The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-05-25
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

The work of constructing a huge raft,
which is to contain 100000 feet of tlum-
Der mas been begun at Portland, Ore. The
raft, when completed, viii be foated to
San Francisco, Cal. 1t will be cigar
shaped, AGO feet long, 50 feet wide, and "A
feet high from the water, drawing about
II feet Of water. If successfully fioated to
San Francisco, others of the kind will fol-
low, and the method of lumber transDor-
tation on the Pacific coast will be, to some
extent, revolutionized. Similar expert
ments on the Atlantic coast proved costly
failures.
California is preparing to establish at
ST. Helena an experiment station and
school of instruction in the grating and
planting of vines Three acres of land
will be devoted TO the work. Prof. Hayne,
who is in charge of the work. has sent TO
France for 1900 cuttings 1900 of the Ru-
pestris St. George, ard $500 assorted va
rieties. These viii be grated and planted
in nursery, and by the cutting method
crop can be secured the third leafng. Free
instruction is TO be given in grating,
so that the great demand for men expert
at this work may be supplied TO the vine
yard owners of the state.
The Philadelphia Commercial Museum
has received from one of its correspond
ents information concerning large beds of
licorice root which exist In an unimproved
condition in the Northern. Caucasus reg
lon, near the shores of the Black sea.
Large quantities of this root are now i'm
ported into the United States each year,
chiefly from Symrna and the Levant. The
new beds lie near a harbor on the Black
sea, which is open all the year round and
the haulage from the beds to the dock
would NOT amount to more than % or 30
miles. The licorlce lands are for the most
part in the hands of poor COssack farm
ers, but the exporting concession is con-
trolled by large firms in Odessa and in
other parts of the region. The exporters
are now making vigorous efforts TO inter
est the American importers in their pro-
duct.
The manner in which the late DR.. II. o.
Coke, librarian of the Bedlelan Library at
oxford for many years, discovered the
falseuess of the Gospel manuscripts got
ten up by Constantine Simonides which &c
ceiVed all the German professors, is cold
in the old gentleman's own words, in a re-
cent number of the Spectator. 1t was his
delicate touch that helped MIN, as he cid
not look at a page of the manuscript. He
told the story as follows: Il never really
opened the book, but held it in my hand
and took one page of it between my fin
ger and thumb while I listened to the ras-
calls account of how he found this most
interesting antiquity. At the end of three
or four minutes l handed it back to him
with the short comment, Nineteenth CEN
fury paper, my dear sir and he took it
away in a hurry and did not come again.
Yes 1 was pleased. But 1 have handled
several ancient manuscripts in my time,
and know the feel of old paper"
Prof Richet says that it takes a man
about one-eleventh of a second to think
out each note of a musical scale. He ex-
plains the practice that people will often
follow of bending their heads in order TO
catch minute sounds, by the fact that the
smallest intervals of sound can be much
better distinguished with one ear than with
both. Thus the separateness of the clicks
of a revolving toothed wheel were noted
by one observer when they did not exceed
sixty to the second, but using both ears he
could not distinguish them when they oc-
CURED oftener than fifteen times a second.
Among the various way in which Prof.
Richet tried to arrive at conclusions as to
the amount of time necessary for realizing
any physical sensation or mental impress
sion was the touching of the skin repeated
ly with light blows from small hammer.
The fact that the blows are separate and
not continuous pressure can be distinguish
ed when they follow one another as fire.
quently as coo a second. The sharp sound
of the electric spark from an induction coil
rate was as high as 800 to the second. The
sight is much less keen. When revolved at
a speed no faster than twenty-four times
a second, a disk half white and half black,
will appear gray We also hear more
rapidly than we can count If a clock
clicking movement runs quicker than ten
to the second, we can count four clicks,
while with twenty to the second, we can
count only two of them.
0o1a FD1r Of
Brazil, states, in an interview recently
published in the Gaulois of Paris, that
few degrees below the equator he dis
covered a forest of flowers that prevented
him from approaching them. With every
Difference to M. Balaguine, that forest
semes to have been discovered before says
Golfers Weekly. Two years ago there
appeared in a San Francisco paper an ac-
count provided by bulb hunter returning
from the same region, who declared that
after noticing in a forest an odor, vague
and sweet at first but which increased as
he advanced, ultimately he reached a
clearing, and there, straight ahead, was
wilderness of orchids. Trees were loaded
with them, underbrush was covered with
them, they trailed on the ground, mounted
in reckoning contentious, dangled from
branches, fell in sheets and elongated and
expanded as far as the eye could reach.
breeze passed and they swayed with IT,
moving with a life of their own, dancing
in the glare of the equatorial sun, and as
they danced eXhaling an odor that pro-
tected them more sheerly than a wall In
vain did that hunter endeavor to approach.
There was a veil of perfumed chloroform
through which he could see, but through
which, try as he might, he could not pass
It held him back more effectually than
bayonets and it was torture to him to see
those flowers and to feel that before he