The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1902-02-15
Correspondence Baltimore County linton.
SCIENTIFIC MIS- CELLANY.


Ventilation Through Walls--A Portable
Telephone. Origin of Heating by Water
Variation in Fowls-A Promising
Steam-G Java Missing
Link"-Smallest Back-Boned Creatures.
The air of heated rooms is changed quite rap
idly through the walls in cold weather. More
than twenty years ago, Flugge estimated that
this Spontaneous ventilation" would complete
ly renew the air of small rooms every hour
when the difference between inside and out
side temperature is 25oF.: but somewhat
slower rate has been obtained since by H. VOL
pert in measuring the hourly dimunition of an
excess of carbonic acid in an unoccupied room.
In a room of 1900 cubic feet, with painted walls,
the passage of air per hour for each degree of
temperature difference was somewhat less than
one hundredth of the total air of the room.
But the rate was considerably greater with ma
sonry walls covered with paper, and three times
as rapid with ordinary whitewashed walls.
~
The military telephone system of Captain
Charollois, which is rapidly coming into use in
the French and German armies, permits the
laying of the bare wire upon the ground when
not too wet The wire, usually about one-for-
teth of an inch in diameter, is of Especial alloy
a man can easily carry or miles of it, Ieeling
it Off at TX miles an hour. With a microphone
transmitter and adjustable receiver, the line
can be worked up to miles.
-.
The earliest known hot-water heating is Curl
ously traced to Greenland where the strangely
forgotten colony of Norweigans had increased
to 100 villages in the fourteenth century. Ger
man author was told in 1915 of the heating and
cooking by water in pipes from hot spring, the
ruins of the colony were located in 1923, and the
hot spring was some years ago seen by ian Ameri-
can artist.
One acre of the sage palm, which is one of
India's valuable products, gives nourishment
equal to 1863 acres of wheat.
Sc
Not the least striking lesson in evolution has
been given by modern poultry shows. half
century ago Darwin enumerated - varieties of
fowls as known to him, giving pictures of the
various races /; but Mr.. w. B. Tegetmies, who
selected the specimens thus illustrated, states
that not one of the figures would be accepted
by the present fanciers as furnishing any idea
of the development of salient points. Some
breeds, in fact. have been improved almost out
Of existence. The Spanish fowl has had its comb
increased to four times its former size, the white
skin on the face has so developed as to blind the
old bird, and the ear lobe has increased to eight
inches in length and an area of some thirty
square inches, but the creature has become
practically useless as a layer of eggs. The old
English Dorking has been least changed, having
simply increased in size. The offer of large
prizes has not only led to the production of in
Vulnerable new breeds, by selection and cross
ing, but has caused fancy points to be so exag-
gerated that the resulting monstrosities have no
value except in showing how far living organ
ism may be artifcialy varied. At the latest
London show the different varieties of fowls
were represented in PSI classes.
az
In the novel steam-generator of Mr.. Henry
Brady, an Australian inventor, the water tubes
to the number needed are bored lengthwise
through fiat copper blocks three inches or more
thick, the ends of the holes being connected by
semi-circular bends so as to form continuous
tube from one side of the block to the other.
The blocks are so arranged that the hot gases
from the furnace pass around the lower one be-
meath second, and around this beneath SINH
lar series of tubes in the cast iron top of the
boiler. The water is fed into the iron tube,
where it becomes heated, then it passes success
lively through the top and bottom series of cop
per tubes and enters a receiver as steam under
a pressure of 100 pounds or more. 1t is claimed
that, for the same power, this generator occu-
pies only a tenth of the space of a multitubular
boiler and is only a fourth as heavy, while it
cannot be exploded, is self-cleaning, and it can
be heated to 100 horsepower capacity in ten
minutes.
One of the most human-ike apes yet described
is young gibbon that Prof. Ernst Haeckel has
kept in view several months at Butenzorg, lava.
The species is known as HyO6dtes LeuciSuS, called
by the natives "Oa" on account of its character
istc sound, and is scarcely taller than child of
six years. the head is quite small, the waist
slender, the legs short, and the arms much
longer. The face is more man-like than that of
the orang, and its expression suggests an insol-
vent banker, with brow wrinkled with worry
over disaster. Though distrusting white Euro
peans, the animal became intimate with the
brown Malays, especially with the children. He
always walked or ran on two legs, the few
sounds of his speech were greatly varied, he
drank milk and cocoa and sweet wine from
cup, and he peeled and ate oranges and bananas
just as the observer himself would Most Ma
lays look upon the gibbons as bewitched men
and the orang- outangs as criminals undergoing
punishment.
The smallest vertebrates hitherto known have
been several species of little fishes in the South
ern States, the shortest being somewhat less
than an inch in length. A new species of goby
to be known as Mistichthys lus0nensis-is re-
ported from Lake Buhi, in southern Luzon and
is even smaller, its average length being only
about half an inch. surprising fact is that
this tiny species is a food-hsh of some impor-
lance. Great numbers are caught in the lake,
and, with peppers or other spiced herbs, they
are priced by the natives.
-
Whether all rays of light and other physical
rays are, or are not, transmitted with the same
velocity seems to be difficult problem. The
Franklin Institutes Boyden prize for an answer
has been before the public since 1859, and has in
creased from 81, 600 to more than $1,000.
"a
Each decade brings a frightening of average
life. In 1900 the deaths in 2n cities of 5000popu-
lation or more were 1875 per 1000 whereas the