Chapter 9

Dr. C.T. Jackson analyzed a portion of one meteorite weighing 4½ oz.; the piece was 2½ in. long, 1¼ in. wide, and 1 in. in average thickness. In the course of his report he stated: "Its specific gravity is 3.456 at 68 deg. Fahr., barom. 29.9. Its structure is imperfectly granular, but not crystallized, and there are small black specks of the size of a pin's head, and smaller, of malleable meteoric iron, which are readily removed from the crushed stone by the magnet. The color of the mass is ash gray. A portion of the surface is black and is scarified by fusion. Its hardness is not superior to that of olivine or massive chrysolite. Chemical analysis shows that its composition is that of a ferruginous olivine. One gramme of the stone, crushed in an agate mortar, and acted on by a magnet, yielded 0.43 gramme of meteoric iron, which was malleable. After the removal of this a qualitative analysis was made of the residual powder. Another gramme was also taken, without picking out the metallic iron, and was tested for chlorine and for phosphoric acid. The results of the qualitative analysis were that the stone contains silica, magnesia, a little alumina, oxide of iron and nickel, a little tin, an alloy of iron and nickel, phosphoric acid, and a trace of chlorine. These ingredients being determined, the plan for a quantitative analysis was laid out, and was duly executed by the usual and approved methods The following are the results of this analysis, per centum:

Silica, with traces of tin 40.000 Magnesia 26.600 Peroxide of iron 27.700 Metallic iron 3.500 Metallic nickel 0.800 Alumina 0.400 Chlorine 0.049 Phosphoric acid not weighed -- ______ 99.049"

Messrs. Dewar and Ansdell analyzed the gases in the meteorite, of which it contained three times its volume; the gases were in the following proportions to each other:

Carbonic acid 61.29 Carbonic oxide 7.52 Hydrogen 30.96 Nitrogen 0.23 ______ 100.00

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TELESCOPIC SEARCH FOR THE TRANS-NEPTUNIAN PLANET.

[Footnote: By David P. Todd, M.A., from the _Proceedings_ of the American Academy of Arts and Science.]

In the twentieth volume of the _American Journal of Science_, at page 225, I gave a preliminary account of my search, theoretic and practical, for the trans-Neptunian planet. I say _the_ trans-Neptunian planet, because I regard the evidence of its existence as well-founded, and further because, since the time when I was engaged upon this search, nothing has in the least weakened my entire conviction as to its existence in about that part of the sky assigned; while, as is well known, the independent researches in cometary perturbations by Prof. Forbes conducted him to a result identical with my own--a coincidence not to be lightly set aside as pure accident.

That five years have elapsed since this coincidence was remarked, and the planet is still unfound, is not sufficient assurance to me that its existence is merely fanciful. In so far as I am informed, this spot of the sky has received very little scrutiny with telescopes competent to such a search; and most observers finding nothing would, I suspect, prefer not to announce their ineffective search.

The time has now come when this search can be profitably undertaken by any observer having the rare combination of time, enthusiasm, and the necessary appliances. Strongly marked developments in astronomical photography have been effected since this optical search was conducted; and the capacity of the modern dry-plate for the registry of the light of very faint stars makes the application of this method the shortest and surest way of detecting any such object. Nor is this purely an opinion of my own. But the required apparatus would be costly; and the instrument, together with the services of an astronomer and a photographer, would, for the time being, be necessarily devoted exclusively to the work. While, however, the photographic search might have to be ended with a negative result, in so far as the trans-Neptunian planet is concerned, there would still remain the series of photographic maps of the region explored, and these would be of incalculable service in the astronomy of the future.

