During the last half-century authors who have had occasion to write about the history of the magnetic compass have quoted extensively from The Intellectual Rise in Electricity, by Park Benjamin (New York, 1895). The wealth of references given by this writer to substantiate his statements promises a reliability which is at times sadly lacking. In one part of this book the statement is made that: ‘A single Finnish Compass has been discovered for which the people claim great antiquity, the card or scale of which is marked for a latitude where the sunrise and sunset at the summer and winter solstices differ by sixty degrees.’ For this the author gives as authority Nouvelles Annales des Voyages, Vol. xvii, page 414 (Paris, 1823), but in fact this reference contains no suggestion of the discovery of an ancient Finnish compass. All there is, is a brief reference to the ancient Finnish method of dividing the compass card which, instead of four cardinal points, had six, spaced sixty degrees apart. This information was said to be based on an article in a monthly miscellany, published in Finland under the name of Mnemosyne. Captain D. Daragan of Helsinki has been kind enough to obtain for me a copy of the original article, which was printed in Swedish, and Rektor S. Nydell has been so good as to translate it into English.
Horowitz, Murray, M. Brooklyn College: The First Half Century. Brooklyn College Studies on Society in Change. New York: Brooklyn College Press, 1981. Pp. xv, 271. $22.50