’s Holl, 329;
Laboratories, Marine, 555.
Biologique, L’Année, 551.
Biology, 329.
Birds, as Flying Machines, Frederic A. Lucas, 473;
of the Adirondacks, George Chahoon, 40.
Blind Fishes, Structure of, 48;
Causes of Degeneration in, Carl H. Eigenmann, 397.
Boas, Franz, Religious Beliefs of the Central Eskimo, 624.
Bolton, Henry Carrington, New Sources of Light and of Röntgen
Rays, 318.
Bootblack, A Mechanical, 105.
Botanical Garden, The New York, D. T. MacDougal, 171.

Botany, 215, 328.
British Association, 664;
Address of the President before the, Sir William Turner, 561.
Bruncken’s North American Forests and Forestry, 216.
Bubble-blowing Insect, E. S. Morse, 23.
Bubonic Plague, Frederick G. Novy, 576.

Catalogue of Scientific Literature, 448, 558.
Chahoon, George, Birds of the Adirondacks, 40.
Chapman’s Bird Studies with a Camera, 440.
Character, National, and Scientific Study, Albert B. Crowe, 90.
Chemical, Fertilization, 223;
Research, Recent, Some Phases of the Earth’s Development in the
Light of, Edward Renouf, 295.
Chemistry, 213;
A Hundred Years of, F. W. Clarke, 59.
Chewing Gum Habit, Antiquity of, Robert E. C. Stearns, 549.
City, The Most Expensive in the World, Bird S. Coler, 16.
Clarke, F. W., A Hundred Years of Chemistry, 59.
Cold Spring Harbor Biological Laboratory, 556.
Coler, Bird S., The Most Expensive City in the World, 16.
Collier, James, Colonies and the Mother Country, 139, 248, 390.
Colonies and the Mother Country, James Collier, 139, 248, 390.
Color, Red, Charles E. Dana, 661.
Congresses of the Paris Exposition, 537.
Conway, Sir Martin, on the Bolivian Andes, 439.
Coral Islands, Agassiz’s Investigations on, 103.
Crazes, Psychology of, G. T. W. Patrick, 285.
Cytology, 330.

Dana, Chas. E., The Color Red, 661.
Darwin, Charles, A Biographical Sketch of an Infant, 197.
Davenport’s Elementary Zoölogy, 440.
Davis, W. M., The Physical Geography of the Lands, 157.
Deaths, 108, 222, 335, 667.
Degeneration in Blind Fishes, Causes of, Carl H. Eigenmann, 397.
Dugmore on Bird Homes, 441.

Earth’s Developments, Some Phases of, in the Light of Recent
Chemical Research, Edward Renouf, 295.
Eclipse, 224, 560;
Total, of the Sun, Frank Bigelow, 1;
Solar of May 28, 1900, S. P. Langley, 302.
Education, 331;
Technical, in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, G. F. Swain,
257;
in the United States, 331;
Higher, for Colored Youth, Andrew F. Hilyer, 436.
Educational, and Scientific Institutions of New York City, 333;
Association, the National, 447.
Eigenmann, Carl H., The Structure of Blind Fishes, 48;
Causes of Degeneration in Blind Fishes, 397.
Eliot, C. W., Legislation against Medical Discovery, 436.
Elliott and Ferguson’s Qualitative Analysis, 213.
Ellis on the Analysis of White Paints, 213.
Ellis, Havelock, Psychology of Red, 365, 517.
Endowment of American Universities, 333.
Energy, Mental, Edward Atkinson, 632.
Engine, The Human Body as an, E. B. Rosa, 491.
Eskimo, Central, Religious Beliefs of the, Franz Boas, 624.
Ewart’s Penycuik Experiments, 126.
Expenditure of the Working Classes, Henry Higgs, 527.

