2o8 



NATURE 



\_7an. 14, 1875 



these Eastern Asiatics. The wood engravings, upwards 

 of sixty, taken from the author's photographs and sketches, 

 add much to the value of the volume. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 



{The Editor does not hold himself responsible for opinions expressed 

 by his correspondents. Neither ean he ttndertake to return, 

 or to correspond with the ■writers of, rejected jnanuscripts. 

 No notice is taken of anonymous eommunications.'\ 



Hoffmeyer's Weather Charts 



I HAVE the honour to inform you that the issue of Capt. 



Hoffmeyer's daily charts of the weather from 63° E. to 60° W. 



longitude, and from 30° to 75° N. latitude, for the three months 



of last winter, are now comijlete. (See Nature of June 25, 



iS74)- 



Capt. Hoffmeyer is anxious to know what chance there is of 

 his being able to continue the publication. The number of 

 copies already sold of the existing charts has not been sufficient 

 to cover the expenses of production. 



At the same time this Office has found that the rate of sub- 

 scription (iij-. per quarter) which it charges has fallen short of 

 the cost, carriage, and postage of the existing charts. 



I have therefore to request any gentlemen who are willing to 

 subscribe to a future issue of tlie charts to send in their names to 

 me as soon as convenient. The rate of subscription will be at 

 least 12^-. 61/. per quarter, and must necessarily be higher if the 

 original cost of the charts at Copenhagen is raised above the 

 price first named, viz., 4 francs per month. 



Meteorological Office, Jan. 12 Robert H. Scott 



A New Bird of Paradise from the Island of Waigeou, 

 near New Guinea 



I GOT to-day from Ternate the skins ( i and 9 ) of a Bird of 

 Paradise from Waigeou, which came through natives into the 

 hands of Mr. van Mounhenbrock there, who recognised it to be an 

 undescribed species. He proposes to call it JJipliyllodes Guil- 

 helmi iii., because no Bird of I'aradise has yet been named after 

 the King of the IN'etherlands, under whose sceptre the greater part 

 of the region stands, where Birds of Paradise occur. It is known 

 that two species from Australia are named respectively after the 

 Queen of Great Britain and the Prince Consort, that three are 

 named after naturalists, and that the others have names accor- 

 ding to their external features. This new bird is highly inter- 

 esting, because it stands in a conspicuous way between Diphyl- 

 lodes speciosa and Cicinnurus regius, but more allied to the 

 former, and at the same time bearmg some characters of Diphyl- 

 lodes rcspidilica ; therefore linking these species together in a 

 similar way as it does Paradisea raggiana (one of D'Alberti's dis- 

 coveries) with P. sangninca, apoda and minor. I shall soon send 

 (in the name of Mr. van i\I.) the description of the new bird to 

 the Zoological Society of London, and intend to publish 

 a coloured figure as soon as possible. But knowing the lively 

 interest English ornithologists take in new discoveries in the 

 group of the Paradiscidit, I thought it advisable to give a short 

 notice in your journal beforehand. A. B. Meyer 



Dresden, Jan. 9 



Chappell's "History of Music'' 



In a review of my " Ilis'ury of Music," in Nature, vol. xi. 

 p. 123, your musical critic takes me to task for having cau- 

 tioned English readers against certain new theories which are to 

 be found in the works of the late V. J. Fetis and in the 

 " Tonempfindungen " of Prof. Helmholtz. I think those cau- 

 tions very necessary, and perhaps, when your critic has studied 

 the subject, he may think so too ; but in the meantime he bows 

 down before such names, and cautions me that if Fctis were 

 alive he " would not be in my shoes for a trifle." 



I should rather object to change shoes with the critic, but I 

 may remind him that he seems to have forgotten his obligations 

 to the readers of N.WUKE. However diffident as to his qualifi- 

 cation to controvert me, and therefore hoping for a second Fetis 

 to arise, it was at least his duty to test each of us by the autho- 



rities which we quote, and to inform your readers of the result. 

 He must know that two such opposite accounts cannot both be 

 true, and therefore either the one or the other is not trustworthy. 

