Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1885-07-01
SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.
Compiled for the SPECTATOR.

compiled for the SPECTATOR.
A PROBLEM SoLvED.-Preliminary trials
with an apparatus specially constructed for
photographing the stars have been made at
the Paris Observatory during the past year.
The results have been so satisfactory that
Admiral Mouchez now declares the problem
of making charts of the heavens, including
all stars down to the fifteenth magnitude,
to be solved. Photographic impressions Of
stars visible to the naked eye are taken
with minimum exposure of -hundredth
to one-half of a second, while for the faint
est stars-those of the fifteenth and six
tenth magnitudes-an hour and half or
more is necessary.
A GROWING WORLD.-Drs. Kleiber and
Keller, of st Petersburg, have been study
ing the increase of the earth's mass from
the addition Of meteors drawn from space.
They have calculated that about 450, O00
meteors fall on the surface of the earth
each hour, and that the weight of the foreign
material thus added must be as much as
1860 pounds hourly, or nearly sixty tons
daily.
Experiments by Baker and Dixon, En-
glish chemists, have shown that highly
explosive mixture Of carbonic oxide and OK
ygen is not explosive when dry, and have in
dictated that moisture is necessary to ordl-
nary combustion. Paradoxicalit must seem,
but it is probably true that without water
there could be no fire.
DR.. Andree, of Leipzig, concludes that
the American Indians in pre- Columbian
times were unacquainted with the art of
forging iron, although they knew how to
obtain and employ gold, silver, tin, copper,
quicksilver, etc. He thinks that the great
masonry works of Peru may have been built
with bronze tools.
On Russian plains where grass is now
unknown, and five out Of every six years
are generally rainless, the grass grew thick
to the height of a man sixty years ago
The change is supposed to be an effect of
the destruction of the vast forests which
once covered the country to the northward.
SENsE-PoINTs OF THE SKIN.-Blix, of
Upsala, and Gutenberg, of Berlin, have
observed that there are definite points on
the skin at which sensations of cold only
are aroused others distinct from the fist
and equally definite, for the sensation Ct
heat while between the two sets of spots
sensations of pressure only are aroused
Donaldson, an American experimenter, has
tried to make accurate maps of the spots
of temperature sensation and has found
that their distribution differs on different
individuals, that the spots for cold are
more numerous than those for heat while
the latter are the more sensitive, and that
the spots are mostly less than one twenty
fifth of an inch in diameter.
ACCUMULATION IN AFRICA.-Stanley,
the American explorer, believes equatorial
Africa to be habitable for Europeans, and
that, with due attention to diet and an oc
casional holiday change, they may long re-
tain their full vigor in the Congo country.
On the other hand, Fischer, a German
traveller, regards Central Africa as entirely
usafe for Europeans at lower levels than
5000 feet, and even at that altitude malaria
must be expected on rich land.
DIMENSIONS OF WAvEs.-The extreme
height reached by ocean waves, according
to careful measurements by the Hydro
graphical Bureau, is from Al to 4S feet, the
average height Of great waves being about
30 feet. During storms in the North At
lantic, waves sometimes extend to length
of 500 and 600 feet, and last ten or eleven
seconds; while the largest wave observed
is said to have had a length of half a mile,
and to have taken % seconds to spend itself.
The velocity of sound in ice has been de-
termined by Trowbridge and McRae to be
about $500 feet per second, or about nine
times the velocity of sound in the air.
The former prevalence of sub-tropicaI
climate in England is indicated by the re-
cent discovery in Cornwall of certain fossils
of the tertiary period of geology.
THE ELECTRICITY OF RAIN.-The sug-
gestion having been made that the ignition
of petroleum tanks may sometimes be
caused by sparks from the rain of thunder
clouds, some interesting results obtained
with an old piece Of apparatus have been
called to mind. In these experiments an
electrometer showed that the drops of oc-
casional showers are almost always more or
less charged with electricity, and that it is
only totally absent during foggy, moist
aud long storms. The strongest charges
were obtained during thunder storms; but
the air even has given indications occasion
ally of an electrical charge without any fall
of rain.
CARBoN's CHANGEs.-At a meeting of
the Berlin Electrical Society, DR.. Aaron
has exhibited specimens of vegetable carbon
which had been transformed into electric
conductors and made almost incombustible
by energetic and prolonged heating in a
vacuum or in neutral atmosphere. These
properties are so like those of graphite
the mineral carbon used in pencils-that
the product may well be called artificial
graphite-the mineral carbon used in pen
cils-that the product may well be called
artificial graphite, although it is not crystal
line.
ARE OUR LATITUDEs CHANGING p
Eleven stars have been selected for obser-
walton at Lisbon and at Washington, to de-
termine whether those places are changing
in latitude. Each star will be observed fif-
teen or twenty times yearly, with the great
est possible accuracy in recording it's posi-
ton. Observations at Pulkowa have indi-
Gated a diminution of about twenty-three
feet in latitude between 1943 and 1872, and
greater changes have been shown at other
observatories; but it is by no means certain
that these results are not due to errors of
observation.
A new species of tape worm-mature
specimens measuring from three to eight
inches in length-has been found in trout.
Two French experimenters make the re-
markable report that silicon, though unaf-
fected by temperature of 2370 degree F.,
volatilizes at 1924 degrees.
A Find at POmpeii.
One house recently uncovered at Pom !
peli appeared to have been undergoing re-