808 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. III. No. 74. 



proves, upon examination, to be, again, mere 

 iterate nonsense. 



Tlie writer is old-fashioned enougli to believe 

 that a plain person can, with some pains at 

 least, understand the writing even of a special- 

 ist, and he is driven by a sense of sheer outrage 

 to criticise these writings of Prof Bigelow ; not, 

 indeed, without peculiar hesitation, for to criti- 

 cise is to point out fallacy, but there is nothing 

 such in these papers ; they are too inane to be 

 fallacious ! Let the reader bear in mind that 

 the writer's estimate of these papers has been 

 reached only after studious and repeated read- 

 ing of more than one hundred thousand such 

 words as are sampled in the following quo- 

 tations. 



Speaking of the previous efforts in systematic 

 meteorology Prof Bigelow says: "The best 

 efforts have been made along the lines of Ther- 

 modynamics as the moving cause and dynam- 

 ical mechanics as the procession of effects ; 

 much talent, if not genius, having been ex- 

 pended on these mathematical and physical re- 

 lations."* 



Prof Bigelow has devised a method for de- 

 termining the synodic period of rotation of the 

 sun. This method, so far as the writer can 

 understand it, is Gauss's well-known method, 

 in which a time interval is determined during 

 which an unknown whole number and a known 

 fraction of periods have elapsed ; the whole 

 number is found by dividing the interval by a 

 known approximate value of the period ; the 

 exact period is then easily calculated. To 

 obtain the data for this determination Prof. 

 Bigelow claims definitely f to have made use of 

 the aspects of the solar corona as photographed 

 during several total eclipses, the corona being 

 assumed to rotate with the sun and to present 

 persistent peculiarities of form. 



He goes on to say : " It is impossible to re- 

 produce fully the process of obtaining this pe- 

 riod, because the work is extensive ; but it is so 

 important, being the key to my development of 

 the subject, that I will briefly indicate the 

 method. If the sun is a magnetic sphere in 



* Report for 1891-2 of the Chief of the U. S. 

 Weather Bureau, p. 519. 



t See p. 521 report for 1891-2 of the Chief of the U. 

 S. Weather Bureau. 



which the magnetism is distributed with irregu- 

 lar intensity throughout the mass, in the same 

 way that the permanent magnetism of the earth 

 deviates from the simple law of the uniform 

 spherical magnet, then in the field outside the 

 sun, as far as its strength reaches into space, 

 the lines of force being propagated through the 

 ether, these variations of intensity will be found 

 by an observer passing along it from point to 

 point."* He adds that if this field reaches the 

 earth it will change as the sun rotates and can be 

 ' measured with almost incredible accuracy ; ' 

 but we gain no clue to the method which must 

 be some other than Gauss's method, after all, 

 unless indeed the terrestrial magnetic elements 

 have such a distinct fluctuation in the solar-ro- 

 tation period as to enable an observer to infer 

 the recurrence of solar rotations thereby, which 

 Prof Bigelow does not state explicitly ; but the 

 26-day variation of the terrestrial magnetic ele- 

 ments is only brought out by averaging mag- 

 netic data at corresponding epochs in a large 

 number of successive solar-rotation periods, 

 and then only with great uncertainty. Prof. 

 Bigelow does not seem to bear it clearly in 

 mind that he has used the corona in determin- 

 ing this period. 



Prof. Bigelow imagines three cosmical mag- 

 netic fields at the earth, viz : the ' coronal 

 field,' perpendicular to the ecliptic due to the 

 action of the sun as a great magnet; the ' radiant 

 field,' in the direction of the sun's rays, and the 

 ' orbital field,' in the direction of the earth's 

 motion in its orbit. Speaking of the coronal 

 field Prof. Bigelow says : " This field enters the 

 northern hemisphere nearly parallel to the 

 earth's axis of rotation, having been diverted 

 from the direction perpendicular to the plane of 

 the ecliptic by the rotation of the earth on its 

 axis, the other component having been screened 

 off or used up in connection with the earth's 

 permanent magnetism, which may be the true 

 origin of the force which gives it a slow secular 

 variation.! At this place we interpose the re- 

 mark that the position is regarded as proven 

 that the sun and the moon do not continuously 



* Report for 1892-2 of the Chief of the U. S. 

 Weather Bureau, p. 521. 



t Report for 1891-92, of the Chief of the U. S. 

 Weather Bureau, p. 522. 



