70 NATURE VOL. 233 SEPTEMBER 3 1971 that he would have no part in such an forced on him he packs a great deal of and the rest of his life was in a sense affair." The astonishing, inexplicable information and lively comment. He an anticlimax; it seems that he genuinely thing is that Oppenheimer later gave rightly stresses the importance of the hated fame and publicity, and regretted different accounts of the incident ; and early years of railway building, before his move from Wi.irzburg, where he had that in particular he gave an egregiously the locomotive appeared and during been happy, to Munich, where he was untruthful account to a security agent its primitive, fitful development. He not. After his three papers describing called Boris T. Pash, in whjch he refused pays proper attention to the track, the phenomena of the X-rays, he played to disclose Chevalier's name while say­ commenting with a severity that is well no important part in the practical devel­ ing that several other men were in­ justified on the treatment usually ac­ opment of the apparatus or in the volved~a cock-and-bull story that was corded to "these unglamorous lengths explanation of the phenomena; in this much more injurious to himself and of scrap iron" in museums, and taking he reminds one of Volta, who made his Chevalier than the truth, and which at trouble to explain the reasons that lay discovery at much the same age. It is his "trial" he allowed to be called "a behind the adoption of different forms clear from th1s biography that Rontgen's tissue of lies". It was an incredible of rail, sleeper, and ballast. His illus­ discovery, while unexpected, was in no thing to do ; and when asked why he trations and diagrams are a well inte­ sense an accident. He had been care­ did it, he replied: "Because I was an grated adjunct to his text. fully trained under A. E. E. Kundt to idiot." It did him critical harm. The book has some faults. Its pro­ make very accurate determinations of What could be the explanation? portions may be criticized here and physical quant_ities; first investigating Nobody among his friends or his there. Scotland receives on the whole the specific heats of gases, and then enemies has found a credible answer by scanty attention. Of more than a hun­ studying electromagnetism, and the looking at the character of Oppen­ dred structures mentioned in the physical properties of crystals. His heimer. Is it to be found, I propose, gazetteer at the end of the book, only academic position-he had held a chair by looking instead at the character of four lie north of the border. Perhaps at Giessen before being called to the incident? Is that kind of interroga­ more serious, more than four-fifths of W'i.irzburg to follow Kohlrausch-and tion liable to induce that kind of aber­ the text is devoted to the period before his reputation for sober accuracy en­ ration? Oppenheimer's egregious per­ 1865. That was indeed the heroic age sured that his preliminary paper on X­ formance vis-a-vis Colonel Pash was of railway building in this country, but rays was taken seriously. recorded through a hidden microphone notable work has been performed since, The study of cathode rays was an and it makes disturbing reading-be­ which is passed over here : for example, obvious field for investigation; mercury cause of the peculiar intimacy existing the extraordinary series of bridges, in pumps were available to give very low between interrogator and interrogated. Staffordshire blue brick, erected over pressures, and it seems that others had A fulsome, ingratiating duplicity on the the Midland Railway's line south of noticed fluorescence near cathode ray interrogator's side ; a fulsome, yielding Kettering in the 1880s and 1890s, where tubes and £ogging of photographic over-accord on the interrogated's­ the engineers were treating the bricks plates, but had not seriously investi­ "God bless you," he says at the end of in an almost plastic way that seems to gated the matter. In November and it. One wants to turn one's head away anticipate the handling of reinforced December 1895, Rontgen investigated ... But that would mean turning one's concrete in the twentieth century. And the X-rays in an extremely capable head away from a very serious matter, by way of a final critjcism it must be manner, proving that the effects could where security really on trial could well said that there are rather more small not be due to cathode rays, and taking be required to prove its case. The mistakes here than there ought to be: a number of X-ray photographs. He matter at issue is not the unnaturalness obvious misprints uncorrected, names submitted his preliminary paper on of the intimacy : it is the trustworthiness mis-spelt and places wrongly cited­ December 28, 1895; it was published of the sjtuation-its trustworthiness not Ashburton for Ashton, for example. It with a rapidity that moderns might to throw a man off balance, not to pro­ was not the North Midland Company envy, for the offprints were ready to be duce, while he is in it, almost a per­ that tried to reach· Manchester (page