374 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ainination of Part II., we are seized with 

 a violent longing to be spared from Part I. 

 Tiie special function of Part II. is to estab- 

 lish meteorological cycles and to promul- 

 gate the theory of planetary equinoxes, on 

 the strength of which Mr. Tice has made 

 predictions which have gained for him con- 

 siderable attention. It is unfortunate, how- 

 ever, for his reputation that he ever vent- 

 ured into print ; for no one can give his 

 book the most cursory examination with- 

 out detecting its unsoundness. Lack of 

 space forbids more than a brief outline of 

 Mr. Tice's theory. To point out all his 

 errors in mathematics, physics, and astron- 

 omy, his false assumptions and logical falla- 

 cies, would require several pages. 



All phenomena are periodic. " The regu- 

 lar recurrence of identical physical phenom- 

 ena is an admitted fact." Were the cycle 

 known, we could tell just when the phe- 

 nomena of the past would be repeated. 

 Mr. Tice considers the discovery of a me- 

 teorological cycle " the most clamant desid- 

 tratum of the age." The discovery (?) of 

 the Great Cycle was Mr. Tice's first step in 

 the science of meteorology. It is exactly 

 11.86 years. He claims that this is estab- 

 lished by the periodic phenomena of sun- 

 spots, magnetic storms, cyclones, earth- 

 quakes, auroras, etc., but fails to give us 

 the process of reduction. This period is 

 identical with Jupiter's year, and the infer- 

 ence is that Jupiter is the cause of the 

 cycle, which henceforth is called the Jovial 

 Cycle. The idea of associating Jupiter 

 with the eleven-year periods is not new, 

 but we supposed it had been abandoned. 



Mr. Tice's next stage is to prove that 

 the phenomena of sun-spots, cyclones, etc., 

 reach their maxima when Jupiter is at his 

 equinoxes, and, of course, once every 5.93 

 years. This proof Mr. Tice gives in full 

 with immense satisfaction, quite uncon- 

 scious of its having not even a presump- 

 tion in its favor. Finding nothing in his 

 astronomy of Jupiter's equinoxes, he as- 

 sumed that his solstitial points coincided 

 with his points of greatest and least dis- 

 tance from the sun (aphelion and perihe- 

 lion), as is the case, approximately, with 

 the earth. The same groundless and false 

 assumption is afterward made for the other 

 planets, and such reasoning Mr. Tice calls 

 " deduction from general principles " arid 



" telluric analogy." Again, at its equi- 

 noxes the earth is at its greatest distance 

 north and south of the plane of the sun's 

 equator : Mr. Tice infers that the same is 

 true of all other planets. 



Mr. Tice calculates the equinoxes of the 

 planets from their aphelia and perihelia, 

 and accounts for the disturbing force of a 

 planetary equinox on the supposition that 

 the planet at its equinox is at its greatest 

 distance from the solar equator, and hence 

 exposed to only one pole of the sun. Thus, 

 when the earth is at its vernal equinox, the 

 north pole of the sun is invisible, and we 

 are exposed to the full influence of its south 

 magnetic pole. Terrific energy is then in- 

 terchanged, disturbing both the atmosphere 

 of the earth and that of the sun. The dis- 

 turbances in the latter are communicated 

 to the other members of the solar system. 

 Similar results are produced at the autum- 

 nal equinox by the sun's north magnetic 

 pole. When at their equinoxes the other 

 planets undergo a like experience, and in- 

 directly, through the sun, we share in the 

 resulta^it electrical excitement. Such is 

 the theory, and on such foundations does 

 it rest. Historical records and the reports 

 of the weather bureaus furnish endless con- 

 firmations, for every storm finds an equinox 

 to bear the responsibility. In order to in- 

 clude all actual phenomena, the duration of 

 an equinoctial period is put at one-fourth the 

 planet's year, so that each planet spends halt" 

 its time in creating disturbances throughout 

 the solar system. 



Not the least curious feature of the book 

 is the adoption, into the family of planets, 

 of the mythical Yulcan, supposed to have 

 been discovered in 1859, and for a time 

 believed to be a real planet, lying very near 

 the sun. As nothing has been seen of it 

 for the last dozen years, this looks very 

 much like another assumption, of which, 

 indeed, there appears to be no lack througli- 

 out the book. 



Proceedings of the Seventh Annttal Ses- 

 sion OF THE American Philological 

 Association, held at Newport, K. I., July, 

 18Y5. Hartford, 1875. 



The meeting of the American Philologi- 

 cal Association, of which this pamphlet is 

 a record, was hold at Newport, R. I., from 

 July 13th to July 15th of this year. It 



