June 20, 1901] 



NA TUBE 



this be so it is only one more instance of the deleterious 

 eti'ect of red tape in this country, of which we have just 

 recei\ed, in the case of the War Office, so impressive, we 

 may say so humiliating, a lesson. Others may ask : 

 Why could not Prof Gregory have shown a more 

 trustful spirit and sailed in the Disco''ery^ believing all 

 things and hoping all things? There are limits even 

 to faith. Had the commander of the expedition been a 

 man distinctly his senior, already accustomed to scientific 

 voyages, with some experience of polar exploration and 

 those special problems which may be solved by the 

 Antarctic expedition. Prof. Gregory might have ventured 

 to dispense with securities and to feel confident that the 

 interests of science would not be subordinated to the 

 more showy work of adding new capes and islands to the 

 iTiap. But is this the case? The commander of the 

 Discovery^ we are informed, was, not many months 

 ago, torpedo-lieutenant on a man-of-war, has had no 

 experience in either Arctic or Antarctic seas, is no doubt 

 well versed in those subjects of which a knowledge was 

 demanded by his former post, may possibly be thoroughly 

 competent to direct magnetic observations, but he has 

 not as yet won the slightest reputation as a naturalist, a 

 geologist, or an investigator of glacial problems. The last 

 two qualifications are of exceptional importance in this 

 expedition. They cannot be acquired on the voyage out, 

 even by the help of a tutor ; they demand, not only book 

 learning, but also much practical experience. This Prof. 

 Gregory possesses in an exceptional degree. He knows 

 where a search for fossils will be the most hopeful and 

 what will be of most value to pakrontologists. He has 

 mastered the literature of glacial questions, and he has 

 studied glaciers themselves, in the Alps, Spitsbergen 

 and elsewhere. He has travelled much, and on his 

 notable expedition to Mount Kenya displayed powers of 

 organisation, calmness in critical circumstances, physical 

 endurance and moral courage which gave him at 

 once a high place among explorers. He has a 

 reputation to lose. Can he be expected to im- 

 peril that by absolute surrender to one who is probably 

 his junior and is without experience in the branches 

 of science of which he is a master? As Prof. Gregory 

 truly remarks : "The position gives no power to secure a 

 fair opportunity for work to the man who would have to 

 bear the blame for scientific failure." It was not the 

 position which he had originally consented to accept, it 

 was not that which was agreed upon when he left England 

 last February ; so, perceiving that he was no longer sup- 

 ported by those whom he had regarded as representing 

 the interests of science, he promptly withdrew from an 

 untenable position. 



The action of those representatives (or rather the 

 majority of them) is inexplicable. They have worked, we 

 hear it said, in the interests of peace. But there are 

 occasions when even peace may be too dearly bought. 

 " There must be give and take," one of them pleaded 

 at a notable crisis. Certainly, but it has been all 

 give on the one side and all take on the other. "The 

 Council of the Royal Geographical Society," it was 

 urged, " were acting within their rights when they 

 rejected the instructions, as modified by their 

 secretary." Certainly, so is one nation doing when it 

 breaks off diplomatic relations with another, and in this 

 way their action should have been regarded by the 

 Council of the Royal Society. That body, or its repre- 

 sentatives, seem to have adopted, at least during the 

 present year, " a peace at any price" policy. In consent- 

 ing to the appointment of a committee of arbitration they 

 meekly accepted a snub, and in designating its members 

 they exposed themselves to defeat. We have the highest 

 respect for their nominees individually, but not one of 

 them is a recognised expert in those branches of science 

 the interests of which were most at stake. The other 

 half of the court consisted of geographers — that is, of 



NO. 165 1, VOL. 64] 



men who were really counsel for that side— and yet this 

 court called no scientific experts to plead before it, 

 though this had been virtually promised, but promptly 

 gave its decision. Time would be saved if this practice 

 were imitated in our law courts, but whether justice 

 would be promoted is another question. 



It has, however, been asserted that the Royal Geo- 

 graphical Society ought to be allowed a preponderant 

 influence in the organisation of this expedition, because 

 it had provided, directly or indirectly, most of the 

 funds. This difficulty, however, is so obvious that it 

 should have been foreseen at the outset, and the Royal 

 Society have been careful to protect itself from being 

 forced into a false position by inequality of contribution. 



But we may go on to ask, does the Royal Geographical 

 Society flatter itself that the Government would have made 

 that grant of 45,000/. if its application had not been so ener- 

 getically and heartily supported by the Royal Society? We 

 venture to be sceptical on this point, and so to affirm 

 that it was the duty of the latter body, at any rate after 

 the rejection of the amended instructions by the Council 

 of the Royal Geographical Society, to have announced 

 that, while wishing all success to the Antarctic expedi- 

 tion, it could no longer be responsible for the guid- 

 ance of its scientific work or the expenditure of public 

 money. Now it must be content to follow whither the 

 geographers lead. It will receive little honour for 

 any successes, but will have to bear much of the blame 

 if the scientific results are of small value. Its represen- 

 tatives have not afforded, as Prof. Poulton complained, to 

 "the claims of the scientific chief in an expedition under- 

 taken to do scientific work . . . that unflinching, undivided 

 and resolute support " which not only he, but also those 

 who set science above even geographical exploration, 

 had expected and desired. 



THE TELEGRAPHONE. 



A 



DESCRIPTION of the telegraphone— the remark- 

 able recording telephone invented by Herr Poulsen 

 — was given in these columns in August last (vol. Ixii. p. 

 371). At that time the instrument was on view at the 

 Paris Exhibition, and though we were able the explain 

 the principle upon which it was designed we could give 

 no detailed description of the actual instrument, nor had 

 we ourselves been able to test its powers. Since then it 

 has been brought to England and has been exhibited at 

 the Royal Society and at other places, where it has 

 deservedly attracted a very large amount of attention. 

 A further description may, therefore, in the circum- 

 stances be acceptable. 



Herr Poulsen's invention fully deserves to be called 

 one of the most astonishing that have been made of late 

 years. That the delicate vibrations of the human voice 

 could be changed into variations of an electric current 

 and thus be transmitted over a distance and reproduced at 

 the far end came as a surprise to men of science a quarter 

 of a century ago. With no less surprise do we learn to- 

 day that these telephonic currents, small though they are, 

 can yet be used to create permanent magnetic fields in a 

 steel wire, which will thus be made to serve as a tablet on 

 which to write one's speech. It is not to be wondered at 

 that when first Herr Poulsen's discovery was announced 

 many were incredulous as to its genuineness ; the inven- 

 tion is precisely of the kind that one does not believe 

 could be practical until one has actually seen or heard it 

 in operation. That it will have the effect of putting the 

 phonograph on an entirely new basis no one who has 

 heard it can doubt. The speech reproduced by the tele- 

 graphone is almost as much superior to that reproduced 

 by the wax cylinder phonograph as are the living pictures 

 of the kinematograph to those of the zoetrope. There is 

 none of the very unpleasant twang inseparable from the 



