SKETCH OF SIR CHARLES WHEATSTONE. 363 



a doubtful struggle for life. This dune does not materially differ 

 from a very large number which cover the banks on the north shore 

 of Loner Island. Their source is the debris of the banks reduced to 

 sand by the action of the waves. The lighter portions of this sand 

 are carried up the slope during fierce winds, and the process is now in 

 operation during every gale. The present forests may delay, but can- 

 not arrest, the final inundation of the land where the sand-hills crown 

 the coast. In Europe the maritime pine and other species of plants 

 whose habitat is the silicious sand have not only arrested the move- 

 ment of it, but have covered immense areas of waste land with valu- 

 able forest. Our native pitch-pine, the Pinus rigida above mentioned, 

 also flourishes on the most sandy soils. There is proof that it formerly 

 grew on portions of the south beach of Long Island, where its foliage 

 was moistened by the spray of the ocean, nor does the occasional 

 overflow of the tides soon destroy it. If these trees are planted 

 abundantly over the surface of these broken hills of sand, their move- 

 ment would be delayed if not permanently arrested. The sands lie 

 motionless where the force of the wind is broken. 







SKETCH OF SIR CHAELES WHEATSTOIN'E. 



CHARLES WHEATSTONE was born in the city of Gloucester, 

 England, in 1802. In boyhood he attended a private school in his 

 native town, but, while still a lad, he quit school and devoted himself 

 to mechanical pursuits, adopting the trade of a maker of musical in- 

 struments. At about the age of twenty-oue years he went to London, 

 and there set up in business on his own account. Hei'e the young 

 tradesman evinced a strong liking for scientific research, endeavoring 

 to find out the principles involved in the various forms of musical 

 instruments. He was thus led to the study of acoustics, a branch of 

 science which he cultivated with rare success. His singular mechan- 

 ical ingenuity enabled him to repeat and extend the experimental 

 results of prior investigators, and the first fruits of his scientific re- 

 searches were communicated, in 1823, to the Annals of Philosophy^ 

 in a paper entitled " New Experiments on Sound." Other essays on 

 the phenomena of sound were published by him from time to time ; 

 thus, in 1827, he contributed to the Quarterly Journal of Science two 

 papers, the one " Experiments on Audition," the other a " Description 

 of the Kaleidophone." In 1828 he published in the same journal a 

 paper entitled " Resonances of Columns of Air ; " in 1831, " Transmis- 

 sion of Sounds through Solid Linear Conductors " {Journal of the 

 Royal Institution) ; and the same year read at the meeting of the Brit- 



