1948-08-21 — Page 4

THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH, · · SATURDAY, AUGUST 21, 1948.

We will now sing ...if five shy men

by

agree

BERNARD WICKSTEED

AVE you heard the story of the Five Shy Men and the Hymn Book? I came across it through an advertise ment saying there is going to be a new edition of "yints

Ancient and Modern."

Some of the old favourites are to be left out "for what seem to the proprietors sufficient reasou,“

The proprietors of the hymn Book are the five phy men.

"Ancient and Modern“ 24 ure In more than half the parishes to the Church of England. Eighty million eoples of it have been and since it was Best brought out Po 1881.

*

Every Sunday Even or thousand clergymen select from hymns for their services, and up to a million people sing them. Millions them. 1 Duzte were brought up on was myself. Yel the Church Itsell hoy no control over the book

Many shared

THE people who decide what goes

in and what siny out are the ve wen Hardly anybody knows who

They are.

There is an Authorised Version of the title at of the Prayer Book, fout there is no authorised bymn beok. The Methodists have mw of Thuste ovt.

nt Church

Scotland, El The Ulteri Free Church, I

the England, Wales, Presbyterians of Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa use the Revised Church

Mraz Hymary, in which you will many of the hymum flas par t Ancient and "Modern," 100,

The Congregationalists and

U

Salvation Army also have their own hymn book. Bui nst the Church of England. In an old-fashioned way it stil relies on private enterprise.

The new edition is going to bo shorter than the last. It will have 036 bymi in it instead of 779.

"Onward, Christian Soldiers." "Able with Me" and "Rock 111 Ages will be kept, but “0 Paradise. "Paradise," which is a real old favourite with many people, is going gut.

1

tried to get into

It was when I touch with the five men to ask them about the changes that I found out how shy they were. I tried the publishers first, "Sorry," they said, "we cannot reveal who they are. They wouldn't like it."

So I tried the Church of Enginnıl, which, in keeping with the times, bas a Press officer. He never even heard of them. "If you and them," he rald, "do let me know."

It was the same with half a dozen Either other Church organisations. they didn't know or they wouldn't No names, no pack drill, they

Day Krull.

Then I found out what may be the Tenson for their shyness. The last me Hymns Ancient and Madern" was revised there was FL terrife

HW.

The proprietors-there were 11 of the then--were so severely assail- ed by the Press and n zeetion of the elery that they had to bring out a 31-page apologja.

That was 44 years ago, and there ave people who haven't forgotten It set. Tipe of them is a reporter who roveved the story.

"I remember it well," he subtl, "They altered Hark! The hernid angels sing to Hark! how all Die wełki ribRS. Two million eoples had been printed befare publiention, There were

many complaints that the proprietors changed back to "herald angels",""

are

Although the publishers arendy advertising the new version,

not soing to he out

before Easter, 1930,

Sales and profits NOW, what happens to alt

the tuck? Up to 1914 it sald two and money that is made out of the

A half million copies year. Paper restrictious have cut this to three- quarters of a million--but quite a sole.

that's

In one form or another the prots are all turned back to the Church. The five men act as a frust. Thou- sands of copies are given away to pour parisher. There is a scholar- ship for students of church music,

and other grantą go to church funds and charities,

Once you start vinking Jugutries like this you come across all sorts of Incidental Intelligence. For instance, according to the Encyclo- paedia Britannica" there are nearly half a million hymns in existence.

So picking the best 630 is a big- ger Job than you might think.

Another thing about hymns is the speed at which one of them seem to have been written. John Wesley who might be called the father of modern hymn writing, invented a special shorthand of his own to get them down on paper. (This was 100 years before Sir Isaac Pitinan op- penred on the scene),

Wesley's brother Charles probably holds the world's record for quan- tity, He wrote 0,500 hymus, 285 ฟ which arc In the current Methodist hymn book and 27 in "Ancient and Modern,"

Practically everything that hap- pened to lifts suggested a hymn. ile wrote “Ser How the Flame Aspires" after seeing a blast furnace in New- castle. He wrote 19 more to com- fort people during an earthquake in London. One of them has a verac starting, “A house we call our own which cannot be o'erlbrown."

