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[Jan. 27, 1882. 



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AbjII. r. MciKI.K. Miinv lhaiik«; yonr letter useful.— Mf.M1i. 

 S<M-. niiiL. Akcii. am vnur cnnmunirationa intereeting. — J. A. 

 MoHATT. TliaiikB.- PniNKA!! Fooo. Our elnsHifiention seems to 

 need mi oxplanntion. As ynu say, we have Corrcsponfience 

 Colutntm, yucries. Replies, and Answers to Correspondents ; ought 

 it to be neces.snry to explain that we receive some letters we like to 

 publish ns such, many queries, not a few replies, and a number of 

 letters, which, though not miitalile for publication, require answer- 

 ing? The dilBouIty is to classify- letters, Ac., at all, wo receive so 

 many more than we can deal with properly. We may soon have to 

 open a new section for the names only of corresjiondcnts. The title, 

 " gonrc painters," is applied to painters who take for their subjects 

 scones of ordinar)' life in some special line. (2.) The name" Millais," 

 is ordinarily pronounced "Millay." (3.) Dionysos, or Dionysus, is 

 the Greek eqinvalent for Bacchus, ns Aphrodite for Venus, Pallas 

 Athene for Minerva, (-t.) Do not know who made the Pears' soap 

 " Dirty Boy." You see, perhaps, why some questions are dealt with 

 here, instead of under the head " Queries." — W. C. The Star 

 Slaps are intended to be used by persons who. having looked 

 at the maps nihern-ifc than " in the dark," had observed that 

 Buch and such constellations were to be looked for towards the 

 south, cast, west, north, and so forth. T do not think their 

 uso would be very great to anyone who took them ont in 

 the dark, and tried to decipher them without a light. — W. Rion, 

 C. E. RoBERT.s, \V. G. Bei.1., R. W. J., R. C. Ati.i), and others. 

 It would be well if correspondents would kindly remember that 

 remittances and business communications generally, must be sent 

 to the publishers, not to the editor. All letters received after 

 Saturday lie over, and are not even opened till the ensuing Friday 

 or Saturday. If they contain stamps or P.O.O.. with orders for 

 Knowleikie, there is naturally ' a week's dissatisfaction, through 

 whose fault would you say ? — R. W. .T. thinks it is very good of us 

 " in our old age, to give to the world at a price which is equiva- 

 lent to a free gift, so much of the vast quantity of knowledge 

 which we have accumulated from within the four quarters of 

 this second-rate planet." We are really very much obliged to 

 Mr. Jenkins. We should not have taken credit, perhaps, for 

 extreme old age, but for his kindly suggestion : but we 

 have no objection. Sixteen years have passed since our first 

 book appeared, and it soems to us now that we were ver>- 

 young then: we must have been mistaken, however. — P. W. 

 Jackson. The difficulty at present is to tind space for mechanical 

 engineering.— Nemo. We give a short sketch of Dr. Draper's life, 

 as you request. — .\qiarh-s. Twelve years having pa.ised since we 

 rowed in a race, and though sliding seats had then come in, wo did 

 not care to give up the old-fashioned fixed seats on which we had 

 learned rowing, so we cannot give any practical explanation as to 

 their working ; but, unquestionably, when properly used, thev 

 greatly hel|> the ron-er. We seldom get a chance now of i-owing in 

 outrigged boats, the only rowing we much care for. — J.J. D. The diffi- 

 culty is that while, ns you say. the picture in Guillemin's Heavens 

 is manifestly incorrect, n correct picture of the moon's path round 

 the sun seems to differ in no observable respect from the elliptic 

 j«th assigned to the earth. See chapter on the moon's motions in 

 my treatise nn the moon. — Robert AVai.ker. Bezique is not in our 

 line. — Xebton Croslanp. I also thought " we had parted for 

 OTOr." Would insert your letter if it were about one-sixth of its 

 length, but ns it is, it is impossible. — J. T. Powell. Thanks, but we 

 have 'irirr ten thousand names of schools. Ac, and expect before long 

 to reach them all. We are growing fast, and wo " seek not to pro- 

 ticipate." We agree with you that Mr. Grant Allen's papers are 

 charming.- M. A. Tirxer. Did not Professor Wilson refer to Mr. 

 Gosse's well-known chapter about immured toads, in his first replv 

 on the subject ? It seemed certainly clear to us that ho was well 

 acquainted with it, ns we suppose most students of natural history 

 must bo. — J. Wanklvn. Quite so ; these questicms of classification 

 nro of themselves of no importance whatever. A new rule for 

 classifying introduces no new facts. It is ns though one who had 

 been fnmiliar with the arrangement of the bookshelves in a library, 

 and with the contents o£ the books in them, should bo told — when 



ho camu bnck a year or two later, perhaps, to the place, 

 and some cluinges hod been made in the arrangement of books — 

 that he knew nothing about the books because ho know only of 

 their riM nrrungement on the shelvcB. — C. A. T. " Five of Clubs " 

 has nlrenily corrected the omission.— .\. E. S. Brewster spoke of 

 faith in other inhabited worlds ns the hope of the philosopher and 

 the faith of the Christian, or ihe faith of the philosopher and the 

 hope of the Christian. I forget which, exactly. It matters not ; 

 the theory is not " liased on iiny religions principles." — R. E. J. 

