Produced by Greg Bergquist, Charlie Howard, and the Online

Transcriber’s note: Table of Contents added by Transcriber.

CONTENTS

  Chapters on the Stars                                              227

  Preventive Inoculation. (II.)                                      240

  Colonies and the Mother Country. (II.)                             248

  Technical Education at the Massachusetts Institute of
      Technology                                                     257

  The Psychology of Crazes                                           285

  Some Phases of the Earth’s Development in the Light of Recent
      Chemical Research                                              295

  A Preliminary Account of the Solar Eclipse of May 28, 1900,
      As Observed by the Smithsonian Expedition                      302

  Malaria and the Malarial Parasite                                  310

  New Sources of Light and of Röntgen Rays                           318

  Discussion and Correspondence                                      323

  Scientific Literature                                              327

  The Progress of Science                                            332

  THE
  POPULAR SCIENCE
  MONTHLY

  EDITED BY
  J. McKEEN CATTELL

  VOL. LVII

  MAY TO OCTOBER, 1900

  NEW YORK AND LONDON
  McCLURE, PHILLIPS AND COMPANY
  1900

  COPYRIGHT, 1900,
  BY McCLURE, PHILLIPS AND COMPANY.

[Illustration: PRESIDENT G. K. GILBERT,

AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE.]

  THE
  POPULAR SCIENCE
  MONTHLY.

JULY, 1900.

CHAPTERS ON THE STARS.

BY PROFESSOR SIMON NEWCOMB.

I. INTRODUCTORY.

It would be difficult to name any subject of investigation, the
progress of which during our time has been more remarkable than that in
the field of stellar astronomy. Several features of this progress are
especially noteworthy. One of these is the mere extension of research.
A natural result of the northern hemisphere being the home of civilized
peoples was that, thirty years ago, the study of the southern heavens
had been comparatively neglected. It is true that the curiosity of
the inquiring astronomers of the past would not be satisfied without
their knowing something of what was to be seen south of the equator.
Various enterprises and establishments had therefore contributed to
our knowledge of the region in question. As far back as 1667, during
a voyage to St. Helena, Halley catalogued the brighter stars in the
region near the South Pole. About 1750 Lacaille, of France, established
an observing station at the Cape of Good Hope, and made a catalogue
of several thousand stars which has remained a handy book for the
astronomer up to the present time. In 1834-38 Sir John Herschel made a
special voyage to the Cape of Good Hope, armed with the best telescopes
which the genius of his father had shown him how to construct, for
the purpose of doing for the southern heavens as much as possible of
what his father had done for the northern. The work of this expedition
forms one of the most important and interesting chapters in the history
of astronomic science. Not only is Herschel’s magnificent volume a
classic of astronomy, but the observations which it contains are still
as carefully and profitably studied as any that have since been made.
They may be said to form the basis of our present knowledge of the
region which they included in their scope.

Herschel’s work may be described as principally in the nature of
an exploration. He had no instruments for accurately determining
the positions of stars. In the latter field the first important
contributions after Lacaille were made by Sir Thomas Brisbane, Governor
of New South Wales, and Rumker, his assistant, at Paramata. Johnson, of
England, about 1830, introduced modern accuracy into the construction
of a rather limited catalogue of stars which he observed at St.
Helena. About the same time the British Government established the
observatory at the Cape of Good Hope, which has maintained its activity
to the present time, though, at first, its means were extremely
limited. About the middle of the century the Government of New South
Wales established, first at Williamstown and then at Melbourne, an
observatory which has worked in the same field with marked success.

An American enterprise in the same direction was that of Captain James
M. Gilliss, who, in 1849, organized an astronomical expedition to
Chili. The principal motive of this enterprise was the determining of
the solar parallax by observations upon Venus and Mars near the time
of their nearest approach to the earth. As these observations would
take but a small part of his time, Gilliss determined to take with him
instruments for determining the positions of the stars. He established
his observatory at a point near Santiago, where he continued his
observations for nearly three years. He was a practical observer,
but an untoward circumstance detracted from the value of his work.
His observatory was built upon a rocky eminence, a foundation which
seemed to afford the best possible guarantee of the stability of his
instruments. He made no attempt to reduce his observations till after
his return home. Then it was found that the foundation, through the
expansion and contraction due to the heat of the sun, was subject to a
diurnal change which made it extremely difficult to derive good results
from his careful work. It was not until 1896, more than thirty years
after his death, that the catalogue of the stars observed by him was at
last completed and published.

We do not derogate in any way from the merit of these efforts in saying
that they could not lead to results comparable with those of the score
of richly equipped northern observatories which the leading nations
and universities of Europe had endowed and supported for more than a
hundred years. Only within the last thirty years has it been possible
to bring our knowledge of the southern heavens up to a satisfactory
stage. Now, however, the progress of southern astronomy, if we may use
the term, is such that in several points our knowledge of the southern
heavens surpasses that of the northern ones. If we measure institutions
by the importance of the work they are doing, there are several in the
southern hemisphere which must to-day be placed in the first rank.

The history and work of the Cordova Observatory are of special
interest. In 1870 Dr. B. A. Gould, who might fairly be considered
as the father of modern American astronomy, conceived the idea of
establishing an observatory of the first class in South America. He
found the President and Governor of the Argentine Republic ready to
support his scheme with a liberality well fitted to impress us with
a high sense of their standard of civilization. In a year or two the
observatory at Cordova was in active operation. A statement of its work
belongs to a subsequent chapter. Suffice it to remark here that Dr.
Gould continued in active charge until 1885, when he returned home, and
was succeeded by Thome, the present director.

A few years after Gould went to Cordova, Gill was made director of the
Royal Observatory at the Cape of Good Hope. The rapid growth of this
institution to one of the first rank is due no less to the scientific
ability of the new director than to the unflagging energy which he has
devoted to the enlargement of the resources of the institution. The
great fact which he sought to impress upon his supporters was that
the southern celestial hemisphere was as large as the northern, and
therefore equally worthy of study.

In any general review of the progress of stellar astronomy during the
past twenty years, we should find Harvard University before us at every
turn. What it has done will be seen, perhaps in an imperfect way, in
subsequent chapters. Not satisfied with the northern hemisphere, it
has established a branch at Arequipa, Peru, in which its methods of
observation and research are extended to the south celestial pole.
Its principal specialties have been the continuous exploration of the
heavens. Celestial photography, photometry and spectroscopy sum up its
fields of activity. For more than ten years it might be almost said
that a sleepless watch of the heavens has been kept up by an all-seeing
photographic eye, with an accuracy of which the world has hardly had
a conception. The completeness with which its work has been done has
recently been shown in a striking way. Our readers are doubtless
acquainted with the singular character of the minor planet Eros, whose
orbit passes through that of Mars, as one link of a chain passes
through another, and which comes nearer the earth at certain times than
any other celestial body, the moon excepted. When the character of
the orbit became established, it was of interest to know whether the
planet had ever been observed as a fixed star at former oppositions.
Chandler, having computed the path of the planet at the most important
of the oppositions, beginning with 1892-94, communicated his results to
Director Pickering, and suggested a search of the Harvard photographs
to see if the planet could be found on them. The result was the
discovery of the planet upon more than a score of plates taken at
various times during the preceding ten years. New stars were formerly
supposed to be of very rare occurrence, but since the Harvard system of
photographing the heavens has been introduced, no less than three have
been known to break out.

The great revelations of our times have come through the application
of the spectroscope to the measurement of motions in the line of sight
from us to a star. No achievement of the intellect of man would have
seemed farther without the range of possibility to the thinker of half
a century ago, than the discoveries of invisible bodies which are now
being made with this instrument. The revelations of the telescope
take us by surprise. But, if we consider what the thinker alluded to
might regard as attainable, they are far surpassed by those of the
spectroscope. The dark bodies, planets, we may call them, which are
revolving round the stars, must be forever invisible in any telescope
that it would be possible to construct. They would remain invisible if
the power of the instrument were increased ten thousand times. And yet,
if there are inhabitants on these planets, our astronomers could tell
them more of the motions of the world on which they live than the human
race knew of the motions of the earth before the time of Copernicus.

The men and institutions which have contributed to this result are
so few in number that it will not be tedious to mention at least the
principal actors. The possibility of measuring the motions of the stars
in the line of sight by means of the spectroscope was first pointed
out by Mr. now Sir William Huggins. He actually put the method into
operation. As soon as its feasibility was demonstrated it was taken up
at Greenwich. In these earlier attempts, eye methods alone were used,
and the results were not always reliable. Then spectrum photography
was applied at the astrophysical observatory at Potsdam by Vogel.
Thence the photographic method soon spread to Meudon and Pulkova.
But, as often happens when new fields of research are opened, we find
them ablaze in quarters where we should least expect. The successful
application of the method requires not only the best spectroscope, but
the most powerful telescope at command. Ten years ago the most powerful
telescope in the world was at the Lick Observatory. Mr. D. O. Mills put
at its eye end the best spectrograph that human art could make at that
time, the work of Brashear. It is Campbell, who, with this instrument,
has inaugurated a series of discoveries in the line in question which
are without a parallel.

A mere survey of what has been done in the various lines we have
mentioned would be far from giving an idea of the real significance of
the advance we are considering. Cataloguing the stars, estimating their
magnitudes, recording and comparing their spectra and determining
their motions, might be considered as, after all, barren of results
of the highest human interest. When we know the exact position of
every star in the heavens, the direction in which it is moving and the
character of its spectral lines, how much wiser are we?

What could hardly have been foreseen fifty years ago, is that these
various classes of results are now made to combine and converge upon
the greatest problem which the mind of man has ever attempted to
grasp--that of the structure of the universe. The study of variable
stars has suddenly fallen into line, so to speak, so that now, it is
uniting itself to the study of all the other subjects to give us at
least a faint conception of what the solution of this problem may be.

One of the principal objects of the present chapter is to make
a comparison of these various researches, and discuss the views
respecting the constitution of the stars individually, as well as of
the universe as a whole, to which they lead us. But there are a number
of details to be considered singly before we can combine results in
this way. Our early chapters will therefore be devoted to the special
features and individual problems of stellar astronomy which have
occupied the minds of astronomers from the beginning of their work to
the present time. Keeping these details in mind, we can profitably
proceed to the consideration of the general conclusions to be drawn
from them.

We may begin by refreshing our memories on some points, an
understanding of which must be taken for granted. What are familiarly
known as the heavenly bodies belong to two classes. Those nearest to us
form a sort of colony far removed from all the others, called the solar
system. The principal bodies of this system are the sun and eight great
planets with their moons, revolving round it. On one of the planets,
small when compared with the great bodies of the universe, but large to
our every-day conceptions, we dwell. The other planets appear to us as
stars. Four of them, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, are distinguished
from the fixed stars by their superior brightness and characteristic
motions. Of the remaining three, Mercury will only rarely excite
notice, while Uranus and Neptune are as good as invisible to the naked
eye.

The dimensions of the solar system are vast when compared with any
terrestrial standard. A cannon shot going incessantly at its utmost
speed would be a thousand years in crossing the orbit of Neptune
from side to side. But vast as the dimensions are, they sink into
insignificance when compared with the distance of the stars. Outside
the solar system are spaces which, so far as we know, are absolutely
void, save here and there a comet or a meteor, until we look far
outside the region which a cannon shot would cross in a million of
years.

The nearest star is thousands of times farther away than the most
distant planet. Scattered at these inconceivable distances are the
bodies to which our attention is directed in the present work. If we
are asked what they are, we may reply that the stars are suns. But we
might equally well say that the sun is one of the stars; a small star,
indeed, surrounded by countless others, many of which are much larger
and brighter than itself. We shall treat our theme as far as possible
by what we may call the natural method, beginning with what, being most
obvious to the eye, was first noticed by man, or will be first noticed
by an observer, and tracing knowledge up step by step to its present
state.

Several features of the universe of stars will be evident at a glance.
One of these is the diversity of the apparent brightness, or, in
technical language, of the magnitudes of the stars. A few far outshine
the great mass of their companions. A greater number are of what we may
call medium brightness; there is a yet larger number of fainter ones,
and about one half of all those seen by a keen eye under favorable
conditions are so near the limit of visibility as to escape ordinary
notice. Moreover, those which we see are but an insignificant fraction
of the number revealed by the telescope. The more we increase our
optical power, the greater the number that come into view. How many
millions may exist in the heavens it is scarcely possible even to
guess. The photographic maps of the heavens now being made probably
show fifty millions, perhaps one hundred millions or more.

