Broca's Brain: The Romance of Science

caught in an Atlantic storm, and he did not arrive in time for the celebration ceremony. He is described as requiring several days to recover from the storm, whereupon the RAS hospitably gave a second dinner for him. Barnard’s lecture seems to have been spectacular and made full use of that recently improved audio-visual aid, the lantern slide projector.

In his discussion of his photograph of the region of the Milky Way near Theta Ophiuchus he concluded that “the entire groundwork of the Milky Way… has a substratum of nebulous matter.” (Meanwhile H. K. Palmer reported no nebulosity in photographs of the globular cluster M13.) Barnard, who was a superb visual observer, expressed considerable doubts about Percival Lowell’s view of an inhabited and canal-infested Mars. In his thanks to Barnard for his lecture, the president of the Royal Astronomical Society, Sir Robert Ball, voiced concern that henceforth he “should regard the canals in Mars with some suspicion, nay, even the seas [of Mars, the dark areas] had partly fallen under a ban. Perhaps the lecturer’s recent experiences on the Atlantic might explain something of this mistrust.” Lowell’s views were not then in favor in England, as another notice in Observatory indicated. In response to an inquiry on which books had most pleased and interested him in 1896, Professor Norman Lockyer replied, “Mars by Percival Lowell, Sentimental Tommy by J. M. Barrie. (No Time for Reading Seriously).”

Prizes in astronomy for 1898 awarded by the Academie Francaise included one to Seth Chandler for the discovery of the variation in latitude; one to Belopolsky, partly for studies of spectroscopic binary stars; and one to Schott for work on terrestrial magnetism. There was also a prize competition for the best treatise on “the theory of perturbations of Hyperion,” a moon of Saturn. We are informed that “the only essay presented was that by Dr. G. W. Hill of Washington to whom the prize was awarded.”

The Astronomical Society of the Pacific’s Bruce Medal was awarded in 1899 to Dr. Arthur Auwers of Berlin. The dedicatory address included the following remarks: “Today Auwers stands at the head of German astronomy. In him is seen the highest type of investigator in our time, one perhaps better developed in Germany than in any other country. The work of men of this type is marked by minute and careful research, untiring industry in the accumulation of facts, caution in propounding new theories or explanations, and, above all, the absence of effort to gain recognition by being the first to make a discovery.” In 1899 the Henry Draper Gold Medal of the National Academy of Sciences was presented for the first time in seven years. The recipient was Keeler. In 1898 Brooks, whose observatory was in Geneva, New York, announced the discovery of his twenty-first comet-which Brooks described as “achieving his majority.” Shortly thereafter he received the Lalande Prize of the Academie Francaise for his record in discovering comets.

In 1897, in connection with an exhibition in Brussels, the Belgian government offered prizes for the solutions of certain problems in astronomy. These problems included the numerical value ofred prizes for the solutions of certain problems in astronomy. These problems included the numerical value of the acceleration due to gravity on Earth, the secular acceleration of the Moon, the net motion of the solar system through space, the variation of latitude, the photography of planetary surfaces, and the nature of the canals of Mars. A final topic was the invention of a method to observe the solar corona in the absence of an eclipse. Monthly Notices (20:145) commented: “… if this pecuniary reward does induce anyone to solve this last problem or in fact any of the others, we think the money will be well spent.”

However, reading the scientific papers of this time, one gets the impression that the focus had shifted to other topics than those for which prizes were-being given. Sir William and Lady Huggins performed laboratory experiments which showed that at low pressures the emission spectrum of calcium exhibited only the so-called H and K lines. They concluded that the Sun was composed chiefly of hydrogen, helium, “coronium” and calcium. Huggins had earlier established a stellar spectral sequence, which he believed was evolutionary. The Darwinian influence in science was very strong in this period, and among American astronomers T. J. J. See’s work was notably dominated by a Darwinian perspective. It is interesting to compare Huggins’ spectral sequence with the present Morgan- Keenan spectral types:

HUGGINS’ STELLAR SPECTRAL SEQUENCE

Order of Increasing Age-Star (and modern spectral type in parentheses)-

Young-Sirius (A1V)

…

Altair (A7 IV-V)

Rigel (B8Ia)

Deneb (A2Ia)

…

…– Vega (A0V)

– Capella (G8, G0)

Arcturus (K1 III)

Aldebaran (K5 III)-Sun (G0)

Old-Betelgeuse (M2 I)-

Note: The modern stellar spectral sequence runs, from “early” to “late” spectral types, as O, B, A, F, G, K, M. Huggins was very nearly right.

We can see here the origin of the present terms “early” and “late” spectral type, which reflect the Darwinian spirit of late Victorian science. It is also clear that there is a reasonably continuous gradation of spectral types here, and the beginnings-through the later Hertzsprung-Russell diagram-of modern theories of stellar evolution.

There were major developments in physics during this period and readers of Ap. J. were alerted to them by the reprinting of summaries of important papers. Experiments were still being performed on the basic radiation laws. In some papers, the level of physical sophistication was not of the highest caliber, as, for example, in an article in PASP (11:18) where the linear momentum of Mars is calculated as the single product of the mass of the planet and the linear velocity of the surface. It concluded “the planet, exclusive of the cap, has a momentum of 183 and 3/8 septillion foot pounds.” Exponential notation for large numbers was evidently not in wide use.

In this time we have the publication of visual and photographic light curves, for example, of stars in M5; and experiments in filter photography of Orion by Keeler. An obviously exciting topic was time-variable astronomy, which must then have generated something of the excitement that pulsars, quasars and X-ray sources do today. There were many studies of variable velocities in the line of sight from which were derived the orbits of spectroscopic binaries, as well as periodic variations in the apparent velocity of Omicron Ceti from the Doppler displacement of H gamma and other spectral lines.

The first infrared measurements of stars were performed at the Yerkes Observatory by Ernest F. Nichols. The study concludes: “We do not receive from Arcturus more heat than would reach us from a candle at a distance of 5 or 6 miles.” No further calculations are given. The first experimental observations of the infrared opacity of carbon dioxide and water vapor were performed in this period by Rubens and Aschkinass, who essentially discovered the v₂ fundamental of carbon dioxide at 15 microns and the pure rotation spectrum of water.

There is preliminary photographic spectroscopy of the Andromeda nebula by Julius Scheiner at Potsdam, Germany, who concludes correctly that “the previous suspicion that the spiral nebulae are star clusters is now raised to a certainty.” As an example of the level of personal vituperation tolerated at this time, the following is an extract from a paper by Scheiner in which W. W. Campbell is criticized: “In the November number of the Astrophysical Journal, Professor Campbell attacks, with much indignation, some remarks of mine criticizing his discoveries… Such sensitiveness is somewhat surprising on the part of one who is himself given to severely taking others to task. Further, an astronomer who frequently observes phenomena which others cannot see, and fails to see those which others can, must be prepared to have his opinions contested. If, as Professor Campbell complains, I have only supported my views by a single example, I was only withheld by courteous motives from adding another. Namely, the fact that Professor Campbell cannot perceive the lines of aqueous vapor in the spectrum of Mars which were seen by Huggins and Vogel in the first place, and, after Mr.