Union gazette. [volume] (Corvallis, Benton County, Or.) 1899-1900, 1900-03-23
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The light which comes to us from the
sun in eight minutes might journey
ten thousand billion years and not
reach the borderland of the universe.
1t has no limit. 1t can have none. Yet
the same laws rule 1t throughout. And
every force. all power within 1t, all
the laws that govern it. work for har-
mony and happiness.
A French engineer, Jean Berlier, has
worked out In detail the plans for a
railroad tunnel under the Straits of
Gibraltar. He would run 1t from a
point in Spain near Gibraltar to Tan
gier, in Morocco, the total length, In
cluding approaches, being 25 miles, of
which 20 miles would lie under the
sea. The estimated cost is about $780,
100000.
Prof. G. e. Bessey announces in a
letter to Science that he has obtained
evidence that trees, including such spe-
cies as oak, hickory, willow, cotton
wood, elm and box elder. are rapidly
advancing in eastern Nebraska. The
areas covered by them are gradually
creeping up the courses of the streams
and spreading out laterally. In some
cases the "tree belt'' along rivers has.
within twenty-five years. Increased
in width FROM 100 feet to half mile
and even mile.
Prof. Arthur Thompson, in Knowl-
edge, deals with the form Of skulls and
brain capacity. The average weight
of a mans brain Is about so ounces,
that of a woman about 45 ounces. This
difference between the sexes Is less
marked In savage than in civilized
races, and Is apparently explained by
the fact that In the higher races more
attention Is paid to the education OF
the male than the female, and conse-
quentIy the brain Is stimulated to In
creased growth.
An ingenious Frenchman, NJ. Louis
Levat, recently administered alcohol,
through the soil, to a geranium plant
for the purpose Of observing the eff
feet 1t was sufficiently startling. The
leaves of the geranium began to turn
yellow and gave off a peculiar etheric
odor, symptoms of poisoning appeared,
the rootlets turned black and seemed
to have been burnt, the leaves dropped
toward the earth, and in four days the
alcoholized geranium, which had been
very beautiful plant, was totterig
wreck.
The Arctic Ocean, says Nansen, Is
a kind Of lagoon, separated from the
Atlantic by submarine ridge, stretch
ing from Spitzbergen to Greenland. To
this ridge is due curious condition.
The Arctic is covered with a layer of
slightly salt water from the Siberian
rivers and Behring Strait, and under
this is the normally salt Gulf Stream
water. II the two layers were mixed,
the average temperature would fall,
but this average would not be as cold
as the surface layer. This accounts
for the enormous formation Of polar
Ice.
There Is a little bird in Costa Rica, a
pretty black and orange oriole, who is
an expert in needlecraft Having no
clothes upon which to exercise her skill
she turns her talent to account in
horne-making. Selecting large, fresh
growing banana leaf. she carefully
sews the two edges together with her
bill for the needle and some strong
grass or rootlets for the thread. She
even follows the grain Of the leaf close
by one Of the veins, and so neatly are
the stitches made that only the closest
examination reveals them. Inside this
pocket is built nest of soft grass or
hair, and here the mother bird lays her
dainty eggs and raises her family
without fear Of discovery.