Camas Prairie chronicle. [volume] (Cottonwood, Idaho) 1901-1917, 1907-04-26
HNmSCienCe !
b. MO
|S&slz1VentiOn

Good returns come HrOm the United
States governments search for valua-
BILE foodstuffs. Macaroni wheat, Inn
ported from Prussia at cost OF $10,-
600, annually yields $1o,O00,000. Sor-
ghum was brought from China in 1854
at a cost Of $1,000. The nations
source Of income from tlat crop Is $40,-
100000 annually.
Astronomers long ago came to the
conclusion that the moons surface Is
very hot during the height Of the lunar
day, which lasts two weeks, and very
cold during the lunar night, which is
equally long. These extremes Of tenn
peratuYe reach their height at the lunar
noon and midnight and are greater
than any natural temperatures on the
earth.
Twenty years observation OF phthlsis
over a district in Dartmoor and North
Devon, England, has convinced inyesti-
gators that populations exposed to
strong prevalent rainy winds have a
higher death rate from consumption
than populations sheltered from them.
The contrasts in the phthlsls death rate
in the sheltered and exposed parishes
are very marked.
FROM the point Of view of the engi-
neer, one Of the most interesting Of
all undertakings in the way Of tunnel
building is the new railway tunnel just
completed under the Hudson river be-
tween Weehawken and New York. Its
peculiar interest arises from the fact
that the tQnnel not only had to pass
. through soft-fowing river mud, or silt,
but that there was no firm, immOvable
foundation to work upon. Overhead
+ was the great river, with its tides and
, Its lnnumerable shipping, and under
' meath, not solid rocks to be penetrated,
I but vast depth Of soft mud, too deep
. to enable the engineers to lay the tun-
: mel on Its bottom. Yet 1t has been
completed within contract time, in less
: than three years, and is believed to be
f available for the heaviest kind Of rail-
5 way traffic.
The astronomers are bestirring them
selves in preparation. for the return Of
; one Of the most famous Of all comets,
that which bears the name Of HALEY,
" 1t is the greatest comet known to have
been seen at more than one return, Its
average period being about Is years
It was last seen in 1895, and will, &C
cording to the most recent calculations
. be visible again early in 1910. The OBJ
1ect of the astronomers at present Ii
9 to predict the moment of its perihelior
passage with the utmost possible accu
racy. Doctor Holetschek, of Vienna
l. thinks 1t will be visible with tele
: scopes as early as January, 1910, and
IS that by March everybody may see /
with the naked eye Later in the yea
= t. is likely to make a startling display
several hours before sunrise, in tn
\ northern quarter of the sky.
Among the many natural curiositie
Of Arizona, but one that is not oftel
visited by ordinary tourists, is the sin
gular bowl-shaped depression in va
vapai county called "Montezuma'
Well" 1t is nearly circular, and be
tween 500 and 600 feet in diameter a
the brim. 1t lies In the midst Of
nearly level area. The sides are vert
cal to a depth of 30 or 40 feet Belo1
that they merge into a sloping talu'
which extends down to a circular poo
Of water, alleged by popular tradition
as are so many other not very dee
- areas of water, to be bottomless. Thi
remarkable formation has usually bee
described as a "pit crater" Of volcanI
origin. But Prof. William P. BlaB
believes it to be the result of the fal
ing Of the roof of a cavern, formed
the limestone strata by running waite
The water Of the pool, he says, flow
out through a subterranean chann