548 



SCIENCE. 



LN. S. Vol. XVII. No. 431. 



" Modern Philosophers, to avoid Circumlo- 

 cutions call that Instrument, wherein a Cylin- 

 der of Quicksilver, of between 28 and 31 

 inches in Altitude, is kept suspended after the 

 manner of the Torricellian Experiment, a 

 Barometer or Baroscope, first made publiek 

 by that Noble Searcher of Nature, Mr. Boyle, 

 and imployed by him and others to detect all 

 the minut variations in the Pressure and 

 "Weight of the Air." 



The mention of the words in connection 

 with the name of Robert Boyle has led me to 

 make a close examination of his voluminous 

 and prolix writings. In Boyle's first publica- 

 tion, ' New Experiments Physico-Mechanioal 

 touching the Spring and Weight of the Air,' 

 dated 1660, the words baroscope and barometer 

 do not occur ; he uses the common term ' tube,' 

 and often writes of the ' mercurial cylinder.' 

 Nor are these words used by him in his ' De- 

 fense of the Doctrine touching the Spring and 

 the Weight of the Air * * * against the ob- 

 jections of Franciscus Linus,' a paper pub- 

 lished in 1662. 



Their use by the anonymous writer to the 

 Philosophical Transactions in 1665 has been 

 shown, and the question arises, who was this 

 person who modestly concealed his name? I 

 believe it was Boyle himself. This eminent 

 man, who was so devoid of personal ambition 

 that he declined a peerage, had a habit of 

 writing about himself and his scientific labors 

 in the third person, and often spoke of him- 

 self by fanciful, fictitious names, such as 

 ' Philaretus ' (in his fragmentary autobiog- 

 raphy) and ' Carneades ' (in the ' Sceptical 

 Chymist'). That he should send an un- 

 signed communication to a journal was not 

 surprising, particularly as he had occasion to 

 mention himself. 



Be this as it may, my claim that Boyle 

 originated the word barometer does not rest 

 on such slender conjectures as these. One 

 year later than the communication in tlie 

 Philosophical Transactions, Boyle wrote to 

 this journal (dated April 2, 1666) and said, 

 ' barometrical observations (as for brevity's 

 sake I call them),' using the personal pronoun 

 this time. Elsewhere in the same paper are 



found the terms barometer, baroscope and 

 baroscopical observations. 



In his ' Continuation of New Experiments 

 Physico-Mechanical * * * ' of which the pref- 

 ace is dated 1667, occurs the following phrase : 

 ' But though about the barometer (as others 

 have by their imitation allowed me to call the 

 instrument mentioned).' (Boyle's Works, 

 Birch's edition. Vol. III., p. 219, London, 

 1744.) 



This sentence is virtually an admission by 

 Boyle that he had coined the word, since 

 others imitating him had allowed and en- 

 couraged him to use the term to designate the 

 tube of Torricelli. 



I conclude, therefore, that the word ' barom- 

 eter ' was introduced into our language by 

 the English philosopher, the Hon. Robert 

 Boyle, about the year 1665. Boyle, by the 

 way, was a scholar, and able to use Greek in 

 forming an English word. Finally, I may add 

 that examination of Murray's Skeats' and 

 other standard English dictionaries throws no 

 light on the origin of the word; they merely 

 refer to the Philosophical Transactions and 

 give its obvious etymology. 



Henry Caeeington Bolton. 



the response op the hearts of certain mol- 

 luscs, decapods and tunicates to elec- 

 trical stimulation. (preliminary 

 communication.)* 

 The physiology of cardiac muscle of the 

 vertebrates is commonly regarded as differing 

 from that of the skeletal muscle, besides the 

 difference in rhythm, chiefly in these three 

 points, namely, that cardiac muscle can not 

 be tetanized, that a minimal stimulus is at 

 the same time maximal (the ' all or nothing 

 law '), and that, beginning with the systole, 

 the muscle is in a condition of inexeitability, 

 the excitability returning gradually during 

 diastole. While making some observations on 

 the comparative physiology of muscle in cer- 

 tain genera of marine molluscs at the Hop- 

 kins Seaside Laboratory in the summer of 

 1902, the ventricle of the systemic heart of 



* From the Hopkins Seaside Laboratory and the 

 Physiological Laboratory of Leland Stanford Jr. 

 University. 



