The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1871-10-13

| CURIOUS, USeIuI anu SclcutIncs
/ 5h u GLACIAL PHENOMENA. - AlAk
To an eye accustomed, to note the
characteristic impress of ice action upon
a land surface, the neighborhood OF
Edinburg presents many features of in
terest. 1t was upon Corstorphine Hill,
on the western outskirts of the city,
that Sir James Hall first called attention
to striated rock surfaces, which, though
enormously attributed to the abrasion
produced by torrents of water, were
even then recognized as trustworthy
evidence of the last great geological
changes that had passed over the sur
face of the country. Even before we
come to look at the surface in detail,
and note the striation of its rocks, we
cannot fail to recognize the distinctive
ly ice.worn aspect of the hills around
Edinburgh Each of them is, in fact, a
great oche-moutonee left in the path of
the vast ice sheet which passed across
the land. That this ice was of suilis
cient depth and mass to override even
the highest hills is proved not merely
by the general ice-worn surface of the
landscape but by SUBMITS of the Pent
land Hills, one thousand six hundred
feet above the sea that it came from
the Highlands is indicated by the peb
bles Of granite, gneiss, schist and quartz
rock occurring in the older boulder
clays which it produced and that de-
Elected by the mass of the southern up
lands, the ice in the valleys Of the Lo-
thians was forced TO move stewards, in
direction little north of east, is
shown by the trend of the stiree gra-
ven on the rocks, as at Corstorphine,
Granton, Arthur's Seat, and Pentland
Hills.
BEEF TEA-ITs USELEssNEsS.
Chambers journal says Many per.
sons believe that beef tea is very nour-
ishing, and is an excellent strengthened
for people of weak health. This is a
mistake. Some few practitioners and
chemists have long been aware of the
fact, and now their view is confirmed
by DR.. Marcel. There is no nourish-
ment in beef tea. Mixed with solid
food, it imparts relish which promotes
digestion and the best solid food that
can be mixed Herewith is the beef
from which it was made, reduced to
powder. In two, at least, of the Lon
don hospitals the mixing of powdered
beef with the best tea has long been
practiced; and there the patients get
strong on beef tea diet. 1t is worth re-
Numbering, too, that the objections to
the use of beef tea apply equally to the
preparations described as Extract of
Meat, with the further disadvantage
that the extract is always stale.
DISTANCES OF THE FIXED STARS.
A paper of Prof Stafford, read before
the British Scientific Association re-
Gently, proposes to ascertain the dis
! tances Of some Of the fixed stars by a
new method. He finds that the solar
motion with which our sun is revolving
around center somewhere in the
Pleiades, and of which it has been ia.
cetiously said that, being the suns sun,
he must be grand sun, has velocity
six times as great as that of the earth
in its orbit As base for the calcula-
ton Of the distances Of fixed stars, he
considers the solar better than the or
btical motion. He has observed for
this purpose many groups of fixed stars,
his general theory being that those
stars which, under observation, show
the greatest motion are probably the
! nearest to us and he regards this as a
better method than that of Ierschel,
which is estimated the promoxity of the
stars by their apparent magnitude
method which is not justified by known
facts.
MINUTE DIAMONDS.
Microscopic crystals of diamonds
have been found in the mineral KAN
thophyllite from the Ural Mountains.
qually distributed through the flakes of
the mineral. Magnified thirty dame
tiers, they are distinctly visible; and
with two hundred diameters their crys-
talline form can be distinguished with
the greatest precision. The greater por-
ton Of the crystals is colorless and per
! fectly transparent some have slight
and perfectly brown color. The dia.
monds are symmetrically imbedded in
the matrix. The discovery Of the dia-
mond inStt1, adds the Academy, is one
of great interest.
COD LIVER OIL.
An ingenious pharmaceutist has lately
adopted the method of making cod liver
oil into butter for the purpose of being
administered to patients who find an
objection in the oil itself This is done
by combining the oil with concrete OF
butyraceous fat, thus bringing it into a
form in which it can be used as butter
on bread, or made into pills.
HOW TO SET CoLORS.
Dissolve a teaspoonful of sugar OF
lead in pail OF water, in which you set
your colored cambria for fifteen min.
utes before washing. If more conve-
nient, little vinegar or handful OF
salt thrown into a pail of hot water
and the dress soaked, will set the color
CURE FOR LEPROSY.
1t is said that cure has been discov
cred for leprosy. A surgeon in Khund
wa, India, reports the case of a wretched
cid man who came to him from Bombay
fasing been abandoned by his friends
because of this terrible disease. He wa:
treated with soap and water, and then
with carbolic acid and oil, and was com
pletely cured.