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TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ant of the loser of the watch, with his face 

 almost convulsed, and trying in vain to get 

 the rice-flour out of his mouth. His lips 

 are dry, and his glands refuse to produce 

 the saliva which is needed to moisten the 

 rice-flour. At last the detector's eyes glare 

 upon him, and pointing at him with his long, 

 bony finger, he says solemnly, " There is the 

 thief ! " The victim quails and grovels on 

 the floor before him ; he faintly appeals to 

 his master for forgiveness, and promises 

 that he will restore the watch. The con- 

 victed thief slowly rises, and requesting his 

 master to follow him, goes to the well in the 

 garden, and produces the gold watch from 

 under a loose brick. This operation savors 

 of magic, but it has a psycho-physiological 

 explanation. It is one of the instances of 

 the influence of mind over body : the anxiety 

 of the culprit evidently arresting the flow 

 from the salivary glands. 



Position of the Expert Witness. — The 



expert, the Chemical News has said, occu- 

 pies an anomalous position in court. Tech- 

 nically, he is a mere witness ; practically, he 

 is something between a witness and an advo- 

 cate, sharing the responsibilities of both, but 

 without the privileges of the latter. He has 

 to instruct counsel before the trial and to 

 prompt him during its course. But in cross- 

 examination he is the more open to insult, 

 because the court does not see clearly how 

 he arrives at his conclusions, and suspects 

 whatever it does not understand. Hence, 

 not a few of the most eminent men in every 

 department of science distinctly and per- 

 emptorily refuse to be mixed up in any 

 affair which may expose them to cross-ex- 

 amination. " I will investigate the matter, 

 if you wish it, and will give you a report for 

 your guidance, but only on the distinct un- 

 derstanding that I am not to enter the wit- 

 ness-box." Such in substance is the decision 

 of not a few men of the highest reputation 

 and the most sterling integrity. Certainly 

 it is not for the interests of justice to render 

 it impossible for such men to give the court 

 the benefit of their knowledge. Further, the 

 spectacle of two men of standing contradict- 

 ing or seeming to contradict each other, in 

 the interest of their respective clients, is a 

 grave scandal. Thus, our present mode of 

 dealing with scientific evidence is found on 



all hands unsatisfactory. The outside public 

 is scandalized; experts are indignant; and 

 the bench and the bar share this feeling, but 

 are disposed to blame the individual rather 

 than condemn the system. It was proposed, 

 as a remedy for this evil, that " the expert 

 should be the adviser of the court, no longer 

 acting in the interest of either party. Above 

 all things, he must be exempt from cross-ex- 

 amination. His evidence, or rather his con- 

 clusions, should be given in writing, and ac- 

 cepted just as are the decisions of the bench 

 on points of law." 



Half a Centnry of Inventions. — " Those 

 of us not yet fifty years of age have probably 

 lived in the most important and intellectually 

 progressive period of human history," says 

 Iron, and names the following as a few of 

 the inventions and discoveries which have 

 originated or been made practical within the 

 past half-century : Ocean steamships, rail- 

 ways, street-car lines, the telegraph, ocean 

 cable, telephone, phonograph ; photography, 

 and a score of new methods of picture-mak- 

 ing ; aniline colors, kerosene, electric lights, 

 steam fire-engines, chemical fire-extinguish- 

 ers ; anaesthetics and painless surgery ; gun- 

 cotton, nitroglycerin, dynamite, and a host 

 of other explosives ; aluminum, magnesium, 

 and other new metals ; electro-plating, spec- 

 trum analysis, and the spectroscope ; audi- 

 phone, pneumatic tubes, electric motors, elec- 

 tric railways, electric bells, type-writers, 

 steam heating, steam and hydraulic eleva- 

 tors, vestibule cars, cantilever bridges. To 

 these may be added the vulcanizing of rub- 

 ber, the Bessemer steel process, bicycles, the 

 " Monitor " type of war-vessels, the dyna- 

 mite gun, and doubtless the list does not 

 now include all of the most important even. 



Science in the Lanndry. — While washing 

 is declared to be as much a chemical process 

 as dyeing or pattern-printing, there has been 

 very little application of scientific principles 

 to it. The finishing up is held in the laun- 

 dries to be more important, but is really less 

 so than the preliminary processes of actual 

 cleansing. These are four in number — di- 

 gesting or soaking, washing, rinsing, and 

 drying. In cleansing, two sources of con- 

 tamination are to be kept in view — the dirt 

 that comes from without and settles on the 



