276 



KNOWLEDGE & SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



[Nov., 1904. 



blage of opinion, lies in its power to induce people, whose 

 views are as wide as tlie poles asunder on spiritual matters, 

 to lend an ear to that which other people are thinking. 

 Tliere are many people, sane, high-minded, and cultured, 

 to whom the opinions expressed by Sir Oliver Lodge on the 

 scheme of creation will seem as heretical as any that ever 

 sent a man to the faggot and fire ; and there are others, not 

 less kindly, conscientious, or tolerant, to whom the reading 

 given by clergymen of the importance of religious tenets must 

 seem illogical to the verge of puerility. There are beyond 

 these two classes of people — like rays in the ult in -violet or 

 the iH/ra-red — other thinkers who genuinely believe that it is 

 wrong to teach what they call superstition ; and other, and 

 equally worthy people who regard doubt of the Old Testa- 

 ment as blasphemy. If the prospect of seeing their own views 

 .stated induces any member of any of these classes of people 

 to buy this book, it will probably lead him to read the opinions 

 that are stated side by side with them ; and that is all to tlic 

 good. In this sense Mr. Hand's collection has a great educa- 

 tional value, and of its interest there can be no doubt. 



The other book which we have joined to his for the purposes 

 of this review, " Scientific Fact and Metaphysical Reality," is 

 of a different kind, and demands a different kind of intellectual 

 equipment for its appreciation. It is, as we take it, an 

 attempt to state, if not to reconcile, some of the eternal dif- 

 ferences which are to be recognised between man's conception 

 of the material universe and the in.'stinctive denial of his own 

 insignificance in it. " The stars ... by their double 

 scale, so small to the eye, so vast to the imagination, seem to 

 set before man the double nature of his character and f.ate," 

 wrote K. L. Stevenson. Mr. R. B. Arnold endeavours to 

 disentangle the paradox of man as a mere collocation of living 

 cells; and of man created by God for immortality as he has 

 believed himself to be. Mr. Balfour, in his recent Presidential 

 Address to the British Association at Cambridge, sought to 

 exhibit the contradiction between the physicist's theory that 

 motion was matter, and man's instinctive disbelief — something 

 akin to Nature's abhorrence of a vacuum — in anything which 

 should persuade him that matter was a mere state of motion- 

 that— 



The stately palaces, the Eolemn temples, 



The round world . 

 could dissolve like the baseless fabric of a vision, and leave 

 not a wrack behind. Mr. Arnold's intention is not to exhibit 

 the paradox, but to reconcile its antitheses ; to show, in short, 

 that there may be a scientific reason, not for the grudging 

 admission of the possibility of a superior Being's existence", 

 but for the acknowledgment of a Divine purpose and a Divine 

 future for man's soul. We are not sure whether Mr. Balfour's 

 paradox was sounder than most paradoxes, since the very 

 latest theory of the physicists is, after all, but a tentatively 

 built model of the universe which is of the most temporary 

 value. Theories are only to explain things we do not under- 

 stand. They are not immortal truths. And if Larmor's and 

 Thomson's and Lodge's modern cosmogonies are only tem- 

 porary structures, we are not very sure of the value of 

 anyone's theories of God and immortality. But the theories 

 are always interesting, and Mr. Arnold's exposition and his 

 philosophy are exceptionally so. 



The Science and Practice of Photography.— By Chapman 

 Jones, F.I.C., F.C.S., F.R.P.S. Fourth edition. Rewritten 

 and enlarged (London: Iliffe and Sons).— The new edition 

 of this well-known text-book is in many respects better than 

 the earlier editions. It has been not merely brought up to 

 date, but re-written, so that, although it is arranged on the 

 same general lines as before, it is practically a new book. Of 

 those parts that are obviously new, we notice especially the 

 chapters on the modern organic developers, the nature of 

 their constitution, and the methods of their use; the most 

 lecent lenses and the priticiples involved in their construc- 

 tion ; the nature of the developable image ; the newer 

 printing methods, such as the X'elours-Artigue, gum bichro- 

 mate, ozotype, and Ostwald's c.atatype jirocesses ; and chapters 

 on photographic measurements and the more exact testing of 

 photographic plates, besides pages on sensitometrv, acti- 

 nometry, shutters, the illumination of the dark room, and 

 many other subjects. In some cases where the subject dealt 

 of is on the border line of what may be called pure photo- 

 graphy, references are given to enable the student to continue 

 his study of the matter if he should desire to do so. .'\lthough 



the book is essentially a student's book, it is also a practical 

 guide, and those whose knowledge of chemistry and optics is 

 slight will find at least a very appreciable help towards under- 

 standing the principles of their work as dealt with here in the 

 few pages devoted to the exposition of the fundamental 

 principles of these sciences as applied to photography. The 

 general arrangement of the volume, with the significant head- 

 lines to the pages and copious index, facilitate reference to any 

 desired subject. It is an invaluable book. 



