NATURAL PHILOSOPHY. 185 



one candle, which gave a somewhat anomalous result, we found, to our 

 surprise, that the quantity consumed at the top was, within the limits of 

 error, the same as that consumed at the bottom. The result surprised us all 

 the more, inasmuch as the light of the candles appeared to he much feebler 

 at the top than at the bottom of the mountain. The explosion of a pistol 

 was sensibly weaker at the top than at a low level. The shortness of the 

 sound was remarkable; but it bore no resemblance to the sound of a cracker, 

 to which, in acoustic treatises, it is usually compared. It resembled more the 

 sound produced by the explosion of a cork from a champagne-bottle, but it 

 was much louder. 



DYNAMOSCOPY. 



This name has been given to a new mode of ausculation directed towards 

 the examination of sounds hitherto not studied. The author, Dr. Collongnes, 

 examines these sounds, in case of a deceased person, with an instrument with 

 one extremity on the part to be ausculted and the other at the car. It is with 

 this instrument that Dr. Collongucs supposes he is able to detect the evidence 

 of actual death. 



He found this evidence in 1834, in the case of a woman attacked with 

 cholera, who was not believed to be dead. Examining about the heart with 

 his dynamoscope, he distinguished a crackling sound, which continued even 

 to the tenth hour after death. He followed up this trial with others, and has 

 arrived at the following conclusions respecting this sound. 



1 . After the respiration and the beating of the heart have ceased at death, 

 a crackling sound may be heard, which he calls " bourdonnement." 



2. The sound continues from five to ten hours after death. 



3 It goes on decreasing from the time of death, and is last perceived about 

 the priucordial and epigastric regions. 



The results have been confirmed by observations on animals. It hence 

 results that life continues until the cessation of this sound has ceased, 

 and the cessation is a positive sign of death. This observation offers a 

 means of distinguishing lethargy from death, as the sound does not cease in 

 lethargy. 



On applying the instrument to the extremity of the fingers, a sound of 

 similar kind is heard which varies with the age, sex, state of health, activity 

 or repose. The crackling is more rapid in children than in adults, and still 

 more so than in aged persons. It is more gentle in Avoman than in man of 

 the same age, and the crackling sounds ("pc'tillcmens") are in general twice 

 as numerous as those of man. There is also a great difference for different 

 temperaments, and for different seasons and climates. 



A singular experiment made with the instrument is to hear a faint and 

 agreeable harmony which is made at the extremity of the fingers of a man 

 asleep, whilst when awake there is only a great discordance in the " bour- 

 donnemcnt." Dr. Collongues supposes that these sounds have their scat in 

 the nerves. SilUman's Journal. 



UNIFORM MUSICAL DIAPASON. 



Yery considerable inconvenience has long been felt in the musical world, 

 in consequence of the want of a uniform standard by which the pitch of mu- 

 sical instruments, whether used individually or in concert, might be regulated. 

 The tendency in all the most celebrated orchestras to an increased elevation 



16* 