Another evident feature is the tendency of the brighter stars to
cluster into groups, known as constellations. The latter are extremely
irregular, so that it is impossible to decide where one constellation
should end and another begin, or to which constellation a certain star
may belong. Hence, we can neither define the constellations nor say
what is their number, and the division of the stars among them is a
somewhat arbitrary proceeding.

A third feature is the Milky Way or Galaxy, which, to ordinary vision,
appears as an irregular succession of cloud-like forms spanning the
heavens. We now know that these seeming clouds are really congeries of
stars too small to be individually visible to the naked eye. We shall
hereafter see that the stars of the Galaxy form, so to speak, the base
on which the universe appears to be constructed. Each of these three
features will be considered in its proper place.

II. MAGNITUDES OF THE STARS.

The apparent brightness of a star, as we see it from the earth, depends
upon two causes--its intrinsic brilliancy or the quantity of light
which it actually emits, and its distance from us. It follows that if
all the stars were of equal intrinsic brightness we could determine
their relative distances by measuring the respective amounts of light
which we receive from them. The quantity of light in such a case varies
inversely as the square of the distance. This will be made evident
by Fig. 1, where S represents the position of a star, regarded as a
luminous point, while A and B are screens placed at such a distance
that each will receive the same amount of light from the star. If the
screen B is twice as far as the screen A, its sides must be twice
as large as those of A in order that it shall receive all the light
that would fall on A. In this case its surface will be four times the
surface of A. It is then evident that any small portion of the surface
of B will receive one fourth as much light as an equal portion of
surface A. Thus an eye or a telescope in the position B will receive
from the star one fourth as much light as in the position A, and the
star will seem one fourth as bright.

[Illustration: FIGURE 1.]

The fact is, however, that the stars are very unequal in their actual
brightness, and in consequence the apparent magnitude of a star gives
us no clue to its distance. Among the nearer of the stars are some
scarcely, if at all, visible to the naked eye, while among the brighter
ones are several whose distances are immeasurably great. A remarkable
example is that of Caropes, the second brightest star in the heavens.

For these reasons astronomers are obliged to content themselves, in the
first place, with determinations of the actual amount of light that the
various stars send to us, or their apparent brilliancy, without regard
to their distance or actual brilliancy. The ancient astronomers divided
all the stars they could see into six classes, the number expressing
the apparent brightness being called the magnitude of the star. The
brightest ones, numbering in all about fourteen, were said to be of
the first magnitude. The fifty next in brightness were said to be of
the second magnitude. Three times as many, an order fainter, were of
the third magnitude. The progression was continued up to the sixth
magnitude, which included those which were barely visible.

As the stars are actually of every degree of apparent brilliancy, no
sharp line of demarkation could be drawn between those of one magnitude
and those of the magnitude next higher. Hence, different observers
made different estimates, some calling a star of the second magnitude
which others would call of the first, while others would designate a
star of the third magnitude which others would call of the second. It
is therefore impossible to state with absolute numerical precision what
number of stars should be regarded of one magnitude and what of another.

An idea of the magnitude of a star can be readily gained by the casual
observer. Looking at the heavens on almost any cloudless evening, we
may assume that the two, three or more brightest stars which we see are
of the first magnitude. As examples of those of the second magnitude,
may be taken the five brightest stars of the Dipper, the Pole Star and
the brighter stars of Cassiopeia. Some or all of these objects can
be seen on any clear night of the year in our latitude. Stars of the
third magnitude are so numerous that it is difficult to select any one
for comparison. The brightest star of the Pleiades is really of this
magnitude, but it does not appear so in consequence of the five other
stars by which it is surrounded. At a distance of 15° from the Pole
Star, Beta Ursa Minoris is always visible, and may be distinguished by
being slightly redder than the Pole Star; it lies between two fainter
stars, the brighter of which is of the third and the other of the
fourth magnitude. The five readily visible but fainter stars of the
Pleiades are about of the fourth magnitude. Of the fifth magnitude are
the faintest stars which are easily visible to the naked eye, while the
sixth comprises those which are barely visible with good eyes.

Modern astronomers, while adhering to the general system which has
come down to them from ancient times, have sought to give it greater
definiteness. Careful study showed that the actual amount of light
corresponding to the different magnitudes varied nearly in geometrical
progression from one magnitude to another, a conclusion which accords
with the well-known psychological law that the intensity of sensation
varies by equal amounts when the exciting cause varies in geometrical
progression. It was found that an average star of the fifth magnitude
gave between two and three times as much light as an average one of
the sixth; one of the fourth gave between two and three times as much
light as one of the fifth; and so on to the second. In the case of
the first magnitude, the diversity is so great that it is scarcely
possible to fix an average ratio. Sirius, for example, is really six
times as bright as Altair, which is commonly taken as a standard for
a first magnitude star. To give precision to their estimates, modern
astronomers are gradually seeking to lay the subject of magnitudes on
an exact basis by defining a change of one unit in the magnitude as
corresponding to an increase of about two and one half times in the
amount of light.

If the practice of separating the visible stars into only six orders
of magnitude were continued without change, we should still have
the anomaly of including in one class stars of markedly different
degrees of brightness. Some more than twice as bright as others would
be designated of the same magnitude. Hence, to give quantitative
exactness to the results, a magnitude is regarded as a quantity which
may have any value whatever, and may be expressed by decimals--tenths
or even hundredths. Thus, we may have stars of magnitude 5.0, 5.1,
5.2, etc., or we may even subdivide yet farther and speak of stars
having magnitudes 5.11, 5.12, etc. Unfortunately, however, there
is as yet no way known of determining the amount of light received
from a star except by an estimate of its effect upon the eye. Two
stars are regarded as equal when they appear to the eye of equal
brilliancy. In such a case the judgment is very uncertain. Hence,
observers have endeavored to give greater precision to it by the use
of photometers,--instruments for measuring quantities of light. But
even with this instrument the observer must depend upon an estimated
equality of light as judged by the eye. The light from one star is
increased or diminished in a known proportion until it appears equal to
that of another star, which may be an artificial one produced by the
flame of a candle. The proportion of increase or diminution shows the
difference of magnitude between the two stars.

As we proceed to place the subject of photometric measures of star
light on this precise basis we find the problem to be a complex one.
In the first place not all the rays which come from a star are visible
to our eyes as light. But all the radiance, visible or invisible,
may be absorbed by a dark surface, and will then show its effect by
heating that surface. The most perfect measure of the radiance of a
star would therefore be the amount of heat which it conveys, because
this expresses what is going on in the body better than the amount of
visible light can do. But unfortunately the heating effect of the rays
from a star is far below what can be measured or even indicated by any
known instrument. We are therefore obliged to abandon any thought of
determining the total amount of radiation and confine ourselves to that
portion which we call light.

Here, when we aim at precision, we find that light, as we understand
it, is properly measured only by its effect on the optic nerve, and
there is no way of measuring this effect except by estimation. Thus,
all the photometer can do is to give us the means of increasing or
diminishing the light from one star, so that we can make it equal by
estimation to that from some other star or source of light.

The difficulty of reaching strict results in this way is increased by
the fact that stars are different in color. Two lights can be estimated
as equal with greater precision when they are of the same color than
when their colors are different. An additional source of uncertainty
is brought in by what is known as the Purkinje phenomenon, after the
physicist who first observed it. He found that if we took two lights of
equal apparent brightness, the one red and the other green, and then
increased or diminished them in the same proportion, they would no
longer appear equal. In other words, the geometrical axiom that halves
or quarters of equal quantities are themselves equal, does not apply to
the effect of light on the eye. If we diminish the two equal lights,
we find that the green will look brighter than the red. If we increase
them in the same proportion, the red will look brighter than the green.
In other words, the red light will, to our vision, increase or fade
away more rapidly with a given amount of change than the green light
will.

It is found in recent times that this law of change does not extend
progressively through all spectral colors. It is true that as we pass
from the red to the violet end of the spectrum the yellow fades away
less rapidly with a given diminution than does the red, and the green
still less rapidly than the yellow. But when we pass from the green to
the blue, it is said that the latter does not fade out quite so fast as
the green.

One obvious conclusion from all this is that two stars of different
colors which look equal to the naked eye will not look equal in the
telescope. The red or yellow star will look relatively brighter in a
telescope; the green or bluish one relatively brighter to the naked eye.

In recent times stars have been photographed on a large scale. Their
magnitudes can then be determined by the effect of the light on
the photographic plate, the impression of the star, as seen in a
microscope, being larger and more intense as the star is brighter.
But the magnitude thus determined is not proportional to the apparent
brightness as seen by the eye, because the photographic effect of
blue light is much greater than that of red light having the same
apparent brightness. In fact, the difference is so great that, with
the chemicals formerly used, red light was almost without photographic
effect. Even now, what we measure in taking the photograph of a star
is almost entirely the light in the more refrangible portions of the
spectrum. It appears, therefore, that when a blue and a yellow star,
equally bright to the naked eye, are photographed, the impression made
on the negative by the blue star will be greater than that made by the
yellow one. A distinction is therefore recognized between photographic
and visual magnitudes.

The photographic magnitudes of the stars are now being investigated and
catalogued on a scale even larger than that on which we have studied
the visual magnitudes. Yet we have to admit the non-correspondence
of the two systems. The bluer the star, the brighter will be its
photographic as compared with its visual magnitude. The most that can
be done is to bring about the best attainable agreement between the two
systems in the general average of all the stars.

Fortunately the differences between the colors of the stars are by
no means so great as those between the colors of natural objects
around us. All the stars radiate light of all colors; and although the
difference is quite appreciable either by the eye or by the photograph,
it is not so great as it would have been were the variations in color
as wide as in the case of terrestrial objects.

Two comprehensive surveys of the heavens, intended to determine as
accurately as possible the magnitudes of all the brighter stars, have
recently been undertaken. One of these is the Harvard photometry,
commenced by Professor Pickering at the Harvard Observatory, and
now extended to the Southern Hemisphere by the aid of a branch
establishment at Arequipa, Peru.

The instrument designed by Professor Pickering for his purpose is
termed a meridian photometer, and is so arranged that the observer
can see in the field of his telescope a reflected image of the Pole
Star, and, at the same time, the image of some other star while it is
passing the meridian. By a polarizing apparatus the image of the star
to be measured is made to appear of equal brightness with that of the
Pole Star, and the position of a Nicol prism, which brings out this
equality, shows the ratio between the magnitudes of the two stars.

The other survey, with the same object, is now being made at the
Potsdam Astrophysical Observatory, near Berlin. In the photometer
used by the German astronomers the image of one star is compared
with an artificial star formed by the flame of a candle. The work is
performed in a more elaborate way than at the Harvard Observatory,
and in consequence, only that part of the heavens, extending from the
equator to 40° north declination, has been completed and published.
A comparison of the results thus obtained with those of Professor
Pickering, shows a curious difference depending on the color of the
star. In the case of the reddest stars, the estimates are found to be
in fairly close agreement, Pickering’s being a little the fainter.
But in the case of the white or bluish stars, the estimates of the
German astronomers are more than one fourth of a magnitude greater
than those of Pickering. This corresponds to an increase of nearly one
fifth in the brightness. Whether this difference is to be regarded as
purely psychological or due to the instruments used, is an interesting
question which has not yet been settled. It is difficult to conceive
how different instruments should give results so different. On the
other hand, the comparisons made by the Germans make it difficult to
accept the view that the difference is due purely to the personality
of the observers. There are two German observers, Drs. Müller and
Kempf, whose results agree with each other exactly. On the other hand,
Pritchard, at Oxford, made quite an extensive photometric survey,
using an instrument by which the light of one star was cut down by
a wedge-shaped dark glass, whereby any gradation of light could be
produced. A comparison shows that the results of Pritchard agree
substantially with those of Pickering. It is quite possible that the
Purkinje phenomenon may be the cause of the difference, the source of
which is eminently worthy of investigation.

This fact simply emphasizes the lack of mathematical precision in
photometric measurements of star light. Even apart from this difference
of color, the estimates of two observers will frequently differ by 0.2
and sometimes by even 0.3 of a magnitude. These differences correspond
roughly to 20 or 30 per cent in the amount of light.

