Light Science for Leisure Hours A series of familiar essays on scientific subjects, natural phenomena, &c.

It may seem, at first sight, that, after all, the result of the Cambridge style should be as effective as that of the other. If arms and shoulders do their work in both crews wi...

On the other hand, Mr. Edward Hull, of the Geological Survey, calculated that with an increase of but one million and a half of tons per annum—considerably less than even the av...

Considered as a time-piece, what are the earth’s errors? Suppose, for a moment, that the earth was _timed_ and _rated_ two thousand years ago, how much has she _lost_, and what...

There must be a singular charm about insoluble problems, since there are never wanting persons who are willing to attack them. I doubt not that at this moment there are persons...

We thus seem to have _primâ facie_ evidence that the sea reached by Kane communicates either with the Pacific or with the Atlantic, or—which is the most probable view—with both...

It is impossible to contemplate the effects which followed the great earthquake—the passage of a sea-wave of enormous volume over fully one-third of the earth’s surface, and the...

Here is another artifice, extremely simple in principle, though not altogether so simple in its application. My readers must bear with me while I briefly describe the qualities...

But it must be admitted that the question of the depth to which our coal mines may be conveniently or even possibly worked, has an unpleasantly doubtful aspect. Of the stores wh...

Amongst such animals the sword-fish must be recognised as one of the most uncomfortably-armed creatures in existence. The shark has to turn on his back before he can eat, and th...

The modern theories of the correlation of force suffice to show how enormous a loss a country suffers when there is a failure in the supply of rain, or when that supply comes ou...

There is a very prevalent but erroneous opinion that the magnetic needle points to the north. I remember well how I discovered in my boyhood that the needle does _not_ point to...

The rocks through which the excavations have been made have been for the most part very difficult to work. Those who imagine that the great mass of our mountain ranges consists...

For so remarkable a phenomenon as this, none but a cosmical cause can suffice. We can neither say that the spots cause the magnetic storms nor that the magnetic storms cause the...

Although so many months have passed since this terrible calamity took place, scientific men have been busily engaged until quite recently in endeavouring to ascertain the real s...

The most destructive floods which have occurred in Switzerland have usually been those which take place in early summer. The floods which inundated the plains of Martigny in 181...

Pietro Giacomo di Toledo gives us some account of the phenomena which preceded the eruption: ‘That plain which lies between Lake Avernus, the Monte Barbaro, and the sea, was rai...

Doubtless the cooling influence of the arctic currents is appreciable; but it would be a mistake to suppose that this influence can suffice to deprive the Gulf current of its di...

There seems, however, no special reason why cyclones should follow the storm-⊂ in one direction rather than in the other. We must, to understand this, recall the fact that under...

In preparing this edition, only those passages which have been shown by recent researches to be erroneous have been removed. It has not been thought necessary, or even desirable...

We know that the inference is absurd in each of the above instances, and we are able at once to show where the flaw in the reasoning lies. We know that splendid flowers are more...

It is clear that the narrative would not have been impaired in any way, while its probability and consistency would have been increased, if Patroclus had fought in his own armou...