The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1894-08-09
SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY.

SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY.
The brewers of New York City pro-
duced 5000, 900, 600 glasses of beer last
year.
Counterfeit whalebone is coming
into use as the genuine article becomes
scarce.
A gas well at Montpelier, Ind, has
changed its tune, and oil flows freely
from its mouth.
1t is proposed by the Argentine gov
eminent to make an extended survey of
the mineral resources of that country.
Coffee planting was formerly the
most important single industry of Cey-
Ion: now tea is the principal article of
export.
The casualties on all American rail-
roads in April, 1894, We're less than in
any corresponding month for twenty
years.
Australian provincial officials keep
poisoned grain in their offices for the
benefit of farmers who wish to destroy
small birds.
At the altitude of twelve miles the
atmosphere has density of about one
tenth that of the surface; that is, the
barometer would stand at about three
inches.
Prof. Milton Whitney, of Johns
Hopkins university, has determined
that in an ordinary wheat soil there
are at least ten thousand million soil
grains in gram about a pint, and in
some of the finest soils this number has
reached twentyfour Thousand millions.
The blue mould on cheese resem-
bles bread mould. 1t bears a cluster of
branches, each of which is a layer of
naked spores, like a string of beads. all
breaking apart when matured. These
produce new fungi. This same mould
is found on old leather, and oftentimes
develops on the surface of preserved
fruits.
The results of examinations Of
European statistics by NJ. Lagneau go
TO show that as among occupations con-
sumption is most prevalent among per-
sons whose work is sedentary; while
persons living in the open air enjoy an
almost complete immunity. From an
other point of view consumption APP
pears to increase in towns rapidly with
the density of population.
The large collection of Egyptian
papyrus documents discovered several
years ago at Isl Fayoum has lately
been placed on exhibition at Vienna by
the Archduke Rainier, whose property
they are. These papyri are said to
cover a period of ., 800 years and to con-
tain evidence that the Egyptians in the
tenth century knew the use of type in
printing. The documents are written
in eleven different languages
"A Hungarian chemist. DR.. Johann
Antal, already honorably known for
his researches in toXicology, has re-
ported to the hungarian Society of
Physicians that he has discovered a
new chemical compound, the nitrate of
cobalt, which. he says, is a most etfica-
ciOus antidote to poisoning by cyan
ide of potassium or prussic acid. He
tried the antidote first on animals and
afterward on forty living persons who
had been accidentally poisoned with
prussic acid. In not a single case did
the andidote prove a Naturalization
journal of Commerce.
Masses of petrified fir wood and
bark, which show the lines plainly
marked of the different stages of
growth, are reported to have been found
in the regulation formation of sand
stone reef in the mines at New Castle
Washington. "A remarkable point
about both specimens is that on the
inner side of the bark is deposit of
white crystalline Substance, and run
ming in the veins through the wood is
the same material. 1t is harder than
steel and cuts glass like diamond, but
seems to be nothing but crystallized
pitch. Another specimen is fir wood in
a more advanced stage toward coal
with pieces Of petrified resin imbedded
in it. ''-Philadelphia Ledger.