Hymn writers

44ILORY and thanks to God we

give" was written ofter a floor collapred at a meeting in Leeds and he and a hundred others fell into the ram below,

Bishop Heber (nine hymns in "Ancient mech Modern") wrote "Greenland's tcy mountains" In nhout fun hour and "Down

Wife's vale we wander." popular with evan- Kelists, was composed by n man walking down stairs.

The first line come to him on the lop step and by the time he reached the bottom he had fuished the whole hymn-music as well as words.

for Appropriately enough article on hymns we'll end with a note about the word "Amen." It is a Greek word, and may be trans- inted "So be it." In the "Ancient and Modern" it appears at the end of

"Ask yourself a question, Mrs. Harris, Do YOU want another €3,000,000,000

millstone round your neck ?”

NOBODY

HAS

EVER

SEEN AN ATOM

By DR. S.

LILLEY

Fellow of St John's College, Cambridge

ever

At

their

13

OBODY has ever seen an standards, but it was a lot more than end, they produce a greenish-yellow

seventeeth glow. If you stick things in atom. That is perhaps the Greeks had; and

century atomism must, I think, be path, you produce shadows in this the most important fact ranked as a genuing scientitle theory, glow; and, by noting the position io bear in mind when thinking

of the shadows, you can show that all events, the first outstand-

travelling away from about the history of atomic

the rays are ing success of atomism-Dalton's the cathode in straight lines. Then theories: "Nobody has

chemical atomie theory of the early you can try various experiments on alom." And all #111

the nineteenth century-has an ancestry the rays-always using the glow and geen

traced back to those the shadows, to tell the that can he

you what evidence which makes

seventeenth-century thinkers. There happening. scientist of today virtually sure is not space to go into details, but that the universe is built up let us put it briefly this way. out of atoms is indirect Other collections use it only after evidence; it comes from ob hymns containing a prayer.

serving all sorts of happenings It shouldn't be sung after "On- and noting that much the best ward, Christian Soldiers," way to explain these happen lustance, or "Suldiers of Christ. Arise for they are not prayers, butings is by assuming that every

prise and exhortation. thing is built up out of atoms And Jolly good ones, too.

which have certain specified properties.

every hymn.

By W. J. BROWN, MP

The grim facts behind the Marshall Loan

Much

for

Newton had produced a theory to explain the way the volume of gas varies with its pressure in terms of atoms and the forces between

them. It was

In the 1800's, cathode rays were very popular among physicists. And they were something of a mystery. They did not fit in at ull well with any of the current notions of mat- ter. It was J. J. Thomson who very suggestive one. Dalton was

a wrong theory, but cleared up the mystery of 1897. He we showed that these were actually interested In meteorology, and, fast-moving streams of very tiny therefore, in the atmosphere which lumps of matter, each carrying an is a mixture of guses-oxygen, electric charge. Actually, ench Of ultrogen, some carbon dioxide, and

little water vapour. He extended them is about one two-thousandth

be lightest atom of all.

the weight of a hydrogen atom, the The nearest that modern scientists Newton's theory to explain the

haviour of mixed gates. Again, have come to seeing atoms is seC-

his theory was wrong, but sugges- been-seeing ing where they have the tracks they leave behind them tive. It suggested to him the idea quickly through of assigning different weights to the when they pass carefully prepared materials. It is atoms. And, thinking along these as if we had never seen an elephant, lines, he evolved his chemical atomic but we deduced that elephants exist theory, which you might put briefly from the Battened grass and broken like this. trees they leave behind in crashing through the jungle,

Elements

atomic

I cannot give you the full details of how Thomson proved this, but some den, By a can give you simple trick, you let these rays out into the air, and you can note how far they travel in

nir.

DEVELOPING NATIONAL FITNESS

By. DR. GEORGE GRETTON

IDE by ride with Britain's great new national, health scheme. which

'cares for the medical welfare of every man, woman and child in the country, go other plans, of which perhaps less is known, aiming at educating her population to keep fit. Recently

in London, delegates from all over the British Common- wealth have been attending a re- search board for the correlation of medical selence and physical educn- tion. Addressing them, Mr P. J. Noel-Baker, Minister for Common- wealth Relations; expressed the hope that within the next generation Brl- tain would have a nation of athletes, "nen and women alike."

