SCIENTIFIC RESEARCHES AND DISCOVERIES.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 4209, 16 September 1874, Page 3

SCIENTIFIC RESEARCHES AND DISCOVERIES.

The President of the Royal Society, Victoria (Mr. Ellery), at the laSt conversazione of the members, read a very interesting address, in which he alluded, as' narrated, to the following subjects : OCEAN WAVES AND THEIR ACTION. At our meeting of the 11th of September in 1871, a paper was contributed by Mr. B, S. Deverell, of Portland, “ On Ocean Waves, and their Action on Eloating Bodies ” ; and again on tho 9th of Deooraber ; 1872, another paper by the same gentleman, entitled “ Ocean Wave Power Machinery,” was read. The first of tliose led up to the theory, that in the motion of the ocean waves, we have a redundant natural force capable of being conserved by proper mechanical arrangement for doing work at the will of man. The second paper dealt with tho principles of the mechanical arrangements by which this force' could bo conserved. Mr. Deverell is a true scientific worker, and having Conceived the idea that part of the wave force could be made subservient to man, he has worked steadily at tho subject for years, and in order to master it,. has acquired 1 by hard study, a sound knowledge of those 1 branches of physics in which the subject is involved. Some mouths ago he devised an Apparatus’by which the movements of a ship at sea could be registered. This was placed in charge of his brother, who went to' England in tho ship Norfolk, for the purpose; of making observations with it on the voyagC; From the results of these, which are most valuable and interesting, Mr. Deverell deduces ’the following 1 The duration of the voyage was 2026 hours. During that time tile ship made'1,764,088 beam oscillations or rolls, and 1,041,137 fore-and-aft oscillations or pitches. Tho average number of oscillations in both directions per minute was fourteen. The aggregate are of pendulum registering beam movements was over fifteen million degrees; while that of the fore-and-aft movements was nearly five million degrees.’ Mr. Deverell also considers be has