It must not be supposed from this that such estimates are of no value
for scientific purposes. Very important conclusions, based on great
numbers of stars, may be drawn even from these uncertain quantities.
Yet, it can hardly be doubted that if the light of a star could be
measured from time to time to its thousandth part, conclusions of yet
greater value and interest might be drawn from the measures.

We have said that in our modern system the aim has been to so designate
the magnitudes of the stars that a series of magnitudes in arithmetical
progression shall correspond to quantities of light ranging in
geometrical progression. We have also said that a change of one unit
of magnitude corresponds to a multiplication or division of the light
by about 2.5. On any scale of magnitude this factor of multiplication
constitutes the light-ratio of the scale. In recent times, after much
discussion of the subject and many comparisons of photometric measures
with estimates made in the old-fashioned way, there is a general
agreement among observers to fix the light ratio at the number whose
logarithm is 0.4. This is such that an increase of five units in the
number expressing the magnitude corresponds to a division of the light
by 100. If, for example, we take a standard star of magnitude one and
another of magnitude six, the first would be 100 times as bright as the
second. This corresponds to a light ratio slightly greater than 2.5.

When this scale is adopted, the series of magnitudes may extend
indefinitely in both directions so that to every apparent brightness
there will be a certain magnitude. For example, if we assign the
magnitude 1.0 to a certain star, taken as a standard, which would
formerly have been called a star of the first magnitude, then a star a
little more than 2.5 times as bright would be of magnitude one less in
number, that is, of magnitude 0. The one next brighter in the series
would be of magnitude -1. So great is the diversity in the brightness
of the stars formerly called of the first magnitude that Sirius is
still brighter than the imaginary star just mentioned, the number
expressing its magnitude being -1.4.

This suggests what we may regard as one of the capital questions in
celestial photometry. There being no limit to the extent of the scale,
what would be the stellar magnitude of the sun as we see it when
expressed this way on the photometric scale? Such a number is readily
derivable when we know the ratio between the light of the sun and that
of a star of known magnitude. Many attempts have been made by observers
to obtain this ratio; but the problem is one of great difficulty, and
the results have been extremely discordant. Amongst them there are
three which seem less liable to error than others; those of Wollaston,
Bond and Zöllner. Their results for the stellar magnitude of the sun
are as follow:

  Wollaston      -26.6
  Bond           -25.8
  Zöllner        -26.6

Of these, Zöllner’s seems to be the best, and may, therefore, in taking
the mean, be entitled to double weight. The result will then be:

  Stellar magnitude of sun       -26.4

From this number may be readily computed the ratio of sunlight to that
of a star of any given magnitude. We thus find:

The sun gives us:

     10,000,000,000, the light of Sirius.
     91,000,000,000, the light of a star of magnitude 1.
  9,100,000,000,000, the light of one of magnitude 6.

The square roots of these numbers show the number of times we should
increase the actual distance of the sun in order that it might shine
as a star of the corresponding magnitude. These numbers and the
corresponding parallax are as follows:

  Sirius; Distance =   100,000: Parallax = 2″.06
  Mag. 1     ”         302,000:    ”       0″.68
   ”   2     ”         479,000:    ”       0″.43
   ”   3     ”         759,000:    ”       0″.27
   ”   4     ”       1,202,000:    ”       0″.17
   ”   5     ”       1,906,000:    ”       0″.11
   ”   6     ”       3,020,000:    ”       0″.07

These parallaxes are those that the sun would have if placed at such a
distance as to shine with the brightness indicated in the first column.
They are generally larger than those of stars of the corresponding
magnitudes, from which we conclude that the sun is smaller than the
brighter of the stars.

PREVENTIVE INOCULATION. (II.)

BY DR. W. M. HAFFKINE,

DIRECTOR-IN-CHIEF, GOVERNMENT PLAGUE RESEARCH LABORATORY, BOMBAY.

In a previous paper I reviewed briefly the history of preventive
inoculation and described the results of my attempts to secure a ‘virus
fixé’ in the case of cholera. It will be remembered that the two
vaccines finally obtained protected guinea pigs successfully against
all possible forms of cholera infection.

It was now necessary to ascertain whether the same protection could
be given to man which was observed in animals. For this purpose it
was essential to first of all prove the perfect harmlessness of the
operation. This was established by very careful observations of medical
men and scientists who were inoculated in Europe soon after the results
of the above investigations were published. The inoculation causes a
rise of temperature and general discomfort, which lasts one or two
days, and some pain at the seat of the injection, which disappears
in a few days. The fever and discomfort induced are, on the whole,
shorter in duration, though often more intense, than those caused by
vaccination against smallpox. The effect disappears within a few days
and the individual returns to his usual condition of health.

The next and all-important stage was to devise an experiment or a
series of experiments on man so as to test the efficiency of the method
against cholera attacks. This part of the investigation could only be
done in a cholera-stricken country, where opportunities would arise of
comparing the incidence of the disease in inoculated and uninoculated.
Such opportunities are limited. Except in certain parts of India
and China, cholera appears in localities unexpectedly and does not
last long. In the places where the disease is endemic the cases are
scattered over large areas. These features rendered the demonstration
of the effect of the vaccine a matter of particular difficulty. In
1893 I went to India, and in the course of a year inoculated some
twenty-three thousand people in the northern parts of the country;
but no cholera appeared in their midst to show whether the vaccine
was of value or not. In the spring of 1894 the inoculations were
introduced into Bengal, and, with the assistance and co-operation of
Prof. W. J. Simpson, of King’s College, London, at that time Health
Officer of Calcutta, and of his staff, efforts were made to induce the
inhabitants of the _bustees_ of Calcutta to get themselves inoculated.
These bustees are isolated villages consisting of groups of mud huts
inhabited by the poorer class. Owing to the consumption of water from
the ponds or tanks belonging to these villages, the inhabitants of the
bustees are subject to periodic visitations of cholera. It was in one
of these bustees that the first observation was made as to the effect
of the cholera vaccines.

The spring is essentially the cholera season in Calcutta. About the end
of March two fatal cases of cholera and two cases of choleraic diarrhœa
occurred in Katal Bagan Bustee, in a population grouped around two
tanks. This outbreak led to the inoculation of one hundred and sixteen
persons in the bustee out of about two hundred. After the inoculation
there occurred nine more cases of cholera, seven of which proved fatal,
and one case of choleraic diarrhœa. All the ten cases occurred among
the uninoculated portion of the inhabitants, which formed the minority,
none of the inoculated suffering. The results were more interesting
when analyzed in detail. Some of the cases had occurred in families in
which some of the members had been inoculated and others not, and the
disease selected the non-inoculated members, sparing the inoculated.
Thus, in one house six members out of eight had been inoculated. The
attack, a fatal one, occurred in one of the remaining two. In another
house eleven members out of eighteen were inoculated. The eleven
members remained free while four out of seven not inoculated were
attacked.

Upon these observations the Calcutta municipality felt encouraged to
vote funds for the continuance of the inoculations in an experimental
farm, and appointed for that purpose a special staff. In 1896 the
result of two years’ observations were embodied by the health officer
in a report to the Calcutta Municipal Corporation. It recorded a most
satisfactory state of affairs. During the time under observation some
eight thousand persons were inoculated. Cases of cholera occurred
in seventy-seven huts in which some members of the family had been
previously inoculated and others not. Comparing the incidence of the
disease in the two groups, a striking advantage was found to be with
the inoculated. I made an analysis of the cases according to the time
which had elapsed between inoculation in each of these huts and the
occurrence of cholera in them, and the following results were found.
During the first four days after inoculation, apparently before
the vaccine had time to produce its full protective effect, there
were proportionately 1.86 times fewer deaths among the inoculated
than among the non-inoculated members of the families. In a second
period, extending from the fifth to the four hundred and twenty-ninth
day--i. e., for fourteen months--there were 22.62 times fewer deaths
among the inoculated; while in the last period--that is, between the
four hundred and thirtieth and seven hundred and twenty-eighth day
after the inoculation--there were only 1.54 fewer deaths among the
inoculated, the immunity having evidently gradually disappeared. The
net result was that for two years after inoculation, including the
periods of incomplete protection, there was a reduction in mortality
of 72.47 per cent among the inoculated; or in other words, in houses
in which inoculations were performed and in which cholera subsequently
occurred there were, even from the day of inoculation, before the full
effect of it could be produced, eleven deaths among the non-inoculated
to only three among the inoculated. Eight lives out of every eleven
were saved.

At the end of my first cholera campaign, in August, 1895, there were
altogether 31,056 natives of India, 125 Eurasians, 869 Europeans of the
civil population, 6,627 native officers and sepoys, and 294 officers
with 3,206 men of the British troops stationed in India, in all 41,787
people, who had submitted to inoculation. Observations instituted among
them, especially among prisoners, soldiers and coolies in tea estates,
with regard to whom detailed records could be kept, went to confirm
the results as detailed above. In order to lengthen, if possible,
the period of immunity, the plan was formed of inoculating stronger
vaccines and in higher doses. The inoculations are now carried on in
a Government laboratory, in Purulia, Bengal, chiefly among the people
emigrating to the cholera districts of Assam, and there is no doubt
that in the course of time a marked effect upon the prevalence of
cholera in those districts will be produced and valuable theoretical
data will be obtained.

There was one noticeable feature about the results of the inoculation
against cholera which early attracted my attention, and this was that
while the number of attacks and the absolute number of deaths was
strikingly influenced by the operation, the proportion of deaths to
those attacked did not appear to be changed. The case incidence was
effectively checked, but the ‘case mortality’ was not reduced. The
inoculation diminished the chances of an attack of cholera--that is,
the chances of the cholera virus penetrating into the tissues of a
man; but if it so happened that the patient was attacked and the virus
found an entrance and started growing in the system notwithstanding the
inoculation, the latter would not assist in mitigating the severity of
the symptoms or reducing the fatality of the disease. In analyzing this
result further, it seemed to me permissible to assume that the vaccine
protected against the cholera microbes themselves, but did not protect
against their poisonous products, which are the cause of the actual
symptoms.

This interpretation of the facts found support in a set of laboratory
experiments by Professor Pfeiffer and Dr. Kolle, of Koch’s Institute,
in Berlin, who showed that the blood serum of animals and persons
inoculated with the cholera vaccine, as practiced in India, acquired
an intense power of destroying cholera microbes, but exhibited
no properties capable of counteracting the effect of their toxic
products--no ‘antitoxic properties’. Combined with those of previous
experimenters these results tended to prove that two kinds of immunity
could be produced separately, and it became incumbent to devise a
plan which would secure not only a lowering of susceptibility to the
disease, but also a reduction in the case mortality.

For that purpose it seemed rational to attempt the treatment with a
vaccine containing a combination of bodies of microbes, together with
their toxic products. I intended to test this plan experimentally in
the cholera districts; but, plague having broken out in Bombay, the
Government of India commissioned me to inquire into the bacteriology of
that disease, and I determined that the knowledge gained in the cholera
inoculations should be applied and tested in the preparation of a
prophylactic against the new epidemic.

The experiments I had in view involved manufacturing a material on a
large scale, and operating on it for weeks continuously. To do this
it was essential to find a way of recognizing plague growth with
certainty, so as to enable the officers engaged in the manufacture
to control the process and know exactly when they were handling the
proper stuff, and when an admixture and invasion of extraneous growth
took place. When this was solved, a drug was prepared by cultivating
the plague microbe in sterilized broth, to which a small quantity
of clarified butter or of cocoanut oil had been added. The plague
bacilli attach themselves to the drops of butter or oil floating on
the surface, and grow down into the depth of the liquid, forming a
peculiar threadlike appearance. While doing so they secrete toxic
matter, which is gradually accumulated in the liquid; at the same
time a large amount of microbial growth comes gradually down from the
surface of the liquid and collects at the bottom of the flask. When
shaken up the whole represents the desired combination of the bodies
of microbes and of their toxic products. The process is continued for
a period of five to six weeks. As the microbes of plague had been very
little studied before, and as their exact effect on the human system
was unknown, I decided not to use for the treatment living microbes,
but to use at least at first ‘carbolized’ vaccines, though the result
of the treatment might be less favorable or less lasting than that
which could be expected from living vaccines. The microbes in the above
plague growth were accordingly killed by heating them at a temperature
ranging from 65° to 70° C., and then mixed with a small proportion of
carbolic acid, to prevent the drug from subsequent contamination and
decomposition. The dose of the prophylactic was regulated by measuring
up the quantity to be injected. The requisite amount is determined by
the degree of fever which it produces. The febrile reaction varies in
different individuals, but a temperature reaching 102° and above in at
least thirty per cent of those inoculated has been found to indicate
a good material. In the cholera, rabies and smallpox vaccines, the
microbes being employed in a living state, it was essential to fix the
strength of the vaccine, for otherwise it was impossible to predict the
behavior of the microbe when injected into the system. In the case of
the plague prophylactic the activity of the microbes is arrested before
it is inoculated, and the effect can be regulated, as mentioned above,
by simply measuring up the doses in the same way as is done with any
chemical drug.

