388 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. mi., No. 195 



for the year ending June 1, 1886, states that the 

 great equatorial has been chiefly employed in the 

 examination and sketching of southern nebulae. 

 The nebula in Orion, and the Trifid and Omego 

 nebulae have received special attention. 351 ob- 

 servations of miscellaneous nebulae have been 

 made, resulting in 326 drawings, and the dis- 

 covery of 233 nebulae vehich are supposed not to 

 have been hitherto detected. Only a few nights 

 have been suited to the micrometrical measure- 

 ment of double stars ; 76 observations have, how- 

 ever, been made. Observations of three comets 

 have been made. Tuttle's comet was observed 

 at only one other observatory. Nice, in France ; 

 and Barnard's comet of 1886 was observed at this 

 place three weeks later than elsewhere. The 

 small equatorial has been employed in revising the 

 catalogue of stars south of 23'^. The observations 

 for the revision of the 23° zone are now practically 

 completed. The director, Ormond Stone, express- 

 es the opinion that the past year has been, with- 

 out exception, the poorest for astronomical obser- 

 vations which he has ever known. Not only have 

 there been an unusual number of cloudy nights, 

 but even on clear nights the definition has been 

 almost always extremely poor. 



— An interesting combination of the Coulier- 

 Aitken theory of the control of dust on cloud-for- 

 mation with Thomson's investigation of the effect 

 of surface form on evaporation has lately been 

 made by Dr. Robert v. Helmholz. He l^finds that 

 a definite and perceptible cooling of a mass of 

 moist air below its devv-point is needed before any 

 condensation begins, and ascribes this to the facil- 

 ity with which the first -formed water-droplets 

 would evaporate on account of their sharply 

 curved surfaces ; so that super-saturation is 

 needed to begin their formation. At the same 

 time, the degree of super-saturation ordinarily 

 needed is less than that required in dust-free air, 

 because the dust particles diminish the surface- 

 curvature of a given minute volume of water ; 

 and also, at the beginning of condensation, the 

 particles may prevent evaporation from the sur- 

 face of vrater that is attached to them. Filtered 

 air has been carried to tenfold super-saturation 

 without a trace of mistiness. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



*** Correspondents are requested to be as brief as possible. The 

 writer's name is in all cases required as proof of good faith. 



Ely's Labor movement in America. 



Although I have never before written any thing in 

 reply to the censures of a reviewer, I feel moved to 

 say a few words about the critique of my ' Labor 

 movement in America ' which ap^jeared in Science 

 for Oct. 15. 



There are several reasons for this departure from 

 my ordinary course. First, other authors have 



established the precedent, and Science has already 

 published statements in reply to severe criticism of a 

 book. While an author should doubtless decline to 

 discuss his own capacity or general qualifications for 

 his task, it may be very proper for him to call atten- 

 tion to positive misstatements of his reviewers. I am 

 inclined to think it desirable that this should become 

 general, as it would perhaps lead people to read a 

 book carefully before reviewing it, — a thing which 

 may be regarded as exceptional at present. Second, 

 while it is doubtless not worth while to notice those 

 who fail to distingiiish between a torrent of personal 

 abuse and serious criticism, it cannot be incompatible 

 with one's self-respect to point out the errors of fact 

 in a critique written by a person like N. M. B., who 

 evidently desires simj^ly to give expression to truth, 

 and not to vilify an author. Third, a review is read 

 by many who never see the book reviewed ; and it 

 may even be my duty to correct serious misappre- 

 hensions to which the article by N. M. B. must give 

 rise, especially as they relate to such grave and 

 pressing problems of the hour. 



N. M. B. says that I seem to uphold " the extrem- 

 ists in their contention that all the evils of the pres- 

 ent state of society are due to private property and 

 the lack of proper co-operation in jsroduction and 

 distribution." This is simply inconceivable to me ; 

 for the exact ojiposite is stated, I think I may safely 

 say, fifty times in the book reviewed. I can find no 

 more rational explanation for this astounding asser- 

 tion of N. M. B. than that during a nap between 

 chajaters it came to him in a dream. If I held the 

 opinion attributed to me, the remedy for social evils 

 would be the abolition of private isroperty ; in other 

 words, the socialistic programme. Is it not a little 

 strange, that, with one exception, the sharpest attack 

 on the book should have api^eared in the organ of 

 the socialistic labor party, while other reviewers com- 

 plain because I leave nearly every thing to sympathy 

 and benevolence, and furnish no adequate room for 

 the activity of the state ? The truth is, I point out 

 many causes for the evils of present society, as in- 

 temperance, imperfect ethical development of man 

 (which N. M. B. acknowledges, thereby falling into 

 self - contradiction), nnchastity, ignorance of the 

 simplest laws of political economy, extravagance, 

 and, in fact, ' the wickedness of human nature.' 

 When, in his reproof of me because I failed to see so 

 deeply as an ancient sage, N. M. B. goes on to ask 

 labor agitators and ' their allies among jirofessed 

 political economists ' whether the social, political, 

 economic, and ethical elevation of men at large, and 

 the hiiman nature that is in them, is not what is 

 wanted, he repeats my own words. I have dwelt at 

 length on this point because I regard the accusation 

 brought against me as a serious one. While I would 

 not reproach N. M. B. with malevolence, I do bring 

 against him the charge of culpable negligence. This 

 is not the only case where the reviewer dwells on ob- 

 jections to the programmes of labor organizations, 

 which I have pointed out, in such manner as to con- 

 vey the impression that I have failed to see them. 

 He does this in the discussion of the financial plat- 

 form of the knights of labor. N. M. B. still labors 

 tinder the delusion that men in masses in this country 

 strike, and do all sorts of dreadful things, because 

 some one ' snaps his fingers.' No dovibt, he has read 

 it in his daily paper ; but for a man of scientific pre- 

 tensions to repeat it, shows a strange ignorance of 

 human nature and of the operations of the mind of 



