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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



hampered in his researches there by a cir- 

 cumstance that illustrates very well certain 

 characteristics of the Indian. About fifteen 

 years ago representatives of the Government 

 were at Sia making investigations, and had to 

 ask many questions. Some time after they 

 went away there was much sickness in the 

 pueblo, and many people died. It occurred 

 to the Sia people that the presence of those 

 white men, asking so many questions, was 

 the cause of all their trouble ; so they sent 

 men to the other pueblos to warn them 

 against white men who came to find out 

 about their customs and beliefs. These 

 messengers also came to Taos, and the people 

 remembered their warning well. If a Taos 

 Indian is caught now teaching the language 

 or telling any of the traditions to a white 

 man, he is liable to a whipping and a fine. 

 This, Mr. Miller believes, accounts for the 

 fact that he could rarely learn anything from 

 his friend when they were at the pueblo, 

 although when away in the mountains he 

 became much more open and communica- 

 tive. 



NOTES. 



The cigarette has found friends. The 

 Truth about Cigarettes embodies the sub- 

 stance of papers read and discussed at the 

 Medico-legal Society of New York. The gist 

 of the papers is to the effect that the stories 

 of harm done by cigarettes are fictions or 

 gross exaggerations; that they contain no 

 opium, arsenic, or other poisons, but are the 

 best pure tobacco (1.0926 grammes each) 

 wrapped in pure paper (0.038 gramme); that 

 they never caused a case of insanity; and 

 that they are simply injurious in the same 

 way and to a corresponding extent as other 

 forms of tobacco. These statements are sup- 

 ported by certificates of physicians and by 

 reviews of special cases of insanity charged 

 to cigarettes, showing that the insanity had 

 matured independently of them. 



The average annual temperature at Ma- 

 nila is given by Mr. W. F. R. Phillips, in a 

 paper on the subject, as 80° F. April, May, 

 and June are the hottest months, May being 

 the hottest of the three, and December and 

 January are the coolest. The highest ther- 

 mometer reading recorded is 100° F. in May, 

 and the lowest 74° in January. The average 

 annual rainfall is 75.43 inches, more than 80 

 per cent of which descends in the months from 

 June to October, inclusive. Departures from 

 the average rainfall are sometimes excessive. 

 For example, as much as 120.98 inches have 

 fallen in one year, and as little as 35.65 

 inches in another. Still more remarkable 



were the fall of 61.43 inches in one September, 

 and that of only two inches in another Sep- 

 tember. 



At the observatory of Yale University, as 

 we learn from the annual report, a planned 

 series of twelve measures each has been 

 completed for eighty-four stars of large, 

 proper motion, with a view to determinations 

 of parallax, and it is expected shortly to 

 bring the number up to one hundred. A 

 series of measures on highly colored red stars 

 has been begun, and is in progress for the 

 purpose of testing the possibility of a sys- 

 tematic error due to the lesser refrangibil- 

 ity of their light. The photographic instru- 

 ment has been put into use at every suitable 

 period of meteorological displays of conse- 

 quence. Preparations are already making 

 for a more complete observation of the 

 Leonid meteoric shower expected in 1899. 



The New York State College of Forestry, 

 in connection with Cornell University, was 

 presented by Professor Fernow, at the Boston 

 meeting of the American Association, as a 

 logical sequence to the policy to which the 

 State of New York was committed in 1885 

 by the purchase of more than a million acres 

 of forest land in the Adirondack Mountains, 

 to be gradually increased to three million 

 acres. A demonstration area of thirty thou- 

 sand acres in the Adirondacks has since 

 been provided for it. The courses leading to 

 the degree of Bachelor in Forestry occupy 

 four years, of which the first two are devoted 

 to the studies in which mathematics, physics, 

 chemistry, geology, botany, entomology, po- 

 litical economy, etc., figure as fundamental 

 and supplementary sciences, in addition to 

 the professional courses ; besides which two 

 courses of a more or less popular character 

 are contemplated. 



The discovery is announced in a prelim- 

 inary communication by Dr. Issutschenko, of 

 Russia, of a microbe pathogenic to rats. An 

 epidemic having broken out among the rats 

 kept for experimental purposes in the Gov- 

 ernment Agricultural Laboratory, a bacillus 

 was isolated from the liver and spleen of 

 affected animals that proved excessively 

 fatal to rats and mice. Experiments in 

 making the organism useful as a living rat 

 poison have not yet, however, had an encour- 

 aging success. 



New Zealand has just definitely adopted 

 a scheme of old-age pensions. In future the 

 New Zealand workingman of sixty-five years 

 of age, who has lived a life of hoDest toil, 

 will be assured an income of one pound a 

 week. 



The Wilde prize of the French Academy 

 of Sciences has been awarded by that body 

 to Charles A. Schott, chief of the Compute 

 tion Division of the United States Coast and 

 Geodetic Survey, for his work on Terrestrial 

 Magnetism. 