The expectation formed when devising the plan for the plague
prophylactic has been very fortunately justified, and an advance on the
results from the cholera vaccines was obtained; but I can not yet say
certainly whether this favorable result is indeed due to the particular
provisions which I had made for obtaining it.

The effect of the plague prophylactic was first tested at the Byculla
Jail, in Bombay, when the epidemic reached that establishment. From
the first day after the inoculation till the end of the outbreak there
were in the jail twelve cases and six deaths among one hundred and
seventy-two uninoculated inmates, and two cases, with no deaths, among
one hundred and forty-seven inoculated. A year later, almost exactly
a similar result was observed when the plague attacked the so-called
Umarkhadi Common Jail, in Bombay. In this case after the inoculation
there were ten cases and six deaths among one hundred and twenty-seven
uninoculated inmates, and three cases, with no deaths, among one
hundred and forty-seven inoculated. These and other observations show
that the vaccine for the plague begins to exercise its effect within
some twenty-four hours after inoculation; that it is useful even in
the case of persons already infected; that it is therefore applicable
at any stage of an epidemic. Numerous further observations were soon
collected on the working of the system.

At the small village of Uudhera, of the Baroda feudatory state, where
plague broke out, inoculation was applied to a half of each family, the
other half remaining uninoculated. After that there were twenty-seven
cases and twenty-six deaths among sixty-four uninoculated, and eight
cases, with three deaths, among seventy-one inoculated of the same
households, the proportionate difference in mortality being over
eighty-nine per cent. There followed observations on a far larger
scale, demonstrating that the mortality of the inoculated, compared
to that of the non-inoculated, was on an average between eighty and
ninety per cent less. Sometimes this reduction reached ninety per cent.
In the Punjaub, in a village called Bunga, there occurred, in two
hundred and eighty-one not inoculated, ninety-seven cases of plague and
sixty-five deaths, while among seventy-four inoculated there were six
cases, but no deaths. In Bangalore, among 80,285 of the inhabitants not
inoculated, there were 2,208 deaths from plague, while among 23,537
inoculated there were only 108. The observations at Lanowli, Kirkee,
Daman, Hubli, Dharwar, Gadag, in the Bombay Presidency, gave the same
results. At Hubli over forty-two thousand inhabitants out of some
fifty thousand were inoculated. In Bombay city, out of a population
of 821,764, 157,256 have now undergone the inoculation. The work
proceeds here at present at the rate of one thousand to eleven hundred
inoculations a day.

From plague hospitals the returns show that among those of the attacked
who were previously inoculated the mortality is reduced to less than
one half of that among patients who were not inoculated. The property
of reducing the case mortality thus appears to belong to the plague
prophylactic in an unmistakable degree.

By the anti-cholera and anti-plague inoculation the methods of
preventive treatment by means of cultivated bacteria and their products
have been rendered, so to say, a part of the daily policy in human
medicine. The usefulness and practicability of those methods have
become clearly apparent, and steps have been taken to extend further
the field of their application. On the ground of the experiments
made with the typhoid bacillus in the Pasteur Institute in 1889-’93,
and of the results obtained from the anti-cholera inoculation in
India, I was able to induce Professor Wright, of the Pathological
Laboratory in Netley, whom I initiated in 1892 in the principles and
technique of anti-cholera inoculation, to start a campaign of similar
operations against typhoid among the British troops. The latter are
stationed at different times of their service very nearly in all parts
of the world, and yearly pay a very heavy tribute to that disease.
The medical officers in charge of these troops pass through a course
of training at Netley, and Professor Wright had rendered excellent
services in connection with the cholera inoculations, by disseminating
the knowledge of them among the probationers of the school. It seemed
to me expedient, therefore, to start the typhoid inoculation also
through the staff and pupils of that school. The following plan as
to the preparation of the vaccine, and the way of carrying out the
inoculation, was laid before Professor Wright. The typhoid bacillus
was to be brought to a fixed stage of virulence by the inoculation in
the peritoneal cavity of Guinea pigs, according to the exact rules
prescribed for the anti-cholera inoculation. Once the virus was fixed,
it was to be cultivated for twenty-four hours on a solid medium, and
a first vaccine prepared by carbolizing that virus. As, however, the
durability of the effect of carbolized vaccine alone was not known,
this was to be followed up by the injection of a dose of the fixed
living virus.

The inoculation was first to be made on volunteers among the physicians
on probation at Netley; then on volunteers among the young officers of
the army on the eve of their departure for the tropics; and then, with
the approval of the military authorities, on volunteers among private
soldiers. At the end of 1895, during my visit to England, I obtained
from Sir William Mackinnon, then Director-General of the Army Medical
Department, permission for Professor Wright to start the work upon the
plan above detailed; and the first inoculations, in the way described
above, were done in the middle of 1896. Soon after that, Pfeiffer
and Kolle, recognizing the same similarity between the cholera and
typhoid microbes, and pointing out that the results obtained by us in
India were likely to be repeated when applying the method to typhoid,
proposed and started a similar series of inoculations.

When the inoculation against plague was begun, and observation showed
that dead vaccines alone were apparently sufficient to produce
satisfactory results, a second inoculation with living virus appeared
less urgently necessary; and as the effect of such an inoculation,
which Professor Wright very courageously tried first on himself,
seemed troublesome, it was decided to do for the time being the second
inoculation also with the carbolized virus. Similarly, the plan which
was adopted for the plague inoculation, of cultivating the vaccine
in a liquid, instead of a solid medium, and of using cultures of
several weeks’ duration, has been subsequently adopted in the typhoid
inoculation also.

Many thousands of British soldiers and civilians have already undergone
the inoculation in question. The latter was done partly with vaccines
cultivated on a solid medium, according to the older plan, and
partly with vaccines prepared according to the plague inoculation
method. The results so far observed are encouraging, and, I hope,
will shortly be improved considerably. At the last Harveian dinner in
London, Surgeon-General Jameson, Director-General of the Army Medical
Department, summarized the results of the observations in India, where,
among several thousands of young soldiers, the most prone to the
disease, the incidence of typhoid since their inoculation was 0.7 per
mille, while among the older, more resistant, not inoculated soldiers,
the incidence was during the same period just double that. A large
proportion of the force now on service in the South African campaign
have been inoculated, some before embarking and others on their way out.

Such is the position of preventive inoculation, as applied, so far, to
human communities. The very success of these operations is now apt to
create some sort of feigned or earnest alarm, and one meets at present
with the question, What is going to happen to our poor body if we
are to be inoculated against _all_ diseases? and with this other one,
How do you expect us to make a _living_ if you try to keep all of us
alive? The humorous form of these questions usually permits of their
dropping out of the conversation without a reply. The earnest answers
are, however, obvious. The efforts of the bacteriologists in combating
diseases are at present directed to a twofold aim: their prevention, by
a prophylactic treatment, and their cure. The advantage of a curative
treatment is that it is to be applied to a relatively small number of
persons, to those who actually fall victims to an attack; while that
of the preventive treatment is in the greater certainty with which
safety and protection are secured by it. The relative position of the
two treatments will, in practice, differ in different diseases--namely,
according to the prevalence and fatality of a given disease, and
according to the merits of the two treatments as they stand at the
time. In diseases in which the risks of being attacked are smaller,
or the consequences of an attack less serious, or for which a very
effective and sure curative treatment has been discovered, the majority
of people will prefer to wait for an actual attack rather than to
undergo the discomfort of a preventive treatment; in diseases, on the
contrary, in which the chances of being attacked are great, or in which
the fatality is higher, the sequelæ of an attack more serious, and for
which a successful and not very troublesome preventive treatment has
been found, large numbers will undergo preventive inoculation. But,
even in the latter case, a mutual co-operation between the two methods
will exist always, as there will always be a number of people, either
among those who have neglected to protect themselves by inoculation,
or among those in whom the inoculation has proved unsuccessful, who
will fall victims to an attack and require the benefits of a curative
treatment, be those at the time little or great.

The answer to the second question is of course to be expected rather
from the politico-economist, the wise administrator, the civilian, than
from the bacteriologist. In any case it is clear already that if we
are ever to be told that we must thin our ranks, we shall prefer not
to leave the task in the hands of the indiscriminating microbe, but to
have some voice in the matter ourselves. Inoculation marks only the
conquest of another force which henceforth we shall be glad to control.

    BOMBAY, INDIA, _March, 1900_.

COLONIES AND THE MOTHER COUNTRY. (II.)

BY JAMES COLLIER.

The growth of the relations between a colony and the mother country
closely follows the development of the relationship between an
organism and its offspring, or (in higher species) between parents and
children. When an infusorian subdivides into two cells, the new cell
produced swims away and henceforth leads an independent life. Most
of the Phœnician and most of the earlier Greek colonies were social
infusoria which parted from the parent organism by segmentation and
had no further relations with it. As we rise in the animal scale a
new relationship, that between mother and young, and a new instinct,
the maternal, come into existence. These begin as low down as the
mollusks, and expand and heighten, though not without strange lapses,
in both insects and birds as species develope; but we need not trace
the evolution here. Let it suffice to note that there are successive
degrees of specialization; a site is chosen suitable for depositing and
hatching eggs; means are found for making them secure; a shelter is
built for them; they are deposited near substances adapted to nourish
the young; special food is prepared for them; they are reared through
food disgorged or brought to them. The accession of the male to the
family marks the dawn of the paternal instinct; it appears earliest
among fishes. This evolution is repeated in the history of colonies,
where, however, the maternal and paternal offices melt into one another
insensibly.

The mother country founds and nurtures colonies. Most of the earliest
colonies are the work of adventurous bands or navigating merchants
or fishermen, who seek their own habitats, carry with them their own
equipment and fight their own battles. Then the metropolis settles its
surplus or discontented citizens in territories previously chosen,
provides them with all that is necessary for their start, and often
nourishes them during the infancy of the colony. Hispaniola was a state
colony manned with miners and artisans who were provided with tools,
and this at the cost of a loan and a draught from the confiscated
property of the Jews. Nor was it until gold began to be found in large
quantities that the receipts equalled the expenditure on the young
colony. Louisiana was founded and fostered with a royal munificence
that conferred on it “more than was contributed by all the English
monarchs together for the twelve English colonies on the Atlantic.”
Georgia was a one-man foundation, but the British Parliament twice
granted considerable sums to initiate it and carry it on; the Society
for the Propagation of the Gospel aided, and the benevolence of
philanthropic England contributed largely to its success. Not till
1818--more than half a century after the conquest--did the revenue
of Canada balance its expenditure. The convict colony of New South
Wales was, of course, entirely of state origin. Stores of every kind,
together with cattle and seeds, were sent out at the beginning, and
long continued to be sent out to it. The first governor was granted
a space of two years to make it self-supporting, but the growth of
a convict colony is abnormally slow, and the civil and military
establishments for thirty-four years continued to be a drain on the
British exchequer to the extent of over ten millions. Even now one of
the oldest and best of existing British colonies, with an area of over
three hundred thousand square miles, does not produce the breadstuffs
needed for its own consumption. The Cape of Good Hope, of mixed Dutch
and French origin, was first made a truly British colony by the
dispatch of six thousand emigrants at the cost of the mother country--a
cost much greater than was anticipated. When the Transvaal was forcibly
annexed by England, the stepmother country advanced a sum of £90,000
to rescue the quondam republic from its financial difficulties. In
1895 Parliament voted three millions for the building of a railroad in
British East Africa. Uganda is supported by a British subsidy. Algeria
is a manufactured colony, which has all along had to be supported
by its creator. Apart from the cost of their civil and military
establishments, France has to subsidize her colonies to the extent of
over four millions sterling, partially expended in reproductive public
works. Even tiny New Caledonia costs France half a million, one half of
which, it is true, is expended on the convict establishment.

