Macon beacon. [volume] (Macon, Miss.) 1859-1995, 1878-09-21
POPULAR SCIENCE.

One ounce of peach kernels contains
one grain OF prussic acid,
AN appreciable quantity of arsenic i,
found TO exist in all rubber shoppers and
tubes.
BRoMINE is now highly lauded as a
cnre for poisoning by the poison-iyy-
RhUS t0Tlc0denayOn.
| PITCHERINE is a new stimulant much
used by the natives of Australia as a
substitute for tobacco. They both chew
and smoke it.
The telephone is now used to help
deaf people to hear, by attaching a
string to the parchment diaphragm of
a simple telephone and having the deaf
person put the string between his teeth.
ADD two ounces powdered alum and
two ounces powdered boraX to a twenty
barrel ciStern rainwater that is black
oned or oily, and in few hours the sed-
iment will settle and the water be clari-
fed and fit for washing and even cook
ing purposes.
TIE following is said to be the for
muIa for the lnucilage used on United
States postage,strmps DeXtrine, two
ounces; acetic acid, one ounce; water,
five ounces, alcohol, one ounce, Add
the alcohol to the other ingredients
when the deXlrine is completely dissOly-
ed.
A NEW spccuoscopc has been devised
by NJ. Thollon, 1t can be readily at
tached to any telescope. The prisms
. are SO connected Mdmrangcd that they
may be moved in q determined way, and
so that q ray Of light coming along the
axis Of the collimator reaches the axis
of the telescope only after twice tray
crsing the whole system Of prisms with
the minimum of deviation The mstru-
ment combines facilities for fully con-
trolling its great dispersiye power, and
for etlecting minute measurements Of
spectra
THE last number of the Philadelphia
Mclisal 4J / SUgio0l Reporter contains
a suggestive editorial on " Color Blind
ness, its Dangers and Detection" Sta.
tistics show that in New England one
person out of twenty is color blind, and
the proportion is probably equally large
in other parts OF the country. The edi-
tor asks, in view of these facts, whether
the railroad companies take any pains
to ascertain that their engineers, signal
men, etc, have not such Il dangerous
defect of vision, Most of the railroads
in Europe subject their employees to Sc
we're tests in regard to this matter
EDISoN's visit to Nevada has given
him new idea, He thinks that the
size, character and point of groupings
of mineral lode may be determined by
the difference of the conductivity of
electricity, provided that the walls of
the lodges are lined with clay or decom-
posed rock. He will test his theory on
/ the Comstock lode when he returns
from California. Should his plan prove
practical, instead of running long tun-
nels, sinking deep shafts, or boring
here and there with the diamond drill,
miner would apply the electrical
apparatus, and thus find out how much
ore there is in a mine, where it lies, its
direction, and the point where its crop
pings may be looked for,
SMOKE is defined by the Boston Jour-
nal Of Chemistry to be "unburnt car
bon, or fuel thrown away 1t adds
"The torrents of black vapor from our
chimneys and smoke-pipes contain thou
sands of tons of coal lost because We
have not learned how to save it, The
time will come when this will be rerk-
oned as foolish as we should now con
slider it to shovel coal into the sea, as
we used to dispose OF the refuse from
gas,works, which has become the source
of so many useful and valuable products
The chemical lecturer of the next cen
tury will tell his audience how long i
was before the world learned to burr
fuel without blowing u good part of i
into the air. He will grow facetious a
he describes the appearance of grea
cities perpetually covered with pail 0
vaporous blackness.