POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



7i7 



It is not necessary to insist upon the con- 

 trast thus afforded between this method of 

 administration and the one that has hitherto 

 been used, in which the operator, making 

 his patient breathe dense chloroform direct- 

 ly into his nostrils, has to exercise the great- 

 est caution lest he kill him. The manage- 

 able zone of ether is a little more than 

 three times as wide as that of chloroform, 

 while that of the protoxide of nitrogen is 

 considerably wider than that of ether. Here 

 we see why ether is less, and the protoxide 

 of nitrogen still less, dangerous than chloro- 

 form. M. Bert's researches further show 

 that it is not so much the absolute quantity 

 of the anaesthetic that should be regarded 

 as the proportion in which it is mixed with 

 air. A dog can safely be made to absorb 

 many times as much chloroform as would 

 kill him, if it were pure, provided it is so 

 diluted as to bring its strength within the 

 manageable zone. 



Poisonous Food-Colors. The prefect of 

 police of Paris has expressly forbidden the 

 use of any of the following substances in 

 coloring sweetmeats, liquors, and foods : 

 Mineral Colors. The compounds of cop- 

 per blue verdigris, mountain blue. Com- 

 pounds of lead oxides of lead massicot 

 and minium. Oxychloride of lead Cassel 

 yellow, Turkey yellow, Paris yellow. Car- 

 bonate of lead white-lead, flake- white. An- 

 timoniate of lead Naples yellow. Sul- 

 phate of lead. Chromates of lead chrome 

 yellow, Cologne yellow. Chromate of bary- 

 ta yellow ultramarine. Compounds of ar- 

 senic arsenite of copper, Scheele's green, 

 Schweinfurth green. Sulphide of mercury 

 vermilion. ' Organic Colors. Gamboge 

 and Naples aconite. Fuchsine and its 

 sub-products, such as Lyons blue. Eosine. 

 Nitro-derivatives, such as haphtol yellow 

 and Victoria yellow. The use of these sub- 

 stances in coloring wrapping-papers for any 

 kind of food is prohibited, and manufact- 

 urers and dealers will be held responsible 

 for any accidents that may occur through 

 disobedience of the prefect's order. 



The Meteorograph. Messrs. Van Rys- 

 selberghe and Schubert exhibited at the 

 Paris Exposition of Electricity an instru- 

 ment they called a meteorograph, for repre- 



senting by means of continuous curves 

 drawn automatically upon a sheet of zinc 

 all the principal atmospheric variations, the 

 knowledge of which is indispensable in me- 

 teorological investigations and in making 

 forecasts of the weather. M. Theorell, of 

 Stockholm, exhibited another machine, of a 

 more complicated character, which indicates, 

 by printed figures in six columns on an end- 

 less roll of paper, the hour when the obser- 

 vation is taken, the velocity of the wind, its 

 direction, the indications of the wet and of 

 the dry thermometer, and the indications of 

 the barometer. Notwithstanding the com- 

 plicated character of the machinery that 

 must do so much, the instrument has borne 

 admirably the test of use at the University 

 of Upsala, where it has been employed for 

 two years in registering the condition of the 

 atmosphere every quarter of an hour. For 

 immediate use in the observatory it is not as 

 convenient as the Rysselberghe instrument, 

 the graphic curves of which can be read off 

 and appreciated at sight ; but it is much its 

 superior for use in cases where the facts 

 have to be transmitted by telegraph. 



Sea Telegraphy for Ships. M. Menusier 

 has proposed a plan of telegraphy for the 

 use of ships at sea. Upon his cable, which 

 he would lay from the French coast to New 

 York, with a branch to Panama, he proposes 

 to ingraft at distances of about one hundred 

 and eighty miles, representing a ship's daily 

 sailing distance, vertical cables rising to the 

 surface where the ends may be held up by 

 buoys. To the main cable he would also 

 add secondary cables thirty or sixty miles 

 long, forming cross-cables, like great arms 

 stretching out on either side, to which other 

 vertical cables would be attached, each to 

 be held in place by its surface buoy. Thus 

 it could rarely happen that a ship keeping 

 on the regular course would not be able to 

 meet one of the buoys every day. Each 

 buoy should have its number and its place 

 marked on a special chart. If a ship wishes 

 to send a dispatch, it attaches the wires of 

 its, own telegraphic apparatus, one to the 

 cable that is held up by the buoy, the other 

 to the buoy itself, which is of course in 

 communication with the earth-currents. M. 

 Menusier professes to solve the principal 

 difficulty in the way of the successful cper- 



