FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



425 



cal character may be of a high degree of 

 constancy in one group, while extremely va- 

 riable in another ; and characters are often 

 most constant when most adaptive. 



Hornbooks. Hornbooks those leaflets 

 containing the alphabet, the a-b-abs, a text 

 for exorcism, the Lord's Prayer, and the 

 Roman numerals, framed and covered with 

 transparent horn as with a glass with which 

 the first lessons in reading were administered 

 to our ancestors, have disappeared so entirely 

 that they are hardly known except to an- 

 tiquaries, yet they were common in England 

 down to the time of George II, and were 

 introduced into America in the seventeenth 

 century. Mr. Andrew W. Tuer, who has 

 written their history, says that the preserva- 

 tion of many of those which have come down 

 to us is due to the tricks of little boys, who 

 dropped the hateful things through cracks 

 in the floor or wainscoting, to be brought to 

 light again when the house was pulled down. 

 The earliest hornbook known to be left, 

 which is assigned to the middle of the six- 

 teenth century, was found behind the pan- 

 eling of a farmhouse. A hornbook called 

 the Middleton was discovered in 1828 in the 

 thatch of an old cottage. As spelling books 

 came more and more into use, hornbooks 

 became obsolete; and when they were no 

 longer in demand it is said that a million and 

 a half were destroyed in one warehouse. 

 They could, however, be found in use in the 

 country villages down into the present cen- 

 tury ; and there may be people still living 

 who took their first lessons from them, and 

 had scholastic chastisement administered 

 with the backs of them. As they became 

 scarce, specimens of them rose in value ; and 

 while the usual price of them had been a 

 penny, three halfpence, or twopence, a fa- 

 mous copy the Bateman Hornbook was 

 sold at auction for three hundred and twenty- 

 five dollars. This book was three inches and 

 three quarters high and two inches and seven 

 eighths wide, with a handle an inch long, and 

 was covered, except the handle, with leather. 

 The alphabet was preceded by the Cross, and 

 this was the case with most of the horn- 

 books. Hence the phrase, " criss-cross row." 

 The back was stamped with a figure of 

 Charles I, bareheaded and in armor, on 

 horseback. At the top corner and facing 



the king was a large celestial crown, issuing 

 from a cloud above his head, and in the other 

 corner an angel's face and wings. The book 

 bore other marks of less interest. Some of 

 the hornbooks were costly. Queen Eliza- 

 beth gave one of silver filigree to Lord 

 Chancellor Egerton, and others were made 

 of ivory and bone. Finally, we come to the 

 gingerbread hornbook, which seems once to 

 have been a common baker's dainty. Of it 

 Prior wrote : 



To Master John the English Maid 

 A Hornbook gives of gingerbread ; 

 And that the Child may learn the better 

 As he can name, he eats the Letter. 



Hornbooks may be seen portrayed in pic- 

 tures by the German and Dutch masters, as 

 in Rembrandt's " Christ Blessing Little Chil- 

 dren " and the works of Jan Steen and Van 

 Ostade. 



Value of " Useless " Research. The re- 

 port of the British Association's committee 

 on the establishment of a national phys- 

 ical laboratory, after referring to what is 

 done and what can be done for promoting 

 research by the universities and schools and 

 other existing institutions, specifies partic- 

 ular types of investigation which are outside 

 the range of effort possible for such institu- 

 tions or for an individual such as observa- 

 tions of natural phenomena, the study of 

 which must be protracted through periods 

 longer than the average duration of human 

 life ; testing and verification of physical in- 

 struments and preservation of standards ; and 

 the systematic and accurate determination of 

 physical constants and numerical data which 

 may be useful for scientific or industrial pur- 

 poses. In the discussion of this report. 

 Prof. Fitzgerald opposed divorcing the uni- 

 versities from research, but hoped they would 

 teach the usefulness of " useless " research, 

 while investigations of commercial impor- 

 tance should be relegated to a national lab- 

 oratory. Prof. Kohlrausch, of the Physical 

 Training Institute (the Reichsanstalt) at Ber- 

 lin, showed how completely that institution 

 was answering the purposes for which it was 

 founded, as illustrated in the great develop- 

 ment of the technical glass industry, partic- 

 ularly of thermometer-making ; the improve- 

 ment of photometers and standards for 

 measuring light ; and researches in apparatus 



