42 CORRESPONDENCE. 



" But with regard to S. gemma itself, I attach no sort of value to 

 this diatom ; and I have often wondered how such a thing ever got 

 voted into a test." * 



" Of course I used no condenser. I have always regarded that 

 article, when employed on liigh-poxijer delicate tests, as a mere opti- 

 cian's booby-trap. Its only use there is to disguise the optician's 

 faulty workmanship and to make a bad glass pass muster for a good 

 one." t 



" Indeed, I seem to myself never to have known what the word 

 definition really meant till I saw this glass (Hasert's), so beautifully 

 clear, sharp, and distinct were all the details. I certainly never saw 

 any objective that even approached it ! " ;(: 



After extracting the above from Mr. Hickie's correspondence, I 

 do not think it necessary to trouble your readers with any comments 

 on Mr. Hickie's statements, but I may just be permitted to add that, 

 although I do not doubt for a moment that Mr. Hickie may be a very 

 good mathematician, a very accurate draughtsman, or an excellent 

 German scholar, I do not consider his skill as a maniiiulator of high 

 powers to be such as he wishes the microscopical world to believe ; 

 and when next in London, Mr. Hickie will, j)erhaps, disj^lay before 

 the Eoyal Microscopical Society some of his extraordinary feats of 

 manipulative skill, giving thus a proof which will certainly be much 

 more convincing than the reports of Mr. H. P. Steadman § and 

 Mr. J. E. Leifchild. || 



As to Mr. Leifchild, I know him personally : he may be a good 

 geologist, mathematician, or anything else, but as a judge of the 

 performance of high powers and of the resolution of diificult tests, I 

 can only say that I very much doubt whether he has ever worked 

 with an objective of less than half an inch focal length, or resolved 

 P. formosum ! ! 



I have just heard from an authority who saw the celebrated 

 Hasert's objective, in London, that its performance is nothing like 

 what it is reported to be ; and it appears to me that we, as English- 

 men, ought to be more careful in setting afloat reports which, when 

 once spread, will certainly damage the credit of the makers of the 

 finest object-glasses in the world — the English. 



Some time since Mr. Hickie caused a similarly startling sensation 

 with Beneche's improved No. 7 objective, and the straight candle-light. 

 I have seen three of these improved objectives and comjiared them with 

 similar powers by Beck, Hartnack, Powell and Lealand, and Eoss — the 

 result being always that Beneche's objectives were found " moderately 

 bad," and would not accomplish the feats announced by Mr. Hickie, 

 not only in my hands but also in those of some well-known micro- 

 scopists ; this bad or inferior j^erformance may have been caused 

 either by our lacking Mr. Hickie's extraordinary manipulative skill — 

 or, rather, by the inferior quality of Beneche's objectives. 



* 'M.M.J.,' No. Ixxii., p. 290; vide also No. Ixxvi., p. 175 (Mr. Leifchild's 

 letter). 



t Ibid., No Ixxix., p. 83. % IW<]., No. Ixxxiii., p. 263. 



§ Ibid., No. Ixxii., p. 291. |1 Ibid., No. Ixxvi., p. 17.'3. 



