The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1892-12-29
SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY.

The production of distilled spirit
Of all kinds in the United States in 1s9
was III, 1856, la gallons This exceede,
the product of any previous year, ex
cept 1881, when the aggregate was lI9,
b2S,0l1.
Algeria is the greatest cork-produc
ing country in the world, having 9, 500,
900 acres of cork forests, of which 300,
900 are made to yield regular crops
The finest cork is obtained from tina
province.
Without opening single additiona
seam, there is probably enough coal il
view in New South Wales. to enabl,
10, 10000 tons to be put out annual,
for some years to come. This amount
is more than double the present pro
duction
How thick is the soapy envelope O.
q bubble? When the bubble has be
come thin enough to be iridescent tn,
thickness of the envelope where il
shows violet is 1910. 600 of an inch
When the bubble has still farther ex
banded the thickness of the black patch
which shows itself near the pipe is
about IL, 200, 900 of an inch.
Most people do not know plant
has lungs, but it has, and its lungs are
in its leaves. Examined through high
power microscope every leaf will show
thousands upon thousands of openings,
infinitely small, of course, but each pro
9iaed with lips which, in many species
ate continually opening and closing.
-%lnsects generally breathe through
special pores in various parts of their
body, and if these pores are closed by
oil they are suffocated. Anyone may
test this by dropping sweet oil on the
thorax or back of wasp; it very soon
dies. For this reason oil has been found
one of the best things to use for the de-
of insects.
Many Thousand goats and kids are
annually in or about Paris
for the sake of their skins, but as vet
thre has not been observed in these
bodies any case of tuberculosis, which
leads to the suggestion that goats milk
will be far safer for our use than the
milk of cows which are more or less af-
fected with tuberculosis everywhere.
The oldest East Indian manuscript
in the world, and one of the oldest
existing manuscripts of any kind, has
recently been dug up just outside Of a
city near Kuchar 1t is
written on birch bark, and contains
two medical sections, two collections OF
provcrbial sayings and one Invaluable
charm against snake-bite given by the
Lord Buddha himself to Amanda
Whether at the poles or the equator,
the worlds people are really travelling
around the sun with the earth itself at
the rate of about IS, 600 miles an hour
The earth's motion is one of compara-
lively slow rotation, yet of swift pro-
gress on it's orbit This motion is not
any more than passenger
at sea, who is shut up in his state room
below, knows how fast he is going.
M. Castor Tissandier has recently
drawn attention to what he calls
Photographic mirage" Three years
ago M. Paul Roy photographed his
young son in the open day, and on de.
veloping the picture found to his sur
prise vague image of himself in the
as he stood in the act OF
the cap from the lens to take
the photograph. AS a matter of fact,
his image had been formed on the at
haze, and, although invisible
TO his eyesight. it was strong enough to
Affect the plate. Transcript
Cats are not the only creatures that
enjoy a plurality of lives; many animals
have remarkable power of existing
while apparently dead. Infusoria have
been dried, and restored to life by moist
ening after remaining inert dust for
years, and the drying and
and resuscitation have been success
fully tried eleven times on one lot Of
rotifers. Frogs and many fishes suffer
no injury from freezing solid; while, in
b few cases, even -blooded ami
mails have been restored to life after
apparent death from freezing.
Weighing the earth is a problem
which has often interested and amused
scientists, and various efforts have been
made to determine with some degree of
accuracy the probable approximate
weight Of the globe on which we live.
In 17Te series of curious experiments
was made by Prof Maskelyne in Mount
lchihallion, in Scotland, by which he
determined the singular fact that the
attraction exerted by the mountain
mass on the plumb line caused it to de-
nate nearly six seconds from the per-
Long and abstruse calcu-
ations followed, on the details of which
t is not necessary to dwell, but the re-
suit was, taking the diameter of the
,arth as 7,912.4l miles and the weight
,f cubic foot of water as CO. SO pounds,
he weight Of the earth was calculated
o be 5,s42, 600, 600, 900, 900 900, 900 tons of
!, 24o pounds ca h. baltimore Sun.
Obsolete Bridal Customs.
IL.