NOTES. 



6 39 



of London ; but I know nothing personally 

 of their utility. I intend to try the ' Arma- 

 dillo' again." 



We spoke of the "Armadillo" last 

 month, not from any direct knowledge we 

 have of it, but to correct the advertised state- 

 ment that The Popular Science Monthly 

 had endorsed it, which was not true. 



Address to an Atom. 



BY AN UNCOMFORTABLY CONSCIOUS AUTOMATON. 



Mysterious particle, 

 Intangible and most indefinite article, 

 Which even Science cannot fix or focus ; 

 Are you indeed of all this hocus-pocus, 

 Misehristened Cosmos, protoplast ? If so, 

 'Tis pity that the happy status quo 

 Of universal dumb inertia ever 

 Was broken up by vortices or voices, 

 "fwere surely better far that space had never 

 Reechoed to objectionable noises, 



Or witnessed all this pother 

 Of biologic bustle, whose chief law seems Bother ! 



Why could not you, 

 And all your fellow-motes, far, far too prankful, 

 In the embraces of the boundless blue 



Rest and be thankful ? 

 A plague on all your forces and affinities 1 



A mcb of monads, to my notion, 

 Surpasses one ol demons or divinities 

 Only while idle. With the earliest motion 

 Began the immitigable Mischief. Why 

 Must you in chaos cut those primal capers, 

 Which were " the promise and the potency" 

 Of all the woes that fill our morning papers ? 

 'Tis surely a reflection most unpleasant 

 To think that all the plagues which haunt the present 

 Spring from that moment in the hidden past, 

 When the first molecule, weary at last 

 Of immemorial motionlessness, stirring, 

 Jostled his neighbor Atom. What a whirring 



Went through astounded space 1 

 Thought pictures a grim grin upon the face 



Of him, the Prince of Evil; 

 Only that then, of course, there was no devil. 

 At least of the New Creed that's one prime article ; 



Though I have little doubt 

 He was incipient in that self-same particle 

 Whose fidgets caused the first great stirabout. 



If Science's "dry light," at its meridian, 

 Finds men no more than automatic midges 

 In its cold ray, the history that bridges 

 The space between us and the first Ascidian 



Were better blotted. 

 To archetypal atoms was allotted 

 An easier fate than to the complex mass 

 Of ' clever matter," which has dared to pass 

 For Man, but is, for all its prayers and panics, 

 A problem in molecular mechanics ! 

 If Conscience be but chemic combination. 

 And Love a mere molecular affinity; 

 What boots all Life's superfluous botheration 

 Of mad and painful dreams, that limn Divinity 

 On fool-projected limbos ? Life's a swindle, 



If taken d la Tyndall. 

 And, let who may in that demoniac war win 

 (" Survival of the fittest ! ") yet, as groping 

 Less anxiously, less fearing, striving, hoping, 

 An Ape was less a dupe than is a Darwin. 

 That Atom must be a misguided duffer 

 Who'd join a Co. ; alone it could not suffer. 

 Why should it long for partnership and pain so? 

 I would /were a monad I'd remain so; 

 And as for '"nascent thrills" and "ganglia," drat 



'em ! 

 They're things for which I should not care an 



Atom! 



NOTES. 



To determine the real value of the " dis- 

 ease-proof potatoes " advertised by seeds- 

 men, the Royal Agricultural Society of 

 England, some time since, offered a prize 

 of 100 for a really disease-proof potato. 

 The conditions were that the potatoes should 

 be tried in twenty different parts of the 

 kingdom for three years. But the commit- 

 tee did not need to continue the experiment 

 for three years ; the results obtained in one 

 season were decisive. None of the potatoes 

 resisted the disease. During the period of 

 vigorous growth, in five localities out of the 

 twenty, the disease was virulent in all the 

 varieties, and by the end of the season it 

 had appeared in all the plots. 



The collection of anatomical and physi- 

 ological preparations made by the late Prof. 

 Jeffries Wyman was in his will bequeathed 

 to the Boston Society of Natural History, 

 on condition that they paid to his heirs the 

 sum of three thousand dollars. The Society 

 promptly accepted the bequest; but, in- 

 stead of the sum named in the will, of their 

 own accord they paid to the heirs five 

 thousand dollars. 



From the investigations of Prof. Buck- 

 ley, State Geologist of Texas, it appears 

 that that State has vast deposits of iron and 

 coal, of much greater extent than had been 

 anticipated. Both are of excellent quality, 

 and, in some cases, they occur near together. 

 He has also found an abundance of salt, 

 gypsum, and a wide range of copper-ores. 

 Other valuable minerals are roofing-slate, 

 marble, soapstone, etc. 



Dr. Kosch, of Vienna, has discovered a 

 method of making certain colors fire-proof, 

 so that they may be used for painting on 

 china in precisely the tones required. The 

 inventor also employs a special enamel, 

 which he spreads over the surface to be 

 painted on, thus doing away with the irreg- 

 ularities and porosities of the porcelain ; 

 the irregular and undue absorption of color 

 is thus prevented. Another invention of 

 Dr. Kosch's is the fusion of gold, silver, and 

 platinum, with bronze, by which the most 

 gorgeous effects are produced. 



A new method of casting statues in 

 bronze has been discovered by a Venetian 

 founder named Giordani. The advantage 

 of the method consists in the cast being 

 effected in a single operation, no matter 

 how large the model, or how complicated in 

 its form. 



During the Paleolithic period horses 

 were numerous all over Europe, and formed 

 the basis of human food. In every "find" 

 of that epoch, horses' bones constitute a 

 considerable portion of the animal remains. 