In the latter part of the paper alluded to above, I stated the speculative basis upon which I restricted the stellar region to be examined; also the fact that between November of 1877 and March of 1878 I was engaged in a telescopic scrutiny of this region, employing the twenty-six inch refractor of the Naval Observatory. For the purposes contemplated I had no hesitation in adopting the method of search whereby I expected to detect the planet by the contrast of its disk and light with the appearance of an average star of about the thirteenth magnitude. A power of 600 diameters was often employed, but the field of view of this eye-piece was so restricted that a power of 400 diameters had to be used most of the time. I say, too, that, "after the first few nights, I was surprised at the readiness with which my eye detected any variation from the average appearance of a star of a given faint magnitude; as a consequence whereof my observing book contains a large stock of memoranda of suspected objects. My general plan with these was to observe with a sufficient degree of accuracy the position of all suspected objects. On the succeeding night of observation they were re-observed; and, at an interval of several weeks thereafter, the observation was again verified." Subjoined to the original observations are printed these verifications in heavy-faced type.

In conducting the search, the plans were several times varied in slight detail, generally because experience with the work enabled me to make improvements in method. Usually, I prepared every few days a new zone chart of the region over which I was about to search; and these charts while containing memoranda of all the instrumental data which could be prepared beforehand, were likewise so adjusted with reference to the opposition-time of the planet as to avoid, if possible, its stationary point. The same thing, too, was kept in mind in selecting the times of subsequent observation. Notwithstanding this precaution, however, it would be well if some observer who has a large telescope should now re-examine the positions of these objects.

Researches in faint nebulæ and nebulous stars appearing likely to constitute a separate and interesting branch of the astronomy of the future, it has seemed to me that the astronomers engaged in this work may like to make a careful examination of some of the stars entered in my observing book under the category of "suspected objects." The method I adopted of insuring re-observation of these objects was by the determination, not of their absolute, but only of their relative, positions, through the agency of the larger "finder" of the great telescope. This has an aperture of five inches, a power of thirty diameters, and a field of view of seventy-eight minutes of arc. Two diagrams were usually drawn in the book for each of these objects, the one showing the relation of adjacent objects in the great telescope, and the other the configuration of the more conspicuous objects in the field of view of the finder. Adjacent to these "finder" diagrams are the settings--to the nearest minute of arc in declination, and of time in right ascension--as read from the large finding-circles, divided in black and white. The field of view of the finder is crossed by two pairs of hairlines, making a square of about twelve minutes on a side by their intersection at the center. The diagrams in all cases represent the objects as seen with an inverting eye-piece. As the adjustment of the finder was occasionally verified, as well as the readings of the large circles, there should be no trouble in identifying any of these objects, notwithstanding the fact that no estimates of absolute magnitude were recorded. The relative magnitudes, while intended to be only approximate, are still shown with sufficient accuracy for the purpose of the research, and the diagrams are, in general, faithful tracings from the original memoranda.

[Mr. Todd transcribes the observing book entire.]

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[AMERICAN ANNALS OF THE DEAF AND DUMB.]

NOTES ON MANUAL SPELLING.

The inestimable value of speech-reading and the practicability of its acquisition under favorable conditions is a matter of common experience and observation but justice to the deaf requires a recognition of the fact that speech-reading has its limitations. Certain English words, chiefly short ones, are practically alike to the speech-reader and the context may fail sometimes to give a clew. It is necessary, at times, in communicating with even expert speech-readers, to have recourse to writing or oral spelling to convey the names of persons, places, technical terms, etc., not in common use. Moreover, it is convenient to have accurate and rapid means of conversation under unfavorable conditions as to light and distance, or when from any cause the deaf person's voice cannot be heard.

Writing is slow, inconvenient, and often impossible. Writing upon the palm of the hand was proposed by the Abbe Deschamps in 1778, as utilizing the sense of touch, and was used in darkness by him as a substitute for speech, but it is neither accurate nor rapid. Writing in the air[1] with the finger is also slow and uncertain, while the action is unpleasantly conspicuous.

[Footnote 1: The brilliant but wily Sicard, whose "show" pupils were accustomed to honoring drafts at sight in appropriate responses to all sorts of questions, acting upon the motto, _Mundus vult decipi, ergo decipiatur_, schooled certain pupils in deciphering writing in the air, and was thus prepared, in emergencies at his public exhibitions, to convey intimations of the answers, while supposed to be using "signs" in putting questions.]

