The Theory of Immersion. 223 



in plain words, which of these two he is talking of; on which of 

 them has he made up his mind, if I may so express it, to " place 

 his money "? If he takes up the common glass he is met at once 

 by the fact that, brought to the test, it would only give the pro- 

 phesied limit. Nor is this met by the suggestion that by an extra 

 twist of the collar it might have been " screwed up " a few degrees 

 more. For, where the difference professed to be attainable is so 

 immensely great, to contend about a few degrees at the enemy's 

 limit would be virtually to surrender the case before beginning it. 

 So small a margin near the wrong place has a suspicious look of an 

 approaching total disappearance so soon as the measurements are 

 correctly made ; and it was only too plain that to let the issue be 

 staked on this looked far more like pleading his adversary's cause 

 than his own. This ground, therefore, is abandoned as much too 

 dangerous to be pleasant, and the other alternative taken up. For 

 is there not the new machine, with the hemisphere in front, which 

 not only can give, but does give, more than the limit laid down, — a 

 great truth which ought not to have been " overlooked " by Mr, 

 Wenham. Here again he is met by the fact — the historical fact — 

 that it was not overlooked by him, but, on the contrary, fully deve- 

 loped ; that it was not only known to him, but put together by him 

 long ago, and put together for the very purpose of showing that in 

 this way we could get a wider angle. So this having also failed 

 he passes back to the other case, and so round the circle again. 



Here then is the dilemma which Mr. Wenham presents to Dr. 

 Woodward. There are two diflterent glasses ; which of the two are 

 you speaking of ? Which are we to understand that your theory is 

 meant for ? If the common one, then it is not true ; if the other 

 one, then it is not new : — choose for yourself on which of the two 

 horns you are to be impaled. 



But Dr. Woodward will not choose. He will answer no ques- 

 tions of the kind, and utterly declines to let his hand be forced by 

 any such unpleasant plainness. At the distance of two thousand 

 miles he cannot of course be put figuratively into a witness box and 

 forced to say which of the two he goes for. Even then he would 

 answer no doubt hke the chaplain in the Vicar of Wakefield, when 

 the squire imagined he could put him in a corner. " Come, Frank," 

 said the squire, " suppose the Church your present mistress, in lawn 

 sleeves, on one hand, and Miss Sophia here on the other, which 

 would you be for ?" But Frank was equal to the occasion. " For 

 both to be sure," cried the chaplain. Dr. Woodward likewise is for 

 both ; with the proviso always that they come on time about. Which- 

 ever you are for, he is then for the other one. 



This pleasant position, it is scarcely necessary to say, he did not 

 deliberately select. He drifted into it. And the way he drifted 

 into it was this. Appealed to by Mr. Tolles as the highest autho- 



VOL. XI. s 



