The news and herald. (Winnsboro, S.C.) 1877-1900, 1895-03-21
SCIENTIFIC AND INDUSTRIAL.

Edison, the electrician, makes rubles
that excel the genuine.
The surface Of mans lungs is esti
mated at $50 square feet, ten times the
surface of the external body.
In Great Britain the annual sick rate
for each inhabitant is ten days to the
year in the United States eight days.
Nests of the termite ants of South
Africa are often twelve feet high and
grouped together in clusters, the taliest
in the center.
Ants are provided with a poison bag,
which discharges fluid having a
strong sulphurous smell, sufficient to
drive away most insect enemies.
The smallest holes pierced by modern
machinery are 1-1000th of an inch IL
diameter. They are bored through
sapphires, rubies and diamonds by a
machine which makes $4,000 revolu
tions minute.
Sir James Crichton Browne, the Eng
1ish specialist, is q believer in the
theory that the coming man will be
toothless. He declares that over H..
100000 false teeth are annually fitted
into the mouths of Britishers.
Many larve of beetles and other In.
sects are used for food; the bee gives
honey and wax, the coccus mama and
cochineal, the Spanish fly a blistering
drug, the gall insects an astringent
and the silk worm an article OF dress.
Uranus has four little moons-Arie!,
Umbriel, Titania and Oberon-whlc2,
funnily enough, rise in the north ana
set in the south. A single diminNs;ss
one, belonging to Neptune, traversSs
the sky from southwest TO southeast.
Neither Mercury nor Venus has any
satellites.
Doctor Neisser, of the Hygienic Insti'
tute at Berlin, has discovered in the
city new cholera bacillus which he
calls vibrio berolensis. The inoccula
tion of dogs, cats and rabbits with this
bacillus has proved that the vibrle is
fully as potent ss the Asiatic bacillns.
The Berliners manifest no alarm over
the discovery.
The difference between the atmos-
phere of the best ventilated houses al d
the outer air is illustrated by the COM
duct of cut flowers. Blossoms that re-
tain their freshness but day or two
when standing in water within doors
viii sometimes live twice as long when
dropped in shady place out of doors,
even without the cid of other moisture
than they obtained from the earth and
air.
Experiments made by the scientists
appointed for that purpose by the
French Government show that the re-
sistance of the atmosphere to the
notian of high speed train often
amesnts to half the total resistance
w!1iSs the locomotive must overcome.
EEwo engines, of which the resistance
sas measured repeatedly and found to
be nineteen pounds per ton at thirty
teven miles per hour, were couple&
together and again tried. In the
Iecond trial the resistance fell to four
seen pounds per ton, the second engine
being shielded from atmospheric re-
sistance by the first.
Great attention is now being paid By
the German military authorities to the
question of facilitating and ezpeditlng
intrenching methods. ArsGag other
implements which they ase testing is
an intrenching spade, invented by NJ.
de Layeh. When IN use it is fitted to
the Sock as the rife, but it is sug"
gested that its proposed place. when
not in use, on the breast of the soldier
is likely to cause oppression and to
give little or no protection. The whole
arrangement adds rather more than
three pounds to his impediments.