Oct. 24, 1884.] 



KNOWLEDGE . 



351 



magistrate would dare to send the veriest tramp to gaol for 

 fourteen days. For the rest, Dr. Healy's argument is temperate 

 enough, and" worthy of all serious attention, and on that account I 

 insert his letter at length. — Ed.] 



[1481] — The following question seems to me to need an answer 

 l)ofore it is possible to enter into the discussion initiated hy Mr. S. 

 Thorne, with any hope of its being a fruitful one. 



Briefly this :— Let atoms of hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, carbon, 

 phosphorus, and so forth, be arranged in precisely the positions 

 they occupv in a human body — let motions be communicated to 

 them precisely similar to the vibrations which the molecules of a 

 normal human body are executing — will, or will not, the result be 

 a sentient being ? 



I am unwilling to obscure the issue involved in the bare question 

 by adding any hint at present with reference to my own opinion on 

 the subject. F. G. S. 



LETTERS RECEIVED AND SHORT ANSWERS. 



P. XEVtLL. Thanks for cuttings ; but the connection seems some- 

 what remote. — F.. K. H. Oh, dear, no, it can " not be said that 

 there were no oecultations visible," as there were thirty stars 

 between the 0th and 11th magnitudes over which the moon 

 passed. But, cui bono ' That rising of Saturn was a slip 

 of " F.R.A.S.'s" to which his attention has been called. — J. 

 B. DiMBLEEV. Thanks; but your chronological vagaries occupy 

 too much space in your account of the Eclipse. — W. Jennings 

 and W. Waksop. Delayed through your omission to address the 

 Publisher!!. — J. H. B. I can quite understand "the leading organ 

 of the wine trade" being irate with Mr. Mattieu Williams for his 

 articles on the Cooking of Wine ; nor do I suppose that the said 

 organ loves me much more for my reproduction of some very 

 remarkable items from a certain " Trade Circular" some time ago 

 in " Editorial Gossip." — F. J. W.\edale. The second edition of 

 "Orbs around us" expresses the matured views of the conductor 

 of this journal on the subject. See concluding paragraph (in 

 eapital letters) with which the Correspondence Column is headed. 

 — E. S. Beaven suggests the Conservation of Mental Force as a 

 contribution to the (now closed) question of Life after Death. 

 Many thanks for the addendum to your letter. — R. Webe. Mr. 

 Baker, 244, High Holbom, London. — E. Bkadsh.aw considers that 

 Transmigration supplies a solution of the Life after Death difficulty. 

 — Thomas J. George. Mr. Proctor has entirely ceased to lecture. 

 See Knowledge for July 18, p. 62. — H. A. Bulley. If you merely 

 ■mean to indicate that psychical phenomena are influenced 

 by the size, texture, and, notably, by the intricacy of the 

 convolutions of the brain — yes ; but there is a long step 

 from this to the system of Gall and Spurzheim. — J. B. 

 Smith. — Your letter marked for insertion. — John C. A. 

 Stewart sends an account of a boy named Carroll, one of the crew 

 of the ill-fated Europa, who refused to go in the ship on the day 

 she sailed, on account of a dream that she sank after a collision 

 (which, of course, she did). — Augcstine Lee. You talk about 

 ■'magnetic" sleep. &c., as though it was an objective, instead of a 

 purely subjective phenomenon. You leave the question just where 

 you found it. — More Light. You are quite right as to Dr. K. 

 ignoring the refracted light from the photosphere. That from the 

 Corona could not possibly illuminate the Moon's surface sufBciently 

 to admit of its being analysed spectroscopically. — C. E. Doyle, 

 T. H. S., F. W. H., and Jas. Spiers. You will see that the 

 enormous mass of correspondence received on the subject has 

 compelled me to close the controversy. — E. C. R. sends a list 

 of the colours of prominent afterglows observed in County 

 Meath between January 7 and October 11. They seem to 

 have varied from white through red and pink to crimson. — 

 Inquirer. — Undoubtedly a man reads English from his ou-n left 

 hand to his right : the only legitimate sense in which that word can 

 be used. Y'ou surely would not say that (in a northern latitude) 

 the sun travels from right to left from his rising to his setting ? — 

 J. X. D.AWsoN. Write to Messrs. Watsons, 313, High Holborn. 

 Thanks for offer of the cricket score, but we are utterly over- 

 burdened with matter. — E. Howabth. See reply to " E. K. H." 

 above. — Arthtr A. West. Thanks, but as yon will see, already 

 sufficiently replied to. — Rev. C. Carus-Wilson writes that he cannot 

 definitely answer Mr. Beaufort's question, as he does not make his 

 own tea ; but that, weak or strong, the effect was the same. — Chas. 

