284 CROOKES' DECIMALS. 



According to Crookes, there are no constant errors; the 

 mean is right. See p. 46, supra. 



In his calculations he does not tire (see p. 130, supra). 

 Up to Equation E he gives 5 decimals; but from F he 

 already gets 6, from K he gets 7, from P he gets 8, from 

 U he gets 9 and keeps getting 9 decimals till the last Equa- 

 tion, Z. 



Thus, the " exact weight " of his rider is given (1. c., 

 p. 690.) 0.009 996 997 grain. 



To use this figure instead of o.oio is the manifestation of 

 the most colossal stupidity; for it asserts the actual tangible 

 determination of o.ooo 003 003 grains by means of a bal- 

 ance giving only o.ooi with certainty. 



To give the weight of a platinum wire to the thousand- 

 millionth by weighing it to the thousandth on a balance 

 barely sensitive to the ten thousandth, is a feat to which 

 nothing in modern science is comparable. 



We have to go back to the days of Isaac Abensid (Hassan), 

 under Alphons, King of Castile, some seven centuries ago 

 to match it, when the daily motion of the moon was given 

 to 8 sexagesimal places. Madler, Geschichte, I, p. 101 ; 1873. 



In this manner, by numerical elimination, grinding out 

 with pencil on paper from 5 to 9 decimals of the grain, 

 Crookes weighed to the ninth decimal of the grain on his 

 balance! 



We must be profoundly thankful, that Mr. William 

 Crookes did not work in all of his 9 decimals, but in his 

 table chopped off the last three. 



In this way he "weighed his weights" to the millionth 

 of the grain. 



He " summed " this value of his weights on the pan 

 and, of course, obtained the weight of his thallium and its 

 nitrate to the millionth of the grain! 



And I had supposed that Mr. William Crookes " deter- 

 mined each weighing independently, by the oscillation 

 method! 



But the fraud and the imposition remain the same only 

 a little more so, because of the greater clumsiness of the 

 process. 



