The Arkansaw traveler., 1888-11-24
Compiled for The Ark0nsGW Traveller.
SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.

The fifth meeting of the Interna-
tional Geological Congress will be
held in Philadelphia in 1891. The
previous sessions have been: Paris,
1878: Bologna, 1881; Berlin, 1885 !;
and London, 1888.
A list of the discoveries of chemical
elements in eleven years 1877-1887)
has been compiled by Prof. FL. Car
rington Bolton, and shows that no less
than SO supposed new elementary
substances have been announced dur
ing that period.
The lightning flash is generally sup
posed to have duration of much less
than the one one-hundred- thousandth
part of second, but Trauvelot has
obtained Photographic results which
indicate that it may last several sec
onds. On slow-moving plate fash
was impressed as a broad ribbon
shaped band.
ELECTRIC NAyIGATIoN.-The navi-
CATION of the Thames by electric power
is now an established success. A small
electric launch has been running for
some months, and the largest electric
boat yet built-654 feet long and ten
feet wide-has just been completed.
A floating station has been put in
operation for charging the storage bat
teries. Other launches and stations
are being designed and constructed,
and a new era in river travelling seems
to have been fairly begun.
PLANTS UNDER ELECTRIC INFLU-
ENCE.-Three plats of land-each about
| four yards square-have been subjected
by Prot. E. Wollny of Munich to
different electrical conditions during
the growth in them of grain, potatoes,
carrots, etc. One enclosure was kept
under the influence of q weak direct
current; the second, of a COMPARE
lively strong direct current; and the
third, of an alternating current.
Comparison of the plants with those
raised under ordinary conditions gave
no evidence that electricity produces
any effect upon the development of
plants.
A CHURCH's TENANTS
| find that the Cathedral of Strasburg,
like the Coliseum of Rome and other
antique structures, has quite an i'm
portant fora and fauna of its own.
Not counting the stork, which tenn
porarily abides in the neighboring
chimneys, eight species of birds nest
upon the great building, where six of
them have become very numerous.
The kestrel, the barn owl, the domes-
tic sparrow and the common pigeon
remain throughout the year; the jack
daw, the chimney swallow, the martin
and the redstart being transitory
guests. Besides these, the established
fauna embraces three or four species
of bats, the common mouse and the
church rat, butterfly, some spiders
and few ants; while the huge stone
spire, rising 465 feet above the pave
ment, is the rendezvous of thousands
of insects that wander in the air. The
| local fora of the dressed stones is rep
resented by some twenty microscopic
lichens.
AN UNwITNEssED PHENOMENON
Impressive as is total solar eclipse
from our points of observation, the
phenomenon would be far more awe
inspiring if 1t could be seen from the
moon. The earth would be seen, in
the absence of an atmosphere, as q
black disc surrounded by a reddish
aureole, and would pass in black sky
over the sun, appearing three and
half times larger than the solar disc.
The totality might occupy three
quarters of an hour, whereas no solar
eclipse can be total to us for more
than eight minutes. Glare and shade
would be sharply contrasted on the
rugged lunar surface, and the stealthy
gliding across 1t of the mighty, hur-
rying shadow of the earth would be
peculiarly terrifying. A German artist
has made striking picture of lunar
landscape just emerging from such an
eclipse, and in new scientific the
atre" in Berlin it is proposed to imi-
tate this wonderful display OF nature
in all its phases.
IRELAND's neutrality-suspicious. by
o. Kellner having shown that linseed
oil as food for horses has rs times the
nutritive value of starch, Mr.. w.
Mattieu Williams mentions similar
experiments in which potato fed labor
ers proved less efficient than workmen
who had eaten largely of fat bacon.
He states that his observations
throughout Ireland during tour sum-
mers have convinced him that the
chief curse of that country is "neither
the Saxon, nor the priest, nor the
league, nor the tory, nor the radical,
but is the potato; and the craving for a
sluggish distension of the stomach
which Is generated by potato feeding,
becomes vice that in many cases Is
comparable to the alcohol crave. .
Even pigs degenerate If fed upon the
pOtAtO exclueivelv and human bo,uoo