326 



SGIJEJSrCE. 



[Vol. VI., No. 141. 



and influential member of parliament. At one 

 time lie held a seat in the cabinet. From both 

 positions, as a savant and as a statesman, he is 

 entitled to speak upon the relations of government 

 to science. It is interesting to note that the princi- 

 ciples which he defends were uttered by Prince 

 Albert in his addi^ess at Aberdeen in 1859, and long 

 before by George Washington in his farewell ad- 

 dress. Prince Albert laid down the doctrine that 

 Science should ' ' speak to the State, like a favored 

 child to its parent, sm-e of his paternal sohcitude 

 for its welfare," and also " that the State should 

 recognize in Science one of the elements of its 

 strength and prosperity, to foster which the clear- 

 est dictates of self-interest demand." The words 

 of Washington hardly need to be quoted to Ameri- 

 can readers : — " Promote as an object of primary 

 importance institutions for the general diffusion of 

 knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a 

 government gives force to public opinion, it is 

 essential that public opinion should be erdight- 

 ened." 



Sir Lyon Playf air goes back to the Greeks and 

 the Arabs, to remind his hearers that in ancient as 

 well as modern times the encouragement of science 

 has been a duty of statecraft, and with many an 

 intermediate allusion he comes to the actual state 

 of affairs in the United Kingdom, — where the 

 working classes now show a respect for science by 

 selecting as their candidates for parliament in the 

 next election such men as Professors Stuart, Ros- 

 coe, Maskelyne and Riicker. Playfair has himself 

 received invitations from working-class constitu- 

 encies in a dozen of the leading manufactm-ing 

 towns. 



In confirmation of the views wliich he advo- 

 cates, Playfair refers to the action of Fi-ance and 

 Germany, and in still more emphatic terms to the 

 practice of the United States. In some respects, 

 he says, tliis young country is in advance of aU 

 European states in joinmg science to its adminis- 

 trative offices. He points particularly to the excel- 

 lent work of the U. S. fish commission, and 

 makes this amusing comparison of the Enghsh 

 and American methods of promoting fisheries. In 

 England there are expensive commissions to 

 visit the coast and question the fishermen ; and the 

 fishermen, having only a knowledge of a small 

 area, give the most contradictory and unsatisfactory 

 evidence. "In America, the questions are put to 

 nature and not to fishermen," — and the results of 

 the inquiry are therefore far more fruitful. In 

 this bright antithesis — questioning nature, not the 



fishermen — there is a ready answer to those who 

 wish for ' practical ' science, not abstract science. 

 It seems ' practical ' to question fishermen ; the 

 process proves to be fallacious. It seems ' abstract ' 

 to question nature ; but this method is found to 

 be the surest road to positive knowledge, and hence 

 to the best results. 



THE EXPLOSION AT FLOOD ROCK. 



The scientific as weU as the general pubhc has 

 felt no little interest in the explosion which 

 occurred on last Saturday at New York, through 

 the effects of which one of the most dangerous 

 obstructions to the East River passage was so 

 altered in its conditions as to be removable in the 

 near future. The destruction of Hallett's Point 

 reef in 1876 was a notable exhibition of engineer- 

 ing skill in the use of explosives, and by its com- 

 plete success gave confidence to General Newton 

 and his aides in their attack upon Flood Rock, 

 which, in the area undermined and in the amount 

 of explosive material made use of, far exceeded the 

 reef at Hallett's Point. The methods of procedure 

 in the latter case were, in general, similar to those 

 of the former, the two operations differing more in 

 magnitude than in anything else. 



On the occasion of the explosion of 1876 it was 

 observed that, although in the immediate vicinity 

 of Hallett's Point no very violent or destructive 

 disturbance took place, the resulting earth-tremor 

 was noticeable over an area several miles in 

 radius. Some observations were made at that 

 time to determine the velocity of transmission of 

 the seismic wave, under the direction of General 

 Abbott of the Engineer corps. The results ob- 

 tained indicated a much greater speed of transmis- 

 sion than had been previously admitted for such 

 distui'bances, and they received considerable crit- 

 icism at the hands of well-known seismologists. 

 The explosion of last Saturday offered an opportu- 

 nity for a repetition of these experiments on a 

 greater scale and under circumstances much more 

 favorable, as it was fair to assume that the earth- 

 tremor would be perceptible at a much greater 

 distance from the origin of the disturbance, and 

 that thus not only would certaiQ errors of observa- 

 tion become of less importance, but any marked 

 variation of velocity with distance would be 

 detected. 



A line of points for time observations was estab- 

 lished by General Abbott on Long Island, which 

 were connected, it is understood, with each other 

 and with the point from which the mine was 

 fired, by telegraph. 



As stated in the last number of this journal, 

 arrangements to secm-e observations were made by 



