SCIENTIFIC NE^VS. 



[March ist, 1887 



being claimed that even in field-pieces a considerable quan- 

 tity of the powder is wasted by being blown out of the gun 

 unconsumed. Many other subjects are mentioned, but the 

 above will suffice to show that, although the United States 

 may not be within measurable distance of being mixed up 

 in European conflicts, Americans are nevertheless keenly 

 alive to the very direct interest they have in applying 

 their inventive powers to the requirements of European 

 war. 



The Horse Power of a Whale's Tail affords a fruitful 

 and interesting subject for speculation, but it would not, at 

 first sight, appear to be one especially suitable for a 

 Professor of Anatomy to enlarge upon before the members 

 of a Philosophical Society. However, Sir William Turner, 

 the eminent Edinburgh anatomist, has lately delivered a lec- 

 ture on whales and their structure, and some details from this 

 have been quoted in a recent number of Engineering. In the 

 course of his remarks the Professor dwelt on the speed at- 

 tained by the whales, and this branch of the subject naturally 

 led him to speculate on the power required to propel these 

 monsters of the deep at the speed they are estimated to 

 attain. Accordingly, Sir William summoned to his aid a 

 well-known naval architect, in the person of Mr. John 

 Henderson, of Glasgow, the designer and builder of some of 

 our most important Atlantic liners. The following are 

 briefly the results arrived at by this combination of expert 

 knowledge. It has been estimated that a Greenland right 

 whale, 50 to 60 feet long, will travel at the rate of 9 to 10 

 knots an hour, but finner-whales will swim at higher rates 

 of speed, whilst the sperm whale will propel itself 12 knots 

 in an hour. Whales, 80 feet in length, frequently visit British 

 waters, one of this size being stranded at Longniddry a few 

 years ago. It weighed 74 tons, and its tail measured iS to 

 20 feet across the flukes. Assuming this leviathan travelled 

 at the higher rate of speed mentioned (12 knots) it would, 

 according to Mr. Henderson, develop 145 horse power. 

 When we remember how wide of the mark ship-designers 

 often are in their estimates of powers required to propel 

 ships at given speeds, and this in spite of the accumulated 

 experience of years, it would appear somewhat strange that 

 one of their number should forecast, with anj' show of con- 

 fidence, the power necessary to drive fishes or marine 

 animals through the water. 



The constants by which naval architects attempt to 

 formulate a relation between powers and speeds in ships 

 are quite untrustworthy beyond ordinary ranges of speed, 

 as is too often proved by the unexpected results of trial 

 trips of new types of vessels, where the " grand old rule of 

 thumb" is not available through lack of data. It would 

 therefore appear somewhat bold for Mr. Henderson to have 

 hazarded his assumption as to the whale's expenditure of 

 •power ; but, as a matter of fact, he is quite as likely to be 

 correct when' theorizing about whales and their tails as 

 about ships and their engines. The modern theory of the 



resistance of ships divides the subject into three sections, 

 viz. (i) frictional resistance due to the gliding of the water 

 in contact with the submerged part of the vessel, (2) eddy- 

 making resistance, and (3) surface disturbance, or wave- 

 making resistance. Of these the second is generally of 

 small importance, and it is the latter which is the great 

 unknown quantitj' when speeds not now considered exces- 

 sive are reached. Obviously in the case of a whale, 

 swimming at some depth in the ocean, there would be no 

 appreciable surface disturbance, and Mr. Henderson, there- 

 fore, had his problem much simplified. Indeed, were the 

 ocean composed of a perfect fluid — and eliminating some 

 other considerations which militate against theoretical re- 

 sults being obtained by the whale in actual practice — a naval 

 architect could calculate the power required to set the 

 animal in motion with exactitude, but, as such conditions do 

 not exist in nature, it would be interesting to have more of 

 the details on which Mr. Henderson based his estimate. 



Could the Original Reis Telephone Speak ? — We do 

 not intend to usurp jurisdiction on telephone patents. But 

 so much is certain that Philipp, Reis of Friedrichsdorf, near 

 Homburg, invented in i860 an apparatus which he called a 

 telephone ; and that Bell 1879 patented an instrument which 

 he did not call a telephone, but which is claimed to be the 

 telephone. The original Reis telephone passed into the 

 possession of Dr. Stein, of Frankfort-on-the-Main ; Dr. Stein 

 sent it to Professor Silvanus Thompson, who has broken a 

 lance for Reis in his book : " Philipp Reis, the Inventor of 

 the Telephone." Thompson sent it to the Overland Tele- 

 phone Co., and many experiments have since been made 

 with the original instrument in America, where Professor 

 Houston has exerted himself to ascertain the opinions of the 

 various scientists regarding the invention of the telephone. 

 The great question is : Could the original Reis telephone 

 speak ? Dr. Stein says no ; and Mr. Paddock says yes. 

 He tried it and found it spoke tolerably well, sometimes ; 

 although the s, /;, and _/ would never come out distinctlj'. 

 Others failed ; but Professor F. Nipher, of St. Louis, has 

 shown that it is simply a question of properly stretching the 

 membrane. If Dr. Stein can't make the telephone speak, 

 argues Professor Houston, it is not Reis' fault. The con- 

 troversy has for some time been carried on in the Journal 

 of the Franklin Institute of Philadelphia, and the January 

 number of this publication brings again £\n interesting con- 

 tribution to the question. 



Analysis and Insurance. — Two barns, said to be filled with 

 unthrashed wheat, were recently burned in Germany. They 

 were insured, but the insurance company refused to pa}', 

 alleging that the contents of the barns were simply straw. The 

 affair was taken into court, and chemical experts were called in 

 to analyse the ashes. Wheat contains a large quantity of phos- 

 phoric acid, almost ten times as much as straw. The experts found 

 that of two samples p'aced in theii hands, one cpntained io-2 per 

 cent, and the other 19 per cent, of the acid, thus proving that the 

 farmers were right and the insurance companies wrong. 



