June 15, 1888.] 



SCIENCE. 



will be of great service in allowing barges to proceed from the Don 

 to Odessa, which at the present moment is impossible, and it is 

 believed that there will be no difficulty in doing this even at periods 

 when the storms that rage in the Black Sea stop coast navigation. 

 The commencement of the canal took place without any fuss, all 

 festivities being reserved for its completion. No engineering diffi- 

 culties whatever exist. 



— The average tonnage of ships passing through the Suez Canal 

 has increased from 1,000 tons in 1871, to over 1,750 in 1887. Out 

 of 3. '37 vessels passing through last year, 2,230 were English, and 

 only 3 American. The Engineer well says, "This table also in- 

 dicates the depth to which the once great merchant navy of the 

 United States has sunk, to find that only three voyages were made 

 in the year by its ships through this great water-way." 



— The annual reception of the microscopical section of the 

 Brooklyn Microscopical Society was held June 5. 



— At the last meeting of the New York Academy of Sciences, 

 Mr. George F. Kunz exhibited some of the finest red corundum 

 (ruby) from within twenty miles of Atlanta. Ga. This was in 

 pieces weighing one pound, and was part of a mass weighing 350 

 pounds which was found on the surface. He also exhibited gold 

 quartz from Dutch Guiana (gold formerly found there only in "placer 

 deposits had been traced to the vein by a brother of the United 

 States consul, Mr. Thomas Brown), and exhibited specimens said 

 to have assayed S-1-5U to the ton. The mines are situated four miles 

 from Paramaribo; and the ore is sent to the coast by natives, who 

 carry it on their heads in fifty-pound bags, making two trips a day. 

 He also read a paper entitled ' List of Diamonds found in the 

 United States,' which will be published later on by the society, and 

 stated, that, in addition to the diamond weighing four and a third 

 carats, exhibited by him two months ago, and reported as having 

 been found near Morrow Station, thirteen miles south of Atlanta, 

 Ga., he had recently heard of a two-carat stone which was brought 

 to Mr. L. O. Slevens of Atlanta, Ga., by a colored man, who found 

 it in his garden a few miles from the city, but who would not sell 

 it, or allow it to be sent North. It was imperfect and off-colored. 

 Mr. Kunz also said that five years ago he had identified topaz, for 

 the first time in Maine, at Stoneham ; and ever since then he had 

 been on the lookout for the rare gem phenacite, crystals of which 

 he had the pleasure of showing on that evening. This was the 

 first time it had ever been found in the United States outside of 

 Colorado, where it was first discovered in 1882. In Maine a num- 

 ber of superb light-green and sherry-colored topaz crystals were 

 found. They were several inches in length, but of little gem-value. 



main arch retained this appearance for nearly a half-hour, but 

 slowly assumed the appearance of the normal auroral bow without 

 streamers. The times and appearances given above were taken 

 from notes made at the time of the aurora. 



H. Helm Clayton.. 



Blue Hill Observatory, June 5. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



Thei 



}ft will be furnished 

 nth the character of 



*,* Correspoiidevis are regxtested to be as brief as pc 

 in all cases required as proof of ^ood faith. 



Twe'tty copies of the number con'ainin° his conn 

 free to any correspondent on request. 



Tile editor will be _^lad to publish any queries cot 

 the journal. 



An Unusual Auroral Bow. 

 The description of the aurora of the night of May 20, by Mr. 

 Kellicottof Buffalo, in Science oi June i, is so remarkably similar to 

 the phenomenon as it appeared here, that it seems worthy of men- 

 tion. Besides " the long streamers emanating from a bright, irregu- 

 lar arch resting on dark clouds." there appeared that extra arch, 

 about the apparent width of a rainbow, with its extremities resting 

 on the eastern and western horizons, and its top passing near the 

 zenith. This arch was first noticed here at 9.30 P.M. standard time, 

 and was very bright at that time, but without color. After 9.35 

 P.M. it began to grow fainter, but was still faintly visible at 10 P.M. 

