The Portland daily press., 1896-11-11
MICROSCOPIC VISION.
Every Person With Normal Eyesight, Says
the Professor, Has the Power.
(From the San Francisco call.)

(fTOm tut Dali FIduClSCO Odll.1
A most astonishing discovery in regard to
the visual powers of the human eye has
been made by Prof. f. L. o. Roehrig, of
Pasadena. The scientific world will be
deeply interested in the premises, for it is
quite probable that the learned gentleman
has simply taken the initial step in the
whole continuous series of con nected subse-
quenJ facts, leading, perhaps, to m any as
yet wholly unexpected important scientific
truths and variously valuable new di scove-
ries. Prof. Roehrig formerly occupied the
chair of Sansk1it and modern Oriental Ian
guages in Cornell University, New York
State, but was compelled on account of his
health to flee the rigors of the Eastern win
tiers and take up his abode in the genial
climate of California. He is a man of wide
learning and great culture. He holds the
degree of doctor of philosophy from the
University of Leipzig and is also graduate
in medicine. During the late war he became
prominent in the Surgeon Generals de-
partment of the United States army, acting
as specialist on the eye and ear He is
the author of a large number of works on
languages, and they are quoted as au-
thority in both Europe and America At the
|
full intellectual powers. To a representa-
tive of the Call, who visited him in his lab
oratofy at Pasadena, DR.. Roehrig spoke of
his discovery as follows:
"Some time ago. while attending to my
morning toilet, happened, by mere acct
dent, to look in an almost perpendicular
direction and at a distance of, more or less,
an inch or two down into my beard, on my
mustache as well, and especially the whisk-
ers surrounding my chin. How great was
my establishment at the strange and unex-
pected appearances of what then saw-ev-
ry hair magnified, just as seen through some
microscope. Each hair stood out in plain
and distinct manner, often variously bent,
knotted irregularly twisted, and forming a
tube which, according to all appearance,
was transparent rather colorless, hollow,
and empty, bounded, as it were ,on both sides
by generally well marked bright white line
OF border, sometimes also more or less
stirated inside, and ending abruptly in an
open, either circular or, more frequently,
pentagonal orifice sometimes, but rarely, in
closed point The size of the magnif1ed hail
varies tubes from that of an ordinary dar1ine
needle to the volume of a small lead pencil
| it increases gradally in proportion as
move those tubes slowly upward from the
| chin and it seems to reach it's maximum
| when seen nearly high enough to be some
| what on a level with the eye or opposite tic
| it,
| 81 likewise examined the very thin and
short hair on my hand and fingers, and the
result was just the same. Then 1 took one
of those hairs of the whiskers, plucked il
out and, isolating it completely, held it be
| tween the fingers in order to subject 1t tc
the same examination-which gave on eacf
| trial invariably the same result
"The experiment succeeded as well in
broad daylight as when the room was il
the evening artifcially illuminated. Monoc
ular or binocular vision seemed to make No
essential difference in that respect. Dark a:
well as light hair, served equally well.
81 could, moreover, render this magnifie6
appearance perceptible to other person.
with the same clearness with which saw
it myself
"Flnally 1 took thick hair lock IRON
some child's head and held it up to M,
sight, when very large mass of strongI,
magnified intertwined tubes, like network
of strings or cords, was at once seen. 1t in
creased in size rapidly in proportion a,
1 moveda it slowly upward; it reached it.
maximum when it had come high enough
to be in front of my eyes and held there a