RESIGNS CHAIRMANSHIP 333 



one member (Mr. Haldane) out of office. . . . — Your 

 loving daughter, Con. B. 



In October the Beauties of Nature came out. 

 It had a large sale and was translated into many 

 languages. In Germany a cheap English edition 

 was printed, as an English reader for schools, 

 with a little dictionary of its own. 



In this book he referred to the question 

 whether there had been any change in the moon 

 during historic times. Some authorities thought 

 that there was in one case evidence of a slight 

 alteration. He consulted Sir G. G. Stokes, who 

 replied : 



Lensfield Cottage, Cambridge, 

 12th Dec. 1892. 



My dear Lubbock — When I wrote to you I had in 

 my mind a vague recollection of a discussion a great 

 many years ago in Section A of the British Association 

 relative to, I think, the spot called Linus, and my 

 recollection is that it was thought that there was no 

 solid ground for thinking there had been a change. If 

 I rightly recollect, it was a suspicion of volcanic action 

 indicated by a slight red light when the spot was in 

 shade, as regards the sun. 



On looking at the drawings of photographs to which 

 you referred me, I noticed at once, what doubtless you 

 too must have noticed, that the shadows lay opposite 

 ways, which is shown also by the difference of the dates 

 at which the photographs were taken — Aug. 15 and 

 Aug. 27. Now imagine that you took two photographs 

 of a terrestrial range of mountains from a fixed point a 

 long way up, the photograph on one occasion being taken 

 when the sun was low in the east, and on the other low 

 in the west. There would be a general correspondence 

 between the two of such a character that light in the one 

 would answer to dark in the other, and such there is 

 between the two drawings. But we should not expect 

 all the details of light and shade to be just the reverse in 

 the one of what they are in the other ; for some parts of 

 the mountain would be in sun on both occasions, and 



