Sullivan republican. [volume] (Laporte, Pa.) 1883-1896, 1891-10-16

SCIENTIFIC AND INDUSTRIAL.

There is no way to bend wood better
or cheaper than by steaming.
Recent experiments show that with
proper appliances ordinary gaslight can
be used in making photographs.
Fahrenheit at first used alcohol in
making his thermometers. He was led
to use mercury after experimenting with
boiling water.
By recent appliance to kitchen
ranges the refuse from the kitchen is
thoroughly dried, converted into char
coal, and used as fuel.
At the naval exhibition in London
there is colossal electric lamp, con-
structed by the Admiralty, which gives
light equal to 5,000,0 900 candles.
Jupiter is larger than all the other
planets and satellites of the solar system.
The sun is little more than 1000 times
larger than Jupiter. But Arcturus is
$50, 900 times larger than the sun.
A pathological statistician calculates
that in the year 1000 there will be
1,700, 900, 900 people who speak Eng
lish, and that the other European Ian
guages will be spoken by only 500, ,0O0,-
600 people.
A scientific observer publishes a pam
phletto show that the European jaw is
narrowing through the lesser severity of
its labors that accompanies civilized
food. The lower jaws of the later Eng
lish are smaller than those of ancient
Rritons or even of Australians.
To the inhabitants of the moon, If
there be any such beings, the earth ap-
pears sixteen times larger than the sun
ana of blue color. That the aurora
boreals is the tail to the earth like the
tail to comets, and as seen from the moon
streams out behind our globe in bright
and beautiful trail.
The rate of growth of corals is diff
cult to estimate. At the meeting of the
Academy of Natural Sciences of Phila-
delphia, Professor Heilprin exhibited "A
specimen of Porites astreoides which
had been taken from au anchor cast in
the autumn of 1885. He estimated that
the annual amount of increase was
scarcely one twentieth of an inch.
The latest plan to improve the draft of
the furnaces of ocean steamers is to in-
crease the height of the smoke pipes.
The new steamer Scot, of the Cape Mail
Line, is provided with smoke pipes 120
feet high above tho CRATES, being the
loftiest pipes ever put into steamer. A
draft of three-quarter water pressure
is thus obtained, all the steam needed is
easily secured, and the use of fans is dis
pensed with. Her speed is nineteen
knots.
Bombay has the greatest piece of solid
masonry construction that the world has
seen in modern times. For years past
the water supply of Bombay depended
upon works known to be defective, in
volving the possibility of a water famine.
A consultation of eminent engineers was
held, under the direction of the Govern
ment, with the result that a large dam
was determined on to inclose the water
shed of the valley which drains into the
sea south of Bombay.
At Sophia experiments have been made
in the last four weeks to ascertain the ac-
curacy of the rapid-firing cannon recently
received from the Gruson Works in
Magdeburg. At distance of 5000 feet
a target representing two field cannon
and ten men was almost completely de-
molished by twenty-five shots. A line
of thirty wooden soldiers, lying six feet
apart, so that only the heads were IN
sight of the marksmen, received twenty
six loads of chain shot and nine of shrap-
nell. Twenty of the chain shot and forty
one pieces of shrapnell struck fourteen
wooden soldiers.