Most colonies at their beginning are burdensome to the mother country.
Years after its foundation South Australia fell into such embarrassment
that its governors had to draw on the imperial exchequer for nearly a
million. In 1834 the expenditure in Cape Colony was still in excess of
the revenue. Sierra Leone had to be aided by a parliamentary grant year
after year. No wonder the Colonial Office complained that colonies were
expensive to keep up. In German Africa the revenue does not meet the
expenditure. The Congo Free State does not pay its way. On the other
hand, Congo Française has a substantial surplus. Western Australia was
another exception to the rule. There the Imperial Government announced
that it would contribute nothing to the foundation of the colony,
which was to be self-supporting from the first. Private capitalists
were to arrange for the emigration of ten thousand persons in four
years. Lands were granted to the emigrants on a scale of extravagance
which long hampered the progress of the colony. Companies likewise
expend large sums in many colonies. French and English companies
embarked on American, Indian, African and island adventures at ruinous
loss. Law’s company withdrew from Louisiana, the New Zealand Company
from New Zealand, and the Canterbury Association from Canterbury
with a balance on the wrong side of the account. Wealthy individuals
bear their part. Mr. Rhodes annually subsidizes the British Central
African Protectorate, and King Leopold the Congo Free State. Colonial
bishoprics have also been endowed and colonial cathedrals built,
largely with the aid of voluntary contributions by sympathizers in the
mother country.

The mother state sometimes gives the colonies the benefit of her
financial good name. In 1869 England withdrew her regiments from
New Zealand when the colony was still at war with the Maoris, and
to salve the wounded feelings of the colonists she agreed (under
pressure) to guarantee a loan of a million in aid of emigration and
public works. Before the Canadian Pacific Railway could be completed
the Imperial Government had to guarantee a loan of £3,600,000. Mr.
Rhodes proposes (unsuccessfully, it now appears) that the Imperial
Government, which contributed £200,000 to the cost of a railway from
Kimberley to Buluwayo, should guarantee a loan of an enormous amount
for the continuation of the African trunk railway from Buluwayo to Lake
Tanganyika.

The mother country supports or aids its self-governing colonies through
its capitalists. In order to execute public works--roads, bridges and
railways--to assist immigration, to build fortresses, and sometimes
to pay the interest on previous loans, all the colonies have habitual
recourse to the British Stock Exchange. There are good reasons for
this. The colonies have little capital of their own, for all their
money has been used up from day to day. The English investor has
an almost unlimited amount--the savings mainly of one industrious
century--and he is prepared to lend it at a lower rate of interest than
would content the colonial capitalist. Of over two thousand millions
sterling which John Bull has out at usury all over the world, the total
public and private indebtedness of the seven Australasian colonies
alone, with a population of four millions, is stated to exceed three
hundred and twenty millions, or at the rate of eighty pounds per head
of these daring colonists. One half of this sum is due from colonial
governments for the purposes already named. The half of it, due from
banks, building companies, mercantile associations and mortgage
agencies, excites no misgivings; these institutions can always go
bankrupt, as many of them did in the financial collapse of 1891-’93.
But it is not open to a British colony to file its schedules, or at
least so we used to think; and so the Times said till the oldest of
British colonies went bankrupt the other day. At all events, it is
harder, and we contemplate this enormous pile of public indebtedness
in young and scantily peopled communities with the same feelings as
made alarmists foresee impending ruin in the growing augmentation
of the gigantic public debt of the United Kingdom. It is commonly
said that while the imperial debt has been accumulated as the cost
of “just and necessary wars,” or of wars that were neither just nor
necessary, the colonial debt has been contracted for the execution of
reproductive public works. This is not altogether so. Eleven million
pounds of the public debt of New Zealand were contracted to carry on
war with the Maoris, who were defending their territory. The Seven
Years’ War, which was begun on the part of England to gain possession
of the Ohio Valley and thus increase the extent of her colonies,
doubled her public debt. Where is the difference between the two
classes of expenditure? Then most of the self-governing colonies have
expended large sums in fortifying ports, some in partly supporting
a fleet, and one at least in purchasing war ships of its own. Nor
has all the remainder been reproductively expended. The building of
schools is a wise way of spending money, one’s own or another’s, but
it can not be called a materially reproductive way. Governors’ and
ministerial residences, parliamentary and departmental buildings, are
indispensable, but they can not be called ‘assets,’ especially if built
of perishable and inflammable timber. Even railways, most profitable of
public works, are not always true assets. In many of the colonies they
are light railways, and when traffic increases and a higher speed is
required they will have to be built over again and new rolling stock
procured. Not a few of them, too, are ‘political railways,’ running
through a sparsely populated country no-whither, and built to capture
votes. Roads are only less valuable, but they were made (sometimes by
graduates and men of scientific antecedents who were afterward cabinet
ministers) at the wage rate of from two guineas to four pounds ten per
week, and are an inadequate return on the outlay. Last century British
loans were issued as prizes to friends of ministers, and a much reduced
amount found its way to the treasury. Deduct an analogous, though
not quite similar, item of waste in colonial loans, add this to all
the other non-reproductive elements, and the genuinely reproductive
proportion will shrink considerably. Every one of the colonies, even
with the fee simple of territories only less than Europe in extent in
their hands, would have sunk under the increasing burden. Happily or
not, the ever-growing wealth of England has so cheapened money that the
interest charge on the whole Australasian indebtedness sank in five
years (1890-’96), mainly through conversion of loans, from fourteen
millions to twelve and a quarter. It may be added that the colonies
which have borrowed most recklessly have not been the most populous or
those with largest resources, but rather the socialistic colonies with
big schemes on hand.

A father may assist his son by supplying him with the capital needed to
carry on his business. Thus it is entirely with the mother country’s
money that the first colonial banks are founded. As the colony grows
wealthier and the business of the banks extends, colonial shareholders
purchase stock in it, but the number of British shareholders remains
considerable. A typical example is that of the Bank of New Zealand,
from two fifths to one half of whose shares are (or in 1888 were)
held in the United Kingdom. In the older or wealthier colonies of New
South Wales and Victoria the number of English shareholders may be
smaller, though still large. A still larger proportion of the shares
of the great colonial steamship companies, amounting possibly to three
fourths or nine tenths of the whole, is held (chiefly by commercial
men and firms) in Great Britain. Many commercial undertakings in all
the colonies are engineered entirely by English capital (not included
in the two thousand millions). The Canadian transcontinental railway;
railways, electric tramway lines and silver mines in Tasmania; the
Midland Railway and also copper mines in New Zealand; the gold mines
in Western Australia to such an extent that much more English capital
is said to pour into that colony than gold flows out of it--are only
a few colonial enterprises that would never have been undertaken but
for the mother country’s aid. Some of these are lucrative, others
not; some have been abandoned, and others belong to a still darker
class. “Uncounted millions of capital have been raised in the central
money market of London, only to be fooled away in ill-conceived and
misdirected enterprises abroad,” says Lord Brassey. Nor are the losses
confined to questionable undertakings. Two great Australasian banks
have frittered away their entire capital of four and three millions,
respectively, and it may be assumed that the British investor has
borne one half of the losses. Of half a dozen smaller colonial banks
a similar tale might be told. Father and son have to share in one
another’s adversity, as in one another’s prosperity.

The socialistic movement in England has lately so strongly reacted on
the relations of the Imperial Government with the colonies that the
Secretary of State is believed to be willing to employ the resources
of the empire to assist backward colonies. He has invited English
capitalists to aid the declining West Indies, and a leading firm has
offered to invest a million in the sugar industry if a guarantee
of sufficient returns is given. The constitution of the projected
Australian Federation contains a novel analogous provision, permitting
the commonwealth to aid its needy provinces. The growing unity in the
social organism as a whole is accompanied by an increasing unity in its
component parts.

The mother country continues to defend its colonies, as animals defend
their young and parents their children. But the polyp does not defend
its offspring, nor did the earliest colonizing powers succor their
colonies. While not even the armed persuasion of Cambyses could induce
Tyre to make war against Carthage, neither seems to have helped the
other in its need. Carthage fought savagely for her Sicilian colonies,
but in her own interests, not in theirs. Though the ties between a
Greek metropolis and her colonies were closer, the one did not
invariably defend the other. Corcyra refused the aid her daughter city
Epidaurus sought, and the latter had to find it in the grandmother city
of Corinth, who considered it _her_ colony no less than that of Corcyra.
The Dorian city was celebrated for her typical Greek patriotism, and
she gladly assisted Syracuse to expel her Carthaginian conquerors. Rome
fought for her colonies while her power lasted. France and England
fought for their colonies, or rather for the possession of them, all
through the eighteenth century. Spain has just fought for her last
colonies, but as much against the colonists as against the foreign
state that came to set them free. The mother country is also at the
cost of keeping her colonies in a state of defence. The sum of £9,000
was in 1679 annually expended on the maintenance of English soldiers in
Virginia and two West Indian colonies, and £1,000 on the fortifications
of New York. Troops were often dispatched to assist the American
colonies in special expeditions. The colonial military expenditure of
Great Britain in 1859 amounted to nearly £1,200,000. In compliance
with the findings of a Royal Commission, repeatedly reaffirmed by
resolutions of Parliament, to the effect that the self-governing
colonies ought to suffice for their own military defense, the troops
were finally withdrawn in 1873, but she still maintains a garrison at
Halifax and in Natal and a fleet in Australian waters, to which last
the adjacent colonies contribute a fraction. Most of the self-governing
colonies have at their own cost erected fortresses, and they maintain
a defensive force. Two of them have stationary ships of war. They are
willing and eager, moreover, to aid the mother country when she is in
difficulties. When England was embroiled in Egypt or danger threatened
in India and South Africa, several of these colonies offered to send,
and one actually sent, troops to engage in wars in which they were
not directly concerned. The head and the extremities are sometimes at
variance because their interests conflict. The heart of such an empire
is one. A stride has been taken toward organic unity.

Animals evolve special organs for the nursing of their young, and all
colonizing countries seem to have created special departments for the
supervision of their colonies. As the lacteal glands are only modified
skin-glands, are in certain lower genera (the Monotremata) at first
without teats and only in higher species develop into true mammæ, so
the colonial department in the mother country is originally a mere
adaptation of existing agencies. A rather perfect example of this stage
is presented by the earliest of modern colonizing powers. The Casa de
la Contratacion de las Indias, established soon after the discovery of
South America, was organized in 1503. It granted licenses, equipped and
despatched fleets, received merchandise for export and cargoes imported
and contracted for their sale. It controlled the trade with Barbary and
the Canaries and supervised the shipping business of Cadiz and Seville.
Taking cognizance of all questions concerning marine trade, it was
advised by two jurists. It also kept the Spanish government informed
of all that concerned the colonies. It was a general board of colonial
marine trade, and such it remained even when, a few years later, its
more important colonial functions were absorbed by a higher department.

Where the colony has been founded by a commercial or by a colonizing
company, the mother country controls the colony through the directors
of the company; the office of the company is _pro tanto_ the
Colonial Office. Yet the later colonial department, as an organ of
government, is not a development of these shipping, commercial or
colonizing boards. It is a delegation of the sovereign authority.
This is at first exercised directly by the sovereign as it was
notably by Isabella and Ferdinand. It is next delegated, like almost
all functions of the ruler, to his privy council, which assigns the
business of colonies to a committee, which again may be set apart as
an independent administrative body. The Spanish Council of the Indies,
the separate English privy council for colonial affairs contemplated
in the first Virginian charter, the Council of Nine appointed by the
States-General of the Netherlands, the Swedish royal council, were
such bodies. Their powers are everywhere the same. The superintendence
of the whole colonial system is entrusted to them. They have supreme
jurisdiction over all the colonies. They appoint and may recall
viceroys, governors-general, governors and other local officers. They
can veto laws and ordinances made by colonial rulers or legislatures.
They frame constitutions for the colonies and enact laws. Through the
governors and other officers sent out by them, they minutely supervise
and incessantly interfere with the whole internal administration
of each colony. The tendency of this supreme council is to divorce
itself evermore from the privy council and become independent, till
at last it is transformed into a ministerial department. Yet an
amicable relationship (such as sometimes survives the divorce court)
long remains. The Colonial Committee of the privy council in England
was summoned as late as 1849, and the Judicial Committee still hears
appeals from colonial courts of justice. The government of the
commonwealth was naturally averse to the king’s council, and a body
of special commissioners (Cromwell and Pym and Vane among them) was
appointed to govern the colonies.

