St. Landry democrat., 1882-12-09
SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.

side of a hill, causing it to fall into a
road below. The lightning cut a deep
zHt down the face Of the hill.
nense size, one of quarts ut Milan
being three and Il quarter feet in length
and five and d half feet in cireumfer-
ence, and estimated to weigh over 500
pounds while a great beryl at Grafton
y. H., is more than four feet long and
thirty-two inches ID diameter and
weighs not less than 5000 pounds.
According to John Rogers, F. R. NJ.
S., it is claimed that modern micros-
3 copes are made to magnify as $4,000
diameters, while some regard 100000
dianeters as possible. Such excessive
amplificatiOn, however, gives too imper-
feet results and is attended by too many
difficulties to be of any value. The
greatest living mcr0scopists are OF the
opinion that power of 5000 Or 1000
diameterS represents the highest useful
limit OF microscopic vision
4 snake whose entire body had be-
come lignifed has been taken from the
trunk OF a Brazilian tree.
Prof. Whitney maintains tEat the
earth is gradually drying up-a process
which commenced in cretaceous times.
The increasing dryness, within the his
forical period. of Persia, Arabia, the
countries around the Aral and Caspian,
North Africa and Greece is proved by
abundant facts.
Messrs. Schulhoff and Bossert have
worked out anew the observations re-
corded of the comet OF 1919, and from
the most probable elements obtain a
revolution period OF 71.7 years, leading
them to believe that the comet will
again come to periheliou about the
middle of 1883. The uncertainty as to
the period of revolution is about three
and a half years.
From four observations Of Comet
Wells of 1889. Herr Thran, of Dingel-
stadt. Thuringia, has computed a set
OF elliptic elements which indicate that
a return OF that body will not occur for
about 3,617 years.
At recent meeting of the Royal
horticultural Society of London. Rev.
g. Henslow exhibited potato-tubers
which bad grown upon the stalks OF the
plants in the oxils of leaves. He also
showed plum leaves perforated with
small cir >llar holes, caused by the lens
action of raindrups which concentrated
the suns rays and burned the leaves.
Another exhibitor, Mr.. Saxton, sent
green, purple and speckled pea-pods-l
the last result of crossing the two
others.
It has been found that the. presence
at silica is not essential to plant growth,
but that it may serve valuable purposes /
is shown by the researches OF Wolff.
After fourteen years OF experiments on
the oat plant, this observer concludes
that silica aids in the ripening OF grain
by causing the early death OF the leaves,
which is followed by II passage of their
nutritive matters to the seeds. Thus in I
an experiment without silica so seeds /
were produced with little silica, 80
seeds; with much silica, 1s4 seeds. t
Silica also tends TO prevent the ahsorp-
fion by plants of supeyfluous quantities
of essential mineral matter, thus keep t
Ing tue soil from unnecessary exllaus-
tlon.
In a paper upon electro -mailia,v Mr.. I
w. Mattieu Williams says that the lead
ing faliacy urging electro -1naniacs OF
the present day to luinous Investments
is the idea that efectro-motors arcnovel-
ties, and that electric lighting is in its
infancy. Directly following the bril-
liant discoveries OF Faraday, sAmpere,
\
motors, aud a parade OF the wonderful
results obtained, with machines which,
it was believed. were quickly to super
sede steam engines. This was nearly
half century ago, and electrical pro-5f
sress has been less rapid than many
seem to believe. Comparing an cleo
trio railway of forty years ago (npon
which he himself rode) with one OF to-
day, and the experimental steam rail-
way Of tllatstime with the pefected and
ubiquitous modern affair, Mr.. Williams
:tffirms that the lateof advance in elec-
tricity has been far slower than that
As to electric lighting, it is older than /:
gas-iighting, and its strides have been
much less rapid and positive. Sir Hum
pllrey Davy exhibited the electric light i
in London while the city was dimly +
lighted by oil-lamps, and before gas
lighting had been attempted anywhere.
The lamp used by Davy at the begin
ming of this century was capable Of
giving a dazzling arc four inches in
lengtl, being vastly more brilliant than
1eDderil arc-Hghts. Even the incandes
cent lamp is nothing new, but was ori-
ginalit invented by a young American
named Starr, who died in 1S47. This
iii whose experiments Mr..
mum and of platinum and iridium al
lays, and abandoned them as Edison
did thirty years later. Various forms
of carbon were then tried, including
the identical form now used by Edison.
In fact, this old lamp was almost iden-
tical in all important details with the
modern ones of Edison, Swan and 9TH
ers. Its only scientific defect was due
to the collecting of a carbon film on
he glass globe.