Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1877-07-11

A curious experiment with the
magnet was recently tried in London.
A boy had broken a needle in the calf
OF his leg, and before resorting to sur
9lcal instruments it was decided to try
the effect OF a powerful magnet in
withdrawing the Steel After num-
Der OF experiments in different posi-
tions, the needle was drawn near the
surface on the opposite side of the leg
from which it entered, and was easily
withdrawn.
"A conference has been recently
held at the Anthropological Institute,
London, to discuss the question of the
antiquity of man. The discussions
were based upon papers read at the
meeting from men of eminence in this
line of research, but the argument
was principally confined to discoveries
made in the British Islands. Nature
regards the evidence adduced as insult
ticent to prove the existence of man in
the glacial epoch. The advocates of
such extreme antiquity do not, how
ever, regard their position as at all en-
dangered by the discussions at the con-
ference, and in case the British discov-
cries fail to give them support, they
can fall back upon the more important
evidences obtained in Continental Eu-
rope.
Mr.. Boyd Dawkins has written a
slight account, in Nature, of a work
ingman who has made considerable
progress in science under circum-
stances which recall the Scotch natu-
ralist, Edwards. The man is one of
the hands III cotton-mill at Old
ham, and bears the name of James
Whitaker. He was led to scientific
pursuits by seeing some one pick a
piece of coal-shate and remark that
there was q tishscale in it. He exam
med the piece skepticaly; then began
to collect; and finally devoted all his
mornings and evenings to accumu-
lating and studying objects in natural
history. He was unable to buy a mi
crosc0pe, but procured couple of
lenses, and mounted them himself in
tubes, after the manner of a telescope.
His collection of fossils comprises
many from the coal-measureS, which
he has cut into slices 50 as to show
their minute structure, and afterward
polished them. cementing them on
glass, and rubbing them down on the
kitchen-hoor until they were trans
parent. Whitaker Is good local bot
anist as well as geologst.
A felted fabric, as it is termed.
has been introduced in various indus
tries III London. 1t is simply a paper,
in the manufacture of which various
animal and vegetable substances are
| used, such a. the intestines of ami
mails, the ibers produced from the va
rious nettles and grasses, banks of
trees, and from flax, hemp and cotton.
| These substances, mixed together in
certain proportions, are treated much
the same as are the materials in paper
making, being disintegrated, purified,
bleached, rolled, pressed and finally
printed upon. The fabric produced
differs, however, from ordinary paper,
II that 1t is not so readily torn, is
somewhat elastic, and soft enough to
fail readily into graceful folds. 1t is
also stated that it will resist the action
of the weather and sun, and that damp
does nothing more than make it more
soft and yielding 20 the touch. TIE
material has been satisfactorily applied
to window curtains, roller blinds, bed
curtains, and for the covering of walls,
III a manner similar to that in which
chlntzes or tapestries are used. The
colors, however, are less liable to fade
than in chintzes, as they are printed
principally in body colors.