DISCOVERY 



229 



were strange sounds, guttural tones and whoops which 

 really might have emanated from a wild son of the 

 forest. A drum, an accordion, a zither, a mouth- 

 organ, were all played upon. The drum-sticks kept 

 time to music, rapped on the wall, appeared above the 

 edge of the curtain several times, brightly illuminated 

 as if dipped in electric light or some phosphorescent 

 substance. As I have said, I was impressed, and might 

 have ended in complete conversion, by manifestations 

 from so trustworthy a source, and vouched for in such 

 sincerity, had it not, in an unlucky moment, occurred 

 to me to apply a little harmless test. 



***** 



"The test consisted simply in putting a dab of 

 printer's ink on one of the drum-sticks at the very last 

 moment before the seance began. The result could not 

 prove physically injurious to the medium, who had 

 challenged investigation, nor to anyone in the circle. 

 The result was starthng. Being accorded the privilege 

 of tjang the medium's hands, I proceeded to do so \vith a 

 stout cord, using a certain knot which I beheve has never 

 been known to slip or come undone. This accomplished, 

 and while someone else fastened the medium securely 

 to his chair, with his back to the instruments on the 

 table, the ink, concealed in a pocket-handkerchief, was 

 applied. In this position we left the medium, the 

 lights were lowered and the music began. Soon were 

 heard the deep breathings preceding the trance, then 

 " the Indian " began to manifest, at first somewhat 

 sullenl3^ as if not pleased with the conditions, some of 

 the instruments sounded, and at last the drum-sticks 

 commenced their tattoo. At the close of the seance, 

 when the curtains were drawn and the lights turned up, 

 the medium was found in his chair with his hands still 

 tied, but great was the astonishment of everyone 

 present at the marvellous condition of the medium's 

 hands. How in the world printer's ink could have gotten 

 smeared over them while under control of " Deerfoot 

 the Indian " no one, not even the medium, could fathom. 



" I beUeve there is an explanation for these or similar 

 phenomena, but I must leave it to the ingenious and 

 adroit expounders of spiritualist philosophy. " 

 ***** 



■ An account,' by Professor Patrick Geddes, of the life 

 and work of Sir Jagadis C. Bose, a distinguished Indian 

 scientist, has recently appeared. Patrick Geddes is, 

 of course, the well-known sociologist, at present a 

 professor in the University of Bombay. This bio- 

 graphy is a competent piece of work, but something 

 very much better than this is expected from Professor 

 Geddes. It compares ill with two recent biographies 

 of scientific men, that of Sir Victor Horsley by Mr. 

 Paget, and that of Silvanus Thompson by his widow 



» The Life and Work of Sir Jagadis C. Bose (Longmans, i6s. 

 net). 



and daughter. A reason for this is possibly that the 

 subject of the biography is still alive. Sir J. C. Bose 

 was born in Eastern Bengal, and trained in physics at 

 Cambridge. For many years he has been a distin- 

 guished investigator of physical and physiological 

 problems, doing most of his work at the Presidency 

 College, Calcutta, where for many years he was Professor 

 of Physics. He is now the Director of the Bose Insti- 

 tute in the same city, and a man of sixty-two. 

 ***** 



Bose has made himself famous by his work on plants. 

 By means of an instrument invented by him, the 

 magnetic crescograph, he has been able to demonstrate 

 the growth and other movements of plants. Plants 

 grow, as we all know, but a growth of a foot per year, 

 if calculated out, amounts only to a fifty-thousandth 

 of an inch per minute. So slow a growth as this is 

 naturally invisible in nature. That it can be demon- 

 strated directly comes as a surprise, even to those who 

 are alive to the wonderful things that science is con- 

 stantly claiming to do. The crescograph makes the 

 movements of the plant visible by magnifying them 

 from one million to ten million times. It can detect, 

 and measure, a rate of growth of a hundred-thousandth 

 of an inch per second. " Our mind cannot grasp 

 magnification so stupendous. We can, however, obtain 

 some concrete idea of it by finding what the speed of 

 the proverbial snail becomes when magnified ten million 

 times by the magnetic crescograph. For this enhanced 

 speed there is no parallel even in modem gunnery. The 

 fifteen-inch gun of the Queen Elizabeth throws out a 

 shell with a muzzle velocity of 2,360 feet per second, or 

 about eight million feet per hour ; but the crescographic 

 snail would move at a speed of 200 million feet per hour, 

 or twenty-five times faster than the cannon shot. 

 Let us turn to cosmic movements for a closer parallel. 

 A point on the Equator whirls round at the rate of 1,037 

 miles per hour. But the crescographic snail may well 

 look down on the sluggish earth ; for, by the time the 

 earth makes one revolution, the snail would have gone 

 round nearly forty times." 



***** 



We may quote further to illustrate how the cresco- 

 graph may be used for demonstrating the growth of a 

 plant before large audiences. A plant is connected up 

 to the crescograph, and the growth of the plant is 

 demonstrated by a spot of hght from the crescograph 

 rushing across a screen. " A stop-cock is turned on, 

 admitting cooled water into the vessel containing the 

 plant. The movement of the spot slows down and 

 ultimately comes to a stop : the growth activity is now 

 held in a state of arrest, a thermometer indicating the 

 exact temperature-minimum. The plant-chamber 

 becomes gradually warmed, and with the removal of 

 lethargy, the growth-movement is renewed, gathering 



