6oo 



NA TURE 



[October i8, 1894 



as consisting of " a boJy and a soul held together by 

 the spirit, which is the cause and the law.'' " To grasp 

 the invisible elements, to attract them by their material 

 correspondences, to control, purify, and transform them 

 by the living power of the spirit— this is true alchemy." 

 The pure, invisible, intangible, universal elements con- 

 stituted the highest of the three orders of things ; the 

 second order was composed of " elements that are com- 

 pounded, changeable, and impure, yet may by art be 

 reduced to their pure simplicity " ; and the third order 

 contained the ''twice compounded elements'' which 

 served as vehicles for drawmg down the pure ethereal 

 elements and fi.'cing them in the substances of the second 

 order. The laboratory was the place for learning the 

 properties of the things of the second order ; " for from 

 these proceed the bindings, loosings,and transmutations 

 of all things." Paracelsus speaks of the three substances 

 of which all things are composed ; these three things are 

 "sulphur, mercury, and salt" ; but he adds, "they are 

 acted on by a fmirlh principle which is life." "These 

 three substances," he says, " are not seen with the physical i 

 eye. ... If you lake the three invisible substances, and 

 add the power of life, you will have three invisible sub- 

 stances in a visible form. . . . They are hidden by life, 

 and joined together by life. . • . All things are hidden 

 in them in the same sense that a pear is hidden in a 

 pear tree and grapes in a vine. ... A gardener knows 

 that a vine will produce no pears, and a pear-tree no 

 grapes " 



I think it is possible from ihese eslracls to construct, 

 in a general way. the non-na!ural scheme of nature that 

 was upheld by Paracelsus. A great deal may be said in 

 its favour, if only we agree to construct the nature that 

 is to be explained from our own consciousness with closed 

 eyes. Thi-s certainly may be asserted in favour of the so- 

 called spiritual science of Paracelsus and the mystics of 

 his school, that their method is infinitely easier than the 

 method of natural science, or, as it is called by the modern 

 Paracelsians, materialistic and sceptical science. What- 

 ever judgment may be pas:ed on natural science when it 

 is contrasted with supernatural mysticism, it is at any 

 rate ludicrously erroneous to say that the former is proud, 

 dogmatic, and conceited, while the latter is humble, 

 suggestive, and ready to learn. The answer to the con- 

 ception of the universe that Paracelsus framed is to be 

 found in the history of science, and in the history of 

 humanity, since the .Middle Ages. 



Hut however radically a modern naturalist may differ 

 from the medi<x-val alchemist, he must recognise the 

 great debt which those who to-day seek the knowledge 

 of natural laws owe to the man of the sixteenth century 

 who boldly declared against authority, and besought his 

 followers to go to nature, who insisted on the inter- 

 dependence of the various branches of natural knowledge, 

 who taught the essential unity of the forms of matter and 

 of the forms of energy, and who, by his discoveries in 

 medicine, helped forward the blessed work of alle- 

 viating the miseries and soothing the sorrows of human 

 beings. Whatever else he was, Paracelsus was certainly a 

 true man ; he lived earnestly ; he was not regardful of 

 theconventionaliiies of life; he received blows, and he 

 returned them ; he suffered much, and he bore his 

 troubles on the whole with patience and some nobility. 

 With his own words we may leave him:— "Have no 

 care of my misery reader ; let me bear my burden my- 

 self. I have two failings : my poverty, and my piety. 

 My poverty was thrown in my face by a Burgomaster 

 who had perhaps only seen Doctors attired in silken robes, 

 never basking in tattered rags in the sunshine. So it 

 was decreed that I was not a Doctor. For my piety I am 

 arraigned by the parsons, for I am no devotee of Venus, 

 nor do I at all love those who teach what they do not 

 themselves practise." M. M. Pattison MuiR. 



NO. 1.103, VOL. 50] 



ON HOLLOW PYRAMIDAL ICE CRYSTALS.'' 