 You can hardly say that the sails of a windmill go with the sun, 

 or against the sun. If the wind is from the north the eastern arm 

 goes down, and the western arm up. If the wind is from the 

 south the reverse holds.^J". C'owLEY. If you will try to picture a 

 star as emitting rays in all directions, which, once emitted, 

 travel continuously outwards, you will see that there is no 

 reni difficulty. As to the waves arriving when the star is 

 "below the horizon or anywhere else," you might equally say 

 that sea • waves, leaving England for — let us say America — 

 may arrive there when jiooplc in England are in bed or anywhere 

 else. — C. Upham. Many thanks for your letter. — .Sio.nev jEnBi'R.N. 

 Never mind the gilt edge, or the crest, or the scent ; it is n«t the 

 paper, but what is written on the paper, we care for. Thanks, all 

 the same. As to the toad storj-, we heard the same story told about 

 Cimex lectularins. The ring of light round the moon emphatically 

 can »iot be explained as you suggest. Is not the cat's-eye pheno- 

 menon known to most persons ? Your plan for testing a cat's 

 power of turning is not cruel to the cat, but might be incon- 

 veuiont to the experimenter. Cats do turn with wonderful rapidity, 

 but we really caiuiot advise our readers, in their search for know- 

 ledge, to " seize a cat, the two front legs in the left hand, the 

 two hind ones in the right, to hold her upside down, with her 

 back two inches from the floor, let go, and observe how, in 

 the two-inch fall, she will turn rouHd and fall on her 

 feet." Unless, indeed, yon could gUEirantee her quie.'cenco before 

 she was " let go."- New Zealand. The Wanganui is a splendid 

 river for rowing. A year ago we had a splendid twenty miles spin 

 on the Wanganui in a four-oared clinker-built outrigged boat, and 

 judged it to be better for boat racing even than the Paramatta in 

 New .Soutli Wales, on which river also we had some capital romng. 

 The Paramatta, indeed, is hardly a river, it is an inlet of the sea — 

 at least as far up as the racecourse. — Johanmsbebg. The English 

 Mechanic is — or used to be, when I knew it- -an excellent paper, 

 but it does not give the latest method of calculating " the phases of 

 Orion." You must be mistaken. In the first place, no re\-iewer could 

 be so ignorant as to write such rubbish ; but if any could, the sub- 

 editor would know it was nonsense, and certainly would not think of 

 allowing it to be quoted. Of course Orion has no phases, and, therefore, 

 it stauds to reason no method — earliest or latest — has ever been in- 

 vsnted for cJilculating them. — M. McC. Phrenology- would certainly 

 not 1)0 proved by the evidence you mention. But there can be very 

 little doubt that there is a certain correlation between the capacity 

 for music, painting, &c.,and the conformation of those parts of the 

 head where phrenologists place the bumps corresponding to these 

 arts. So, readiness of verbal expression is almost always found in 

 fulI-eycd persons, as Gall noticed at the very beginning of his 

 observations. There is a very strong argument from induction 

 with regard to many of the localisations of phrenology, but they 

 have no more real bearing on cerebral localisation than has 

 the observed fact that blue-eyed white cats (male) are commonly i 

 deaf. — J. WniTLEV. We propose soon to have a paper on 

 the approaching transit of Yenus. If we put in your query : 

 we should have about fifty replies, every one of which, though ; 

 only one could appear, would involve just as n>uch trouble 

 to us as though we used it. If you could see our parcels of letters 

 (they are no longer forwarded from the head office in envelopes, 

 even tLe largest sizes tailing to hold them), you would understand 

 our reluctance to insert queries. We note that with a power of ii 

 200 the apparent diameter of Venus in transit next December will I 

 bo 1° 54' 40". The size of the O.G. and its focal length need not ■ 

 have been mentioned when the power was given. — F. Riiylfji. 

 You nro right about the beading, but we know from the aspect of 

 the ring when seen edgewise that there is no such inequality there. 

 — Walter G. Wo<)Llco.mbe. It does so chance that we had for- i 

 gotten about Clerk Maxwell's Theory ; but it is the merest J 

 nccideut thnt yon should be right, for there arc many sub- | 

 jccts about which we are ignorant. We thought this was one of ! 

 them, but, instead of ignorance, must now plead forgetfulness. — i 

 J. O. M, Excuse us ; but no space for the Cuddapah question. So i 

 few readers would be interested, and so many other subjects ! 

 crowding in upon us.- — J. N. Barnes. The paragraph to which yon | 

 refer a]>peared only in the first edition of the " Vestiges ;" morel 

 experienced students of science explained to the author of that work I 

 thnt ho had erred. — John Roi'se. We have seareheil for one of the! 

 questions in vain. We remember receiving them, and had intended! 



