The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1886-08-19
Facts and Theory.

:
words as a final reply to your Stockton cores
pondent who has honored us by more than Il
column of explanation of his 'theory" of rain,
explosives, thunder and lightning, cohesion,
and several other obscure natural phenomena.
After | had written short reply to your
correspondents 'thcory of rain,' ! was sorry,
thinking it was only ajoke on his part, but fear
ing that some, less versed in science than he
must be, would be led from the truth by such
theorizng even in fun, sent it. But it seems
now that he was in earnest, that having slept all
through these years of scientific research and
progress. he has heard in his sleep few chem
ical terms and has just awakcd and tells his
antediluvian dreams in modern phrascology.
Or is he still asleep, and only murmuring these
things in his dreams?
As he has limited, l had mt the purpose of
crushing rising genius, or of preventing the
publication of theories to account for natural
mysteries, but simply to show that this partic-
ular "genills" with his theories was on the
wrong road, and had not mastered the facts of
science well enough to warrant the promulga-
ton Of his ideas. There are no rules for the
formation Of Il theory, but certainly one pre-
requisite is a mastery of the facts upon which
the theory claims to be founded Besides,
theories should be viewed from all possible
points of view, and the maker of them should
carefully examine them to ascertain if they fit
the facts Every man is, born more or less of
Il thcorist, but every man does not publish his
theories in Il newspaper. A very itcratc
New Hampshire man, some time ago, felt
moved to preach, and when reasoned with by
a more enlightened brother, asked: ''Don't the
Scriptcrs command us to 90 out into the world
and preach the Gospel to every erecter:'
Yes replied his friend, ''but they don't COM
mand every 'crecter' to preach the Gospel
Now first, your correspondent seeks to cX-
plain why water evaporatcs when exposed to
heat, or the sun, and his explanation is about
as follows: Nitrogen which exists in LARGE
quantities in the air, has Il great desire for
oxygen which is in water; it siczes what it can
hold and carries it off, while the hydrogen
which is thus left behind takes what remains
of the water and flies after it, Nothing could
be farther from the truth than this In fact.
nitrogen has scarcely any affinity for oxygen,
and although it has been mixed for ages with
oxygen in the air, it has never vet seen fit to
unite with it chemically any more than water
does with the sugar dissolved i'll it. | will not
insult the intelligence of your readers by en-
planning the well-known cause Of the rising of
vapor, and will only add that your correspond
cnt might gain considerable insight into the
dark mysteries of evaporation if hr would
take the trouble to experiment with an air
pump or the Torrecellian vacuum. Though
no nitrogen Is present in these yacua, vet water
evaporates and the vapor arises with the great
est facility.
Secondly, he has confoundcd the ideas of
chemical union and physical union. In the
former two or more substances unite to form
another totally unlike either, and can be obtain
ed again only with the greatest diliicuty in
the latter no change takes place other than
fine division of the substances, each of which
may be readily regained by evaporation, sift-
ing or some other process. Here is an expert
mcnt that any one can make: Take equal guam
titles of powdered sulphur and iron filings and
mix thoroughly; then with 4 magnet we can
pick out every grain Of the filings. Mix the
substance again and heat them gently over
| candle and they will unite with a bright flash
and all the skill of the stockton correspondent
| could not separate them.
Thirdly, his explanation of thunder is very
curious. 1t seems almost like cruelty to quote
his words. There would be 10 thunder if the
air did not contain the four elements we find in
dynamite, namely, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen,
and carbon. Leave either Of these out and
you will lose the thunder the lightning and the
deStructyeneS>."
Now whether this is meant in earnest or not
| cannot say, but the little grammatical Joke in
the latter sentence inclined me to think that il
Is not. 1t was Il belief of our great grand
mothers that tightening AMI thunder Were due
to the explosion of combustibcs which had
collected in the air, but since the time of
Franklin. no sane man has doubted that they
were due TO electricity. Two strata of air
charged with different kinds Of eIectricitv or
i'll different degrees with the same kind approach
each other, and when near enough to allow the
electricity to overcome the resistance Of the
air 1t leaps across the chasm and restores the
equilibrium, and the thunder is the meeting Of
the air-mocculcs that have been so violently
separated. But your correspondent is not
satisfied with his dynamite theory of thunder,
but he offers another, so that one may take his
choice at the same price. ''Alv idea he saVS,
lis, that 1t Is the explosion of rain drops. one
causing the explosion of another they fall"
W hat i'll the world should make rain drops eN-
plode because they run into one another, or
should make them kick when set on fire, or
why they should be so willing to burn mp i'll
''clOudland" and be obstinate down here, or
why they travel 50 rapidly as to make zigzas
lightning up there. and yet fall 50 innorentlg
as not to inJure the upturncd nose would take
Stockton philosopher to explain. one needs
to read this extraordinary paragraph of his in
which he constructs double barreled. dynl-
mite loaded. seven shooting drop of water by
just taking it up few miles where nobody can
see him.
Fourthly, he eNclaim>: Nov if the noise OF
explosion neither helps nor hinders the rain
why does it thunder" | think this must be
printers bundcr, and should read ''why in
thunder does it, 1t has always seemed to me
that the reason why it rained when the thunder
becomes heavy is that the rain-bearin- cloud,
have arrived overhead.
But time fails me to speak of YOUR corrc-
spondent's computations, all based upon in
accuracies; of his total forgetfuInc>s of the
ditfusivcness of hydrogen; of his universal
stlcker, carbon, over whose properties he
WAKES eloquent, forgetting totally the di>tinc-
ton between adhesion and cohesion; of his
total Ignorance of the fact that the German
needle gun eNplodes all its cartridges in the
centre; Of his highest rain drops coming from
the highest clouds: and only SutficcS to say Il
kindly word to our '.tmd adventurer" DO
not stop your thcorizing but give us a theory
of the earth, showing how flat it is, and be
sure never to look into Il book to Sub>tantiate
your figures; give us Il theory of the moon
based upon the adhesive properties of carbon,
or show us how porous plasterS' give us their
most afiectionate embraces by means of this
great stckcr: and finally explain how the sun
is only Il great "breachburncd" rain drop aud
that water is fire if we could only be ignorant
enough to believe it. j. .EC.
The numbers of The Living Age for August
7th and 14th contain Louis AgasSiZ, London
Quarterly; History in Punch, The Novci>ts
and their Patrons and Pastcur, Fortnightlv:
Edmund Burke, Contemporary; The Primrose
League. Nineteenth Century; The Mc,litations
of Il Parish Priest, Backwood; The Templars,
by j. A. Froudc, Good Words; A Christening
in karpathos, Macmillan; The Beasts and
Birds of the Law, the Spites of Rulers, and
the Contrast between Buddhist and Christian
Teaching. Spectator; The First Watcr-Mcadow,
st. James Gazette; In Hcigoand, All the
Year Round; On the Variations of Climate in
the Course of Time, Nature; Old Letters,
Globe; with instaments of "Don Angeles
Stray Sheep" "ThiS Mans Wife,""A Garden
of Memories and ''Sainte Marie" and Poetry.
Our dealings with China and Japan are be-
coming more intimate every day With us the