May 17, 1883] 



NA TURE 



5i 



the nose, or again as if he had painted feet instead of 

 hands. 



There is one instance so much in point that we may at 

 once refer to it. One artist, who shall be nameless, has 

 attempted to grace his picture by introducing into it a 

 rainbow. Now if the rainbow had been part of the human 

 form it would have been studied, there would have been 

 books about it, and the artist would have made it as much 

 his own as the student of physical science, since some 

 artists study anatomy as closely as does the man of medi- 

 cine, but, because the rainbow happens to lie outside that 

 branch of scientific knowledge which is generally supposed 

 to be the only branch to which artists need turn their 

 attention, the painter thinks that he may treat it anyhow. 

 Thus we have had rainbows with the colours— which in 

 nature are absolutely definite in their order and arrange- 

 ment—painted in reverse order ; again, we have had a 

 rainbow, which must always appear to form part of a 

 circle, painted in perspective ; but the rainbow fancier of 

 this year has almost transcended the want of observation 

 shown by his predecessors. Possibly ignorant of the 

 fact that all primary rainbows are alike ; that the order 

 of colours, from red through orange, yellow, green, blue, 

 indigo, to violet, is dominated by a most rigid law, to 

 which there is, and can be, no exception ; the artist has 

 chosen to paint his rainbow with the violet in the middle 

 This seems to indicate either such looseness of observation 

 or such contempt for nature— and the painter may take 

 his choice between these two alternatives— that we 

 doubt whether side by side with either there can exist 

 that sympathy with nature which must lie at the root of 

 all good work in art. We shall show on a subsequent 

 occasion that this picture is only typical of a good deal of 



' artistic work, which must in the nature of things act like 

 a discord, and put the eye and the heart of the painter 



I out of tune. 



Those branches of science to which we have to make 

 reference in these columns have to do of course with 

 the forms and colours of clouds and sky and natural 



■ objects generally, and the laws of reflection, and if an 

 artist will paint suns and moons, then with those ele- 

 mentary astronomical principles which have to deal 

 with the appearances of these bodies, and which are not 

 beyond the comprehension of a child in the Fourth 

 Standard of a public elementary school. It is not there- 

 fore imposing too much upon an artist that he should 

 know these things, and it is not too much to suppose 

 that one who paints work on which he wishes to build 

 his fortune or his reputation as the case may be, should 

 wish to appeal to a more or less cultured audience. At 

 present, perhaps, it is only a select few who notice and 

 deplore this want of harmony with nature which marks 

 the productions of so many of our artists ; but the love of 

 physical science among the great mass of mankind grows 

 stronger and more strong, and the circle of those who 

 can discriminate between fact and fancy as displayed in 

 the works which grace the walls of our picture galleries 

 is daily becoming a wider one. We would therefore utter 

 a word of warning to the artist who allows blunders to creep 

 into his picture because he thinks nobody will find them 

 out. Somebody is sure to find them out. 

 _ The opportunities which artists in following their profes- 

 sion have of studying nature in very varied moods enable 



them to see the actual phenomena, where a priori con- 

 siderations leave a student who lacks such opportunities 

 entirely in the dark. Several very interesting questions 

 are raised by some of the pictures in this year's Academy, 

 and the candid critic must acknowledge that many of 

 them give much food for thought and suggestions for 

 future inquiry and study on his own part. 



THE TRANSIT INSTRUMENT 

 A Treatise on the Transit Instrument as Applied to the 

 Determination of Time; for the Use of Country 

 Gentlemen. By Latimer Clark, M.I.C.E., &c. (Pub- 

 lished by the Author.) 

 TT is something new to have a book on the transit 

 •1- instrument for the use of country gentlemen. It is 

 something still newer to find that book brought out by an 

 eminent engineer. In fact we may regard the publication 

 of such a book, under such conditions, as a sign of the 

 times, and as an indication of the slow but sure way in 

 which science, and even the methods of science, are 

 interesting a gradually increasing number of our educated 

 classes. Mr. Latimer Clark has done his work in a most 

 admirable manner, and no country gentleman who wishes 

 to know a little more than he does at present about the 

 practical working of a most fascinating branch of science, 

 could do better than invest, not only in the book, but in 

 the very satisfactory and handy little instrument which 

 Mr. Clark has been wise enough to produce side by side 

 with it. This transit instrument to which we refer, and 

 which can be obtained of Mr. Coppock of Bond Street, 

 is an excellent one of its kind. It is cheap— costing only 

 about 10/. — and it is simple. The many parts of the'in- 

 strument which form necessary adjuncts to it when used 

 in an observatory are of course suppressed, but nothing 

 is wanting which is really of importance to that public 

 which Mr. Latimer Clark wishes to educate in its use 

 The author is quite wise in the way he goes to work 

 We naturally have a description of the instrument, and 

 reference to the way in which it can be most conveniently 

 and satisfactorily employed, nor are those necessary 

 adjustments omitted without which of course the simplest 

 instrument would be of very little use. Full instructions 

 are then given for putting it in position, and Mr. Clark's 

 form of instrument has a cover, by means of which, when 

 once placed in position, say, out on a stone pillar on a 

 lawn with a good north and south line, it can be left out 

 with very little chance of its taking any harm in all 

 weathers. The actual taking of transits, both of the sun 

 and stars, are then dealt with, and we should add here 

 that the transit eyepiece is armed with a system of seven 

 vertical wires, so that the means of several transits over 

 the wires can be taken in the ordinary way. The only 

 objection we have so far found to Mr. Latimer Clark's 

 form, is that there are no means of adjustment for the 

 vertically of the wires. We regard this as a point 

 which should be looked to, in case our author should be 

 fortunate enough to induce a great many people to employ 

 this cheap and simple form. 



The corrections for longitude and latitude are next 

 given, and we are glad to see that the book deals with 

 these matters in a way not only far from dry, but so as to 

 introduce a considerable quantity of very useful astro- 



