277 



unknown acting independently ; (3) to causes unknown acting 

 together ; (4) to certain causes known and unknown, or 

 imperfectly known, acting in combination. 



Mr. Biggs, therefore, has somehow failed to grasp the 

 scope of my argument when he sets himself to the task to 

 prove that the movements of Jupiter have no appreciable 

 " influence whatever, direct or indirect," upon the coincident 

 phenomena, simply because the variable cycles of the maxima 

 and minima of sun-spots, death rate, magnetic inclination, rain- 

 fall, etc., are not solely influejiced by the movements 

 of Jupiter primarily. This is proving a negative in refei'ence 

 to a complex problem, by ignoring all the factors necessary 

 to arrive at a correct conclusion, save one — viz., the supposed 

 value of Jupiter's influence. Even this influence seems to be 

 unnecessarily restricted by him to the mere point when 

 Jupiter is exactly in perihelion. 



Mr. Biggs, by demanding proof and demonstration suffi- 

 cient to produce conviction, again fails to grasp the object of 

 my paper, which so far as the causpJ aspect of the phenomena 

 discussed is concerned, is most guardedly restricted by me to 

 mere suggestion. Now, had he studied my paper closely 

 instead of the brief abstract referred to, he would find that I 

 pointed out that the " coincidences observed are not suffi- 

 ciently broad and regular to justify prediction ;" that, at 

 present, inferences drawn from them are " more suggestive 

 than conclusive," and in consideration of many unexplained 

 anomalies due to unknown and complex relations, I could 

 only hazard from them ^^presumption " in favour of a rela- 

 tively low death rate in Australasia during years of sun-spot 

 maxima, and a more or less relatively high death rate during 

 years of sun-spot minima. In this last respect it is a plea- 

 sure to nie to find that I am in accord with Mr. Biggs, who 

 also, with Young, Scott and others, admits that there seems 

 to be a well established connection between " solar disturb- 

 ances and the electrical condition of our globe." 



Professor Balfour Stewart, the celebrated physicist and 

 author of the profound work "On the Conservation of 

 Energy " (Inter. Series, 1874), in a paper read by him on 

 " Magnetic Declination " (See Nature, April, p. 592), states 

 that, although Professor Rudolph Wolf's list of sun-spot 

 observations "extends back into the seventeenth century, 

 and is unquestionably of much value. Nevertheless, it must 

 be borne in mind tha^t v>^e possess no sun-spot data suffi- 

 ciently accurate for a discussion of cj^uestions relating to 

 solar periodicity before the time when Schwabe had finally 

 matured his system of solar observations, which was not 

 until the year 1832." Curiously enough that is just one 

 year prior to the period from which my diagram records the 



