I02 



NATURE 



[Dec. II, 1873 



tained some better tokens of consciousness than the greater or 

 less resemblance of the movements in question to such move- 

 ments as our conscious selves are in the habit of executing. 



M. Foster 



Meyer's Exploration of New Guinea 

 Few persons can have read Dr. Meyer's account of his recent 

 adventurous and very successful journey with more interest than 

 myself; but I confess I was surprised to find that the translator 

 of my book should have misunderstood what I had stated, and 

 so create a difference between us where none exists. He says 

 (speaking of Dorey) that I " have not given a correct impression 

 of the natives of the surrounding hills and mountains, separating 

 them in some way from the inhabitants of the coast, as smaller, 

 uglier, not mop-headed," &c. ; and that he finds on the other 

 hand, that " there is no generic difference at all between the 

 Papooas of the mountain and the Papooas of the coast, except 

 such differences as we find everywhere between the highlanders 

 and coast inhabitants of the same race." Now I say exactly the 

 same thing : "From these (sketches) and the captain's descrip- 

 tion, it appeared that the people of Arfak v.'ere similar to those 

 of Dorey." (" Malay Archipelago," 3rd Ed. p. 505.) Dr. Meyer 

 however, probably refers to what I say of the people of one hill 

 village, close to Dorey: " The inhabitants seemed rather uglier 

 than those at Dorey village. They are, no doubt, the true indi- 

 genes of this part of New Guinea, living in the interior, and 

 subsisting by cultivation and hunting. The Dorey-men, on the 

 other hand, are shore dwellers, fishers, and traders in a small 

 way, and have thus the character of a colony who have migrated 

 from another district. These hillmen, or Arfaks, differed much 

 in physical features. They were generally black, but some were 

 brown like Malays. Their hair, though always more or less 

 frizzly, was sometimes short and matted," &c. (p. 499). I can 

 only suppose that the word " differed " in the above passage was 

 taken to mean **differed from the Dorey people," whereas the 

 context shows that it means " differLd among themselves," 

 or varied, which would have been a better word. In the preced- 

 ing page I have stated of the inhabitants of Dorey : "The ma- 

 jority have short woolly hair;" so that there is no difference 

 from them in that respect. In all 1 have written about the 

 Papuans I have maintained that the people of New Guinea and 

 of all the immediately surrounding islands are of one race, with 

 very unimportant local differences ; and I do not think my re- 

 mark, that the people of one village were " rather uglier " than 

 those of another, three miles off, justifies the idea that I sup- 

 posed there was any "difference," in an ethnological sense, be- 

 tween them. I cannot find that I have said a word about differ- 

 ence of stature. 



The great success of both Messrs. D'Alberlis and Meyer in 

 penetrating inland in New Guinea vnll, it is to be hoped, induce 

 other travellers to attempt the exploration of tlie far larger and 

 less known southern portion. Two Europeans, with a small 

 steam launch and a Tilalay crew, would, no doubt, be able to 

 penetrate a long way up some of the larger livers, and establish 

 a station from which exploration of the central mountains might 

 be eflected. There is now no portion of the globe so completely 

 unknown as this, or which promises such great results for every 

 branch of Natural History. Alfred R. Wallace 



Deep-sea Sounding and Deep-sea Thermometers 



With reference to the discussion which has recently beeir 

 carried on in Nature as to the deep-sea thermometers, I hope 

 that perhaps the following statement may tend to put the 

 matter at rest. 



One of Negretti's thermometers was exhibited at the Royal 

 United Service Institution at a lecture, March 11, 1859, by 

 Admiral FitzRoy, who then spoke of them "as thermometers 

 pecuharly constructed, self- registering," &c. The construction 

 of these thermometers had been fully described in the "First 

 nrrmber of Meteorological Papers, 1S57," and was subsequently 

 given in a "Treatise on Meteorological Instruments," published 

 by Negretti and Zambra in 1864. The peculiariiy of these 

 thermometers was mentioned in the Ilydrographic Instructions 

 to Captain Dayman of the Cyclops Sounding Expedition, dated 

 May 29, 1S57. These facts are sufficient to show the anrple 

 publication of the device in question for protecting the bulbs 

 against pressure. 