sent out on new year's day 1896. sonality change. Is the solution to the 117) ; nor was Tite the architect of the Rontgen was transformed from a man Oppenheimer enigma not that he was station at Shrewsbury (page ix). with a high reputation within his field an idiot, but that such interrogations These small blemishes can be rectified into a celebrity; and was in 1901 are liable to bring idiocies to a man's when the book goes jnto a second edi­ awarded the first Nobel Prize for lips? Really on trial, security is not tion. It deserves to be kept in print Physics. invulnerable. WILLIAM CoOPER for a long time as an excellent introduc­ Reading this sympathetic biogrl}phy, tion to its subject, which will not lose one feels that Rontgen had somehow its value. Mr Morgan is generous in got out of his depth; like Faraday, he Early Trains searching out distinction among his had the "ability to improvise laboratory Civil Engineering: Railways. By Bryan engineers and architects, whether in equipment, which enabled him to make Morgan. Pp. xvi+ 176+45 Photo­ pioneering forms and techniques or in observations that less skilled men were graphs. (Longman: London, April aesthetic sensibility, and he communi­ unable to do", but we find little evi­ 1971.) £2.96. cates his enthusiasm so attractively that dence that like Faraday he was a soli­ THE admirable series of studies of he will inspire his readers to follow him tary voyager in strange seas of thought. industrial archaeology edited by Mr. in the direction of inquiry he has laid His orderly life, with the spring and L. T. C. Rolt has now reached railways. down. His book achieves its purpose summer vacations spent in Italy and Wisely, he has decided that the subject very well indeed. JACK SIMMONS Switzerland, does not have that appear­ is too big to be comprehended in a ance of complete devotion to the single volume, such as the one he wrote struggle with the mysteries of nature himself on Navigable Waterways, and Rontgen Revealed which characterizes those few scientists that it must be treated in two. This of the first rank . Rontgen's example book is therefore complemented by The Life of Wilhelm Conrad Rontgen. can encourage us all, for he seems to another on mechanical engineering, By W. R. Niske. Pp. xi+355. (Uni­ have been a rather ordinary scientist written by M r J. H. Snell. versity of Arizona: Tucson and who made an extraordinary discovery; Mr Morgan's study is comprehensive, Arizona April 19, 1971.) $8.50. and this biography is valuable in bring­ clearly arranged, and most pleasantly WHEN in 1895 Rontgen made his great ing before us such a man and casting written. Within the modest limits en- discovery he was already fifty years old, light on his times. In spite of a ten-

© 1971 Nature Publishing Group NATURE VOL. 233 SEPTEMBER 3 1971 71 dency to degenerate into travelogue, the the ways in which their work is utilized. From this mine of information for book is readable and interesting; we While Einstein signed the momentous teachers and lecturers, it would be encounter both the crusty and forbid­ letter to Roosevelt which helped launch impossible to summarize, or even give ding professor and the shy man at ease the American atomic effort, Born found a list of the demonstrations in these holidaying with his friends. We even the idea of nuclear weapons so distaste­ volumes, which together add up to 1,400 find him in 1888 complaining of the ful that he avoided personal involve­ pages. It is easier to say that from a declining number of students because ment and tried-unsuccessfully-to dis­ simple demonstration of shadow pro­ for scientists "the outlook is gloomy". suade one of his workers jn Edinburgh jection to solid state physics or the D. M. KNIGHT from joining the British effort: Klaus application of a laser, all are included. Fuchs. And when Born returned from On reading these books the com­ Britain to Germany after the Second plexity of some of the apparatus is a World War, Einstein noted that he was little worrying until it is realized that Illuminating Letters going back "to the land of the mass­ apart from the description of the murderers of our kinsmen". demonstration in the text, full construc­ The Born Einstein Letters. By M. Born, There is a third interest in the corre­ tional details and drawings, almost Translated by I. Born. Pp. xi+240+4 spon~ence, in some ways almost as down to the last nut and bolt, are given plates. (Macmillan: London and important as the light cast on the argu­ in an appendix at the end of each Basingstoke, May 1971.) £3.85. ment between the standard-bearers for volume. If commercial apparatus is THIS volume consists of 120 letters be­ two opposing scientific views. Both used a list of suppliers or manufacturers tween Einstein and Max and Hedwig Max Born and Albert Einstein reveal in is given. This publication was spon­ Born, the first written by Einstein in these letters not only great intellects, but sored by the American Association of 1916 as the General Theory was break­ a warmth and humanity sometimes con­ Physics Teachers, and being