Oct. 20, 1882.] 



KNOWL.EDGE 



345 



Loyo TRICYCLE HIDE. 



[594] — Mr. G. S. Xewth, of Xew Collc<,'e, Hampstead, yesterday 

 rode to Bedford, 50^ miles, on tis " Otto," in the face of wind and 

 rain, leaving London at 5.30 a.m., reaching Bedford 10.45. 



Starting on the return journey at 1.30, London wa.s reached by 

 six o'clock. Allowing 15 minutes for refreshment, the 50 mil<?3 

 were ridden in 4 hours 13 minutes, and the entire jotimey of 100 

 miles in 9J hours, without any previous training, and on wet, soft 

 roads. J. F. P. 



Sept. 22. 



WOLLASTOX AXD FAIRT-RIXGS. 

 [59S] — In justice to the memory of one who is no longer with 

 us, we beg, with your permission, to point out that the fungus 

 theory of the origin of fairy-rings, advocated by certain of your 

 correspondents, was propounded, so long ago as the beginning of 

 the centnrj-, by the celebrated Dr. Thomas Hyde WoUaston. His 

 paper on the subject is to be found in the Philosophical Transactions. 

 Alfbed W. Sow.\rd, 

 I. Probeet. 



SPIRITUALISM. 



[396] — ^Abont eighteen months ago I attended a lecture of Mr. 

 Stuart Cumberland on spiritnalism, his object being to expose the 

 spiritualists. Considerable controversy took place between Mr. 

 Cumberland and his opponents, but the latter were entirely de- 

 feated, inasmuch as they were afraid to come on his platform, fear- 

 ful lest he should expose them. About ten months ago Mr. Carl 

 Von Buch, of Lancaster Gate, and a friend, were fortunate enough 

 to relate in the Times the capture made by them of a celebrated 

 medium in the act of personating a spirit. This occurred in the 

 i-ooms of the British Xational Association of Spiritualists, 38, Great 

 RusseU-strect, now reconstituted under another name, where similar 

 seances have been since held. 



Recently, another weU-known medium of the Association, a Miss 

 Wood, was caught in the same manner by a spiritualist, who, having 

 had his suspicions aroused, seized the " Ghost," and found it to be 

 identical with the medium herself, while the chair was, of course, 

 empty. We shall again, probably, have another explanation from 

 the Central Association of Spiritualists, of the unfortunate medium 

 made by their spirits " to act part wholly irrespective of their own 

 volition," and other similar jargon, to prevent, if possible, the defec- 

 tion of their wavering adherents and the loss of substantial contri- 

 butions to the good cause. As long as the world exists there will be 

 dopes, and, therefore, knaves to dupe them, for the demand creates 

 supply, and the supernatural has always exercised a fascination over 

 many. The truths, if there be any, of spiritualism may be a legiti- 

 mate field for inquiry, but a few good exposes of paid mediums will 

 probably deter many from becoming victims to a fraud the worse in 

 that it trades on the most sacred of human feelings, viz.. the sanctitv 

 of tlie dead. E. P. W. " 



DR. HUNTERS EXPERIMENTS. 



[397] — Allow me to remark that Professor Owen's statement 

 regarding Hunter's discoveries (Kxowlebge, July 2S) does not 

 agree with Sir William Fergusson's, mentioned in one of thg 

 articles on Vivisection in the Xineteenth Century (February, 1882). 

 Sir William Fergusson says : — " So far as I have been able to make 

 out — and I have inquired into the subject — Hunter's first experi- 

 ment, if it may so Ijc called, was on the human subject ; and it was 

 long after he had repeated his operation on the human subject, and 

 others had repeated it, that the fashion of tying arteries on the 

 lower animals originated and was developed." 



San Remo. H.\tiiilue v.vs Evs. 



THi: FIFTEEN PUZZLE. 

 [598] — The " box-turning " solution of this puzzle from the lost 

 position 'can be accomplished in 39 moves bv moving the blocks in 

 the follo»-ing order:— 14, 15; 10, 6; 7; 11, 15; 10, 13 ; 9, 5, 1 ; 

 2,3,1; 8,12; 15; 10; 13,9; 5,1,2; 3,4,8; 12,15,14; 13,9,5; 

 1, 2, 3 ; 4, 8, 12 ; turning the box whenever you please. A. B. 



FLINT JACK. 



[599] — Seeing that a reader of K.sowledgf. (page 268) wishes to 

 know where and how the wanderings of this celebrato<l man were 

 ended, 1 wrote to the head-master of a large public school when- I 

 had heard " Flint Jack" mentioned in a lecture, and lie kindly in- 

 formed me that ho had seen a collection of his manufactures and a 

 photograph of him in the Blackmore Museum at Salisbury, and was 

 told that he was there taken up as a vagabond and died in gaol, 

 cither at Salisbury or at Exeter. E. T. C. VV. 



anstDtrsf to CorifSponlinitd* 



r ^0r the Editor requiring earljf attention thould reach tie 

 OJiee on or before the Saturday preceding the current m»u« of Ksowlxdci, the 

 increasing circulation qftrhich compete u$ to go to pree* early in the treele. 



