November 13, 1903.] 



SCIENCE. 



611 



covering esseutially the same departmeuts 

 as those of the sections of the American 

 association, and Professor Thurston ac- 

 cepted the charge of the department of 

 engineering. His contributions to the pages 

 of this JoiJKNAii have been many and are 

 well known to our readers. His work, 

 which never flagged, continued to the last, 

 for on the day of his death an article signed 

 R. II. T. was in tj-pe and it appeared in the 

 issue which contained the obituary an- 

 nouncement. 



It is yet too early to speak with accurate 

 judgment regarding the final value of the 

 scientific and engineering work of Professor 

 Thur.ston. There can be no doubt, however. 

 that it was of great benefit to mankind, 

 for he made engineere better scientists, 

 promoted engineering education, helped to 

 put engineering upon a higher professional 

 plane, and constantly was on the watch to 

 dispel the fogs of prejudice by help of the 

 truths of science. II is alma mater con- 

 ferred upon him the degree of LL.D., and 

 Stevens Institute devised the degree of doc- 

 tor of engineering to do him special honor. 

 In personal disposition he was quiet and re- 

 tiring, but yet aft'able and kindly. His 

 work was done with method and precision. 

 and he was always most untiring to serve 

 the interests of the educational institution 

 with which he was connected. It is an- 

 nounced that the authoi-ities of Cornell 

 University propose to commemorate his 

 services by the erection of a costly labora- 

 tory as a memorial, the same to be called 

 Thurston Hall. 



SlMUhTANKOUS SOLAR AyP TKRRESTHIM, 



CHANOES.* 



TnKRE are very many cases recorded in 



llie history of science in which we find that 



the most valuable and important applica- 



■■ Report, International Committee, Soutliport, 



tions have arisen from the study of the 

 ideally useless. Long period weather fore- 

 casting, which at last seems to be coming 

 into the region of practical politics as 

 a result of the observation of solar 

 changes, is another example of this se- 

 quence. 



The first indications of these changes on 

 the sun, to which I have referred, are 

 matters of very ancient history, and so 

 also is the origin of some of the branches 

 of (il)S('rvation on which the study of them 

 depends. 



I will begin by referring to these and 

 to the conclusions arrived at in relation to 

 sinuiltaneous solar and terrestrial changes 

 previously to the last 25 years. 



The facts that there are sometimes spots 

 on the sun, and that there is a magnetic 

 force which acts upon a needle, seem to 

 have been known to the ancient Chinese. 

 In more modern times the enquiries with 

 which we are now concerned, date from 

 the times of Galileo (1564-1642) and Kep- 

 ler (1571-1630). 



To Galileo, Fabricius and Scheiner we 

 owe the first telescopic observations of the 

 spots on the sun; to Kepler, the basis of 

 spectrum analysis, which has not only re- 

 vealed to us the chemistry of the sun and 

 of its spots, but enables us to study daily 

 other phenomena, the solar prominences, 

 which will in all probability turn out to 

 be more important for practical purposes 

 than the spots themselves. 



It is only quite recently that the impor- 

 tance of the study of the prominences in 

 this direction has been indicated, so that 

 we have to deal, in the first instance, with 

 a long period of years in which only the 

 spots and their terrestrial echoes were in 

 question. 



According to Professor Wolf (as quoted 

 by Professor Koppen), Riccioli, in 1651, 

 shortly after the first discovery of sun 

 spots, surmised that some coincidence 



