SlAEcn 31, 1882.] 



Kr'OWi.EDGS • 



481 



t!i]), how are yoa going to eliminaie the marbles and tops from the 



- atcmcnt ? Do you not at once learn from it that 39 marbles and 

 : :i tops are worth 3s. OJ. ? — Boreas. (1.) Axial rotation of earth 

 k instant all the year ronnd. (2.) Ko evolutionist supposes there 

 were frerms of life in the earth during its incandescent condition. — 

 C. J. C, S. C. S.VRGissox, Philo, Symp.^thy, C. H. Olivkb, G. F. S. 

 I'vLi, Di.<i'i:.\SF.K, G. GoBDOx, H. W. Z., Petek P.\ri.ey, J. Haekix- 



- N, G. W. B., M. X., L. LiCAS, and hosts of others, have answered 

 lories about '"Burial of iloscs," Ferrier's Influenza Powder, and 

 ants in bedroom. — H. A. Bcxley. (1) We are not, so far tis I 



.:.>w. approacliing another glacial period. (2) Inclination of earth's 



\i3 remains almost unchanged. (3) Present condition in sense 

 : lat eaith is nearest to sun in winter of northern hemisphere, will 



, reversed some eleven thousand years hence ; but whether that 



. uid be favourable to glacial northern epoch or not, is open to 

 i'Stion. — AsHBRiDGE n. RoBixsox. Certainly not for reason 

 ined that Mr. Grant left out date of Stone Age period. Have 

 •u seen any, even the slightest trace of unwillingness on our part 

 put facts as we find them, because they do not square with precon- 

 ived ideas (whether relating to facts, fancies, or faiths) ? Fifty 

 atsand years ago. excentricity of earth's orbit was less than now 

 t ' UlOO; now 0.0168), longitude of perihelion 28° 36', so that earth 

 IS nearest to sun towards end of October. That was not the glacial 

 ch, or time of Stone Ago. For a time when excentricity was verj- 



: at take SoO.OOOb.c, excentricity 00717 (I), and longitude of peri- 

 'ion 239° 28' — earth nearest to sun towards end of August. Very 

 acial time for northern hemisphere then. — Dr. Littox Forbes. 



1 any thanks; a most interesting subject. — J. L. Sixclaie. Theory 

 at satellites were expelled from primaries by e.v|)losive force will 

 r bear examination. — E. C. It will make no difference which way 

 u put the lens. — W. J. L. (1) Ophite is a synonym of serpen- 

 le, but also sometimes applied to speckled green porphyry. (2) 



'■ 1-. Brough was librarian at the London Institution, successor of 

 ayley in the office, and predecessor of Mr. Nicholson, now 

 Jleian librarian. He was a well-known writer on scien- 



:io, chiefly chemical, subjects. — F. H. S. About the eye — the 



;ierimenl proves nothing as to inversion of image. We know 



; r. m optical laws that the image must be inverted. The other 



lostions too wide, — such queries remind me of the lady who, just 



■ lore supper, at a ball, said to Humboldt : " Now we have live 

 'uutes to ourselves, do tell me all you know about the earth." Sir 



'-'.. Phillip's idea sheer nonsense. — Geo. E.Xewto.v. Thanks for the 

 imphlet against vaccination. I do not wonder that no notice has 

 on taken of it by Dr. Carpenter. IB-written, ill-reasoned, and 

 Ti^nsive, how does it deserve notice ? — J. McDowell. Probably 

 ^r Henry Thompson meant the term vegetables to include fruit. 

 an one say that it docs not? What are tomatoes, pumpkins, 

 L,'etable marrows, and so forth ? Consider again the lines — 

 Amidst them stood the tree of life, 

 High eminent, blooming ambrosial fruit 

 Of vegetable gold. 



'. Iocs not this seem to imply that Milton at any rate thought fruit 

 vegetable production '- Science thinks so, too. Ton would " define 



. vegetarian as one who excludes from his articles of diet flesh, fish, 

 m1 fowl;" surely strict vegetarians would exclude eggs, milk, 

 itter, cheese, and so forth. These are distinctly animal food. 