 Fetis and I differ toto calo, even to the scales. I had supposed 

 that a few of the extracts which I have adduced from Fetis's own 

 works would have spoken for themselves and have convinced 

 anyone who professes critical knowledge that Fetis was a pre- 

 tender, and that he was unable to understand the Greek treatises 

 which he had before him. Your reviewer, however, is far too 

 staunch-headed to be convinced, even though Fctis assumes to 

 correct Aristoxenus in Greek, and Josephus in Hebrew. 



My own conviction is unchanged by the second, third, and 

 fourth volumes of Fetis's History. I find the same system of 

 charging error upon others when he alone is in fault, and the 

 same inability to understand the books before him. For instance, 

 he had Kosegarten's translation of El Farabi's treatise on Persian, 

 Greek, and Arab music, written at the beginning of the tenth 

 century, but he could not discover from it that the Persians had 

 then no tliirds of tones in their scales. Neither did he find out 

 that the Arabs had then emancipated themselves from the Greek 

 minor scales, and had an excellent two-octave major scale, with 

 perfect thirds in it, and a major seventh. It differed from ours, 

 but rather for the belter. These two points are most important 

 in history, for in them we trace the comparative civilisation from 

 which tliose nations have declined. 



As to Ilelmholtz's new musical theories, your reviewer com- 

 plains that I have described his book as "hasty," when "it is 

 the result of eight years' labour." I think ill-considered conclu> 

 sions may, in polite terms, be described as "hasty." Secondly, 

 that I have said, "Some very: necessary experiments, such as 

 those upon harmonics, were omitted." I am quite of that opinion, 

 for I differ with him as to the existence of " cmer-iones," and I 

 adduce proof that harmonics are subsequent to the principal notes, 

 and not simultaneous. 



My arguments are before the world, and I have found thenr 

 supported by others, including two of the very highest authorities. 

 Until they can be rebutted, I have nothing to withdraw, but 

 h 've much to add to them. 



The " Tonempfindungen " is not a book which requires more 

 thai\ ordinary intellect to understand ; therefore such deep sub- 

 mission as that of your critic is not necessary. When Helm- 

 holtz informs his readers that thirty-three consonant vibrations 

 between B and C cause the dissonance of that interval, he is lite- 

 rally telling them that white is black ; and yet this critic would 

 have us believe him. Wm. CiiArrELL 



Strafford Lodge, Oatlands Park, Surrey 



Origin of Bright Colouring in Animals 



Those who are moderately well acquainted with Mr. Darwin's 

 writings are not likely to feel that Mr. Murphy's criticisms (vol. 

 xi. p. 14S) upon them require any answer; but as many of your 

 readers are probably not so well acquainted with these writings 

 as they ought to be, I shall briefiy expound the points raised. 



1. Mr. Murphy himself admits that coloration may be as 

 "variable within the limits of the same species" as is "any 

 other part of the organism." In view of this fact, then, why is 

 there any more difficulty in the way of our accepting sexual 

 selection as a vera causa, than there is in the way of our accept- 

 ing natural selection as such? Moreover, we must remember 

 that animals have probably a much keener sense than we have 

 of differences in form and colour among individuals of their own 

 species. 



2. Ornamental colouring is, as a rule, confined to the male, 

 because, in Mr. l)arwin's words, "the males of almost all ani- 

 mals have stronger passions than the females." I wonder that 

 anyone can have read the " Descent of Man," and afterwards 

 have asked the question to which this is the answer. Compare 

 especially pp. 221, 222 (2nd edition). 



3. I do not know on what "evidence" Mr. Murphy relies to 

 "prove that the female is passive," in the sense of not exerting 

 " any choice or power of selection whatever ;" but I am quite 

 sure that it must be something very great, if it is to neutralise 

 the vast body of facts which Darwin adduces on the otlier side ; 

 for surely no one can doubt that "the elaborate manner in 

 which the male birds and other animals display their charms 

 before the female," is one of the strongest arguments we could 

 desire to have " m favour of the belief that the females admire, 

 or are excited by, the ornaments and colours displayed before 



