The Toledo chronicle. [volume] (Toledo, Tama County, Iowa) 1873-1924, 1876-04-27
INDUSTRIAL, STATISTICAL AND
TECHNICAL.

INDUSTRIAL, STATISTICAL AND
TECHNICAL.
SOME statistical genius calculates that
the fences in the United States cost
81, 800, 000,0 900. About 5000, COG, 600 trou-
ser seats are annually torn out in getting
over these fences, and not a statistic on
the subject.-Brtdgepor Conn Standard.
INFORMATION direct from the coal
mining regions of Pennsylvania says the
anthracite trade is gradually increasing,
but with declining prices. Freights to
the Atlantic sea-board have also declined,
and the prospect now looks like cheaper
coal for six months ahead. In the btu
minous districts there are no material
changes to note. The great staple of coal.
like most other commodities, is in the
hands of monopolists, who regulate the
price of this fuel according to their greed.
1t is not the miners who play the infa.
nous game Of extortion, but mining CAPT.
talists, and overgrown and monopolizing
railway corporations.-Trad Journal.
SURPRISING the life of a railroad sleeper
is seven years, the $1,000 miles of track
consume annually $4,000, 900 sleepers, OF
thirty years growth on $4,000 acres of
the best natural woodlands. Or, if the
sleepers are raised artiticially, some 700,-
900 acres would be required, planted with
trees best adapted for the purpose, reg
ularly cropped and scientifically managed,
to supply the railroads already construct
ed. At least 125, 900 miles of fencing are
required to enclose the railroads of the
country, which could not have cost on
an average less than $500 per mile. One
half of this would barely represent the
cost of the wood employed, or $43, 000,-
600; while it must take annually lumber
to the value of not less than $40, 000, 900
to keep these fences in repair.-Kr.
Ndrsh's address.
HERR URBANTsCHITCH, in paper con-
tributed to German medical journal, di-
reefs attention 10 the fact that if a watch
be held at little distance from the ear
the ticking is not heard uniformly, but
there is swelling and diminishing of
the sound. If held al such distance as
to he scarcely audible the ticking will
come and go, being at times perceived
distinctly, but at times becoming wholly
inaudible, as if the watch were being
moved to and from the ear. This varia-
ton in perception is not always gradual
it is sometimes sudden. The same holds
good for other weak sounds, as that of q
weak water jet or a tuning fork. Since
breathing and pulsation have not the least
influence on the phenomenon, the inter-
ruptions of the sensation must be attlibut-
ed to the organ of hearing itself; our ears
being unable to feel weak acoustic stimuli
uniformly, but having varying times of
fatigue. To decide finally where the seat
of the popularity lay, Herr Urbantschitch
made both ear passages alright and ap-
piled tuning fork and watch to the
head. The sounds seemed not continuous
but intermittent The cause must, there
fore, be in the nerves of hearing.
AN apparatus of great delicacy has
lately been invented by DR.. Mosso, of
Turin, for measuring lhe movements of
the blood-vessels in man. 1t is named
the plethysmograph, and its operation
consists in inclosing Part of the body,
say the forearm, in glass cylinder with
Il caoutchouc ring, filling the cylinder
with tepid water, and measuring, by q
special continuance, the quantity of water
which flows out or in through tube con-
nected with the cylinder, as the arm ex-
pands or contracts. An opening in the
cylinder is connected by piece of
caoutchouc tubing with glass tube
opening downward into a test-tube sus-
pended from double pulley with coun-
terpoise, TO which the recording lever is
attached, in vessel containing mixture
of alcohol and water. When the vessels
Of the arm dilate, water passes from the
cylinder to the test-tube, which is thereby
immersed further, so that the counterpoise
rises; in the opposite case water flows
back from the test-tube into the cylinder,
the test-tube rises and the counterpoise
descends. Among other applications of
the apparatus, DR.. Mosso employs it in
studying the physiology of thought and
cerebral activity. The slightest emotions
are revealed by the instrument by a
change in the state of the blood-vessels.
The entrance Of person in whom one is
interested during the experiment has the
effect of diminishing the volume of the
forearm by from four to fifteen cubic
centimetres. The work of the brain dur
ing the solution of a perplexing problem
or the reading of an obscure passage is
always accompanied by a contraction of
the vessels proportionate to the effort of
thought