EDITOR'S TABLE. 



413 



breathing from the first page to the last 

 the spirit of personal insult, and so far 

 tried to set the key for the criticisms of 

 other "fellow-workers." If the direct- 

 or had gone on and made this state- 

 ment, which would hare been quite rele- 

 vant to the subject and purpose of his 

 article, we think he would have felt it 

 incumbent on him to express some opin- 

 ion as to the expediency and propriety 

 of his coadjutor's method of vindicating 

 scientific orthodoxy as established at 

 Washington. There is a manifest les- 

 son to be learned from the incident. 

 The Geological Survey is a body with 

 wide ramifications, and whether it has 

 already done so or not, it is in dan- 

 ger, from the very nature of its organi- 

 zation, of becoming a kind of scientific 

 hierarchy, and, as such, of exercising an 

 influence unfavorable rather than favor- 

 able to the increase of scientific knowl- 

 edge. We learn from the director that 

 when Prof. Wright proposed to publish 

 his first book, The Ice Age in North 

 America, Prof. Chamberlin, under whose 

 direction he had worked as an assistant 

 in the Survey, " demurred." It is really 

 hard to see why Prof. Chamberlin should 

 have taken upon himself to demur. 

 Prof. Wright was not seeking to com- 

 promise any one but himself, and it was 

 known that his work, of whatever char- 

 acter it might prove to be, would be fully 

 open to criticism. If some scientific 

 gentlemen could get it into their heads 

 that science is not a personal matter, 

 but a simple question of the establish- 

 ment of general truths, and that every 

 man is free to labor toward that end by 

 the aid of such lights as he possesses, 

 subject to correction by those whose 

 lights are stronger and clearer, things 

 would go more smoothly than they do 

 in the scientific world, and the laity 

 would not so often have to exclaim 

 (with sarcasm), "See how these men 

 of science love one another ! " The 

 services of Prof. Wright were dispensed 

 with from the Survey — so the director 

 tells us — because he failed to distin- 



guish "overplacement" from original 

 glacial deposit. We are not in a posi- 

 tion to judge of the adequacy of the 

 reason; but admitting that it was a 

 sound one, might we suggest to the di- 

 rector that the writing of so discredit- 

 able an article as that which proceeded 

 from the pen of Mr. W J McGee might 

 perhaps be at least as serious a reason 

 for removal from the Survey as even 

 the non-recognition now and then of 

 " overplacement " ? As our readers are 

 aware, the general soundness of Prof. 

 Wright's observations was defended in 

 a carefully written article by Prof. E. 

 W. Claypole, which appeared in the 

 April number of this magazine. It is 

 not our part to enter into the con- 

 troversy, but we can not help remarking 

 upon the magisterial manner in which 

 the Director of the Survey dismisses 

 Prof. Claypole's article as being "based 

 upon error in every paragraph." Let 

 us hope that, if such is the case, some 

 one will come forward and prove it 

 otherwise than with a lofty wave of the 

 hand. 



A BACKWABD MOVEMENT. 

 We have often had occasion to notice 

 the valiant struggles of our contempora- 

 ry, The Nation, in the cause of rational 

 journalism, and we earnestly trust it may 

 not grow weary in well-doing, however 

 potent the opposing forces may appear 

 to be. We particularly wish it success 

 — some measure of success, for there is 

 no use in wishing too much — in its cru- 

 sade against the fashion lately intro- 

 duced by many of the daily papers of 

 disfiguring their columns with wood- 

 cuts, far less for purposes of illustration 

 in the true sense than as mere distrac- 

 tions for idle readers (save the mark !), 

 who can not bear the stress of a score 

 of lines of unbroken print. These cuts, 

 the Nation says, with a measure of 

 truth, are a natural sequence of the very 

 childish editorial and news matter which 

 many papers have for years past been 

 serving up to the public. As our con- 



