DISCOVERY 



19 



It is the first time that in a great European settlement 

 the population of doubtful territories have had the 

 opportunity of giving their own vote. This principle 

 had, indeed, been adopted at the time of the French 

 Revolution, and received its most emphatic sanction 

 in the time of Napoleon III, first in the creation of the 

 United Kingdom of Italy, and secondly in the trans- 

 ference of Nice and Savoy to France. The concep- 

 tion of the plebiscite is a principle which it is easy to 

 accept, but the appUcation of it presents great difii- 

 culties and dangers, and it was not unnatural that the 

 Conference should use it only in those cases where it 

 was absolutely inevitable; for a plebiscite means 

 prolonged uncertainty, the continuation of national 

 animosity and allied occupation. 



Sound-Ranging in War 

 Time 



By A. S. Russell 



SoUND-R.\NGERS Were a body of men who, in the late 

 war, spent their time and energy in locating hostile 

 batteries accurately, in estimating the number of guns 

 or howitzers in such batteries, in ascertaining the 

 calibre of these guns, and, on occasion, in assisting 

 certain portions of the Royal Regiment of Artillery in 

 "strafing them to blazes." This they did, these 

 sound-rangers, not by guess-work or intuition, or by 

 bluff; they had a system, and the whole system, 

 method, apparatus and procedure goes by the name of 

 Sound-Ranging. 



At the bottom of the whole matter is the fact that 

 sound travels, not quickly like light or electricity, 

 but at a comparatively leisurely pace — namely, about 

 370 yards a second in air at ordinary temperatures. 

 Suppose, now, that a loud noise as, for e.xample, an 

 explosion, occurred at some particular spot in South 

 London, the report would reach Londoners at various 

 times after the explosion had really occurred, depending 

 upon their distance from the place where the sound 

 came from — the sound travelling in every direction at 

 equal rate, at about 370 yards per second, neglecting 

 the (very sUght) influence of the wind. If an observer 

 on the Monument heard the explosion at exactly the 

 same time as one on the tower of Westminster Cathe- 

 dral, it is obvious that, wherever the sound originated, 

 it did so at a place that is equidistant from these places. 

 If, however, we suppose the observer on Westminster 

 Cathedral heard the sound exactly one second before 



[Continutd on p. :o 



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