Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1881-03-25
SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.

ioi' Milne mas found the japan.
csc to be very keen archaeologists.
They have made numerous valuable
collections of stone implements, an
cleHt pottery, etc, from the alum
dant remains of their country, the
general belief among them being
that such objects are freaks of M
turc.
According to DR.. Edward Smith
an egg contains fifteen and one
fourth per cent, of carbon and two
per cent. of nitrogen. Another
writer estimates that the value of
one pound of eggs, as food for sus-
tanning the active forces of the body,
is to the value of one pound of lean
beef as ISL to 900. As a flesh pro-
Queer one pound of eggs is about
equal to one pound of beef.
During recent boring for water
IN the Wimmera district, Victoria.
a tree was passed through for dis
lance of six feet at q depth of 25O
feet. Several fruit stones were
brought to the surface. At some
period in the worlds history grove
OF trees probably occupied this spot,
and the great depth of earth now
covering the remains of the veceta-
ton indicates Il vast lapse of time
since it tlouished.
1t was recently announced that Mr..
j. w. Swan, an English electrician, 3,
had succeeded in overcoming the
difficulties met by Edison in per-
fecting his incandescent electric
light. Mr.. Swan has since read a
remarkable paper in which he claims
a priority of discovery of all the es-
sential features of the Edison lamp.
He pronounces his own lamp an en-
tire success, and asserts that by q
new plan of establishing circuits he
can secure great economy over the
system proposed by Edison.
The plant most sensible to cleo.
tricity is the vine. When lightning
strikes in vineyard the leaves af-
fected are turned red brown or deep-
green, which circumstance shows,
in the opion of Prof. Colladon, that
the electricity descends in n sheet or
shower, and not in u single point as
is usually believed, the large num-
Der of vines touched proving that
the lightning has covered large
area. The Professor finds this theory
confirmed by an observation on a
tree which was lately struck.
The distance required for stop
ping railroad trains increases very
rapidly with the increase of speed.
In experiments made in England,
the Westinghouse brake stopped n
train moving at the rate of Al miles
an hour at q point only 1876 feet dis
tant from the place where the brake
was applied; bat when the speed
was increased to 81 miles an hour
the distance run after the applica-
ton of the brake was ,1S5 feet, and
at a speed Of G7 miles an hour the
train ran zoos feet after the brake
was applied.
During late visit to the solar OBJ
servatory at Meudon, Prof. Bell
was much interested in M. Janssen's
splendid photographs, and expressed
the opinion that the variations of
brightness of given solar point
might make the photophone speak,
and so reproduce in the laboratory
sounds produced on the sun. NJ.
Jansen has proposed that series of
successive photographs Of particu-
lar point on the suns surface be
passed rapidly before IN objective
giving images on the selenium APP
paratus, thus condensing into a
brief space variations which in the
solar images are too slow to produce
sound in the photophone.