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SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIV. No. 605. 



and other rQeteorological conditions have been 

 very carefully investigated by eminent Jap- 

 anese meteorologists. Japan has just estab- 

 lished a new weather service in Korea and 

 Manchuria, and is said to be intending to 

 extend the service to southern China. These 

 are all for immediate practical daily forecasts ; 

 but the exploration of the free upper atmos- 

 phere by balloons and kites has not been 

 touched. This vast upper ocean of atmos- 

 phere, the study of which is exceedingly im- 

 portant for further advances in the physics 

 of the atmosphere, as well as in the prediction 

 of the weather, must remain entirely unknown 

 to Japanese meteorologists until they are able 

 to investigate it. 



Japanese meteorologists do not generally 

 possess all the expensive instruments and ap- 

 paratus that are found in the United States 

 and Europe. In the whole of Japan there is 

 probably not a complete set of modern appa- 

 ratus for the study of atmospheric electricity, 

 such as those of Elster and Geitel, Ebert, 

 Benndorf or Gerdien, Japanese physicists 

 and meteorologists have relied on their own 

 hands and brains, but we have now come to 

 the age when international cooperation in 

 science is progressing rapidly and our scien- 

 tists should be provided with laboratories and 

 observatories containing powerful instruments 

 and apparatus. It is sad, indeed, to hear 

 from Japanese meteorologists that they have 

 no hope of establishing an aero-physical ob- 

 servatory similar to those mentioned above. 



I have been asked if I can induce some 

 worthy American patron of science or some 

 institution to establish an aero-physical ob- 

 servatory in Japan, or somewhere on the other 

 side of the globe. What we should want at 

 first would not necessarily be a great observa- 

 tory, such as Mount Weather, but a small one, 

 or several such, where we can observe with 

 kites the conditions of the upper atmosphere, 

 and can also study the atmospheric electrical 

 phenomena by using the Ebert, Elster and 

 Geitel and Benndorf apparatus. Such work 

 is entirely new in Japan, but good physical 

 assistants and materials can be obtained at 

 small cost. It will require comparatively a 



small sum of money to establish and maintain 

 such an observatory in Japan. 



All Americans remember gratefully that 

 the Smithsonian Institution, of Washington, 

 which has done wonderful service for the in- 

 crease and diffusion of scientific knowledge in 

 America, was founded by a foreigner, an Eng- 

 lishman, James Smithson, in the beginning of 

 the nineteenth century. May not Japan re- 

 ceive similar encouragement from foreign 

 countries or institutions? Scientific research 

 is becoming more and more international and 

 cooperative; it soars far above the differences 

 of race and national policy. The results of 

 the meteorological investigations that are car- 

 ried on in an aero-physical observatory in 

 Japan will be directly beneficial to the whole 

 human race as well as to that country. The 

 world's meteorology will receive far greater 

 benefits indirectly than will Japan directly. 

 Our atmosphere must be studied as a unit. 

 When the atmospheric conditions in the upper 

 and the lower strata become thoroughly known 

 over America, Europe and Asia, then, and 

 only then, can meteorologists establish the 

 true theories of cyclones, anticyclones, floods 

 and droughts on a firm observational basis. 

 We must remember, however, that at present 

 the atmospheric conditions in the upper at- 

 mosphere over the eastern hemisphere of the 

 globe are entirely unknown, and the final solu- 

 tion of our complex aero-physical and dynam- 

 ical problem is still far away. 



All nations send their naval and merchant 

 vessels to Japanese ports, where we do our 

 best to forewarn them of dangerous storms. 

 A storm-warning service blesses all nations 

 alike. Its signals represent an international 

 cooperation for the benefit of all mankind. 



Eor these reasons I appeal confidently to 

 the American patrons of science for the funds 

 necessary to establish a modem aero-physical 

 observatory in Japan. 



S. T. Tamura. 



AN UNUSUAL METEOR. 



To THE Editor of Science: The recent 

 descent of a meteor and its resultant im- 

 pressed me as being so unusual and interest- 

 ing that I am prompted to write about it. 