 A phenomenon visible here which was not mentioned by Mr. Kelli- 

 cott was the appearance of a segment of a secondary arch or band 

 attached to the top of the main arch in the north, and at 9.30 P.M. 

 extending down to the horizon a little west of north. Between 

 9.35 P.5L and 9.40 P.M. the lower end of this segment seemed to 

 detach itself from the earth, and, pulsating like a piece of ribbon 

 held by one hand and waving in the wind, it rose upward, at the 

 same time exhibiting beautiful colors, and at 9.4010 9.42 P.M. joined 

 the main arch, which assumed the appearance of a bent bow. The 



The People and the Common Schools. 



How natural it is for us to try to shift responsibility from our 

 own shoulders upon some other fellow's back ! and yet, as Lester- 

 Wallack used to say in ' Ours,' " there is nothing so consoling to a. 

 man, when he is found out, as the sweet consciousness of — guilt.'" 

 The people are at last becoming conscious that there is some- 

 thing wrong in the great public-school system of New York City,. 

 — a fact that has been evident to every true educator in the landi 

 for the past ten years ; and now the people dearly desire to make- 

 somebody a scapegoat for their sins. After stoning the scape- 

 goat out of camp and into the wilderness, they would like to again, 

 relapse into a complacent contemplation of their own righteousness, 

 soothed by a serene sense of duty well done. 



They can safely enjoy " the sweet consciousness of guilt," how- 

 ever. The schools are to-day just what the people, through apathy, 

 indifference, carelessness, and ignorance, have permitted thern to 

 become, — one vast machine ; a treadmill, teachers treading the 

 wheel, happy innocent children the grist, superintendents for task- 

 masters, and the product a mass of automatons. 



Have you not committed the monumental stupidity of placing, 

 through laws enacted by your servants, all responsibility for the 

 management of your schools — not only in monetary matters, but in 

 all educational affairs as well — into the hands of bankers, brokers, 

 lawyers, and physicians, who know no more about the science of 

 education than school-teachers do about finance, law, and medicine, 

 and perhaps not half as much ? 



To show the utter absurdity of this condition of affairs, it is only 

 necessary to suggest that the Chamber of Commerce, the Stock 

 Exchange, the Bar Association, and the County Medical Society 

 select their governing committees from among the principals of ihe- 

 New York schools. Preposterous, is it .' Would it not he. safer to- 

 intrust affairs of finance to a man who knows, in theory at least, all 

 the laws that govern trade — as a principal must — than to intrust 

 the education of one hundred and fifty thousand children ti:) men 

 who know nothing of the science of pedagogy even in theory.' 



It.is of no use to try to dodge the issue by stating that the Board 

 of Education is guided in educational matters by the city superin- 

 tendent, an expert teacher. Neither he nor the Board of Educa- 

 tion will permit any such construction of the law defining t^eir 

 relative positions. The city superintendent pleads that he is only 

 responsible for the execution of the law as it stands. The Board 

 of Education assumes all responsibility for the inception, enactment, 

 and continuance of all the laws, other than 'State Statutes,' which 

 he executes. 



The city superintendent is thus the self-confessed creature of the 

 system he administers, instead of being, as you perhaps supposed, in 

 any degree its creator. If he is not even the author of any portion 

 of the present system, of which he has been the executive head for the 

 past nine years, how can he be expected to become the creator of a 

 nobler plan for the education of your children ? You certainly can- 

 not indulge in any such unreasonable expectation. 



You, the people of New York City, are directly responsible for 

 the larger part of all the evils that exist in the common-school sys- 

 tem. Your children attend them ; you hear from them daily reports 

 of the manner in which they are educationally crammed ; you see 

 them at home, wearing out their young lives in preparing lessons 

 for the next day's recitations ; and, if some wise teacher reduces 

 the tasks assigned for home-study, you immediately begin to in- 

 quire why your children have no more books, and why they have 

 so few lessons to learn at home. 



I know you do this, for I have heard you talk just that way. 

 In vain have I pleaded with you for the little ones. In vain have I 

 told you that five hours' daily attention to books, to recitations, to 

 instruction, is all that any growing child can safely endure. " No, 

 no ! " you cry, " give them more lessons — give them tasks to do at 

 home ; " and your children go through their school-lives with the. 



