The Big Stone Gap post. [volume] (Big Stone Gap, Wise County, Va.) 1892-1928, 1894-07-12
! SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY.

SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY.
Gseat Britain exports every yeas
abons sllo, 600. 900 OF textile fabrics.
aao, 900, 900 OF metals, Eli, 200, 900 Of.
clothing and es,ooo ooo of chemicals.
Russia exports wheat, cattle, hides,
wool, gold, iron, copper, lumber and
platinum, and manufactures enormous
quantities Of alcohol and sugar.
The Cape of Good Hope raises
wheat, oats, Indian corn, rye and
barley. It also makes 4, 000, 900 gallons
OF vine every year and 100000 OF,
brandy.
--Toads and frogs carry supply OF
water about with them in sack pro-
vidcd for the purpose. II, by accident,
the supply becomes exhausted, the
animal dies =
Tho strongest timber known is the
"Bfliann or Borneo ironwood, whose
breaking strain is one and fifty-two
hundredths times greater that that Of
English oak. BY long exposure it be-
comes of ebony blackness and inn
mensely hard.
Farmers in Tasmania and Eastern
Australia frequently turn up with q
pillow n substance that resembles po-
tato. but is, in reality, a species of poly
porus fungus. 1t is allied to the Tuck
al1oe or Indian bread found in the
United States, but, unlike its American
congener, has no value as food, being
insipid and indigestible.
food pencil cedar Is getting SO
scarce that the great firm of Faber &
Co. have begun to cultivate forests Of
cedar in Germany. At Schloss Stein
there is q cedar. forest which covers
thirteen acres, and the head of tho firm
has for many years maintained nurser-
les and plantations of cedars on his
land in Bavaria. grown from seed
which he imported from Florida.
Mr.. II. III. Dixon has been studying
the locomotion Of insects and spiders
by means of instantaneous photographs.
lie finds, says Nature, that the limbs
move together in diagonals In insects
She first and third legs on one side
move with the second on the other, the
ontene moving with the first leg on
the same side. In the case of spiders,
which have eight legs, the first and
third on one side move with the second
and fourth on the other.
Murray Challenger expedition
states the greatest depth Of the Atlantic
ocean ut 1886 feet; Pacific ocean,
thirty thousand feet; Indian ocean,
1858: feet; Southern ocean, $4,000 feet;
Arctic ocean, nine thousand feet. The
Atlantic ocean has an area in square
miles Of 24,536, 900; Pacific ocean, So
sos, 900; Indian ocean, II, 084 200; Arctic
ocean, 4,7S1, ZOO; Southern ocean. So
500, 0oO The highest mountain Is be-
lieved to be Deodhunga, one Of the
Himalayas, 10000 feet.
M. F. Walter has found that an al
10y consisting of ninety-fve parts OF
tin and FIVE parts of copper adheres 30
tcnaciouslY to glass that It may be en-
ployed as solder to join the ends OF
OF glass tubes. 1t is obtained by adding
the copper to the tin previously melted,
agitating with a wooden stirrer, cast
ing or graduating, and then re-melt-
ing. 1t melts at about $50 degrees c.
BY adding from half to one per cent. OF
lead or zinc, the alloy may be rendered
either softer or harder, or more or less
easily fusible. It may also be used for
silvering metals or metallic thread
Revue Scientifque.
-Celluloid is prepared from dry gun
cotton treated to solution Of camphor
in the least possible quantity Of alcohol.
AS layer is placed on layer Of the gun
cotton the solution is sprinkled upon IL
nntil finally it sinks into transparent
humps. These are first worked between
cold iron rollers, and then rollers heated
bysteam, forming layers that are finally
subjected to hydraulic pressure. After
Thorough drying of the resulting plates
they are nodded while warm, cut and
turned into any desired form. The
imitation Of amber, coral and the like
is accomplished by coloring the Jumps
of celluloid Us first formed and pressing
various colors together in the proper
tions and patterns desired. Non-com-
bustible celluloid has not yet been
made.