The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1882-06-24
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SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.

/, SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.
! NJ. Renan has expressed the belief that
II century hence mankind will study
little else than physical science.
Plateau, the eminent French naturalist,
finds that June bug can exert as great
a force in proportion to its sige as .
locomotive.
that treating the woods with ozone
greatly adds to the durability Of pianos
used in warm climates.
Grapes exposed to sunlight contain,
according to DR.. A. L. dc Yillanova, three
and three fourths per cent. more sugar
and more than one per cent. less acid
than those WHICH have remained in dark
| ness.
| The sorrOwfnl tree-so named because
it fourishes only at night--grows upon
the island Of Goa, near Bombay. The
flowers, which have a fragrant odor,
appear soon after sunset the year round,
and close up or fall off US tue sun rises.
The city Of Paris has granted a piece
of ground in the park Of Montsouris for
school of insectology. The useful
insects (snci as bees and silkworms),
the auxiliary insects Cor those useful to
plants), and the noxious insects will all
he studied.
After recent violent storm on the
English coast u quantity Of saline matter
was observed OH windows at a distance
inland. The deposit is believed to have
been made by ocean spray, which in this
case must have been blown by the wind
at least sixty miles.
When ocean cables are raised, SO many
Of the crabs, corals, snakes and other
inhabitants of the ocean bottom are
drawn up with them that cable repairing
has been suggested as a novel method Of
dredging, of which it is hoped some
competent naturalist may take advan-
tage.
English microscopists have given
various facts showing that human snb
jccts have been i'll many cases infected
with filaria, mnch-lreaded worm para
site, by mosquitoes. These parasites
breed in countless numbers in tho human
body, usually invading the circulation in
the evening, increasing till midnight,
and then retiring to other parts Of the
system.
The gathering in Of cloth stretched IN
large bleach fields is new European
application of the electric railway. The
railway constructed has twenty one
branches, each al'.s;;iIt a third of mile in
iengtll.F#ihe pieces of cloth are con-
antcted ut the ends so as to form long
lengths, and the railway trucks roll up
as much in half an hour as could be done
by the old method in an entire day.
Mr.. St. George Land Fox predicts that
the incandescent electric lamps will soon
altogether supersede the arc lights now
SO rapidly coming into general use for
lighting streets and large areas. He
thinks tho danger to life from contact
with tie wires used for electric lighting
purposes may be overcome by using low
tension currents which are harmless As
to fire risks, he believes that they can
only arise from gross carelessness.
A cnrious collection of books is COIL
tanned i'll the library Of Warstenstein,
near Cassel in Germany. These books
appear at first sight to be logs of wood,
but each volume is really Il complete
history of the tree it represents. The
back shows the bark, in which a small |
place is cut to write the scientific and !
the common name as u title. One side |
shows the tree trunk in its natural state,
and the other is polished aud vanished.
Inside are shown the leaves, fruit, fibre
and insect parasites, 10 which is added a
full description Of the tree and its pro-
ducts.
According to statistics recently worked
ont, one railway traveller is killed in
France for each 1000, 600, 900 kilometres
(about 1914 $50 900 miles) run, which is a
distance equal to 10000 times the length
Of voyage around the world. This
the comp,tter adds, would last
during 3O44 years travelling day and
night 1T the rate of 60 kilometres 1928
miles) per hour. Allowing sixty Years
to be the average lifetime in store for a
healthy man, it follows that before he
could be killed by :: railway accident
according to the law Of probabilities he
would have died natural death fifty
times.
The present increase of the population
OF England from excess of births over
deaths is about one and a half per cent.
a year; and Proctor computes that if the
world had started with one million
inhabitants 5000 years ago IAN estimate
probably far too low) and had made a
uniform increase at that rate the earth,s
present population would be 213. 8OO.-
Ooo, 600, 100000 ,ooo, 900, 600 900.
Even if the worlds population had been
only ten 1000 years ago, and the same
rate OF increase had been kept up that is
now i'll progress i'll England, the number
would now be so great that ~, 200, OOO.-
700 such globes as this earth would only
give standing room for the vast popula-
ton surprising the entire surface of each
globe to be occupied.