Farm Homes for City Children, 106.
Fauna, Cave, of North America, 446.
Fayerweather Bequest, 558.
Fertilization, Chemical, 223.
Fiction and Science, 324, 336.
Fishes, Blind, Structure of, Carl H. Eigenmann, 48;
Causes of Degeneration in, Carl H. Eigenmann, 397.
Flournoy’s Des Indes à la Planète Mars, 662.
Flying Machines, Birds as, Frederic A. Lucas, 473.
French Association for the Advancement of Science, 664.

Gas and Gas Meters, Hubert S. Wynkoop, 179.
Gasoline Automobiles, William J. Baxter, Jr., 593.
Geography, 439;
Physical, of the Lands, W. M. Davis, 157.
Geologic Time, Rhythms and, G. K. Gilbert, 339.
Geology, 439;
International Congress of, 666.
German Association for the Advancement of Science, 664.
Gibbs, Wolcott, Portrait of, 114;
Works of, 219.
Gilbert, G. K., Rhythms and Geologic Time, 339.
Gilbert, G. K., Portrait of, 226;
Work of, 332;
on Recent Earth Movements, 439.
Greatness, Comparative Longevity and, Joseph Jastrow, 206.
Greely, A. W., Scientific Results of the Norwegian Polar Expedition,
420.
Groff, George C., The Conquest of the Tropics, 540.

Haddon, A. C., Expedition to Torres Straits, 217.
Haffkine, W. M., Preventive Inoculation, 115, 240.
Higgs, Henry, Expenditure of the Working Classes, 527.
Hilyer, Andrew F., Higher Education of Colored Youth, 436.
Hollick on Geological Formations and Forests in New Jersey, 107.
Homes, Farm, for City Children, 106.
Howard on the Mosquitoes of the United States, 663.
Huggins’s Atlas of Representative Stellar Spectra, 552.
Human Body as an Engine, E. B. Rosa, 491.
Humiliating Situation, 100.
Hydrogen, Solidification of, 223.

Importation of Animals, Legislation regarding, 560.
Infant, A Biographical Sketch of an, Charles Darwin, 197.
Ingle’s Chemistry of Fire and Fire Prevention, 214.
Inoculation, Preventive, W. M. Haffkine, 115, 240.
Insect, Bubble-blowing, E. S. Morse, 23.

International Assembly, 220.

Jackson’s Glossary of Botanical Terms, 328.
Jacoby, Harold, The Sun’s Destination, 191.
Jastrow, Joseph, Comparative Longevity and Greatness, 206;
The Modern Occult, 449.
Jesup, North Pacific Expedition, 217.
Jones, H. C., Theory of Electrolytic Dissociation, 213.

Keane on Man, Past and Present, 218.
Keeler, James Edward, Death of, 667.
Keeler’s Bird Notes Afield, 215;
Our Native Trees, 328.
Kingsley’s Vertebrate Zoölogy, 214.
Kite Flying, Scientific, 559.

Laboratory, National Physical, 221.
Lange’s Chemische-technische Untersuchungsmethoden, 214.
Langley, S. P., Solar Eclipse of May 28, 1900, 302.
Law, International, and the Peace Conference, James Harris Vickery,
76.
Law, V. Marshall, The Fate of the Beagle, 86.
Legislation, against Medical Discovery, C. W. Eliot, 436;
regarding the Importation of Animals, 560.
Light, New Sources of, and of Röntgen Rays, Henry Carrington
Bolton, 310.
Liquid Air, 102.
Longevity, Comparative, and Greatness, Joseph Jastrow, 206.
Lounsberry’s Guide to the Trees, 216.
Lucas, Frederic A., Birds as Flying Machines, 473.

McCarthy on Familiar Fish, 553.
MacDougal, D. T., The New York Botanical Garden, 171.
MacDougal’s Nature and Work of Plants, 216.
McMillan’s Electro-metallurgy, 214.
Malaria, and the Malarial Parasite, Patrick Manson, 310;
and Mosquitoes, 336.
Manson, Marsden, Mount Tamalpais, 69.