The way this will be achieved is by the widespread establishment of plyalent research elinles, The best known of those already in existence 1s probably that at Peckham, in Southeast London. These "health centres," as they are sometimes called, do not provide for people who are nick-the sick are provided for under the national health scheme- but for ordinary folk and their families.

FIRST CENTRE

were

The Arst centre was started about a quarter of a century ago as the result of voluntary research Into family health by, two doctors. They observed that a large number of people who

nominally healthy, that

is to say they had nothing medically wrong with them, were none the less incking in vitality, la the real spirit of living. So they set Only up a family centre or club. families could join it, and they had lo live

live in the

locality. immediate Members pald a regular weekly sub-

scription and undertook to submit to a regular medical examination.

But apart from that there were no One of the basic prin- regulations. ciples of this form of self education, was to leave the people to teach

do whatever themselves to

they wished.

ple, when the For example, centre started, only 13 percent of In less the members could swim. than a year over 80 percent had not for themselves that only decided they wanted to swim but had learn- ed to do so.

In general, results showed that 75

coming percent

of those

to the centre ceased to be just "neutral," but came nilve and started to enjoy living. Experis, who moved freely about the centre, were able to ob- serve the development of men and women in the art of being truly alive, just as in hospitals doctora observe the growth of a disease.

INITIAL OUTPLAY

The spread of centres like this all over Dritan cannot be expected to take place quickly. For, although eventually each centre can hope to be self-supporting through its mem- bers' subscriptions, yet there is con-

Thomson Initial outlay in acquiring

found that they travelled much fur-

they ther than they would do if were as big as atoms. That พอร some evidence for the idea that they were actually much smaller

than atoms,

Electrons

and launching a family clubs. Particular attention has to and layout at be paid to the design the buliding. In Landon's Peckham Centre, for example, maximum use That is coming fairly near to

has been made of glass so that direct evidence for the existence of ACH different element-iron, car-

members can see each other's acti- atoms. But the Greek philosophers, bon, oxygen, and so on-is com

vities so that people in the cufe who first proposed atomic theories posed of atoms all having the same about 2,400 years ago, had much less weight--the atomic weight. And

ierin can see those In the swimming bath or gymnasium. In these days Tisa Socialist assumption us squeezed by the Yanks.

in principle

than that to go on. They wanted to cach element has its own there are only three

between explain some, of the obvious facts of weight, different the gentle ways of repaying a debt

from that of the THEN, by measuring how much the of shortage in building material and that the cause of all our preferable to them are

Dalton with which the touches

Russians nations, it

1 rays became bent in electric and supplies, buildings of this type ean- nature around then-why a plece others. Furthermore, said woes lies in the immense sacri- caress the British sector of Berlin!

can be repaid in gokl.

not be put up in a hurry. to goods, or in labour.

of wood hangs together as one piece when a compound is formed, that magnetic fields, he worked out the

apart from any formal Meanwhile, apart ratio of the electric charge on each fices we made for victory in the

and yet can be divided into two by simply means that the atoms of diz-

plans, the British people are showing a knife, why two distinct

in particle to its weight. And, Boally, liquids ferent elements have joined up is right

Ot gold we have none to mention. 'Therefore, it war.

dioxide. Most of the world's

that they are intent on keeping t. for using a device which was really an like water and wine can be mixed small teams carbon supplies are suffered

roads out of all that America, which

Every week-end, spring buried at Fort Knox."

together to give one perfectly homo- example, consists of tearns (or one electrical equivalent of a so much less, should help us.

of carbon

both liquid. And

large elties of the United Kingdom they also atom

of balance, he was able to find

or cyclists, are filled with walkers wanted to explain some of the more inolecules) each of which contains the charge, and the weight separate-

singly or in clubs.

Physical

culture cosmic facts about the universe one atom of carbon and two oxy- ly.

societies report increasing member- how is it, for example, that

the Ken. universe is a permanent thing; and

ship. The demand for all kinds of yet everything within it is constant-

sports goods continues to grow, and the industry which supplies them has shown a marked revival since the end of the war.

that

It is the Tory assumption pretty well all our troubles are due in the wickedness and incompetence of the Socialist Government. There fore, it is right that we should be helped by capitalist America.

