NATURE 43 
May 14, 1885 | 
scale is equal to all that previously xnown, visible and invisible, 
as you willsee better by this view, naving the same thing on the 
normal as well as the prismatic scale. If it be asked which of 
these is correct, the answer is “both of them.” Both rightly 
interpreted mean just the same thing, but in the lower one we 
can more conveniently compare the ground of the researches of 
others with these. ‘These great gaps I was at first in doubt 
about, but more recent researches at Alleghany make it probable 
that they are caused by absorption in our own atmosphere, and 
not in that of the sun. 
We would gladly have stayed longer, in spite of physical dis- 
comfort, but the formidable descent and the ensuing desert jour- 
ney were before us, and certainly the reign of perpetual winter 
around us grew as hard to bear as the heats of the desert sum- 
mer had been. On September 10 we sent our instruments and 
the escort back by the former route, and, ourselves unencum- 
bered, started on the adventurous descent of the eastern precipices 
by a downward climb, which, if successful, would carry us to 
the plains in a single day. I at least shall never forget that day, 
nor the scenery of more than Alpine grandeur which we passed 
in our descent, after first climbing by frozen lakes in the northern 
shadow of the great peak, till we crossed the eastern ridges, 
through a door so narrow that only one could pass it at a time, 
by clinging with hands and feet as he swung round the shoulder 
of the rocks—to find that he had passed in a single minute from 
the view of winter to summer, the prospect of the snowy peaks 
behind shut out, and instantly exchanged for that below of the 
glowing valley and the little oasis where the tents of the lower 
camp were still pitched, the tents themselves invisible, but the 
oasis looking like a green scarf dropped on the broad floor of 
the desert. We climbed still downward by scenery unique in 
my recollection. This view of the ravine on the screen is little 
more than a memorandum made by one of the party in a few 
minutes’ halt part-way down, as we followed the ice-stream 
between the tremendous walls of the defile which rose 2000 
feet, and between which we still descended, till, toward night, 
the ice-brook had grown into a mountain torrent, and, looking 
up the long vista of our day’s descent, we saw it terminated 
by the Peak of Whitney, once more lonely in the fading light 
of the upper sky. 
This site, in some respects unequalled for a physical observa- 
tory, is likely, I am glad to say, to be utilised, the President of 
the United States having, on the proper representation of its 
value to science, ordered the reservation for such purposes of 
an area of 100 square miles about and inclusive of Mount 
Whitney. 
There is little more to add about the journey back to civilisa- 
tion, where we began to gather the results of our observation, 
and to reduce them—to smelt, so to speak, the metal from the 
ore we had brought home—a slow but necessary process, which 
has occupied a large part of two years. 
The results stated in the broadest way mean that the sun is 
blue—but mean a great deal more than that; this blueness in 
itself being perhaps a curious fact only, but in what it implies, 
of practical moment. 
We deduce in connection with it a new value of the solar heat, 
so far altering tbe old estimates that we now find it capable of 
melting a shell of ice sixty yards thick annually over the whole 
earth, or, what may seem more intelligible on its practical bear- 
ings, of exerting over one horse power for each square yard of 
the normally exposed surface. We have studied the distribution 
of this heat in a spectrum whose limits on the normal scale our 
explorations haye carried {o an extent of rather more than twice 
what was previously known, and we have found that the total 
loss by absorption from atmosphere is nearly double what has 
been heretofore supposed. 
We have found it probable that the human race owes its 
existence and preservation even more to the heatstoring action 
of the atmosphere than has been believed. 
The direct determination of the effect of water-vapour in 
this did not come within our scope; but that the importance of 
the blanketing action of our atmospheric constituents has been 
inno way overstated, may be inferred when I add that we have 
found by our experiments that if the planet were allowed to 
radiate freely into space without any protecting veil, its sunlit 
surface would probably fall, even in the tropics, below the tem- 
perature of freezing mercury. 
