Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1885-08-19
SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.
Compiled for the SPECTATOR.

SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.
[Compiled for the SPECTATOR.
CEREAL GRowTH.-From careful re
searches in Russia, Kowalewski has found
that cereals grow faster in the north than
in the south. For instance, oats and spring
wheat take 1913 days and barley 110 days
to ripen about the southern province of
Kherson, and only 9S, SO, and 9S days at
Arkhangelsk in the north. The intermedi-
ate regions show intermediate differences.
The cause is the greater length of the daily
exposure to sunlight in the high latitudes,
which more than compensates tor the diff
ference in temperature in favor of the
southern regions. In each latitude the
growth of cereals is more rapid in the east
ern parts of Russia than in the western,
the land near the coast having less sunshine
that in the continents interior.
The extent to which animals appreciate
color is an interesting but unsolved prob
lem. 1t is being Investigated by j. Gra-
ber, who has experimental upon five man.
mails, seven birds, two reptiles, three am
phibians, two fishes, three mollusca, twen-
ty-seven insects, two spiders, and two
worms. He has found that the sense of
color, as well as the power of receiving
light, is much more widely distributed
among animals than has been supposed, al
though the variations in the sense of color
and brightness in animals are great.
A Chinese Viceroy has propounded new
earthquake theory. In memorial to the
throne this high official attributes an earth
quake of last January to the mildness of
the winter, which caused an excess of
"yang," or male element of Nature; al
though the shock was in measure due to
local officials who neglected their duties,
and thus failed to gain the harmonizing in
fluence of Heaven!
Lyell estimated that the gorge of Niaga-
ra River was cut out in about 30, 900 years,
but surveys to determine the present rate
of recession of the Falls indicate that the
work may have been done in 10000 years.
During forty-one years the average annual
wear Of the rock was 23 feet.
VEGETABLE SHEEP.-On Mount Torlesse,
in New Zealand, grows a singular plant,
specimens of which are known as ''vegeta-
BILE sheep" The plant belongs to the Cud-
weed tribe, and is described by a recent bo-
tanical explorer as growing on loose debris at
an altitude of 4500 to 5000 feet, and forming
round or kidney-shaped patches, some of
them as much as eight feet across and three
feet high. They resemble immense cush-
ions, in one species snow-white and in the
other silvery gray, and both are formed of
dense mass of leafy branches, so closely
packed together that chisel cannot be ca
silly thrust into the mass. The flowers are
so small that their parts can be seen dis
tinctly only under the microscope. The
peculiar shape and appearance of these
plants led to their being occasionally mis-
taken for skeep by early settlers, and hence
the name.
Since 1877 Delaunay, of Paris, has made
several predictions of earthquake seasons,
and his prophesies have unfortunately all
come true. He now predicts very severe
volcanic disturbances for 1886, to occur at
a time when the attractive influence of the
other members of the solar system is most
strongly felt upon our planet, or, rather,
when that influence is most unevenly dis
tributed during a near approach of the
great attractive bodies.
According to Prof J. G.. Gale, five
comets were known to make their perihe-
lion passage in 1880, eight in 1881, three in
1882, two in 1888, and three in 1884.
The electric light has been applied to the
firing of guns at night. Trouve has de-
scribed to the Paris Academy of Sciences a
button illuminated by a minute battery, by
which the gunner is enabled to take aim;
while another little apparatus incande-
scent lamp with suitable refector---throws
beam of light upon the object to be fired
at.
A prize has been offered by the Anti-To-
bacco Society of France for the best essay
on the liability or non-liability of smokers
to contract cholera.
A MINERAL LUNG.-By a remarkable
process, now being exhibited in London,
the Brin brothers, French chemists, claim
to be able to cheaply obtain oxygen from
the atmosphere in unlimited quantities.
The air is first freed from it's moisture and
carbonic acid by quick-lime, reducing it to
mixture of oxygen and nitrogen. These
gases are then passed through an artificial
lung of anhydrous oxide of barium, which
at a temperature of 500 degrees absorbs the
oxygen, while the nitrogen is drawn off to
gasometer for conversion into ammonia,
etc. This use of baryta is not new, but the
salt is for the first time made indestructible
and capable of performing its work for an
indefinite period. 1t is claimed that this
cheapened method of obtaining oxygen, and
the secondary nitrogenous products, must
effect an absolute revolution in chimistry.
Bones have been proven to quickly dis
solve in sea-water. They are consequently
seldom obtained during ocean dredgings,
although teeth, which resist the action of
the water indefinitely, are often brought up.
A colossal poplar in the Botanical Gar
dens at Dion measures 130 feet in height,
46 feet in circumference near the earth, and
81 feet in circumference at 16 feet above the
earth. DR.. Lavelle finds reason for believ-
ing that it is at least 500 years old.
Continued investigation confirms the be-
lief that the English sparrow destroys vege-
tation instead of protecting it from insects.
One observer has reported to Miss Il. A.
Ormerod, the English entomologist, that the
crops of fifty sparrows, killed in one sum-
mer, contained but two insects.
Among the animals eaten by different ma
tions which are not used as food in civilized
countries, Mr.. P. L. Simmonds mentions
monkeys, lemurs, bats, skunks, foxes, lions,
porcupines, crocodiles, salamanders, snakes,
caterpillars and ants.
A Texas man bet that he could invent
question to which fifty people would give
the same answer. He won the bet. The
question was:
'sHave you heard that Smith has commit
ted suicide?"
The answer in each case was;
"What Smithg''