. len again, do you not rather ea^"il about words than facts, when 

 u dwell on his remark about debarring ourselves from the right 



■ use such and such food ? " Surely he knows," you say, " that 

 u'ctarians do not debar themselves from the right," <ic. Might he 

 I reply that, in holding it to be wrong to use vegetable food, they 

 debar themselves from the right to use it ? It seems to me that 



>;r H. Thompson's letter was eminently fair and judicious, and con- 

 ivcd entirely in the spirit of his own doctrine, that it is unwise to 

 ■Ticlude over hastily that what suits ourselves must necessarily be 

 o best for others. If your letter had not been so very long, it 

 iuld have appeared. — R. H. I doubt if any reader could tell you 

 a way by which you could successfully make a Bainband spec- 

 ; scope. — Ln"EEPOOL. The zodiacal light is certainly more than 

 <^ mere radijince from the sun after he has set. It is very 



■ Iiiom distinctly seen in our latitudes. When seen (in February 

 : March in the evening, and in the autumn in the morning), it 

 ; pears as a slant cone, the apex being some 80° or 90° from the 



- ni's place. It is incorrectly depicted by Dr. Phipson, in his ex- 

 • '.lent little work on meteors, as a vertical cone. It is best seen 

 Ti hour or two after sunset. — F. Peait. You will pardon my re- 



■ :arking I did not " permit the planets to be described here as the 

 aiise of weather changes." I distinctly said that I must draw the 

 ire somewhere, and I drew it just there. — E. P. C. Geologists 



• -timate the thickness of strata (without digging directly down 



* ' : rough the depths they name) , by noting the thickness of successive 



>.yers, as they crop up to the surface, and adding these thicknesses 



jjether. I do not myself think that the moon's mass was thrown 



off in a single effort, so to speak, thinking it more probable that 

 the moon was first formed of multitudinous small bodies separately 

 thrown off, like spray, from the top of the great tidal wave. I 

 think the rings of Saturn represent this earliest or embryonic 

 stage of the moon's history. — S. Hall. The star you refer to 

 just below ''the little Bear" is Vega. You will be able to find 

 the place of the planets now visible to the naked eye, from the 

 zodiacal map in Part III., except Saturn, which you will find about 

 as far to the right of Jupiter as Mars is to the loft. — A. M. S. 

 Queries noted. — The Village Philosopher. One of the ways you 

 mention must certainly be used to find the cube root, unless you 

 resort to logarithms. — A. G. S. Your cat storj- is rather long ; 

 besides, the cat which follows the sweeper may " wish to gain 

 some jirivate ends." — X. Have already mentioned that query 

 about noise in trains was lost in postal transit. — CoXstaxs. Thanks. 

 — Alex. Aitkex. The only book I know of that would suit you is 

 "Chauvenet," in two volumes. It is expensive, and rather difficult. 

 For the other purpose you cannot do better than u.se " Guillemin." 

 — Gradatim. Shall probably write on the subject of space. — 

 Daxiel Jacksox. I belie\-e no small part of the success of 

 Kxowledge has been due to just those sections (Whist and Chess) 

 which you wish to see removed. If your ovm editorial experience 

 had been half as satisfactorj- as mine, you would understand my 

 unwillingness to make any changes. The contributor to whom you 

 refer is well able to tell me himself, if dissatisfied. As he has not, 

 I cannot but think your reference to what he said when at Hamilton 

 a breach of confidence. Is mischief-making one of the devices 

 which your editorial experience suggests as desirable for extending the 

 circulation of a magazine ? On the whole, I am inclined to believe 

 I know how to conduct this paper at least as well as you can teach 

 me. — Jos. Baxexdell. I did not insert your reply to Mr. Banyard, 

 because it seemed ^^-ritten under the impression that he meant to 

 offend you personally, which I am sure was not the case. Y'our 

 remarks to myself had better not be inserted, because readers might 

 imagine they were meant to offend me personally, which I am sure 

 is not the case. Still, they are digressive — if not aggressive. I 

 shaU be glad to publish any arguments you may wish to advance. 

 In the meantime, I do not see how you can deny that if there 

 are five equations in each of which cosmical elements appear 

 on one side, while one and the same number 18S1'59 

 appears on the other, there can be formed no less than ten 

 equations (the number of combinations of five things two to- 

 gether) having cosmical elements on both sides — giving, there- 

 fore, ten instances of remarkable but quite extra - pyramidal 

 coincidences. You say you do not know what '"Fudging" means, 

 and that a young schoolboy friend, whom you have asked, cannot 

 tell you. Perhaps in the North the term is not used. It means 

 humouring numbers or facts so as to get some result you want. 

 For instance, the answer to a sum should be, let us say, £1. 13s. id., 

 and a schoolboy gets £1. 13s. Id. : well, he puts the right answer 

 in the proper place, and alters several of the preceding steps to 

 correspond, taking his chance that the teacher will only glance over 

 the few first steps and the few last, not finding out either the 

 original error, or the place where it has been corrected by an arti- 

 ficial error. That is one form of fudging. For other instances, 

 take your quiet assumption that the sun's real diameter has a 

 certain value fitting in with your other results, or your other quiet 

 assumption that the number 1S81"59, which comes out among cos- 

 mical relations, is the exact length of the Great GaUery. — Wm. 

 WiLSOX. Well, since you ask me, I do think your letter in singu- 

 larly bad taste I "' need not " (need I not ?) " trouble to reply." 

 No trouble whatever, my dear sir ; as you assume the office of 

 censor, I venture, following suit, to tell you that, while there is no 

 irreverence at all in what I said (quoting Shakspeare), there is 

 gross irreverence in the way in which you, to all intents and pur- 

 poses, attribute to the Almighty the susceptibilities of a soured peda- 

 gogue. Datveiiia»icunv[\\'.Vi'.) ieiat censura columham (K. A .P.). 

 — C. F. B. Harstox. Had not heard that " cats lie on their heads, 

 ^viih one or both ears on the ground, when it is going to rain." It 

 may be the case ; but I wonder how it is done. 'The " sun entering 

 a sign" is quite different to the sun being in a "house"; the 

 former relates to the sun's passage along the ecliptic, the latter to 

 his position in those imaginary divisions of the heavens with 

 reference to the horizon on which astronomers base their predic- 

 tions. When astrologers said a person was born under a particular 

 planet, they meant that that planet was in the ascendant (the part 

 of the heavens about to rise above the horizon) at the time of the 

 person's birth. — C. Do you call the series (2 x S) + (4 x J) -H (6 x *) 

 -h(8x|) -i- (10 xf) -I- (12 xi), geometrical? The definition of a 

 geometrical series is sufficiently precise, and certainly does not 

 include such series. Surely " Teacher " is justified in his criticisms. 

 — X. Surely you are not in earnest in asserting that the oar 

 is not a lever of the second kind. If the object of the oars- 

 man was to push the water along, the oar would be a lever of the 



