The Arkansaw traveler. (Little Rock, Ark.) 1882-1???, 1885-03-14
Complied for THE ARKASsAw TRAVELLER.
SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.


SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.
An International exhibition of animals
is PROPOSED for the next year at Buda Pes,h.
The seas of India and China now have
twelve tidal observatories, each ef which is
moved to new spot every fifth year.
| A writer from FIJI asserts that when
! fiocks of tern and other sea fowl rest upon
the sea the water becomes smooth, an effect
which he ascribes to oil emitted by the birds.
Evidence eff the sanitary value of sun
| light is afforded by the recent experiments in
France of Mons. E. Duclaux, who finds that
| the light Of the sun, in its action on germs,
is fifty times as destructive as its heat
Distilled water saturated with oxygen
is now prepared in Paris, and is rapidly gain
ing favor. Aside from its healthfulness for
| ordioary table use, it is said TO be valuable
in the treatment of diseases Of the digestive
| organs.
An opportunity CT studying a case of
leprosY has been afforded DR.. Guttman, who
assures the Berlin Medical society that there
| can be no doubt that the living bacilli found
in the system Of leprous patients are really
| the cause of the disease.
The Dutch government has had COL
lected she reports OF 1900 eye witnesses in
order to prepare an accurate history of the
K akatoa volcanic eruption, which many sup
pose was the cause of the wonderful sky
giows seen over large part of the world.
1t is reported that Herr Palisa, of
Vienna, the well known discoverer of as.
teroids, wishes to sell for $25o the right of
naming small planet No. a44. the money to
be applied by him to the fitting out Of an ex-
petition to observe the total eclipse of
august, 1885.
The conclusion has been reached by
Mons Foyal that the absorption of atmos-
pheric oxygen by coal dust usually produces
the rise in temperature to which spontaneous
combustion is due. He finds that Ignite is
ignited at the .ow temperature of 900 degrees,
anthracite at SIS degrees, and other varieties
of coal, in powdered form, at intermediate
temperatures.
Fish in Warm Water.-An experiment
termne the degree of heat which various
fishes may endure. The water containing
them was slowly warmed, when individuals
of the several species were Frustrated at the
following temperatures Perch, So degrees
roach, 81 Ia degrees; salmon, So degrees
minnow, IS degrees; gudgeon, IS Ia de-
grees; dace, 60 degrees; common tench, 80
degrees; golden tench, SO degrees carp 81
degrees. Brandy-about which as a FISH
to have good effect in restoring to animation
the exhausted objects of the experiment.
Shape Of the Earth's Orbit Proctor re-
marks that a common error is the SUPPOSE
ton that the earth moves in an obviously
elliptical path, whereas it really appears to
travel in circle. Taking the earth's orbit
when its eccensricity was very nearly at its
greatest-6so,oooy years ago-the numbers gag
and 324 represent the actual proportion be-
tween the greatest and shortest axes of the
figure described by our planets motion
around the sun. So that If a circle is drawn
with radius of three aud ne-fourth inches
1t nowhere departs more than the hundredth
part of an inch from the ellipse which would
represent with perfect accuracy the orbit of
the earth $50 600 years ago when it was SO
much more divergent from An exactly circu-
lar form than now.
Plant Parasites.-Almost every sou of
plant furnishes living to its own peculiar
species of aphis, OF plant-louse, by which
great destruction is occasionally wrought.
DR.. J. Sibley Hicks, an English entomolosist,
states that the hop aphis caused loss in
1882 amounting to nearly So 600 600. This
enormous damage is explained by the fabu-
lous rate of increase of the aphis, it being
possible for single female to see in her life
time a progeny Of over 1900 million indi-
viduals. Another destructive species, known
as American blight occars on apple trees,
and was first observed in 1885 in an orchard
near London. The vine aphis (phyIloxera)
has done immense damage in the vineyards
q France, where il was frst found in 1865.
Fortunately, the aphites have numerous enc
mics, especially active ones being the cater
pillars of the lady-bird, the lacewing fly and
its grub, and the ichneumon hy. A lady
bird caterpillar will devour forty or fifty daily.
Catarrh Cured.
A clergyman, after suffering a number
OF years from that loathsome disease,