The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1892-04-05
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

ITEMS OF INTEREST.
THE Japanese. like the Chinese, are subject to
a peculiar disease called kakke in which the
patient is the victim of an increasing lethargy
and weakness, and o slow degeneration of the
system. 1t is said TO be due TO eating rice
WHICH is the staple food of the country and car
be ameliorated. if not cured, by change OF
diet.
ONE OF the Rblest Investigators Of bacterioloRy
is the Japanese, Kitasato. He has Just left
Berlin where he has resided for six years, ia
become attached to the University of Toxic
Besides Kitasato, sapan boasts other distin.
guished bacteriologi4ts in Ogata, Kumagawa
Mura and several others.
IN ICELAND the Protestant religion is the ma
tional one, for there is not a single Roman
Catholic place of worship on the island. Theree
are very few Roman Catholic Hebrews or Dis
senters in the Scandinavian countries, the per
centage OF non-Lutherans Uutheranism being
the established Scandinavian reliRiopl being
barely one of the total.
A coLLAPsIBLE LrFE-RAFr has been brought
out, which is likely to be of great service in
cases where the use Of a lifeboat is impractical.
bic or unavailable. The raft is built with ninety
water-tght compartments, and is practically
unsuitable. 1t can be sailed or rowed. A clear
run. fore aud aft, is secured for naval and mill
tary purposes, and if Joined front TO end the
RATS will form bridge of boats, especially
adapted for landing guns, troops, etc.
some GENIUS in Syria named Mousa Rhourt
has discovered the secret by which the silk
worm makes silk. He can make the silk by
machinery without the aid of the silk worm.
In this way the cost of making silk can be re-
duced one-half. A mandatory is to be started
in Georgia soon by Syrian colony. To manu-.
fecture silk in this way large tract of land has
been secured on which TO plant mulberries and
the emigrants expect soon to make their for
tunes.
THERE is at the present moment a very curl
GUS building being erected within the harbor
precincts OF Hamburg It is an immense house,
which is being built without the aid of scaffold-
ing. The skeleton entirely of iron, consisting
or uprtghts and cross 2irders and beams fitted
together by the bolt system, is already in posi-
ton. The brick walls of the house will be built
up from the in9ide-that is to say, the worISmep
will use the skeleton while building the outer
wals-and thus save the labor and expense Of
scaffolding.
Curious EVIDENCE shows that a cubic inch OF
air at sea level contains about $50, 100000 mole
cules If the law of regularly diminishing
density holds good, a cubic inch of air at the
hight of 200 miles will contain about $50 900
molecules, and at less than 222 miles only one
molecule. Opinions differ, however, as to the
actual hight of the atmosphere's upper surfBce
Prof. Young declares that no definite upper
limit can be stated while Prof Forster OF
Berlin contends that thin air connected with
tenn.
In the time of Alfred the Great the Persiaus
imported into Europe machine which pre-
scented the frat rudments of q striking clock
1t was brought as a present TO Charemagne
from Abdallah, King of Persia, by two monks
of Jerusalem, in The year 500. Among the
other presents, says ERinhart, was horloge of
brass, wonderfully constructed by some me-
chanical article, in which the course of the
twelve hours al clepysdram vertebatur, with as
many little brazen balls, which at the close of
each hour dropped do on a sort of bell IN
derneath, and sounded the end of each hour.
a PHYSICIAN warns brain workers against
overeating and states that the breakdown of
active brain workers is often caused by the
overstutltng Of their stomachs when it is attrib-
uted to brain fatigue He says that hard work
mental or physical. rarely ever kills. If a mild
amount of physicnl exercise be taken, and a
judicious amount of food be furnished the
functions attended to, the surfaces be protected
by proper clothing and a philosophical nature
cultivated, an almost unlimited amount of work
can be done for an indefinite length of time
bearing in mind always that when WEAKNESS
comes rest must be taken instead of stimulants,
so that there shall be no working on false CAD
ita
How many people who are fond of eggs and
eat them daily, ever stop to think what a won
derful thing an egg is. 1t is one of the greatest
wonders of nature What part OF egg is the
animal? The clear white part? No. The yolki
No, that is merely food. Break raw egg, and
beside the white and the yolk what do you find
on the membrane which covers the yolk you
will see little whitish circle. That is the ami
NAL. When nature brings the young animal at
an early period into the outer air or water il
provides it with means to live A young ALI
gator, no larger than a tiny lizard takes to the
water the momentit creeps out of the shell and
begins TO devour what 1t can. It needs no pro-
lection.
JAVA has thunder storms on the average 81
days in the year; Sumatra, SC: Hindostan, So;
Borneo "a; the Gold Coast SO: Rio de Jaueiro.
81; Italy, SO; West India, So; South Guinea, 80;
Buuos Ayres, Canada and Austria, %; Baden
Wutemburg and Hungary, 22; Slesia Bavaria
ana Belgium, q; Holland, Is; Ssxony and
Brandenburg, II; France. Austria and South
Russia. l6; Spain and Portugal, IS; Sweden and
Finland, 5; England and the high Swiss
mountains, Z; Norway, 4; Cairo. 8. In East
Turkestan, as we'll as III the extreme north,
there are almost no thunder storms. The
northern limits of the thunder storms are Cape
Ogle. northern part of North America Iceland
Novaja Semelja and the coast of the Siberian
ice sea.
The chances of a watch being affected on an
electric railway need ordinarily give but little
reason for anxiety but electricity is now com
ing into such general use that there are many
conditions of daily life in which an ordinary
watch, which has a brass and steel balance
wheel and steel hair spring, Is likely to be
affected by the current. The amount of injury
depends, OF course. upon the intensity of the
magnetism 70 which the watch is subjected. In
many cases where the magnetism is slight,
watches simply lose time, say from S to I2J
seconds an hour; in other cases-and they are
numerous-the watch ceases to run and is prac-
ticaly ruined. The only remedy Is demagneti-
cation, and that never completely restores the
original tme-keeping qualities, A watch once
magnetized can be partially but never fully
demagnetized.
AS TO the size Of the steamship of the future,
says Engineering, financial considerations must
determine it. Any addition to size means greater
displacement and greater power TO get high
rate of speed. A small craft, similar perhaps
TO a torpedo boat of the Thornycraft or Yarrow
build, would give results satisfactory at least on
credit side. which. after all is the more impor-
tant in a merchant ship of the Atlantic grey
hound type? In the case of British ships there
are only two sources of revenue-from passen-
gers and for the transport of cargo and mails.
In vessel of the torpedo type there is not room
for either. So also with high speed cruisers
where q very large proportion of the length in
some cases 40 per cent. Is given up for machln-
cry. Indeed, only in exceptional cases could
cruiser carry fuel to cross the Atlantic at full
speed, and certainly no torpedo boat would
essay to do so. In the modern high speed pas
senEer steamer the cargo capacity OF the vessel
is limited, and so valuable that only precious
cargo is carried and that at pretty high rate.
The cause of the Limitation is the weight of the
machinery and of the coal for consumption and
the necessity for minimizing the displacement.
As TO speed, there is no insurmountable diff
Guilty in attaining 40 knots, but this would re-
quire something like 100000 Indicated horse
power, 40 boilers to generate the steam for the