432 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. IY., No. 92. 



Two important improvements in navigation 

 are also due to Sir William Thomson, — his 

 improved mariner's compass, which has been 

 adopted, we believe, by the British and French 

 navies, and which is extensively in use upon 

 large vessels generally ; and his more recent 

 invention of a navigational sounding-machine 

 — navigational, as distinguished from the deep- 

 sea sounding apparatus devised by him for 

 purposes of research. The navigational sound- 

 ing-machine permits of soundings being taken 

 at intervals of a few minutes, in water of the 

 depth of a hundred fathoms ; and thus it 

 gives navigators — who, it is to be hoped, will 

 soon avail themselves of this new safeguard — 

 the means of easily getting warning of danger 

 long before it is imminent. 



We cannot conclude even this brief and im- 

 perfect sketch of Sir William Thomson's work, 

 without mention of the great treatise on natural 

 philosophy upon which he and Professor Tait 

 have united their labors. 



To those who have had the privilege of per- 

 sonal contact with Sir William Thomson, his 

 name will always be associated with the idea 

 of personal lovableness and kindness, gentle- 

 ness and modesty, even more than with that of 

 scientific greatness. Every one who attended 

 his recent lectures must have been deeply im- 

 pressed with the truth of Helmholtz's remark, 

 that " the gift to translate real facts into 

 mathematical equations, and vice versa, is by 

 far more rare than that to find the solution of 

 a mathematical problem ; and in this direction 

 Sir William Thomson is most eminent and 

 original." But he could hardly fail to be as 

 strongly impressed with his possession, in 

 an equally rare degree, of genuine and unaf- 

 fected modesty, enthusiastic appreciation of 

 the achievements of others, and tender con- 

 sideration for all those whom the chances 

 of time bring into connection with him, 

 whether it be for a lifetime of friendship, or 

 for a few fleeting weeks of union as teacher 

 and pupil. 



The accompanying portrait is after a crayon 

 from a photograph taken in Montreal during 

 the recent meeting- of the British association. 



THE NEW VOLCANO OF THE BERING 



SEA. 1 



Since the appearance in Science (vol. iii., No. 

 51, pp. 89-93) of Professor Dall's paper upon 

 this new volcano, Lieut. G. M. Stoney, U.S.N. , 

 has embodied in an official report the results of 

 a personal examination of this locality. It will 

 be recalled that when Professor Dall sunned 

 the island of Ioanna Bogoslova (St. John the 

 theologian) in 1873, seventy-seven years after 

 its appearance b} r violent upheaval, he found, 

 that with the exception of the small reef near 

 Umnak, and of the rocks within a short dis- 

 tance of Bogoslova, there was water more than 

 eight hundred fathoms in depth on all sides of 

 the island. 



In October, 1883, a violent disturbance burst 

 forth, contemporaneous almost with that at 

 Mount St. Augustine, described in Science (vol. 

 iii., No. 54) b} T Professor Davidson, and result- 

 ing, as was believed, in the formation of a new 

 island. The last reports of this, while agreeing 

 materially with Professor Dall's conclusions, 

 show, that, while no new island was formed, 

 Bogoslova was extended ; that the old volcano 

 was supplemented by another, which is still 

 active ; and that where was relatively great 

 depth of water there is now a land-formation 

 nearly three hundred feet in height. 



Lieut. Stoney reports that the new volcano 

 was first seen by Capt. Hague in October, 

 1883, and suggests for it, in lieu of the name 

 ' Grewingk ' proposed bj 7 Dall, that of its dis- 

 coverer. 



There is no lack of clefiniteness as to the date 

 of this new formation, all accounts agreeing 

 that the violent eruptions began early in 1883, 

 and culminated about the 16th of October, when 

 " a dark cloud of indescribable appearance cov- 

 ered the sky northward from Unalashka, and 

 hung ver}- near the earth for some time, ex- 

 cluding the light of the sun, and accompanied 

 by a rise of temperature. In about half an 

 hour this cloud collapsed, and covered the earth 

 with dull, gray, cottony ashes of extreme 

 lightness." During this period the volcano of 

 Makushin, on Unalashka, was quiet, though 

 shocks were felt there ; and in the subsequent 

 surve}', Stoney found that " the dust and ashes 

 which fell in Unalashka were the same as those 

 seen on the sides of the new volcano." 



On the 27th of May of this year, Stoney saw, 

 after leaving this last island, the smoke of the 

 new volcano, then distant forty-five miles, and 

 bearing south-west; and by three a.m. of the 

 28th it was in plain view, the base distinct, 



1 Communicated by the U. S. hydrographic office. 