Hints to C0BBESP05DE;fT9. — 1. yo question* aalcing for ecientiflc information 

 can beannrered through the poet. 2. tettere sent to the Editor for correepondentt 

 cannot be fortcarded^ nor can the names or addresses tf correspondent* bee' 

 antseer to prieate inquiries. 3. Correspondents should write on one 

 paper, and put drascings on a separate leaf. 4. Each tetter should J 

 in replying to a letter, r^erence should be made to it* numtter, the j 

 appears, and its title. 



e given in 

 4 of the 



ihich it 



L. R. S. Proportional to i' and proportional to (2x)', 

 are exactly the same thing. — W. H. E. Kcth. Thanks, but for the 

 present cannot find space for your letter. Much of what you 

 say has been said by others (whose letters have reached us 

 before yours). — U.Kiu. Your advice is excellent. I have ordered 

 a new and very large waste paper basket, so that, as you 

 pleasantly put it, " a place of honourable and luxuriant rest may be 

 provided for the products of captiousness and hypercriticism." — 

 A. B. I fear that no more space can be given to that Algebraical 

 problem. It may be worth noting, however, that the two equations, 

 i:-+mu = a- and >/+nT = b' represent two parabolas, having their 

 a.xes coincident with the axes of y and x respectively. The former 

 cuts the axis of x in two points, a, 0, and — a, 0, and the axis of y in 

 the point 0, a'-i-m ; the other cuts the axis of y in the points 0, b, 

 and 0.-6, and the axis of i in the point b'-i-ni, 0. These parabolas 

 may intersect in two points or in four, according to the values of a, 

 b. ill, and n. — If A. H. will send me one of the photographs referred 

 to I may be able to give him the information he seeks. If the 

 picture is on glass it may have been whitened with bichloride of 

 mercury (A. Brothers).— C. Y. W. [Letter 584, page 314] will find 

 a full description of the Glycerine Barometer in the Times of 2oth 

 October, 1880 (Vega). — D'. Illixgworth. The rationale of your 

 formula is bound to come out if we test it. Thus, let ii be the 

 number of the month, a the man's age last birthday. The first 

 process of your formula gives us 2n + 5. Y'on multiply by 50, sub- 

 tract 305, and then add 115. Clearly this gives 50(2n -1^5) + a -250, 

 orlOOii + a. In other words, the resulting number has his age in 

 the last two figures, and the number of his montli in the preceding 

 digits or digit.— T.4R.\x.vki. I have not heard of the paper you 

 mention on the boomerang. I should like to, the subject being one 

 of frreat interest to me. It seems to me to illustrate well the 

 flight of birds. — T. wishes to know how the colour can be restored 

 to the metallic scarlet of old plates. — F. R. JI. would like to have a 

 statement of the circumference, long and short diameters of (1 ) the 

 Dolichocephalic. (2) the Brachyeephalic, and (3) the average 

 modem English skuU.^J. B. Thanks. Good for our Gossip. — 

 T. A. The explanation of the tides and of twilight is doubtless 

 often incorrect in our school-books. — Sl'RGEOx. ilr. BrudeneU 

 Carter is doubtless right about the rays surrounding stars. Tlicy 

 are, of course, subjective phenomena. But he was <iuite mistaken 

 about the Solar Corona. That theory was entertained by 

 many who had never seen the Corona, not by any who had. 

 If there had been any occasion to dispi-ovc it, the pho- 

 tographs would have done that for us. But the coronal 

 rays are not at all like those seen around a lumiuons 

 object.— H. A. would like to know if there is any evidence to show 

 that dogs by accidentally biting themselves, as when flea-hunting, 

 may self-inoculate themselves with hydrophobia. — Ei.iz. Bkown. 

 There is no reason for associating the colours of self-luminous 

 paints with the phenomena of mctachromatisra. — W. P.\rkkk. Your 

 letter reached us too late for u.«eful reply.— H. J. Whitk. Prof. 

 Tyndall's Address (Belfast) is published as part of the later edit ions 

 of his " Fragments of Science " (Longmans). He certainly never 

 made an apology for that able address. It assuredly noodcd none, 

 even for those who differed from him. As for the little sum you 

 sot, I must really decline to work it. We must draw the lino some- 

 where. — G. Griffiths. There is no way of tolling the odds against 

 one horse from the known odds against another. — H. B. Richard- 

 SOX. Do not know the publishers of Mr. Birloy's " Zotctic." — W. H. 

 Ba.nweli,. Like you, I did not quite see what, in Mr. Aniold's 

 article, drew down my friend's attack. If 1 were asked which I 

 would rather give up, my literary or my scientific studies, 1 should 

 nnliesitatiiigly say the latter. Fortunately there is no occasion to 

 give up cither. Of course I am sjicaking only of the )MT8onal 

 pleasure either form of study affords, not of their use- 

 fulness. But I have the greatest possible cuntcmpt for the 

 class of classical studies to which F.R.A.S. referred.— Bevan Linc- 

 wooii wants to know of an English translation of Demosthenes' 

 '• Philiiipips." — OriFER, J. E. S. They wereoloctrie clouds. — Woop. 

 The cause of light is not known. Science can only discuss the 

 natnrs of light ; she can deal with the How, not with the Why. — 

 F. C. I am vcrj- sorry, but it would really \x> imiiossiblo to give 