Finger-spelling would appear to be a far more convenient, easy, rapid, and accurate adjunct to speech or substitute for it than writing.

It is a common error to consider the ordinary manual alphabets as deaf-mute alphabets and finger-spelling as the sign-language of the deaf. Finger-spelling is to the deaf a borrowed art. It is used by many of the educated deaf and their friends as a substitute for the sign-language, and it enables them also to supply the deficiencies of the sign-language by incorporating words from written language. Scagliotti, of Turin, devised a system of initial signs[2] which begin with letters of the manual alphabet, and Dr. Isaac Lewis Peet, of New York, has made a similar application of manual letters to signs to suggest words of our written language to the initiated deaf. But it should not be forgotten that practice in finger-spelling is practice in our language.

[Footnote 2: _Quatrieme Circulaire_, Paris, 1836, p. 16. Carton's _Memoire_, 1845, p. 73.]

The origin of finger-spelling is not known. Barrois, a distinguished orientalist, in his _Dactylologie et Langage primitif_[3], ingeniously traces evidences of finger-spelling, from the Assyrian antiquities down to the fifteenth century upon monuments of art.

[Footnote 3: Barrois: _Dactylologie et langage primitif_, Paris, 1850, Firmin Didot freres.]

The ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans were familiar with manual arithmetic and finger-numeration, as quaint John Bulwer shows by numerous citations in his _Chironomia_ (1644). The earliest finger-alphabets extant appear to have been based upon finger-signs for numbers, as, for instance, that given by the Venerable Bede (672-735) in his _De Loguela per Gestum Digitorum sive Indigitatione_, figured in the Ratisbon edition of 1532.[4] Monks and others who had special reason to prize secret and silent modes of communication, beyond doubt invented and used many forms of finger alphabets as well as systems of manual signs.[5] The oldest plates in the library of the National Deaf Mute College are found in the _Thesaurus Artificiosae Memoriae_ of frater Cosmas P. Rossellius of Florence, printed in 1579, which gives three forms of one-hand alphabets. Bonet's work[6] of 1620 gives one form of the one hand Spanish manual alphabet, which contains forms identical with certain letters in the alphabets of 1579. This was introduced into France by Pereire and taught to the Abbe de l'Epee by Saboureux de Fontenay, the gifted pupil of Pereire. The good Abbe however continued to use a French[7] two-hand alphabet which, he had learned when a child and which he said all school-children knew. He mentions also a Spanish alphabet in part requiring both hands, and remarks that different nations have different manual alphabets. The Abbe Deschamps, a rival of De l'Epee, made use of a finger alphabet in teaching the deaf to speak, which was not adapted to rapid use. John Bulwer, in his _Chirologia, or the Naturall Language of the Hand_, printed in 1644, figures five manual alphabets for secret communication.

[Footnote 4: The library of the New York Institution contains a copy of this very rare edition, bearing the title _Abacus atque velustissima Latinorum per digitos manusque numerandi (quinetiam loquendi) consuetudo_, etc., Ratisbonae, 1532.]

[Footnote 5: For an exhaustive account of the gesture speech in Anglo-Saxon monasteries and of the Cistercian monks, who were under rigid vows of silence, see F. Kluge: _Zur Geschichte der Zeichensprache.--Angelsachsische indicia Monaslerialia,_ in _International Zeitschrift fur Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft,_ II. Band, I. Halfte. Leipzig, 1885.]

[Footnote 6: _Reduccion de lasletras y arte para ensenar a hablar los mudos_, 1620. The writer is under obligations to Sr. Santos M. Robledo, of the Ministry of Public Works and Education, for advance sheets of the reprint in beautiful facsimile of this rare work ordered by the Spanish Government in 1881.]

[Footnote 7: The Abbe de l'Epee did not master the Spanish alphabet, and, attaching but little importance to manual spelling, he was unsparing in his criticism of _Messieurs the dactylologists_, but by "the irony of fate" this alphabet occupies a face of the pedestal of one statue to his memory, and in another statue the good Abbe is represented either as receiving this alphabet from the skies or as devoutly using it.]