Different conclusion,

we

Besides, added the ineffable Pritt, after the Presidential election shouldn't get American help anyway. So what! Don't bother? No. Resist like anything.

NW

my views on this matter 해진 somewhat Individual.

think it is not so much the clauses of the Marshell Akl agreement which matter as the fact of being

whereby uve, controls my life- whatever the terms of the bond.

And so I think that the

to

geneous

Our goods could be sent America on the requisite scale only at the expense of precipitating crisis there. If We sent u million men to work out the debt by labour 'we should merely put a correspondingly changing. number of Americans out of work.

·

That is why, when I was asked. repudiated the debt we

Permanence

assumption-the same in debt. He who controls the means in America, in 1941, why we had could best be explained by as-

According to the Socialist Govern-

onls

ment, in a few years we enn achieve thing we should accept from the

balance

paymenta with Americans is an outright gif, with-

罹

of

America that is, the dollar shortage out

la temporary, Therefore to accept temporary help is justifiable.

According to many Tories, the dollar shortage arises out of the changed situation of the world, and will be permaneni. Therefore, to accept temporary help is justitiable.

Different assumption-the conclusion.

same

So, after a series of knockabout turns, the subverminous Tories, and the presumably super-verminous Socialists, having each altributed every political vice and crime to the other, inked -arins through the same lobby in happy harmony about the Marshall Loan

DIS

And

walked

ISSENT was confined to two tiny groups, one on the Left and one on the Right; these two groups Jikewise went into the saine No lobby for wholly different reasons.

The Right dissentients feared the effect, of the agreement on'ngricut- ture at home and Colonlal develop- ment abroad,

The Left dissentients opposed the because they said that agreement Marshall Ald was a deepland plot to reduce Britain and Europe to the level of an American colony,

They preferred that we should rest our economy on Russia-so that we might be a tree people, like tho

Polas, the Czechs, the Rumanion and the rest. They would not-have-

conditions. This may seem

slightly abrupt. But I mean it.

In the first place what is due to

us is nola loa but

contracted

from the Americans in the 1914-18 war, I repiled superbly: "Because we are very fond of you, and wouldn't hurt you for the world."

CCEPTANCE gift, Granted A will serve, I fear, to

and

two

They did the trick it turned out Given these assumptions, you can that all these particles had the same deduce a tremendous number of charge and the same weight, and the the facts about.chemical combination weight was about a two-thousandth why two elements will combine in of the weight of the smallest atom. one proportion and not in another, of course, you recognise these par- and things like that. Starting from" ticles: they are familiar enough now a few simple assumptions about as electrons. atoms, this theory explained a

vast

ND they found that these things suming the world was made up of

body of chemical facts. And that is And now the final points relating the sign of good theory, a probably electrons to atoms: it was found that atoms tiny, hard, unbreakable por correct theory. It was the

first these electrons came out of the ticles that sometimes stuck together really strong evidence for the exis material in the cathode, and that

one arrangement, sometimes

electrons fence of atoms, though it was cer- you always got the same another. The unbreakableness

tainly not conclusive.

In

in

of

.

the atom gave them that underlying Permanence of the universe; and the

of Marshall Aid ever-changing combinations explain- .ed the constant change and flux that disguise they saw everywhere.

two truths from two peoples.

It will disguise from the British the truth that we are producing and continue to produce much less than

that we are brola today because of disproportionate effort and loss in a common enterprise, our partner should freely restore, the balance. I this were done, America would give us more than the frst American Loan ani Marshall Ald combined. WE

Next, it should be given without conditions, for It is as much America's interest to give as it is to receive. The American

Qura to

to

are consuming-a process to which in the long run there is only one, and a very painful, end. And it will retard the education of the American people In the truth that the American economy. now con- fronts a situation which cannot be met on the basis of the old interna

economy can go on working only if it fuds some means of disposing tional economics. of the surplus which its Immense productive machine Inaken evitable.

in-

Nor can it be repaid. For, in fact, repayment is impossible without in Juring American Interests,

DAB and FLOUNDER

In the labour of our own hands, in the resources which, at home and in the Colonies, are within our; control, the real hope of our future rests, and, not in American toons,

