May 29, 1884J 



NA TURE 



105 



water of towns, and successive memoirs, with almost 

 identical titles, made their appearance either in the 

 Society's Transactions ox among the Reports of the British 

 Association. The Royal Society's Catalogue shows that 

 Smith was the author of about thirty papers on air and 

 water. These he eventually collected and published, with 

 considerable additions, in the form of a thick octavo 

 volume, entitled "Air and Rain, the Beginnings of a 

 Chemical Climatology," with a dedication to his friend and 

 teacher Liebig. This book shows Smith at his best and 

 at his worst. It is full of facts and quaint out-of-the-way 

 references ; on the other hand, it is diffuse, and, as a 

 piece of literary work, badly put together — faults difficult 

 to avoid in a compilation based upon, or largely composed 

 of, papers already published. That Smith had consider- 

 able literary skill, and a sound critical faculty, may be 

 seen in the short memoir on Graham prefixed to the 

 collection of that philosopher's papers brought together 

 and published, with a reverential care, by the late Dr. 

 James Young of Kelly. Smith had years before saturated 

 his mind with the notions of the Hellenic atomists, even 

 before the time he wrote his monograph on Dalton, and in 

 this short prefatory memoir of some twenty pages he 

 crystallises out his thoughts on the development of the 

 atomic systems of Kapila, Leucippus, Lucretius, Newton, 

 and Dalton, and shows with admirable lucidity Graham's 

 true relation to these great thinkers. Smith, however, 

 would never have made a good teacher, despite 

 his wish, in early life, to connect himself with some 

 place of higher chemical instruction. When at his 

 best he was not an ineffective speaker ; but he was 

 wanting in power of exposition, and his metaphysical 

 tendencies and his quaint playful fancy were only 

 too apt to disturb the even tenor of a sustained descrip- 

 tion, or closely reasoned argument. No man, however, 

 was more popular among young men, for he had a genuine 

 sympathy with youthful aspirations, and a kindly way of 

 drawing out and encouraging what was good in them, 

 and there are dozens of men still living who have to 

 thank the gentle, quiet-spoken philosopher and friend for 

 their first step in life. He had, too, his countrymen's 

 tenacity of friendship : it took a very violent wrench 

 indeed to disturb a confidence once placed. 



From 1842 Smith was closely connected with Man- 

 chester. In that year he settled himself in the town as a 

 consulting chemist. Shortly afterwards he became a 

 member of the Literary and Philosophical Society of 

 Manchester — a society made famous by its connection 

 with Dalton and the Henrys — and much of his work 

 appears in the Memoirs and Proceedings of that body. In 

 1855-56 he became one of its honorary secretaries, in 1S59 

 a vice-president, and in 1864-65 president. In his 

 " Centenary of Science in Manchester," published a short 

 time ago, he has sketched, in characteristic manner, the 

 growth of that institution, and has sought to trace its 

 influence on the development of scientific life in 

 Lancashire. 



In 1S63 Smith was appointed Inspector-General of 

 Alkali Works for the Government, and the somewhat 

 delicate task of initiating the working of Lord Derby's 

 Act fell to him. He performed this duty with character- 

 istic tact and with every desire to avoid undue inter- 

 ference with the legitimate business of the alkali maker. 

 The successful working of that Act is largely due to the 

 manner in which Smith and his subordinates set it in 

 operation. On the passing of the Rivers' Pollution Act 

 he was made Inspector for England, and afterwards for 

 Scotland. He held both these appointments up to the 

 time of his death. 



Angus Smith had a passionate delight in the Highlands, 

 and the smell of a peat fire was to him as incense. He 

 had something, too, of the Highlander's love of mysticism 

 in his composition, and throughout his life he found 

 pleasure in Celtic literature ; and it was with a mind well 



stored with legends that he produced "Loch Etive and 

 the Sons of Uisnach," published anonymously in 1879. 



Smith lived the " quiet life " of Pope's philosopher. 

 His temper was singularly even and placid: he had his 

 checks and crosses, of course, like other men, and he was 

 occasionally pained to find himself misunderstood. But 

 nothing ruffled his calm. His perfect transparency, his 

 charming simplicity, and a certain quiet playfulness of 

 manner gained for him the sobriquet of "Agnus" 

 Smith. Indeed, his sense of fun could see the latent 

 humour in any situation. Even on his death-bed it was 

 with him. Somebody had said that they were not going 

 to part with him yet. " You will be clever people," he 

 rejoined, with the old twinkle in his eye, " if you keep me 

 here three days longer." 



Smith became a member of the Chemical Society in 

 1S45, and a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1857, and in 

 1882 the University of Edinburgh conferred the honorary 

 degree of LL.D. upon him. 



T. E. Thorpe 



NORWEGIAN GEODETICAL OPERATIONS 1 

 HTHE first part of this publication, published in 1882, 



■*• was reviewed in Nature, February 8, 1883. The 

 second part, now before us, consists principally of a series 

 of tables giving the results of the observations at the fol- 

 lowing tidal stations: — Stavanger from 1881 to 1S82, 

 Throndhjem from 1880 to 1881, Kabelvaag from 1881 to 

 1882, and Vardoe from 1S80 to 1882. These tables are 

 arranged precisely as in the first part ; it is therefore un- 

 necessary to refer to them more particularly. 



A description, accompanied by a drawing, is given of 

 the self-registering apparatus used. The float, placed in a 

 tube, is connected by means of a fine wire to a wheel 

 50 cm. diameter, and the wire is kept taut by a counter- 

 weight acting on a second concentric wheel. On the axis 

 of these wheels, and rigidly connected to it, is a pinion 

 2'5 cm. effective diameter, working on a horizontal rack, 

 to which the scribing pencil is attached. Thus the rise 



and fall of the tide is measured to a scale of — or — 



50 20 - 



A cylinder, on which is fixed the diagram paper ruled 

 with hour lines, is placed horizontally below the rack, and 

 is driven by a clock connected to it directly by means of 

 gearing, and assisted by a weight attached to a string 

 passing over a pulley. This apparatus is the invention of 

 Lieut-Col. Haffner, and is made by a watchmaker (G. P. 

 Stenberg) at Bergen. 



It is mentioned that, owing to a defect in the self- 

 registering apparatus used at Oscarsborg and at Dron- 

 theim, and described in the first part, the observations 

 are not as satisfactory as might be wished. In the instru- 

 ments used at these stations the motion of the driving 

 clock was communicated to the diagrams by means of a 

 string, and it has been found that the variations in the 

 amount of humidity and of temperature sufficiently 

 affected the length of the string to cause appreciable 

 errors. It should be understood that the readings were 

 taken by means of hour lines ruled on the diagram paper; 

 any alteration in the length of the string clearly affects 

 the accuracy of the position of these hour lines. 1 his 

 source of error has been removed, and new observations 

 taken, which will be published in a succeeding part. 



SA TURN 



MESSRS. PAUL AND PROSPER HENRY con- 

 tribute to La Nature some interesting information 

 on the recent aspect of the planet Saturn. During the 

 month of February and the beginning of March last 



1 Publication of the Norwegian Committee of the Association for the 

 Measurement of Degrees in Europe, Part II. (Christiania, 1883.) 