The Restoration did not at once return to the old system. On the
contrary, a remarkable democratic advance was made. Recognizing that
though ‘politics lie outside the profession of merchants’ (as the
Swedish and British governments declared), yet trade is eminently
within their scope, the restored monarchy set up a Council of Trade and
Plantations, of whose forty members twenty were elected representatives
of the five merchant companies and the incorporated trades. But there
was ever a tendency, at least under the despotic rule of the Stuarts,
to revert to the privy council, and in 1674 a standing committee of
it was appointed Lords of the Committee of Trade and Plantations. The
change appears to have been unimportant. Trade still governed the
committee and shaped its policy.

The Board of Trade set up in 1696, rather by the House of Commons
than by the Ministry, marked the more popular character of the
revolution of 1688, and lasted for ninety years. As if foreshadowing
the despotic character of the English reaction against the greater
French revolution, this board was abolished by an act introduced by
the chief reactionary--Edmund Burke. A committee of the Privy Council
for Trade and Plantations was in 1786 again resorted to, and this
committee in a shadowy manner survived (perhaps it still survives)
till 1849, when it was for the last time summoned by Earl Grey. But
the real administration of the colonies had long been in the hands
of a department of state, directly responsible to Parliament, though
it was still a department that dealt with other affairs as well.
Specialization began in 1702 by the colonies being assigned to the
Secretary for the Southern Department. In 1768 a separate department
with a secretary was created for America, where almost all of the
colonies were then situated. After the loss of most of the American
colonies the new department was abolished in 1782. The colonies were
then annexed to the home department. In 1794 the newly created war
department nominally included the colonies, though these were not
actually united with it till the Committee for Trade and Plantations
ceased to act, seven years later. In 1854 a separate colonial
department, with an independent secretary of state, was finally
created.[A]

    [A] The history of the relations between the government of
        Great Britain and her colonies will be found in many books,
        but best in Mr. Egerton’s comprehensive survey of British
        colonial policy.

As there were twenty-three secretaries in forty-one years, it will be
readily understood that the practical work of administration remained
with the permanent officials. With a longer tenure of office, previous
training and thorough mastery of details, they held all the threads of
colonial administration in their own hands. A newly-appointed minister,
with little knowledge of the colonies and no acquaintance at all with
the business of his department, was no match for an experienced officer
who had colonial affairs at his fingers’ ends.

A mere clerk, unknown outside his office, though well known in
literature, could recall a governor; another, whose very name was
unknown till he died, recommended (that is, commanded on pain of
dismissal) a recent Governor of New Zealand to give away to his
ministers on a crucial exercise of the prerogative.

Nor is it in matters of routine alone that the permanent officers shape
the course of colonial administration. A strong-minded minister with
a policy of his own, like Lord Grey or Lord Carnarvon, will force his
subordinates to carry it out, but even here a still stronger-minded
under-secretary will often have his way. In 1848 Lord Grey, then
Secretary for the Colonies, summoned the aged and moribund Committee
(of the privy council) on Trade and Plantations to advise with him
on the policy to be adopted towards the Australian colonies. The
report was drafted by Sir James Stephen and we have no difficulty in
discovering in its far-sighted proposals and masculine style the mind
as well as the hand of the author of the essay on ‘Hildebrand.’ It is
often said that a state department is inevitably wedded to routine.
In the report just mentioned the striking feature is the outline of a
system of Australian federation that is only now on the point of being
realized. So far was the pedantic Colonial Office then, as it has often
been before and since, ahead of its subject colonies.

The other colonizing countries have followed the same line of
development. Beginning as direct delegations of the sovereign power
to a branch, first constituent and then separated, of the sovereign’s
council, the department of colonies has been in course of time made an
independent ministry directly answerable to parliament. In bureaucratic
France the colonies since 1854 have been associated with the navy. On
the first of January, 1899, the empire on which the sun never set,
having lost the last of the dependencies that were once its glory,
abolished its colonial office. The sun had set on Spain to rise no
more.

TECHNICAL EDUCATION AT THE MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY.

BY PROFESSOR GEORGE F. SWAIN.

With the enormous progress in the arts and sciences which has
characterized especially the last half of the nineteenth century,
education has kept well abreast, although its progress has been gradual
and it is not always easy to recognize the great advances that have
been made. In the sciences, a discovery is made or a machine invented
that in the course of a few years forms the basis of a new industry,
gives occupation to thousands and places within the reach of almost
every one conveniences previously attainable only by the few. In
education no such sudden revolutions occur, and great changes are
introduced by degrees without producing any commotion or any surprise.
From the days of Erasmus and Rabelais, if not earlier, educational
reformers have urged the importance of studying things rather than
books about things, of cultivating the hand and eye as well as the
mind, of training the perceptive powers, of cultivating a habit of
observation and discrimination, and of developing the faculty of
judgment. Yet, notwithstanding all that has been said and written,
progress in this direction has until recently been very slow. Carlyle,
apparently looking at the matter almost from the old scholastic
standpoint, expressed the opinion that the true university of modern
times was a great library; books, not things, should be studied. It
would conform more to the modern point of view to say that the true
university of the twentieth century is a great laboratory. Even the
function of a library in our modern institutions of learning is perhaps
more that of a laboratory than that of a mere storehouse of facts and
opinions.

It is perhaps not too much to say that the development in the direction
indicated has been greatest in our own country; that the United
States have taken the lead in the revolution against the old method
of teaching, and that at the present time the higher schools of this
country are examples of the best practice and the highest development
of the laboratory method. It may, therefore, be of interest to give the
readers of this magazine a brief account of the school which has in
these respects been one of the foremost, if indeed it has not led the
schools of this country, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

[Illustration: THE ROGERS BUILDING, MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF
TECHNOLOGY, IS AT THE RIGHT, THE WALKER BUILDING AT THE LEFT.]

With the development of the natural sciences and the growth of the
constructive arts, natural science long ago gained a place in the
curricula of the great universities of Europe; and afterwards special
schools were founded for teaching the applications of science to the
arts. In France, the École des Ponts et Chaussées, originally started
in 1747 as a drawing school, was organized in 1760 for the training of
engineers. In the States of Germany, a number of similar schools were
organized early in the present century. In America, the Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute, the pioneer in technical education, was founded
in 1824, and was the only school devoted to applied science until the
forties, when Joseph Sheffield and Abbot Lawrence established the
schools which bear their names, in connection, respectively, with
Yale and Harvard. With the development of railroads, which dates from
the thirties, and of manufacturing, which began in this country but
a few years earlier, urgent need was felt for schools which should
fit younger men to grapple with the problems which the new industries
offered. These schools, however, maintained for many years but a
precarious existence and were quite elementary in character. The Civil
War interrupted their growth and absorbed for a time all the resources
of the nation; but its termination set free an abundant store of
energy, henceforward to seek its chief application in the development
of trade, commerce, manufacturing and industrial pursuits of every
kind. From this time the success of schools of technology was assured.
They were needed to supply young men for the development of the arts;
but, on the other hand, as in all things not purely material, they
were to create a demand for such men by first furnishing a supply.
Manufacturers and leaders of industrial enterprise soon found that
they could not afford to do without the services of young men trained
in scientific principles. In this way, by reversing the usual law of
supply and demand, these schools contributed powerfully to advance the
technical development of the country, far indeed beyond the measure
that may be inferred from the mere number of their graduates.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology was chartered in 1861, and
first opened to students in 1865. Its claim to recognition as a leader
in the development of technical education may perhaps be summarized as
follows: It was the first school in the world to institute laboratory
instruction in physics and chemistry to students in large classes as a
part of the regular course of each candidate for a degree; the first
to equip a mining and metallurgical laboratory for the instruction of
students by actual treatment of ores in large quantities; the first to
establish a laboratory for teaching the nature and uses of steam, and
a laboratory for testing the strength of materials of construction in
commercial sizes; and the first in America to establish a department
of architecture. Later still, it was the first school in America to
establish distinct and specialized courses of study in electrical
engineering, in sanitary engineering, in chemical engineering and in
naval architecture.

The success of the school has been commensurate with its
progressiveness. It stands to-day the largest, most complete school of
its class in the United States, and one of the largest in the world.
The number of its students is 1,176, the number of its teachers,
including lecturers, 175. Excluding lecturers, the number of students
per teacher is only 8.7, a ratio which is a good general index of the
character of the instruction. The students come from 40 States and
Territories of the Union and from 12 foreign countries.

Before passing to a more detailed description of the work of its
various departments, some general characteristics of the school
should be mentioned. The first is the great variety of its courses
and the specialization of its instruction. It is a college of general
technology, embracing almost every branch of study which finds
application in the arts. There are thirteen distinct courses of study:
Civil and topographical engineering, mechanical engineering, mining
engineering and metallurgy, architecture, chemistry, electrical
engineering, biology, physics, general studies, chemical engineering,
sanitary engineering, geology and naval architecture. These several
departments mutually support and reinforce each other, and allow a
specialization of the instruction which would be impossible in a
smaller college with a less numerous staff of instructors. Thus,
at the Institute of Technology, there are not only professors of
civil engineering and of mechanical engineering, but professors
of mechanism, steam engineering, railroad engineering, highway
engineering, hydraulic engineering, topographical engineering, etc.
Again, the chemical staff of twenty-four persons is distributed over
general chemistry, analytical chemistry, organic chemistry, industrial
chemistry and sanitary chemistry. There are separate laboratories for
water analysis, for gas analysis, for food analysis, for dyeing and
bleaching, etc. In each of these there are teachers who are able to
give their entire time to instruction and research in a single line.

[Illustration: WILLIAM BARTON ROGERS, PRESIDENT, 1862-1870; 1878-1881.]

The second characteristic of the Institute is the predominance of
laboratory, shop and field practice, experiment and research. These
are used wherever it is found practicable to supplement, illustrate or
emphasize the work of the recitation or lecture-room.

The third characteristic of the Institute, and one which is absent in
the case of many similar schools, is the fact that a not inconsiderable
amount of general training has from the beginning been required of
every candidate for the degree. In some technical or scientific schools
there are no liberalizing studies, aside from those of a professional
character. The faculty of the institute have insisted that such studies
should be incorporated to a considerable extent in the curriculum of
every course, recognizing the fact that few students in technical
schools are graduates of colleges, and that the aim of the Institute
should be first of all to graduate broadly trained men. Aside from the
courses in liberal studies, a broad spirit is shown in the technical
courses themselves. The study of general principles is always the chief
end in view, and to it are strictly subordinated the acquirement of all
knacks, tricks of the trade or merely practical rules.

These characteristics of the Institute were impressed upon it
from the beginning by the master hand of its founder and first
president, William B. Rogers. President Rogers aimed to establish ‘a
comprehensive, polytechnic college’ which should provide a ‘complete
system of industrial education.’ It is now generally recognized that a
complete system of industrial education would consist of three parts:
First, manual training schools, for developing the eye and hand, not
with the object of producing artisans, but for training alone. Second,
trade schools for special training in the technique of the different
trades. Third, higher technical schools for training in the fundamental
principles of the sciences, and fitting men in the broadest way to
become leaders in the application of the sciences to the arts. Manual
training is now generally recognized as a desirable addition to every
scheme of public instruction and a powerful adjunct to every technical
school. It was not indicated in the original scheme of the Institute,
but was added in 1877 through the wisdom of President Runkle, as a
result of the exhibition in Philadelphia of the results obtained in
Russia by instruction of this kind. Trade schools, for the training of
artisans, were never included in the scheme of President Rogers, and
are not now, either in America or Europe, considered suitable adjuncts
to so-called technical schools, although they are very desirable
as special and independent institutions. The original plan for the
Institute contemplated simply a school of the last-named kind, together
with provision for evening lectures, to which outsiders should be
admitted, and which it was expected would be of benefit to artisans;
and also the establishment of a museum of arts, and of a society of
arts which should hold regular meetings and which should be the medium
for the communication to the public of scientific discoveries and
inventions. It may be as well to state here that the museum of arts was
never established except in so far as the separate departments of the
Institute have accumulated collections; but that the society of arts,
which held its first meeting in 1862, has been continued to the present
time. Many important inventions, as for instance the earliest forms of
the Bell telephone, were first publicly exhibited at its meetings.

