July io, 1890] 



NATURE 



259 



I 



ihat might be on the roots. Nothing could be detected, and we 

 were strengthened in an opinion that they were true seedling 

 canes by the very great difference in their mode of growth from 

 that of canes growing from the eyes of canes. A few months 

 later we found that there were several distinct varieties amongst 

 them. In December l!588 we examined them with great care, 

 and grouped them into ten groups according to their most 

 strongly marked characteristics, and found that in many of our 

 groups thus formed the canes graduated from one group into 

 another. Many of these canes exhibited some of the charac- 

 teristics of certain of our varieties, together with the charac- 

 teristics of other varieties, but in some cases we could not even 

 form any opinion as to their parentage, as they differed com- 

 pletely from any canes we had ever seen. During the latter 

 stages of their growth these canes were examined by many 

 planters and sugar chemists, all of whom were particularly 

 struck with the amount of variation they exhibited and with the 

 fact that certain of them were entirely different from any canes 

 they had previously seen. The canes, as grouped, were re- 

 jilanted in the usual manner, and are now in course of experi- 

 mental cultivation. The remaining canes were reaped on March 

 S, 1889, and fifty plants yielded 307 pounds of cane tops and 

 1626 pounds of canes, which gave 61 per cent, of juice of a 

 density of io°-6 Beaume, containing i '629 pounds of sucrose 

 and 0090 pounds of glucose in the imperial gallon. The 

 following are the compositions of the canes, cane-juice, and 

 megass : — 



"In order to definitely settle the question of whether the 

 sugar-cane produced fertile seed, from the middle of December 

 1888 to that of February 1889 most careful search was made 

 through the fields for growing seedlings and for arrows contain- 

 ing fertile seed. The search for both of these proved successful, 

 but only on the fields in which the varieties were growing and 

 on which, as pointed out by us in our 1888 Report, the condi- 

 tions for fertilization are most favourable. The seedlings, as 

 found, were transplanted into boxes, but, on account of the 

 unfavourable climatic conditions, great difficulty was experienced 

 in preserving them : on one occasion an accidental exposure to 

 the sun for about three hours destroyed five out of seven con- 

 tained in the exposed box. One seedling was found attached to 

 a portion of cane arrow which had fallen in a damp and 

 sheltered position. The portions of cane arrows found which 

 apparently contained fertile seed were collected, the apparent 

 seeds carefully separated from the spikelets of the panicles and 

 sown at intervals, commencing on January 12. Ten days after, 

 some of the seeds were seen to be germinating, and certain of 

 them were removed and preserved as microscopic objects. Of 

 the apparent seeds, less than 5 per cent, germinated, and not 

 more than one- fourth of the germinated ones finally survived, 



*' As the self-sown seedlings and those raised from the seeds by 

 ourselves reached a sufficiently advanced stage of growth (the 

 exceedingly slow growth of the seedlings at an early time is most 

 marked, a point which in certain previous researches may have 

 prevented the attainment of complete proof of the fact that the 

 sugar-cane produces fertile seed, and in which mode of growth 

 the seedlings strikingly differ from the rapid growth of canes 

 from the buds) were, similarly to the seedlings of 1888, trans- 

 planted into the field, and are now in course of experimental 

 cultivation. 



"As far as our experience at present shows, the conditions 

 most favourable for the production of fertile seed by the sugar- 

 cane are found in the cultivation 'of varieties side by side and 

 in comparatively large numbers, although from observations 

 recently made, apparently fertilized ovules are to be found from 

 time to time upon arrows of Bourbon canes growing by them- 

 selves. To secure the germination of the seeds, it is necessary 

 to sow them soon after the arrow ripens, under similar conditions 

 to those necessary with the seeds of other of the Gramineae of 

 low germinating power. 



NO. 1080, VOL. 42] 



"The fertile seeds ioclosed in the glumes are long and 

 narrow, being from 3 to 4 millimetres in length and 0-65 to o-7(> 

 millimetres in breadth, and terminate in a beard from 6 to & 

 millimetres long." 



