386 



SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



[April 27, lE 



regretted that so large a portion of his valuable time 

 should have been given to the mere examination of chil- 

 dren in such elementary subjects as spelling and arith- 

 metic, to say nothing of needlework ! 



i-^^^'^i^-f 



SCIENTIFIC TABLE TALK. 



By W. Mattieu Williams, F.R.A.S., F.C.S. 



The International Astrophotographic Congress presents 

 an admirable example of general co-operation for a 

 purely scientific object, an object that has the great merit 

 of being commercially worthless, is without the remotest 

 possibility of having any naval or military utility, and 

 yet it has collected fifty-six eminent delegates representing 

 France, England, Germany, America, Russia, Holland, 

 Austria, Sweden, Denmark, Belgium, Italy, Spain, 

 Portugal, Switzerland, Brazil, and the Argentine Re- 

 public. 



France stands worthily at the head of the list, having 

 initiated the movement, and having, so far contributed 

 the largest number of active workers. The work of the 

 congress will be to produce a chart of the heavens with 

 a degree of accuracy and detail which until lately has 

 been unattainable, and which even now is only rendered 

 practically possible by such international co-operation. 



Photographs of every part of the heavens are to be 

 taken from the most advantageous stations on the globe, 

 with instruments that will be identical in all their essen- 

 tial parts, so that the different maps may be combined to 

 form one harmonious picture of every celestial object 

 down to stars of the 14th magnitude, i.e., far beyond the 

 reach oi unaided human vision. The photographic 

 plates will be in duplicate. 



A second series of photographs, extending to stars of the 

 nth magnitude, will be taken with shorter exposure, 

 concurrently with the first. All the photographic plates 

 are to be prepared from the same formula, and the 

 photographic telescope to be identical in all essential par- 

 ticulars with that used at the Paris Observatory by the 

 brothers Henry, who have been the pioneers in the re- 

 search. It is estimated that the total number of stars 

 that will be shown in the plates reaching the nth magni- 

 tude will be about three and a half millions, but the 

 additional number that will appear between the nth 

 and 14th magnitudes is beyond the reach of safe estima- 

 tion with our present knowledge of the subject. The 

 mere counting of these will be an interesting work. 



It is hoped that some years after the completion of 

 this first great chart, another will be made under similar 

 conditions. A comparison of these will help to solve the 

 gigantic problem of the general movements of the stars 

 which are inaccurately described as " fixed." We have 

 the best of reasons for concluding that there exists 

 nowhere in the universe such a thing as a fixed star, or 

 any other fixed or motionless body. Gravitation is at 

 work upon all, and therefore none can remain at rest. 



If any one should ask the grovelling question of what 

 is the use of knowing these things ? I would tell him 

 that man is superior to an ass, a pig, or an ape, because 

 he has intellectual faculties, and moral sentiments that 

 can contemplate and enjoy intellectual and sentimental 

 objects, that he must either cultivate these specially 

 human attributes, or revert more or less completely to 

 the asinine, porcine, or simian type ; that the pursuit of 



pure science has far more to do with truly human pro- 

 gress than the growth of wealth and luxury ; that the 

 increase of these without a corresponding development 

 of pure intellect can only promote degrading, and ulti- 

 mately destructive, sensualitj'. 



The Society of Arts proceeds so steadily and quietly 

 that only a few of us can estimate the magnitude of the 

 work it has done and is doing. We rarely, for example, 

 associate it with the progress of geology, but it is never- 

 theless a fact that this science, when a feeble infant, was 

 adopted and cherished by the Society of Arts, which in 

 1802 publicly announced the following award : — "To 

 any person who shall complete and publish an accurate 

 mineralogical map of England and Wales on a scale not 

 less than ten miles to an inch, containing an account ofthe 

 situation of the different mines therein, and describing 

 the kinds of minerals thence produced, the gold medal 

 or fifty guineas." 



It may be observed that the word geology does not 

 appear here, the simple reason being that the babe thus 

 taken under the Society's protection was not yet formally 

 baptised. A near neighbour to the Society, William 

 Smith, of Craven-street, Strand, and afterwards of 

 Buckingham-street, was, however, working upon such a 

 map as the Society demanded and finally produced it, 

 receiving the Society's premium of fifty guineas in June, 

 1S15. In the preface to volume 32 of the transactions 

 of the Society is the following : " Under the class 

 chemistry will be found an account of a most valuable 

 mineralogical map of England and Wales, a labour of 

 many years by Mr. William Smith, in which, he has-, 

 with infinite care and accuracy, pointed out the situation 

 of the different strata of coal, lime, iron, stone, and 

 other mineral products." Note the expression, " under 

 the class Chemistry" 



The map was on a scale of five inches to the mile, 

 double that of the minimum required by the Society, 

 and in fifteen coloured sheets. It was published by 

 Carey in the same year as that in which the 50 guineas 

 were given to its author. 



Greenough's map of about fifteen years later was 

 based on this, and the existing maps of the official 

 Geological Survey are but further developments, with the 

 Ordnance maps as a geographical basis. 



This sound and thorough worker has been justly de- 

 scribed as the father of English geology, and such a title 

 is almost equivalent to that of the father of the science 

 cf geology as now understood. Plis predecessors were, 

 for the most part, theoretical cosmogonists, " Vulcanists," 

 " Neptunists," supporters or antagonists of Werner or 

 Hutton, of de Luc or Woodward, etc. ; combatants who 

 attacked or defended the Noachian deluge, and all dis- 

 puting on but a narrow basis of facts. Smith's work 

 consisted in extensive observation and sound generalisa- 

 tion ofthe facts thus laboriously collected. AsD'Aubuisson 

 said, " What many celebrated mineralogists had only 

 accomplished for a small part of Germany, in the course 

 of half a century, had been effected by a single indi- 

 vidual for the whole of England." 



On page 235 of the current volume of this magazine 

 is an account of some fossil tree-stumps found standing 

 upright, or as described " in situ," with the usual in- 

 ference that they must therefore have grown where 

 thus found. 



