3^4 



NA TURE 



{August 18, 1887 



has been a " black-boarcV subject in most, if not all, 

 schools; and for this neglect there is little excuse, for a 

 great number of most important experiments may be 

 made without more expenditure than in the case of 

 ordinary quantitative analysis. 



A somewhat similar plan of work to the one in this 

 little book has been followed for the last three or four 

 years at the summer course of the Normal School of 

 Science, and no doubt other Colleges where chemistry is 

 a leading subject will have adopted some plan of prac- 

 tical organic instruction. The publication of this book 

 will save some trouble to teachers in directing the pre- 

 parations. The book is divided into two parts, and, 

 curiously enough, what is generally considered the easier, 

 viz. marsh-gas derivatives, are put in the second part. 

 The author gives as his reason for this, that the selected 

 examples offer fewer difficulties. That is a matter of 

 opinion to some extent, and may depend on the course 

 of lectures the student is hearing at the time. 



In Part I., after the purification of alcohol, ether, ben- 

 zene, and short descriptions of boiling-point determina- 

 tion and fractional distillation, we pass on to formation 

 of benzene derivatives, commencing with bromobenzene, 

 ethyl benzene, &c., to typical members of different fami- 

 lies, ending with ethyl benzoate. The descriptions of 

 process to be followed are short, but generally to the 

 point, and are preceded in each case by references to 

 the literature on the subject, which is a very valuable 

 addition, and should be useful to beginners. The ap- 

 pendix, consisting of notes on the preparations, is very 

 good, but would have been better placed, probably, in the 

 text, or in connexion with the most typical substance of a 

 group or family. As to the physical constants, melting 

 and boiling points and specific gravity only are men- 

 tioned. Surely a great number of substances, the prepara- 

 tion of which is described, allow of their vapour-densities 

 being taken by Victor Meyer's method .? Beyond that 

 there is little to complain of. The book is fairly well 

 adapted for its ostensible purpose. 



My Microscope. By a Quekett Club Man. (London ; 

 Roper and Drowley, 1887.) 



It is impossible to give in a small volume of some sixty 

 pages a clear description of the microscope and the 

 wonders it reveals. Still the author has managed to 

 make his little essays interesting ; and if there is not 

 much depth in his work, he has perhaps written enough 

 to induce some of those who are not already the pos- 

 sessors of a microscope to get one. It is surprising 

 that he has not laid more stress on the advantages of a 

 binocular over a monocular instrument. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



[The Editor does not hold himself responsible for opinions 

 expressed by his correspondents. Neithqr can he under- 

 tcLke to return, or to correspond with the writers of, 

 rejected manuscripts. No notice is taken of anonymous 

 com tn tin ic at ions. 



[ The Editor urgently requests correspondents to keep their 

 letters as short as possible. The pressure on his space 

 is so great that it is impossible otherwise to insure the 

 appearance even of com?nunications containing interesting 

 and novel facts. '\ 



Sun and Fire Symbolism. 



There is a phase of sun and fire symbolism in our very midst 

 which seems hitherto to have received but little attention, viz. 

 the presence of such symbols as crests or in the coats-of-arms of 

 many of the oldest noble families and landed gentry of the 

 British Isles. We find them in the greatest numbers in the 

 armorial bearings of our Scottish families, and those belonging 

 to the most northern counties of England ; probably for the 

 same reasons that they are most numerous on objects which 



have been found in the northern portions of Scandinavia, i.e. 

 that the light and warmth of the sun were naturally prized in 

 such districts, and also because they have there survived longer, 

 owing to the isolated position of the inhabitants depriving them 

 of free intercourse with the outer world. 



In a letter in Natqre (vol. xxxv. p. 558) headed " The 

 Svastika both as Sun and Fire Symbol," I gave illustrations 

 of some of the emblems of the sun and of the svastika as a fire 

 symbol, and also alluded to the wheel as being in use in some 

 countries to this day as a preservative against fire. A type of 

 fire symbol exists in some parts of England at our very doors. In 

 Gloucestershire and Herefordshire — possibly also in some of the 

 other south-western counties of England-— it is not an uncommon 

 circumstance to see on the external walls of some of the older 



houses one or two pieces of iron in this form 



anl sometimes thus 



^ 



^J \^^*mS> 



It seems evident that they 



could not have added much support to the building, since they 

 were bolted on to it at one point only — the centre. 



A most interesting explanation of them was given a few years 

 ago by an old servant of our family who died about five years 

 ago ; his age went with the century. He was a Gloucestershire 



man, and on being asked the reason of the 



S 



form of 



these irons, he replied "that they were made thus in order to 

 protect the house from fire, as well as from falling down." 



In the little village of Kingstone, in Herefordshire, it is still 

 the custom for the people on the eve of May-day to take two 



short pieces of wood and nail them in this form 



+ 



the door of a house or a stable, removing the one of the 

 previous year. On inquiry why this was done, the reply 

 was, " To scare the witches or the evil spirits away." 



In the crests and armorial bearings of many of our families 

 we find at least three distinct forms of sun and fire symbolism. 



(i) The sun in splendour. 



(2) Fire, represented sometimes by a mountain in flames. 



(3) The sun as a ring, or as a simple circle, the heraldic 

 terms for this latter type being amulets (Collins's " Peerage of 

 England," London, 1779) and annulets (Sir Bernard Burke's 

 " Peerage, Baronetage, and Knightage," London, 1880). 



I propose now to give examples of a few of the most typical 

 of each kind. 



Blount, Bt. — This family is of French extraction, and 

 formerly Lords of Guisnes, in France ; their crest is an armed 

 foot in the sun. Motto, Lux ttia via mea. 



Blunt, Bt.— Probably originally the same family. These 

 latter have for a crest the sun in glory, charged in the centre 

 with an eye, issuing tears. 



In the Earl of Clancarty's arms— the Trenches came from 

 Poitou in 1575 — on the first and third quarters is the sun in 

 splendour, and in the centre an escutcheon with the coronet of 

 a Marquis of the Netherlands, charged with a wheel with six 

 spokes. (The wheel is still used as a preservative against fire, 

 both in Holland and in Denmark.) 



Musgrave, Bt., of Hayton, has, for his crest, two arms in 

 armour embossed, sustaining the sun ; so has also Musgrave, 

 Bt., of Tourin, co. Waterford ; and their arms are the same. 



The rising sun and the sun in his splendour is also borne — 



By the Marquis of Lothian, by the Earls of Stamford and 

 Warrington, by Lords Polwarth and Hammond — Lord Pol- 

 warth's cre^t is a lady richly attired, holding a sun in her right 

 hand and a half moon in her left ; and it also forms the crest of 

 Tyrwhitt, Bt., Fairbairn, Bt., the Earls of Antrim, Nicholson, 

 Bt., where it is placed between two stars of eight points, and of 

 many more families. _ , 



We find fire symbols in connexion with the san in the armorij 

 bearings of Macleod of Lewis. Their crest is the .sun in splef 

 dour, and in their arms they have a mountain in flames on tl 