The first alphabet which appears to have been devised expressly for use in teaching the deaf is that of George Dalgarno, of Aberdeen (1626-1687), given in his remarkable philosophical treatise, _Didascalocophus, or the Deaf and Dumb Man's Tutor_, Oxford, 1680. A facsimile of this alphabet is given in the _Annals_, vol. ix., page 19. Words are spelled by touching with your finger the positions indicated, either upon your hand or upon the hand of your interlocutor. An alphabet of the same character, however, was not unknown at an earlier date. For Bulwer, in 1648, says: "A pregnant example of the officious nature of the Touch in supplying the defect or temporall incapacity of the other senses we have in one Master _Babington_ of _Burntwood_ in the County of _Essex_, an ingenious gentleman, who through some sicknesse becoming _deaf_, doth notwithstanding feele words, and as if he had an eye in his finger, sees signes in the darke; whose Wife discourseth very perfectly with him by a strange way of Arthrologie or Alphabet contrived on the joynts of his Fingers; who taking him by the hand in the night, can so discourse with him very exactly; for he feeling the joynts which she toucheth for letters, by them collected into words, very readily conceives what shee would suggest unto him. By which examples [referring to this case and to that of an abbot who became _deaf, dumb_, and _blind_, who understood writing traced upon his naked arm] you may see how ready upon any invitation of Art, the _Tact_ is, to supply the defect, and to officiate for any or all of the other senses, as being the most faithfull sense to man, being both the _Founder_, and _Vicar generall_ to all the rest."[8]

[Footnote 8: _Philocophus_: or, THE DEAFE and Dumbe Mans Friend. By I.B. [John Bulwer] sirnamed the _Chorosopher_. London, 1648. Pp. 106,107.]

Dr. Alexander Graham Bell has modified the Dalgarno alphabet, and has made considerable use of it in its modified form as figured in the _Annals_, vol. xxviii., page 133. He esteems it highly for certain purposes, especially as employing touch to assist the sight or to release the sight for other employment, as in reading speech for instance. Here a touch-alphabet may be an efficient aid to the sight, as the touch may fairly keep pace with the rapidity of oral expression in deliberate speech. An objection of Dr. Kitto to the two-hand alphabet so widely know by school-children and others in Great Britain and in this country would seem to apply with greater force to the Dalgarno alphabet: "To hit the right digit on all occasions is by far the most difficult point to learn in the use of the [two-hand] manual alphabet, and it is hard to be sure which fingers have been touched."[9]

[Footnote 9: Dr. Kitto remaks the following common mistakes in reading rapid two-hand spelling: the confounding _i_ with _e_ or _o_; _d_ with _p_; _l_ with _t_; _f_ with _x_; _r_ with _t_ and with one form of _j_; _n_ with _v_, and adds: "Upon the whole, the system is very defective, and is capable of great improvement." _--The Lost Senses_, p. 107.]

It is not the purpose of the writer to attempt even a catalogue of the numerous finger alphabets, common, tactile, phonetic, "phonomimic," "phonodactylologic," and syllabic, which have been proposed for the special use of the deaf.

The one-hand alphabet used by Ponce and figured by Bonet was common in Spanish almanacs hawked by ballad-mongers upon the streets of Madrid in the days of De l'Epee, and although rejected by him, it was adopted by his pupils. This with slight modifications became the French manual alphabet which was introduced at Hartford by Dr. Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet. This alphabet is known in almost every hamlet in the land. Slight changes in the form of certain letters, or in the position of the hand, in the direction of greater perspicuity and capacity for rapid use, have taken place gradually, though there is no absolute uniformity of usage among instructors or pupils.

This "American" alphabet, as here presented, through the liberality of Dr. A. Graham Bell, has been drawn and engraved from photographs, and represents typical positions of the fingers, hand and fore-arm from a uniform point of view in front of the person spelling, or as seen in a large mirror by the user himself.[10]

[Footnote 10: See an interesting paper on figured manual alphabets by H.H. Hollister, _Annals_, xv., 88-93.]

