Dec. 16, 1869] 
NATURE 
199 
Shinas, but the different castes intermarry and eat together. He 
narrated a curious Shina legend of a Shinari who fell in with a 
company of one-eyed demons, and was a witness of a demoniacal 
wedding. A very numerous and interested assembly listened 
with marked approval ; and in reply to various questions, Dr. 
Leitner further stated that he had not remarked any megalithic 
or Druidic remains. ‘The countries were traversed by him rather 
with a view to linguistic and philological discoveries. The houses 
were meanly constructed; the food evinced a rough skill in 
cookery ; every Dard family seemed to possess a cavern, the 
secret of which was known only to them, and they thus had 
plentiful supplies of food, which they shared with him, while the 
Maharajah’s sepoys were starving. Strong opinions were ex- 
pressed as to the refusal of extension of leave to Dr. Leitner, 
and a resolution was unanimously passed calling upon the 
Government to take measures to aid and encourage travellers to 
visit these little-known regions of Central Asia. It is to be 
hoped that some means may be found to prolong the visit of 
Niar Mahommed, the Varkandi, and both obtain from him 
information, and give him lasting impression of our resources 
and hospitality. We should not omit to mention that Dr. 
Leitner altogether denied the statement quoted from the 
Invalide Russe, that he had visited Herat or taken part in 
the battle of Samarcand. 
Philological Society, December 3.—Mr. A. J. Ellis, F.R.S., 
in the chair. Mr. A. Melville Bell read a paper on Pronouncing 
all Languages. He showed how all the vowels could be produced : 
first, by placing the tongue in nine different positions, by means 
of which the extent and form of the neck which unites the front 
with the back cavity of the mouth was modified ; secondly, by 
increasing or diminishing the whole of the cavities behind this 
neck; thirdly and fourthly, by altering the form of the cavities 
in front of the neck in the two former cases, by the action of the 
lips. The thirty-six vowels thus produced practically covered all 
known vowel sounds. He also showed how the consonants could 
be produced by three positions of the tongue and one of the lips, 
modified in six definite manners, allowing voice or breath to pass 
through a simple narrow orifice with central aperture, or a com- 
pound orifice of the same description, or a double simple or com- 
pound orifice, the central passage being stopped, and emission of 
yoice taking place at the sides ; or else by stopping breath or voice 
altogether, or allowing them to pass through the nose. He also 
explained how these forty-eight consonants could be varied, pro- 
ducing, with the glottal and nasal actions, all the possible varieties 
of articulation. He illustrated his paper by diagrams and models 
of his symbols, by which in each case he made the precise position 
of the organs of speech necessary for producing each sound visible 
on paper in a single definite and intelligible letter. | He informed 
the Society that these letters had been most effective in teaching 
little children who had been born deaf and dumb to articulate and 
distinguish vowel sounds with accuracy; a statement which the 
chairman confirmed from personal knowledge of Miss Hull’s 
school for deaf and dumb girls, 102, Warwick Gardens, Kensing- 
ton. The meeting unanimously passed the following resolution : 
«That this meeting of the Philological Society desires to express 
its strong sense of the beauty and great value of Mr. A. M. Bell’s 
system of Visible Speech, and its ready applicability to purposes 
of philological investigation,” 
Institution of Civil Engineers, December 7.—Mr. C. W. 
