, 1903-03-27
kmmSCienCe


A rench physician removes mosI
foreign bodies from the a by suck
Ing them Into a soft rubber tube.
"Nieves p~enitentes," slightly inclined
snow columns resembling shrouded fig
ures doing penance, are a peculiar
phenomenon of the Andes to which
Sir NJ. Conway has given attenion.
They are the last remains of drifts or
slides which have become hardened In
nearly vertical strata of different den
sites.
A plan recently employed in France
for giving a stereoscopic effect to
ma~gic-lantern pictures thrown upon a
screen is to furnish each spectator
with a pair of prisms. set in spectacle
frames, through which two pictures,
side by side on the screen. are viewed.
The angles of the prisms are varied
for widely different distances from the
screen, but owing to the natural power
of accommodation of the eye, the same,
angle serves at distances not widely.
variant.
Two coats Of hot oil. carefully ap-
piled after thorough cleaning of the
metal. are recommended by "a Cana
dian artisan as an Improvement over
any process now in use for preventing
rust of structural iron and steel. The
oil would fill crevices, cracks and
holes where paint cannot enter. 1t
would cover rough places often i'm
perfectly coated in ordinary painting.
and 1t would be a fine preparation for
subsequent painting or covering with
cement coating. vp
Some of the giant Sequoias Of South
ern California are estimated to be
from FIVE thousand to eight thousand
years old, having perhaps, spanned
the entire period of written history.
A section In the American Museum of
Natural History was cut from one Of
thees trees at a height of twenty feet,
Is a little more than eighteen feet in
diameter, and its concentric rings show
that it began Its growth In $50 A.. D..
the tree reaching a diameter Of thir.
teen feet at Columbus landing.
Arsenic, the dreaded poison that
Professor Armand Gautier of Paris as
serts Is essential to life, proves to be
disseminated in the primitive rocks,
from which sea-water derives its store.
The minute quantity taken In the food
becomes localized in the skin and its
a~ppendages. the thyroid and mammary
glands, the brain and the bones. and
1t is stated to be the exciting ferment
of the functions of sensation and re-
production, just as phosphorus Is the
exciting element of the functions Of
cellular nutrition.
Fresh discoveries are continually
adding to the worlds known STOKES Of
iron.s Last summer extensive ffeIds
Of iron ore were found In northern
Norway, on the coast of Sydvaranger
Bay, neal the Russian border. Anal
Uses at Christiania show that the ore
ton, because the presence of titanium
which Is regarded as a good lndlca-
ton, because the presence of tianium
In large quantity retards the melting
of ore. 1t is said there are good har-
bors near these new iron fields. and
surveys have shown that the ore COW
ers g very large territory.
Recent researches by Professor Mac
fayden have shown that many micro
organisms can be exposed to the teio.
perature of liquid air for a period of
six months without any apprec,able
loss of vitality. although. at such a
temperature. the ordinary chemical
processes Of the living cell must
cease. Referring to Professor Mac
fayden's experiments. Professor James
Dewar says that the organisms in the
state just described cannot be said
to be either alive or dead, in the ordi-
nary ~acceptation of these words. 1t
Is a new and hitherto unobtained con-
dition Of living matter-a third state"