NOTES. 



ai 



abundant. " The whole coast round, to a 

 distance of several miles inland, is covered 

 with recent shells; the drainage of the 

 country is apparently altering. Lakes 

 known to have been formerly filled with 

 salt water are now filling up with fresh or 

 becoming dry. The lagoons near the coast 

 are filled with salt and brackish water, and 

 their banks are filled with marine shells with 

 their colors in many cases preserved. Reefs 

 of rocks are constantly appearing in places 

 where there were none formerly. At Rivoli 

 Bay the soundings have altered so much as 

 to make a new survey requisite. A reef 

 has lately almost closed this harbor. Other 

 reefs have appeared at Cape Jaffa, etc. It 

 would appear that a vast movement is tak- 

 ing place in the whole of the south of Aus- 

 tralia. In Melbourne the observations of 

 surveyors and engineers have all tended to 

 confirm this remarkable fact." 



From these and multitudes of other sim- 

 ilar facts, Mr. Howorth concludes that the 

 circumpolar land is rising about both poles, 

 and that there is a general thrusting out of 

 the earth's periphery, in the direction of its 

 shorter axis. He also believes that an 

 equally general subsidence is at the same 

 time going on in the intervening region, ex- 

 tending both north and south of the equator, 

 until it reaches the line of upheaval. 



NOTES. 



Prof. Tyndall remarks that the or- 

 dinary definition of the solid, liquid, and gas- 

 eous states, given in many text-books, is 

 hardly correct. Cohesion is thought to be 

 predominant in the first state of matter, 

 absent in the second, and negative that 

 is to say, absolute repulsion exists among 

 the molecules in the third. But liquids 

 may be strongly cohesive, and indeed the 

 researches of many physicists have shown 

 that there is not an absence of cohesion 

 among, but sliding powers possessed by, 

 the molecules of matter in the liquid state. 

 If air is expelled from water, it is still 

 liquid, but the cohesion of its molecules be- 

 comes very great. 



A whiter in the Chemical News states 

 that iodine is set free in sea-water wher- 

 ever rivers charged with offal and sewage 

 meet the sea. Thus liberated, it passes into 

 the atmosphere, and may sometimes be de- 

 tected long distances away during the prev- 

 alence of favoring winds. 



A clergyman, acting in the capacity of 

 chaplain to a lunatic asylum in England, 

 has for the last four years been engaged in 

 the attempt to trace the relations that may 

 exist between meteorological states and the 

 mental and physical conditions of the insane. 

 He states, as the results of his observations, 

 that the accessions of epileptic fits have, as 

 a very general rule, been preceded or ac- 

 companied by considerable alteration in at- 

 mospheric pressure, or solar radiation, or 

 both ; and he is led to the inference that it 

 is not the moon, but the change in the 

 weather, which directly affects epileptic pa- 

 tients. So far as his observation goes, he 

 concludes that any marked change of at- 

 mospheric pressure, solar radiation, or both, 

 either in the same or contrary directions, is 

 almost certain to be followed by an in- 

 creased number of fits among the epileptics, 

 or by a development of mania or melan- 

 cholia. Sometimes all three forms of dis- 

 ease are augmented at once, sometimes only 

 one ; and it is deserving of notice that very 

 often the maniacal and melancholic patients 

 seem to be affected in opposite ways, the 

 latter being well when the former are ex- 

 cited, and the reverse. 



The following are the regulations adopt- 

 ed by the Prussian Chamber of Deputies 

 to guard against the occurrence of steam- 

 boiler explosions : 1. The owners or repre- 

 sentatives are responsible for the observ- 

 ance of the laws and decrees laid down by 

 the government. They are, moreover, not 

 exonerated from culpability in case of ac- 

 cidents on account of ignorance of such 

 technical laws and rules as are acknowl- 

 edged by the profession. 2. The fine is 

 fixed at a maximum of 200 thalers (30), or, 

 in case of default, three months' imprison- 

 ment. 3. The owners of steam-boilers must 

 allow official tests to be made by competent 

 engineers. They must bear the expense of 

 the investigation, and furnish the examiners 

 with all requisites. 



Drs. Euxenberg and Wohl have been 

 trying the effects of animal charcoal as an 

 antidote for phosphorus - poisoning, and 

 find it superior to any thing else heretofore 

 employed. It is given in the form of pills 

 made with gum - tragacanth ; and is re- 

 garded as preferable to the oil of turpen- 

 tine, which, though an effectual antidote 

 against phosphorus, causes in many in- 

 stances very severe headaches when taken 

 internally. 



TnE temperance question, now much 

 agitated in France, brings to the surface 

 one ingenious reformer, Dr. Prosper Des- 

 pine, whose zeal for the cause is at least 

 equal to his discretion. He proposes to 

 outlaw the growth of the grape, and to make 

 the French abstemious by encouraging the 



