Dec. 29, 1882.] 



KNOAA^LEDGE 



480 



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MAGAZINE oTSGIENCE ^- 



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LONDON: FRIDAY, DECEMBER 29, 1882. 

 Contents op No. 61. 



PAGB PAG 



Science and Art Gossip 489 Learning Languages: Ilamilton's 



The Star in the East. By Eich. A. , Method 4! 



Proctor 491 I Coeebspottdenck : British Snakes — 



The Crvstal PaUce Electric and Gas 



Exhibition 



Corsets and Health. By Dr. Dio 



A Strange Caterpiiiar."' By C.F. 



Holder. {lUtutrated) '. 



~ " -II. Joints. By Dr, 



ight — Siugola 



Andrew Wilsen, F.R.S.E. 



Cold Bath 



Kainbow, &c. .. 



Answers to Correspondents 499 



Our Mathematical Column.— Ea5y 



Lessons in Differential Calculus. 



No. XTT 500 



Our Chess Column 601 



496 I Onr Whist Column.. 



Science anti ^rt ^o^siijp. 



And now the end of the -world is to come in 18SG, d 

 1882 departed. 



But the comet, according to the latest estimate of its 

 orbital motion, is not to return for 4,000 years, — though 

 it did travel so close along the orbit of the comets of 1 843 

 and 1882. 



Between ten and eleven o'clock on Dec. 21, the atten- 

 tion of several persons in Broughty Ferry was directed 

 for a time to a somewhat unusual sight in the heavens. 

 The sun at the time was shining brightly, being about due 

 south, when a star was seen in close proximity to it. The 

 star was a little above the sun's path, and the peculiar 

 phenomenon was seen by various persons, who had their 

 attention directed to it. Being daytime, the star did not 

 have the brilliant luminous radiance stars exhibit at night, 

 but was of a milky white appearance, and seemed, when 

 seen through the glass, to be of a crescent shape. Being 

 on a light blue ground, and lying between two white clouds, 

 it was seen to great advantage. 



" De MORTms NIL NISI BONU.M " SGcms to be precisely the 

 reverse of the usual custom. For we never hear any man 

 abused so roundly in life, as he is when, being dead, he 

 can no longer defend himself. At least, it is so in public 

 life. Perhaps, because a man who is in power, or may 

 rise to power, is regarded as one whom it is best to treat 

 respectfully — with due reference to what Do Morgan called 

 the "way up in the world." Anyhow, we never hear the 

 worst that can be said of such men till after they are 

 dead. 



For instance, here are the words of a statesman, recorded 

 by a bishop, who filled a greater space in public life than 

 the innocuously neutral Tait, and had so pleasantly (to all 

 seeming) rounded oft" his idiosyncratic corners that ho was 

 generally known as Saponaceous Samuel (or to that effect) 

 respecting one who was certainl}' presented to the British 



public by omniscient newspapers as a great and chivalrous 

 (not horsey) statesman : — 



Clarendon spoke to " mo with Itho atmost bitterness of Lord 

 Derby. He " had studied him ever since he (Clarendon) was in 

 the Honse of Lords. JJo generosity, never, to friend or foe ; never 

 acknowledged help; a great aristocrat, prond of family wealth. 

 He had only agreed to this (the Eeform Bill of 1867) as he would 

 of old, have hacked a horse at Newmarket; hated Disraeli, bnt 

 believed in him as he would have done in an unprincipled trainer ; 

 lie irinf, that is all. He knows the garlic given, &c. He eays to 

 those without, 'All fair, gentlemen.' " 



It was reported recently in certain daily and weekly 

 papers that Colonel Keyter had done some heliographic 

 signalling from the top of the Great Pyramid which had 

 been read at Alexandria — a distance of 1 20 miles. As we 

 pointed out in these columns, the thing was impossible, as 

 the depression at each of a tangent line to the earth's sur- 

 face, 120 miles long, and touching at its middle point, is 

 (60)- X depression for 1 mile or (with due account of re- 

 fraction) about 3,600 times G in., or 1,800 ft.— nearly four 

 times the height of the Great Pyramid. We were in\-ited 

 to write to Colonel Keyter, asking under what conditions 

 his signalling was made ; but we were not very anxious to 

 ask a question akin to, say, " Under what conditions did 

 you see through a millstone 1 " But Mr. Hampden (who 

 really mnst believe in the earth's flatness !) did so. 



Colonel Keyter explains that his signalling was slightly 

 exaggerated ; it was at Cairo, not at Alexandria, that the 

 signals were read — a distance of about 12 miles, instead 

 of 120. The depression for the whole distance of 12 miles 

 would be about 72 feet, or less than a sixth of the Great 

 Pyramid's height. 



A CORRESPONDENT writes that Adam's Peak, in Ceylon, 

 some 7,400 feet high, can be seen in clear weather a 

 distance of 1.50 miles; but he does not say v:hence. If 

 from the deck of a ship, I question the distance mightily, 

 and doubt the captain's judgment of his position. If from 

 a height of not less than 300 feet above the sea, and the 

 barometric pressure high, so as to bring the eftects of refrac- 

 tion to a maximum, which would make the depression for 

 a mile rather less than .5i inches, the tangent line to the 

 sea surface would touch 26 miles from the ship, and the 

 remaining 124 miles would correspond to a depression of 

 (124)- X ■'ii- inches, or about 7,040 feet. This would leave 

 200 or 300 feet of the peak visible. 



Messrs. Campbell, a firm of dyers at Perth, have 

 adopted the electric light, and are well pleased with it, 

 finding that the purity of the light enables them to dis- 

 tinguish colours perfectly, and to carry on at any hour 

 operations which could be otherwise only performed by 

 daylight. 



Electric Lioiit Companies received a somewhat severe 

 rebuff the other day at the hands of Mr. Justice Chitty. 

 A disappointed shareholder sued one of the subsidiary 

 Brush Companies for the return of the money he had paid 

 in. The claim was based on the fact that wlieroas the 

 Lane-Fox incandescent lamp is the property of the British 

 as well as the Brush Electric Light Companies, he 

 took up his shares on the representation that the Brush 

 Company had sole right to use it Tlie application was 

 opposed on the ground thatjf a misstatement had been 

 made it was not material, since the Lane-Fox lamp was the 

 least valuable of the inventions conceded to the Company 

 by the Anglo- American Corporation. Mr. Justice Chitty 