The Heart of a Continent. — The publication in a cheap edition 

 of Colonel Vounghusband'sbook. " The Heart of a Continent " 

 (John Murray), comes at a most opportune moment. Not 

 only because its author, as the hero of the Thibet Mission, has 

 a special claim on the interest of the public just now, but 

 because the travels described in " The Heart of a Continent" 

 took place partly in the scene of the present Russo-Japanese 

 War, as he visited Mukden and Kirin, and travelled through 

 Manchuria. It would be difficult to have a more agreeable 

 cicerone than Colonel Vounghusband ; his fine intelligence 

 illumines all he touches, and the entire absence of prejudice 

 with which he treats all he describes gives it a special value. 

 We will quote as an instance the following comparison 

 between the English and Russian Armies : " An English 

 soldier is perfectly right when he has shaken down on active 

 service, but in barracks he produces the impression that his 

 dress is his main interest in life. A Cossack, on the other 

 hand, whenever one meets hitn, looks as if he were ready to 

 buckle to and fight then and there, and certainly dress or 

 appearance is the last thing in the world he would trouble his 

 head about." 



A History of South America. — In his " History of South 

 America" (John Murrayi, Mr. Charles Edmond Akers has 

 admirably executed a most useful piece of work. Up till the 

 appearance of this book, there was no general history of South 

 America in existence; and the seeker after information had to 

 glean his facts with pain and toil from writers of divers 

 authority and nationality. Mr. Akers has provided in one 

 m.oderatc-sized volume a concise yet readable history of the 

 South American Republics down to the present day. He has 

 dealt in greatest detail with the events of the last fifty years, 

 but the emancipation of Spain's Colonies is briefly described, 

 and an introductory chapter relates the history of the Spanish 

 Conquest. Subsequently Mr. Akers deals separately and at 

 length with the histories of individual States. In a narrative 

 that is of necessity so condensed there is not much scope for 

 picturesqneness. The story is one of cruelty and oppression, 

 bloodshed, and revolution, but it is told tersely and dispas- 

 sionatel)', though Mr. Akers is a little too much inclined to 

 judge medieval adventures by the standards of to-day. Here, 

 for instance, is his estimate of the Spanish Colonists : " The 

 national character had been formed under malignant influences, 

 and the outcome was narrow-minded fanaticism, carelessness 

 as to human life, despotic conduct towards all of lower rank, 

 an absence of any impartial sense of justice. A lower stan- 

 dard of the relation of man to man, a narrower conception of 

 public morality, it would, even in those days, have been diffi- 

 cult to find anywhere. It was from the scutii of this fanatical 

 population that the first Colonists came." Mr. Akers goes on to 

 describe very briefly the ever-to-be-regretted destruction of 

 Inca civilisation, one of the greatest tragedies of history. 

 The chapters that follow are a remarkable achievement in 

 their concise and well-proportioned marshalling of facts in 

 which one dominant personality after another comes to the 

 front and is coiispicuous ; and here great interest is added to 

 the book by the portraits of leaders and presidents from 

 Simon Bolivar onwards — men with strongly-marked features 

 and rough exteriors. " Glancing back over the period which 

 this history covers," says Mr. Akers, in conclusion, " there is 

 everywhere the sense of human sacrifice, the all-pervading 

 smell of bloodshed, no matter whether the country under 

 review is Argentina, Brazil, Uruguaj', or Paraguay. If 

 these Republics would suppress their military establishments, 

 and rid themselves of the armaments they have collected, 

 tranquillit}- would be ensured. They arc fond of posing as 

 nations while still in their swaddling clothes. The possession 

 of great stores of war material is a temptation to try conclu- 

 sions with their neighbours." But even in this respect Mr. 

 Akers thinks itnprovement is noticeable, and there is a grow- 

 ing desire for internal and external peace. What is necessary 

 for the consolidation of peace is the " adequate administration 