Gregory, president, in the chair. The first paper read was on 
the Public Works of the Province of Canterbury, New Zea- 
land, by Mr. Edward Dobson, Assoc. Inst. C.E. In this com- 
munication a history was given of the Public Works Department 
of Canterbury, from its establishment, in 1854, to the completion 
of the railways, in 1868. During that period the survey of the 
province, commenced under the ‘‘ Canterbury Association,” had 
been completed by the officers of the Survey Department ; the 
eastern portion of the province had been thrown open to settle- 
ment, by the construction of many hundred miles of metalled 
roads; the western goldfields had been connected with the 
capital, by a coach-road through the passes of the New Zealand 
Alps—a road remarkable both for the boldness of its design and 
the circumstances under which it was executed ; and a complete 
system of railroad had been surveyed, the key to which (a tunnel 
129 chains in length through the crater wall of Lyttleton Har- 
bour) had been successfully completed. Extensive harbour works 
had been constructed, public buildings erected in the principal 
towns, and telegraph and postal services carried to a fair state of 
organisation. ‘The total expenditure on public works and suryeys 
during the period referred to had been, in round numbers, 
1,800,000/., out of a total Government expenditure of about 
8,880,000/. The population in 1854 was about 6,000; in 
1868 it amounted to 54,000, including the mining popula- 
tion of the county of Westland. The great bulk of the public 
works of Canterbury possessed but little professional interest— 
the country being level,and the bridges chiefly of timber of or- 
dinary construction. Many of the rivers run on ridges above 
the general surface of the plains, and in dealing with them 
it was essential to leave abundant waterway, as there was 
little chance of any ordinary embankment standing against such 
torrents as they sometimes carried. Paradoxical as it might 
appear, the portions of the proposed railways which were to 
traverse the level plains would require heavy earthworks, while 
the lines through the ranges, being contoured on the hill-sides, 
would be carried for miles on surface gradients with light side- 
cutting through a mountainous and difficult country. The 
principal works executed by the Government were: first, the 
Summer Road from Lyttelton to Christchurch, which was 
scraped out of the cliffs for a continuous length of several miles ; 
second, the West Coast Road, from Christchurch to Hokitika, 
which was constructed in nine months, through a hundred miles 
of rough and difficult country, totally uninhabited, and for the 
most part densely timbered ; third, the Moorhouse Tunnel, on 
the line of the Lyttelton and Christchurch Railway, 2,861 yards 
in length, driven through the crater of an extinct volcano under 
a summit level 1,220 feet above the sea; and fourth, the wharf 
and jetties at the Lyttelton station, built upon a soft mud-bank 
which was, in places, 50 feet in depth. In laying out roads on 
hilly ground, the principle uniformly adopted was to follow the 
windings of the spurs, contouring the gradients with the spirit- 
level, so. as to minimize both cutting and embankment, and to 
dispense with culverts as far as possible. In the case of side 
cuttings, the gradient was contoured with the spirit-level and 
lock-spitted. The back line of the floor of the cutting was 
thus ranged out, and the depth of the cutting measured at 
every half-chain. The width of the slope was then calculated and 
set off, and the back line of the slope lock-spitted. The work 
could then be let by contract at any future time when the funds 
might be voted by the council, no plans or sections being required, 
or any details, beyond the rate of slope, the total length of the 
cutting, and its cubic content. A serious difficulty in the conduct 
of the road works was the want of timber. The expedient 
adopted was to keep constantly in stock a quantity of planks, 16 
feet 8 inches long, and 8 inches by 3 inches in section, and the 
bridges and culverts were built on standard patterns designed 
with reference to this unit of material. This plan effected a 
great saving of office labour, as no drawings were required in 
ordinary cases ; and as three planks made up 100 feet (board 
measure), any labourer was competent to take an account of the 
timber used, all that was necessary being to count the number of 
planks. Amongst the road bridges there were few that presented 
special interest, with, however, two exceptions. These were: 
first, a drawbridge over the Waimakariri River, built on the 
telescope principle, from a simple design, and which worked 
satisfactorily ; and, secondly, a bridge over the Taipo River, on 
the West Coast Road, presenting several peculiarities of con- 
struction, The Harbour Works possessed considerable interest, 
which was enhanced by their partial failure. It was found that the 
mud-bank was too soft to support the screws of the screw-pile 
jetty, and, accordingly, additional lengths of piles were cast, and 
a solid core of hard wood placed in the bottom of each pile, and 
driven down to the solid rock, on which the weight of the structure 
was made to rest; the flanges of the screws simply acting as 
supports to check lateral vibrations. The diagonal bracing was put 
in by divers without difficulty, the exact length of each brace being 
taken from a template applied by the diver to the work after the 
piles were screwed down to their proper depth. The sea-wall 
slipped forward in two places during the progress of the work, 
the total amount of forward movement in each case being between 
5 feet and 6 feet. The author did not consider that any ad- 
vantage would have been gained by carrying the piles down to 
the solid rock, as, in all probability, the outward movement of 
the embankment would in that case have overturned the work 
and destroyed it. He thought that the partial failure of the 
work might be attributed to two causes: first, that the stone 
embankment was deficient, both in bulk and weight, for the duty 
it had to perform; and, secondly, that the tipping of the clay 
embankment was commenced before the stone embankment had 
had time to take a solid bearing, so as to form an abutment to 