In outlining his plan, President Rogers showed wonderful keenness and
foresight. With the added experience of the succeeding forty years,
it would scarcely be possible to make a more complete statement of
what experience has shown to be the best method of organization. In
fact, his Scope and Plan of the School of Industrial Science of the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology may be said to be the first step
toward a new order of things in education, and contains the first clear
statement of the desirability of teaching physics, mining, metallurgy
and other branches by the laboratory method.

[Illustration: THE HENRY L. PIERCE BUILDING AND ENGINEERING BUILDING.]

Let us now see what has been the result of the nearly forty years
of development since President Rogers outlined his plan. Originally
confined to one building, the growing needs of the school have led to
the erection of five others, in addition to a gymnasium. The original
building, completed in 1865, is now known as the Rogers Building, after
the founder of the school; while the one next erected, in 1883, is
named after the third president, the late General Francis A. Walker.
These two buildings each measure about 90 by 150 feet, and in addition
to a building occupied by the Boston Society of Natural History,
occupy one entire square nearly in the heart of the city, and in
close proximity to the Public Library and the Art Museum. Three other
buildings, which adjoin each other and now form one structure, are
situated about six hundred feet distant and form the front and part of
one side of what will some day be one large quadrangle. The first of
these buildings to be erected was the Engineering Building, built in
1889, measuring 52 by 148 feet on the ground, adjoining which is a
building erected in 1892, 58 by 68 feet on the ground, and now forming
part of the Engineering Building. Adjoining this is the Henry L. Pierce
Building, erected in 1898, and measuring 58 by 160 feet. In addition to
these buildings are the workshops, about a quarter of a mile distant,
covering 24,000 square feet, and a gymnasium and drill hall.

[Illustration: ONE OF THE CHEMICAL LABORATORIES.]

The first laboratory to be established at the institute was that of
chemistry, and this leads us to speak first of the department of
chemistry. The laboratory of general chemistry was opened in 1876
under the direction of Professors Eliot[B] and Storer, and is believed
to be the first laboratory where instruction was given in general
chemistry to classes of considerable size. From small beginnings, this
department has rapidly grown under the able direction of such men as
James M. Crafts, (since 1897 president of the Institute), William
Ripley Nichols, Charles H. Wing, Lewis M. Norton and Thomas M. Drown,
until now the instructing force consists of five professors, thirteen
instructors and six assistants, a total teaching force of twenty-four,
in addition to seven or eight lecturers on chemical subjects. The
department occupies the two upper floors in the Walker Building,
together with about half of one floor in the Henry L. Pierce Building,
devoted to industrial chemistry. The laboratories, which are said to be
the largest and best equipped in the United States, are known as the
Kidder chemical laboratories, having been so named in recognition of
the generosity of the late Jerome S. Kidder. They comprise twenty-two
separate laboratories, three lecture-rooms, a reading-room and library,
two balance-rooms, offices and supply-rooms, making forty rooms in
all, with accommodation for seven hundred students. Besides the large
laboratories for general chemistry and analytical chemistry, there are
smaller laboratories for volumetric analysis, for organic chemistry,
for sanitary chemistry with special reference to the analysis of
water and air, for oil and gas analysis, for the optical and chemical
examination of sugars, starches, etc., for the determination of
molecular weights, and so on. In the industrial laboratories, the
students are taught how to manufacture chemicals with due regard to
economy of material, space and time. There is also a special laboratory
for textile coloring, with printing machines and all the necessary
equipment of baths, dryers, etc., for experimental dyeing and coloring.
In this laboratory the preparation and use of coloring matters are
taught with the object of fitting young men for positions in dye works.
A course of lectures in textile coloring was first introduced in 1888
and the laboratory course in 1889.

    [B] Now President Eliot of Harvard.

A large amount of original work is accomplished each year in these
laboratories, both by students and professors. During the year 1897-98,
for instance, four books and sixteen articles on chemical subjects came
from them. In the development of sanitary chemistry the Institute has
been particularly prominent. Beginning with the careful and thorough
investigations made by Professor Nichols for the State Board of Health,
the reputation of the institute in this direction has been still
further increased by the recent extensive investigations of Professor
Drown and Mrs. Ellen H. Richards, made for the same board in connection
with the examination of the purity of the water supplies of the State,
and the experiments at Lawrence relating to the best methods for
purifying water and disposing of the sewage of inland towns.

An illustration of the policy of the school in separating out a
subject whenever it is found capable of complete theoretical and
practical treatment and putting it into the hands of some assistant
professor for development, is found in the laboratory for gas and oil
analysis, which for some years has been in charge of Dr. Gill. In
this laboratory, investigations are made relating to chimney gases,
as well as questions of fuel, furnaces, gas firing, etc., while oils
are tested and analyzed with reference to specific gravity, viscosity,
friction, flashing and firing points, and liability to spontaneous
combustion. The same policy is further illustrated in the establishment
in 1894 of a well equipped laboratory devoted entirely to physical
chemistry; that is to say, to the relations between chemical changes
and heat, light and electricity. This laboratory, under the charge of
Dr. H. M. Goodwin, occupies a room measuring 28 by 29½ feet, and is
devoted to photographic work, experiments in electrical conductivity,
thermo-chemistry, molecular weight determinations and experiments
in chemical dynamics. More recently still, a complete option in
electro-chemistry has been established, to meet a growing demand.

[Illustration: PART OF THE ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING LABORATORY.]

Still another illustration of the policy of specialization is afforded
by the action of the Institute in establishing new courses of study,
extending through the entire four years, whenever the need is felt
for men trained in a direction not hitherto specially provided for.
Thus, in 1888 a new course was established in chemical engineering.
The chemical engineer is not primarily a chemist, but a mechanical
engineer--one, however, who has given special attention to such
problems as the construction of dye works and bleacheries, sugar
refineries, soap works, paper and pulp manufactories, fertilizer works,
chemical works, and in general all the problems of chemical machinery
and manufacturing. That this new course filled a real want was soon
made evident. The first class, that of ’91, contained seven graduates,
while eighty-eight students in all have now been graduated and are for
the most part engaged in chemical works.

The physical laboratories of the Institute are now known as the Rogers
laboratories. Although they formed perhaps the central feature of
President Rogers’ plan, financial and other exigencies prevented their
being established when the school was opened. In 1869, Prof. Edward
C. Pickering, then in charge of the department of physics, submitted
a scheme to the government of the Institute entitled ‘Plan of the
Physical Laboratory.’ This plan was adopted and carried out in the
autumn of 1869 and has been in use ever since. It is worthy of remark
that the original statement of Professor Rogers with reference to
laboratory instruction in physics contained no mention of electricity,
then a subordinate branch, but one whose development since has caused
it to occupy the leading place in any physical department. In 1882 the
corporation established a course in electrical engineering, setting an
example which has since been followed by almost every large technical
school, and founding a course destined in a few years to become one of
the largest in the Institute.

At present the department of physics and electrical engineering, under
the head of Prof. Charles R. Cross, has an active teaching force of
one professor, four assistant professors, six instructors and three
assistants, a total of fourteen. In addition to these, there are
twelve lecturers on special topics, including many men eminent in
their profession. The Rogers laboratories occupy sixteen rooms in the
Walker Building, including two lecture-rooms and ten laboratories.
As in the case of the chemical department, these laboratories are
highly specialized. There is a laboratory for general physics, one
for electrical measurements, two rooms devoted to a laboratory for
electrical engineering, containing two distinct power plants driven by
steam engines of 100 and 150 horse-power, with a large number of dynamo
machines, transformers and a great variety of other apparatus arranged
for purposes of instruction, the mere enumeration of which would
occupy several pages. Moreover, a lighting and power plant in the new
building on Trinity Place is available for experiments and instruction.
Besides these, there are rooms for photometry, for heat measurements,
for acoustics, for optics and for photography. In fact, probably no
department of the Institute is more fully equipped than this, the
wealth of apparatus being so great that the casual visitor is confused
by the network of wires and machinery which surround him.

The interdependent and harmonious work of the various departments
of the Institute is shown in the development of special lecture
and laboratory courses, and is in marked contrast to the policy of
departmental isolation sometimes practiced. Thus, in 1889, two new
courses of instruction were established by the physical department in
response to the demand of the department of mining; namely, the course
in heat measurements, including measurements of high temperatures,
the determination of the calorific power of fuels, etc., and a course
on the applications of electro-metallurgy to chemical analysis, the
reduction of ores and similar problems. The equipment of calorimeters,
pyrometers, etc., in the heat laboratory is said to be so large as to
permit a more complete examination of the efficiency of fuels than has
hitherto been possible anywhere.

[Illustration: SMELTING FURNACE IN JOHN CUMMINGS LABORATORY OF MINING
AND METALLURGY.]

Perhaps the greatest innovation made by the Institute in the early
days was in establishing a laboratory for the teaching of mining
and metallurgy. Previous to 1871 metallurgical work was done in the
chemical laboratories, but in that year the mining and metallurgical
laboratory was put into operation through the efforts of President
Runkle, Professor Richards and Professor Ordway. Prior to this date,
there were assaying or metallurgical laboratories at the École des
Mines at Paris, the Royal School of Mines in London, the German
Mining Schools at Freiberg and Clausthal and Berlin, and also in
several technical schools in this country. The German mining schools
were situated beside smelting works, but the plants could not often
be used for experiments by professors or students in a way to alter
the usual method of running. In all these laboratories, however, the
apparatus was designed to treat quantities of ore not exceeding a few
ounces for each test. The Institute laboratories were the first in the
world which were designed for the treatment of ores in economical
quantities of from five hundred pounds to three tons, and used entirely
for purposes of instruction. They are now known as the John Cummings
laboratories, in memory of one who for many years was treasurer of
the Institute and one of its most devoted friends. They now occupy
the entire basement of the Rogers Building, and include laboratories
for milling, concentrating and smelting ores, as well as for testing
them by assay and by blowpipe. The development of these laboratories
from the small beginnings of 1871 has been mainly due to the efforts
of Prof. R. H. Richards, past president of the American Institute
of Mining Engineers, whose contributions on methods of ore dressing
are well known to mining engineers. The staff of this department
also includes Prof. H. O. Hofman, well known for his researches in
metallurgy.

[Illustration: THREE STAMP MILL IN MINING LABORATORY.]

Mention should here be made of the department of geology, which is
under the direction of Professors Niles, Crosby and Barton, and
which now occupies commodious quarters comprising the greater part
of a floor in the Henry L. Pierce Building. The collections of this
department number many thousands, and are supplemented by those of
the Society of Natural History, which are available for purposes of
instruction. As would be expected in a school of applied science, the
economic aspects of geology are kept closely in view, and the work
is adapted to the particular object to be attained. The student in
architecture, for instance, receives a course in geology in which the
study of building stones is a prominent feature.

An engineering laboratory formed part of the original scheme of
President Rogers, although he included it under the head of physics
and did not anticipate the importance which has since attached to it.
Such a laboratory, especially devoted to engineering, was established
on a small scale in 1874, through the efforts of Professor Whitaker.
An engine for experimental purposes was presented to the institute
by Mr. G. B. Dixwell, and this, with other apparatus, constituted
what is believed to have been the first engineering laboratory in the
world for the regular instruction of classes. For lack of funds and
space, it was not much developed until 1882, but since that time it
has been brought to a high state of efficiency. To-day the engineering
laboratories, as they are called, which include laboratories of steam
engineering, hydraulics, for the testing of materials and a room
containing cotton machinery, occupy a floor space of 21,380 square
feet on the two lower floors of the Engineering and Pierce Buildings.
In addition to this, there are workshops which will be referred to
again. It would be tedious to enumerate the great variety of apparatus
to be found in these laboratories, but a few important points may be
mentioned. In the steam laboratory a 150 horse-power triple-expansion
Corliss engine, the first of its kind of practical size ever arranged
for experimental purposes, was purchased in 1890 and is regularly used
for testing purposes. A second engine of 225 horse-power was added two
years ago, transferring its power through a rope drive. Besides these
two large engines, there are a number of smaller ones for experimental
purposes and the study of valve setting, and, in addition, there are
gas engines, hot-air engines and other apparatus. There is also a
collection of cotton machinery sufficient to make clear to the student
the mechanism of the various machines.

