108 JOURNAL OF THE [April, 



model of twenty-five or thirty years ago. The general objec- 

 tion to American stands seems to be that they furnish more 

 mechanism than the particular worker who wrote the complaint 

 happens to require for his particular work. He makes a 

 more specific charge, however, that they have a joint in the body 

 by means of which they may be tipped out of a vertical position, 

 when the makers ought to have known that he and his pupils 

 never care to tijj their microscopes ; and another specification is 

 made of the fact that the length of the tube has not been deter- 

 mined solely with reference to the height of the table or the 

 chair which this rather exacting critic commonly employs ; — at 

 least this is the inference I draw from his demand that tubes 

 should never be made longer than suits Ids convenience. 



Now, I presume you find it as difficult as I do to understand 

 why all supposed faults are laid at the doors of American manu- 

 facturers ; for surely all bad microscopes are not American, even 

 if all American microscopes are bad. But the unreasonable and 

 sweeping denunciation in which this somewhat self-opinionated 

 iconoclast indulges is only another illustration of the familiar 

 phenomenon of blotting out all the rest of the world by holding 

 a comparatively small object close to one's eye ; for here is an 

 acknowledged expert in histology who is so completely absorbed 

 in his specialty as to be entirely oblivious to, or regardless of, 

 the instrumental needs of all other branches of microscopy. In 

 common with others who have lately made public display of 

 their ignorance of the vastness and variety of microscopical re- 

 search, he would actually prescribe " for one that uses the micro- 

 scope for real work " a single simple pattern which, as you may 

 imagine, would be pretty strictly limited to the requirements of 

 his own restricted field of investigation. Instruments which per- 

 haps meet the demands of different classes of observers are " con- 

 structed with a view of entrapping inexperienced purchasers."' 



1, It is only right to say that since these remarks were written, Dr. Minot has re- 

 plied to some of his critics by a letter, published in Science, iu which he disclaims hav- 

 ing made an exhaustive e.xamiaation of all forms of American microscopes and profes- 

 ses to have written previously " only in regard to microscopes suitable for biological 

 and particularly histological work." I feel bound to say, however, that, taking his first 

 letter by itself, the inferences I have drawn seem to me entirely justified, and I believe 

 them to be such as must have occurred to nearly every reader of that letter. It is there- 

 fore to be regretted that he did not. in the first instance, e.xereise that calnmess of 

 judgment and carefulness of expression which are incumbent upon one who makes 

 pubhc announcement of a grave opinion. But, even in reference to biological or his- 

 tological stands, he has to confess that he had overlooked the work of one of our old 

 est and best known manufacturei's, and perhaps he will now learn that there are still 

 others of whom he ought to have been informed before giving out biis all-inclusive 

 condemnation . 