I. 'T'HE Lava Cavern of Surtshel/iy. — The lava cavern 

 of Surtshellir forms a long subterranean channel 

 —over a mile in length — in the post-glacial lava-field 

 which encompasses in a vast semicircle the ice-covered 

 Eyriksjdkull (Iceland). The farthest recess forms a 

 chamber about 30 feet high, and from its floor and ceiling 

 spring ice-stalagmites and stalactites of rare beauty. 



(Kig I.) 



The north-western wall is gracefully draped by a long 

 curtain of icicles resembling somewhat the pipes of an 

 organ. From those parts of the vault not covered by 

 icicles a thousand glitterings and sparklings are seen, at 

 every movement of the candle, to be reflected from ice 

 crystals which stud the walls. 



The ice crystals have the form of hexagonal funnels, 

 or hollow hexagonal pyramids. In size they range up to 

 two inches long, with a hexagon side of half an inch. 

 The triangular sides of the pyramids are built of most 

 delicate steps of ice, arranged in the manner of a stair- 

 case. 



The attachment is invariably by the apex, and the 

 hexagonal bases turn truinpet-like towards the interior of 

 the cave. (Fig. 2.) When these observations were made 

 in June 1892, the temperature of the air in the cave was 

 + o 5^ C. 



There are some minute cracks in the roof of the cave, 

 through which water trickles scantily. At such places 

 icic/t's are formed, but not crystals. The crystals are not 

 formed from the water percolating into the cave,but from 

 the moisture contiined in the air, and as such they must 

 be regarded as a kind of hoar-frost. 



II. Hoar-frost. — During Christmas week 1S92 an 

 unusually fine hoar-frost prevailed over the North of 

 England. In various parts of Yorkshire, Lancashire, and 

 Cheshire, we found the rime to consist almost entirely of 

 hexagonal " hopper " crystals. (Fig. 3, <?,/', i.) The basal 

 hexagons varied up to about i' inch in diameter, and the 

 majority of the crystals measured in height about twice 

 the diameter. (Fig. 3, <i) Some, however, were more 

 obtuse. (Fig. 3, b.) The forms were often obliquely 

 truncated (Fig. 3, t), certain faces having grown more 

 rapidly than others. A spiral arrangement was noticed 

 in some cases, and occasionally a double spiral re- 

 sembling the helix of an Ionic capital. (Fig. 3, d.) 



There was a marked tendency for the simple pyramids 

 togroup themselves inio compound forms. (Fig. 3. <',/•) 

 The group-; exhibited hexagonal outlines (Fig. 3,_/\ 

 and the primary pyramids on the periphery were, as a 

 rule, better developed than those in the interior. The 

 secondary hexagons often measured more than \\ inches 

 in diameter. Even a tertiary grouping could be made 

 out in a few cases. In a few rare instances the primary 

 hexagons were studded at the corners with small hexa- 

 gons resembling bastions. These bastions were either 

 solid or hollow. (Fig. 3,.i,'.) 



III. Crystals under Ice Crusts. — On January 3, 1S94, 

 we found in Cheshire, during a severe frost, similar 

 hexagonal hoppers on the under-surfaces of ice-cnisls 

 covering hollow spaces over ruts in clayey soil, or cover- 

 ing ponds where an air-space divided the ice from the 

 water. No ice crystals were found on the sides and 

 bottom of the ruts, and there was no trace of hoar-frost 

 on adjacent objects. 



These observations suggested the idea that hoar frost 

 mii^ht lie wade at will on any cold night. We accord- 

 ingly spread pieces of black cardboard and black velvet 

 over grass, and on examining these after two days of 

 hard frost we found the ////r/f/--surfaces coaled with an 

 abundance of hollow pyramidal and other forms of ice 



I From a pripcr read before ihe Royal .Socitly, l)y Dr. Karl Gros»:naiin 

 and Joseph Lomas. 



