The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-06-05
SCIENTIFIC.

quantity. is found by Dewar to have a
boiling point of about 240 degrees below
zero c., and the unexpected density of
about six-tenthS that of water.
A proposal to celebrate this year the seven
hundredth anniversary of the discovery of
coal in Europe-a discovery claimed to have
been made in 1893 near Lege, Belgium-has
brought out evidence from DR.. +. Buttgen-
bach that the first find was really made in
lib in the basin of the River Worm, north
of AK la Chappelle.
The idea that pepsin aids digestion is pro-
nounced by Dr. Kellogg a deusion. Indi-
gestion is attended by a lack of gastric
juice and not of pepsin, and the continued
use of the latter tends to unfit the stomach
for making it,. An English Psychologist
found that guinea pig given pepsin gained
for a few weeks, then lost rapidly.
Holiday scientific excursions are being in
troducedN into Russian schools. This sum-
mer for instance, fifty pupils of the Ekater
inodar Gymnasium will make a mountain
trip of fifty days, collecting natural history
specimens and ethnographical data, taking
photographs. sketching and getting the
physical benefits of life in the pine forests
of the Caucasus
The efficacy of harmless preventive nocu-
lation means of stopping the spread of
diphtheria has been satisfactorily tested by
DIR. Karman in a Hungarian village. In
the previous five months nearly 20 per cent
of the villagers had been attacked and eight
had died six not having been subjected to
serum treatment. Among the ia children
on whom preventive incubation was tried
there was during the next two months no
case of diphtheria although the epidemic
continued in surrounding villages
The soft flexible rice paper of the Japan
csc has been recommended for such pur-
poses as the water and ice bags of the sick
room, the claim being that this material
supplies satisfactory substitute for rub
a Some cushions
exhibited at the Berlin Society of Internal
Medicine by Professor Jacobsohn were cap
able of supporting a permanent. weight of
over three hundred pounds, while being air.
tight, flexible, very light and remarkably
durable. They were made of several layers
of the paper, Joined by resin, with an out
side finish of Japanese lacquer.
A British estimate is that ten horse power
per ton of coal per week may be regularly
obtained from the waste gas of a blast fur
mace, so that if 100000 tons of coal are
used annually in English and Scotch blast
furnaces then 100000 horse power has been
running to waste. A fourth of this supply
would run Englands cotton mills. A con-
siderable beginning in utilizing the waste
has been made, and it is found that no great
outlay is necessary, the only cost being for
gas engines. holders, scrubbers and pipes.
The gas, which has too small heating power
for steam boilers, is very suitable for gas
engines.
Aluminium is source of stored energy
whose use, as described by Herr Gold
schmidt to the German Electrochemical So
ciety, has given astonishing results. When
mixed in a sand-lined wooden bucket with
an oxygen compound, such iron oxide,
the aluminium can be ignited with match,
after which it burns quietly, giving forth
an intense heat, which may reach 5000 de-
grees centigrade. This supplies an econom-
cal furnace for brazing or hard soldering.
1t can be used also for welding, for pro-
ducing pure wrought iron. for making a
variety of alloys and for obtaining certain
pure metals free from carbon that have
been hitherto almost impossible to produce.
A mass of metallic chromium weighing fif-
ty-fve pounds has been obtained in this
way The Stag is of interest, being artificial
corundum of extraordinary hardness and
containing minute artificial rubes.
An extraordinary case is reported by a
French medical man named Domlot A man
who had lost his right eye some years be-
fore, while still child, fell from cherry
tree his face striking upon sharp stick in
such a way that the nose, the cheek and the
left eye, with the eyelids and the eyebrow
were horribly mutilated The attendant
surgeon believed the eyeball had been ccm-
being left sightless. A year aTterward the
man was surprised to notice that he could
distinguish daylight and the colors Of flow
ers through his nose, and his vision i'm
proved until he was able to see alV objects
below, though still insensible to light from
above. A simple explanation is found. The
must have permitted the escape of the hum
ors of the eye and pierced the orbit, but
without iniuring the membranes, particu-
lary the retina. On healing. there must have
remained in the bony case behind the closed
lids small opening putting the eye cavity
in communication with the nas5l fossal,
thus permitting the light to reach the re-
tina through the nose 1t is pointed out that
this serves as experimental proof of the
theory comparing the retina to a darkroom
screen, on which images of outside objects
are formed, even without refracting lenses,
when the light rays come through very
narrow opening.
The rate at which the world is being
transformed by science is hard to realize.
A French writer finds that, if man should
now awaken from a trance that began at
the close of the Paris exposition of 1889, we
should have to explain to him these sensa-
tional discoveries and advances in mechan-
les and physics alone. /. The bicycle, which
is revolutionizing our habits and which
listed nine years ago only in and crude
specimens. 2 The horseess carriage moved
by petroleum or electricity with, perhaps,
an even greater future than the bicycle. 3.
The electric railways, which, in the next
century, will modify the working of the
great trunk lines. 4. Polyphase currents. en-
abling us to transmits and distribute natural
motor forces at great distances. ). The La
val steam turbine, practical means OF us