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The number of known explosives is stated to have increased from twenty five to HOO in thirty-two years.
 Cold is not fatal to micro-organisms. Dr. Macfayden and MT. Rowland find that an exposure for ten hours to a temperature of 250 degrees c. has no appreciable effect on the vitality of mi cro-organisms.
 Prof. Fleming of London University is now conducting important eXperi- ments in connection with the transmits sion of electrical energy. It is said that the professor has discovered means by which power can be distributed with out wires by utilizing ether.
 Caterpillars occasionally crawl from their hiding places on warm days in winter. The most common of these is a thick furred worm with a red coat banded with black, which has the ap- pearance of chenille. Of the caterpil- lars that live through the winter large number belong to species that require more than one season to develop from the egg to the perfect insect.
 Moscow is probably the worst-paved city in the world. Great cobblestones driven by hand into a loose bed of sand form a roadway which is always dusty in summer and muddy in autumn and in many of the roads there is no at tempt at roadway of any kind. The streets are badly watered and cleaned. ' fO, two operations is only about $155,OOO.
 Every traveller in France has been struck by the sight of multitudes of slender poplar trees growing by the roadsides and .brooksides. Two or three times in twenty years the branches of these poplars are trimmed, and the light wood thus obtained is dried and sold to bakers, whose practical science 1 has taught them that the quick, intense heat produced by burning poplar is ex- cellent for giving thick crust to their bread.
 A gutta-percha substitute has recent | ly been patented. It consists of a mix ture of pulverized peat and resin oil. The peat is dried thoroughly and is then pulverized and sifted until it is about the fineness of flour. It is then mixed with equal parts by weight of resin oil and per cent of amyl acetate. It Is then stirred and worked until il forms a smooth, dough-like mixture. Ii can be worked into shape and is semi hard like gutta-percha.
 l c,,;1 I;,4,.s 4- which impress the beholder with the ] belief that the hand of man has shaped their features, although there is now no population capable of producing such effects. These districts, near Lake Tanganyika, are called park lands, and their origin was recently explained before the Linnean Society in London by MT. Moore, as being due to the spread of vegetation over light sur. face soil gradually deposited above the salt steppes left by former lakes. IT some places these districts are covered with natural plantations that have g quite homelike look"
 The balloon races and contests con ducted in connection with the Paris Exposition were productive of some very interesting results. Every Sun day the spectacle was witnessed of 6 large number of balloons starting or their Journey. "One afternoon" says A. Lawrence Rotch, "17 balloons rost successively, each aeronaut endeavOr ing to land as near as possible to some point that he had fixed beforehand By taking advantage of the variou: air-currents and skillfully manipulating the guideropes, surprising results were obtained One aeronaut, after travel ing 30 miles, landed within half a mil' of the goal he had set out for. Int greatest height attained by any of th' aeronauts was 27,000 feet. In the long distance race six balloons started, an( three of them landed in Russia. Abou 1. 400 miles were travelled in 37 hours.