Evening star., 1896-12-19
Written for The Evening Star.
1N!.E EXPLORATION. SCIENCE AND |


Written for The Evening Star.
Research into the so-called Rcentgen rays
has experienced a new phase. DR.. Roent-
gen described his famous discovery under
the name of X--the unknown formula. DR..
Jsgadis Chunder Bose, M A. of Cambridge,
and professor of physical science in the
Presidency College of Calcutta, now ascribes
the whole phenomena of the rays to cleo
tricity. DR.. Bose is now in London, whittier
he has been sent by the Indian government
for the purpose of laying his discovery be-
fore the British scientific world. The learn
ed Calcutta professor, in discussing his
work and its results, says:
1--WE hear little and see still less. Our
range of perception of sound extends
through only eleven octaves. There are
many notes which we cannot hear. Our
rage of vision is still more limited. A
single octave of ethereaf notes is all that
is visible to us. The lights we see are few,
but the invisible lights are many"
Prof. Bcse produces ''invisibe lights by
means of electric waves in the ether; and
these lights, he claims, can pierce doors,
brick walls, granite rocks, earthen mounds,
ETC." When the vibration of a string reach
es the rate of $1,000 beats in second the
note produced is the limit of audibility.
Vibrations of ether between four hundred
and eight hundred billions of vibrations a
second produce light; and it is said that
the Roentgen rays vibrate at even a higher
rate than this. To detect these invisible
rays Professor Bose has invented an cleo
trio eye, consisting of q sensitive layer, on
which the rays fall, and which by an cleo
trio optic nerve" produces in the apparatus
a tWlnkling sensation-as the human optic
n in, no
Professor Bose has succeeded in ringing
tells and firing pistols by means of his in
visible electric waves; and, with the aid Of
special lenses constructed with ebonite, he
has transmitted signals for nearly a mile.
Thus it will be possible to transmit signals
at sea in the densest fog.
DR.. Bose Is a young Hindoo, thirty-six
years old. He was lately made a doctor of
science by the London University, and Is
soon to be made fellow of the Royal So
ciety.
MicrObe and Butter Making.
One Of the most startling discoveries of
this end of the century is that microbes
are required to make frst-class butter.
Bacillus No. IL" is the scientific term or
artificial culture
TITS startling microbe theory was first
advarCed by a person who came from
Denmark to lecture on the art of butter
making. The theory which was received
with scorn is now advocated by many SCI
entists and many creameries in different
parts of the country now invest in the
culture" In one state alone, Iowa, tWen-
ty-eight creameries are using the culture.
One of the most satisfactory experiments
was made recently in a Connecticut cream
cry. Jure butter as is well known, is i'll
flavor about the best produced during the
year. and the effect of bacillus No. Al upon
June butter was therefore especially in
teresting. Early in June, when the amount
collected
very large, two large watts full of cream
were collected One of these was inocu-
lated with No. Al and the other was un-
noculated. They were then both allowed
to stand in the same room at the same
temperature, for the same length of time,
to ripen and were subsequently churned.
The effect of No. Al even here was striking.
Both lots Of cream produced as was to be
expected, an excellent quality OF butter,
but No. Al had an aroma more pronounced
and more agreeable than that of the but
ter made without the inocuiation.
In both taste and odor, the butter made
by incubation vas decidedly superior to
that made without it. This butter was
submitted for testing to large number of
persons, and no one had the slightest hesi-
tarcy in deciding that No. Al made the
superior quality of butter.
Experiments in improving the quality and
flavor of butter have been made with over
hundred different species of germs. but
it was not until the experimenter hit upon
No. Al that he found a bacteria fit to put
into his mouth.
The first attempt at an estimate of bac-
terra in butter was made in Munich, in
1891. 1t was found that there are about
two millions In a grain, and one pound
weighs 454 grains.
Fertility of the Sahara.
Explorations in various parts of the
Algerian Sahara continue to bring forward
evidences of former comparative fertility
of the desert, and of the existence within
that region Of a people whose historic asso-
Citations, as developed by the human relics
that have been found scattered about in
modern and ancient river courses, are with
the stone ages. These relics consist chiefly
of Clipped fiints for spear ana arrow heads
and knife blades, in fragments of pottery,
dressed ostrich eggs, ETC., and have in the
main been brought 10 light through the
various artesian diggings that are being so
successfully prosecuted by the French en-
gineers. What were the direct causes that
brought about the physiographic changes
OF the present and past periods can hardly
be determined, but they seem to be bound
in with conditions of climatic desiccation
which were not restricted to the region
alone, but were of broadly universal ex-
tent. A writer in La Nature November
14), surveying the evidence of the recent
finds. and of the region of their occurrence,
concludes that they bear testimony to
abundant rains, to a former vegetation
favoring the rearing of fiocks, and to
pronounced pastoral life of a people now
entirely departed. 1t is certainly an inter-
esting fact, and one bearing direct testt-
mony to the former plant growth in the
region, that even at the present day, at
distance Of only thirty miles from Inifel.
and in the valley of the Oued Mya, copsa
or brushwood thicket of Italian poplars is
to be met with.
Animals in Australia.
Australia has for many years been to the
naturalist the faunal exception of the ami
NAL world; its remarkable marsupial fauns.
and the equally remarkable absence of al
most al. mammalian types that are not
marsupial in character, have given to its
fauna an interest and importance which
have In 10 way been diminished by the
discovery, few years ago, that two of it's
quadrupeds-the duck-bill or ornithorhyn-
chus and y-hedgehog-brought forth
their young, in the manner of birds and
reptiles, from laid eggs OF the special
conditions which surrounded this fauna
comparatively little was known before the
geological explorations of the last year.
and even today our knowledge is restricted
to special areas of the continent In a
summary of the result of researches made
by the Horn expedition, which has Just
been published. Prof. Baldwin Spencer of
the University of Melbourne furnishes the
following pen picture of the animal life
of the land.
The permanent fauna he states NAV bo