SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



ilarity 



strained or relaxed nerves and from obstruc- 

 tions in the vessels. Humoral pathology 

 was only acquainted with alterations in 

 mixture. The four cardinal fluids, repre- 

 sentatives of the classical four elements, 

 blood, phlegm, black and yellow gall ; with 

 others, the acrimonies or dyscrasies, which 

 had to be expelled by sweating and purging, 

 all these were elements of their 

 chemistry. HELMHOLTZ Popular Lectures, 

 lect. 5, p. 210. (L. G. & Co., 1898.J 



3115. SIZE RELATIVE Difference in 

 Point of View Microscopic Objects Re- 

 garded as Immense. To two men, one edu- 

 cated in the school of the senses, having 

 mainly occupied himself with observation; 

 the other educated in the school of imagina- 

 tion as well, and exercised in the conceptions 

 of atoms and molecules to which we have so 

 frequently referred, a bit of matter, say 

 ^nnny of an inch in diameter, will present 

 itself differently. The one descends to it 

 from his molar heights, the other climbs to 

 it from his molecular lowlands. To the one 

 it appears small, to the other large. So, 

 also, as regards the appreciation of the most 

 minute forms of life revealed by the micro- 

 scope. To one of the men these naturally 

 appear conterminous with the ultimate par- 

 ticles of matter; there is but a step from 

 the atom to the organism. The other dis- 

 cerns numberless organic gradations between 

 both. Compared with his atoms, the small- 

 est vibrios and bacteria of the microscopic 

 field are as behemoth and leviathan. TYN- 

 DALL Fragments of Science, vol. ii, ch. 8, p. 

 124. (A., 1897.) 



3116. 



Dimensions of Sun- 



spots One Spot Might Engulf the Earth. 

 The dimensions of sun-spots are sometimes 

 enormous. Many groups have been observed 

 covering areas of more than one hundred 

 thousand miles square, and single spots 

 have been known to measure forty or fifty 

 thousand miles in diameter, the central 

 umbra alone being twenty-five or thirty 

 thousand miles across. A spot, however, 

 measuring thirty thousand miles over all, 

 would be considered large rather than small. 

 YOUNG The Sun, ch. 4, p. 126. (A., 1898.) 



3117. SKELETON ADORNED WITH 



JEWELS Mother and Babe Perish Together 

 Remains at Pompeii. A very small num- 

 ber of skeletons have been discovered in either 

 city [Herculaneum or Pompeii] ; and it is 

 clear that most of the inhabitants not only 

 found time to escape, but also to carry with 

 them the principal part of their valuable ef- 

 fects. In the barracks at Pompeii were the 

 skeletons of two soldiers chained to the 

 stocks, and in the vaults of a country house 

 in the suburbs were the skeletons of seven- 

 teen persons, who appear to have fled there 

 to escape from the shower of ashes. They 

 were found enclosed in an indurated tuff, 

 and in this matrix was preserved a perfect 

 cast of a woman, perhaps the mistress of 



the house, with an infant in her arms. Al- 

 tho her form was imprinted on the rock, 

 nothing but the bones remained. To these a 

 chain of gold was suspended, and on the 

 fingers of the skeletons were rings with 

 jewels. Against the sides of the same vault 

 was ranged a long line of earthen amphorae. 

 LYELL Principles of Geology, bk. ii, ch. 24, 

 p. 391. (A., 1854.) 



3118. SKEPTICISM, PSYCHOLOGIC- 

 AL, CONTRADICTS ITSELF Duty and Mo- 

 rality Remain Truth of Skeptical Denial 

 Assumed. If you repeat again and again 

 that there are only relative laws, no abso- 

 lute truth and beauty and morality, that 

 they are changing products of the outer 

 conditions without binding power, you con- 

 tradict yourself by the assertion. Do you 

 not demand already for your skeptical 

 denial that at least this denial itself is an 

 absolute truth? And when you discuss it, 

 and stand for your conviction that there is 

 no morality, does not this involve your ac- 

 knowledgment of the moral law to stand for 

 one's conviction? . . . Psychological 

 skepticism contradicts itself by its preten- 

 sions ; there is a truth, a beauty, a morality, 

 which is independent of psychological condi- 

 tions. MTJNSTERBERG Psychology and Life, 

 p. 17. (H. M. & Co., 1899.) 



3119. SKETCH OF CREATIVE PUR- 

 POSE IN EARLY FOSSILS These early 

 types seem to sketch in broad, general char- 

 acters the creative purpose, and to include 

 in the first average expression of the plan 

 all its structural possibilities. The crinoid 

 forms include the thought of the modern 

 starfishes and sea-urchins; the simple cham- 

 bered shells of the Silurian anticipate the 

 more complicated structure of the later ones; 

 the trilobites give the most comprehensive 

 expression of the articulate type, while the 

 early fishes not only prophesy the reptiles 

 which are to come, but also hint at birds 

 and even at mammalia by their embryonic 

 development and their mode of reproduction. 

 AGASSIZ Geological Sketches, ser. i, ch. 2, 

 p. 58. (H. M. & Co., 1896.) 



30 2O. SKILL OF PRIMITIVE MAN 

 IN STONE-WORKING Difficult for Civilized 

 Man To Attain. Easy as it may seem to 

 make such flakes as these [prehistoric flint 

 specimens], a little practise will convince 

 any one who attempts to do so, that a cer- 

 tain knack is required; and a gun-flint 

 maker at Brandon told me that it took 

 him two years to acquire the art. It is also 

 necessary to be careful in selecting the flint. 

 It is therefore evident that these flakes, sim- 

 ple as they may appear, are always the work 

 of man. To make one, the flint must be 

 held firmly, and then a considerable force 

 must be applied, either by pressure or by 

 blows repeated three or four times, but at 

 least three, and given in certain slightly dif- 

 ferent directions, with a certain definite 

 force ; conditions which could scarcely occur 