 Rice. Yes ; but the onlj- thing requiring elucidation is the 

 mathematical reason why. — M. B. The system is really genuine, 

 and would. I believe, be of service to you. — Selwyn Thorne, 

 Rev. Wm. Fitzgerald, C. Ridley, Dr. Dyhteb, and others, will see 

 from the announcement with which this column concludes on 

 p. 329, that the " Life after Death " controversy has now termi- 

 nated. Such thoughtful letters as Mr. Ridley's, and one or two 



more which liave reached me, cause me to regret that they did not 

 arrive before these pages were closed to them. — Thos. Radmore. 

 The only possible interpretation that I could place upon yotir 

 original communication was that yon imagined that the fore and 

 after-glow were — or would be — in some way affected by the Lunar 

 Eclipse. If you intended to express the exact converse of this I can 

 only deplore that my limited knowledge of English prevented me 

 from understanding you. Unless there is some novelty in yotir 

 observations I should hardly care to insert them merely in corrobo- 

 ration of others already published, considering how much of inte- 

 rest is at present crowded out of our pages. — James Gillespie, 

 105, St. Michael-street, Dumfries, once more sends me an exposi- 

 tion of his " theory," filling a penny memorandum-book. This is, 

 at least, the third time I have acknowledges the receipt of 

 these essays here, and once or twice 1 have even pointed out the 

 egregious fallacies underlying Mr. G.'s assumptions. It is, how- 

 ever, pretty evident that he does not read Knowledge, and expects 

 a reply by post, which neither he — nor any other correspondent — 

 will ever receive. If any of our readers are acquainted with Mr. 

 Gillespie, they will confer a favour upon the Editor of this journal 

 by inviting that gentleman's attention to this reply. — Sampel P. 

 Cheeseman. Received. — J. N. A. We do not give the prices of 

 books. They must be sought in advertisements proper. — Patrick 

 McMananim. The article you send me is simply a very clumsy repro- 

 duction of the famous Lunar Hoax, of which the details will be 

 found in " Myths and Marvels of Astronomy." There is no such 

 a person as " Dr. Blendmann " in the Berlin observatory. No 

 lunar photograph could by any possibility be taken through an 

 object glass blackened with camphor smoke ; nor would the most 

 perfect one yet obtained bear magnification to the extent of 55 feet. 

 There is not a scintilla of truth in the rubblish reproduced by the 

 Mayo paper. — W. I am really grieved that my omission to insert 

 your lengthy communication has made you so very angry. — Delta. 

 The succession of the strata, the distances, magnitudes of the 

 heavenly bodies, &c., are all correct, and this is all. As for the deduc- 

 tions from these, I am still thoroughly in agreementwithyou. — Pal. 

 " Eye-Witness " treated the question from a purely scientific point 

 of view, and, from such, quite fairly. Are you unable to distin- 

 guish between faith and knoicledge ? — Otto Ovebbeck. Thanks ; 

 but while certain of your subjects are foreign to those to which 

 these pages are devoted, those which are more appropriate are 

 already in the hands of competent members of our regular staff. — 

 A Pheenologist. Wait until the series of articles is completed. — 

 Eve-Wit.vess. The mind and brain discussion must cease ; it is 

 drifting into a theological stage. — Faciebat. Yours is the only 

 request, so far, received for an explanation of a graphical mode of 

 representing the details of a Lunar Eclipse. 'The existence of a 

 large amount of carbonic acid in the atmosphere during the epoch 

 of the coal vegetation has been disputed, but certainly never " ex- 

 ploded." No ; the " Workshop at Home" articles are not finished. 

 The next will appear almost immediately. — Edwaed Preston. 

 Received. 



Whist. — Clcb Decce. Undoubtedly a misdeal. 



€>\\x fnbrntors' Column. 



So great is the number of inventions now patented that many good 

 things are comparatively lost in the croicd. A succinct account, 

 therefore, by aji Expert, of all inventions of really papular interest 

 and utility must be advantageous both to the public and the 

 Inventor, enabling persons to hear of inventions already desiderated 

 by them, and thus acting reciprocally as a stimulant on supply 

 and demand. 



IMPROVED LAMPS AND LANTERNS. 



Ms. Joseph Rogers, of 16, Hanover-sqnare, London, has patented 

 an improved make of lamps and lanterns, in which, it is claimed, 

 colza, or other vegetable or animal oils, may be burnt with a per- 

 fectly steady flame without the use of a chimney-glass, whUe at the 

 same time a much more brilliant light is obtained than with the 

 ordinary lamps with a less consumption of oil and wick. For this 

 purpose a plate is slid into the bottom of the lamp upon which is 

 an oil reservoir, preferably of the kind known as a bird's fountain, 

 which supplies the oil to a wick tube projecting some distance up 

 from the plate. Surrounding the wick tube is a tubular enclosure, 

 also fixed to the plate, to the top of which is hinged a cap having a 

 slit or opening arranged at such a height as to be a certain distance 

 above the top of the wick. In the annular space between the en- 

 closure and the wick-holder numerous perforations are formed in 

 the base plate through which air can pass into the annular space, 

 and in passing upwards the air is heated to a certain extent by 



