The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1899-02-02
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

col. II. watkins, chief inspector of M
sition finding in the British armv has
recently devised modification of the usual
form of aneroid barometer. in which If ia
claimed the accuracy of the instrument is
sfeatly increased The inaccuracy of an
eroids, owing TO temperature effects which
cannot De eliminated entirely, and the ex-
periencinS of progressive error. at low
pressures, has been a serious DISADVANTAGE
IN the use of an otherwise extremely con-
venient instrument. Col. Watkins corrects
these evils by having the vacuum-box ad-
Justab-e and placed in position with
screw when it is desired to take a read
ing. lr this way there is no continuous
strain on the mechanism, and the vacuum
box can be raised or lowered as often as
is necessary. One of these barometers
was used about Zermatt by Edward
Whymper' the Alpine explorer, and the
error in comparison with a mercurial in
strument was found to be much less than
one-tenth of an inch.
Col. Robert Ingersoll admitted recent
ly that there was something wanting in
his philosophy of life. An Illinois theater
manager skipped off with the receipts |
from the sale of tickets. When Ingersol !
learned of it he remarked IF there is !
no hell there should be one" In Kansas |
City the atheist and John L. Sullivan were |
rival attractions one night. The pugilist |
expressed his opinion of Ingersoll in this |
wise: "Bob's clever fellow He's one
of your bright ones He's fast and his
uppercuts and rushes are bad-bad, tell
you. But religion is a id bad thing to
talk about Religion, my boy, we don't
know anything about I've got two as
good hands as ever grew and I'd lay EN-
on the track of a trolly car and let the
| wheels cut 'em off if I could bring my old
mother and father back TO earth again.
| But l can't. No more can Bob Ingersoll.
| He doesn't know any more about these
| things than you or 1 do. The man who
tells you an untruth, my boy, is liar.
An Iowa boy recently passed through an
experience which he will not forget if he
lives to be 100 years old, says the Chicago
| Inter-Ocean He is only years old, and
| one day when his father went to the wheat
| field to drive the harvester he took MIN
| along and perched him on the high seat
at his side. For time the little fellow
watcher the yellow wheat lop over as II
was cut in a wide swath, and the tall
| arms sweep it back and bind 1t and hnally
the fat bundles being tossed aside one by
one. For a time all this was very inter
esting, but presently the little fellow grew
tired and began to squirm and complain
| And then, just as his father was leaning
over to look more closely at some OF the
| machinery off tumbled the little fellow
on the conveyor. He shrieked just once,
and his father tried vainly to stop the
horses But before he could even Slack
the speed the boy had been driven up
through the elevator canvas with nan
bundle of wheat, the binding Irvine mad
twisted swiftly around his neck and legs
and he was rolled out on the wide carrier
securely bound in a wheat bundle. nc
was almost choked and there was a tiny
bit of skin torn from his shoulders, pu
otherwise he was unhurt when ms Iathel
I,1I,,n i'm I'm
= But a worse frightened boy Would nave
been hard to find.
r Some interesting facts regarding bees
appeared in the Archives of Surgery some
time since. Summarized they are as fol
lows: There are no "neuters' in the bee
hive The workers are all females,
whom the sex organs are present but | n
developed The development of the SCI
organs depends upon the food supplied t
Certain sef Eheqf J j0d th fy4fs gwen giVeh
the bees to any larva which it is wishe
| should grow into a developed females
| other words a queen bee. Under TN
influence of this food the larva grows NOR
quickly, both as regards size and deVeioI
ment, than one fed from the commo
food; and, as a most special feature, II
ovaries grow and become capable of fol
ming eggs without formulation. The quee
bee can at will, if she has once been in
pregnated, produce eggs WAch Will nate
out either as workers or as drones. If
queen bee has not been impregnated, sf
can produce fertile eggs, but they will a
hatch out males. Sexual impregnation
absolutely necessary to the production {
females. Thus 1T would appear that thei
may be some truth In the old belief thu
males take chiefly from their mothers an
females from their fathers, and one ca
=, by no means feel certain that prepotenc
III on the part of one or other parent ma
lie not have some influence in the determine
tn ton of the sex of the offspring.
lie Although volcanic flames have bee
he seen and described by many writer's, say
t. the Scientific American. their existence hi
1" been doubted BY others. Special intere4
en- thus attaches to the outbursts of faml
1g which occurred on Vesuvius in April la
TO and which are dealt with in two papers
a. one by Prof. Z. Semmola, in the Rend
d. Conto of the Naples Academy, the other
H. Prof V. Matteucci in the Atti del Linct
2" From the former paper it would appe;
ne that this rare phenomenon may have bee
irl caused by the falling in of a part of Il
ed crater wall, and consequent blockage
on the orifce, the pent-up gases becomiI
ne heated until a chimney was form'
vn through which they escaped in flame
Is Prof Matteucci's paper concludes wi
ID. the following summary of the princip
tie points: l. The greater part of the aei
TX form substance evolved from volcan
,st magma has the power Of producing flame
III 9 The small flames in the crater of V
he suvius were of longer duration than 4
nv large ones; these latter did not last wit
h. out intermission for more than ninete'
IN or less than fifteen days, and ultimate
became small and quieseent like the OF
ers. 8. The complex phenomenon,
which the flames were one of the most
teresting features, seems only compardt
Did with that described by Sir Humphrey Dav
of II has not. been reproduced or, at al
ar rate, has not been noticed on Vesuvi
80 for eighty-four years. 4. The spectru
produced by these flames is continued
ne like that observed by Libbey in the
DIV candescent lavas, also. with flames,
in | Kilauea.
NC Some interesting speculations concer
ice ing the age of the Niagara gorge are I
'or ported by Nature. This was the subje
it of a paper by Prof. G. Frederick Wrgl