The Arkansaw traveler., 1888-03-03
CO1sptLed for The ArkdRs0w 1+GueLer. SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.

France is given as 32 years, two months and 15 days; the average in the United States is only 24 years, 10 months and A days.
 A company has been formed in Berlin to manufacture electrical watches. Two small cells and small electric motor take the place of the ordinary watch movement.
 Women are gradually becoming active in scientific work. The Royal Geographical Society has decided to admit them to fellowship, and other prominent societies will shortly fol- low the example.
 A deaf race of men seems to be the inevitable result of a continuance of schools for deaf mutes. The close as- sociation with one another naturally leads to intermarriage, with offspring inheriting the common infirmity.
 The well-known wintergreen plant is blessed with an abundance of names, among them being checkerberry, box berry, grouseberry, partridgeberry, deerberry, spiceberry, teaberry, red berry, groundberry, hillberry, moun- tain tea, redberry tea, ground ivy, and ground holly.
 The magnetic properties of iron have been found by M. P. Ledeboer to be unaffected up to a temperature of HOO degrees F., beyond which they are rapidly lost, becoming scarcely perceptible at 1900 degrees, and en- tirely disappearing at 1850 degrees. They return in the same way as the metal cools.
 A DISTANT PossIBILITY.-A curi- ous speculation has been made con- corning what would happen were the earth's rotation to cease. The equa- torial diameter being twenty-six miles more than the polar diameter, the earth would present an equatorial zone of solid ground miles high above sea-level, the water being all drawn to the poles. This land zone would then be like our Arctic regions, and would be banded by ring of perma- nent ice and snow.
 MOONLIGHT EFFECTs.-The influ- ence of the moon upon vegetation is an interesting problem awaiting so- tuition. A recent writer upon the subject mentions that wood-cutters in Cape Colony and in India insist that timber is full of sap and unfit to be cut at full moon. Another obser- vation of lunar influence in Cape Colony is the rapid spelling ot meats and other provisions when exposed to moonlight, though this may be due to the fact that the light serves as guide to insects.
 SCIENCE AND CREATIoN.-"The re- searches of science" says Dr, W. H. DalliDger, F. R. S., "are physical. The observable finite contents of space and time are the subjects of it's analy- sis. Existence, not the cause of ex- istence; succession, not the reason of succession; method, not the origin of method, are the subjects of physical research. A primordial cause cannot be the subject of experiment nor the object Of demonstration. It must for ever transcend the most delicate phys ical reaction, the profoundest analysis, and the last link in the keenest logic. Absolute knowledge concerning it can only be the prerogative of itself.
 CURIOUS COMMENsALs.-Fish-p para sites, eel-shaped and very small, have only recently become known, though ten species have now been found in the Mediterranean sea and the Atlan- tic and Indian oceans. These para sites usually attach themselves to the hollow parts of marine animals, seem- ing to prefer the respiratory cavity of the star fish, but sometimes finding less favorable habitation, as in the interior of pearl-oyster buried in mud. They feed upon small animals brought to them by the water, and do not injure the creatures that give them home. This is the condition called commensalism by Van Beneden.
 A MECHANICAL GIANT.-Whati is be- lieved to be the most powerful and efficient tool yet made is the gigantic hydraulic forging press of the Atlas works at Sheffield, of which Krupp of Essen has ordered duplicate. It ex- erts a nominal force of 4,0O0 tons, though it's actual maximum power is considerably greater. The work is made ready for the great machine by three furnaces, each capable of heating an ingot of 100 tons, and two travel ing cranes, each easily lifting 100 tons, convey and manipulate the forgings. One man operates four valves to raise, lower, advance, retire, move sideways or rotate the forging, and another man regulates the strokes of the press with the utmost delicacy and &C., curacy.
 A WIDE FIELD FOR ENToMOLo- GIsTs.-The insect world is vast al- most beyond our conception. Prsi- dent Sharp of tho London Entomo- logical Society states that. while lin.