Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1889-01-18
SCIENTIFIC AND INDUSTRIAL.


Vermont factories turn out 600, 900
snowshoyels per year, and New Hamp-
shire and Maine send the figures up to
1000, 900.
A Hartford Conn betting house has
produced leather bolt double, which
is l3S feet long, feetWide and half an
inch thick.
One pound of paint will cover about
| four square yards of surface, first coat;
and about six square yards for each ad-
ditional coat.
A test of bagging m de from fiber OBJ
taired from pine leaves seems to es-
tablish the fact that substitute of great
value has been found for jute.
The scheme of filling bombs with
asphyxiating gas, so that the enemy
will lie down quietly and go to sleep on
both sides after a short shower of bombs,
is said to be the best that has yet been
offered in military science.
Lightning produces chemical changes
in the atmosphere, by converting a por-
ton of the two gases oxygen and nitro
gen, of which it is principally composed,
into nitric acid. This acts very power
fully in destroying the exhalations which
arise from putrid vegetable and animal
matters.
A German electrician has devised an
ingenious scheme for the regulation of
dynamos. The field magnet cores, in
stead of being solid, ere made of tubes,
in which solid core is inserted. This
core can be withdrawn by hand or auto
matically, aud the strength of current
thus regulated.
A Birmingham ala steel company
recently shipped some Of their steel to
razor company in Massachusetts,, the
latter making it into rdzors and sending
back word that the steel was equal in
every respect to the best English cru
chile steel. Other tests, it is claimed,
proved equally satisfactory as to the
quality of the steel.
A new scheme of utilizing the saw
dust of the Ottawa River in Canada, for
the purpose of fuel is proposed. 1t is
claimed that by system of grinding the
refuge into uniform tineness, mixing it
with the refuge gas tar from the gas
house and COMPRISING the substance
into cakes, fuel can be made in every
way superior to soft coal for open fires.
Duringa discussion of the "lightning-
rod question at the last meeting of the
British Association, it was stated that
where there are special corroding
agencies at work copper is to be preferred
to iron as being less easily oxidized, but
that in ordinary cases equally good Sc
curity can he obtained, at much less eX-
pense, with iron. The question whether
the rods really afforded any security was
not considered.
An English electrician has invented a
material which he calls alterion for the
prevention of corrosion in boilers. The
interior is quoted with this and currents
of electricity are passed through the
boiler and from time TO time reversed.
The formation of scale is prevented by a
layer of hydrogen gas, which is deposited
upon the inner surface of the boiler. The
reversed currents reforms the hydrogen
into pure water, thin layer of pure
water being thus kept all around the
boiler.
A chimney 1872 feet high settled until
its top was three feet two inches out of
the perpendicular. This was at the
works OF Matthews & Sons, in Gloucester
shire, England. A course of bricks was
taken out for tive-eighths of the circum-
ference and replaced by course, one
and five-e ighths inches less in height. AS
fast as the cut was made the new course
was laid and iron wedges were driven in
above it. When all was in place, the
wedges were driven out, and the Chin
ney came back to within an inch or two
of the perpendicular.
Parasitic Extraordinarily small be-
ings, shaped like an eel-have been
recognized only for relatively short
time. Ten species have been distin-
guished in different seas and oceans.
They usually attach themselves to some
hollow part of the bodies of marine
animals, preferably entering the respira-
tory cavities of star.fsh. They have
even been found in the interior of the
shells of pearl oysters. They do not
injure the animals with which they asso-
ciate themselves, for they do not live
upon them, but upolthss. minute organ
isms which the sea water brings to their
cavities, so that they are really COM
mensals rather than parasites.