unconsciously given. I saw that pathetic scene in the
jungle while the doctor was speaking, heard the last
words, saw the boat with its dear freight gliding
through the tropical n ig h t; and yet I was sharing in
the talk over the wine, and I was thankful to the
doctor for his emphatic opinion, that to be shot through
the lungs means a sudden and painless death.
v.
In 1880-1 Frank contributed a long series of “ Science
Notes ” to a country journal, under the nom de plume
of “ A Professor of Chemistry.” They cover about
forty newspaper columns. I find them in a scrapbook,
annotated with a few memoranda here and
there. The “ Notes ” are in themselves more or less
instructive; they exhibit a general love of inquiry and
a desire to thrash out controversial subjects. A cordial
sical moment, to fall dead—struck as if by a thunderbolt—while giving
an arrogant command that is to control heaven itself ; and it seems
to me that he should collapse ignominiously, as I try to illustrate.” .
“ Yon succeed perfectly,” the doctor replied, “ and from a
physiological point of view, too.”
“ Hamlet’s death, on the other hand, I would fry to make sweet
and gentle as the character, as if the ‘ flights of angels winged him to
his rest.’ ”
“ You seem to have a genius for fathoming the conceptions of your
authors, Mr. Irving,” said the doctor; “ and it is, of course, very
important to the illusion of a scene that the reality of it should be
consistently maintained. Last night I went to see a play called
«Moths,’ at Wallack’s. There is a young man in it who acts very
well; but he, probably by the fault of the author more than his own,
commits a grave error in the manner of his death. We are told that
he is shot through the lungs. This means almost immediate unconsciousness,
and a quick, painless death ; yet the actor in question came
upon the stage after receiving this fatal wound, made a coherent
speech, and died in a peaceful attitude.”—Henry Irving’s Impressions
of America.
acknowledgment of the merits of great men, and an
appreciation of their work, are manifest throughout the
entire series. But it appears that Frank had an opponent
with whom he occasionally crossed swords. One
of his encounters is worth recording. I t is sufficiently
explained in the young professor’s reply, and I think
the subject is one that may not be uninteresting for its
own sake.
In some notes of mine which appeared a few weeks ago in your
columns, I made some statements concerning Mr. Joshua Prusol,
which “ a Reader of Colburn’s New Monthly also ” has taken very
much to heart. In his very enthusiastic but somewhat indiscreet
letter in your last week’s issue, he makes some remarks which I feel
obliged, in the interests of common sense and wholesome scientific
thought, to contradict. In my refutation I will overlook the entire
absurdity of the whole article, and shut my eyes, as far as possible, to
the lamentable ignorance of scientific knowledge which it displays. I
will treat the arguments, however, as those of a thinking man, and will
now call in review the “ theories ” which your correspondent advances ■
theories, by-the-bye, which the merest tyro at science could easily refute.
The “ Reader of Colburn’s New Monthly also ” begins by a dogmatic
statement that “ where there is no atmosphere there is no heat,” and
that “ the heat we enjoy is not solar but atmospheric.” As a proof of
this he brings forward the cold of the Arctic regions, and states,
entirely on his own authority, that “ were the sun the source of heat,
the intensity of the cold would increase, till in a short time there
would be no heat, and thus the men would be congealed into statues.”
It is evident to me, from the above, that the gentleman in question
does not know what heat is; it seems that he is bringing to life the
old theory of caloric, a theory exploded at least a hundred years ago.
For your correspondent’s edification, and I hope instruction, I will
give the following :—The heat of a body is caused; by an extremely
rapid oscillating or vibratory motion of its molecules, and the hottest
bodies are those in which the vibrations have the greatest velocity and
the greatest amplitude. Hence heat is not a substance, but a condition
of matter, and a condition which can be transferred from one body to
the other. There is also probably an elastic ether which pervades all
matter and infinite space. A hot body sets this in rapid vibration, and
D