American, ing on the world, the last by Born in sidered-rightly or wrongly-to be rare most of the suppliers are American. January 1955, as both men became in­ among scientists. R. W. CLARK This need not deter the English reader volved in the events leading up to the as equivalent equipment is obtainable in Russell-Einstein Manifesto. Com­ this country. mentaries written by Born in 1965, when Physics Performed These books, which have some 2,000 he was already in his eighties, fill in photographs as well as line drawings, details, add later judgments, and pro­ Physics: Demonstration Experiments. would be excellent additions to any vide a background to the men, and the Edited by Harry F. Meiners. Vol. 1: Science Library. occasional woman, who lived through Mechanics and Wave Motion. Pp. To conclude, Sir Lawrence Bragg's the dramatic era of physics between the x + 1-654. Vol. 2: Heat, Electricity and advice to a lecturer was to not just talk two world wars. Magnetism, Optics, Atomic and Nuclear about science, but, if possible, to The principal scientific interest in the Physics. Pp. iv+655-1395+36. demonstrate it. These books show the correspondence lies of course in the long (Ronald: New York, 1970.) $30 per way. W. A. CoATES debate between the two men, and set. most, although not quite all, of their ONE of the opening chapters of the long discussions can be followed here. two volumes entitled Physics, Demon­ Their first meeting was at Salzburg in stration Experiments was written by the Anaesthetic Collection 1909 when Einstein, justy thirty, giving late Sir Lawrence Bragg. His associa­ International Encyclopedia of Pharma­ his first big invited paper, declared "a tion alone makes these two books not cology and Therapeutics. Section 8, profound change in our views of the just another pair of books on physics Vol. 1: Local Anesthetics. Section nature and constitution of light" to be demonstrations but an inspiration-an edited by P. Lechat. Pp. ix+377. indispensable. Born himself finds it inspiration to all those who wish to (Pergamon: Oxford and New York, hard to believe that he djd not corre­ make a physics course in school or at April 1971.) £6; $16. spond with Einstein when working on university really alive. the latter's theory of specific heats three The two volumes are divided into a THIS volume of the International years later. subject classification of, volume I: Encyclopedia of Pharmacology and The letters touch on the anti-Einstein Mechanics and Wave Motion, and Therapeutics comprises ten chapters movement of the early 1920s in Ger­ volume II: Heat, Electricity and Mag­ written by internationally known many and on the confrontation between netism, Optics, Atomic and Nuclear authors, two of whom are now un­ Einstein and Lenard at Bad Nauheim Physics. A great bonus in each book fortunately deceased. It amply justifies in 1920, in some ways comparable with is an additional chapter: in volume I the title encyclopaedia, and covers in the Wilberforce-Huxley dispute at the whole philosophy and art of the exceptional detail the various aspects of Oxford in I 860. (Interestingly enough, use of demonstrations to teach physics local anaesthetics, which range from no full verbatim account of either seems is discussed, while in volume II the addi­ historical development to current to have survived.) They add to the tional chapter discusses the use of closed clinical application, and deals with material on the birth of quantum circuit television, overhead projectors, structure-activity relations, mode of mechanics already available in the stroboscopic effects and other modern action, pharmacological properties and Einstein-Sommerfeld letters and in the teaching devices which are now becom­ their modification, methods for com­ Letters on Wave Mechanics by Einstein, ing commonplace in the lecture room. parison of activity and finally the Schroedinger, Planck and Lorentz pub­ Not since Demonstration Experiments toxicity and side effects of these lished four years ago. And they carry in Physics by R. M. Sutton has there substances. the debate on quantum mechanics into appeared a work which deals with thf" Each chapter is very fully referenced the 1950s. subject so well. Professor Harry F. and the individual authors arc to be Yet their interest does not lie solely Meiners, the editor, has gathered the complimented on the fullness of their in the contemporary comments of two cream of international physics demon­ text which is amply illustrated with masters, made as the new physics stration techniques and methods into photographs, diagrams and tables, al­ evolved. There is also their parallel these two volumes. Contributions from though the first chapter on the historical reaction to events in Germany, to the the United States, Britain, Israel and development of local anaesthesia tends birth of nuclear weapons and to the Russia are all included, together with toward over illustration. A strong increased responsibility of scientists for many others. emphasis is placed throughout the book

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