By WALTER

CLOCKS

WHILE S

REPAIRER

CLOCKS

REPAIREN. ILE YOU WAED

Indivisible

Today

SIGNIFICANT CHANGE Perhaps one of the most signif- cant changes in the last 25 years is shown in the attitude of the people towords playing fields. Every com- toward

regards of any size, now munity playing fields for its younger mem- bers to be an absolute necessity. no matter what material the cathode After the first World War, memorials was made of. That could only mean to the fallen usually took the form

electrons

of must one thing these

monuments or sculpture. come out of the atoms in the cathode, when people are discussing the best In other words,

atomis

form of memorial to those who gave contained ALTON, and his successors for smaller particles. So, in 1897, the their lives in the second World War,

ninely years, thought of atoms as old idea of Individual atoms was more often than the smallest units in nature, abso- abandoned. Atoms were discovered agreed that it should be playing lutely Indivisible. The min who to be complex structures, bullt up felda or open spaces for children, proved that atoms themselves are from electrons and-something else. That something else' was going to composed of smaller particles was J. J. Thomson, in 1007. Now my require a great deal more research, jump from Dalton to Thomson is but at least the first step was taken. bound to give you the impression that very little progress was made and Thoni- Because Its factual basis was so between Dalton's time small, Greek atomism was wenk; it „son's. Actually, the impression is

The atomic theory gave the best explanation of the facts that the Creeks knew about. But the num- her of facts they knew was very, very small-too small to form the basis of a genuinely scientific theory. So we have to class Gruck atomism plausible speculation, as no more than an Inspiring and

DAL

Alpha-particle

BOUT that time, things were mov-

could not stand up to any determin- false. In fact, Thomson's discovery.ing quickly in the atomic world.

cd attack. And it had features follows on decades of steallly de- which brought wery determined ut veloping knowledge chiefly con- In 1888, Becquerel had discovered tacks upon it. This picture of the cerned with the relations between that uranium was radio-active--that

and world as made up of atoms whose electric

electricity

chemical action. Is, it gives oft continually some sort changing combinations were the

And, on the practical side, his work of radiation which does things, like whole of reality seemed to leave no was only made possible by years of fogging a photographic pinte, even in- room for human freewill, and most improvements in methods of making the dark. And, in 1808, the Curles damnable of all lo those days--no high vacuums,

discovered radium, which is far more room for the gods.. And so, when

radio-setive. It took several years'

atheist.

Evidence

The great independent thought of If you pass an electric discharge work, chiefly by Rutherford and Grecce decayed, when theology be through a vacuum in a glass tube, Soddy, to discover what really hup- came the queen of the selences-In you get very remarkable results, pens in radio-activity. But, even- Inter Greek times, under Rome, and What happens depends on how good itally, it became quite clear that the all through the Middle Ages-átom- the vacuum lo. If it is only atoms of the radio-active substances ism fell into disrepute as a form of moderate, you get an effect, like the were splitting up from time to time, one you see in neon lighting, But There was mora ovidence that the really exciting tliings happen in atoms are really complex structures. a much ΠΟΙΟ perfect vacuum. Three things were found to come When almost all the air is gone from out of them. First, · gamma-rays, the tube, it looks at first sight as if which are like an extreme version IT did not gain support again until nothing is happening. But, on closer of X-rays. Secondly, electranstho Thomson had the seventeenth century, when examination, you discover that some same electrons thal Independent selenlife thought once sort of invisible rays aro passing discovered. Thirdly,' n now 'sort of more became strong. The evidence along the tube.

particle, called un alpha-particle. seventeenth-century

We call n which the

these cathode rays, be- These alpha-particles inter proved to intomis based their theory was still cause actually they come from the be complex things-the nuclel

very indirect-it

atk con wire at the negative end of the tube hellum atoms, in fact-so that cerned with how things mix, why or the enthode, as it is called. You would be misleading it you were to they can be cut, how salt gets dis- cannot see the rays but you can start thinking out the structure solved in water, and the like. It detect them by the fact that, whore the atom from the fact that you can was very scanty evidenco by modern they strike the glass at the other get Alpha-particles out of it.

Was

not

It will bo

No one in Britain today mini- mises the difficulties through which the country has to pass in order to, achieve prosperity. But the people's Kalth in the future is reflected in their eagerness to keep fit,

of

"Taxi!!"