NOTES. 



287 



The Deep Valley of the Caribbean Sea. 



Commander J. R. Bartlett, of the Coast- 

 Survey steamer Blake, has ascertained some 

 interesting facts in regard to the depths of 

 the western part of the Caribbean Sea. The 

 data he has obtained malie it probable that 

 a large portion of the supply for the Gulf 

 Stream passes through the " Windward Pas- 

 sage " between Cuba and San Domingo, and 

 that the current extends in it to the depth 

 of 800 fathoms. The temperature, of 39 i, 

 which was indicated at all depths below 

 700 fathoms in the Gulf of Mexico and the 

 western Caribbean, was not obtained here. 

 Elsewhere, in these seas, the temperature de- 

 creased from the surface to 39^ at 700 fath- 

 oms or less, and remained constant at that 

 temperature for all lower depths. At great- 

 er depths than 600 or 700 fathoms the bot- 

 tom was always found to be a calcareous 

 ooze composed of pteropod shells with small 

 particles of coral. An immense, deep val- 

 ley was found to extend from between Cuba 

 and Jamaica to the westward, south of the 

 Cayman Islands, well up into the Bay of 

 Honduras. It has a length of 430 miles, 

 and a general breadth of 105 miles, with a 

 depth nowhere of less than 2,000 fathoms, 

 except at two or three points where the sum- 

 mits of submarine mountains rise to near the 

 surface. Within 20 miles of Grand Cayman 

 it attains an extreme depth of 3,428 fath- 

 oms ; this island is therefore, to the bottom 

 of the valley, as a mountain 20,000 feet high, 

 and Blue Mountain, in Jamaica, rises 29,000 

 feet above the bottom, or as high as the high- 

 est of the Himalayas is above the level of 

 the sea. The deepest part of the valley has 

 been named the " Bartlett Deep." 



NOTES. 



Mr. Rogers Field, in a recent lecture on 

 hou?e-drainage at the Parkes Museum of 

 Hygiene, condemned all forms of water-traps 

 as a means of excluding sewer-gas from 

 dwellings, on the ground that they allow the 

 gases to pass through them by the water ab- 

 sorbing it on one side and giving it off on the 

 other. In his opinion, the only sure way to 

 keep these gases out of the house is by thor- 

 ough ventilation and disconnection. Efficient 

 ventilation moans a continuous current of 

 fresh air through the drains and pipes, but 



even then perfect security can only be ob- 

 tained by cutting off direct communication 

 between the sewer and the house-drains. 



The last annual report of the New Haven 

 Board of Health contains a valuable letter 

 addressed to the Common Council of that 

 city, by the President of the Board, Profes- 

 sor William H. Brewer, of the Sheffield Sci- 

 entific School, setting forth in a forcible way 

 the financial advantages of a thorough sys- 

 tem of sanitary administration in towns and 

 villages. This letter should be in the hands 

 of all the village trustees in the land, many 

 of whom may be reached by money consid- 

 erations when mei-e questions of life and 

 death would scarcely arrest attention. 



In its crusade against the London shop- 

 keepers for obliging their saleswomen to 

 stand continually during business hours, the 

 " Lancet " is disposed to lay a part of the 

 blame on the patrons of these establishments. 

 It thinks if there were any real sympathy, on 

 the part of the public, for the young per- 

 sons who are made to suffer by the system 

 of standing, it would long ago have been 

 brought to a summary close. We some- 

 times hear of women having a special fac- 

 ulty for nursing the sick: they should show 

 in this matter that they have the humanity 

 to avoid the creation of needless disease. 



Mr. Nilson has prepared a quantity of 

 the oxide of the new metal ytterbium, or yt- 

 terbine, and finds the atomic weight of the 

 metal to be 17"301. Ytterbine appears in 

 the state of an infusible white powder of 

 a density of 9"175, insoluble in water, but 

 easily dissolved in acids, even when diluted, 

 at a boiling heat ; but, when cold, they at- 

 tack it with difficulty, even if concentrated. 

 The solutions are colorless, and show no ab- 

 sorption rays in the spectrum. The earth 

 and its salts do not communicate any color 

 to flames ; but the chloride gives a very 

 bright spectrum with the electric spark. 



A NEW remedy for neuralgia has been 

 introduced into England from the Feejee 

 islands. It is called tonga, and is brought 

 in the shape of fragments of woody fiber, 

 bark, and leaves, broken up into pieces so 

 small as to make it hard to identify them 

 botanically, mixed and done up into balls of 

 about the size of an orange. To prepare it, 

 the ball is soaked in cold water for about ten 

 minutes, when the infusion is drawn off and 

 a claret-glass of it is taken three times a day. 

 The ball is then dried and hung up, and can 

 be used over and over again for a year. 

 The principal constituent of the remedy ap- 

 pears to be the stem of a species of Rcqjhi- 

 dophora. 



M. LoRTET, who has been studying the 

 fauna of the Lake of Tiberias, reports that 



