J2Q 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



with a still lower red-ash group in the con- 

 glomerate. 



M. Alfred Gauthier, for many years Pro- 

 fessor of Astronomy at Geneva, died Decem- 

 ber 2d, in the ninetieth year of his age. 



An English engineer, who bought a boiler 

 sixteen years old, and used it as if its ca- 

 pacity to resist pressure was equal to that of 

 a new and perfectly sound one, till it blew 

 up and caused the death of several work- 

 men, has been sentenced by the court at 

 Leeds to a year's imprisonment for criminal 

 negligence." The "Pall Mall Gazette" de- 

 clares that the sentence is " severe, as it is 

 probably novel," but can not consider it in 

 excess of the merits. 



So far as the Department of Agriculture 

 has been able to obtain information on the 

 subject, 181,583 acres of land in the United 

 States arc devoted to the culture of the 

 grape, giving a production of 23,453,827 

 gallons of wine, of an estimated value of 

 13,426,17-1. California leads in respect to 

 both the area planted and the quantity of 

 production, while the industry is not so 

 concentrated anywhere east of the Rocky 

 Mountains as in that State. Yet, while 

 California produces three or four million 

 gallons more than all the other States, the 

 value of the crops of the latter is, in conse- 

 quence of their greater accessibility to the 

 market, more than twice as great as that of 

 the crop of California. 



Recognizing that the zero of thermom- 

 eters is moved after undergoing sudden 

 changes of temperature, and that it gradu- 

 ally rises during the first few months after 

 the instruments are made, M. Pernet has 

 inquired whether the distance between the 

 " boiling-point " and the " freezing-point " 

 is likewise subject to variations or is con- 

 stant at all different stages of secular altera- 

 tion in volume of bulbs. He has found 

 that the distance is constant if the freezing- 

 point is determined immediately after the 

 boiling-point ; but that if the boiling-point 

 be determined and a long interval elapse 

 before the freezing-point is determined, 

 there is a considerable error. For a ther- 

 mometer to read rightly at any particular 

 temperature, it should be exposed for a con- 

 siderable time to the temperature for which 

 exact measure is desired, or else for a few 

 minutes to a slightly higher temperature. 



Mb. Lawrence Bruner, of West Point, 

 Nebraska, who has been traveling in the 

 locust-centers of the West and Northwest, 

 with especial reference to investigating the 

 probabilities for another visitation of the 

 pests, reports that there are probably no 

 loeust-eggs east of the Rocky Mountains 

 tlii- season, ami that, therefore, a general 

 visitation in 1882 is highly improbable. 



Dr. Ami Boue, who recently died at 

 Vienna, at the advanced age of eighty-seven 

 years, is stated to have been the author of 

 more than two hundred works on subjects 

 related to geology and natural history, lie 

 had been for more than fifty years an hon- 

 orary member of the Geological Society of 

 London, and received the Wollaston Medal 

 in 1847. 



The Nickajack Cave, near the corner of 

 Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama, which is 

 comparable in dimensions with the Mam- 

 moth and Wyandotte Caves, contains like 

 them a fauna with peculiar characteristics. 

 Professor Cope, who recently made two col- 

 lecting expeditions into it, found abundant 

 traces of human habitation near its mouth : 

 first of the outer world so far within as 

 light from without could be observed ; and, 

 farther in, blind crawfish, whose snowy- 

 white forms could be readily distinguished 

 by candle-light in the clear water. Of the 

 five kinds of animals living in the waters of 

 the cave, all but one differ decidedly from 

 those of the caves of Kentucky, Indiana, 

 and Virginia. This indicates, Professor 

 Cope suggests, that these cave-forms are 

 the descendants of different out-of-door 

 species from those of the more northern 

 caves. 



Professor W. K. Brooks, Ph. D., of 

 Johns Hopkins University, has been award- 

 ed a medal of the first class by the Socidte 

 d'Acclimation of Paris, for his work on 

 the " Development of the Oyster." Pro- 

 fessor H. A. Rowland, of the same institu- 

 tion, has been awarded the prize of 1,500 

 lire which was offered by the Reale Insti- 

 tute Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti, for 

 the best essay on the " Mechanical Equiva- 

 lent of Heat." The essay has been trans- 

 lated into Italian, and will be published by 

 the institute. 



Professor E. D. Cope has described a 

 new saurian (Chconpsosauris Australia), be- 

 longing to a genus of uncertain affinity, that 

 has hitherto been regarded as peculiar to 

 the Laramie strata, which is found in New 

 Mexico, in a formation lying below the typ- 

 ical Wahsatch Eocene. Specimens of the 

 genus appear also to have been found by Dr. 

 Lemoine near Reims, in France, in the Sucs- 

 sonian Eocene, associated with mammalia. 



M. Rene Tiiury, of Geneva, has com- 

 municated some observations on the pro- 

 duction of inductive currents by distant 

 lightning. He stretched between the roofs 

 of two houses a wire, one end of which 

 communicated with the ground, while the 

 other end was connected with a telephone. 

 Whenever lightning was perceived at a dis- 

 tance that might reach as far as twenty-five 

 miles, the telephone simultaneously uttered 

 a characteristic sound. 