Manson, Patrick, Malaria and the Malarial Parasite, 310.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Technical Education in, G. F.
Swain, 257.
Mathematical Physics, 327.
Meat, Diseased, in Paris, 104.
Mental Energy, Edward Atkinson, 632.
Milne-Edwards, Alphonse, Death of, 222.
Mineral Industry, 214.
Mivart, St. George, Death of, 223.
Mongols, Modern, F. L. Oswald, 618.
Morse, E. S. A Bubble-blowing Insect, 23.
Mosquitoes, and Malaria, 336;
of the United States, 663.

National Academy, Retiring President of, 219;
Work of the, 219.
Negro, The, since the Civil War, N. S. Shaler, 29;
Future of, in the United States, N. S. Shaler, 147.
Nietzsche, Frederick, Death of, 668.
Novy, Frederick G., The Bubonic Plague, 576.
Newcomb, Simon, Chapters on the Stars, 227, 376, 500, 638.
Newton’s Dictionary of Birds, 215.
New York Botanical Garden, D. T. MacDougal, 171.
North’s Catalogue of the Nests and Eggs of the Birds of Australia, 215.
Norwegian Polar Expedition, Scientific Results of the, A. W. Greely,
420.

Occult, The Modern, Joseph Jastrow, 449.
Ornithology, 440.
Oswald, F. L., Modern Mongols, 618.

Paget on Experiments on Animals, 553.
Parasite, Malarial, and Malaria, Patrick Manson, 310.
Paris Exposition and its Congresses, 557.
Parker and Haswell’s Manual of Zoölogy, 214.
Parker’s Practical Zoölogy, 215.
Patrick, G. T. W., Psychology of Crazes, 285.

Peace Conference and International Law, James Harris Vickery, 76.
Pearson’s Grammar of Science, 550.
Penycuik Experiments, Professor Ewart’s, 126.
Pfeffer’s Plant Physiology, 216.
Photographing Live Fishes, 106.
Photography of Sound Waves, R. W. Wood, 354.
Physical Geography of the Lands, W. M. Davis, 157.
Physical Laboratory, National, 221.
Physics, Mathematical, 327;
International Congress of, 666.
Pitt-Rivers, Sir Fox-Lane, Death of, 335.
Plague, Bubonic, Frederick G. Novy, 576.
Pneumatic Dispatch Tubes, 103.
Poetry and Science, L. W. Smith, 546.
Polar Expedition, Norwegian, Scientific Results of the, A. W. Greely,
420.
Preventive Inoculation, W. M. Haffkine, 115, 240.
Promotion of Men of Science, 221.
Psychology, of Crazes, G. T. W. Patrick, 285;
of Red, Havelock Ellis, 365, 517.

Quantitative Study of Variation, 445.

Radio-active Substances, 558.
Rayleigh, Lord, Scientific Papers, 327.
Red, Psychology of, Havelock Ellis, 365, 517;
The Color, Chas. E. Dana, 661.
Reform, School, 210.
Religious Belief of the Central Eskimo, Franz Boas, 624.
Renouf, Edward, Some Phases of the Earth’s Development in the Light
of Recent Chemical Research, 295.
Research Work and Courses of Instruction, 556.
Reynolds, Osborne, Papers on Mechanical and Physical Subjects, 328.
Rhythms and Geologic Time, G. K. Gilbert, 339.
Roe, William J. Some Scientific Principles of Warfare, 605.
Röntgen Rays, New Sources of Light, and, Henry Carrington Bolton,
310.

Rosa, E. B., The Human Body as an Engine, 491.
Rydberg’s Flora of Montana and the Yellowstone Park, 329.