[Illustration: HORIZONTAL EMERY TESTING MACHINE OF 300,000 POUNDS
CAPACITY IN THE APPLIED MECHANICS LABORATORY.]

The hydraulic laboratory is well equipped for the study of the laws
of flowing water, having a steel tank five feet in diameter and
twenty-seven feet high, with a system of stand-pipes eighty-five feet
high, reaching to the top of the building. This tank is furnished with
gates and other apparatus suitable for experiments on the flow from
orifices, and connected with a system of horizontal pipes by which a
large variety of other investigations may be carried on. Among the
other apparatus of interest may be mentioned two impact water wheels,
placed in housings with glass sides so that the action of the water on
striking the buckets can be observed.

Some experiments have already been made in the laboratory on the flow
of air, the results of which have been communicated by Professor
Peabody to the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. It is now
intended to continue the study of the flow of air and its use as a
motive power in great detail, just as the flow of water is studied, and
an air compressor of 100 horse-power, which will produce a pressure of
twenty-five hundred pounds, is now being installed.

[Illustration: THE 100,000 POUND BEAM MACHINE IN THE APPLIED MECHANICS
LABORATORY.]

The laboratory for testing the strength of materials was established in
1881 by Prof. G. Lanza, and has since been extensively developed under
his direction, until it is now one of the most complete in the world.
It is perhaps not too much to say that the experiments made in this
laboratory have in some respects revolutionized the ideas of engineers.
Previous to its establishment, the only tests of timber that had been
made were upon small selected specimens one or two inches square and a
few feet long. The results of these tests had been used for years by
architects and engineers, and they were given in all the engineering
handbooks. In the Institute laboratory there were conducted the first
systematic and extended tests of beams of commercial size. The results
soon showed that the strength of such timber was a great deal less
than previous tests on small beams had indicated, and the practice of
engineers and architects has since that time been completely modified
through the results obtained in this and similar laboratories. In this
way does the work of such a laboratory become of direct and lasting
value to the arts. The central piece of apparatus of the Institute
laboratory is the Emery machine, similar to the great machine at the
Watertown arsenal, with a capacity of three hundred thousand pounds.
But in addition to this machine there are a dozen or more other
machines designed to test beams, columns, rope, wire and, in fact,
materials of every kind and in every form. An interesting machine is
that for testing shafts in torsion, and it is instructive to see it
twist off with apparent ease a steel shaft three inches in diameter,
twisting the fibers before they break till the rod resembles a barber’s
pole. There are also beam-testing machines with capacities up to one
hundred thousand pounds, in which not only beams but wooden trusses
may be tested to the breaking point. Some of the apparatus is of great
delicacy; for instance, one instrument will measure the twist of a
steel shaft two and a half inches in diameter and six feet long so
delicately that the effect of a twist given by one’s hand is distinctly
visible; scientifically speaking, it will measure an angle of twist of
two seconds. There is also a machine designed for testing stone arches,
having a capacity of four hundred thousand pounds and suitable for an
investigation of many questions concerning these uncertain structures;
also machinery for studying the wear of brake shoes and wheel tires,
a subject in regard to which there is room for much investigation.
Finally, mention should be made of machinery for investigating the
interesting subject of the effect of repetition of stress.

[Illustration: FORGE SHOP.]

The tests performed in the engineering laboratory cover almost the
entire range of mechanical science. Sometimes investigations are
carried on through a number of years; for instance, during three
successive years experiments were conducted and formed the subject of
theses on the proper method of counterbalancing the reciprocating parts
of a locomotive. Nor are the tests performed by the Institute students
as a regular part of their instruction confined to these laboratories,
as is made evident by the fifty-hour test of the West End Street
Railway power station and the twenty-four hour test of the pumping
engine at Chestnut Hill, both recently carried out.

In connection with the engineering laboratories, brief mention may be
made of the shops, which form an important adjunct of the laboratories.
They consist of a shop for carpentry, wood-turning and pattern-making,
equipped with forty carpenters’ benches, thirty-six pattern-makers’
benches and a full equipment of saws, planers, lathes, etc.; a foundry
with a cupola furnace for melting iron, thirty-two moulders’ benches,
two brass furnaces and a core-oven; a forge shop with thirty-two
forges, a power hammer, vises, etc.; a machine shop with about forty
lathes, together with drills, planers and all the other necessary
apparatus used in machine tool work.

The magnitude of the Institute laboratories is shown by the following
statements: The total horse-power of steam and other engines is nine
hundred and eighty-three; the total capacity of tension, compression
and transverse testing machines is over eight hundred thousand pounds,
and of torsion testing machines about one hundred and fifty-six
thousand inch pounds; the total horse-power of hydraulic motors is
sixty-two; and the total capacity of pumps is thirty-two hundred
gallons per minute.

The engineering laboratories are used by students of all the
engineering departments, that is to say, by a large majority of the
students in the school. The benefit derived by this actual contact
with materials and with machines of commercial size, under proper
instruction, is believed to be very great.

The department of mechanical engineering, one of the original
departments, is now the largest in the school, having a force of
instruction of five professors and twelve instructors and assistants.
As an offshoot of it, a department of naval architecture was
established in 1893, after a preliminary experience of four years with
an option in this direction. This was the first course of its kind
established in this country. It is somewhat remarkable, considering
the preëminence that America has long enjoyed in the building of ships
and marine engines, that our technical schools should for so long have
failed to offer specialized instruction in these important branches.
Schools devoted to these subjects have long existed abroad. The French
Government School of Naval Architecture was established in 1865 for
the purpose of educating young men for the Government service. To
this school foreigners are admitted under certain restrictions. In
England the first school of naval architecture was opened in 1871,
but no systematic instruction seems to have been provided until 1864.
At present, however, the Royal Naval College, at Greenwich, gives
excellent and thorough instruction to young men desiring to enter
the Government service. There has also been for a number of years an
excellent course of study in naval architecture at the University of
Glasgow. The Institute of Technology established in 1888 an elementary
course in ship construction, and this was followed in 1890 by a
specialized option in naval architecture extending through the four
years. Already forty-one men have graduated from this course.

[Illustration: JOHN D. RUNKLE, PRESIDENT, 1870-1878.]

One of the large departments of the school is that of architecture.
Forming one of the original departments established at the beginning
of the Institute in 1865, when there was no similar department
in this country, it may fairly be affirmed to have led in the
development of instruction in this important profession. It was for
many years in charge of Prof. W. R. Ware, who left the Institute in
1880 to assume charge of the newly established department at Columbia
College. In common with the other departments of the Institute, that
of architecture has developed enormously within recent years. Three
times since 1883 has the department been obliged to change its location
in order to meet the continued need of expansion. From the original
small quarters in the upper floor of the Rogers Building, it has
grown so that it now occupies two and one half floors in the Pierce
Building, besides a large room for modelling in another building. The
drawing-rooms now accommodate over two hundred students. The department
has a magnificent library and a very large collection of photographs
and lantern slides. Under the careful management of Prof. F. W.
Chandler, who at the same time is head of the Architectural Department
of the city and member of the Fine Arts Commission, it has now attained
a most enviable reputation. Institute students competed for several
years for the prizes offered by the New York Société des Beaux Arts,
and in each competition in which they entered they carried off the gold
medal and the highest honors. In the three competitions of ’94-’95, no
less than seventy sets of drawings were submitted by all competitors.
The two gold medals, four first mentions and two second mentions were
awarded to Institute students. Of the nine designs sent from the
Institute, six were placed by the jury among the first eight of the
seventy designs submitted; two received second place and one was put
out of competition because of too great deviation from the preliminary
sketch. This great success is doubtless due to the rigorous training
which the students receive in architectural design at the hands of
Professor Despradelle, himself a graduate of the École des Beaux Arts,
a winner of high honors in Paris, and of the third prize in the recent
Phœbe Hearst world competition for the new buildings of the University
of California, and within a few weeks the winner of the first medal in
architecture in the Paris Salon of 1900. For three years the students
are continually engaged upon architectural design, and the work of each
student is examined and criticised before the class by a jury from
the Boston Society of Architects. Students in architecture have also
the opportunity, if they desire, of taking an option in architectural
engineering, in which they are given a course in the theory and design
of structures as rigid as that received by the students in civil
engineering. The relations between architecture and engineering are
exceedingly close and are becoming closer every year. The work of the
architect, aside from the æsthetic design of his buildings, is becoming
more and more like the work of the engineer, and requires a thorough
knowledge of engineering construction.

During the past year, after very careful consideration, the faculty
has also established an option in the course of architecture, devoted
particularly to landscape architecture, including, besides a large
amount of work in architecture proper, instruction in horticulture and
landscape design, on the one hand, and in surveying, topographical
drawing, drainage, etc., on the other hand. The landscape architect
has heretofore had no opportunity to secure a thorough training in
his profession, except by passing through an apprenticeship, as
was formerly necessary in the older professions. On account of the
steady increase in this country in the demand for trained landscape
architects and the increasing attention which is now being paid by
our municipalities to questions concerning public parks, and also by
private individuals to the beautifying of private grounds, there seems
now to be an unusual opportunity for young men to devote themselves to
this branch of the profession. As usual, the Institute of Technology
is early in the field with a course designed to this end.

[Illustration: HYDRAULIC SURVEYING IN THE ESSEX CANAL, LOWELL.]

The last of the engineering departments to be considered and one of the
largest, is that of civil engineering, a department established when
the Institute was founded, and until 1881 under the direction of that
accomplished scholar and teacher, Prof. J. B. Henck, and since 1887 in
charge of the writer. This department has grown since 1886 from four to
eleven teachers, and from sixty to one hundred and fifty-three students
in the three upper classes. It now occupies the two upper floors of
the Engineering Building, or about twenty-three thousand square feet.
In recognition of the increasing importance of sanitary questions
affecting the health of communities, a new branch of civil engineering
was recognized by the Institute in 1889 by the establishment of a
regular four years’ course in sanitary engineering, in which particular
attention is directed to such problems, and students are afforded
opportunities of studying the bearing of chemistry and biology upon
them. Here again the breadth and specialization of the work at the
Institute was shown, rendering it possible with no change in the
teaching force and with no disarrangement of studies, to establish such
a course of instruction as soon as the need for it became apparent.

Interesting work has been done under the direction of Professor
Burton, professor of topographical engineering, in connection with
the measurement of base lines with the steel tape. After devising
an apparatus for holding and supporting the tape, and measuring the
coefficient of expansion of actual tapes, an application was recently
made of the thermophone for determining the exact average temperature
of the tape. This instrument, which was invented a few years ago by two
Institute graduates, allows the average temperature of the tape to be
measured within half a degree.

An interesting department of the Institute, and one that has of recent
years assumed great practical importance, is that of biology. It was
organized in 1882, as an outgrowth of what was prior to that date
the course in natural history, and now has a teaching force of six,
under the direction of Prof. William T. Sedgwick, and occupies, with
its laboratories and lecture-rooms, one entire floor of the Pierce
Building. There are five distinct laboratories, fully equipped,
with private rooms, store and preparation rooms, and a library and
reading-room, and it is perhaps safe to say that nowhere in the United
States is there so compact or well arranged a series of laboratories
devoted chiefly to the sanitary, hygienic and industrial aspects of
biology. The great advances in sanitary science in recent years have
made bacteriology one of the most important, as well as one of the most
practical, of the biological sciences, and the biologist has taken his
place beside the chemist and the engineer in the study of the science
and art of public sanitation. But bacteriology is of importance,
not only in sanitary science, but also in its industrial relations.
Great industries, like those connected with food preserving, canning,
vinegar making, tanning and brewing, depend upon the activity or the
exclusion of micro-organisms. As might be expected in a school of
applied science, the development of the biological department in the
Institute has been mainly along sanitary and industrial lines, rather
than in the direction of zoölogy. The biological work in connection
with the recent important investigations of the State Board of Health
regarding the purification of water and the disposal of sewage, was
done at the Institute, and early led to special instruction in these
directions. In 1894 a course was established in the micro-organisms of
fermentation, not only new to the Institute, but, it is believed, to
the United States. Important researches had been made in Denmark in
these lines, and in order to become thoroughly familiar with them, one
of the instructors of the department spent a summer in the laboratory