The citizen. (Frederick City, Md.) 1895-1923, 1896-03-06
written for the CITIzEN.)

written for the CITIzEN.l
The serum treatment of snake
bites has been undergoing tests in In
dia and Australia, to which countries
DIR. Calmettee, of a Pasteur Institute of
Lille, has sent large supplies of serum
furnished by immunized horses. A
rabbit inoculated with 100000 of its
weight of this serum resists dose of
cobra venom that would kill a similar
uninoculated animal in three or four
hours. In India the serum has prov
ell effective against the virus of rep
tiles Of various species, an illustration
of its value being afforded by the
cases of a man and woman bitten 10y
two specimens of Ndid h'iDudia1as-th
former being InocuIated with serum
an hour afterward and completely re-
covering by the next day, while the
latter was not treated and died in two
hours. In hot climates the power of
the serum seems to be reduced about
four-fifths in three months. In the
serum treatment of pulmonary con-
sumption, encouraging results are re-
ported from Italy, where DIR. Mara
gliano has been developing extensive
laboratories for preparing the protec-
tive serum for this disease and expert
menting with it upon rabbits and
other animals. Some of the serum has
been tried by Prof. De Renzi, of the
University of Naples, in % cases of
Well-marked tuberculosis, with I'M
prOvement in every case, and in some
the ,Ipfn "a nf tho diGpaGn
Early particulars concerning an anti
cholera serum are promised 10y DR..
BehriDg.
An investigation by DIR. Losener in
dicates that typhoid baclli may sur
vive in buried corpse for So days,
cholera vibrios for not more than %
days, tubercle bacil!i from So to 123
days, teianus bacilli more than ga
days, but not over 361 days, and an
thraX germs for a full year or more.
Only anthrax germs found their way
to adjacent soil or water. The earth
is so perfect "a filter that ordinary bur-
ial seems 10 offer little more risk of
spreading disease than cremation.
A little petroleum barometer, $50
times as sensitive as the ordinary mer-
curry barometer, has been exhibited to
the Berlin Physical Society.
Although Roentgen's work was so
thoroughly done that little has been
added to it by other xperimenters,
his view that the X-rays differ from
the cathode rays is not accepted by all
physicists. Dolbear believes that the
same results could be obtained from
any source of light. He has gwen
some attention to the matter, haying
as long ago as 1892 photographed an
iron star through All o. dinary table top
bv means of electric sparks. He stated
two years ago that all rays have SINH
lar characteristic properties. that what
any ray can do depends upon the kind
of matter it falls upon, that what we
know as light has no existence apart
from the eyes, and that it has long
been known that other waves too long
to be seen by the naked eyes could be
made to produce photographs. The
Interesting fact may be added that M.
Gustave LIE Bon has reported TO the
French Academy of Sciences photo
graphs obtained through plates of iron
and lead by three hours exposure to
the light of paratfin lamp.
The GregOrian calendar, first sub
stituted for the Julian calendar in 1882,
allows the ordinary year 365 days, the
leap year 1865 days, and drops three
leap years in every four centuries, only
those centennial years which are divis-
IDLE by 400 being leap year. The mean
year of our time-reckOning by this sys-
tenn, while sufficiently accurate to
satisfy most individuals, is still 26 sec
Onds longer than the true astronom-
ical year This has led learned
member of the French Academy of
Sciences to propose a further correc-
ton of the calendar by considering
every year divisble by 5000 as an or
binary instead of leap year, thus re-
ducing the error in our mean year to
one day in 10000 years. If the change
is adopted, the first departure from
the Gregorian rule will not occur for
more than 1900 years.
1t is pointed out that new and i'm
mense field for scientific investigation
has been opened by the great Trans
Siberian railway. Next summer the
explorer can travel by rail to the banks
OF the Yenesei, at a distance of 3,O57
miles from st. Petersburg, and will
nave AdCAIItIcS IoI navigating CD6 great
rivers running nOrthward.
n
Since 1872 about 20 lines of rack rail
way, with u total length of 500 miles:
have been built in different parts of the
world. They are worked by 3O8 loco
motives, the heaviest weighing 20 tons.
n
The theory that electricity, magne-
tism and chemical action are modes of
motion, either of the molecules or the
other, is held by Walker, an English
physicist. He claims that this view,
which he published three years ago, is
confirmed by the Roentgen expert
ments. An electric current, accord
ing to this author, is series of waves
of greater length than the largest of
the invisible heat waves, and of
transmission rate lower than those
waves; electromagnetism, a series of
waves shorter than the ultraviolet
waves, and with higher rate of trans
mission; magnetism, a wave motion
impaired to the molecules of iron at
their formation or to the ether sur
rounding the molecules. chemical ac