definitely established from these observations the following propositions ; —lst. That between ocean limits the swell of the ocean is unceasing. 2nd. That the oscillation of a vessel in an ocean fetch is unceasing. 3rd. That the motion of an independent body within a ship on the ocean is unceasing. Here then is represented an immense amount of conservable energy, and the question remains—Can a practicable method be found for conserving it for use on board-ship ? Mr. Devereil believes it can, and to a sufficient extent to be useful in auxiliary propulsion. We know from his papers that the power to be obtained is to be derived from the conserved aggregate motion of a freely suspended mass within the ship, and an idea of the extent of this possible motion can be readily conceived from his third proposition and the figures I have quoted. Mr. Hevcrell expects to be in a position in a few months to detail his method of putting his propositions into practice, and promises to bring it before this society immediately it is matured. In the meantime, the subject is attracting a good deal of attention among naval architects and nautical men in Europe and America, and its further development will be watched with great interest, not only by members of our society, but the world generally, for any reasonable proposition for the utilisation of any of nature’s redundant forces must be among the highest aims of scientific workers, I may mention before leaving this subject that Mr. Bessemer has purchased from Mr. Deverell the instrument the Norfolk voyage observations were made with, for his famous saloon ship, and that this fact has probably led to a report which appeared in print some time ago that Mr. Bessemer and the Admiralty were building ships on Mr. Beverell’s principle, but which is entirely without foundation. THE TRANSIT OP VENUS. There is no instance, I believe, in the annals of science where there has been such a general co-operation among. the various nations, and such a liberal expenditure of State funds for a single and purely scientific purpose as has taken place with regard to the forthcoming transit of Venus. True, the phenomenon is one of the rarest and most important of all astronomical events, the proper observation of which would be cheaply purchased at even a greater outlay than will be made on this occasion. The simple result that it is desired to obtain is the sun’s distance from the earth; its distance is probably known within a million miles or two, but these limits are too wide in the present state of astronomy, therefore, by universal consent the civilised communities have entered on a great scientific alliance, and granted money from their treasuries to enable their astronomers to make the requisite determinations on a scale as nearly commensurate with the present demands of science as the means at present at command will admit of. I had the honor of addressing this society on a former occasion concerning this phenomenon somewhat in detail ; it only remains, therefore, to inform you of the present stage of the preparations. There will be altogether about 70 observing parties, 23 or 24 British (including India, Cape, Victoria, New South Wales, as well as Bord Lindsay’s Mauritius party), five or six German, twentysix Russian, eight American, and six French. The British observing stations will be Alexandria, Cairo, Rodriguez, Kerguelen's Laud (two stations), Christchurch (New Zealand). British Colonial Stations.—lndia, three stations; the Cape of Good Hope, Victoria, four stations; New South Wales, four stations; Mauritius (Lord Lindsay’s expedition). The German stations will be Mauritius, Cheefoo (China), Macdonald Island, Auckland Islands, and Ispahan. The Russians will occupy twenty-six stations, all in Siberia, Japan, and China. The Americans will be stationed at Hobart Town, New Zealand, Chatham Islands, Kerguelen’s Land, Crozet's Islands, Pekin, Nagasaki, and one station in Siberia. The French parties will occupy Campbell Island, St Paul’s Island, Pekin, Yokohama, and Saigon in Cochin China. Most of these observing parties are now in course of talcing up their stations, aud all the southern parties of British, American, French, and German are expected to he at their respective destinations within the next two months. Our own preparations are in a forward state, and' some of the special instruments required which were ordered from England have arrived, but our preparations, cannot he completed -till others shortly expected arrive. WEATHER WARNINGS. A prominent'example of a field for scientific research, which concerns all civilised nations alike, and in which the joint labors of all are necessary to further knowledge and progress, is meteorology. In my last address I referred at some length to the organisation in Europe and America of a very complete system of meteorological work, in which immediate transmission of observations from different parts of a country to a central office, there to be combined so as to enable the chief meteorologist* to make deductions from them, for weather forecasts, storm warnings, &c., formed the principal basis of operations. This work has been carried on steadily, and with most remarkable and satisfactory results. Some volumes have been lately issued from the meteorological bureau at Washington, in which are printed the observations received at the central office) aud the forecasts deduced from them, which are posted up at all important places in the States, to which is appended the actual weather which occurred, the fulfilment or otherwise of the forecast ; and it is remarkable how often the the forecasts are verified, more especially in tho ie cases where warilings are most valuable, such as the approach of storms and very low temperatures. In England, and Europe generally, the same system is carried out by a very complete system of storm warnings, which have already proved invaluable, although the system is yet only iu its infancy. I advocated in this place last year the carrying out of a somewhat similar system in Australia, and although no final scheme is yet decided upon, the chief features have been discussed by the principal Colonial observers, and many points agreed upon. It .must be borne in mind that moterological observations for obtaining a knowledge of a climate are in a great measure distinct from such as are required for the more general observation necessary for obtaining a knowledge of the great atmospheric movements and disturbances which must form the basis of any forecasting. Our ordinary meteorological observations of pressure and temperature of air, the direction aud velocity of its movements at a few places, distributed over a small area like our own Colony, for instance, would be valueless for such a purpose, unless supplemented by similar work from the surrounding Colonies. The climatic statistics of a country are of great value, pro tanto, and so far as experience has gone, it appears that no averages can be safely taken as representing the averages to come, so that meteorological observations for this purpose alone must be carried' on. But the grander objects of this science are undoubtedly those I have referred to, requiring wider considerations than those involved iu the simple climatology of a country. For all that has yet been done iu this science, we dare not attempt to prophesy more than 24, or at most 48, hours beforehand.-- We have nothing to guide us to a foreknowledge of a coming dry or wet season, and despite the auguries of tho oldest inhabitants and blacks, or tho discussion of past observations, or any theories of cycles, we are as completely in ignorance of the probable weather a few days hence as if we had no barometers, thermometers, or rain gauges. The meteorological organisation I have spoken of, however, shows how much can be done by scientific sytematising. There is no theory, no nostrum, no quack weather prophecy, hut a sure and certain knowledge obtained from careful observation and clear-headed deduction, and a bold grasp at the more general laws which govern tho behaviour of the atmosphere over large areas of the globe. Tho forecasting—and this should mean forestalling, too—of a storm, of great cold and snow, may save much life and property, and has undoubtedly done so iu numerous instances. A" single instance would probably be ample recompense for a nation's outlay in meteorology. So far tho accomplishment is satisfactory ; but it cannot be said that tho most, or the best methods

of obtaining a more complete knowledge of the atmosphere and its movements have yet been put in action. "We content ourselves with measuring its conditions and movements on the earth’s surface only. We can certainly see something that is going on above us, but at best very little, for we are quite ignorant of the temperature, humidity, electrical condition of, and frequently of the motion of, the upper strata of air. In Paris I see they are about to make systematic observations in the higher strata of our atmosphere. One of the balloons used by the beleagured French in the late war has been converted to more peaceful purposes than that for which it was first constructed, and will now form one of the appliances of the Paris Observatory for investigations of the higher atmosphere. This is a step in the right direction, for what little we do know of these regions only indicates how valuable and necessary it is to know more, for meteorological ends. What is principally wanted, therefore, to extend our knowledge of the more general laws governing the aerial ocean around us is the combination of observations made at various atmospheric levels with those obtained at the earth’s surface, which latter should undoubtedly include as much as possible the more critical regions, those parts of the earth most and those least heated by the sun. Such operations, it is evident, can only be undertaken by the co-operation of observers in all parts of the world, aided by arrangements for telegraphic interchange of the observations among the central observatories or meteorological offices of all countries, and involving as a sine qua non money help from states.