SCIENCE 



FRIDAY, OCTOBER 28, 1887. 



At N A AS, Sweden, the third summer course of normal training in 

 slbjd, which is the equivalent of our manual training, began towards 

 the end of July with a total attendance of eighty. Of these, twelve 

 were English and eighteen were Italians, sent by their government 

 to receive the training. New and commodious buildings had been 

 erected during the past year, and the school was favored with many 

 distinguished visitors during the summer. Encouraged by the re- 

 ception of her article in the \.ovi.Aox\ Journal of Education on slojd. 

 Miss Evelyn Chapman announces a slojd training-course for 

 teachers, to be held at Birmingham during the holidays. Miss 

 Chapman has an efficient colleague in Miss Nystrom of Stockholm, 

 who was the first directress at the Naas seminary. It is hoped that 

 the efforts of these two ladies will result in introducing manual 

 training in the board schools of Great Britain. In this country the 

 progress of manual training has been very rapid of late, and we 

 hear almost daily that some new locality is considering the subject. 

 Paterson, N.J., is about to take favorable action in this matter, and 

 Hoboken and other cities of the same State are expected to fol- 

 low Paterson's e.xample. 



The New York Times, a paper which has in earlier days, in the 

 contributions of HoUey and Newton and their successors, supplied 

 much more valuable and interesting scientific matter to its readers 

 than the average daily newspaper seems to feel called upon to give 

 the intelligent portion of its patrons, and which has dealt less in the 

 coarse and vulgar accounts of crime and folly which make up the 

 average staple than many of its contemporaries, recently, under the 

 heading, 'Is Heavy Artillery doomed ? ' presents an account of an in- 

 vention, destined, apparently, to overthrow all existing methods of 

 ordnance construction and operation. Since the Times has allowed 

 its ' funny man ' entrance into its editorial columns, its readers have 

 sometimes been at loss to know whether some of its articles are 

 genuine ' information,' are the product of an overworked vender of 

 the 'humorous,' or are simply the gossip of an ignorant penny-a- 

 liner. The several characters are sometimes found to operate in so 

 circumscribed a field, that it is difficult to say whether the article 

 of the day is to be assigned to one or to another of these usually 

 far-removed classes. Possibly it may be the intention, as appar- 

 ently in the article here referred to, to kill two birds with one stone, 

 amusing the smaller and more intelligent class of readers, while 

 gulling most mercilessly the larger and less well informed body of 

 its patrons, who may not have had the advantages of a good com- 

 mon-school education. It certainly cannot be presumed that its 

 editors are of the latter class. The general make-up and character 

 of the Times, and the fact that its proof-reading and orthography 

 are very correct, would forbid that supposition being held a moment. 

 The story which it is so difficult to classify, and of which it is so 

 utterly impossible to guess the origin, is that a distinguished Rus- 

 sion chemist has discovered a new explosive, of extraordinary 

 power, and endowed with a capacity for evading or directly over- 

 coming the second of Newton's laws. This new compound fur- 

 nishes an exception to the general rule, and here action and 

 re-action are not " equal and opposite in direction." In fact, the 

 re-action is turned directly about, apparently, and effectively assists 

 direct action in its destructive mission. This wonderful explosive 

 acts in but one direction, and that is the direction which is sug- 

 gested to it by its manipulators. A tube of cardboard, of tissue- 



paper, — or, we may presume, the geometrician's imaginary cylinder, 

 — serves to communicate the intent of the ' captain of the gun,' and 

 the stored energy of the combustible starts off in the indicated 

 direction, impelling the projectile with inconceivable force, and with 

 not even sufficient recoil or lateral expenditure of force to crumple 

 the imponderable gun. The latter, it may be presumed, is, when 

 out of action, packed down like an opera-hat into the least possible 

 space, and put in the pocket of the officer in command, or stored in 

 the caisson until again required for the demolition of an iron-clad 

 or the destruction of a fortress. The only really puzzUng fact is, 

 however, that the inventor of this extraordinary explosive, in the 

 quiet seclusion of the Times office, — for the Russian must have 

 become domiciled there, — does not seem to have successfully ap- 

 plied the tremendous brain-power, which has thus defied the laws 

 of nature, to the completion of his work by also inventing a projec- 

 tile of lightness commensurate with that of his gun, and to have 

 endowed his explosive with a ' negative gravity ' such as readers of 

 his article must experience and appreciate. He would thus have real- 

 ized the idea of Lord Lytton, and would have won immortal fame 

 by presenting to the worid the blessed ' VRILL,' which we now 

 know only in the fictions of that great novelist. We would suggest 

 to our neighbor of the Times that he secure a good supply of that 

 marvellous ' sleetover,' and turn it, first upon his ' funny man,' and 

 then upon those unsympathetic neighbors among the ' great New 

 York dailies' who are prone to smile at such. facetiiz. 



At the recent meeting in New York, of the American As- 

 sociation for the Advancement of Science, the fact that the remains 

 of the great naturalist Audubon lie in an obscure and little-visited 

 portion of Trinity Cemetery, New York City, and that his tomb is 

 unmarked by any distinguishing monument, was brought to the at- 

 tention of the members. The demands upon the time of all in at- 

 tendance at that meeting were so great, that no action was taken 

 by the association, although the most lively interest was expressed 

 by individual members, and the propriety of marking the resting- 

 place of the founder of American ornithology by a suitable monu- 

 ment was appreciated. The Audubon plot in Trinity Cemetery 

 will probably be disturbed by the continuation westward of 153d 

 Street. The trustees of the cemetery have with commendable 

 liberality assigned the Audubon family anew lot close to i5Sth 

 Street, in full sight of Audubon Park, and near the end of Audubon 

 Avenue, when this shall be continued from the north, and are in 

 hearty co-operation with the monument enterprise. At the first 

 autumn meeting of the New York Academy of Sciences, a com- 

 mittee was appointed to solicit funds and make all arrangements 

 for a monument. Vice-President Trowbridge then appointed as 

 such a committee. Prof. Thomas Egleston of the School of Mines, 

 chairman, Prof. Daniel S. Martin of Rutgers Female College, and 

 Dr. N. L. Britton of Columbia College. This committee has or- 

 ganized with Df. Britton as secretary and treasurer, and is now 

 ready to receive subscriptions, which will be properly acknowl- 

 edged. Checks should be made payable to N. L. Britton, treas- 

 urer, and post-office orders should be drawn on Station H, New 

 York City. The committee estimates that between six and ten 

 thousand dollars will be required to erect and engrave a shaft 

 worthy the memory of America's first naturalist, and, while con- 

 fident that this amount will be forthcoming, desires to have interest 

 taken in the project by scientists in all departments, in all portions 

 of the country. 



