W. B. Taylor— Recent Researches in Sound. 



Art. III.— On Recent Researches in Sound; by Wm. B. Taylor. 



That two so eminent physicists as Professor Tyndall in 

 England, and Professor Henry in our own country, should 

 have been for some time past (and almost simultaneously) en- 

 gaged in investigating the aberrant actions of Sound, with es- 

 pecial reference to securing increased efficiency to the national 

 systems of Fog-signaling, is a noteworthy circumstance, and 

 one of no slight practical importance. In view of the many 

 disastrous marine accidents resulting from fogs on either coast, 

 every thoughtful mind must regard with profound interest a 

 series of researches requiring so much patient labor for the 

 attainment of new and accurate information on the subject, and 

 so high a degree of scientific sagacity and skill for its right 

 interpretation. 



As somewhat different explanations have been offered by 

 these two distinguished observers to account for certain abnor- 

 mal phenomena of sound, a concise statement of the facts and 

 views respectively announced, will interest the general reader. 

 The records of these investigations are, on the one side, the 

 Philosophical Transactions of the Eoyal Society of London for 

 ^ ^ ^ • ._ ,.„ , ' tmosphere as a 



F.RS., a com- 

 . read February 12, 1874 ; and on the other side, the 

 Annual Report of the Light House Board of the United States 

 for the year 1874; the Appendix to which is an account of the 

 operations ot the Board relative to Fog-Signals, by Joseph Henry, 

 Chairman of the Light House Board. In addition to these 

 principal sources of information, reference will be made to an 

 interesting communication read before the Royal Society, April 

 23, 1874, " On the Refraction of Sound," by Professor Os- 

 borne Reynolds, and published in the Proceedings of the Royal 

 Society for 1874. The salient points of the observations are 

 selected, and are here arbitrarily designated by bracketed num- 

 bers, to faciii' ■ ■ 



L 



Ten years ago, or in 1865, Professor Henry commenced his 

 investigations on the subject of Sound in connection with fog- 

 signals, at the Light House station near New Haven, Connecticut 

 Omitting here his careful experiments in regard to the charac- 

 ter of the various instruments employed, the principal results 

 then obtained, were the following: 



[1.] The reflection of sound was observed to be very imper- 

 fect and inexact. A large concave reflector with a smoothly 



