The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1909-05-08
Correspondence Baltimore County Union.
SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.

Correspondence Baltimore County Union.
SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.
The World to Insect Senses-Non- Ductile
Metal Drawn Into Wire-Progress In
Mapping Alaska-Quick Drying ofPlas-
tering-Pigeons in Regular Mail Service
-,-Life's Potentiality---FerroT itanium
Rails Without Titanium-Comets in
Moving Pictures.
The mental processes of the horse and the dog
are those of man in much lower degree, 10 the
view of Prof. N. A. Harvey of Michigan, butthc
intelligence of insects must be of very different
kind. The double nerve cord and ganglia differ
both In structure and position from the brain
and spinal cord of man. Insect eyes are immov-
able and compound. and perceive motion and
color, but not form. Ants. bees, wasps and other
insects have no hearing. Taste and smell cannot
be identical with those senses in man. and feel
ing is a perception through touch hairs instead
Of the skin. But insects have very acute senses
that we do not possess. A cecropia moth can
perceive female mile or more away, although
q man could not detect IL under the same con-
ditions at q distance Of more than six inches.
and ants. bees and wasps seem to have other
senses located. like this. in the antennae. Differ
lives and different living. the insects have intel
ligence that, though of high order, is not easy
for US to understand.
A difficulty in making flaments of non ductile
metals. like tungsten, has been ngeniously over
come in a new patented process of the Siemens-
Halske firm Of Germany. The tungsten or other
hlament metal is enclosed in a thin coating of
ductile metal, and the whole is drawn through
die-plate until the required hneness is reached.
The coated flament, attached to- conducting
support, is then mounted in the lamp bulb. The
air is exhausted from the bulb, and an electric
current is turned on, when the heat quickly
drives Off the ductile metal, leaving the refrac-
tory filament.
Since 1893 the q. 8. Geological Survey has
made topographic maps in Alaska of 1929
square miles on a scale of four miles to an inch
and 27S2 square miles on a scale of one mile to
an inch and has made geologic reconnaissance
maps of $50 square miles, with detailed geolo-
gic maps of 1904. Total area, 5s6,4OO square
miles.
The plastering in new houses is being dried by
a new apparatus so effectually in three days that
exception in favor of the method is being made
by the authorities in places having in force the
any house until it has been built six months.
The apparatus employed is a coke stove. with
number of small tubes surl ounding the fire. box,
and with supply pipes leading dry air from out
side to these tubes. AS the fresh air rapidly
passing through the tubes becomes heated, it
rises and passes along the ceiling and walls. 1t
absorbs and becomes saturated with moisture
from the plastering, then sinks, enters the fire.
box of the stove, and escapes with the coke
gases into the chimney. The current of heated
dry air not only carries off the dampness very
rapidly, but furnishes an abundance of carbonic
acid to harden the mortar. The effect is exactly
the same as that Of slow natural drying and the
rooms are made speedily habitable instead Of be.
ing unsafe to live in for many weeks.
A+s
The pigeon post Is proving valuable adjunct
of civilization, even in these day of fast trains
| and steamships and wireless telegrapby. The
isolated lighthouse of Maatsuyker Island is Is
miles southwest from Hobart Tasmania, in
direct line and 90 miles by steamer, and since
| Jan. Fl, 1908. twelve homing pigeons have kept
| up communication with the mainland, three be-
| ing regularly liberated every three weeks. The
first message left the lighthouse at AM, reach
| ing Hobart at 100 P. M. The service has been
| generally satisfactory, though not all messages
/ nave ECdCueu bu0lF uSStludLlOuy duu IL pEOOdOiy
saved the life of an assistant at the lighthouse.
as an urgent message brought much needed
| medical relief from Hobart In twelve hours.
&c
| The remarkable power of increase of plants
and animals. ensuring their continuance through
long ages with the production of the new forms
| by adaptation, was noted by DIR. A. r. Wallace
in his late Royal Institution address on Darwn's
| work. A single common weed, the Sisymbrium
| Sophia, yields three-fourths of O million seeds,
and if all grew and multiplied, the land of the
| globe would be covered in three years. One pair
/ of elephants, the slowest breeding of animals,
would produce 100000 individualslin75 $50 years.
| The prolific rabbits the national pest of Aus
tralia, would have progeny of 100000 from a
single pair in four or five years.
s*s
| A curious popularity of the new ferro- titani-
| UNI rails, which have been made experimentally
| in the United States for little more than
| year, is that they may be entirely free from
titanium, and at most they contain but little.
In this respect the "alloy" differs from others.
The properties of nickel-steel, for instance, de-
| pend upon the presence of material percentage
of nickel, and manganese steel must have care
| fully adjusted proportion of manganese. For
the new metal, the steel is made in a converter
charge of titanum alloy. This is a product of
the electric furnace, and is a mixture contain
ing 10 to 10 per cent. of titanium and to Z per
cent. of carbon, the remaining portion being
| iron. Each ton of steel receives a charge of
about pounds of 10 per cent. alloy, the effect
being to increase the Stag removed from the
metal in the ladle. while the ingots are free from
blow-holes. The titanium, unless in excess of
what is necessary to remove the impurities all
passes Off in the Stag. The treatment gives
special durability to rails for curves. and at the
Grand Central Station In New York an ordinary
rail lost 3.O3 pounds per yard in months, while
a titanium alloy rail of the same composition
was worn away only l.01 pounds per yard in
months. The few dollars increase per ton Of
Bessemer rails is expected to be much more than
Offset by added durability.
-.
The changes in progress in a comet are now
shown on a screen in moving pictures. More
houses comet was favorably situated for obser-
walton in England during last autumn, and as
this body gave an unusual opportunity for
studying changes, the Astronomer Royal had
photographs made at frequent intervals so as to
obtain a cinematograph record. One series
shows the alterations that took place I'M period
of about hours.
For sterilizing a city's water supply, the novel
plan is proposed of using powerful mercury
vapor lamps with quartz tubes. which should be
so placed that every particle of water should re-
main two minutes within few inches of a
lamp. The large proportion of ultraviolet rays
was shown in 1905 to have great germ destroying
properties Recently Courmont and Nogier
have proven that most disease bacteria in water
within IL inches of lamp are destroyed in one
minute, and that much contaminated water is
completely sterilized in two minutes.
THE UNITED STATES census will be taken in
1870 commencing in April and preparations
are now being made in Washington for the
work. For the State of Maryland five super
visors and nine hundred enumerators will be
appointed and in addition the supervisors will
each have an Office force. The compensation
of the supervisors will be 81 800 each, with an
addition of 81 for each 1000 population emu
merated. The pay of the enumerators will be
q fraction over 2 cents per name.
A.