I know from Dr. Miller himself that he did not know of 

 Negretti's plan. In his paper in the Royal Society Proceedings, 



he calls tire one which he describes a " simple expedient." I am 

 not aware of any just claim on the part of Mr. Casella to the 

 principle of the invention. 



I C' nsider that the practice of instrument makers designating by 

 their names instruments which they have not invented, is most 

 reprehensible. Robert H. Scott 



London, Dec. 9 



[We have received a letter on this subject also from Mr. 

 Casella, but as there is nothing in it bearing on the real point at 

 issue, we do not print it. The above letter from Mr. Scott 

 renders it clear to us, and it will doubtless he also clear to our 

 readers, that the whole credit of the double bulb belongs to 

 Messrs. Negretti and Zambra. We quite agree also with Mr. 

 Scott's closing remarks. This correspondence must now cease. 

 —Ed.] 



The Dutch Photographs of the Eclipse of 1S71 



A130UT a year ago Dr. Schellen kindly sent me two paper 

 copies of the Java photograph, one of them was stated to be of 

 the size of the original negative and the other was an enlargement 

 of about ten and a half diameters, with a delicately soft outline 

 and much detail in the corona. On comparing this with the 

 Indian photographs 1 found that though the outline of the corona 

 corresponded depression for depression with the two Indian 

 series, yet there was great difference in the detail of the lo\\'er 

 parts. The question therefore arose, \\'as such difference to be 

 regarded as proof of enormous change in the corona in the course 

 of aboirt an hour, during the passage of the totality shadow from 

 India to Java ? 



I had carefully compared and catalogued the details visible 

 upon the original negatives of the two Indian series, and had 

 found no structure in the one that could not be traced in the 

 other, but the details of the new Java photograph were quite of 

 a different character, lumpy, and in more definite masses. On 

 merrtioning this to Lord Lindsay he irrformed me that he had 

 other copies of the Java negatives which he had received directly 

 from Prof. Oudemans arrd which were almost structureless. Mr. 

 Davis undertook a critical comparison of the two Java photo- 

 gr'aphs, and pointed out that in spite of the striking dis- 

 similarity of the paper prints, they were evidently both 

 taken from the sanre original, for they each showed a faint 

 scratch and three minute photographic flaws in the same re- 

 lative positions. It w-as impossible to assert that the 

 one was a good prirrt and the other a very bad one, for in the 

 photograph with the delicate corona the moon's limb was soft 

 aird hazy, while with the poor corona the limb was perfectly 

 sharp and defiirite. We had only one course left, and that was 

 to infer that the softening and details had been produced ar-fifi- 

 cially. Having detected manipulation in the corona, we natu- 

 rally suspected it in the moon's limb, and thus arose rrry remark 

 at the meeting of the Astronomical Society, that the sharp edges 

 of the irradiation under the prominences might have been arti- 

 ficially produced by stopping out the moon, or rather by stopping 

 out the hazy irradiation which presents so rrrarked a feature, 

 esjiecially under the prominences in the Indian photographs, as 

 well as in those taken in 1870. 



There is still a little mystery which requires clearing up about 

 the hazy irradiatiorr. No trace of it is to be found in the copies 

 of the Shelbyville photograph taken by Mr. Whipple in 1S69, 

 nor (as we now learn) in the Java photographs, although the 

 action of the light has been greater in these than in some of the 

 Indian and 1S70 negatives, which show it as a very marked 

 feature. We know that under ordinary circumstances hazy 

 irradiation is produced by reflection at the hinder surface of the 

 glass on which the photograph is taken, and that its amourrt 

 may be greatly reduced by backing the plate, during its exposure, 

 with \\'et paper, so as to produce a film of water instead of a 

 film of air inrmcdiately behind the plate, thus causing nearly all 

 the light to be transmitted instead of rellected at its back surface. 

 Yet the Baikul photographs (and I understand also the Cadiz 

 photogi-aph of 1870) were backed with wet paper, and still show 

 the irradiation very markedly. 



T he cause of the ellipticity of the dark moon touched upon by 

 Prof. Oudemans seems to me to involve some very interesting 

 questions. It is remarkable that the ellipticity does not occur ia 

 all eclipse photographs. After making allowance for the moon's 

 motion during 40 seconds in the enlargement fronr the Cadiz ne- 

 gative, I may say that I have not been able to detect any dif- 

 ference between the polar and equatorial diameters in any ol 

 the 1S70 photographs. 