School Reform, 210.
Science, Study and National Character, Albert B. Crowe, 90;
and Fiction, 324, 336;
and Poetry, L. W. Smith, 546.
Scientific, Societies, Meetings of, 333;
and Educational Institutions of New York City, 333;
Literature, International Catalogue of, 448, 558.
Shaler, N. S., The Negro since the Civil War, 29;
The Future of the Negro in the United States, 147.
Sharp, David, on Insects, 215.
Sharpe, R. Bowdler, Nomenclature Avium, 215.
Shelley’s Birds of Africa, 215.
Sidgwick, Henry, Death of, 668.
Smith on the Teaching of Elementary Mathematics, 550.
Smith, L. W., Poetry and Science, 546.
Solar Eclipse, 224, 560, Frank H. Bigelow, 1;
of May 28, 1900, S. P. Langley, 302.
Solidification of Hydrogen, 220.
Sound Waves, Photography of, R. W. Wood, 354.
Spencer and Gillen on the Native Tribes of Central Australia, 218.
Sperber’s Inorganic Chemistry, 213.
Stark, on Birds of South Africa, 215.
Stars, Chapters on the, Simon Newcomb, 227, 376, 500, 638.
State Support and Individual Gifts, 334.
Stearns, Robert E. C., Antiquity of the Chewing Gum Habit, 549.
Stokes, Sir George, Memoirs Presented to, 327.
Suess’s Das Antlitz der Erde, 551.
Summer Schools, University, 447, 556.
Sun, Total Eclipse of the, Frank H. Bigelow, 1.
Sun’s Destination, Harold Jacoby, 191.
Swain, G. F., Technical Education in the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, 257.

Taka-Diastase, 102.

Tait’s Scientific Papers, 327.
Tamalpais, Mount, Marsden Manson, 69.
Thoughts for the Times, 99.
Trowbridge, M. E. D., Meetings of the American Association, 660.
Tropics, Conquest of the, George G. Groff, 540.
Tunnels, Ventilation of, 101.
Turner, Sir William, Address of the President before the British
Association, 561.

Universities, American, Endowment of, 333.
University Summer Schools, 447.

Variation, the Quantitative Study of, 445.
Ventilation of Tunnels, 101.
Vickery, James Harris, International Law and the Peace Conference,
76.

Walcott, Charles D., Washington as Explorer and Surveyor, 323.
Walker’s Introduction to Physical Chemistry, 213.
War, Civil, The Negro since the, N. S. Shaler, 29.
Warfare, Some Scientific Principles of, William J. Roe, 605.
Washington as Explorer and Surveyor, Charles D. Walcott, 323.
Whipple on the Microscopy of Drinking Water, 554.
Wilson on the Cell, 330.
Winking, 103.
Wood, R. W., Photography of Sound Waves, 354.
Wood’s Holl Marine Biological Laboratory, 555.
Woodward, R. S., Portrait of, 338;
Work of, 442.
Working Classes, Expenditure of the, Henry Higgs, 527.
Wynkoop, Hubert S., Gas and Gas Meters, 179.

Zeppelin’s Air Ship, 559.
Zoölogy, 214, 440.

Transcribers’ Notes
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made
consistent when a predominant preference was found in
this book; otherwise they were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected;
occasional unbalanced quotation marks retained.
Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were
retained.
Text uses both “angakok” and “angakut”; both
retained.
Page 561: Footnote ‘A’ was not referenced in the
text; Transcriber attributed it to the title of the article.
Page 564: Transcriber’s transliteration of Greek text
shown in {curly braces}.
Page 575: “milkrosomen” was printed that way.
Page 577: Text uses both “Quan-si” and “Quansi”;
both retained.
Page 580: “grewsome” was printed that way.
Page 588: “where in 1861” was printed that way, but
likely is a misprint, perhaps for “1681”, as the next
paragraph says that the plague disappeared from Europe
in the eighteenth century.
Pages 601, 602: use both “Vallee” and “Vallée”; both
retained.

Page 645: “Moreever” was printed that way.
Pages 669, 672: “Wood’s Holl” was spelled that way
when this issue of the magazine was published.
Page 672: Missing page reference “76” added to
“Vickery” entry, based on examination of the May, 1900
issue.
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