I will not go on enumerating the results of these investiga- 
tions, but they all flow from the fact, which they in turn confirm, 
that this apparently limpid sea above our heads, and about us, 
is carrying on a wonderfully intricate work on the sunbeam, and 
on the heat returned from the soil, picking out selected parts in 
hundreds of places, sorting out incessantly at a task which would 
keep the sorting demons of Maxwell busy, and as one result, 
changing the sunbeam on its way down to us in the way we 
have seen. 
I have alluded to the practical utilities of these researches, 
but practical or not, I hope we may feel that such facts as we 
have been considering about sunlight and the earth’s atmosphere 
may he stones useful in the future edifice of science, and that if 
not in our own hands then in those of others, when our day is 
over, they may find the best justification for the trouble of their 
search, in the fact that they prove of some use to man. 
May I add an expression of my personal gratification in the 
opportunity with which you have honoured me of bringing 
these researches before the Royal Institution, and of my thanks 
for the kindness with which you have associated yourselves for 
an hour, in retrospect at least, with that climb toward the stars 
which we have made together, to find, from light in its fullness, 
what unsuspected agencies are at work to produce for us the 
light of common day. 
ZOOLOGICAL RESEARCH * 
HE Vettor Pzrsanz is soon expected in our port, on her 
return from a long voyage of no little scientific importance. 
We think we cannot better hail her arrival than by publishing 
that portion of Prof. Dohrn’s report in which he speaks of the 
scientific mission fulfilled by this vessel—a mission which, besides 
meeting with a success far surpassing the highest expectations, 
has redounded not a little to the benefit of our ‘ Stazione 
Zoologica.” 
The time has now arrived, writes the illustrious Professor, 
for me to speak of an event which took place towards the end 
of 1881, and which has since borne no inconsiderable fruit. And 
this, in its turn, takes me back to a conversation which I had in 
1878 with the Italian Minister of Marine. I had already pro- 
posed that, instead of sending out a young naturalist on board 
the frigates which sail around the world, a young naval officer 
should be sent to the ‘‘ Stazione Zoologica,” where, in about 
four months, he might pick up so much knowledge as would 
enable him to collect and preserve specimens of marine animals. 
Owing to a change in the Ministry, my proposition, though 
accepted in the main, was forgotten ; and I only succeeded in 
getting it put into execution in 1881. 
On December 27, 1881, a young naval lieutenant, Signor 
Gaetano Chierchia, a Neapolitan by birth, introduced himself 
to me with these words: “I have been sent by the Ministry to 
learn under your direction at the ‘ Stazione Zoologica’ how to 
collect and preserve specimens of marine animals. I present 
myself accordingly, and beg to be allowed to begin work at 
once.” These few words, modest, yet full of energy, made a 
deep impression on me ; for they not only marked the beginning 
of a new epoch in the active life of the Zoological Station, but 
also promised a more intimate connection between it and the 
officers of the Italian navy—an intimacy to which I had looked 
forward from the very day in which I conceived the idea of the 
future floating Zoological Station. 
With the same modest energy which characterised his first 
interview with me, Signor Chierchia continued for four months 
his studies under the special direction of the Curator, Salvatore 
Lobianco; and all the employes and naturalists of the 
Zoological Station were astounded at the rapid progress he 
made in a field so entirely new to him. And when the moment 
came for establishing my laboratory on board the corvette Vector 
Pisani (which came most appositely to Naples), and there had 
been put on board all the fishing apparatus, chemical reagents, 
alcohol, glass vessels, &c., we accompanied him as a dear friend, 
and looked forward to results which should mark a distinct 
advance in the culture of our science. And our expectations, far 
from being disappointed, were widely surpassed. After only 
five months there arrived the first consignment—the product of 
deep-sea work, of dredging and coast-fishery along the shores 
of Gibraltar, Brazil, and Montevideo. The whole collection was 
in excellent preservation, carefully labelled and packed, and 
accompanied by a minute report as to the place and circum- 
stances of each find. And I do not for a moment hesitate to 
affirm that never has so important a collection of oceanic 
* From the Pumgolo, April 23, 1885. Naples, Italy. 
