The Florida agriculturist. [volume] (DeLand, Fla.) 1878-1911, 1885-02-04

the very tissues Of the mouth and body !;
the second dlscriminates between poison
GUS and chemically harmless food stuffs !;
and the third merely decides the minor
question, whether the particular food is
likely to prove then and there wholesome
or lndigestible to the particular person. ;"
The plan of electrically transmitting
power has been in practical operation for
more than eight months at Bienne, Swift
Zerland. A turbine and DYNAMO con
vert the power of mountain torrent
into electricity, which passes over wires
some 800 fe9 ct to a receiving dynamo fur
nishing two shops with their required six
to eighteen horse power.
After ten years of experiment, the SUI
perlntendent of the porcelain factory at
Seyres, Mons. Lauth, thinks he has pro-
duced porcelain identical with that of
China, and far superior to the famous old
Sevres.
German research has shown that the
mellowness of old wine is due to an in
crease in its proprtion of glycerine.
INDEsTRUCTIBLE LIFE.-A matter of
surprise and wonder to those who wit
ness it for the first time is the rousing
the addition of drop of water to a few
grains of earth or dust. These micros-
copic organisms abound everywhere in
water containing decomposing vegetable
or animal matter, and some forms may,
in dried state, remain for months or
even years apparently dead, to be reviv-
ed when water is again supplied to them.
Mr.. Jabez Hogg has been experiment.
ing during the past three years with one
form of infusorial life-the rotifers or
wheel animalcules-and has even kept
dried specimens for time at temper
AZURE of 200o Fahrenheit and afterward
exposed them to intense cold, neither
process killing them nor greatly dim
inishing their vital powers. Mr. Hogg
supposes that as the animal dries it
shuts itself up like telescope, its skin
taking an egg-like shape, and that
secreting organ coats the body with
gelatinous envelope which protects it
from further change.
A European observer, DIR. Ochorowicz,
believes that he has found evidence of
magnetic sense" 1t is stated that by
hanging magnetic tube-called hyp-
noscope-from the index finger he real
ICES peculiar sensations, somewhat re-
sembling the effects produced by the ac-
ton OF the air in front of an electrical
machine.
De Candolle, the French botanist, sup
poses that agriculture had its origin in
three widely separated regions, namely:
China, Southwestern Asia and Egypt.
and the highlands of Mexico and Peru.
The value of sulphate of iron as plant
food has been tested by an English chem
list, Mr.. A. B. Griffiths. The use of fifty
pounds per acre increased the yield of
beans from % bushels to A, of turnips
from ID tons to 161s, but produced little
effect on cereals.
WHY BOILERS EXPLODE. -Many rather
mysterious boiler explosions having been
attributed to the sudden and explosively
violent flashing into steam of superheat-
ed water, the French Academy of Scien-
ces appointed a committee, year or
more ago, to investigate the subject
That committee has since made many
careful experiments, using pure and inn
pure water; water which had been long
stagnant, and water from which the air
had been driven by long boiling, and
generating steam by rapid and by slow
firing. AS result the conclusion has
been reached that if any boiler explo-
sion has occurred through superheating,
it must have been through the concur
renee of exceptional circumstances which
are neither defined, known nor suspect
ed. The experiments have shown con-
clusively that, however unaccountable
explosions sometimes appear, the real
cause must be looked for in the simple
loading of the boilers with steam pres
sures beyond their strength.
THE EARTH's INTERIoR.-Dr. M. L.
Wadsworth finds that the assumption
that the earth has "a heterogeneous,