This alphabet can be learned in less than an hour, and many have learned it by extraordinary application in ten minutes. It is recommended that the arm be held in an easy position near the body, with the fore-arm as in the plates. Each letter should be mastered before leaving it. Speed will come with use; it should not be attempted nor permitted until the forms of the letters and the appropriate positions of the hand are thoroughly familiar. The forms as given are legible from the distant parts of a public hall. In colloquial use the fingers need not be so closely held nor firmly flexed, as represented, but sprawling should be avoided. It is not necessary to move the arm, but a slight leverage at the elbow is conducive to ease and is permissible, provided the hand delivers the letters steadily within an imaginary immovable ring of, say, ten inches in diameter.

This adjunct to speech-reading is recommended for its convenience, clearness, rapidity, and ease in colloquial use, as well as for its value as an educational instrument in impressing words, phrases, and sentences in their spelled form upon the mind, in testing the comprehension of children, and in affording by easy steps a substitute for the sign-language.

In the simultaneous instruction of large classes not able to follow speech, finger-spelling "may take the place of signs to a great extent in the definition, explanation, and illustration of single words and phrases, and in questions and answers upon the lessons, and in communications of every kind to which the stock of language already acquired may be adequate."[11]

[Footnote 11: _The Use of the Manual Alphabet_, by S. Porter: Proceedings of the Eighth Convention of American Instructors, pp. 21-30. Copies of the Proceedings which contain this extremely valuable paper may be obtained of R. Mathison, Superintendent of the Ontario Institution, Belleville, Ontario.]

All who have anything to do with the school instruction of the deaf may well bear in mind the matured opinion and wise counsel of Professor Samuel Porter, of the National College, the Nestor of American instructors. In this connection, Professor Porter says:

_In short, let the gestural signs come in only as a last resort, or, so far as possible, merely as supplementary to words, re-enforcing them in some instances, or employed as a test of the pupil's knowledge of words, but always, so far as possible, falling behind and taking a subordinate place. And let the pupils be required, in what they have to say to their teachers in the schoolroom or elsewhere, to employ the finger-alphabet instead of natural signs to the utmost possible extent, and this by complete sentences and not in a fragmentary way_.

JOSEPH C. GORDON, M.A.,

_Professor in the National College, Washington, D.C._.

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FRUITS AND SEEDS FOR DRESS-TRIMMING.

The use of natural flowers for decorating the person is instinctive among certain peoples, and a question of fashion among others. It is in Oceanica especially that this taste seems to be nationally developed, and from the narrative of Cook we know that the Tahitian belles use in their toilet the perfumed flowers of the pua and tiare (_Carissa grandis_ and _Gardenia Tahitensis_), whose dazzling whiteness renders still more marked the ebony blackness of their wealth of hair.

In Europe this custom is traditional in many countries. Women of fashion scarcely ever appear at a soiree or ball without wearing a camellia or an exotic orchid on their breast or in their head-dress, and so, too, gentlemen of "high life" do not go out without a boutonniere of white violets or Cape jasmine.

But natural flowers, being ephemeral, were once replaced in the toilets of ladies by artificial ones. The artificial flower industry originated in China, and from thence passed into Italy and afterward into France. In course of time people got tired of artificial flowers for decorative purposes, and then imitation fruits made their appearance, and were worn in the toilets of dowagers and mothers of families.

Now that fashion, that tyrant born of dressmakers, milliners, and tailors of renown, obliges us to clothe ourselves according to accepted models, the kaleidoscope no longer suffices to find the most varied designs and most fantastic cuts for garbs or ornament.

In recent years pleasing objects have been borrowed from the animal kingdom, such as small birds and quadrupeds, and insects with brilliant colors and of strange forms. What formerly would have been a repulsive object (such as a great longicorn or beetle) is worn with ease by the belles of our time. The use of such objects of natural history, however, has been about confined to the decoration of head-dresses or the manufacture of jewelry.