MUSICAL SCIENCE} 



'T'HE object of this little pamphlet is one with which musical 

 ^ students are tolerably familiar. The author complains that 

 the science of acoustics, although now well advanced, is unable 

 to explain the actual structure of musical compositions, or to 

 account for their effect on the mind. Many writers have made 

 the same complaint, and have endeavoured, each according to 

 his own fancy, to "account for" everything by some particular 

 system of his own. 



Now, it happens that some quarter of a century ago a person 

 named Helmholtz wrote a great book with the express object of 

 explaining this difficulty. He showed, about as conclusively as 

 anything can be shown, that, although physical science has fur- 

 nished an intelligible basis on which the musical art is founded, 

 it goes but a very little way in explaining practical musical com- 

 position, this being guided chiefly by the esthetic instincts and 

 the artistic feelings of the best composers, with which physical 

 science can have very little to do. 



One would have thought that such a doctrine would be hailed 

 with satisfaction by musicians, as exalting and ennobling the 

 share of art in the generation of high-class music. But, strange 

 to say, it is the musicians who chiefly dispute it, and who would 

 wish to substitute for the heaven-born gift the dry process of 

 scientific deduction. 



Our author is of this opinion . He tells us that if by science 

 we are to understand a thorough rational understanding of any 

 subject, musical science has not yet been discovered ; it waits 

 still its Columbus, or its Galileo, or its Cuvier. 



This may be in a certain sense true, but the science wanted 

 for the purpose is not physical science. We know already pretty 

 well all that physical science can tell us about music ; but there 

 is a science much deeper — namely, that which would investigate 

 the general effect produced by mus ic on the mind, as depending 

 on its composition and style. This is the psychology of music, 

 an abstruse branch of resthetics, and it is this that must tell us, 

 if it can, how music has attained its present power over the 

 feelings and the emotions of mankind. It is only lately that 

 attention has been called to this by competent writers ; what is 

 popularly said or sung about it has seldom any serious meaning. 



The idea promulgated in this pamphlet is that all the mys- 

 teries of the art may be explained on the principles of rhythm — 

 not, as usually understood, having to do with time and measure 

 and accent and so on, but in a more hidden application to the 

 generation of sounds. The system is not completely elaborated, 

 and it is not possible to do more here than give a very general 

 notion of it. The first six chapters treat of rhythms in general ; 

 and the author gives a drawing of a machine for illustrating 

 them. This consists of a series of " Savart " ratchet wheels, 

 which, having different numbers of teeth, can give rise to various 

 rhythmic combinations of their beats. He then deduces ' ' laws " 

 from the consideration of these, of which the following are souie 

 specimens : — 



"When we listen to a series of isochronous blows, we per- 

 ceive them at once in binary rhythm, and we therefore call this 

 perception spontaneous, natural, and instinctive. 



" We cannot perceive a series of isochronous blows in ternary 

 rhythm, except with the concurrence of the will ; hence we call 

 this perception voluntary." 



These are simple fundamental laws ; the following are more 

 complicated ones : — 



"Whatever is the number of teeth of a wheel, and the velocity 

 at which it revolves, there is always the spontaneous perception 

 of the isochronous series in binary rhythm. 



" If, to a series perceived in binary rhythm, we cause another 

 to follow, which has with it any ratio whatever represented by r,- 

 this will be at once perceived in the same ratio r, which proves 

 that the brain is endowed with the faculty of comparison. 



"In any association whatever of two series of different 

 rhythms, there is the production of a forced perception which 

 compels the immediate perception of the two rhythms." . 



» " Musiconomia : Leggi Fundamentali della Scienza Musicale." By Dr. 

 Primo Crotti, Professor of the History of Mi 



of Parma. (Parma, 1890.) 



the Koyal Conservatory 



