The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1891-01-08
SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY.

-Ihere IS more shlpplng now IN the
port at Charleston than at any time for
the last five years.
Eighteen and one-half tons of celery
were shipped from Kalamazoo in one
day recently.
1t is said there are only two red
slate quarries in the United States, one
in Vermont and the other in Virginia.
The Chinese Cotton Cloth Company
of Shanghai is at last about to COM
mence operations. although much ham,
pered by financial difficulties
-Nearsightedness is overrunning the
French people as much as the Germans.
Among the senior boys in the different
French colleges more than forty-six per
cent. are nearsighted.
The largest fruit farm in West Vir-
ginia is the Becker farm, near Harper's
Ferry. 1t contains 5000 apricot trees,
$1,000 peach trees, 5000 plum trees.
5000 miscellaneous fruit trees and 35,.
600 grape vines.
Recent experiments on the physio-
logical effects of the electric current
lead to the belief that continuous cur
rent causes death by direct action on
the substance of the heart, and death
by an intermittent current is due to the
alteration of the nerves and the inhibi-
tory mechanism of the heart.
"A German chemist has discovered
that when bottle partly filed with a
solution of ozone in water is shaken, a
soft phosphorescent glow spreads over
the surface of the liquid and quickly
disappears. A second shaking gives a
fainter light but the appearance can
not be obtained again until after an
interval of some days.
"A French agricultural experiment
station reports that out of 575 plants the
goat eats 449 and refuses 1876; the sheep
out of SIS plants eat 387 and refuse 141;
the COW out of 494 plants eats 276 and re-
fuses 218; the horse out of 474 plants
eats 262 and refuses 212; while the pig
out of 243 plants eats 72 and refuses III.
The production of silk throughout
the world last year is estimated at H.
FOG tons, as against II. 548 tons in 1888,
11,8S8 tons in 1887. 1854 tons in 1886,
and 9,002 tons in 1885. The average of
the four years from 1885 to 1888 was
1O,T4S tons. The 1889 crop was rather
above it, although scarcely any silk was
produced in Syria and other parts of the
Levant.-N. Y. Evening Post.
Apparently the tables are turning.
California prunes have become so popu-
lar in this country that it is said the
French are beginning to put up their
prunes in the California style, so that
they will pass for California prunes.
Some of these days, perhaps. dishonest
dealers will try to sell French wines
by putting on them California labels.
westward the star of Empire takes its
way"
The value of the worlds production
of coffee, at II, 600, coo cwt, would be
about S267, 900, O00 in the wholesale
market. The worlds consumption OF
coffee is placed at $4,000 tons, the
United States and Canada alone using
265, 600 tons. Two-thirds of the coffee
we drink comes from Brazil, which pro
duces considerably more than one-hali
of the worlds supply.-Kansas City
Commercial.
Attention has been called in various
quarters (the United States, England
Belgium, France and Germany to the
remarkable cold weather prevailing ot
late years, since 1885, in Central and
Western Europe; the yearly average be
ing constantly under the normal. II
now appears from an Algerian record
that these years have been warmer thar
usual in Algeria. 1t has also show1
that there has been no change in the
frequency of north and south winds
while in Europe the northeast wind!
have been increasing in frequency.
"A recent dispatch from Chattanoog;
contains the unequivocal announcement
of the casting of twenty-five tons o
superior, soft, low-carbon steel, oh
tanned from Southern iron by the basi,
process. The dispatch describes this al
1.-The most important eventin the indus
trial development of the South" and
the account is true it is an importan
event, surely. New England's relation
with the coal and iron fields of th,
South are such that the news of thi
successful experiment will be received
with good deal of interest in this re
gion.-Boston Journal.